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Labor Day Brings Concerns About New Coronavirus Spike; President Donald Trump Suggests Biden Has "Big Issues" Because He Wears A Mask; President Donald Trump Speaks As U.S. Economy Adds 1.4 Million Jobs In August; President Donald Trump: I Expect Good News On Vaccine, Therapeutics Soon; President Donald Trump Touts Coronavirus Response As Death Toll Nears 187,000. Aired 12-12:30p ET
Aired September 04, 2020 - 12:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[12:00:00]
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JOHN KING, CNN HOST: Hello to our viewers in the United States and around the world. I'm John King in Washington. Thank you for sharing a very busy news day with us. And a big day it is for Joe Biden. He is in Delaware for a speech on the economy and put blame for the massive American job losses on President Trump's pandemic mismanagement.
The president promises he can rebuild what he labels the greatest economy in the world. New economic data this morning outlines just how steep of a challenge that really is? Unemployment now back under 10 percent in the United States but the pace of the recovery is slowing.
There were 1.4 million jobs added last month but that was a smaller number than in July. And this, the president is sure to enter Election Day with a jobs record in the red. Coronavirus is driving the economic disruption and there is new worry today about a Labor Day surge because we have failed to get the number of infections down more and because many Americans are still unwilling to wear a mask and honor social distancing.
The IHME model now projects - get this number 410,000 will die by the beginning of 2021 if we keep doing now what we're doing. 410,000 that's more than the entire population of Tulsa, Oklahoma or you frame it this way 410,000 dead Americans would mean more Americans died in 10 months from this pandemic than died during four years fighting the Nazis and the Japanese in World War II.
Let's get straight to CNN's Rosa Flores in Miami, one of the states, Rosa that drove the summer surge and now has a giant concern even though it is in somewhat better shape heading into this holiday weekend.
ROSA FLORES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: You know you are absolutely right because local officials know that it's large gatherings that allow this virus to spread. I'm on Miami Beach, one of the most iconic beaches in the world. Normally during Labor Day this place would be packed. I want you to walk with me and take a look because even though it is not packed, officials here are making sure that the umbrellas, the beach furniture they're separated to allow for social distancing. There is a lot of concern here in Southeast Florida but officials are allowing beaches to stay open.
They do encourage masks, people to social distance and also wash their hands frequently. Earlier this week Governor Ron DeSantis had a press conference to promote tourism in his state, to reignite tourism saying and encouraging people to go to beaches and patting himself on the back for not closing beaches from the get-go. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. RON DESANTIS (R-FL): One of the things that I looked at very early in March when there was a lot of hysteria in the air is whether you shut every beach in Florida and people said you had to do that. That's just so important. I did not do that. I was criticized for it, of course, but it was the right decision.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
FLORES: Now, as we take another live look here you can see that some people are out on the beach wearing masks, others are not. I can tell you that the three Southeast Counties that were most impacted by the Coronavirus are allowing beaches to reopen and that of course is Miami-Dade County where I am, Broward and Palm Beach.
Now John, the only way for you not to wear a mask here in South Beach is for you to actually be in the water swimming. So here we go. I have tried it. This is the only way to be out here on South Beach without wearing a mask. John?
KING: Rosa Flores, literally getting wet in the line of duty for us. Rosa, I appreciate you being on the beach. So, let's hope it is stays as spaced out throughout the weekend as it is right now. Part of the election choice comes down to whose example the country wants the follow.
Last night the President of the United States setting an on the on masks, the opposite of what the public health experts in his administration say is essential.
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DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: But did you ever see a man that likes a mask as much as him? And then he makes this speech and always has it - not always but hanging down because you know what it gives him a feeling of security. If I were a psychiatrist - right? No. I would say, I would say this guy's got some big issues, hanging.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: CNN's Kaitlan Collins live for us with a busy day at the White House, Kaitlan? KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, certainly is. And you're seeing this with the president making those comments last night as, of course, his health officials are warning about going into the Labor Day weekend and what it will look like?
[12:05:00]
COLLINS: But the other big thing that we're reporting on today from the White House when it comes to Coronavirus is this push by the president to get a vaccine. And last night he made clear when he wants one?
And so the question is whether or not political pressure is being applied to those aides who are going to be responsible for helping get a vaccine? Of course, the FDA is squarely in the president's view and it comes to this and that means the FDA Commissioner, as well Dr. Stephen Hahn. But listen to what the president said last night when it comes to the timeline for a vaccine, John.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: It will be delivered before in my opinion, before the end of the year, but it really might even be delivered before the end of October. How do you like that? Wouldn't that be nice? That will be nice. You know why? Not because of the election. Be nice because we want to save people. That's why it would be nice.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: So he said there, it is not because of the election but of course, end of October is right before that election and privately the president has talked about this and said that he believes there are officials at the FDA who he thinks are deliberately slowing the process to hurt his chances of winning reelection when FDA officials say that's not the case.
They're obviously working just as fast as they can because they want the vaccine just as much as everyone else does. But John, while this is going on we also have another story popping up and that is a story about the president in the military after an article appeared in "The Atlantic" making a lot of allegations about the president and how he views the military overall.
But specifically talking about a trip he took to Paris in 2018 when he canceled a trip to the - cemetery which the article says that they were told it was because of the weather, that the president didn't want to go just because it was raining.
It was canceled in real time we know because of the weather. We were in Paris at the time but really what you take away from this article overall are these allegations about how the president views the military? And people service asking why people choose to serve knowing that they could?
Mocking John McCain something we know that the president has actually said publicly and on camera. There are tapes of it. And the president was so furious over this story, John, that he came and spoke to reporters when he got back to the airport last night and something he very rarely does.
It was so dark that they didn't even have a light on the camera as the president came and spoke and angrily refuted the story. As we have seen several aides come out and do the same, something really this effort to push back on a story that you don't always see this much of a rebuke from the White House of the story.
But the president did just comment on it. Again, he rejected the allegations and he did just told reporters he will be briefing today. So he'll likely have another chance to talk about this story on the record later on this afternoon, John.
KING: Kaitlan Collins, live as I said very busy day at the White House. Kaitlan, stay with us as we wait for this we're going to hear from the President of United States. He is meeting with the leaders of Serbia and Kosovo this hour and we expect to hear from him momentarily.
Kaitlan, you mentioned the president mentioned just again this president is bristling and he is angry about this story and it is in "The Atlantic". And it says as you said he calls losers and suckers, people who are heroes, American military personnel who died in combat.
The allegation is the president call them losers and suckers and the article notes that allegedly with him when he made at least one of those comments with his Former Chief of Staff, who is of course the Retired Marine General John Kelly.
It is interesting you mentioned Sara Huckabee Sanders, Hogan Gidley the president's former body man all political aides for the president have issued statements saying they have been around the president. He never said this; they never heard him speak like this.
We have not heard either from John Kelly or General Dunford who was the Former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who went with Kelly to that cemetery when the president did not go. Their silence to me is pretty telling. I'm assuming behind the scenes the White House is trying to get them to issue statements but here we are in the new normal a day later we have nothing.
COLLINS: I don't think we have heard anything from the Pentagon so far. None of the four stars or admirals and that's really telling because, of course, the allegations in this story are damning. The president has been so proud of his support from the military. He often talks about the military so much.
And so to lose that support ahead of the election would be pretty devastating for this president so that is likely why you have seen this response. But you're right, we have not heard from John Kelly and of course he is someone who could confirm these comments, or he could deny them given that he was--
KING: Sorry, to interrupt Kaitlan, I need to take you. This is the President of the United States in the Oval Office. TRUMP: Yes, sure.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The economy today, obviously it was 1.4 million jobs--
TRUMP: Right.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: --that were added. At this pace though it would still take a full year before all the jobs lost before the pandemic are regained. Is that good enough?
TRUMP: I think what's happening is you're going to see tremendous growth in the very near future. We are rounding the curving. We're coming with vaccines. I think the vaccines are going to be announced very soon.
And I think you are going to see great companies announcing these vaccines. I spoke with Pfizer today. I speak with different companies, Johnson & Johnson as you know doing really well. Moderna, we have tremendous talent, tremendous scientists and they're really right there.
[12:10:00]
TRUMP: And I think you're going to hear some very good news. And also, to me maybe even better I think when it comes to therapeutics. You're going to have some incredible news coming out very soon.
I say therapeutics because that's you walk into the hospital and whether it's a transfusion or a shot, people get better. That's something that I think right now is really incredible. The numbers are way down as you know.
Florida's doing very well. Arizona's been actually a little bit of a miracle how quickly it went down because it went up and it went down very quickly two really great Governors. Texas, great Governor, same thing. California the numbers are way down.
So we're really starting to see those areas that popped are really going down. The mortality rates, you look at the percentages, what's happening and that's because of the convalescent plasma, because of the Remdesivir. It's for a lot of different reasons but we all - we do have therapeutics that are really having an impact and you're looking at what's going on.
I have seen numbers from 50 percent to 85 percent better so that's really something. So we're very proud of the job we're doing and I think in particular not only the great companies but the companies, every one of them have said to me, if this was a more typical kind of presidency, I'll be nice.
If this was a more typical kind of president, getting these approvals would take two or three years and they'll have them, as far as we're concerned, very close to announcing some very big news. So we're honored by that. I have had a team, whether it's Vice President Mike Pence Head of the Task Force and all of the people on the Task Force. And really done a great job, I don't think they've been recognized for the great job they've done. And last night I read out in Pennsylvania Latrobe, the Home of the Great Arnold Palmer and I read out some statistics on how we're doing compared to other parts of the world and we're doing phenomenally well.
And if you took New York, New York was just really - they made a lot of mistakes in New York. But if you took that out, the tremendous number of deaths in New York, if you took that out, our numbers are just about as good as anybody in the world.
And even without that, without taking it out you see the kind of numbers we have. So we have done a good job, we've done a great job in helping Governors. I think every Governor is very happy, not everybody expresses it to the media but they do at the task force meetings.
We've had Task Force meetings where they are laying praise on us and then talk to the press and they won't be quite as generous but that's okay. But for the most part I think we have helped in every case we have helped every Governor and we've helped them a lot.
And some of them we have made look very good and some have done a really great job and others haven't. But as a country we have really done a terrific job and I want to thank Vice President Pence, but I won't thank too much right now because we like to get the job finished first.
And the vaccines are going to come out soon and the therapeutics are continuing and that's why we're having the kind of numbers we have. And I'll be doing a news conference today at 5:00 so I'll see you there, okay?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Sir, do you need to apologize to service members and veterans?
TRUMP: No. It was a fake story written by a magazine that was probably not going to be around much longer. But it was a totally fake story. And that was confirmed by many people who were actually there.
It was a terrible thing that somebody could say the kind of things and especially to me because I have done more for the military than almost anybody else. You look at how the VA is doing? It is doing incredibly well. We got all sorts of things done from accountability to veterans' choice to everything.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Choice of--
TRUMP: And it's got right now the highest approval rating that it's ever had. 91 percent approval rating it has never been anywhere close to that. Nobody's done what I've done and that includes salary increases but it really includes the rebuilding of our military because as you know when I came here our military was totally depleted.
And we spent almost $2.5 trillion, much more than you spent on your military I can tell you that, right? Slightly more $2.5 trillion all made in the USA, F-35s, brand new jets and rockets and missiles and hope to God that we never have to use it but our nuclear is now in extraordinary shape including new weapons.
I just hope we never have to use that because that's a level of power that you don't even want to talk about. You don't even want to hear about it.
[12:15:00]
TRUMP: So it's a fake story and it is a disgrace that they're allowed to do it. And very interestingly I hate to bring up his book but John Bolton, no friend of mine. I thought he was - didn't know too much about what he was doing?
He didn't do a good job but he wrote a book and he talked about this incident and he doesn't mention it. And frankly a lot of reporters even some pretty bad ones they read that and that was the end of the story. There's nobody that considers the military and especially people that have given their lives in the military to me they're heroes.
To me they're heroes. It's even hard to believe how they could do it. I say that - the level of bravery. And to me they're absolute heroes. Thank you very much, everybody. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
KING: President of the United States, you see him in the Oval Office there just addressing a number of questions. He is with the President of Serbia and the Prime Minister of Kosovo. Those two leaders signing an economic partnership if you go back in history a lot of tension between those lands so an important development for the president.
But he was discussing a number of issues. At the end there again angrily denying a report in "The Atlantic" that he called American service men who gave their lives in combat losers and suckers. The president insisting that was not the case.
The president also giving what you just simply have to say is a parallel universe presentation about the state of the Coronavirus pandemic in the United States right now. Saying the United States is doing much better than most of the word. It is simply not true.
You can find the numbers yourself and also just talking in a way that suggests the United States is out of the woods at a time his public health experts are urging states to do more because they are worried about another explosion in cases. CNN's Kaitlan Collins is still with us at the White House.
Kaitlan, it is just striking to hear, look, he is the president, he is a politician, he is up for re-election you want to put the best positive spin on anything. But his idea that we're doing a great job, just in the last week, his Coronavirus Task Force because the president will not give them a platform at the White House anymore to give public warnings.
They've given private reports to states like Missouri saying you are in a lot of trouble. I wish you would impose a mask mandate to a Republican Governor. To Iowa, you are in a lot of trouble. I wish you would impose a mask mandate to a Republican Governor.
Couple of weeks ago it was Georgia where the Republican Governor just again today said I want people to wear masks, mandates are not my thing. The White House Task Force sent him a stern report a couple of weeks back.
So we have a parallel universe where the president says all is well, vaccine will be here soon, when his Task Force is worried about the holiday weekend, worried about an explosion of cases in the fall and lamenting that the government has not done more to shove down the baseline of new infections which is still averaging around 40,000 a day.
COLLINS: It makes you wonder why the Task Force doesn't make those reports public. Instead they give them to the Governors, they tell them to distribute them around the state. But we see just how different and how urgent those warnings are coming from the administration's own task force and those documents yet.
We don't always find out about it publicly in real time rarely we do. Sometimes we get them from Governors and sometimes they do not share them with us. And the White House is not sharing them with us or even confirming them.
So you kind of think what would the pressure be on those local leaders if the White House had published these reports at the time where they were telling them close your bars, make people wear mask and instead those Governors and local leaders were ignoring basically and just dismissing those urgent warnings.
And so that's one big thing we've talked about throughout this, why don't they make those public? The other thing is we're seeing the president of course try to put a positive spin on this. In our reporting last night that we published about the FDA and this push for a vaccine, we saw how the White House is really willing to make what seems like pretty minor announcements seem like these bigger announcements?
Because they want people to think that they're making progress here. It happened with the emergency authorization for convalescent plasma as a potential treatment for COVID-19 patients that is something that didn't have a full consensus about approving that EUA.
But instead the president came out on a Sunday he held this really big press conference talking about it and he brought the FDA Commissioner and HHS Secretary with them. And the FDA Commissioner later had to walk back his statements because basically he overstating the benefits of what they were doing?
They overhyped it according to medical experts and so you see how they're really looking for any piece of good news. And of course, as a president you can understand why anyone wants good news? But it's also important that it's realistic and that people actually know where we are and where things are going?
And if we're actually going to have a vaccine by the end of October like the president said last night at that rally it is something that you've not heard from the vaccine chief or from Dr. Anthony Fauci who is also working closely on this vaccine development. It's just two different messages and people want to have a realistic timeline of when there could actually be a vaccine?
[12:20:00]
KING: And it is stunning to the degree that if you're one of those who have subscribed to the theory the president only does things that are in his interest. If he would get the case countdown closer to the election it might be in his interest, but he will not speak up and urge these Governors to do more in the places that have the hotspots.
Kaitlan Collins, I appreciate the live reporting there. If you have listened to the president you also said he believed the U.S. economy was "Rounding the corner" This on a day when the government did report a lower unemployment rate, did report job growth last month but at a slower rate than the month before.
Let's bring in our Chief Business Correspondent Christine Romans. Christine, the data from the government today says okay but not great. Is that fair?
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I think that's fair and when you look over the course of the summer what you have seen is a very deep hole, a very deep hole in the jobs market, a crash and we've crawled our way halfway through that hole now so a lot of work still to be done.
1.4 million net new jobs in any normal time that would be a record but, in fact, that is slower than last month and slower than the month before so the trajectory of these job gains really important to look at here. The jobs growth is slowing.
Remember in the spring in May and June and even in July you still had the effects of that super charged stimulus. Well, in August you didn't and so now there's some concern that this job creation could slow more going forward.
I mean, overall, you lost 22.2 million jobs in 2 months the crash in the spring and now we've brought back about 10.5 million. That's leaves us 11.5 million jobs short of where we were before this pandemic began.
Now what amounts to good news in 2020 is that the jobless rate is 8.4 percent. That is still a staggeringly high number, it is down below 10 percent, it is lower than it was in the Great Recession. But the government in this report John is pointing out that if you classified workers a little bit differently this number might be more in the 9 percent range.
So we're closely watching that there you saw some gig workers, part time workers going back to work, that was important. But we also saw a lot of government workers, census workers, about 250,000 census workers, those are temporary jobs, those will go away. KING: Well, let's hope the recovery continues but as you know there are some, at least some potholes or warning signs speed bumps ahead. Christine Romans, very much appreciate the live reporting there.
When we come back Joe Biden has a very different view. You just heard the president say we're rounding the corner. Joe Biden will deliver soon his comments, his take of the state of the economy and his belief that the president's pandemic mismanagement has made things worse.
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[12:25:00]
KING: Live pictures we're showing you here that are Wilmington, Delaware the Former Vice President now Democratic Nominee for President Joe Biden moments away from delivering a speech on the economy. He will make the case because of President Trump's pandemic mismanagement the U.S. economy is not recovering as quickly as it should from the pandemic blow.
As we wait for the Former Vice President with me now to discuss is our Chief Political Correspondent Dana Bash CNN Congressional Correspondent Phil Mattingly and the National Politics Reporter Yahoo News Brittany Shepherd. Thank you all for coming in and forgive me if I have to interrupt if the vice president does shows up we'll take those remarks.
Dana, it is an interesting moment in the campaign after having the most orthodox campaign ever and we still have that. But suddenly you have the President of the United States in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, last night he was in North Carolina the day before that. Joe Biden was in Kenosha, Wisconsin yesterday and he is out giving a speech today was in Pittsburg earlier in the week.
We now have a more active campaign not normal, but a more active campaign and we have a more complex conversation about the issues. It is not just the Coronavirus or just racial reckoning or just the economy.
Joe Biden about to try to connect those dots if you will and saying you have a combination of crises in America because of the incumbent president and his failed leadership.
DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: No question and those they're all connected, that one has caused the other and it has kind of gone back and forth when it comes to the cause and the effect. And what I mean by that is that the president was so eager to get the economy back up and running, to get the jobs numbers back up, to open up society, to return to normal that he didn't discourage Governors from doing it too soon and in some cases maybe quietly or not so quietly encouraged them to do that.
And what happened was the virus got worse in a lot of places and the economy got worse along with it. One thing that Joe Biden says as a refrain and I'm sure he'll say again today is that one; you can't talk about one without the other. And he is not wrong and the reason I say that is because we see this now as evidence of what is happened with the virus and with the economy as they are completely intertwined and we have seen that over the last six months and it continues right now.
KING: And Brittany, another dynamic in the campaign, the president was just talking about it in the Oval Office, as well. And this Joe Biden does call out repeatedly, is that the White House briefings are no more by the Coronavirus Task Force only the president briefs now. Every now and then he'll have one scientist around. But Dr. Birx is warning states. Dr. Fauci is warning states. But if you listen to the president his rally last night we're out of the woods.
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TRUMP: Before the China virus, this election was over. Now I had to go back to work. We have done a great job on it. We don't get the credit. We have done a hell of a job. Always starts off, COVID-19 that's all he knows, COVID-19. I say, what about the economy, what about the jobs? What about all the other things we have to do? All he does, he thinks it's a weak spot. It is actually a strong spot.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KING: Again, the Former Vice President, the Democratic Nominee, will connect those dots in the speech we'll hear in just a few minutes. But it's just interesting to me I know there are very few persuadable voters left so the president there was largely speaking to people who are for him and are not going to be with him not matter what.
But to stand up and say we're doing a great job, at a time we're approaching 200,000 Americans dead and that IHME projection says that will more than double by the end of the year unless Americans start wearing masks, more Americans start wearing masks and socially distancing.
