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Events in the Chauvin Trial; Biden Pushes Infrastructure; Relief for COVID-19 Long Haulers; Masters Tees off in Augusta. Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired April 08, 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]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: So, Jen, I ate too many drugs, I ain't do no drugs. Why was that such an important moment and who got the better of it?

JENNIFER RODGERS, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Well, John, the defense lawyer's job is to create reasonable doubt. So it's hard to tell what's going to resonate with a juror. So what they typically do is just throw a bunch of arguments out there to try to undermine the prosecution's case and hope that something sticks.

So that's what we saw yesterday. Their big issue here is causation. And if George Floyd admitted to taking a bunch of drugs, that goes to what actually ultimately killed him. So it was an important moment.

As to who got the better of it, ultimately, of course, the prosecution cleaned it up and had the witness listen again to a longer snippet without having words fed to him, and he said what he ultimately said, that it -- I ain't do no drugs. So, ultimately, I think, the prosecution got the better of it because the evidence is actually the recording. The jurors can listen to the recording. The fact that the witnesses said what they thought they heard is just an aid to the jury. And the jury might be thinking to themselves now, well, you know, the defense lawyer tried to trick that witness and also tried to trick us. And when you lose the goodwill of the jury, it's much harder to get them to your side and make your point.

So I think, ultimately, it probably was at least neutral or definitely didn't help the defense, but, you know, it certainly was one of those things that sometimes happened in court and, as a prosecutor, you just have to clean it up afterward. A little bit embarrassing, but ultimately, probably, not harmful.

ERICA HILL, CNN ANCHOR: When you talk about what's resonating with the jury, I was struck by some of the reports from -- from the pool who are in there, in the courtroom, right, because we, obviously, can't see the jury as we're watching this trial coverage on TV and some of our reporters who were sharing notes with me yesterday noting that they were taking more notes during the discussions about possible distractions for these police officers, but they were having a harder time staying as fully engaged when they were doing the more technical discussions. The fact that there may have been more note taking during this talk

about, was there distraction, was there not distraction and how did that impact the officers, is there anything to read into that?

RODGERS: Well, I think it demonstrates, Erica, that they are paying attention to what's important. We all know that these technical issues about laying foundation for evidence coming in needs to be done, but it's not really the key of the issue here.

So the fact that the jurors are kind of perking up when the important evidence comes in and the fact that they're taking notes means they're paying attention. And if I'm the prosecutor, I'm always happy when my jurors are paying attention to the important stuff. So I think that, again, is a good sign for them.

BERMAN: So you brought up the issue of causation, what caused George Floyd to die? And we're inching closer to what could be some crucial testimony, testimony that you know that both the prosecution and defense are counting on here, which is the various medical examiner, the witness testimony about exactly what happened there.

How do you think the prosecution, based on what we've seen, because we already have clues already on this, how are they going to approach it?

RODGERS: Well, they're going to approach it the way that they've approached the trial so far, which is methodically, trying not to hide anything that might be bad for them, to put it all out there so the jury doesn't think that they're trying to pull one over on them and just lay it all out and get the evidence that this was a homicide, that there were a bunch of things going on in terms of what the actual cause of death, whether it's affixation or cardiac arrest, but that ultimately it was caused by what happened to George Floyd and Derek Chauvin's actions. So I think they'll just be professional, methodical, get it all out there and then, of course, in closings, argue to the jury that drugs were not an important enough factor to undercut what the law says, which is just that it has to be a substantial factor, Chauvin's actions have to be a substantial factor in the causation.

HILL: And just, you know, give us your thoughts, if you would, on, you know, as a former prosecutor, the way we're seeing the prosecution lay out its case, a more emotional first week, more technical so far in week two, ultimately moving on to the medical examiner. How does that leave things in the mind of the jury when you're progressing this way?

RODGERS: Well, prosecutors always want to start strong and end strong. So you definitely want to start with a very strong witness who you think the jury is going to remember. And, if you'll recall, they started with the 911 dispatcher who saw something that she thought was so wrong that it warranted a call to Chauvin's supervisor, the sergeant. So they started with that witness, who I thought was strong. And we'll see where they end. But they'll likely try to end with a very strong witness too, understanding that juries have a limited attention span and so sometime in the middle they're going to flag. Also at the end of the day they're going to flag. So prosecutors do give a lot of thought to when the jurors is paying the best attention, when they're most likely to perk up and take notes and they try to pace their case accordingly.

BERMAN: I think it's so interesting that you say that the prosecution has laid out this case here, in a way opening the door for some moments for the defense because that was one of my -- the questions I've been having right now is that a lot of the inroads, if they are inroads the defense is making, is with witnesses called by the prosecution.

[06:35:01]

The prosecution must know that there is some vulnerability here, yet they're still putting it out there. So I'm just -- I was interested to hear you say that they think it's worth the risk and they think it may actually be helping them be so transparent.

RODGERS: Well, you always want to do what we would call draw the stain, right? If there's something bad that's likely to come out on the defense side because remember, of course, prosecution turns over all of this information and discovery to the defense. There really aren't any surprises here. They're going to want to draw that out so the jury doesn't think they're hiding anything and so that they can ask those questions and elicit that information in a way that they think is most beneficial to their case.

So they certainly do make a calculation. Is this someone we need to call? Do we need this information? Is it worth the possible bad information that might come out, and how are we going to present that information in the least harmful way.

So, you know, I think they've been doing a pretty good job of that so far. We'll see how it goes from here.

But, you know, they all seem to be veterans and pros, so I think they've been doing their job in that regard.

BERMAN: Jennifer Rodgers, very helpful. Thank you so much for being with us this morning.

RODGERS: Thanks, guys.

BERMAN: So President Biden pointing to China, arguing that the infrastructure bill will help the U.S. stay competitive. Is that the case? Next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:40:14]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Do you think China is waiting around to invest in its digital infrastructure, or in research and development? I promise you, they are not waiting. But they're counting on American democracy to be too slow, too limited, and too divided to keep pace.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: President Biden framing the infrastructure push as a national security issue, arguing that he's trying to keep the U.S. competitive with China.

Joining me now is CNN contributor Evan Osnos. He spent years as "The New Yorker's" China correspondent and is the author of "Joe Biden: The Life, the Run, and What Matters Now."

Evan, great to have you here.

So you say that Joe Biden is trying to play offense and defense when it comes to China here. What do you mean by that?

EVAN OSNOS, CNN CONTRIBUTOR AND AUTHOR, "JOE BIDEN: THE LIFE, THE RUN, AND WHAT MATTERS NOW": Well, he's drawing a distinction between the approach of the prior administration, which, of course, you remember was focused really around the trade war, about establishing tariffs.

And what the Biden administration says is, look, tariffs can be helpful in some cases. They've held them in place. They haven't given them up. But that's really the defense side of things.

They say, if we want to be competitive in the long term, we have to play offense. That means strengthening our own infrastructure at home.

Look, China, over the last generation, has built more high-speed rail, more highway than the rest of the world combined. And, in a lot of ways, it has taken advantage of the period in American politics when we have been divided, when we have had a hard time making the hard choices. And what Joe Biden is saying is, it's time for us to make those investments if we want to be able to play as a serious competitor, not just next year, but ten years and 20 years down the road.

BERMAN: That out compete thing, it sounds so obvious, but it actually does signify a shift in China policy and, mind you, a significant shift in Joe Biden's own thinking about China.

One of the things that I've been struck by is, is I keep on wondering why he always talks about how long he's known Xi Jinping. And you wrote about how they met, the amount of time they spent together. They went to a certain restaurant. It caused, you know, quite a stir in China in a good way. And he keeps on referring back to that.

But the fact of the matter is, is that's a period where he clearly thought differently about China. He just did. And his thinking has now evolved to where it is when he's talking about outcompeting them.

Explain that.

OSNOS: Yes, it's really interesting, John. You know, in many ways Joe Biden's thinking on China is a reflection of how the thinking in Washington has moved over the course of the last ten years. I remember I was in Beijing when Joe Biden came over in 2011 and he was sent over -- remember, they were official counterparts. Xi Jinping and Joe Biden were both vice presidents and Biden was sent over there to sort of suss this guy out. He was on his way to becoming the top man in China. And Biden did something that was a bit of a diplomatic maneuver. He decided to go to a local restaurant, a really kind of earthy canteen, something right near my house where I used to live, and he did that partly as a way of saying to the Chinese people, we know you're concerned about corruption in your own system. At that point the Chinese Communist Party was really on its heels about looking secluded and out of touch. And he went out and he sort of, you know, did what Joe Biden likes to do, he shook hands and he did the whole bit.

And then you say that Xi Jinping sort of responded months later by going to his own restaurant, going to a dumpling restaurant and trying to show that he was in touch with the people.

What that's about is, you have these two very sophisticated, very sort of canny political players. They've been at this a long time.

When Biden came back to Washington, and in the months that followed, what he said to people privately was, this guy, Xi Jinping, is serious business. Meaning, as he put it, he is not a democrat, small "d" democrat. He is not somebody who's going to lead this country down the path of reform.

But what's changed since then is that at the time Joe Biden really believed that there was still fundamentally a path for cooperation between these two countries. And what you see today is much tougher, actually. His administration describes it as extreme competition. And there has been this real sort of basic revision in the way that people in Washington conceive of the possibility of dealing with these two countries. And now we're on a much -- it's a very tense time because it's not clear how to maintain that line of intense competition without letting it explode into something more volatile, which would be ultimately destructive for both sides.

BERMAN: It is a significant, notable shift and so important moving forward. Also important, and it weighing into this idea of it being really complicating right now, there's a genocide and the whole world knows it's happening right now in China against these Muslim minorities, the Uighurs, and also the Kazaks (ph).

"The New York Times" say -- I mean, sorry, "The New Yorker."

[06:45:01]

Your friends at "The New Yorker" have just a phenomenal piece about -- about the oppression and personal stories going on there.

So how does the Biden administration deal with this? Something we all know is happening. Something that, you know, China is denying it's happening, but the world knows it, independent organizations knows it. China's hosting the Olympics in a year. You know, the White House has backed off the idea of boycotting.

But how much pressure is the U.S. willing to put on China here?

OSNOS: It's going to be a more sensitive issue as the -- as the months go by. I mean, as you say, there has been some really powerful investigative reporting recently in "The New Yorker" by Raffi Khatchadourian and Ben Mauk. You've seen a -- you've seen just a level of detail about understanding what it's like to be in these detention centers. China, after all, has detained as many as a million people in Xinjiang. They call it a transformation through education program. The United States government calls it genocide. And other countries are beginning to impose restrictions on Chinese officials, sanctioning people who are involved in that policy.

The Olympics, of course, is a hugely sensitive priority for Xi Jinping. He wants to pull off a spectacle that would show the rest of the world that China is strong and confident. And you're hearing this bubbling conversation that's gotten louder just in the last few weeks among corporations and, of course, among governments saying, well, how can we go to Beijing if, in fact, there is a genocide underway. Human rights groups are calling it the genocide games. And China is determined to try to beat this back. So expect to hear more of this over the course of the next 10 months. This is not going away.

BERMAN: As "The New Yorker" noted, this is the largest mass internment, the largest internment we've seen in any way since World War II. I mean this is significant. It's historic. The world knows it's going on.

Evan Osnos, thanks for helping us understand this because it is the crucial world relationship now.

OSNOS: A pleasure.

BERMAN: All right, coming up, new insight into a potential game- changer for so-called coronavirus long-haulers.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JESSAMYN SMYTH, COVID-19 LONG HAULER: Within a matter of days after the second shot, I began to feel almost like myself.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: The details, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:51:16]

HILL: As the number of coronavirus cases remains alarmingly high, so, too, does the number of people experiencing long-term issues after having the virus. This morning, new evidence suggests that the vaccine just may be the key to helping some long-haulers find relief.

CNN's Elizabeth Cohen has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Jessamyn Smyth says her happy place is in the water as an endurance swimmer, but a year ago she contracted COVID-19. For months, the lingering aftereffects leaving her breathless, tired, bring fogged, unable to swim, unable to work.

JESSAMYN SMYTH, COVID-19 LONG HAULER: I was unable to ever really achieve a full breath. I could not fill my lungs.

COHEN (on camera): That must have been an incredibly scary feeling.

SMYTH: I was terrified that I would never be able to swim again.

COHEN (voice over): In February, Jessamyn got Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine.

SMYTH: Within a matter of days after the second shot, I began to feel almost like myself.

COHEN: Experts, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, say the long-hauler symptoms of COVID-19 are real, not imagined.

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: Profound fatigue, muscle aches, temperature dysregulation, unexplainable tachycardia and what people refer to as brain fog.

COHEN: And anecdotal evidence suggests that between 30 percent to 40 percent of COVID-19 long haulers like Smyth could be experiencing vaccine-induced relief.

It might be that the vaccine helps fight off the virus itself.

AKIKO IWASAKI, PROFESSOR OF IMMUNOBIOLOGY, YALE SCHOOL OF MEDICINE: If the long haul disease is caused by persistence virus infection, then the vaccine induced immunity will be able to clear the persistent virus reservoir and basically eliminate the source of the symptoms.

COHEN: Or it might be that the body's own immune cells are what's keeping people sick and the vaccine, in effect, calms them down.

IWASAKI: The immune responses that are induced by the vaccine can help dampen the responses from these types of autoimmune cells.

COHEN: It's also possible that the vaccine's not helping at all.

FAUCI: Many people spontaneously get better anyway. And if you get vaccinated and you get better, you're not sure whether it's the vaccine or the spontaneous recovery. So you'll have to do a randomized trial in order to determine that.

COHEN: But Smyth believes the vaccine did help turn her symptoms around, enough to help her get back to swimming.

SMYTH: I swam my first mile back in the pool, and hit the wall, and hung onto it, and burst into tears and just hung there, sobbing with joy and relief that I knew that my body could do this.

(END VIDEOTAPE) COHEN: Dr. Fauci has told lawmakers that the NIH has been given $1.5 billion to study long haul COVID and to see which treatments might work best.

Erica.

HILL: It is fascinating as we learn more and more.

Elizabeth, thank you.

Well, the countdown is on for the Masters and there will be some fans in attendance this year. "Bleacher Report" is next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:58:39]

BERMAN: Break out the pimento sandwiches. For the first time in a year, golf fans will return to Augusta as the Masters tees off.

Coy Wire, put it in order for me, there for the "Bleacher Report."

Hey, Coy.

COY WIRE, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: John, I can't wait to have my first famous pimento cheese sandwich. Good morning to you, sir.

It is a very interesting energy here in Augusta. The 2021 Masters being played less than five months after last year's edition, which was pushed back due to COVID. Limited number of patrons will be allowed on the grounds of Augusta National Golf Club each day. Masks and social distancing still required, but with the fans comes more of a sense of normalcy. And the players, well, they can't wait to see them, as you can imagine.

Now, before the first group tees off at 8:00 Eastern, a Masters tradition with the honorary starters. Joining Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player will be Lee Elder. Back in 1975, Elder became the first black man to play in the Masters. He's now 86 years old, still breaking barriers. He'll be the first African-American to open the most prestigious tournament in golf, ever mindful, though, of a very different and painful era.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LEE ELDER, BROKE MASTERS COLOR BARRIER IN 1975: When I tried to play at certain places, you can't play here. When I tried to eat at certain places, you can't eat here. Those obstacles was most -- probably the most biggest obstacles that I wanted to -- to try to overcome. And I felt like I did.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[07:00:02]

WIRE: It was so inspiring to be in that room with him. He said that his message to others is that you have to take a look at where you came from in order to get.