Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Antioch Police Arrest 17-Year-Old Following Shootings at Kenosha Protest; CDC Issues More Restrictive Testing Guideline Changes; Live Coverage of Kenosha, Wisconsin Press Conference. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired August 26, 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]

JENNIFER GRAY, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Now, we're waiting on that turn to the north because that's what the National Hurricane Center is banking on for it to make that landfall right there at the border.

If it does not make that turn, it is going to make landfall farther west, that's going to put places like Houston more in this than it will be if it makes that landfall a little bit farther to the east.

So the hurricane hunters are out there. They found winds of 139 miles per hour. Of course there are winds higher than that, with it being a Cat 4, within the storm. And you can see the outer bands already starting to make it on shore. South Louisiana, southeast Texas coast. So we do have the tornado potential there. Consider this pregame because the actual storm or the meat of the storm will make it onshore later tonight.

So here we go, there's the current storm surge of about two feet in Calcasieu, Sabine Pass, almost two feet. And we're looking at 15 to 20 feet of storm surge across southwest Louisiana. What does that look like? It shows later all the way up to I-10 in places.

This is a very low-lying part of the Gulf Coast. Louisiana, there's a lot of marsh, they have lakes, the oxbows, the rivers that flow all the way through there that feed into the Gulf of Mexico, so the water could easily make it up to I-10. And so that's what we're seeing, the water inundation with the storm surge where it is now. Could be higher if the storm gets much stronger than that, so keep that in mind.

Here's a high-res forecast radar, what we're expecting right now. Storms this big will wobble. They'll wobble to the west and to the east, they're not going to flow in a straight line. So this is not perfect right here, but given the models that we have this is what we're thinking of a landfall right there along the Texas-Louisiana line.

And then still, a significant storm well inland. The Ark-La-Tex, places like Shreveport, Little Rock will definitely feel the impacts of this as well. Here's the area shaded in purple that we're thinking will get 110-mile per hour winds or even much higher, especially along the coast. You're going to get stronger winds. And then the winds, all the way, 75 miles per hour in places like Shreveport.

So this storm is going to be felt far and wide. Tropical storm-force winds, Anderson, extend about 175 miles from the center and so we're talking about wind and storm surge with this storm. Not as much the rain like Harvey, but we're talking about devastating wind and storm surge with this one.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST: I mean, that's amazing that it might get up to a Category 5. I mean, that's just incredible. Jennifer Gray, really important information. Thank you.

We do have breaking news out of Kenosha, Wisconsin right now, a suspect involved in last night's fatal shooting that left two people dead has been taken into custody. That's according to the Antioch Police Department.

The violent arrest stems from the police shooting of Jacob Black, an unarmed black man who was shot multiple times in the back in front of his children. CNN's Sara Sidner is on the ground for us.

So what do we know about this arrest?

SARA SIDNER, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: So we know from the Antioch police that this is a 17-year-old Antioch resident, so he is underage. We know that they apprehended him and are looking to charge him, arrested him for first degree murder.

So at this point in time, we don't have a lot of details but only that he is a 17-year-old Antioch resident. And just to give you some idea where Antioch is in compared to Kenosha, it's about 13 miles or so away, so in the local vicinity but not actually someone who was from Kenosha itself.

I do want to show you some video. Now, we are not sure if this is the same person that has been arrested, but there is video on social media that we have been talking about all day of a man with a large gun. He is wearing a sort of green, he is running down the street as people are chasing him. They have accused him of shooting someone.

As he starts to run down the street, he falls on the ground. People are coming at him, and then he fires his gun, not once, but two or three times. He hits someone at point-blank range. That person crumples to the ground and does not move after that. And then someone else is also shot -- shot in the arm.

We know this now because we have just talked to a witness of that shooting who was able to sort of see this whole thing unfold. And he told us -- his name is C.J. Halliburton -- he told us that the injuries that he saw of the -- the man who was crumpled on the ground, that it appeared that he -- those were life-threatening injuries. And the person who was shot in the arm survived, he was still talking after this but that he had a huge hole shot through his arm, because this was a very high-powered weapon.

He also described the person that you're seeing as someone who was quite young. He said at some point he looked very scared, he said his eyes were like saucers as he was walking with this large gun that he described as larger than the man himself as far as across his body.

[14:05:05]

He also said that when this man passed him as people were chasing him, he turned to look at C.J. Halliburton, who is livestreaming this whole thing. And says to him, I didn't shoot anybody, I didn't shoot anybody. But then as he's running down the street and falls down, he ends up -- and you can see it on-camera -- shooting at least two people at that time.

We are trying to ascertain whether or not the 17-year-old who has been apprehended by the Antioch Police Department is indeed the same person shown in this video. We do not have that information at this time, but clearly on the video there are two people who have been shot there, and so we are trying to ascertain that.

Because, Anderson, there were a lot of gunshots last night. There were a lot of things going on, and we know that there is at least one person injured and two people dead at this point, and we're just trying to figure out if this is two different suspects or just one -- Anderson.

COOPER: Right. Also just important to point out, you know, there were violent acts by protestors -- buildings, property damage lit on fire, there was confrontations with police. Then there was also a call that went out among people on Facebook for what were described as patriots to come. And at least one of the posts that I saw on Facebook was for patriots to come and defend the city of Kenosha from -- you know, I think they said "violent thugs" or something like that.

So there's both protestors, and then there's whether -- I think the sheriff described them as sort of vigilantes or self-styled militia. Not sure how much of an organized militia they actually were. They're basically weekend warriors with long guns who came to you know, argue with protestors, defend property. And we don't know exactly who this 17-year-old, where he plays into all of this.

SIDNER: That's absolutely right. What we do know is that he lives in the vicinity, just outside, 13 miles away. But we should mention that that call to arms, if you will, to come protect property and persons, you know, we actually saw that and we know people who have witnesses what they had on.

We did talk to someone who talked about them having on a lot of army gear as they stood around gas stations for example. And they said that they were there to protect the property.

Of course, protestors who had just gotten done battling it out with police, as they're taking on tear gas and throwing water bottles at police in light of what happened to Jacob Blake, who was shot seven times in the back by a police officer, then you have this new element that has entered into this protest situation. And it went very, very, very wrong and very violent with two people being killed and one person very badly injured. And so there's a lot of concern, Anderson, in this city. We've been following sort of the world of militias and sort of the world of folks who are looking at the United States as a place that they feel like they need to protect against people that they don't like their actions. And there has been a call to arms in this country by some small groups who have tried to create a war, a civil war. And there's a lot of that out there as well.

And so there's a lot of concern in this community. They do not want to see that happen and pop off here in Kenosha, but there's a lot of fear from residents. We even heard from a county supervisor who said he knows some residents that are simply leaving the city for a while because they do not want to be in the midst of this and they do not want their children in the midst of this, fear that this is going to turn into something much bigger and much more violent -- Anderson.

COOPER: Yes, Sara Sidner, thank you very much, appreciate it.

We expect to hear form local officials in Kenosha in just a moment. We'll bring you that -- there you see the podium with the sheriff -- we will bring you that live when it happens of course.

Now, to the startling change in CDC guidelines on who should get tested for the coronavirus. The change that one senior health officials tells CNN came as the result of pressure from the Trump administration. The agency previously recommended tests, quote, "for all close contacts of persons with SARS-CoV-2 infection."

Now, suddenly, the agency says that some people without symptoms probably don't need a test even if they've been in close contact with an infected person. Our Nick Valencia is tracking all the developments for us.

So, Nick, Health and Human Services Secretary -- well, the admiral, Brett Giroir that is sort of the -- he was at one point referred to as the testing czar, he's expected to address these changes at a briefing this afternoon. He also issued a statement to CNN earlier. What is he saying?

NICK VALENCIA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: That's right. Sometime in the 2:00 hour, 2:00 Eastern, Anderson, we're expecting to hear from Admiral Brett Giroir about the specifics of what led them to make these changes.

But we're hearing laid out very clearly from a federal health official that this is coming from the very tops of the upper ranks of the Trump administration, from the White House to the HHS, which oversees the CDC, directly to the CDC reversing -- essentially -- recommending that less people get tested, discouraging testing.

[14:10:13]

Now, this falls in line with what we've heard repeated for weeks if not months during the pandemic from President Trump, who wants to slow down testing. He believes that if there's less testing, there will be less infections. There's no public health official in the United States right now that

you will find that thinks that this is a good idea. In fact, experts here at Emory University, one of the top medical schools in the nation, are really pushing back on this and want to know the specifics behind this decision.

According to this federal health official, Anderson, who I spoke to earlier by phone, they told me that this is coming from the very upper ranks. And they're not commenting, when I reached out to the CDC, as why they changed their recommendations. HHS, however, did release a statement to our Sara Murray and Kristen Holmes. I want to read this here very quickly.

It says, "This guidance has been updated to reflect current evidence and best public health practices, and to further emphasize using CDC- approved prevention strategies to protect yourself, your family, and the most vulnerable of all ages."

Anderson, it is worth noting, prior to this, the CDC recommended for viral testing, if you were thought to be around somebody who had -- was positively infected or if you were thought to have been exposed even if you were asymptomatic, you were being encouraged to be tested.

I asked a federal health official if this has anything to do with capacity. They laughed. Clearly, President Trump is going to get what he wants here in less testing if this guidance holds up, and hopefully we'll get more details as far as what went behind this decision-making and this change in policy at this press conference at 2:00 -- Anderson.

COOPER: Yes. Admiral Giroir, who's by the way not an admiral, he's -- works for public health. He gets the title of an admiral but he's not a Navy admiral, he gets to wear a uniform that's a Navy uniform --

VALENCIA: That's right.

COOPER: -- but he's not in the Navy. He says it's to reflect current evidence. That makes it sound as if there's some new evidence out there, some new studies, peer-reviewed studies that are out there. I've talked to several doctors already in the last hour, there are not as far as we know. So it's unclear why they would even say all of a sudden, this thing that people are symptomatic don't need to get tested. Nick Valencia, we'll see their press conference.

Dr. Jake Deutsch is an emergency medicine physician. Dr. Deutsch, good to see you. One expert I spoke with last hour said it doesn't pass the common-sense sniff test. I'm wondering what your thoughts are on this.

JAKE DEUTSCH, EMERGENCY MEDICINE PHYSICIAN: Yes, Anderson. Aside from bad politics, it's really just bad medicine. We know that the number one situation that we have is people testing positive have high percentage of asymptomatic cases. And if we have people that are potentially exposed, we need to test them, we need to identify these infections which are otherwise undetectable.

So advising people not to get tested if you are in clear contact with somebody who is known to be positive just doesn't make sense. I'm not going to recommend that to my patients, and we need to understand what that objective -- why this was pushed through. Is it a capacity issue? Certainly the labs are being overwhelmed with high number of tests, but we need to make testing more available. That should be the policy which is being pushed through.

COOPER: Yes. I mean, the CDC specifically mentions people without symptoms in this new updated guidance, but just last month the CDC said as many as 40 percent of Americans infected with the virus are asymptomatic. How will it even be possible to track new cases or do contact tracing?

DEUTSCH: Completely contradictory. And I can speak from experience testing thousands of patients a month, we're seeing that of the low number -- we have a low percentage, about one percent in New York -- three-fourths of those are asymptomatic. So if we don't identify people who otherwise wouldn't have been identified, we're not going to keep this number low.

So that's the critical message here. And if we don't have testing available, if we make it confusing for people -- which clearly, this is just one more layer of confusion for people on what they need to do -- we're not going to head in the right direction.

COOPER: Again, the -- Brett Giroir, the HHS assistant secretary, telling CNN that the guidance was updated, quote, "to reflect current evidence." Have you seen any evidence that would support a change?

DEUTSCH: Absolutely not. The number of people that are getting tested now, the majority of them are asymptomatic. Many are just coming in because they needed to get tested for school or travel, and then they find out they actually are carrying the virus. So that just goes to show how important it is to continue to do spot-testing, randomly test people. And certainly if somebody was in direct contact with somebody that was sick, get tested.

COOPER: What's interesting too is this change was made quietly on the website, no public announcement, no briefing. Again, what is so suspicious about this is not only does it suddenly bring the scientific community -- the CDC -- in line with what the Trump administration wants, which is less testing.

The idea that they would announce such a thing just by changing what's on the website and not actually even kind of making a big deal of it, seems to me extraordinary. Because such a change like this affects -- I mean, the idea that they would just like, in the night, put it on their website -- it just seems surprising to me.

[14:15:21]

DEUTSCH: Incredible. I mean, there are so many examples of incredibly bad practices and management of this crisis, but you know what also speaks to me is the press conference in the Rose Garden that was given the other day, there wasn't significant testing as well. Some people were tested. If they were farther away, they weren't being tested. That really speaks to the agenda for this administration. And my agenda as a physician, as a person who is taking care of people

that are sick, and for the 5 million people who have been infected, we need to make sure that we do what's best for our population, and that's continue to test people.

COOPER: Dr. Jake Deutsch, I appreciate your time. Thank you very much.

DEUTSCH: Thanks, Anderson.

COOPER: More on our breaking news right now, Hurricane Laura now a Category 4 storm, set to hit the U.S. tonight. This is a monster storm. We're going to take you to the coast.

Plus, we are moments away from a news conference by police in Kenosha, the site of deadly shootings in a protest over the shooting of an unarmed black man.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:20:34]

COOPER: Bed, Bath and Beyond has announced it's laying off 2,800 employees, the latest retailer struggling with financial challenges because of the pandemic. The job losses are effective immediately and account for about five percent of its total workforce. The company has previously announced it was permanently closing 200 stores later this year.

Here are some other coronavirus headlines CNN correspondents are following.

LUCY KAFANOV, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Lucy Kafanov. A day after maskless protestors stormed the Idaho State Capitol, authorities on Tuesday arrested and wheeled (ph) anti-government activist Ammon Bundy out of the building, still tied to a rolling chair after he refused to leave the auditorium.

CNN affiliate KBOI reports that Bundy and other protestors have demanded gallery seats during the special session to address coronavirus, despite efforts to limit crowd sizes due to the pandemic. They are demanding an end to the state of emergency declared by Republican Governor Brad Little. Bundy has since posted bond, and is awaiting a court date.

BRYNN GINGRAS, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm Brynn Gingras in New York City. Maine's health officials can now link 60 COVID-19 cases to a wedding that took place in that state two weeks ago. But get this, some of the people who tested positive weren't even guests at that wedding. Instead, in some cases, they are people who had contact with someone who had contact with someone who was at that wedding.

Health officials link cases to a county jail and a nursing home, both located at least 100 miles away from where the wedding took place. One person has died from this outbreak and Maine's governor, giving a sobering reminder about this virus, saying, quote, "One person, one contact can light a match and spark a fire that we may be unable to put out."

COOPER: Thanks to all our correspondent.

Unrest in Wisconsin following the police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha has quickly turned into a political flash point in one of the nation's most important swing states. In the 2016 election, Trump won Kenosha County by just over 200 votes. The way voters in Wisconsin interpret Blake's shooting and its aftermath could be central to November's outcome in a state Trump won by fewer than 2,300 -- excuse me, 23,000 votes in 2016. Trump was the first Republican to carry Kenosha County in 44 years.

Now, President Trump and Republicans are using this week's convention to shine a spotlight on violence and property damage that's resulted from some of the protests over racial injustice and police shootings this summer. So how will voters react to the president's calls for what he calls law and order?

CNN political commentator Michael Smerconish joins us now. Michael, we saw Black Lives Matter movement featured at the DNC. Now, we're seeing the Trump campaign paint pictures of unrest, violence, lawlessness. We heard from the McCloskeys who were, you know, gun-toting people outside their home, sayings that Trump -- that the Democrats want to do away with the suburbs altogether.

The president has just tweeted that federal law enforcement, National Guard are headed to Kenosha. Both of these components are at the forefront of the election and playing out in real time.

MICHAEL SMERCONISH, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: So the president, Anderson, is portraying himself as the thin blue line that separates suburbanites across the country from what they're watching on their television sets either in Kenosha or in Portland, Seattle beforehand, a little bit in Chicago as well.

I think the McCloskeys and that incident is kind of a Rorschach test for this campaign, right? If folks line up on the side of the gun- toting couple from Missouri, they're more likely to be Trump supporters. And if their sympathies lie with the Black Lives Matter protestors who were in that camera frame, then they're probably voting Democratic.

But it's clear that this is something that the White House, that the Trump campaign sees as a means of winning back suburbanites without whom he can't get home.

COOPER: It's so interesting that, you know, they were focusing on the McCloskeys. We now have a 17-year-old in custody with police, and we're waiting to hear a press conference on that. After you know a call went out on Facebook for armed people to come and defend the city, defend property, two people were killed last night, were shot to death last night.

Things can go awfully wrong when there's a lot of people with weaponry in a very chaotic and you know, in the midst of a chaotic protest.

[14:25:00]

SMERCONISH: Right. And I guess your point is, we really don't even know what the facts were for that recent shooting incident. I don't know that that's going to matter in terms of how this is all going to be handled. And you know, there's scant political data thus far as to how this plays out, but there are some interesting findings.

A CBS YouGov survey found that a plurality, 44 percent of Americans, believe that the aftermath of the George Floyd incident has gone a bit too far. And I'm sure that that's a number that the Trump administration and the campaign are paying attention to.

Something else that's interesting about the data, Minnesota, at least according to a RealClearPolitics average, closer than Pennsylvania or Michigan, albeit only by a couple of points. But it begs the question, why would Minnesota be closer if the data is accurate than those other battleground states? I'm sure they want to read into that and to say, you know, this is our winning hand and we're going to pursue it.

COOPER: Interesting. Michael Smerconish, appreciate it. Thank you very much.

The 2020 Republican National Convention continues this evening with Vice President Pence formally accepting his nomination, plus appearances by South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem, Senators Marsha Blackburn and Joni Ernst, and more. Special coverage continues tonight, starting 7:00 p.m. Eastern, live on CNN.

And we are moments away from a news conference by police, we're told, in Kenosha, the site of the deadly shootings and the protests over the shooting of an unarmed black man.

Plus, Hurricane Laura is now a Category 4 storm, set to hit the U.S. tonight.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COOPER: Let's listen to the press conference in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

MAYOR JOHN ANTARAMIAN (D), KENOSHA, WISCONSIN: Well, thank you all for being here. It has been a difficult time in the city of Kenosha, a devastating time for the community. There have been deaths that are sad, there are situations where we have an officer shooting that is being investigated and has been given to a third party, which is the state of Wisconsin. And they will be the ones who will do the investigation and then once the investigation is done, it'll be turned over to the District Attorney's Office.

What I want to talk to you about though today is what's going on. There are a lot of very good people in this community, and what is happening to them is wrong. People have differences of opinion. We have different concepts of how things should be done -- those are all fine.

But violence in the community is not acceptable. Violence to property, violence to people? Absolutely unacceptable. And it is up to us to make sure that that does not continue.

We have called on many groups for support. And one of those I'd like to thank at the moment is Mrs. Blake, who came out and said stop, this is not what her son wanted. And so I want to give a heartfelt thank you to her because she cared about the community and what was being done in her son's name. And that is appreciated.

But we still have so many things that we have to deal with, and a lot of misunderstanding of what is being done in this community for the safety of the public and the safety of the community.

And I want to just kind of walk through a little bit of what occurred after the shooting. The city made the request to the state for support. And Governor Evers granted the Guard -- National Guard to come in. We have continually talked with him about the Guard, and the Guard has continued its numbers into the community to help us deal with the looting and violence that has occurred.

We also have had the situation where we have called for a curfew, which is 7:00 to 7:00 (ph). And that curfew is there to protect the public. We need to make sure people are off the streets so law enforcement can do their job.

[14:29:58]

And I think sometimes people forget that they think that because you call a curfew, it's there so you can give tickets to everyone. It is not, it is there to protect the public.