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Trump Pushes Law and Order Message on Wisconsin Visit; Latin American Economies Hit Hard by COVID-19; Some Russian Teachers Raise Concerns over Vaccine; Facebook: Russia is Targeting American Voters Again; New Questions Surround Trump's Hospital Visit Last Year. Aired 12-1a ET
Aired September 02, 2020 - 00:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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JOHN VAUSE, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Shot an African American man seven times in the back.
A rain soaked Japan now bracing for a major typhoon.
And why did Donald Trump say a stroke was not the reason for his mystery trip to a hospital in November when no one suggested it was?
CNN NEWSROOM begins now.
VAUSE: Donald Trump spent three hours in Kenosha, Wisconsin, on Tuesday and never said the name, Jacob Blake, the Black man shot by police. He didn't visit Blake in hospital; he didn't meet with Blake's family but he did have a lot of praise and millions of dollars for police. CNN's Jeremy Diamond reports from the White House.
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DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: A thing like this should never happen.
JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Tonight. President Trump surveying Kenosha, Wisconsin, a week after police here shot a Black man in the back seven times.
But the president all but ignored that tragedy, instead lamenting the property damage caused by riots that followed the shooting and delivering political remarks.
TRUMP: Reckless far-left politicians continue to push the destructive message that our nation and our law enforcement are oppressive or racist. They'll throw out any word that comes to them.
DIAMOND: Also taking credit for a National Guard deployment he did not order.
TRUMP: This ended within an hour, as soon as we announced we were coming and then they saw we were here. This ended immediately. DIAMOND: Falsely claiming federal troops marched into Kenosha and ended the unrest. The reality, all National Guard troops in Wisconsin are under state control.
As for Jacob Blake, Trump addressing the situation only after questions from reporters.
TRUMP: I feel terribly for anybody that goes through that. As you know, it's under investigation. It's a big thing happening right now. I guess it's under a local investigation.
DIAMOND: Blake's uncle saying above the fray.
JUSTIN BLAKE, UNCLE OF JACOB BLAKE: We're not going to get caught up with him. He wished we would and we're not. We're here to heal Kenosha and push forward our agenda for getting little Jake justice.
DIAMOND: Today, Trump denying the existence systemic racism in policing.
TRUMP: No, I don't believe that. I think the police do an incredible job and I think you do have some bad apples.
DIAMOND: A day after he compared the police officer who shot Blake to a golfer cracking under pressure.
TRUMP: you know, a choker. They choke.
Shooting the guy -- shooting the guy in the back many times, I mean, couldn't you have done something different?
Couldn't you have wrestled him?
I mean, in the meantime, he might have been going for a weapon and you know there's a whole big thing there. But they choke. Just like in a golf tournament, they miss a three-foot putt.
DIAMOND: Trump also making excuses for Kyle Rittenhouse, the 17-year old charged with killing two people during Kenosha protests.
TRUMP: He was trying to get away from them, I guess, it looks like. And he fell and then they very violently attacked him.
DIAMOND: And while Joe Biden delivered blanket condemnation of any violence...
JOE BIDEN (D-DE), FORMER U.S. VICE PRESIDENT AND PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We have to stand against violence in every form it takes.
DIAMOND: Trump refusing to condemn violence by his supporters.
TRUMP: That was a peaceful protest. And paint is not -- and paint is a defensive mechanism. Paint is not bullets.
DIAMOND: Trump is also spinning new conspiracy theories. Controlling
LAURA INGRAHAM, FOX NEWS HOST: Who do you think is pulling Biden's strings?
TRUMP: People that you have never heard of, people that are in the dark shadows.
DIAMOND: And then there was this:
TRUMP: We had somebody get on a plane from a certain city this weekend. And, in the plane, it was almost completely loaded with thugs wearing these dark uniforms, Black uniforms with gear.
A lot of people were on the plane to do big damage.
DIAMOND: The president providing no evidence to back up his strange claim.
TRUMP: This was a firsthand account of a plane going from Washington to wherever. And I will see if I can get that information for you. Maybe they will speak to you. Maybe they won't.
DIAMOND: President Trump spent nearly three hours on the ground in Kenosha and, during that time, we saw him turn this city into the backdrop for his 2020 reelection campaign and his focus on his law and order message.
We saw him disparage what he called left-wing violence and this anti- police rhetoric that he feels some politicians are engaging in.
What we did not hear from the president in those nearly three hours were the words Jacob Blake. That is the name of the man who was shot by police in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and the president did not utter his name once during those nearly three hours.
Instead, we heard the president only address the situation when he was asked about the shooting. In that case, we heard the president say that he feels terribly about the situation but he declined to weigh in any further. The president also did not meet with Jacob Blake or his family -- Jeremy Diamond, CNN, the White House.
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VAUSE: Ron Brownstein is CNN senior political analyst and the senior editor for "The Atlantic"" and he joins us this hour from Los Angeles.
Ron, let's get straight to it. There is a shameless and bizarre absurdity of a president who violated ethics law while announcing a law and order platform, who for four years considered himself above the law while inciting the violence that his senior adviser confirmed is all part of their campaign strategy.
I'm wondering if there's any indication that this is working.
RON BROWNSTEIN, CNN SR. POLITICAL ANALYST: The answer is we don't know yet because there has not been any high quality polling since the Republican convention last week but there are several reasons why the Democrats are a little more calm about the situation than they were immediately after the convention.
One, Joe Biden gave a very strong speech on Monday, not only denouncing violence but also criticizing the president for fomenting violence on the other side.
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BROWNSTEIN: They are putting a short version of that on television with part of the incredible $300 million dollar-plus fundraising haul they announced for the month of August, the most any candidate has ever raised at this point in a single month.
The other thing that has happened in the last few days is that Trump, once again, has shown that he does not really understand the limits of how far to push. He has taken his argument to an extreme. You saw that last night and you probably talked about it, he was on FOX News, comparing the shooting of unarmed Black man to a golfer missing a putt.
And today his appearance in Kenosha, not meeting with the family while they were organizing a community festival. So I think Democrats feel they have to watch this line of attack but they feel that Trump is, as is often the case, playing to the short side of the field and building a box over his own support.
VAUSE: To this point, so far by my count, more than 350 senior Republicans have endorsed Biden. We're looking at former Republicans elected to Congress, national security officials, campaign aides for Mitt Romney and hundreds of officials from the George W. Bush White House years.
You write about the impact this could have on the GOP regardless of what happens in November. That was picked up by the anti-Trump Lincoln Project, which added this.
"We are on the cusp of a profound political realignment in American politics. The split in the GOP may be marginal at the moment but history is often made on the margins. College educated Republicans are leaving the GOP. The historic number of GOP endorsements of Biden are a sign."
So if 2016 was a hostile takeover of the Republican Party by Trump, does that mean next his bankruptcy, moral bankruptcy, which is almost like going out of business?
BROWNSTEIN: Yes, it's a reconfiguration at least. As I pointed out today, the number of Republicans endorsing Biden, high-profile Republicans, is the largest number of crossover endorsements for a presidential nominee of the other party since Nixon in 1972 and the giant Democrats for Nixon operation that existed as part of this 49- state landslide that year.
And the Nixon crossovers, the Democrats who crossed over for Nixon really were the heralds of the reconfiguration of the electorate among blue collar whites. Their movement from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party, as well as the movement of Southern Democrats into the Republican Party, you could see that beginning to develop in the kind of officials who crossed party lines in '72.
The same thing may be happening in reverse now, 50 years later, where all of these white collar Republican professionals, who had been both in campaigns and administrations, are leaving Trump's definition of the GOP and endorsing Biden.
They're not the cause of the problem; they are a symptom of it. Trump is on track to run more poorly on college educated whites than any Republican nominee ever. In the House, Republicans are down to one- quarter of all the seats where college graduates exceed the national average.
And in the Senate, similarly, they could be holding a very small percentage of the Senate seats after this election in the states where there are more college graduates (INAUDIBLE).
That's the trade Trump has imposed on the party. He's weakening it among young people, people of color and college educated whites who tend to be growing constituencies. And that is the cost of his improving their stand among non-college whites, rural and evangelical whites, all of whom are shrinking as a share of the electorate.
VAUSE: We hear about mail-in ballots and the fraud and all that; now this year we will see an unprecedented number of mail in balloting and a data firm has done the numbers on this. They found that Republicans are expected to overwhelmingly vote in person, Democrats by mail, which on Election Night, would create what they call a red mirage.
Because the in person balloting gets counted mostly that day, the mail-in ballots will be gathered in the days after that. So what we could have on Election Night is the Republican ahead by a wide margin, claiming victory.
But the reality is, when all those mail-in ballots are counted, he actually loses the election and Biden wins. In between Election Night and that count being finalized, Trump --
(CROSSTALK)
VAUSE: -- would declare those mail-in ballots as fraudulent.
BROWNSTEIN: Absolutely. It could be extraordinarily turbulent. The polling has been clear that many more Democrats than Republicans say they are going to vote by mail and if you look at the early ballot requests in some of the states where you can already request ballots, you're seeing them.
In places like Pennsylvania, for example, I think a lot of Democrats in the end are going to request a ballot by mail but return it in person in early voting. So I'm not sure the effect will be as quite as severe as they said.
But if you look at a state like Arizona, for example, on Election Night in 2018, Martha McSally, the Republican, was leading. And by the time and they counted all of the mail-in ballots from Maricopa County, the largest county, Kyrsten Sinema won comfortably. [00:10:00]
BROWNSTEIN: So this is a real dynamic and it's just one of many ways I think that between now and next January we could be in for some of the most turbulent months in American politics since the 1960s or perhaps even 1860.
VAUSE: And there are 60 something days to go?
Ron Brownstein, good to see you.
BROWNSTEIN: Thanks for having me.
VAUSE: Cheers.
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VAUSE: This weekend is the Labor Day holiday in the U.S. If history is prologue, it could mean a major spreading event is about to take place for the coronavirus.
Across the U.S. a number of states, including California and Florida, are seeing infection rates decline and health experts are pleading for Americans not to become complacent.
Meantime, government health experts are pushing back on the latest supposed breakthrough treatment being touted by "doctor" President Trump. More now from CNN's Dianne Gallagher.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DIANNE GALLAGHER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A National Institutes of Health panel says doctors should not use convalescent plasma as a standard of care for COVID-19 until more study has been done.
This is a little more than a week after the FDA issued an emergency use authorization and President Trump praised it as a historic breakthrough.
TRUMP: It's had an incredible rate of success. Today's action will dramatically expand access to this treatment.
GALLAGHER (voice-over): But the National Institutes of Health saying, in a statement today, quote, "There are insufficient data to recommend either for or against the use of convalescent plasma for the treatment of COVID-19."
There are now three potential coronavirus vaccines in phase 3 human trials here in the United States but Dr. Anthony Fauci is cautioning that proven safety is far more important than speed when it comes to vaccines.
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: You don't want a vaccine to be available widely to the American public unless it has been shown to be safe and effective.
GALLAGHER (voice-over): After saying that a vaccine could be authorized for emergency use or even approved before human trials are completed, FDA commissioner Dr. Stephen Hahn now says he would consider resigning if he was pushed to authorize a vaccine before it was ready.
DR. STEPHEN HAHN, FDA COMMISSIONER: I think all options are on the table with respect. I hope we will not be in that position.
GALLAGHER (voice-over): If one is approved, is expected to initially be in short supply.
DR. RICHINA BICETTE, BAYLOR COLLEGE OF MEDICINE: A lot of the companies that are in phase 3 trials are also saying that they will have to do vaccines that are not single dose but double dose vaccines.
GALLAGHER (voice-over): So who gets it?
Today, an independent committee appointed to help advise the federal government released a four-phase proposal that starts with health care workers, first responders and people with conditions that make them especially vulnerable to COVID-19.
As testing totals decline, Admiral Brett Giroir, who leads U.S. testing efforts, announced $5 antigen tests will be sent out to states starting in a few weeks but also said he was tired of being asked about cheap, quick tests for every American.
ADMIRAL BRETT GIROIR, M.D., ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR HEALTH: I don't live in a utopian world, I live in the real world. And the real world had no test for this new disease when this first started.
GALLAGHER (voice-over): Dr. Ashish Jha, dean of the Brown University School of Public Health, responded on Twitter, saying, "That's what White House staff and major league sports get now. Sure, let's call it utopia when it's for the less privileged."
The average number of daily cases and deaths have declined over the past seven days as the coronavirus surge now appears to be moving from the South to the Midwest. But officials are concerned about what Labor Day weekend might bring, since cases spiked in many areas in the weeks after Memorial Day weekend and the 4th of July.
MAYOR SYLVESTER TURNER (D-TX), HOUSTON: As we approach Labor Day, let me encourage people to be mindful. The virus is still looking for you. And so if you come together, then you will give it a home.
GALLAGHER: Now experts in the United States are actually asking college students to stay at school and if they have plans to go home, to quarantine 14 days before they go back to their home cities or see their family members.
That is because of this exponential rise in cases among college students. At this point, more than 20,000 college students have tested positive for COVID-19 in 36 different states -- Dianne Gallagher, CNN, Atlanta.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: Along with the devastating global death toll from this pandemic, there's the ongoing economic chaos. Latin America has been especially hard-hit and Brazil in particular, with the world's second highest number of cases, is now officially in recession. CNN's Matt Rivers has more now on the economic fallout.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MATT RIVERS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We know the coronavirus pandemic has devastated countries across Latin America not only from an public health standpoint but also from an economic standpoint and we got more proof of that on Tuesday with new GDP figures released by the Brazilian government.
The country's Institute of Geography and Statistics announced on Tuesday that Brazil is officially entering a recession after posting a 9.7 percent decrease in the GDP in the second quarter as compared to the first three months of this year.
[00:15:00]
RIVERS: And that is, of course, due to the effects of the coronavirus pandemic in that country. Brazil has experienced one of the worst outbreaks of any country around the world.
This also comes as Brazilian officials announced they will be extending aid payments to some of the country's poorest families through the end of this year. Those payments, of course, in connection to coronavirus relief.
Meanwhile, here in Mexico, we heard from Mexico's president on Tuesday. He gave what is essentially the State of the Union address here in Mexico, talking about the state of affairs here over the past year.
And as politicians are wont to do, he highlighted what he believes his country's successes are, including its fight against COVID-19, despite the fact that Mexico's death toll is among the highest of any country around the world. The president says he believes the worst of the pandemic is over, both from a public health standpoint and an economic standpoint.
He said the economy added more than 90,000 jobs in August alone. But that doesn't change the fact that Mexico's economy has been devastated by this outbreak here. In the second quarter, the GDP fell more than 17 percent as compared to the first three months of the year. The International Monetary Fund predicts that, in 2020, Mexico's GDP could fall 10.5 percent -- Matt Rivers, CNN, Mexico City.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: Still to come, good news for teachers in Russia. They will be among the first to receive the rushed, untested, potentially deadly, locally made coronavirus vaccine. Find out why some are surprisingly saying nyet.
Plus, with strong winds and heavy rains Typhoon Maysak is heading for South Korea. We will tell you when it's expected to make landfall in just a moment.
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VAUSE: The trial of 14 suspected accomplices in the terror attack on "Charlie Hebdo" magazine in Paris will begin in the coming hours. The French satirical magazine is republishing the controversial cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad. They are at the heart of the 2015 massacre alongside a tribute to the 12 people who were killed in the attack.
President Emmanuel Macron defended the magazine's right to publish the cartoons.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
EMMANUEL MACRON, PRESIDENT OF FRANCE (through translator): I think that a president of the French Republic never has a right to pass comments on the editorial choices of a journalist or a member of the editorial staff, never, because there is a freedom of the press that you quite rightly care deeply about.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: A day after the attack on "Charlie Hebdo," a police officer and four men were killed at a supermarket.
Right now, a powerful typhoon is barreling towards South Korea. Typhoon Maysak already swept through Japan, hitting the island of Okinawa, bringing heavy rain and winds up to 193 kilometers an hour.
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VAUSE: In Russia, students are now returning to class, even as the number of confirmed cases continues to climb, now an excess of 1 million. And while the first doses of the Kremlin's vaccine are available, Matthew Chance explains, some teachers don't want it.
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MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Starting school can be daunting, even without a pandemic. But Russia is putting on a brave show. It says it has a vaccine after all, approved for use on this COVID frontline. Well it's the first day of school here, the first time since March that Russian classrooms have reopened amid the COVID-19 pandemic. It's very exciting for the kids.
Their teachers, who are meant to be among the first to benefit from Russia's new coronavirus vaccine, but what we are learning is that few, if any, have taken up the offer to be vaccinated.
We were given access to one of Moscow's top schools where some measures like testing and teachers and face masks have been implemented.
And I have seen that they are not using face masks. They're not --
But no one we spoke to here had taken the Russian vaccine, even though teachers, along with doctors, are meant to have been given first access after the vaccine was fast-tracked to approval before completing phase three human trials.
There is some concern that it might not be safe, it might not be effective. Have you heard that concern amongst your colleagues? Amongst teachers that they are worried about the vaccine?
MARIA ZATOLOKINA, DEPUTY HEAD, SCHOOL 1363: Actually, we haven't discussed it yet. But I think that every teacher understands how important to be safe and to create a safe environment for our students to be healthy. That's why I hope that we are possible people and we should -- we should be vaccinated.
CHANCE: Are you going to have the vaccine?
ZATOLOKINA: Yes, of course.
CHANCE: Definitely?
ZATOLOKINA: Definitely.
CHANCE: But there are others who say they definitely want. One Russian teacher's union has started an online petition, calling on members to reject the vaccine outright on safety grounds and expressing concern that vaccination, currently voluntary, should not be made mandatory unless clinical trials are complete.
YURI VARLAMOV, TEACHER, UCHITEL UNION MEMBER: Before the end of all testing, they cannot make it mandatory. But I know that in some schools, in some state bodies, people are talking about mandatory status of this vaccine in the end of this year.
CHANCE: Do you think that's a sort of political decision?
Do you think it's important for the Russian authorities to make sure everybody has this vaccine, whether or not it works, whether or not it's safe?
VARLAMOV: Yes. Sure. That's a very political decision, because skills of government to make the life of people safe is a very important point in Russia.
[00:25:00]
CHANCE (voice-over): And so is showing Russia's widely criticized vaccine to be a success. Teachers can refuse it now but not, perhaps, for much longer -- Matthew Chance, CNN, Moscow.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: A new survey has found 3 out of 4 adults worldwide would get vaccinated for COVID-19. Enthusiasm for a vaccine was highest in China, 97 percent, followed by Brazil, Australia, India and U.K. That's the top 5. The U.S. ranks 20th out of 27 countries, with a third of those asked saying they would not get the vaccine and fewer side effects is the reason why.
Researchers in Florida say face shields and masks with breathing valves may be ineffective in preventing the spread of coronavirus. This simulation shows people wearing those devices can still spread tiny droplets over a wide area. It shows a face shield can initially block the droplets but they can move around the visor relatively easily.
And droplets can also pass through the valves of masks when someone sneezes or coughs. The study suggests that high quality cloth or surgical masks are more effective at preventing the virus from spreading.
Still to come, U.S. intelligence officials warned about Russian misinformation during the U.S. election months ago. Now Facebook says Russian trolls are at it again, targeting Left-leaning voters.
Also, new questions tonight over the president's mysterious hospital visit last year.
Why did officials reportedly feel the need to get the vice president to be on standby?
That is to come.
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VAUSE: Well, for the first time during this election campaign, there is evidence that Russian Internet trolls are at it again. It's the same group that interfered last time and the same player. Donie O'Sullivan has the details.
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DONIE O'SULLIVAN, CNN BUSINESS REPORTER: Facebook on Tuesday announcing that acting on a tip from the FBI, it had removed a set of accounts that it said were linked to the Internet Research Agency. That's the Russian troll group that sought to interfere using social media in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
A lot of concerns here in the United States that the Russian troll group is back again to interfere in November's election.
Now Tuesday's takedown all focused on an online magazine called Peace Data, which posed as a left-wing news outlet, a left-wing independent news outlet. And it wrote articles about U.S. foreign policy, about the presidential election.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
DONIE O'SULLIVAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: And similar to what the Internet Research Agency had done in 2016, it attacked Democratic candidates, this year being Vice President Joe Biden and Senator Kamala Harris, from the left, a tactic that analysts who have looked at these accounts pointed out, which was something that was also done by Russia in 2016 as they tried to split the Democratic vote and support for Hillary Clinton.
[00:30:23]
The good news here is that this -- these pages had relatively low traction. Facebook, the FBI, and others seemed to catch them early on in their sort of infancy. And they had posted about other issues, not only just the election.
The bad news here is, of course, that this is happening at all and that Russia is active in this space so close to November's election. And one particular new development which we hadn't seen with this sort of operation in 2016 was the use of artificially-generated images.
Take a look at this Twitter account, which was also removed, belonging to a person purportedly called Alex Lacusta, who identified himself as the editor of Peace Data. Now, while the profile picture on that account may look like a real person, analysts and experts who looked at these accounts said that that image was actually generated through using artificial intelligence technology. It is a deepfake image, meaning the person in that picture does not actually exist.
Now, prior to this, an easy way to spot a fake account, or one way to spot a fake account would be if it had used profile pictures from -- had stolen them from a real person. Obviously, with this new development and technology, that is something that is no longer possible.
So with just a few weeks to go to November's 2020 election, it's a good reminder to all of us to be careful with what we encounter online, and that with new developments in technology come new risks.
Back to you.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
JOHN VAUSE, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Steve Hall was the chief of Russia and Ukraine operations for the CIA, and he is a CNN national security analyst. He joins us from Tucson, Arizona. Steve, it's been a while. Thanks for taking the time to speak with us.
STEVE HALL, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Sure.
VAUSE: OK. It seems this is all kind of a replay of 2016 but with a few added bonuses. You've got the fake profiles created by artificial intelligence, and notably, real freelance writers who are contributing articles to -- to this Peace Data website.
And the strategy here seems to mirror what President Trump was sort of doing earlier this year, and that's try to split the progressive wing of the Democrats, you know, the Bernie Sanders wing of the party, away from the Joe Biden-Kamala Harris side of the party. I mean, does that mean they just watched the news, or is there something else here?
HALL: Well, it's really no surprise, of course, that the Russians are doing this again. The American intelligence community has -- has predicted this and said it's going to happen.
It is interesting that they have improved a little bit in terms of, you know, sort of the deepfake technology that they're now using. And the good news is, of course, that the FBI caught this and notified Facebook.
But really, the interesting thing for me is that I don't anticipate that we're going to see a whole lot more of this. I think what's really going to happen here is the Russians have learned since 2016 that they don't need to use these fake accounts, even if they, you know, pay journalists unwittingly to contribute to such a fake account.
What they can do is they can use the content that, really, the United States and other western democracies during elections are providing them. Those divisive issues that we all already know, the Black Lives Matter for example, racism, police brutality, even the COVID pandemic.
And they'll take that, and they'll put it up on RT. They'll put it up on a Russian government-owned site, knowing that, as human beings, we just can't help ourselves. We will just -- you know, we'll copy that meme because we look at it. We have an immediate emotional response to it. And we'll get it out there.
So they don't really have to rely on these more sophisticated methods when we're helping them just by looking at the bigger issues, or the bigger sites like RT, Sputnik and so forth.
VAUSE: OK. So to that end, "The New York Times" is reporting that, according to two U.S. intelligence officials, "This group's recently discovered activities on Twitter and Facebook were almost overt, designed to be detected."
So further to this question, what are we not seeing? Because you seem to be implying that they're going to dumb it down and just basically take advantage of, you know, our own sort of, I guess, failings, if you like. But are the Russians actually doing something else? Have they developed something over the last four years that, you know, is beyond all of this?
HALL: Well, look, the Russians, I think, will use every weapon at their disposal. So are they going to use bots to amplify things? Absolutely.
Are they going to continue to try to come up with some of these fake sites? Yes, they're going to do that.
But again, I think what they really learned was they don't have to work that hard. I mean, in 2016, they were establishing these fake accounts and trying to get as many followers as possible. But again, what they have learned is using their big media operations -- RT, Sputnik -- and then on a sort of lower level that people don't necessarily recognize as much, sites like Ruptly and Redfish (ph).
They know that, if that content, that divisive content which grabs everybody, is there for the taking, we'll do it ourselves. They don't have to be that sophisticated to be amazingly effective. And I think that's the path they're going to choose, and indeed are choosing, this time around.
[00:35:13]
VAUSE: Yes. That's kind of sad, because you'd think that, at least, they'd have to work for it.
If there is some good news here, it's the reaction, I guess, from Facebook and Twitter, which closed down these sites fairly quickly, but meantime, over the Trump administration, the director of national intelligence, John Ratcliffe, has ended election security briefings to Congress. Over the weekend, he explained why. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN RATCLIFFE, U.S. DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: I reiterated to Congress, look, I'm going to keep you fully and currently informed as required by the law.
But I also said we're not going to do a repeat of what happened a month ago, when I did more than what was required, at the request of Congress, to brief not just the oversight committees, but every member of Congress.
Within minutes of that -- one of those briefings ending, a number of members of Congress went to a number of different publications and leaked classified information.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Yes. Keeping in mind this is the same guy who a week ago was playing down the threat from Russia, suggesting China was a much bigger issue.
But is that an excuse of the leaking of Congress, is that -- you know, how does that sit with you? HALL: Look, I've worked in CIA's Office of Congressional Affairs,
which is their legislative affairs unit. I can tell you that's just balderdash. I mean, it's stupid, right?
If what he is -- what the DNI is saying is, I am not going to provide you with oral briefings. Instead, I'm going to provide it to you on paper, as if somehow -- I mean, this is just common sense, right? Somehow you can't leak paper? That makes no sense whatsoever.
What makes a lot of sense is the fact that the DNI is essentially trying to minimize his contact with the oversight committees, which he's -- you know, he's legally responsible for keeping them fully informed as to what's going on. And he's trying to do the minimum amount that he possibly can to stay within the law but at the same time not provide a whole lot of information to Congress on what is absolutely a threat to the security of the United States.
VAUSE: Is this a pre-cover-up before the cover-up, before it happens?
HALL: Yes. I suppose there's a lot of different technical terms that we could use, but it's just -- it's just this administration.
I mean, again, when I was at the CIA working at the Office of Congressional Affairs, we would never have said, Well, I just don't know if we're going to respond to that, or We're the ones who are going to decide how Congress is going to hear what it gets.
That's not the way it works. Oversight committees are there for oversight. And when you try to avoid it, even if you try to paper it over, it's still avoiding providing the people's representatives the information that they need.
VAUSE: Yes. Steve, great to have you with us. It's been a while. Good to see you.
HALL: Sure. My pleasure.
VAUSE: Still ahead on CNN NEWSROOM, there's a new report about Donald Trump's secretive trip to the hospital last year. And the president now denying he had a stroke, even though no one said he did.
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VAUSE: One weekend in November last year, suddenly without warning, without notice, President Donald Trump made a mysterious dash to Walter Reed Hospital. It's still not known why he went there, but now a new book, which has been just released, has raised some serious questions about the purpose of that trip. Here's CNN's Brian Todd.
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BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): President Trump's unannounced visit to Walter Reed Army Medical Center last November, raising new and troubling questions about transparency from the White House.
In a forthcoming book obtained by CNN, "New York Times" reporter Michael Schmidt, not revealing his sources, says Vice President Pence was put on standby to temporarily assume the powers of the presidency if Trump had to undergo a procedure that would have required anesthesia.
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: It makes you wonder, what was that, and is it going to lead to anything more down the road? He was only in the hospital for just over an hour, so you know, we know that it's unlikely he was anaesthetized. It's unlikely he had a procedure done, but something that day got people really worried.
TODD: Pence did not end up assuming the powers of the presidency that day. At the time of Trump's Walter Reed visit, the White House called it routine. A former White House physician who served under Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton says there could be a straightforward explanation.
DR. WILLIAM LANG, FORMER WHITE HOUSE PHYSICIAN: The president travels. The job of the military -- military unit and the medical unit is to make sure that all contingencies are covered, so we don't know what the details of this reported, have the vice president on standby, this may have just been the routine, OK, the president is going to the hospital. Let's make sure we've got all of our standard -- standard operating procedures in place.
TODD: Responding to questions about his health, Trump tweeted, "It never ends" and denied a suggestion from a fringe author that he'd suffered a series of mini strokes.
Trump's White House physician, Dr. Sean Conley, also denied that, and in a statement today, said, "The president remains healthy and I have no concerns about his ability to maintain the rigorous schedule ahead of him."
But CNN chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta says there remain too many unanswered questions over unusual occurrences surrounding that Walter Reed visit.
GUPTA: They say this was a routine visit, but nothing about this visit was routine. On a Saturday, unannounced, doctors in the car with him.
They say it had nothing to do with the brain or the heart, but frankly, most routine things can otherwise be taken care of at the White House. So this doesn't make sense.
TODD: There have been other attention-grabbing moments. On two separate occasions, President Trump had to steady one hand with the other while drinking water during speeches.
He seemingly walked hesitantly down a ramp at West Point this summer, steadying his feet at every step. He made an unfounded claim at the time that the ramp was slippery, and he didn't want to fall in front of the, quote, "fake news." DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: This was a steel ramp.
It had no handrail. It was like an ice-skating rink.
TODD: Through all of it, the president and his doctors have repeatedly contended he's healthy, but one medical ethicist is concerned about the secrecy.
ARTHUR CAPLAN, DIRECTOR, DIVISION OF MEDICAL ETHICS, NYU LANGONE MEDICAL CENTER: Our biggest worry is we have an election between Trump and Biden, and Trump somehow, in the middle of this, becomes somewhat incapacitated, but covers it up, doesn't let us know that the person we're going to vote for may become increasingly disabled during a second term.
TODD (on camera): Vice President Pence now says he doesn't recall being put on standby the day that President Trump went to Walter Reed.
In an interview with FOX News, the vice president said he's always kept informed of the presidents movements, and he's always ready. But he doesn't remember anything out of the ordinary about that day.
Brian Todd, CNN, Washington.
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VAUSE: There you have it. Thank you for watching CNN NEWSROOM. I'm John Vause. I'll be back at the top of the hour. But in the meantime, stay with us. WORLD SPORT with Patrick Snell is after the break.
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