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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi Reacts To Trump Comments On Peaceful Transfer; President Donald Trump Says He Needs 9th Supreme Court Justice For Election Day; President Donald Trump Won't Commit To Peaceful Transfer Of Power After Election; Average National Positivity Rate At 4.9 Percent; President Donald Trump Claims He Could Override FDA On Stricter Vaccine Standards. Aired 12-12:30p ET

Aired September 24, 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]

JOHN KING, CNN HOST: I am John King in Washington to our viewers in the United States and around the world. Thank you so much for sharing your day with us. And a very busy news day it is, more anger and frustration on the streets of America in Breonna Taylor case the current flashpoint.

We saw protests in Louisville and many other American cities last night after a Kentucky Grand Jury did not file any charges directly linked to Taylor's death during a police raid on her Louisville apartment back in March. One officer was charged with wanton endangerment for spraying gunshots during that rate. The attorney for Taylor's family calls it yet another protects the police outrage.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BENJAMIN CRUMP, ATTORNEY FOR BREONNA TAYLOR'S FAMILY: If they want an indictment they would get an indictment. If they want to exonerate these police officers, as they so often do in America when they kill black people, they exonerate them. And we just cannot have these two justice systems in America, one for black America and another for white America.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: We'll go live to Louisville for the latest a bit later in the program. But we begin this hour with a moment of testing for America's democracy and a raw display of power lust by President Trump. In just 40 nights we will be counting your votes here in America.

The peaceful transfer of power is a staple of the American democracy, but this president making crystal clear he might not honor the results if they show him losing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're going to have to see what happens. You know that. I've been complaining very strongly about the ballots and the ballots are a disaster.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I understand that but people are rioting. Do you commit to making sure that there's a peaceful transfer of power?

TRUMP: We want to get rid of the ballets and you have a very - you'll have a very peaceful, there won't be a transfer frankly, there will be a continuation. The ballots are out of control. You know it and you know who knows it better than anybody else? The democrats know it better than anybody else.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KING: The House Speaker Nancy Pelosi responding to the president's comments just a short time ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): It's very sad that you even have to ask that question a real testimony to the need for protecting our democracy that we put forth yesterday. But that a president of the United States would place in doubt the idea of the peaceful transfer of power is, well, it is no surprise again because the president has been contemptible of science and governance.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Not to be clear what the president says about mail-in voting is simply untrue, it's a lie. But he is bracingly transparent about his strategy right now. Trump campaign lawyers are fiercely mounting legal challenges to new pandemic voting rules all across the country.

And the president makes clear he not only wants a new Supreme Court Justice confirmed before the November election, but he expects that justice to side with him when there are election challenges.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I think it's better if you go before the election because I think this scam that the Democrats are pulling, it is a scam. This scam will be before the United States Supreme Court. I think it's very important to have a ninth justice.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: The president's bulldozing of tradition and norms did not stop there with meddling in the court. Hours before that White House briefing, top government scientists made clear they would not bow to presidential or any pressure to rush a Coronavirus vaccine to market. Now there are long standing legal and regulatory steps for vaccine approval, but the president insists this, too, is up to him.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Well, I tell you what. We're looking at that. That has to be approved by the White House. We may or may not approve it. That sounds like a political move, I think it's a - I think that was a political move more than anything else.

(END VIDEO CLIP) KING: Kaitlan Collins is live for us at the White House today. Kaitlan, an unusual amount of blowback to the president from - we'll have an election. Then we'll honor the result of a peaceful transfer of power. But this - especially because it happened in the White House briefing room yesterday, just a brazen attempt to muddy the waters heading into this election.

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, John, what the president said yesterday is something that no modern president in American history has ever said before. Going that far to say they do not know if there will be a peaceful transfer of power should he lose to Joe Biden come November.

And the president was asked about this in an interview today. He tried to talk about the Supreme Court. We are likely to hear some spin coming out of the White House. But to be clear what we heard from the president yesterday is part of a longstanding pattern of what he's been saying for the last several months.

When he has been saying, Joe Biden would only win the election if it was rigged, when he talked about fraudulent mail-in voting without any evidence. When he suggested the idea of delaying the election, really all of these comments that the president has made over the last several months trying to cast doubt on the results in November really culminated with that comment yesterday refusing to say that there will be a peaceful transfer of power.

And you are right. We are hearing a lot from Republicans today. But one thing we're not hearing is the president's name in the statements from these Republican lawmakers. You saw what Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said, he got out ahead of these questions, he knew he was going to get on Capitol Hill by tweeting out a statement saying that there will be a peaceful transition of power.

But he did not name Donald Trump in that statement. And, John, it is really hard to see how McConnell would have reacted in the same way as a Democrat said what the president said yesterday?

[12:05:00]

COLLINS: But of course this is something, this kind of side stepping that we are used to seeing on Capitol Hill now. But now we are seeing it about something that is just very bedrock of American democracy and you're seeing it from McConnell, Marco Rubio, Liz Cheney. All of these people who say, there will be a peaceful transition of power.

But John, they will not mention the president's name and the only reason we're talking about this is the president would not commit to it yesterday.

KING: He would not and now Republicans in an election year trying to get a little bit of distance. But you're right, delicately trying to get that distance. Kaitlan Collins live for us at the White House. Let's try to connect the dots now as we noted, President Trump also talking about the need for a full Supreme Court. In case the election ends up there like it did back after campaign

2000, of course, that ninth justice would be his handpicked selection. CNN National Correspondent Kristen Holmes is tracking that for us.

And tracking not only the Supreme Court process Kristen, but this playing out as the trump campaign and the Republican Party have a very aggressive legal effort across the country to challenge voting rules.

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right, John. And we should make it clear it's not just ahead of the election. They also have a plan in place for after the election, but I will start with what is going on right now.

We know the Trump campaign and Republican Attorneys across the country, particularly in swing states, have filed a litany of lawsuits that challenge everything from mail-in voting to drop boxes.

In one case we know Republican Attorneys were supporting a green party candidate being on the ticket in Wisconsin. So you can see here that the legal strategy is really part of all of this. And as Kaitlan said this is just the latest in this effort to sow distrust in the American democratic process.

And we talked to all of these election officials and that is the real concern and these are Democrats and Republicans who say that once Americans don't trust the system that is when it becomes possible to circumvent the system.

Now I want to talk a little about post-election, because I've heard from numerous Republican officials who say that they believe that the results of the election will be tied up in litigation, in court.

They have lawyers on standby according to one Republican official who will be in key swing states, people that poll watchers can report to so that they can actually file litigation in real-time, so they make sure that they have the courts, they have people there who are ready and that included an official told me that they need to file an injunction. John?

KING: Kristen Holmes, appreciate the very important reporting there. We know we're going to stand top of this right through the election. And you're right, probably in the days plus the weeks after.

Let's continue this conversation now with Republican Election Lawyer Ben Ginsberg who has been the party's premier election law expert for the past two decades including a big role as National Counselor to the George W. Bush campaign in Bush V. Gore 2000. Counselor, it is good to see you. It's been too long.

You are known for being very scrappy advocate on behalf of Republicans. A lot of Democrats who would recognize your name in cases and not like the way they turned out. And yet you see something over the line in the way this president and the Republican Party at this moment are handling this. Make the distinction between a fair fight and a tenacious fight and a wrong fight. BEN GINSBERG, REPUBLICAN ELECTION LAWYER: If you're going to say that

the system of our elections is rigged or fraudulent, you have to have evidence for that. I spent 38 years as a Republican lawyer going into precincts looking for evidence of fraud.

There are to be sure isolated cases but nothing like the widespread fraud that would somehow invalidate an election or cause anyone to doubt the peaceful transfer of power. So what's different about this is the President of the United States going right at one of the pillars of the democracy without the evidence that you've got to have to make that case.

KING: And Ben, you were part of the team. I lived through it with you back in 2000. You are part of the team that won at the Supreme Court in Bush V. Gore. At that moment of time, 535, 537 votes in the State of Florida.

Al Gore could have said, no, hell no. Instead he very gracefully, even though he was mad, even though he did not like the outcome, very gracefully conceded the election and George W. Bush became our president.

To see the current President of the United States, stand at the podium in the briefing room yesterday and say it depends, it depends on the question of a peaceful transfer of power, what goes through your mind?

GINSBERG: Well, what goes through my mind is that Al Gore did what was clearly in the best interest of the country. And in our elections, you count all the votes, you look for evidence of fraud and abuse, you have election contests in a state to be able to deal with those allegations.

But at the end of the day, winning an election is winning by one vote, one vote. And so, what went through my mind when I heard that was, this is really different, and this is really destructive.

KING: It's dangerous, destructive, different, destructive and dangerous. I want you to listen to the president. No I want to continue because I think it's really important that we try to connect the dots here. The president routinely lies about mail-in voting. You were more polite and how you characterize it? There is no evidence of widespread fraud.

[12:10:00]

KING: Of course, lawyers in both parties should check every state, you check the rules, you check the ballots, you keep an eye on it. Of course, they should. But there's no evidence of widespread fraud and actually the evidence is that it increases participation and the state, secretaries of state would tell you, makes it easier to count.

When they committed different times in all of that but listen to the president connecting the dots now to the fight over the Supreme Court.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) TRUMP: I think it's very important that we have nine justices. I think it's better if you go before the election because I think this scam that the democrats are pulling, it is a scam, this scam will be before the United States Supreme Court, and I think having a 4-4 situation is not a good situation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Again, there's no evidence of a democratic scam. Let people fight out the election and all that. But help me as an expert in the law, are there not rules now if you are soon to be Justice perhaps Amy Coney Barrett or whoever the president picks.

And he publicly and repeatedly says one reason to get this Justice confirmed is to get her vote on the Supreme Court for inevitable post- election challenges, does that Justice not have a responsibility to recues herself?

GINSBERG: Each Justice makes the determination for him or herself whether they need to recuse in a case, John. So, it may put a burden on whoever is the pick but it's not going to be a requirement. There simply will be a lot of debate about it, but not a requirement.

And one other thing of interest in the president's statements, John, is the position, really, awkward position he's putting Republican Senators in.

KING: Right.

GINSBERG: Look how Mitch McConnell said what he said about the peaceful transfer of power and then recognized that one of Donald Trump's lynch pins for whatever it is he wants to do is getting that ninth Justice confirmed.

So that puts Republicans in a vice between their proper statements about transfer of power and having to confirm Justice who is a key to doing whatever the president thinks he's going to do.

KING: Well, you wrote, you touched on that very theme, the future of the party, the responsibility in your view of other Republicans when the president says such reckless and false things. When you announced, you were stepping away from these fights this year.

Obviously, the president's team would love to have you. You are very good at what you do. You want no part of that, and you've stepped away from it. You wrote in a Washington Post op-ed, the president's rhetoric has put my party in the position of a firefighter, who deliberately sets fires to look like the hero putting them out, calling elections "Fraudulent" and results "Rigged" with almost nonexistent evidence is antithetical to being the rule of law party.

Do you wish and do you think there is lasting damage if your fellow Republicans especially those in positions of authority like leader McConnell and others are not more specific, more critical, more damning of the president's remarks when he does what he's done in recent days? GINSBERG: Look. Here is precisely where that issue is going to be

John. And it's in the more than 40 court cases around the country dealing with voting laws and counting and casting of ballots.

Because implicit in everything the Republican Party is asking for is having to produce proof, evidence of fraud, where they're going to lose in court and they're going to look like they're more interested in suppressing the votes of people who don't agree with them than in stopping fraudulent voting. So it's a really sort of tender, difficult, challenging time for the Republican Party and its future.

KING: Ben Ginsberg, great to see you, it's been too long. I appreciate your sights.

GINSBERG: Thanks John.

KING: Thank you, Ben. Up next for us, President Trump claims he can overrule the FDA if it imposes stricter vaccine standards.

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[12:15:00]

KING: President says the United States has turned the corner when it comes to the fight against the Coronavirus. But the numbers tell us something different, especially when you look at new infections. Let's take a look at the 50-state trend map.

Red and orange bad, deep red especially bad Texas and Arizona states that were big part of the summer surge now reporting more than 50 percent new infections this week compared to the data last week. 21 states in all trending up, the deeper the red means 50 percent more infections this week than last week.

Orange is 10 percent or higher, 10 percent more this week or higher. 21 states trending up, 21 states holding steady, only eight states reporting fewer infections this week compared to last week a lot of orange and red most of it out here in the western half of the United States.

If you look at the case curve beginning of the summer surge about 20,000 new infections a day got up as high as around 80,000, 77,257 in the middle of July. Yes, we've come down some but look the trend line starting to go in the wrong direction.

This is a turn for the worst, not the final turn. Yesterday 37, 330 new infections the average now over the last seven days back above 40,000 new infections a day. Let's take a more closer look just at recent weeks.

If you go back just two weeks ago the average was 36,000, 36,294 that was the seven-day average two weeks ago. Now it is back up, as I said, above 40,000, 43,000 plus new infections a day on average.

Again that is a turn for the worst, not a bend round, the final turn. And if you look at positivity, 13 states reporting over the past week a positivity rate above 10 percent, 13 states, the public health experts would tell you get the positivity rate down to 5 and then shove it down more.

13 states were above 10. When you have higher positivity that means you have more cases today, it means more people getting infected tomorrow. And sadly, it means down the road the death numbers start to go back up and we see some evidence of that.

1098 nearly 11,000 deaths reported yesterday in the United States. This trend line had been dipping down below 1,000. You see the horrible numbers here have been dipping down.

[12:20:00]

KING: Now it's starting to trick back up, let's hope it does not, but1098 dead Americans yesterday because of the Coronavirus. Now the president says, though, look at other data, things are getting better. Most public health experts though, like Dr. Ali Khan here say, no, sir. That's wrong.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR, ALI KHAN, DEAN, UNIV. OF NEBRASKA MEDICAL CENTER'S COLLEGE OF PUBLIC HEALTH: America did not turn the corner. We should technically have zero cases. At the end of June, we had 20,000 a day and now we have 40,000 a day. There's no turning a corner when you look at what cases look like in the United States and approximately 1,000 deaths a day.

But as you look at that map what you are seeing is an inconvenient truth which is that many states allowed schools and colleges to reopen when they had not gotten their disease under control.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Joining us is now Dr. Amy Compton-Phillips. She is a Chief Clinical Officer for Providence Health System, also CNN Medical Analyst Dr. Compton-Phillips. It's good to see you.

So, let's continue from where Dr. Khan leaves off there. He says we do not have the disease under control and we now are in the fall where people are worried about cooler temperatures, back on campus, more people moving indoors.

When you're looking at the average of new infections back of above 40,000 a day, what does that tell you about what we are heading?

DR. AMY COMPTON-PHILLIPS, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: Well, that tells me we're headed in the wrong direction. And then exactly as you said, as people move back indoors, we're back into the place that we're sharing each other's air and allowing the actual contagion to pass back and forth. It's a lot harder to keep the windows open and keep air flow going the way that we know improves the transmission rates.

The other thing is that people are just sick and tired of doing these things and so, you see people getting fatigued with mask wearing and getting much more complacent. And so, I really do worry that we're headed for a perfect storm.

KING: I know another thing that public health experts like yourself are sick and tired of or frustrated with is the constant mixed signals from the administration including administrators agencies, the CDC has had the change of testing guidelines a couple of times the other day. They put up guidance that said there was aerosol transmission of the Coronavirus, and they took it down.

Dr. Anthony Fauci was just speaking with the New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy moments ago. And he said "There are good enough data to say that aerosol transmission does occur." He went on to say "Aerosol means the droplets don't drop immediately. They hang around for a period of time".

Explain why that is significant and please tell me if I'm wrong as a way person, even more significant if the droplets hand around for a period of time, as people do start to go back indoors where there is less ventilation and circulation of the air it strikes me that's a complicating factor.

COMPTON-PHILLIPS: It is absolutely a complicating factor and we have several case reports and this is what Dr. Fauci was talking about where things like people at choir practice weren't necessarily right next to within six feet of another person singing, but actually across the room.

And so, the belief is that in certain circumstances not all the time and not the vast majority of the time, in certain circumstances, super spreaders as they sing, as they cough, as they sneeze can actually rather than just the larger droplets that fall to the ground pretty quickly within six feet can actually stay diffused through the air and then that's what can create the super spreading events.

And that's what we are really, really worried about as we get into cold and flu season this fall, that we have these super spreaders inside unmasked and able to create explosive spread.

KING: And in part because of the politics in the town I work in, the other Washington, here Washington, D.C., we saw quite remarkably Dr. Hahn, Dr. Stephen Hahn, the Head of the Food and Drug administration go out of his way yesterday to repeatedly assure lawmakers on Capitol Hill, I will not respond to pressure anyone's pressure implicitly meaning, including the President of the United States who keep saying, we will have a vaccine before election day.

Dr. Hahn saying, no, we have processes in place, we will follow the rules, we will follow the regulation, we will follow the science. Short time after that briefing the president of the United States said, no, I may overrule you. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Well, I tell you what. We are looking at that. That has to be approved by the White House. We may or may not approve it. That sounds like a political move extremely political. Why would they do this, when we come back with the great results and I think you will have those great results? Why would we - it? But we're going to look at it. We're going to take a look at it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Just your reaction as a public health professional. Again the president publicly undermining his own Food and Drug Administration administrator saying he is being political. Doctor Hahn was making the case, I am going to follow the science and be careful.

COMPTON-PHILLIPS: Well, first of all, thank heavens for Dr. Hahn because the president exerting political pressure over what really should be a policy political free actual scientific debate is a stab to the heart. It is just so unnerving. The fact that we had these four leaders of the pandemic working with the government double down and say we're going to follow the process.

[12:25:00]

COMPTON-PHILLIPS: We are not going to follow politics, we're going to follow the process, we're going to actually follow the science, we are going to let the data do the talking and decide when things are safe and effective, so that we can protect the American publicly, the American public deserves to be protected is the way to go.

And if we allow politics to interfere with that, we're going to set public health and the health and well-being of Americans back decades. We can't let that happen.

KING: Confidence in institutions sadly is a conversation we're having on several different subjects including the pandemic at the moment Dr. Amy Compton-Phillips grateful as always for your time and your important insights. Thank you.

COMPTON-PHILLIPS: Thank you.

KING: Still ahead for us, thousands protest around the country after grand jury in Kentucky holds no one accountable for the death of Breonna Taylor.

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