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Supreme Court to Hear Obamacare Arguments; Death Toll from Coronavirus; Supreme Court Pick and Republicans; NFL Fines Coaches. Aired 6:30-7a ET

Aired September 22, 2020 - 06:30   ET

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

[06:30:00]

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: CARE Act will be thrown off their health insurance.

DR. ABDUL EL-SAYED, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: It really is devastating. I was the health director in the city of Detroit and in that city 50 percent of Detroiters have access because of Medicaid. The expansion of health care because of the passing of the Affordable Care Act meant that so many more Detroiters newly had access to something that they had struggled to have their whole lives. And if you're health care insecure, you have to worry about what might happen if you get sick, your kid gets sick, your parent gets sick. And all of a sudden they didn't have that anymore.

If the ACA were to be struck down, and, of course, the court is set to hear a case that could do that on November 10th, literally a week after the election. If it were to be struck down, all of those people go without their health care. And it's really important to see past the numbers here, right? We talk about 20 million or 200,000 deaths. Each of those people has a story. They have a set of needs. They have a set of struggles in their life. And all of a sudden, it could mean that health care is one more of those struggles.

And we have to remember that there is a real human toll on the back end of these craven political decisions. And those folks, they don't deserve to have their health care taken away. In fact, they need more health care. And that's what's at stake here.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Along those lines, they need more health care, Dr. El-Sayed.

I want to play Dr. Anthony Fauci again from overnight. He was talking about the impact of coronavirus on young people.

So listen to what he says.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NIAID: More and more young people, you see when you look at it, are getting into some significant trouble. Not a lot, not a high percentage, that's true.

The other thing is that when people get infected, we're seeing more and more of lingering signs and symptoms.

You can see things like inflammation of the heart. Now, they may not be symptomatic, but we want to make sure that six months or a year from now they don't wind up with unexplained arrhythmias or premature heart attacks or cardiomyopathies.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: That sounds to me, Dr. El-Sayed, that he's describing what will be, for maybe millions of people, pre-existing conditions that, if and when Obamacare is overturned, will no longer be guaranteed to have protection.

EL-SAYED: That's exactly right, John.

Look, one of the problems with the ways that the Republican Party has seen this pandemic is, they make this assumption. Like, everybody's disconnected and nothing's connected with itself. The fact of the matter is, it's all connected. Nothing happens in a vacuum.

If you get sick as a young person, you may not have a serious disease right now, but we don't know what the long-term consequences of -- are of a disease that we've only had in humanity for like eight months. And so, over the long-term, you're right, those could be pre-existing conditions, which if the ACA is struck down, you are no longer eligible for getting health care if you have them.

The other part of this is that, yes, young people may not have a serious disease right now, but young people all have older people in their lives who might have more serious diseases. And then lastly, I know many young people who have had very serious illnesses with Covid- 19, and the consequences for the rest of their lives is pretty big for having to take two weeks, a months away to be able to recover.

And so we've got to stop thinking like it's one group and not the other. All of us are in this thing together. All of us are at risk. And when we cut down on health care, even on the most susceptible, it affects all of us in the midst of a pandemic because we all live in the same society, and this is a disease that moves from some of us to others of us.

CAMEROTA: Abby, President Trump promised Chris Wallace in that interview in August, was it, July, August --

BERMAN: July.

CAMEROTA: July, that he would very soon be releasing his fantastic --

BERMAN: Two weeks.

CAMEROTA: Health care plan. That was in July.

What's the holdup? Where -- where is that?

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: It doesn't exist. I think we can pretty safely say that. This has been a promise that the president has been making for more

than two years now. If you just count the period right before the 2018 campaign, when he promised a health care plan then as well, and I was covering the White House at the time and remember talking to White House aides who were saying there -- saying privately to me, there is not going to be a health care plan released before an election. Why? Because Republicans do not want to run on a plan that's written down on paper that people can see and evaluate and hold them accountable for in the context of an election.

So this is just, you know, something that he dangles on the end of a string to counter arguments that there is no plan for when -- if or when the Affordable Care Act might be struck down by the courts. But it does not exist. Because if it did exist, it wouldn't be released in the last month of the campaign. It would have been released months ago.

And, you know, I think that it's -- you know, to Dr. El-Sayed's point, this is more than just politics. The president dangling this prospect out there and not being up-front with the American people about what his plans are is a real problem for many Americans who want to know what their lives are going to look like under a second term in the Trump administration, versus a first term of a Biden administration.

[06:35:07]

BERMAN: And more uncertainty is very hard for people now given the current circumstances.

Dr. El-Sayed, Abby Phillip, thank you both so much for being with us this morning.

EL-SAYED: Thank you.

BERMAN: And everyone join CNN today for "Citizen by CNN." This is a virtual conference featuring interviews with guests, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Loretta Lynch, NBA all-star Chris Paul, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, discussing an array of issues that matter to voters six weeks exactly before Election Day. You can watch a live stream starting at 9 a.m. on cnn.com.

Nearly 200,000 Americans have died from coronavirus. A "Reality Check," next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, (D), PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: What worries me now is we've been living with this pandemic for so long, I worry we're risking becoming numb to the toll that it has taken on us and our country and communities like this.

[06:40:00]

We can't let that happen. We can't lose the ability to feel the sorrow and the loss and the anger for so many lives lost.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Joe Biden trying to warn Americans against becoming numb to the staggering death toll from coronavirus. The U.S. will surpass 200,000 today.

John Avlon has a "Reality Check" on this horrible milestone.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOHN AVLON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: This defines grim milestone. Nearly 200,000 Americans have now died from coronavirus. This is the nightmare scenario that while unimaginable many health care experts saw as inevitable.

But we're in danger of becoming numb to the daily death tolls. And Covid-19 denial still somehow exists. But that is hugely disrespectful to the dead and their families.

So I want to take a second to put America's Covid death toll in perspective.

In less than seven months, we have lost nearly four times the number of Americans who died in battle during the First World War, two-thirds the number of Americans we lost in the Second World War, nearly six times the number of American soldiers killed in Korea. And we've lost almost three and a half times more of our fellow Americans than the total lost in Vietnam.

This is obviously a very different kind of war. No one's been drafted. No one's volunteered. But we all find ourselves on the front lines. In the past, Americans were asked to make real sacrifices to protect our fellow citizens. Now some folks can't even be bothered to wear masks when they're out in public because it still doesn't feel like a crisis to some people, starting with President Trump.

Who we now know was intentionally downplaying Covid to the American people while calling it a, quote, plague in private. And who just gave himself an A-plus grade on his Covid response. Yes, A-plus, as in excellent work.

That follows his ten out of ten score he gave himself back in mid- March when we had about 65 deaths. Nothing's changed except for more than 199,000 lives.

Denial apparently runs in the family because Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, again tried to spin these deaths as a success story. It's a story he's been sticking to since April. But repetition doesn't change reality. It just makes you sound like Baghdad Bob.

There's just no way to spin having both 4 percent of the world's population, but 20 percent of the world's deaths as a success.

So let me try to put those numbers in a way that might seem more real to them. The time Donald Trump would look back on is his quote, personal Vietnam for surviving sex without STDs. Trump owned a football team called the New Jersey Generals. They played in the old Giant's stadium. The American death toll from Covid to date would fill every seat in that stadium, two and a half times over.

Or try this, the Trump hotels in Washington, Chicago, Las Vegas, and Miami have just over 2,500 rooms. Now, assuming two to a room, the American dead from Covid would fill up those rooms close to 40 times.

We hear a lot about law and order from this president and we've seen decades of decline in violent crime, but America still suffered 16,214 murders in 2018. Every one a tragedy. We've lost more than 12 times that many Americans to coronavirus in less than seven months.

This isn't a success story. It's American carnage. It's 200,000 tragedies. And it didn't need to be this way.

And that's your "Reality Check."

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CAMEROTA: We want to thank John Avlon. That's a really helpful mental exercise to try to visualize what 200,000 lives mean.

And, you know, I can't -- I keep going back to what Alexandra Field told us, the other mental exercise, imagine if on New Year's Eve, which we all remember where we were on New Year's Eve, somebody had said to us, our crystal ball had said to us, 200,000 Americans are about to die in a pandemic and most of it could have been avoided with simple -- following simple medical guidance, we wouldn't have been able to process it.

BERMAN: No, 200,000 is hard to process. The way I like to think about it -- or the way I think we should think about it is, think of one person -- think of one person you love and how hard it is to lose them and then think about what those 200,000 families are going through right now, because it's happened.

CAMEROTA: How do Americans feel about Republicans pushing through a Supreme Court nominee before the election? Well, Harry Enten breaks down the new numbers for us, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:48:24]

BERMAN: So, new this morning, GOP Senator Lindsey Graham says Republicans have the votes to confirm whoever Donald Trump nominates to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg. You've no doubt heard a lot of punditry saying this whole process will help galvanize Republicans and help Donald Trump in the presidential election. But what do the polls actually say about this?

Joining us now, CNN's senior political writer and analyst, Harry Enten.

And, Harry, we've heard a lot of people on both sides say, oh, this is going to help one side or the other. What do we know? And let's start by looking at a group of voters who matter more than anybody, swing voters. What do they say?

HARRY ENTEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL WRITER AND ANALYST: Right. So, you know, take a look at this. This is persuadable voters, those who say they might change their mind or those who say they were undecided in key swing states, like Arizona, Maine, and North Carolina. This poll was just taken a week ago. And what do we see? Who do they believe is better to pick the next Supreme Court nominee? It's Joe Biden by an overwhelming margin, 49 percent to 31 percent. So among that group, we're seeing that they prefer Biden to Trump to pick the next Supreme Court nominee. And, obviously, now that's an issue that's much more in the news than it was say a week ago at this point.

BERMAN: And, obviously, if people are looking at history here when they're making their assumptions, and there is the assumption backed up by some fact, that the Supreme Court process helped Donald Trump in 2016 to get elected the first time. But what's different now?

ENTEN: Yes, I mean, take a look here. So, you know, back in 2016, in our final CNN poll, we asked, you know, how important are certain issues to your vote? And among those who said it was extremely important to their vote, what we saw back in 2016 was 58 percent of Trump supporters said that was the case versus just 46 percent of Clinton supporters. So it was something that helped galvanize Republican voters in favor of Donald Trump.

[06:50:01]

But take a look at our last poll in August, what did we see? We saw that 47 percent of Biden supporters said it was an extremely important to their vote, the Supreme Court nominations, versus just 32 percent of Trump supporters. So the shoe is now on the other foot, whereby the Supreme Court nomination back in 2016 might have galvanized Republican voters. Right now what we're seeing is the exact opposite. It may, in fact, galvanize Democratic voters, specifically Joe Biden voters in particular, much more so than Trump supporters. So a big switch from 2016.

BERMAN: Yes, I -- the point here is the data gives you every reason to doubt people who say this is a slam dunk politically at the polls for the president.

The flip side of this is the Biden campaign, and Joe Biden, the way that they are approaching this is by making it about health care and Obamacare. Why?

ENTEN: The reason -- the simple reason why is because he does so well on the issue, right? You know you ask, who do you think is better to handle health care and it's Joe Biden leading Donald Trump overwhelmingly in our August CNN poll, 55 percent to 42 percent. And more than that, what's so important is health care. Forty-one percent of voters said it was extremely important to their vote. That ranked third of all the issues we tested.

So what Biden is seeing, he says, look, health care is something in which I'm leading on. The voters trust me more. It's extremely important. And, of course, remember back in 2018, that's part of the reason Democrats took back their House majority was they said, we're going to defend the ACA, the Republicans are trying to take it away, and, obviously, they were able to net gain 40 seats. So why not try the same formula again here.

BERMAN: Since you brought up 2018, there is a feeling among Republicans that the Brett Kavanaugh, the controversy over the Kavanaugh nomination, might have helped defeat Democratic incumbents. How does that compare to now? What's the situation in the race for Senate seats?

ENTEN: Yes, I think the key difference here is just look at the number of seats that were up in red states back in 2018. There were five of them. Five Democratic seats in states that Trump won by 10 points more. Now there's just one down in Alabama this year, Doug Jones, who was already an underdog for re-election. So the fact is, the Senate map is completely different right now in 2020 versus where it was in 2018.

BERMAN: All right, in terms of where the Senate stands right now, you brought up Doug Jones. He is trailing in Alabama. If he does lose there, Democrats would need to pick up, what, four seats and win the election to take over the chamber. Where do things stand?

ENTEN: Yes, so they need that net gain of four if Kamala Harris becomes the VP. And if you look right now, look at the top five chances for pickup opportunities. You see that the Democrats are -- actually hold a nominal edge in at least four of those races, Arizona, Colorado, Maine, and North Carolina. Iowa is close, a tie at this particular point. And keep in mind, here's the key nugget, versus 2018, where there were all those red states up, all of these states are states Trump lost or won by less than ten points. So it's not a big surprise that Democrats are competitive in a lot of seats and have a real lane for a Senate majority.

BERMAN: And just -- you'll put up one more slide in ten seconds or less. There are even other races where it's close now, correct?

ENTEN: Right, there are five other states in which Democrats are quite competitive. A number of these are red states. But even if they lose, say a few of those top five pickup opportunities, they have a number of other opportunities for them to get that Senate majority.

BERMAN: Harry Enten, Poll-a-palooza (ph). A lot going on. Thank you for waking up for us. Appreciate it, my friend.

ENTEN: You're like a cup of coffee to me.

BERMAN: Yes. Thank you very much.

There are 18 jokes in my head, none of which will let me keep my job beyond today.

CAMEROTA: Don't say any of them. BERMAN: NBA legend Michael Jordan forming a new dream team in Nascar with Bubba Wallace at the wheel. Details in the "Bleacher Report," next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[06:57:38]

CAMEROTA: The NFL taking its mask policy very seriously, handing out more than a $1 million in fines to coaches not wearing masks on the sidelines.

Andy Scholes has more in the "Bleacher Report."

Hi, Andy.

ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Yes, good morning, Alisyn.

So the NFL, it's not messing around, cracking down on three coaches for not wearing their masks on the sidelines during their games over weekend. The Broncos Vic Fangio, Seahawks Pete Carroll, and 49ers' Kyle Shanahan fine $100,000 each and all three of their teams also have been fined a quarter of a million for not wearing those masks. That's according to a league source telling CNN, Raiders Coach Jon Gruden and Saint's Coach Sean Payton, meanwhile, they were seen not wearing masks during last night's Monday night football game. They're likely going to be seen -- going to see fines as well.

Bruins (ph)/Raiders opening up the brand-new $2 billion Allegiant Stadium right off the Los Vegas Strip last night. It's been nicknamed death star, and rightfully so. I mean it's a really cool-looking stadium. They're going to have no fans in there the entire season in Vegas due to coronavirus. The Raiders, though, on the field continuing to look good. Derek Carr's three touchdown passes. Vegas turning an early 10 point deficit into a 34-24 win over the Saints.

All right, finally, Michael Jordan going to be a Nascar owner. The six-time NBA champ teaming up with good friend Denny Hamlin to own a new team next season. Jordan's going to be the first black majority owner in the sport in over 45 years. His driver is going to be Bubba Wallace, whose the only black driver at the sport's top level. Jordan saying in a statement, in addition to the recent commitment and donations I've made to combat systemic racism, I see this as a chance to educate a new audience and open more opportunities for black people in racing.

And Jordan, you know, of course, grew up in North Carolina. He says he was a fan of racing his whole life. His parents use to take him to races, Alisyn. And Jordan just saying, the timing seemed perfect for him to become an owner with Nascar evolving right now and embracing social change more and more.

CAMEROTA: There you go.

Andy, thank you so much.

All right, NEW DAY continues right now.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The U.S. approaches another grim milestone, 200,000 lives lost to coronavirus.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We may be in for a very apocalyptic fall.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We may be at 300,000 by New Years. This is not necessary. This is not deaths that need to happen.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: With 43 days until the election, the president is hoping to galvanize conservatives by seizing on the sudden opening at the Supreme Court.

[07:00:06]

SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY): This Senate will vote on this nomination this year.