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Trump Floats Kamala Harris Birther Conspiracy Theory; Coronavirus Testing Czar Brett Giroir Denies U.S. Needs More Tests; Interview with State Rep. William Boddie (D-GA). Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired August 14, 2020 - 14:00   ET

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

[14:00:00]

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: And when she tried to follow up, he moved on to another reporter.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Yes, he certainly did. He was very careful to not respond to that follow-up question.

I want to bring in Abby Phillip as well. So, Abby, this -- we took the question and answer part of this briefing -- just to be clear -- we find that part to be instructive as reporters are challenging the president with question.

But yesterday during his briefing he floated essentially a birther conspiracy. He -- about Kamala Harris, which is something that is -- I mean, it's very othering, it is racist. He was asked during this briefing if he has an issue with women of color, and he sort of swatted that away and said he doesn't see Kamala Harris as a threat.

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: That's what he says. And I think, you know, we'll see about that. I do think it's interesting that the president has been, it seems, grasping at ways to get at Kamala Harris, to find something to stick to her in terms of how he can attack her on the campaign trail. And one thing that he has bizarrely settled on is reprising this racist birther lie that he used against Barack Obama.

You know, it is, as you said, othering and racist, but it's also, you know, cynical in so many different ways. It suggests that people are kind of stupid enough to believe that Kamala Harris, who ran for months for the presidency -- she ran to be president of the United States, and we didn't hear anything about this from the president until now, until she is now going to be on the ballot for sure, running against him and Mike Pence.

So all of this is truly bizarre in a lot of ways. But, you know, whether or not the president is afraid of a strong black woman or what have you, it's clear that he hasn't figured out what an above-board argument against Kamala Harris is, that doesn't sink into these very low depths of birther conspiracies and lies that are aimed at kind of racist instincts in some people in this country.

KEILAR: Yes. I mean, certainly we've seen that he reserves some of his most aggressive vitriol for women of color who challenge him. We have seen that time and again when it comes to the White House Press Corps.

I want to play something from earlier, Abby. This is Jared Kushner, the president's son-in-law, on this birther lie.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTHONY MASON, CBS HOST, CBS THIS MORNING: Do you accept that she's a qualified candidate?

JARED KUSHNER, SENIOR ADVISER TO PRESIDENT TRUMP: I personally have no reason to believe she's not, but again, my focus for the last 24 hours has been on the historic peace deal that we've been able to achieve here.

MASON: She was born in Oakland, California.

KUSHNER: Yes.

MASON: Makes her a qualified candidate. Why didn't the president take the opportunity to debunk that theory?

KUSHNER: I have not had a chance to discuss this with him.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Abby, what do you think?

PHILLIP: I mean, it shouldn't come as a surprise that Jared Kushner -- or really, anybody in this White House -- is unwilling to simply just assert facts if they contradict what the president wants to say. They are not absolved from the consequences of that.

I do think that it's a responsibility of every person including people who work in the White House, Republicans on Capitol Hill to decide which side of this issue they are on. They are either on the side of the racist conspiracy theory, or they're not. And I think Jared Kushner made it very clear which side he's on.

KEILAR: Yes, Kaitlan?

COLLINS: And, Brianna, you know what's different about this? Is that before, you know -- Abby's right, it's not surprising, especially with the president's comments yesterday because we saw how he built his political career in part on promoting the birther lie about President Obama. But that was in 2011, and that was before he worked in the White House, and that was before Jared Kushner was a senior adviser to him in the White House.

So now the president is making these comments from the briefing room of the White House, letting this theory float out there instead of knocking it down like he knows he should. And Jared Kushner is answering that question from the front lawn of the White House, with the White House in the background. And yet he's refusing to say that it's not true and that he knows that Senator Kamala Harris is qualified legally to be the vice president of the United States.

So you just have to consider, it's the backdrop that makes it not surprising, but all the more striking that this is happening in 2020 with the president in the White House.

KEILAR: Yes. It's despicable. And history will not be kind to them in this moment as they conduct themselves like this.

I want to ask you guys about the president's comments on mail-in voting, because this is coming as we're getting some big headlines on the Postal Service and how it's going to impact the election, including reporting that the USPS plans to remove nearly 700 high- volume mail processing machines across the country. Abby, talk to us about this.

[14:05:06]

PHILLIP: Yes. I mean, these developments are coming every day it seems. But the big picture is that we're watching what seems to be a complete restructuring and really slimming down of the services of the Postal Service that's causing mail delays across the country.

And postal workers are alarmed because they say these machines -- almost 700 of them, as you said -- are responsible for sorting thousands of pieces of mail. And while regular mail is down because of the pandemic, we're expecting it to be up a lot in November because of mail-in voting. You've got millions and millions of Americans using mail-in ballots for the first time, and those ballots will go through the Postal Service.

So it's all part of the question of how much -- what is going on at the Postal Service, and is President Trump exerting political influence over that agency? He has now appointed a top donor to be the postmaster general. Louis DeJoy is someone who, just last week, met in the Oval Office with the president.

The White House says it was a congratulatory meeting, but it came just days before the announcement of some major restructuring and these reports of widespread delays all across the country that we are tracking, Brianna.

So it's a developing story, but the president now is being very clear, he wants to -- or he is willing to hold up funding for the USPS if it means hurting mail-in balloting. The question is, will he be able to do that? Will Congress allow him to do that?

KEILAR: Yes, he's talking about doing it out in the open, so we know that you'll be tracking that, Abby and Kaitlan. Thank you so much, it's great to see both of you. I appreciate you being on.

The coronavirus crisis is still killing far too many Americans, 1,076 lives lost just yesterday. Take a look at this; deaths from coronavirus over the last month. Too many days with hundreds and hundreds of Americans dying. The deaths are devastating and so are the number of people still getting infected, while the White House says that testing is sufficient. California is leading the country in the number of infections, becoming the first state to surpass 600,000 COVID cases. Over the last week, the U.S. has reported more than 365,000 known coronavirus cases, which is enough to fill this Atlanta stadium more than five times.

And there's a new warning today for Georgia from the White House Coronavirus Task Force: Your policies are not enough. That was kept hidden and not followed. We'll have more on that, ahead.

Plus, Dr. Anthony Fauci says the consequences will be devastating if we do not get coronavirus under control and reopen safely.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: You will never get a good marching back economically unless you control the biologics. You have to be able to control that.

And one of the problems is, in your understandable zeal to quickly get back to normal and revive the economy, you can do it if you do it in a measured, prudent way. The lesion that we've seen was the jumping over the benchmarks and the guideposts that have been put forth. So to think that you could ignore the biologic and get the economy back, it's not going to happen.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: And yet the White House coronavirus testing czar is saying, don't get hung up on the number. Admiral Brett Giroir, referring to the number of COVID-19 tests being done in the U.S., which is decreasing, not increasing. A seven-day average of new tests is just over 700,000 for the entire country.

And just to remind you, the U.S. is currently averaging more than a thousand deaths per day to COVID. But Admiral Giroir says the number of tests currently being done is flattening the curve.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

BRETT GIROIR, WHITE HOUSE CORONAVIRUS TESTING CZAR (via telephone): You beat the virus by smart policies supplemented by strategic testing. You do not beat the virus by shotgun testing everyone all the time. It is just a false narrative, and I'm really tired of hearing it by people who are not involved in the system, that we need millions of tests every day.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: I'm joined now by Dr. Kent Sepkowitz. He's a CNN medical analyst and deputy physician and chief of quality and safety at Memorial -- pardon me -- Memorial Sloan Kettering. I'm just tripping over myself today, doctor.

Can you tell us your reaction there to Admiral Giroir's comments? Is testing in the U.S. sufficient? KENT SEPKOWITZ, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: Absolutely not, it's not even close. It's very disappointing to hear him say that, because even a few weeks ago his tone was very different. It was more compatible with good public health policy. This does not bode well for us.

The evidence is that we have some areas with enough testing. New York City has enough testing, we have a positive rate of about one percent of all tests that we do are positive.

In contrast, the southern United States, the outbreak states that we've seen in the news the last weeks, have a positive test rate of 10 to 15 percent, most of them. That means there's a whole lot of cases out there still waiting to be found. And until they're found, they'll spread to the next person, to the next person.

So there's no way that we're testing enough, not even close.

KEILAR: OK, so you are disappointed by what he said. Why do you think he said that? And I wonder, as an expert who is looking at public health officials connected to the White House, you know, sometimes it seems like they're being honest in that they are hewing to what public health consensus is. And then sometimes, you hear -- like this -- Admiral Giroir saying something that is not what any expert outside of the White House is telling us.

SEPKOWITZ: Yes. You know, I'm not sure what his motivation is, it's certainly not the consensus of people who do this for a living. He suggests that he and his buddies are the only ones who really know the truth, the secret truth, and that we're all outside the -- you know, the bubble there.

This is not new stuff. I mean, testing, isolating, tracking, this is decades old. Nobody's reinventing anything where you have to be in the cool club with him to know how to do this. It's hard to do --

KEILAR: YES.

SEPKOWITZ: -- but everyone knows how to do this. And testing has been the key since we started talking in March, it's always been testing. And they have failed every day.

KEILAR: I want to ask you about an op-ed you wrote that said states are following the president's advice when it comes to slow testing. Do we know if states are slowing them or is it that fewer people are going to get them?

SEPKOWITZ: I know Texas is claiming that no one wants them now, which is peculiar to me. We don't know. It would strike me very unexpected if indeed people had decided against getting tested. It's up to the public health community to encourage people to get tested for their own protection and the protection of their loved ones. There's just no other way to proceed.

So I would take it as a failing either way. If they deliberately suppressed testing, that's a problem. If they've suppressed the urge to get tested, that's actually a bigger problem because it's asking for trouble down later where people who thought they could get away without a test have now brought it home and given it to Grandma, given the infection to Grandma. So it's disastrous either way.

KEILAR: It's almost like giving up, to do those things. Doctor, we really appreciate it. Dr. Sepkowitz, thank you.

SEPKOWITZ: Thank you.

KEILAR: Next, the White House is warning officials in Georgia that they're not doing enough to stop the spread of COVID. But they didn't follow that warning and they never made it public.

Plus, President Obama weighing in on Senator Kamala Harris and his biggest concern about the 2020 election.

And I'll speak with a reporter who asked the president this question:

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mr. President, after three and a half years, do you regret at all all the lying you've done to the American people on (ph) everything (ph)?

TRUMP: All the what?

[14:13:37]

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All the lying, all the dishonesties.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: The state of Georgia is in trouble, and that message is coming from the White House. Today, the "Atlanta Journal Constitution" reports that the White House Coronavirus Task Force is warning that Georgia's current policies are not enough to handle the surge in coronavirus cases in that state.

But that information was not followed by the state, and it was not made public to Georgians. We are only aware of this critical information because it was leaked to the AJC, which is a reality that is frustrating public health officials there.

The numbers don't lie. In the past two weeks, Georgia has had at least 2,200 new cases per day, and that is the low end of the scale. On August 8th, the single-day new case count was 4,423. And although Georgia ranks eighth in the nation when you're talking about population, it currently ranks fifth in total number of confirmed cases.

Joining me now is William Boddie, he is a member of the Georgia legislature and a Democrat. Thank you so much for being with us, Representative. I wonder just what was your reaction when you found out that your state has actually been getting reality-based warnings that complete contradict the public health stance from the state government, and that they are not following this, and that they're keeping it secret?

STATE REP. WILLIAM BODDIE (D-GA): Well, that's a great question. I was completely stunned and shocked. I mean, for the citizens of the state of Georgia to find out about this White House Task Force report in regards to their great state and my great state of Georgia through a leak, and AJC basically making this leak come to light, was very problematic for me.

Because we're talking about people's lives, and then this is not a political issue, this is a public health issue that every citizen in the state of Georgia needs to know what needs to be done to stop the spread of COVID-19 in the state of Georgia. And so it was very problematic for me.

[14:20:03]

KEILAR: And the Task Force, quote, "strongly recommends," those were the two words --

BODDIE: Yes.

KEILAR: -- that were used, that Georgia adopt a statewide mandate that citizens wear masks.

BODDIE: Yes.

KEILAR: As you are well aware -- and I think our viewers all over the country are aware -- the governor there, Governor Kemp, has recommended masks but he has refused so far to issue a statewide order. He even sued the mayor of Atlanta when she tried to impose one in the city of Atlanta, which has since been dropped.

BODDIE: Yes.

KEILAR: But I wonder what you think he might be doing going forward. He's talked about an executive order this weekend, what are you expecting?

BODDIE: I just think that is totally out of line for the governor. And the reason why is that in the state of Georgia, you have mayors like Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms in the city of Atlanta, and Mayor Van Johnson in Savannah, Georgia that are trying to do the right thing to protect their constituents. They are closest to their constituents and they know.

And so my request to the governor would be, if you're not going to mandate masks statewide, leave the local elected officials alone and let them enforce mask mandates on the local and county level.

When we talk about local control, the governor wants to control mask mandates for cities. However, he's letting the school system pick and choose if they want to mandate masks. So if you're going to let the school system mandate masks on the local levels, let the local municipalities and counties do the same thing in the state of Georgia.

KEILAR: I do want to mention that we contacted the governor's office to see if he could join us, and we got this statement from his press secretary.

Quote, "Governor Kemp continues to rely on data, science, and the public health advice of Dr. Kathleen Toomey and her team in our state's ongoing battle against COVID-19. As the governor has said many times before, this fight is about protecting the lives and livelihoods of all Georgians."

What's your reaction to that?

BODDIE: What data is he looking at? I would challenge the governor. The Governor's Mansion is less than 15 minutes, I would say, away from the CDC, less than 15 minutes away from Emory University, where you have global pandemic experts that are getting the data on a daily basis.

And I would ask the governor, just drive over to one of those facilities or both and sit down with the experts on the COVID-19 virus and talk with them, and analyze their data. Because the data that he's looking at obviously is not the right data.

If you're a citizen in the state of Georgia and we have 10.6 million people and we're up with the other states that are twice our size, like the state of Florida, the state of Texas and the state of California, the state of Florida has 22 million people. The state of Texas has 30 million people, and the state of California has 40 mil.

So you're going to tell me that the data that the governor's looking at and examining is the right data? Because if it is, we wouldn't be in the top five with other states that are twice, three times and four times the size of the state of Georgia. If he was looking at the right data.

KEILAR: Representative, thank you for being with us. William Boddie, we appreciate it.

BODDIE: Thank you so much for having me.

KEILAR: Just in, the CDC revealing what you can and cannot do if you've recovered from coronavirus. Stand by for that.

[14:23:32]

Plus, Don Lemon will join me live on the president amplifying another birther lie. This time, it's about Kamala Harris.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: President Trump is returning to one of the ugliest chapters in his political playbook: birtherism, or to be frank and call it what it is, blatant racism.

His target this time is the newly minted V.P. candidate, Senator Kamala Harris.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But can you definitively say whether or not Kamala Harris is eligible and meets the legal requirements to run as vice president?

TRUMP: So I just heard that. I heard it today, that she doesn't meet the requirements. They're saying that she doesn't qualify because she wasn't born in this country.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No, she was born in this country but her parents did not -- the claims say that her parents did not receive their permanent residence at that time.

TRUMP: Yes, I don't know about it. I just heard about it, I'll take a look.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: All right, she was born in this country, as you heard the reporter make very clear there, very irresponsible of the president to suggest that she was not.

And his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, also his senior advisor was asked about this last hour on CNN.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JARED KUSHNER, SENIOR ADVISOR TO PRESIDENT TRUMP: The president was asked a question, he said he didn't know anything about it. And now that you're insinuating that this has something to do with race.

President Trump's actions have been very consistent with trying to fight for all forgotten Americans. He's done a great job in that. He has an unimpeachable track record in terms of delivering success. But for whatever reason, the media likes to chase down rabbit holes and try to create controversies when ones shouldn't exist.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: All right. Don Lemon is with us now, he's the host of "CNN TONIGHT." I mean, I'm not going to insinuate anything. This has to do, of course, with race. And I just wonder what your reaction is to what you heard from Kushner.

[14:29:55]

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: Well, I don't think the media's insinuating anything. And that's not quite accurate, what Jared Kushner said. He was asked about it and he responded to it, and he didn't say I don't know anything about it, he responded.