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Judge Barrett Meets with Pence, McConnell on Capitol Hill; Tonight: Trump and Biden Face Off in First Presidential Debate; Two NFL Teams Suspend In-Person Activities after Positive Cases. Aired 11- 11:30a ET

Aired September 29, 2020 - 11:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[11:00:08]

JOHN KING, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, everybody. I'm John King in Washington. Thank you so much for sharing this very, very important day with us.

It is presidential debate night in America, exactly five weeks to Election Day. One certain flashpoint is President Trump's late campaign Supreme Court pick. And Judge Amy Coney Barrett making her courtesy calls, beginning them this morning up on Capitol Hill. A friendly start for the judge, a meeting with the vice president and the Senate majority leader. That to open a bruising confirmation battle over healthcare, abortion rights and just the very question of whether the election winner should be making this pick.

Coronavirus is another debate topic and the daily trends tell us the virus moving in a troublesome direction but there is more evidence this morning that the administration is quite fine if you don't know that, if you don't pay attention to the numbers. A former White House official admits to pressuring the CDC to downplay the risks of reopening America's schools. And Dr. Anthony Fauci says the White House still stops him from going on TV to explain the state of affairs.

The president and Democrat Joe Biden will share a stage in Cleveland, Ohio. A no handshake allowed rule, just one more reminder this is the pandemic campaign, a campaign like no other.

We are 35 days away from Election Day. This first presidential debate is a 90-minute national platform to rally supporters and to try to reach and persuade a few voters, the tiny slice who say they are still undecided or at least not locked in. Candidate Trump was the outsider, disrupter in the 2016 debates but he is the embattled incumbent in this 2020 sequel back on his heels entering the debate.

The race right now tilts heavily towards Joe Biden. A new Pennsylvania polling today making the Democrats' advantage more than clear. Without Pennsylvania, the president's path to 270 electoral votes and reelection, not impossible but it is highly improbable. And yet, sources tell our White House team, get this, the president has spent little time in debate prep, roughly two hours. Add this to the president's debate challenge, more reporting from "The New York Times" about his personal wealth. The ream of Trump tax documents obtained by "The Times" detailed in red ink that the scene on television of Mr. Trump was a fraud.

When "The Apprentice" debuted back in January 2004, Mr. Trump had reported a nearly $90 million loss from his core businesses the prior year. $90 million. That might come up in the debate, too. 9:00 p.m. Eastern is debate time.

And CNN's Jessica Dean is outside the debate hall in Cleveland. A very big night ahead, Jessica.

JESSICA DEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: John, it's certainly is this has been one of the most anticipated nights of this entire election. We remember talking in the primary. People were -- primary voters were talking about who would best hold up to Donald Trump on a debate stage, and here we are in Cleveland, Ohio.

As you mentioned, this is going to be a debate unlike any other because of the pandemic. We've got a 90-minute debate set to take place tonight. We know there will be no opening statements. President Trump will get the first question in this debate, and there are six set topics right now that Chris Wallace, the moderator is expected to cover. That includes both men's records, the Supreme Court, COVID, the economy, race and violence in cities and election integrity.

Now, as for preparation for this debate, well, it's yet another study in contrast between the two men running for president of the United States. President Trump, as you mentioned, spending very little time on debate preparations, about roughly two hours. We did see Rudy Giuliani and Chris Christie with him in the briefing room over the weekend. He said that they have been helping out standing in as Joe Biden.

On the other side, former Vice President Joe Biden has been studying a lot. Has spent the weekend really in debate preparation which is customary leading up to these presidential debates. He has been working with aides. They have done some mock debates, but we're told he also really just likes those rapid-fire questions that he's been studying briefing books. So yet again, a study in contrast there.

The Biden campaign is expecting personal attacks from President Trump. That's something they have focused on. We're also told that the team, his team, Biden's team doesn't expect him to fact check everything that President Trump says, but instead they want him to continue to hammer home two major points, John, that you've heard from Vice President Biden over and over again on this campaign trail, and that is the coronavirus pandemic and this public health crisis that the United States is facing as well as the economic crisis that it's facing. And really, they want to continue to bring home that point that it was President Trump's lack of leadership, in their opinion, that has led us to this moment now. John?

KING: Jessica Dean on the scene for us in Cleveland. Jessica, thank you so much for the live report. And joining me now to continue the conversation, CNN's Jeff Zeleny and Seung Min Kim of "The Washington Post."

Just going to hold up "The Columbus Dispatch." Ohio, one of the battleground states, obviously, the debate is in Cleveland. Trump paid little in taxes report says and debating the impact down at the bottom.

[11:05:00]

Seung Min Kim, to you first, if you look at polling, if you look at the state of the race, the president is the underdog. He was the disrupter. He was the slasher. He was the aggressor back in 2016. Do they have a different approach this time understanding Ohio is in play which tells you everything you need to know. New Pennsylvania numbers today saying Joe Biden has a healthy lead, really hard to get the president reelected without Pennsylvania. What is the strategy going in?

SEUNG MIN KIM, WHITE HOUSE REPORTER, "THE WASHINGTON POST": Exactly. I mean, right now, Republicans have told us for so much of this year that once this becomes a contrast choice between President Trump and the eventual Democratic nominee that it will be more equal footing ground.

But that has not been the case. And it is only 35 days out from the election where the focus still is on so much of the president and more of a referendum on him, his handling of the pandemic, the economy and everything else that's happened this year.

But the strategy really hasn't changed all too much. I mean President Trump is not someone who is known for preparation. He is seeing kind of all of these impromptu gaggles, all these press conference that he has with the media on a regular basis as kind of his debate prep. That's what sources are telling us.

And we will see -- we will see how the president kind of aims to get under the former vice president's skin tonight, but he is certainly the underdog here. I mean, the really key thing to remember is that Vice President Biden has many multiple paths to victory considering his higher polling in the battleground states you just mentioned. President Trump really has to nail down all these key states like Florida, Pennsylvania, and it is a struggle for him right now.

KING: It's a struggle in the sense. Jeff Zeleny, you can deal with one state if you have a one-state problem. It's hard to change a big dynamic in the race. It's hard to change the dynamic in the race when people, the clear majorities don't approve of the way you've handled the biggest issue in the country right now, the pandemic.

I just want to show you our CNN poll of polls. This is the average of the recent big national polls, and Joe Biden right now 51/43. That gives you an eight-point lead. We often say, don't overinvest in national polls. If you see the national lead by either candidate get down inside five then you start thinking we've got a competitive race we go state by state but eight-point national lead suggests Biden is in good position or Jeff, we can look at it this way.

This is our road to 270, and if you look at our electoral map right now, the dark blue are solid Biden, the light blue are leaning Biden. He's at 269. He's at 269. Now we know from 2016, this map can change, and it can change fast but all Joe Biden would have to do right now if nothing else changed on that map was win a congressional district in Maine. If he took Pennsylvania off the board, game over.

JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Indeed, in Maine or in Nebraska, of course, the second Congressional district there which both campaigns are spending a lot of money on. But, John, there is no question that this is Joe Biden. He's driving this race, but I think tonight following the debate, a lot of Democrats will be breathing easier once they see this first side by side performance. This is no ordinary debate.

Yes, Joe Biden has debated multiple times of course during this primary and also as vice president. Of course, memorably against Sarah Palin and then against Paul Ryan. He's actually a pretty good debater. So, the White House, you know, test started to sort of dial back their lowering of the expectations, but reality is this.

For President Trump, this is one of his last best opportunities to try and reframe this conversation to make Joe Biden unacceptable alternative. He's been unable to do that so far for weeks and millions of people either are voting or had their ballots in front of them and will be voting. So, time is running out on that score.

What Joe Biden, I'm told, is going to try and do, and he's watched a lot of these Trump debates. He's going to talk about how he is a unifier. I'm told he is going to, you know, not go after the president on every sort of jive he makes, but he's going, to I'm told, say that the country is ready for a president who doesn't exhaust you every day. So, he's going to be a bit of Xanax, if you will, for Democratic voters of course but also for some of those independent voters who are just looking to see if Joe Biden can stand up side by side with the president.

So, that is one of the dynamics here, but the president without a doubt, he says he doesn't prepare. The reality is he prepares for how he debates, and that is, you know, by having these one-liners and the facts have never necessarily gotten in the way of an argument here, but I'm also told as Jessica reported earlier that Joe Biden is not going to spend his time fact-checking.

He's going to use this as an argument to get, to you know, perhaps 100 million Americans here. The biggest audience yet to make the case why he is the president who can bring a sense of calm to this country.

KING: I've been doing this for 35 years and I don't think I've ever heard the term Xanax used in a pre-debate, to set the expectation stage, but that is the remarkable campaign. We've mentioned expectations. This is sometimes a silly game. Sometimes it's a silly game.

But the Trump team put out an email. They said to supporters the other day because the president himself has dug himself into a hole saying he'll be surprised if Joe Biden can stay up that late. He says Joe Biden can't handle himself.

We know from Joe Biden's debates and Joe Biden's convention speech he can be quite good sometimes. He's uneven but he can be. So, you see that one there. And you know the Biden campaign as well.

[11:10:03]

Seung Min, to you. That becomes part of the silly conversation but in a way has the president lowered the expectations about Joe Biden's performance to a point where Biden has a lower bar to leap?

KIM: Well, this is another example of time and time again of where his staff, his campaign, his White House tries to go with one strategy and the messenger in chief, the communicator in chief goes completely other way. I mean, you do see the last-minute attempts from the Trump campaign to raise those expectations for Vice President Biden which is typically what you would do of a challenger when the debate is particularly when this debate is so critical to President Trump, but it's not.

I mean, those last-minute talking points, those last-minute talking points related to allies, I don't know if that overcomes, you know, months and months of the president tweeting and saying and calling Joe Biden Sleepy Joe and just kind of the messaging that he's had. So, the president does have an interesting way of -- of kind of, you know, sizing up his opponents. And again, this is you know, this is another example where the staff and the principal aren't quite on the same page.

KING: We will quite see how it plays out tonight. Seung Min Kim, Jeff Zeleny, appreciate help with the preview and make sure you watch the first presidential debate. You can watch is right here live on CNN. Our special coverage tonight starts at 7:00 p.m. Eastern.

Up next, no handshakes of course, that's just one of the many ways coronavirus will shape tonight's debate, but first a look back here. How Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton's greetings changed from debate number one to debate number two four years ago.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

(APPLAUSE)

HILLARY CLINTON, FORMER PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: How are you, Donald?

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Hello.

CLINTON: Hello. Hello. Hello.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:16:05] KING: There's a messy internal Trump administration coronavirus fight playing out in public today. In a moment, some clear direction would be helpful. Several of the president's top scientist are worried now that the president favors advice from a new member of the team who questions the efficacy of masks and pushes to ease restrictions on businesses.

Dr. Anthony Fauci going as far as to call Dr. Scott Atlas an outlier but Dr. Fauci acknowledges Atlas has the president's ear. And the former vice-presidential aide today both confirmed and then detailed pressure the White House put on the CDC to playdown the risks of reopening schools.

The turmoil is new where it's even more unhelpful when the coronavirus numbers are heading in a troublesome direction. Let's take a look at those numbers.

This is a sad, sad milestone that the world passed yesterday. More than 1 million, more than 1 million now confirmed coronavirus deaths around the world and many experts think that will double by the time there is widespread availability of a coronavirus vaccine, more than 1 million deaths.

You look at it here in the United States, by far leading, I'm not sure that's the right word to use, but the United States leading the world when it comes to coronavirus deaths, Brazil, India, Mexico and the United Kingdon. Round out the list there.

The state trend map right now, not good. Red and orange are bad. You see 23 states heading in the wrong direction. That means reporting more new infections now compared to a week ago. 23 states trending in the wrong direction.

A lot of the swath here across the northern plains to the west. 20 states holding steady, most of them here. You see it's stretching up here. Only seven states at the moment reporting fewer new infections this week compared to last week. Notably Florida, Texas and Arizona saying fewer new infections this week than last. Those three states were a big part of the summer surge.

If you look at the case trendline here. Here's the question mark. Which way are we going? It is in debate at the moment in the sense that we came down a little bit from the summer surge, got down below 40,000 new infections a day and then started to trend back up.

Monday, 33000. Sunday was also below 40,000. Are we going to push the baseline below 40,000? That was the goal, started to get there here, or are we going to stay above. On average right now, the seven-day average of new infections still above 40,000. We will see in the next few days whether that can be shoved down or as many people fear because those states are trending up, it starts to go back up.

The national positivity rate in coronavirus testing is actually pushing down. You want it below 5 percent, then you want to shove it down more, 3.6 percent on Monday. So, that is some progress in the sense of fewer coronavirus tests nationally. Some states have a problem but nationally that number going down some.

And the testing trend, we have talked about this for months. A lot of public health experts would tell you the United States is simply not doing enough coronavirus testing. You need more tests to have better eyes on the virus.

Well, that trendline is going. This is the one line you don't mind going up and you see this starting to trend up in the right direction, above 800,000, approaching a little above 900,000 tests a day on average across the United States.

This as the administration says and it has made promises before which is why people are skeptical. But it's says it is rushing even more rapid tests out to the state, helpful in schools. The administration testing czar says those who say it isn't enough aren't paying attention.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ADM. BRETT GIROIR, MD, ASSISTANT SECRETARY FOR HEALTH, HHS: I absolutely disagree with the conclusion that these can't make a significant difference because they can. I was on the governor's call today, almost every -- well, every governor that spoke said that this was a game-changer.

Just imagine your child in school, somebody sniffles in the classroom. Do they have COVID or don't they have COVID? You can get a test within 15 minutes right here with a very high sensitivity. If they have COVID, you can diagnoses them, isolate them and do contact tracing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Joining us now to share her expertise or insights, our CNN medical analyst, Dr. Leanna Wen, a former Baltimore health commissioner. Dr. Wen, let me just ask you straight up this way. We could show you clips of Admiral Giroir every month going back seven months. And a lot of those promises simply had turned out to be true. Is there a reason this time that these new rapid the admiral is talking about can and will be distributed quickly enough to make a difference?

[11:20:01]

DR. LEANA WEN, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: Well, I do think that having more tests rather than fewer tests is a good thing, and we should also celebrate this concept of rapid point of care test, this 15 to 30- minute result because that's the direction that we should be going.

Here's my concern though, John. 150 million tests sound like a lot but when you consider that we need to be doing tens of millions of tests every single day that uses up the 150 million pretty quickly. And so, what we really a need is to have this comprehensive strategy where there's 150 million tests as part of this whole instead of justifying why 150 million is a lot. If you should be testing kids, let's say twice a week and employees twice a week before they go into school and to work, you use up that 150 million within a week or two. KING: That's quick math there. So, where are we, is a question we ask a lot on this program. And I think it's more even fitting to ask it again today as you see this strange spot in terms of the new infection counts, right?

Somewhere around 40,000, did dip down Sunday and Monday. We'll see if it stays down below 40,000 and we certainly hope so. It's also a moment that the American people will be tuning in tonight to see their two candidates on a debate stage and obviously the pandemic and the president's handling of the coronavirus, the number one issue in the campaign, heading into the debate. This is his answer.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I say it and I'll say it all the time. We're rounding the corner, and -- very importantly vaccines are coming, but we're rounding the corner regardless, but vaccines are coming, and they are coming fast. We have four great companies already, and it's going to be added to very rapidly. They are in final stages of testing and from what we're hearing the results are going to be very extraordinary.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Are we rounding the corner regardless of the vaccine pace as the president just said there?

WEN: No. So, two things.

First is I wish that the president would stop talking about a vaccine timeline because every time he does it conflates politics and it makes people more suspicious and more distrustful that there isn't going to be political manipulation that influences the vaccine approval process.

And second, we need to stop misleading the public. It's time that we tell the truth and set the expectation because at this point we are seeing escalating numbers of infections. We're coming into fall and winter season when we're expecting a second wave and that's on top of a surging first wave.

So, we're not headed in the right direction. We need to be setting the expectation telling the American people the truth so that there are things that we can do. We can be on our guard. We can for example, look at the fact that so many of the new infections that are occurring, they aren't in formal settings. It's not necessarily in the schools or in universities. It's all these activities that are happening around schools, in play dates, in dinner parties, when people really let down their guard around family members and friends.

Those are things that we can do right now, keep on wearing masks, limit indoor gatherings. The president should be setting that expectation so that the American people can do a weekend to protect ourselves.

KING: Dr. Wen, as always, grateful. Thank you.

WEN: Thank you.

KING: This just into us, related story, the first signs of potential coronavirus outbreak impacting the NFL. Tennessee Titans and the Minnesota Vikings are suspending in-person activities like practices indefinitely. That after three Titans players and five team staffers tested positive for COVID-19.

The Vikings have not announced yet any positive cases among their ranks, but they did play the Titans this past Sunday.

Up next, the state of the race. We look at the key polls heading into the first presidential debate tonigt.

[11:28:32]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: Let's take a closer look now at the state of the presidential race as we countdown to tonight's first presidential debate.

And if you look at our map right now, it is advantage Biden, heading into debate number one just without a question. Look at the national polls, look at the state battleground polls. We have the Democrat Joe Biden at 269 electoral votes.

The dark blue, like California, solid Biden. The lighter blue, like Arizona and Colorado and Nevada, leaning Biden's way. Right now, 269. It takes 270 to win.

So, look at this map. See the yellow? Those are the tossups. If nothing else change, Joe Biden win anything, win a congressional district here or in Maine. Nebraska and Maine, the two states that allocate their electoral votes including congressional district factors. Otherwise, these tossup states, Ohio, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Georgia and Florida, all carried by the president four years ago, all tossup states right now.

Let's just look at one of them. We'll go through the scenarios many times over the next five weeks to Election Day. But let's just look at one in the context of this. Brand-new polling out. This is the latest.

Now a handful of polls over the last week to 10 days in Pennsylvania that showed Joe Biden consistently ahead and look at this lead. Nine points in this Washington Post/ABC News poll in the commonwealth of Pennsylvania. That's one of the states of course the president flipped from blue to red. Four years ago, the key to his victory, this tells you the steep hill as the president enters the debate tonight.

In Pennsylvania and nationally really. Yes, a slight edge on the economy among Pennsylvania voters but look at this. Joe Biden 14-point advantage on the coronavirus, a lead on crime and safety, a huge lead on race relations, a lead on the Supreme Court and a giant lead on healthcare. The big issues facing the voters, this is the commonwealth of Pennsylvania, advantage Biden.

Why do we focus so much on Pennsylvania?