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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Interview With Former BARDA Director Dr. Rick Bright; Whitmer: Hate Groups Heard the President's Words as a "Rallying Cry". Aired 4:30-5p ET

Aired October 08, 2020 - 16:30   ET

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

[16:30:00]

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DR. RICK BRIGHT, FORMER DIRECTOR, BIOMEDICAL ADVANCED RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY: It's interesting that Regeneron is the first company that I put an agreement in place with in January at BARDA to rapidly start developing monoclonal antibodies for this coronavirus.

It's a proven platform. It's worked for Ebola. They were working on it for influenza and for MERS. It made sense to start it with this coronavirus.

However, they're just finishing some clinical studies. They put a press release out about a week ago saying they took a quick look, and it looks good, it looks encouraging.

But we can't allow press releases to drive our science or our clinical judgment. We can't allow a company to promote their own drug and, all of the sudden, start taking the drug.

So, it's important that the scientists get all of the data from Regeneron, review that carefully for safety and for its effectiveness, and then make the best judgment on whether or not that drug should be considered for emergency use authorization.

When you talk about making it available for everyone across America, that's very premature. We don't have much data. I think 275 patients were treated so far in the press release.

President Trump is one person. He was on more than one drug. Actually, we have no idea what all he was treated with.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: No, they still -- they still won't tell us everything that he's on.

BRIGHT: So, it -- you cannot make a judgment in that way. You cannot rush to judgment prematurely, especially as a world leader and make some announcement that this is a cure-all.

He hasn't seen the data. None of us have seen the data. But it's not the first time he's done this. I mean, he thought hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine were miracles, a gift from God, a cure-all, miraculous -- miraculously going to address this virus. They weren't.

He thought disinfectants were something we should look into. That wasn't a sarcastic comment. I watched it. I was horrified that I would get a call within a day at BARDA to start a clinical study investigating how we could inject disinfectants. That was a real panic moment for us in science.

And he prematurely pushed the FDA to give an emergency use authorization to convalescent plasma. We still don't have strong data.

The NIH director, Francis Collins, and Dr. Tony Fauci have said, the data is still out. We're not convinced that convalescent plasma is -- is working in the way they say it is or they want to believe it is.

So, this president continues to get a small piece of anecdotal information, from either his own personal treatment or from some friends of his...

TAPPER: Like that MyPillow guy who was watching the oleandrin extract.

BRIGHT: Yes, that's scary. That is absolutely horrifying.

And it does a disjustice to Americans and people around the world who hear him do that, because they're looking to him to be a leader, to be honest, and to guide them through safe and effective treatments through the pandemic.

And he has done anything but that by promoting these drugs that aren't supported by science, prematurely pressuring the FDA to put an emergency use authorization in place, and then, subsequently, potentially causing great harm by making them available for people without the evidence to know who should get it, when they should get it, how much they should get it.

TAPPER: When you hear President Trump say that the vaccine is being delayed because of politics, and that's just politics, my impression is that it's actually the opposite, that it's politics from him pushing the scientists to act quicker than they want to, according to protocols, to keep us all safe.

What is the reality here?

BRIGHT: The reality is, it's irresponsible and reckless for the president United States to drive the evaluation of something as critical as a vaccine to meet an election timeline.

He is doing that. He's mentioned it on numerous occasions that he wants the vaccine before the election. There is no rationale and a scientific judgment to move that vaccine to meet that target date.

He is not a scientist. He's not a doctor. I say, let the scientists do their job.

I can guarantee you, Jake, that there are thousands of scientists in our government today, thousands or tens of thousands of scientists in the companies around the world working on these vaccines who are doing the right thing. We need to give them time to do their work.

Remember, vaccines go into healthy people to try to protect them from disease. We do not want a vaccine to cause harm to those healthy people, potentially more harm than they would prevent by preventing infection.

So, it takes time. Vaccines are very complicated to make. There's a lot of components, a lot of ingredients.

TAPPER: The president says he's just trying to cut through the red tape, that there's just too much bureaucracy, he's trying to push things around to save lives.

BRIGHT: That's not true, not at all.

[16:35:01]

The scientists are working at breakneck speeds. It is unprecedented to see how fast they are moving through a lot of the steps. The one step you cannot rush is the safety evaluation of that vaccine after it's put into people.

And that takes time.

TAPPER: The phase three trial.

BRIGHT: This phase three trial.

TAPPER: Yes.

BRIGHT: Now, remember, these people are getting two doses of the vaccine about a month apart.

And it takes some time after you get that second dose of vaccine to see if anything bad happens. Now, we hope that nothing bad happens, but it doesn't always happen immediately.

So, all the scientists are asking for now, all the experts at the FDA are asking for now is to give the vaccine time to enable us to see if there are any bad effects that we should be concerned with.

TAPPER: First, do no harm, the Hippocratic Oath.

BRIGHT: First, do no harm.

TAPPER: Let me ask you a question.

When you filed your whistle-blower complaint earlier this year, and then you were reassigned from BARDA to the NIH, there were a lot of critics from the Trump administration of you, alleging that you don't manage your office well, that you mistreat staff, you fail to consult your superiors.

I could go on and on.

But let me just -- let me just cut to the chase here. Do you have an axe to grind here? Are you a Democrat that hates Donald Trump because of what he stands for? Why are you speaking out like this?

BRIGHT: Jake, I'm a scientist. And I have dedicated my entire life to trying to save people's lives. I have dedicated my career to studying pandemic outbreaks, to focus on development of vaccines and drugs and diagnostics, response.

Every facet of responding to a pandemic is what I have dedicated my life, career to do.

And when this pandemic started, I sprung into action. I found out that I was moving light speed ahead of this administration. Before they were willing to admit we had a problem, I had plans in place to try to make a vaccine. I had plans in place to start drug development. I had plans in place to work on diagnostics and tests.

We knew what we had to do. But this administration refused to admit it.

So, I was, I think, in their eyes, a fly in the ointment, because I was pushing for the inevitable, this pandemic that was emerging. All the signs were there. I had no doubt in my mind and scientists like me had no doubt in their minds about where this was going, once we saw what was happening in China.

This administration didn't want to admit it. When I sounded the alarms to make masks to protect our health care workers, they resisted. When I sounded alarms to start vaccine development, they resisted. When I sounded alarms to buy swabs, the essential component for the tests, they resisted.

So, when I spoke up about the dangers of chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine, and the recklessness that our public health, political officials were doing to push this drug out -- to flood the streets is the note I saw from the White House directive, flood the streets.

That was the straw that broke the camel's back for me. I could not sit by and be complicit and watch people in danger and watch people die. I had to speak up.

When I did, they pushed me out, 25 years of vaccine and drug and diagnostic development kicked to the curb, to the NIH, demoted, ridiculed, as you said, disparaged in every way, called a deserter.

My record speaks for itself.

TAPPER: Stay right there. I have more questions for you.

I will be asking more about the whistle-blower complaint and why Bright says this winter could be the darkest winter in modern American history.

Stay with us.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[16:43:25]

TAPPER: We're continuing our interview in our health lead.

You just heard senior vaccine scientist Rick Bright say that more Americans are going to die from coronavirus because scientists are being sidelined by the Trump White House.

Six months ago, Bright filed a whistle-blower complaint, claiming he had been demoted from his job at the Department of Health and Human Services for complaining about political interference in science. This week, he resigned from government altogether.

This is his first interview.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TAPPER: You faulted specifically political operators in the Trump administration for not taking the pandemic seriously enough.

Who specifically are you talking about? Are you talking about HHS Secretary Alex Azar?

BRIGHT: Absolutely.

I think it cascaded all the way down from the White House, from the -- President Trump to the vice president, those on the White House Task Force, moved into the department, Secretary Azar and the assistant secretary for preparedness response, Dr. Bob Kadlec.

TAPPER: Last night, Vice President Pence would not answer the question when asked by Susan Page as to why the death toll for coronavirus is so much higher in the United States than for any other country, and our death rate is higher than for any other wealthy country.

As someone who was inside the administration, can you answer the question? Why? Why are we doing so much more poorly than any other comparable country?

BRIGHT: Because of failed leadership.

Because of a reluctance to admit there was a problem. Because of a reluctance to tell America the truth. Because of a reluctance to take critical actions up front.

[16:45:01]

It disgusted me last night to hear Vice President Pence try to say that President Trump did all he could by putting in a travel ban from China in January. That is the only thing they actually talked about that they ever did.

That alone was so insufficient to get in front of this virus. They don't recognize that many people, hundreds of thousands of people are already coming in to our country with this virus. So, that one small travel ban, that's the only thing they hold out that they did, was not enough.

And they deny the fact that if you do take a step, such as a travel ban, that is called an attempt to contain, contain the virus outside the country.

When you contain and try to hold off the spread of a virus, you must be doing something else in the background to prepare for a breach in that containment. We breached -- the virus breached that containment very quickly, and we weren't doing anything else to mitigate, plan for mitigation. That is where this administration failed most.

TAPPER: In May, you said this could be the darkest winter in modern history. It's now October. More than 211,000 Americans have been killed. More than 7.5 million have been infected. Cases are going up, or staying steady in most states.

What are you afraid is going to happen in November, December, January?

BRIGHT: This winter, we're going to have an explosion of cases of coronavirus. This winter, we're going to have an explosion of influenza infections and other respiratory infections. It's going to overwhelm our health care system again.

We still don't have enough personal protective equipment for our doctors and nurses. We still don't have enough tests. We're still not doing enough testing.

We still are not delivering and leading by example those critical measures. So, one of these things, coronavirus, again, compounded by influenza, compounded by other respiratory viruses, and it could be absolutely disastrous. And it doesn't have to be.

TAPPER: Last question, sir. It sounds as though you're saying that President Trump has blood on his hands, the blood of tens if not hundreds of thousands of Americans. Is that what you think?

BRIGHT: I believe President Trump and this administration has failed America, failed to respond to this pandemic and many people have died needlessly. There were many lives that were lost that we could have prevented. And there are many more lives that we're going to lose this winter that are preventable if we just had strong leadership, we just had truth and transparency coming from our White House. And people who lead by example.

So, short of them doing that, it's criminal. More people will die. And I believe that from the bottom of my heart.

TAPPER: Rick Bright, thanks so much for your time. We really appreciate it.

Our other breaking news today, the Michigan governor is pointing her finger at President Trump after the FBI stops a plot to kidnap her and overthrow the government.

Stay with us.

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[16:52:59]

TAPPER: Breaking news in our national lead. The FBI says they have stopped a domestic terrorist group, a militia plot to kidnap the governor of Michigan and overthrow the government.

Michigan's Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer addressed this last hour, blaming hate groups that she said heard the rallying cries of President Trump, as CNN's Jessica Schneider reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

GOV. GRETCHEN WHITMER (D-MI): I knew this job would be hard, but I'll be honest, I never could have imagined anything like this.

JESSICA SCHNEIDER, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer speaking out against the alleged plot to kidnap her.

WHITMER: You don't have to agree with me, but I do ask one thing, never forget that we are all in this together.

SCHNEIDER: Today, the FBI charging six men in the conspiracy, saying the group plotted to kidnap the governor from her vacation home before the election. Authorities became aware of the scheme as they monitored social media and discovered a group of men based in Michigan mapping out how to violently overthrow government officials and target law enforcement.

ANDREW BIRGE, U.S. ATTORNEY FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF MICHIGAN: The alleged conspirators used operational security measures, including encrypted messaging platforms and use code words and phrases in an attempt to avoid detection by law enforcement.

SCHNEIDER: Law enforcement was able to track the group by using informants and undercover agents who recorded the men when they visited the governor's vacation home two times.

BIRGE: Fox and Croft in particular, according to the complaint, discussed detonating explosive devices to divert police from the area of the home and Fox even inspected the underside of a Michigan highway bridge for places to seat an explosive. The complaint further alleges that Fox purchased a Taser for use in the kidnapping and the group successfully detonated an improvised explosive device wrapped with shrapnel to test its anti-personnel capabilities.

SCHNEIDER: State officials announcing separate terrorism charges against several other men linked to a militia group, saying they plan to instigate civil war, target police officers and storm the capitol building in Lansing, taking hostages, including Governor Whitmer.

[16:55:06]

BIRGE: All of us in Michigan can disagree about politics but those disagreements should never, ever amount to violence.

SCHNEIDER: Whitmer has been a frequent target of President Trump over her coronavirus response. Trump saying this at a rally in her state last month.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: You would be doing even better if you had a governor who knew what the hell she was doing. You got to open up the state.

SCHNEIDER: And tweeting: Liberate Michigan, in April.

Protesters and militia, some armed, have even gathered at the state capital, calling for an end to Whitmer's stay-at-home order.

The governor today blaming Trump for escalating the rhetoric.

WHITMER: Stand back and stand by. Hate groups heard the pre president's not as a rebuke but as a rallying cry. As a call to action. When our leaders speak, their words matter.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SCHNEIDER: And Republicans around Michigan have rallied in support of Governor Whitmer. She, of course, is a Democrat. In fact, the state GOP chair putting it this way, saying political disputes should be settled at the ballot box not by violence.

But, Jake, so far tonight, there's absolutely no word from President Trump on all of this -- Jake.

TAPPER: All right. Jessica Schneider, thanks so much.

In our 2020 lead today, sources tell CNN that aides close to President Trump are trying to get him to stop making baseless claims about voting, such as this today.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: You pick up any paper in the country practically and they're cheating all over the place on the ballots. So, how is that not a problem? That's a much bigger problem than China or Russia.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

TAPPER: Not true and not true. Foreign adversaries are looking to exploit Trump's frequent lies, according to America's intelligence chief on election security.

CNN's Pamela Brown reports in our voting series, "Making It Count".

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PAMELA BROWN, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Twenty-six days to go until election day, and President Trump is showing no sign he will stop spreading misinformation about mail-in voting and voter fraud.

TRUMP: It's a corrupt system because they're sending out millions of ballots.

BROWN: CNN has learned some of Trump's aides have been trying to steer him away from these baseless voter fraud arguments and instead have them talk about how mail-in ballots could cause confusion and even chaos.

But Trump continues on.

TRUMP: When you send out millions of ballots, when you're the sender, you can send them wherever you want. You can send them to Democrat areas, Republican areas. You don't have to send them at all.

BROWN: The disconnect between the candidate and campaign also heard in poll watching videos created by the Trump campaign for 17 different states and reviewed by CNN.

TRUMP CAMPAIGN WORKER: Essentially, the key is to behave yourself and not act like a fool.

BROWN: Now, one of the top U.S. intelligence officials on election security is acknowledging the president's false claims are being used by foreign powers. The director of National Counterintelligence and Security Center, Bill Evanina, telling Hearst Television: If they see a reference made by the president of the United States, a prominent U.S. senator, a business person, someone who America looks at as a voice of reason, and they believe it suits their interests, they will amplify that by a thousand to make sure that the most amount of people see it.

In Florida, Governor Ron DeSantis is fighting an extension of voter registration deadlines after a system outage prevented some people to register on the last day to do so.

GOV. RON DESANTIS (R-FL): You can have the best site in the world. Sometimes there's hiccups on it.

BROWN: A court filing from an attorney for DeSantis says extending the deadline might sabotage, perhaps irreparably, Florida's efforts to maintain normalcy during this profoundly abnormal election cycle. Already, more than 4.5 million Americans have cast their votes, this according to CNN and Edison Research Survey of election officials in 31 states reporting voting data.

Now a bipartisan group, that includes Trump's former director of national intelligence, Dan Coats, is launching a $20 million campaign in several states, telling the public that the election is quote, safe and secure.

AD ANNOUNCER: And help make sure every vote is counted, no matter who you vote for or how.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROWN: And we have learned the Justice Department is letting prosecutors announce voter fraud investigations close to Election Day. This is an exception made to a 40-year-old policy that deterred prosecutors from making such announcements as to not influence the election.

One election expert says this essentially gives the green light to impact the election, Jake.

TAPPER: Of course. That's the point of it.

Pamela Brown, thank you so much.

In our national lead, we want to take a moment to honor some of the more than 212,000 American lives lost to this pandemic.

Today, we are going to remember Julie Davis (ph), a 49-year-old elementary school teacher in North Carolina, considered an inspiration for her young students. Her daughter described her as selfless and caring. Davis died just days after testing positive for coronavirus.

May her memory be a blessing. Our condolences go out to her family.

Our coverage continues on CNN right now. I'll see you tomorrow.

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