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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Interview With Rep. Fred Upton (R-MI); Marjorie Taylor Greene More Emboldened?; Biden Pushes Ahead on COVID-19 Relief Package; Positive COVID-19 Trends. Aired 4-4:30p ET

Aired February 05, 2021 - 16:00   ET

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

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BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN HOST: But you can join CNN from your couch as we take viewers inside the Super Bowl kickoff in Tampa Bay. A CNN Bleacher report special airs tomorrow at 2:30 Eastern right here on CNN.

I'm Brooke Baldwin. Have wonderful weekends. We will see you back here Monday.

"THE LEAD WITH JAKE TAPPER" starts right now.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: Welcome to THE LEAD. I'm Jake Tapper.

And we begin today with our health lead. It has been and continues to be a cold, dark COVID winter, but we in the United States are finally seeing the first signs of light on the pandemic front. There is now a third vaccine. Johnson & Johnson just asked the FDA for emergency use authorization. Cases are down 50 percent since the U.S. reached its peak almost a month ago.

Hospitalizations are also down nearly 13 percent since last week. And more Americans are finally getting shots. The number of vaccines administered this week outnumbers new cases of COVID 10-1.

But that's not to say that serious struggles do not remain. Getting schools reopened remains a significant logistical and political challenge. Vaccinations still need to ramp up. The spread is not yet under control, and more, as CNN's Lucy Kafanov reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

LUCY KAFANOV, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The fight against COVID-19 progressing on three fronts today, more shots, more sites, and more vaccines heading towards approval.

New York's mega-vaccination site opening up at Yankee Stadium this morning.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I was in and out, two seconds.

KAFANOV: In Maryland, the back parking lot at Six Flags now a mass vaccination center. GOV. LARRY HOGAN (R-MD): The idea eventually is to build an

infrastructure that can handle millions of vaccines.

KAFANOV: And in Northern California, Oakland's Coliseum and Levi's Stadium now vaccination hubs. American troops joining the fight against COVID. The Biden administration announced it will deploy 1,000 service members across the country to help with vaccination efforts, this as COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in the U.S. outnumbered new cases 10-1 this week.

DR. ASHISH JHA, DEAN, BROWN UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH: It is getting better, and I think we're going to get much, much better yet.

KAFANOV: Another 1.3 million shots in the arms of Americans reported Thursday, new cases down 30 percent in the last two weeks, and, according to the CDC, down 61 percent since the January 8 peak.

Hospitalizations dropped below 90,000 for the first time since November. A new study, which hasn't yet been peer-reviewed, found that AstraZeneca's vaccine, not yet authorized in the U.S., is effective against that faster-spreading variant first identified in the U.K., while Johnson & Johnson submitted its single-dose vaccine for emergency FDA authorization and could become available next month.

DR. PAUL OFFIT, CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL OF PHILADELPHIA: It's a single dose. It's shipped and stored in refrigerator temperatures. So that makes it much easier.

KAFANOV: With the CDC set to release new guidance on reopening schools in the coming week...

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Today, we are going to be vaccinating teachers.

KAFANOV: ... 24 states, plus Washington, D.C., now allowing teachers to get the vaccine.

NUREKA DIXON, ASSISTANT PRINCIPAL: We're so excited because we will be able to get back.

KAFANOV: Not the case at several districts, where teachers unions have demanded more safety measures before getting back, a thorny issue for the White House.

QUESTION: Will President Biden use the power of the bully pulpit to help cajole teachers who are unwilling to go back to schools to go back?

JEN PSAKI, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: Well, and I'm just going to reject the premise of the question. The president is absolutely committed to reopening schools. He wants them not just to reopen, but to stay open. And he wants to do that in a safe way.

KAFANOV: The Biden administration today announced plans to make 60 million at-home COVID-19 tests available this summer. The White House also still exploring sending face masks directly to all Americans.

RON KLAIN, INCOMING WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF: We want to get this back on track.

KAFANOV: And not wearing a mask when traveling, that could get you a $250 fine, according to the TSA.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KAFANOV: And new today, British researchers releasing a report that found the use of convalescent plasma -- that's the treatment promoted by the Trump administration that's made from the blood of coronavirus patients who've recovered -- well, that might have actually helped fuel the spread of dangerous mutations of the virus.

Coincidentally, the FDA yesterday announced that it is scaling back its authorization of that treatment because of confusing data about its efficiency -- Jake.

TAPPER: All right, Lucy Kafanov, thank you so much.

When it comes to the debate between health officials and government officials who argue that schools need to be opened as soon as possible for in person classes, with mitigation efforts in place, of course, there seems to be no daylight between the Biden White House and teachers unions, who are pushing back, demanding that they all get vaccinated first, some teachers unions demanding that all the students also get vaccinated first.

This week, the CDC director, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, said this:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. ROCHELLE WALENSKY, CDC DIRECTOR: Vaccination of teachers is not a prerequisite for safe reopening of schools.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: Vaccinations of teachers not a prereq for safely reopening schools.

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To this, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said that:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PSAKI: Dr. Walensky spoke to this in her personal capacity. Obviously, she's the head of the CDC, but we're going to wait for the final guidance to come out, so we can use that as a guide for schools around the country.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: CNN's chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, joins me now.

Sanjay, obviously, schools need to be safe before they reopen, masking ventilation, smaller class sizes. People with preexisting conditions who are vulnerable need to still be able to stay at home. All that's important.

But this is the White House claiming that the CDC director was speaking in her personal capacity, undermining her own top health official, seemingly, for seemingly saying vaccinations are not necessarily reopened school safely, which is what the health community has been saying for months and months now. It's inexplicable. What's going on?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I mean, Jake, science has to lead the way here.

But I think it's a little bit more of a murky issue. And let me explain it this way.

I have been talking to lots of people about it. Jonathan Reiner wrote a great op-ed about this today on CNN.com. A couple things.

First of all, there is data to show that there are situations where schools can reopen safely without teachers being vaccinated. These are the studies that the CDC is pointing to. There was one out of Wisconsin you know, showed that the school, sort of virus transmission was a lot lower than the surrounding community, close to 40 percent lower.

Out of around 5,300 students and staff, 191 people became infected over the semester, and only seven of those were actually related to in-school transmission. So, what did we learn from that in North Carolina and other studies? That it can be done.

Problem is, many school districts don't have some of those resources. They don't have the space. They don't have adequate ventilation. Some of them don't even have enough masks and hand hygiene that's going to be -- that they can be confident it's going to be available for everybody.

So, I mean, what I'm hearing over and over again is that -- there's teachers who are just frightened of that. You say it can be done safely, but our district cannot do it safely because we don't have the basic things. So that's why the vaccinations become increasingly important. That becomes a safeguard for these teachers and these staff.

The situation we're in now is, as you just heard from Lucy, is that most states are now going to be offering vaccines to teachers. And I think that process is going to ramp up. So that may obviate this issue. In the beginning of this pandemic, we didn't know what was going on. So I think everyone was trying to play it safe.

We have data now on what needs to be done. But some school districts just can't do it. And that's why the vaccines end up being this really important backstop for them.

TAPPER: Well, the CDC guidelines, which we're expecting next week, should be an important part of that, in terms of what the schools need to do. Then the districts can satisfy the requirements. But if teachers are saying, well, I don't care what the scientists

say, I need to feel safe, and I'm only going to feel safe if every teacher is vaccinated and every student's vaccinated, why would we defer to somebody whose feelings over the science?

GUPTA: Yes, I mean, it's -- I don't have a good answer to that.

I mean, I'm a scientist. The science should lead the way. But, Jake, throughout this pandemic, I don't think we can dismiss people's feelings of concern here. It is a very low likelihood, obviously, of somebody's getting sick.

But if you have a staff member who says, I teach in a poorly ventilated classroom, it's cold outside, I cannot open the windows, I have preexisting conditions, how do you start to parse this all out for people?

And what kind of environment might it be? And this is subjective, admittedly, but what kind of environment would it be if the teachers who are teaching feel unsafe? I think it's going to be different district to district. And that's what the CDC is going to have to take into account in their recommendations.

We heard what Dr. Walensky said. She doesn't think vaccinations are a prerequisite. So what are the prerequisites? And if school districts can't meet those prerequisites, in terms of ventilation, in terms of space, in terms of masking, then what? Can they only open then with vaccines?

I think these are the questions that hopefully we're going to get some answers on over the next week. It's critically important.

TAPPER: Yes, it's kind of amazing that we have made it to February and there hasn't been guidance yet, the way that we need it and our kids need it.

The Biden administration is hoping to resurrect a proposal from the Trump administration that never took off to mail face masks to every American. What do you think of this? Is that the best use of time and resources right now? I mean, can't people who want face masks get them already?

GUPTA: Yes, I mean, this is fascinating, I got to tell you.

So, this is actually the package of face masks that were supposed to go out last year via the Postal Service. You may remember that, Jake. They didn't go out via the Postal Service. Some were administered through faith-based groups and things like that.

I agree with you, Jake. I mean, they -- these masks -- these are cloth masks. They're much more widely available than they used to be. That doesn't seem to be the problem. The problem seems to be that there's a significant percentage of people who still just won't wear them, not because of availability, just for other reasons.

They don't believe in them, they are making a political statement, Whatever the reason may be.

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So, I don't know that it's the best use. I mean, I think spending a lot of time reminding people of the value of masks, we have obviously been trying to do that for the last year now, roughly. But it's -- I'm not sure that it will make a big difference.

I understand why they're doing it, but I'm not sure what the actual impact will be.

TAPPER: I mean, you can get them literally at gas stations and CVS and Rite Aids and Walgreens all over the country.

GUPTA: Right.

TAPPER: Sanjay, thank you so much. Appreciate it, as always.

A well-known economic adviser to the Obama White House says that President Biden's COVID stimulus plan is too big. Well, now the White House is firing back.

Then: a fight heating up between the White House and the Texas governor over something you cannot see with your naked eye.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: In our politics lead: President Biden seems convinced that his COVID relief plan needs to be big more than it needs to be bipartisan. And he is not budging. Democrats are with him, for now.

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But, as CNN's Jeff Zeleny reports, Obama's former chief economic adviser, Larry Summers, today emerged as Biden's perhaps most unwelcomed attractor on the size of this legislation.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It's time to act. We can reduce suffering in this country.

JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): President Joe Biden saying bluntly today the American pain is too deep to go small and too urgent for a drawn-out Washington debate.

BIDEN: I believe the American people are looking right now to their government for help to do our job, to not let them down. So, I'm going to act. I'm going to act fast.

ZELENY: The president making clear he's plunging ahead with his American Rescue Plan, saying, if Democrats have to pass the bill alone, so be it. He invited Republican help, but said their proposals did not meet the magnitude of the economic need. BIDEN: What Republicans have proposed is either to do nothing or not enough.

Thanks for coming down.

ZELENY: It was the capstone of a whirlwind week that started with Republicans in the Oval Office on Monday, and ended with Democratic leaders there today, charting a path forward to pass the COVID relief plan through a budget process that only needs a simple majority in the Senate.

BIDEN: Here's what I won't do. I'm not cutting the size of the checks. They're going to be $1,400, period. That's what the American people were promised.

ZELENY: But Biden said he is willing to negotiate who gets those checks, signaling his interest in targeting the help toward Americans who need it most, not some families making $300,000 a year.

The president and his advisers dismissed criticism from a top Democratic economist that the $1.9 trillion plan was too big and could overheat the economy.

QUESTION: Is the Biden administration going too big?

JARED BERNSTEIN, WHITE HOUSE COUNCIL OF ECONOMIC ADVISERS: No. I firmly would disagree with that contention.

ZELENY: Pushback to Larry Summers, a top economic adviser in the Obama administration, who said today such a large bill would eat into other priorities, writing in "The Washington Post": "After resolving the coronavirus crisis, how will political and economic space be found for the public investments that should be the nation's highest priority?"

But Biden saying that mentality would delay the American recovery.

BIDEN: Don't worry, hang on, things are going to get better. We're going to go smaller. So, it's just going to take us a lot longer, like until 2025. I can't in good conscience do that.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ZELENY: Now, one thing driving the urgency of President Biden was the jobs report out this morning. It showed that only 49,000 jobs overall were added to the economy in the month of January alone.

That is what led the president to say, look, the economy is still in trouble.

Now, Jake, it's an open question if this closes the door to bipartisanship on other parts of the agenda less than three weeks into the Biden presidency. Senior administration officials I talk to you say it does not. There are many other opportunities to work on a bipartisan way on the agenda. We will see about that. But on this American Rescue Plan, one thing is clear. It's supported

by some two-thirds of the American people. That's why the White House believes it's easy for them to bypass Republicans -- Jake.

TAPPER: All right, Jeff Zeleny, thanks so much.

I want to bring in CNN senior White House correspondent Phil Mattingly.

Phil, tell us more about the argument that Larry Summers is making and why it's so frustrating to the White House.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, so start with two things on the outset.

One, Larry Summers, obviously former topic Obama economic official, says that it is a bold plan. And he is also concerned about -- more about undershooting than overshooting. But the scale of the plan at $1.9 trillion is what he's concerned about, given the current economic elements in the United States right now.

He's talking about the output gap, basically, what the output of the economy actually is vs. what it could potentially be and says what the Biden administration is putting into place would overshoot where they need to be by a significant amount. That could lead to overheating of the economy and a potential increase in inflation.

The broader point Larry Summers is trying to make is that, if inflation goes up, then you're going to have to raise taxes. Then, all of a sudden austerity comes into play, and the broader progressive goals of this administration won't be possible in Congress.

Why this frustrates the White House when I talk to White House advisers is, as one put it simply: This is not stimulus. Larry is looking at it as if it's stimulus.

They view this from a broader perspective. They view this economically as trying to essentially float the American population until the virus gets under control, not to stimulate the economy, float the economy, and, as such, put into place several things, whether it's unemployment insurance, whether it's direct payments, whether it's increases of the child tax credit or Earned Income Tax Credit, that allow the American people to basically hang on until vaccinations are more widespread.

TAPPER: All right, Phil Mattingly, thanks so much. Appreciate it.

I will be talking about the stimulus package on CNN's "STATE OF THE UNION" this Sunday with Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.

We will also get a response from Republican Senator Pat Toomey of the great Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. We will also have Senator Bernie Sanders and Democratic Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley.

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That's at 9:00 a.m. and noon Eastern Sunday morning, only on CNN. A defiant defense full of contradictions and hypocrisy from bigot

Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene after she lost all of her committee assignments -- why this Republican problem does not seem to be going away.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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TAPPER: In our politics lead, something of a reckoning for House Republicans, after another tumultuous week revealed serious fractures in the party.

Members overwhelmingly refused to punish Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia during a vote last night for spreading bigoted and deranged conspiracy theories.

And now Greene is warning that, if the Republican Party tries to distance itself from her or from President Trump, they will get humiliated in the 2022 midterm elections, as CNN's Ryan Nobles now reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

RYAN NOBLES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): One day after she was stripped of her committee assignments in a dramatic vote...

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The resolution is adopted.

NOBLES: ... Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has pushed bigoted and deranged conspiracy theories about Jews, Muslims, 9/11, and school shootings, and called for violence against Speaker Pelosi, is showing no signs of backing down.

REP. MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE (R-GA): I'm fine with being kicked off of my committees because it'd be a waste of my time.

NOBLES: A defiant Greene firmly declared her vision for the future of the Republican Party led by former President Donald Trump.

GREENE: Republican voters support him still. The party is his. It doesn't belong to anybody else.

NOBLES: But there are signs the rest of the party isn't so sure. Eleven House Republicans joined Democrats to kick Greene off her committees, distancing themselves from her rhetoric.

Representative Nicole Malliotakis, a committed Trump supporter, was among them. "As Americans, we must hold ourselves to a higher standard and fully condemn such comments, regardless of which side of the aisle they come from," she wrote in a statement after her vote.

The GOP divide also playing out in other places as well. In Nebraska, Senator Ben Sasse, who easily won reelection in the fall, is in the process of being censured by the state's Republican committee because of his criticism of Trump.

SEN. BEN SASSE (R-NE): You are welcome to censure me again. But let's be clear about why this is happening. It's because I still believe, as you used to, that politics isn't about the weird worship of one dude.

NOBLES: And while Sasse and others navigate a world of Trump worshipers, Greene is fast becoming the Trump emissary on Capitol Hill, taking a page out of the Trump playbook by refusing to apologize for supporting a call for the execution of Speaker Pelosi when pressed by CNN's Jessica Dean, showing just how apologetic she truly is.

JESSICA DEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Do you stand by the fact that you said Nancy Pelosi is guilty of treason and that's punishable by death?

GREENE: I think you heard my speech yesterday. You owe the people an apology. You lied about President Trump.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

NOBLES: In a late development here on Capitol Hill, some Republican members of Congress testing the new policy as it relates to metal detectors outside the House chamber.

A senior Democratic aide telling our Kristin Wilson and Annie Grayer that Andrew Clyde of Georgia and Louie Gohmert of Texas have both been fined $5,000 for not going through those metal detectors appropriately.

Jake, it's clear that Speaker Pelosi is not messing around as it relates to this new policy.

TAPPER: All right, Ryan, thank you so much.

Joining us now to discuss, Republican Congressman Fred Upton of Michigan. He's one of the 11 Republicans who voted to strip Congresswoman Greene of her committee assignments and one of the 10 Republicans who voted to impeach President Trump.

You're in a pretty small club there, Congressman Upton. What do you say to Republicans who say you're on the outs, you're a traitor, et cetera?

REP. FRED UPTON (R-MI): My oath is to the Constitution. I'm not afraid to criticize any president, regardless of party.

I have disagreements. I have supported President Trump on a number of initiatives, the tax cuts, the wall, repeal of Obamacare, and trying to make it better, a whole number of different things.

But, at some point, you say, enough is enough. And so we looked at my colleague Ms. Greene. She didn't apologize. I have been to a lot of schools. I watched you a couple years ago moderate the debate between Rubio and Ted Deutch on -- with some of those Parkland kids.

I met with the Parkland kids, as I did when I served on the Education Committee back in the '90s and we had the Columbine kids come and actually testify before us. Not a dry eye was there.

To think that this was a staged event, that it was going to be used just for gun control -- and I have got family members that were in Vegas for that -- at that shooting a few years ago over Labor Day weekend. This was not staged. She was unapologetic. She was unremorseful.

And it was pretty evident in her press conference that she held this morning.

TAPPER: Yes, she wouldn't even apologize, wouldn't even address the issue that she had called for Nancy Pelosi to be assassinated, to be executed.

So, let me ask you, Congressman, what does it say about the state of the Republican Party that only 11 Republicans voted to remove Marjorie Taylor Greene from her committees because of her insanities and her bigotry, but 61, 61 Republicans voted to remove Congresswoman Liz Cheney from her leadership position because she voted the way you did, to impeach President Trump for inciting the riot?

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