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Update on Coronavirus Responses Around the World; Sarah Huckabee Sanders Denies "The Atlantic" Article Reporting Trump Called Servicemembers "Losers," "Suckers"; Biden Ad Hits Trump on Military Remarks as He Continues to Deny Them; Tonight at 8:00 P.M., "Fight for the White House: Joe Biden's Long Journey"; Volunteer Michael Rouse Discusses Participating in Moderna Vaccine Trial; Trump Takes Questions from Reporters at White House. Aired 1:30-2p ET
Aired September 07, 2020 - 13:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
[13:30:00]
VEDIKA SUD, CNN REPORTER: India has reported over 90,000 infections for two consecutive days.
The country's population stands at over 1.26 billion, whereas Brazil has a population over 211 million.
India's confirmed death toll stands at over 71,000, the third-highest across the world.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN HOST: Thanks to both of you.
Back here at home, former employees of the postmaster general are speaking out, reportedly saying that Louis DeJoy pressured them to donate to Republicans and then reimburse them through bonuses. That's next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[13:35:14]
BALDWIN: Sarah Huckabee Sanders may no longer be the White House press secretary but she is the latest ally of President Trump's to rush to his defense after that recent article in "The Atlantic" alleged he referred to fallen U.S. servicemembers as "losers" and "suckers."
The president and his allies continuing to deny the report even as multiple outlets, including CNN, have confirmed several details.
And now the Biden campaign is using Trump's words against him in a new ad targeting military families.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) MUSIC)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: Let's go to Gloria Borger. She is in Washington. She's our CNN chief political analyst.
Gloria, listen, how many times have we talked about how the president is no stranger to controversial remarks?
GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes.
BALDWIN: And surely he will be asked about this at his news conference today, that is one of the mainstream outlets is allowed to ask a question.
But could this time be different or might it have a significant impact on the campaign?
BORGER: I'm going to quote from Harry Enten, who is own numbers guru here at CNN, who said that, "Active military and veterans combined are about 12 percent of the voting population." So it's large and Donald Trump generally does well with them.
And I think this is something that clearly the Trump campaign is worried about. You saw the way the president and lots of his advisers have been very strongly pushing back against it, including Sarah Huckabee Sanders. And they will continue to push back against it.
I think the real question is: Will somebody go on the record talking about this?
And the president already disparaged General Kelly in kind of a prebuttal saying that, you know, he couldn't handle the job at the White House.
But we have to see how this story continues to play out -- Brooke?
BALDWIN: But as you point out, it's not just CNN confirming it.
BORGER: Yes. Yes.
BALDWIN: "The Washington Post," the Associated Press, "The New York Times," even FOX News.
BORGER: Yes.
BALDWIN: Let's talk about you and this project you have been working on for quite a while.
BORGER: Yes.
BALDWIN: You sat down with the former Vice President Joe Biden and a number of people close to him as part of this new CNN documentary on his life and career. And in one part, he speaks about his very first race back in 1972. Let's roll the clip.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BORGER (voice-over): It was audacious if not arrogant for Biden to run as a 29-year-old underdog candidate of change against a well-liked Republican Senator named Caleb Boggs.
CALEB BOGGS, FORMER DEMOCRATIC SENATOR: What is your last name?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Miller.
BOGGS: I know the Miller family.
TED KAUFMAN, PERSONAL FRIEND & LONGTIME BIDEN ADVISER: He had been governor of the state for two terms. He was a member of Congress for three terms. And he was running for his third term in the United States Congress.
Caleb Boggs was loved. I mean, he was loved.
BORGER: Once again, Biden asked Valerie to run the show.
VALERIE BIDEN OWENS, SISTER OF JOE BIDEN: I remember saying to him, Joey, I can't run a statewide campaign. I don't know how to do that.
BORGER: She reached out to a local Democratic Party activist, Ted Kaufman.
KAUFMAN: So I went down and talked to him. I said, so you are running on civil rights. You are running on the environment. You are running on tax reform. And those are really good issues. Then silence. And I said, but I don't think you have a chance of winning.
BORGER (on camera): You said what?
KAUFMAN: I don't think you have a chance of winning.
BORGER: And his reaction to that was?
KAUFMAN: Just come and help me. We'll see. We'll see.
BORGER (voice-over):p Biden was confident he could talk his way into voters' hearts but what Kauffman saw was bleak.
KAUFMAN: On Labor Day, we did a big-time poll. You know what the number was? It was 47 percent for Boggs, 19 percent for Biden.
BORGER: But it was also the first year 18-year-olds could vote. And young voters saw a candidate who was promising that he understands what's happening today.
And 50 years later, this time as a political elder trying to connect with young voters, it's still his mantra.
(CHANTING) UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They had this funny feeling that Caleb Boggs just -- his heart wasn't in it. He had been talked into returning one more time by Richard Nixon.
BORGER: And then --
BIDEN OWENS: We snuck up on him. Boggs, this is the Nixon landslide here. Everybody expected no Democrat to win and that was the truth.
KAUFMAN: He won by a rousing 3,100 votes.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: Gloria, in the clip, we heard from Joe Biden's sister, Valerie. And she's helped run every campaign --
BORGER: Everything.
BALDWIN: -- in his life. What is their relationship like?
BORGER: It's really close. I was asking Biden about her and he teared up about her. She has been with him in every campaign. They are a very close family. But I think Val has always been by his side.
[13:40:11]
If you saw -- I don't know if you remember the pictures of Super Tuesday where they were kind of -- he had his arm up, Jill Biden in one arm and his sister, Val, in the other. So I think it really couldn't be closer.
She is very involved in this campaign, obviously. And don't forget, he's run for the presidency a couple times before this, where it didn't go so well. So she's kind of hoping it will be better this time.
BALDWIN: Yes. We'll be tuning in.
BORGER: Thank you so much.
BALDWIN: I know you have been working on this project for so long
So Gloria is bringing us this --
(CROSSTALK)
BORGER: My COVID project. My COVID project.
BALDWIN: Your COVID 2020 project.
BORGER: Right.
BALDWIN: Thanks to you stories of Joe Biden. And then we'll also hear Donald Trump and their fight for the White House. The back-to-back documentary event starting tonight 8:00 Eastern here only on CNN. Please tune in for that. Very shortly, President Trump is expected to take questions from
reporters at the White House. We'll bring that to you live in just a moment.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[13:45:35]
BALDWIN: Scientists racing to develop a coronavirus vaccine are still struggling to recruit people of color to join the clinical trials.
Moderna, the first company to begin phase three trials in the United States, said it has increased its enrollment of black, Latino and Native American volunteers but it is still not even close, they say, to the levels they need.
Their participation is critical because, as you know, people of color are disproportionately impacted by COVID-19.
President Trump promises a vaccine by the end of the year or maybe sooner. He says perhaps before the election.
But that is something Democratic vice-presidential nominee, Kamala Harris, tells CNN she would not trust at face value.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. KAMALA HARRIS (D-CA) & VICE-PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: I would not trust Donald Trump. And it would have to be a credible source of information that talks about the efficacy and the reliability of whatever he's talking about. I will not take his word for it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BALDWIN: With me now, Michael Rouse, who's among the first volunteers for the Moderna vaccine trial at UCHealth University of Colorado Hospital.
Michael, thank you so much for being on with me.
And the obvious question is: Why? Why did you want to volunteer? How's it been going so far?
MICHAEL ROUSE, MODERNA CORONAVIRUS VACCINE TRIAL VOLUNTEER: I wanted to volunteer because of the news reports saying that they were unable to get African-Americans and other minorities to participate. I think it is important that we step up.
And I've been fairly healthy all my life and that's because of vaccines.
And this vaccine is very important for the minority community because, between April and August, there's been over 35,000 African-Americans die from this disease.
So I wanted to use myself as an example of someone who was not afraid to step up, take the vaccine. And I got my first shot in September 20th. And I've been doing fine ever since.
The Moderna vaccine is not like vaccines used to be. I think that information needs to be pushed out more into the minority community to make sure people understand this is a new type of vaccine. They're not using any part of the virus.
They're actually using your body, the cells in your body to generate the spike protein that mimics the virus. So it's very safe. And as I said, I've been quite healthy.
BALDWIN: Just so I hear you correctly, I know you said September 20th. We're not quite -- did you mean August 20th when it started?
ROUSE: Yes, yes. I meant August 20th.
(CROSSTALK)
BALDWIN: No, no, I know.
(CROSSTALK)
BALDWIN: If you were to put a name on -- I mean, thank goodness you're healthy and good on you in I can say for stepping up.
But do you have any concerns? If you had to say, this is my one concern, what would it be?
ROUSE: Well, my one concern probably is that the test needs to go through its cycle.
I think because these are new ways of developing vaccines, we don't know -- I'm not a doctor by any means. I'm just a regular guy on the street.
But what I see is, you know, we don't know how long it is going to last because it hasn't been in human testing for a year yet. They just started phase one testing some time in, I believe, March.
But other than that, I have no concerns because the vaccine will eventually dissipate in your body once it does what it needs to do.
BALDWIN: Glad to hear you.
I have more for you, but, Michael, forgive me. I need to -- you are upstaged by the president of the United States.
We need to go to the White House and listen in.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: -- on the opposite side of John McCain. John McCain liked wars. I will be a better warrior than anybody. But when we fight a war, we will win them.
And frankly, I was never a fan of John McCain. You know that. It's been very obvious. But I had to approve his entire funeral. I wanted him to get -- he deserved a first class -- it was approved by me. We sent Air Force One to pick up the casket, a lot of things. [13:50:59]
But, no, I was not a fan of John McCain because he wanted the endless wars and I didn't. I thought that the way that the vets were taken care of, our great vets, was not good, not appropriate.
Of course, he took the fake dirty dossier and gave it over to the FBI.
So this is not somebody -- am I supposed to say, what a wonderful guy?
So, you know what, I lived with him. He lived with me. But we had different philosophies. I think my philosophy is right. I think it's turned out to be right.
But I was not a fan. But I respect people. And I respect a lot of people. That doesn't mean I necessarily have to agree with them. And I didn't agree with him in a lot of things.
The story is a hoax, written by guy who's got a tremendously bad history. The magazine itself, which I don't read but I hear it's totally anti-Trump. He's a big Obama person. He's a big Clinton person.
And he made up the story. It's a totally made up story.
In fact, I was very happy to Zack Fuentes came out -- and I think that's number 15. And these are people who were there. That's the 15th person, General Kellogg. Everybody that was there knew what happened.
And so I was happy to see that Zack came out and said it isn't true. He just came out.
And it's a disgrace. Who would say a thing like that? Only an animal would say a thing like that.
There's nobody that has more respect for not only our military but people who gave their lives in the military. There's nobody -- and I think John Kelly knows that. I think he would know that. I think he knows that from me.
But Zack Fuentes, as you know, worked for John. And I think they both know that. But Zack came out, as you know, today or yesterday, last night, and said very strongly that he didn't hear anything like that.
Even John Bolton came out and said that wasn't true.
What was true is that we had the worst weather. I think it was as bad a rain as I've just about ever seen. And it was a fog. You literally couldn't see. I walked out. I didn't need somebody to tell me.
I walked out and said, there's no way we can take helicopters in this. I understand helicopters very well. And they said, no, sir, that's been cancelled.
They would have had to go -- Secret Service, I have a whole list. They would have had to go through a very, very busy section during the day of Paris. They would have had to go through the city.
The Paris police were asking us, please don't do it. Because, really, when you need that, you need a lot of time. They take days and days and days to prepare for that.
I wanted to do it very badly. I was willing to sit in a car for two hours, three hours, four hours. I didn't care. It didn't matter. And I had nothing else to do. I went there for that. I had nothing else to do.
It was ended because of the terrible weather. And nobody was prepared to go through, in terms of Paris, the police, the military, and the Secret Service.
And they came out very strongly and said, sir, we can't allow you to make this trip. If I wanted to. Sir, we can't allow you, from a safety standpoint.
It was a phony story, just like the dirty dossier, the fake, phony dossier, just like the Russia collusion, just like all of the other phony stories. And there will be more phony stories.
But I do appreciate Zack coming out. But Zack now is the 15th person that's denied it. Zack, now, I think, also talked about the weather aspect of it. And he's probably the 14th or 15th person that blamed it on weather. So, that's enough of that.
Yes, please?
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Thank you for holding the briefing.
TRUMP: Thank you.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: We're seeing judges limit police ability to limit nonlethal force. My question to you: Should the police be allowed to use nonlethal force to quell the violence in their cities?
TRUMP: We're talking about where, nonlethal force?
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Right.
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: Well, I think what's happened is the toughness. These are Democrat-run cities, all. And there's no retribution.
There's no -- they stand there. They throw things at the people that are supposed to be protecting something and nothing happens. They throw rocks. They throw cans of soup. They throw lots of hard objects. And rarely does anything happen.
What I've told -- when we have the federal in there -- I told the U.S. Marshals to get the man who killed a -- another man and they know who it was. And you have to arrest him. You have to arrest him. After two and a half days, they didn't arrest him. The U.S. Marshals went in and it ended up being a gun fight and the
man was killed. But this is a man that had a bad record and a man that killed a man in the street. I witnessed it. Most people witnessed it.
And the U.S. Marshals went in. They weren't playing games. They can't play games. If somebody is breaking the law, there has got to be a form of retribution.
[13:55:03]
I watch so often, when I watch some of the areas we're talking about -- now we have Rochester. That's, again, Democrat governor, Democrat mayor. All Democrats, every one of them. And it always will be.
I was with the governor of Texas and he looked at me and said, I can't imagine how they allow this to happen. It's different. It's different. I could talk about other governors saying the same thing.
Yes, please, go ahead.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: And we're hearing reports of groups like Black Lives Matter leaving their home cities to go riot and protest in other cities where they're causing damage.
TRUMP: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Do we expect to see prosecution of --
TRUMP: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: -- those traveling for that purpose?
TRUMP: So, we have over 1,000 people, federal, in jail. We're prosecuting many people.
A big thing was when I signed the law putting people in jail if you knock down monuments. That was three months ago. There hasn't been a federal monument knocked down in months or even though about. I don't think they've even thought about it. That's had a big impact, a very big impact.
But, yes, we're going around. And the nice part is you people take -- see those people up there? They take nice pictures of everybody. So we don't have to bother. We can use the news photos.
We had a photo right over there of Andrew Jackson, the monument. He was getting ready. And this guy was a big, brave guy, and he was up like this and he was showing off to all his friends and he got arrested. So did a lot of other people that got arrested. And I would say we have the ultimate proof.
Now in that case, we got there before they ripped down the statue of Andrew Jackson, which is so beautiful, which is right over there. But they never got it.
But right after that, I signed an order saying you go to prison for 10 years. And as soon as I signed that order, that was the end of the statures coming down.
But they have other ideas. And they have plenty of ideas. They are not at want for ideas.
Please, go ahead.
DAVID SPUNT, WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT, FOX NEWS: David Spunt, from FOX News. Mr. Trump, Mr. President, thank you for taking my question.
Sir, you talked a lot about the economy and touted the economy. Three weeks ago, in Bedminster, I asked you specifically why you have not called Democratic leadership to the White House to meet with them. If they don't want to, it's on them.
A lot of people are criticizing you. I cover you on the weekends and stuff. You --
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: I don't think so.
SPUNT: Why have you not met with them in person?
TRUMP: Yes.
SPUNT: I mean, we're in September. There's no deal.
TRUMP: I know.
SPUNT: There's no hope of a deal. We're two months out from the election --
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: Don't say there's no hope. Why do say there's no hope?
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: What do you know?
SPUNT: Well, what can you say --
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: What do you know?
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: And let me just tell you, I know my customers. That's what I do. I know Pelosi, I know Schumer very well. They don't want to make a deal because they think it's good for politics if they don't make a deal.
This has nothing to do with anything other than you have to know who you're dealing with. I do. These are people that I don't have a lot of respect. I don't think they have a lot of respect for the American people. And I know who I'm dealing with.
And I don't need to meet with them to be turned down. They don't want to make a deal because they know that's good for the economy.
And if they make a deal good that's for the economy and, therefore, it's good for me for the election in November, November 3rd, they're not going to make a deal.
Now, if we gave the store away, if we bailed out all their Democrat- run cities, where we give them a trillion dollars, which is the kind of money they want -- they want a trillion dollars to bailout badly run cities and states, whether it's New York or Illinois or others, they want to bail them out.
And we're saying, well, we're not going to pay them that kind of a price in order to bail the cities out. We'll do something to help cities. But that's going to have to rest on its own.
And why didn't you do this at the beginning? Because they could have done it at the beginning.
So, I know who I'm dealing with. And I'm on the phone with Mnuchin and with Meadows and with all of these people constantly while they're there.
But I know when it's time to meet with people. I've done very well with deals, OK? That's what I do. And know when it's time to meet.
But I don't need to meet them to be turned down and in order for them to walk out to the sticks, which is the microphones, and give you people a false report of what took place in the Oval Office.
So, they don't want to make a deal because they think that if the country does as badly as possible, even though a lot of people are being hurt, that's good for the Democrats. But, David, that's a bad thing.
Yes, please, go ahead?
SPUNT: But as president, shouldn't you take the high road, sir?
TRUMP: I am taking the high road. I'm taking the high road by not seeing them. That's the high road.
Yes?
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: And if I thought it made a difference, or would make a difference, yes, I'd do it in a minute.
Yes, go ahead.
DAVID JACKSON, WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT, "USA TODAY": David Jackson, USA Today."
My question is about the Durham report that you have talked about recently. You said let's see what happens. Now you've accused people of committing crimes against you during the Russian investigation.
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: Yes. Sure. They spied on my campaign. That's right.
JACKSON: But my question --
TRUMP: They spied on my campaign. And if they were Democrats, they would have been in jail two years ago. They would have been in jail. Literally, if this side were the Democrat side, they would have been in jail two years ago for 50-year terms for treason and other things.
[14:00:02]
JACKSON: My question is: Do you want the Justice Department to indict people over this?
TRUMP: I'm not going to say that. I have to see the report. I haven't seen it. I purposely -- I don't know if that's a good thing, smart thing.
