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President Trump Tests Positive for COVID a Month Before Election; Two More COVID Cases Reported at White House, Journalist and Press Staffer. Aired 1-1:30p ET

Aired October 02, 2020 - 13:00   ET

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

[13:00:01]

MIKE ROGERS, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY COMMENTATOR: And they should not take advantage of the news that we got today.

JOHN KING, CNN INSIDE POLITICS: Chairman Rogers, I very much appreciate your important insights. I want to thank you for watching today. Thank you for your patience throughout all these breaking news.

Don't go anywhere on this busy day. Brianna Keilar picks up right now.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN RIGHTNOW: Hello. I'm Brianna Keilar. Welcome to our viewers here in the United States and around the world.

The president of the United States has been infected with the coronavirus just one month before the election. He is now among 7 million Americans who have tested positive along with First Lady Melania Trump.

The president who said that the couple would begin their, quote, quarantine process immediately is expected to work out of the residence. The stunning announcement following the revelation, Thursday, that one of his closest aides, Hope Hicks, had also tested positive for COVID.

But while the nation learned about Hicks last night, she actually tested positive on Wednesday night after traveling with the president to his Minnesota rally earlier that day and to Cleveland for the debate on Tuesday, the day before.

In spite of that, and with a small group of White House officials aware of her status, the president went ahead with his public schedule yesterday, including attending an evening fundraiser at his Bedminster golf club in New Jersey. And with less than five weeks until Election Day, the president's diagnosis is throwing even more uncertainty into an already unprecedented campaign.

Former Vice President Joe Biden wishing the 2020 rival a speedy recovery just days after the two squared off in a contentious and raucous debate. Biden's primary care physician announcing moments ago that Biden and his wife, Jill, have tested negative. And on Capitol Hill, Republican Senator Mike Lee announced he has tested positive just days after visiting the White House and meeting with Supreme Court Nominee Amy Coney Barrett. A White House spokesman says that Barrett, who is tested every day, is currently negative.

Let's get the very latest from the White House where the president and first lady are isolating. That's where CNN Chief White House Correspondent Jim Acosta is covering this story.

And the president is experiencing symptoms, Jim?

JIM ACOSTA, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Brianna. The president, according to a White House official, including the chief of staff, Mark Meadows, is experiencing some mild symptoms from the coronavirus, so is the first lady, Melania Trump. We are told by the first lady's office that Barron Trump has tested negative for the virus.

But, obviously, this has thrown this White House into a tailspin at the moment, Brianna. We talked to the chief of staff, Mark Meadows, earlier this morning. He tried to insist that the president is doing well and he is on the phone talking to various White House staffers. And here is a bit of what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARK MEADOWS, WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF: The president and the first lady tested positive for COVID-19. They remain in good spirits. The president does have mild symptoms.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: So, the chief of staff there, Brianna, is saying that the president is experiencing mild symptoms but yet, just a few moments ago, he was not able to chair a conference call that he was supposed to lead on vulnerable seniors and the coronavirus. Instead, Vice President Mike Pence, who has tested negative for the coronavirus, he was leading that phone call.

We are going through the audio of that right now to see exactly what the vice president had to say. But we understand he told people on the call, essentially, the president would not be on that call because he has the coronavirus.

In the meantime, what we understand is that White House officials are conducting and White House doctors are conducting contact tracing to try to get to the bottom of exactly who the president and Hope Hicks, who they have been around over these last several days. We have a graphic to show you of just how many various people the president has been around over this past week.

Keep in mind he had that event on Saturday in the Rose Garden announcing the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett for the Supreme Court. Senator Mike Lee, who was there for that event, has since tested positive for the coronavirus. And so we're trying to isolate exactly when all of this might have started happening because we don't have an exact timeline. Mark Meadows was telling us earlier this morning that they discovered that Hope Hicks had tested positive for coronavirus as they were leaving for these events up in New Jersey yesterday, but that doesn't exactly distill for us, you know, precisely when all of this might have been passed from one person to another.

The other thing we should point out, Brianna, and it's been shocking to watch this all morning, various senior White House officials walking around the White House grounds here without a mask. We saw Dr. Scott Atlas, I have some of video of that to show you earlier this morning, the controversial member of the coronavirus task force, who has been flirting with this idea of herd immunity and talking down the idea that young people can catch the coronavirus and so on, he was on the campus grounds this morning not wearing a mask, smiling and talking to people.

I personally saw Johnny McEntee, who is a senior White House official over here, walk right past me, said he was on his way to get his COVID test, was not wearing a mask this morning, walked into the area of the west wing where the press secretary, Kayleigh, McEnany has her office.

[13:05:03]

There were various White House staffers there not wearing their masks this morning.

And so, Brianna, one of the things that we're experiencing over here at the White House is sort of -- just sort of dumbfounded disbelief that even after the president of the United States tests positive for the coronavirus, some people over here still haven't gotten the memo as to how serious this situation is.

As I finish up this live shot, I'm putting my mask back on. Other members of the press are putting their masks on when they're around here. But White House staffers in some cases are not doing that, Brianna.

KEILAR: Yes. It is -- I mean, it defies common sense, for sure. Jim Acosta, thank you so much for that update from the White House.

Moments ago, we learned Democratic Presidential Nominee Joe Biden has tested negative for coronavirus. CNN Correspondent Jessica Dean is in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where Biden is expected to continue campaigning this afternoon.

And, Jessica, President Trump, when he was very likely contagious, shared a debate stage with Joe Biden. Hope Hicks tested positive Wednesday, and yet the White House did not give the Biden campaign any information. How is the campaign reacting and mobilizing to monitor Biden's health?

JESSICA DEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Right. So there was a memo sent out early this morning from the campaign manager, Brianna, that said that the campaign is doing -- to the staff, saying, that the campaign is doing everything it can to make sure that everyone is as safe as possible. We did get those negative test results for Joe and Jill Biden just a little bit ago.

They were administered the PCR test, which is considered really the gold standard of tests. It takes a little longer to get the results back, but those results are very good in terms of their accuracy.

He was scheduled to be here in Grand Rapids, Michigan, starting 1:20 this afternoon Eastern Time. You can tell he has not left Wilmington yet, so you can tell that he is not going to be making it here on time, but we are told that he will travel here to Michigan after the delay this morning, waiting on those test results, and that he will give remarks. We're expecting later today, later this afternoon.

If you zoom out kind of big picture, the coronavirus and the president's response to the pandemic and his lack of response to the pandemic has been the central theme of the Biden candidacy. And the Biden campaign has drawn contrasts at every turn. I mean, back in March, they called off all major rallies. He really did only virtual events for a long time and, really, has only resumed major travel since Labor Day with him going to the battleground states.

We also heard yesterday from the campaign that they had planned, after months of staying away from it, they planned to go for in-person canvassing in these battleground states with volunteers door-to-door and reaching people that were hard to reach over the phone and online. The campaign saying that they had great success there but really felt like they could be safe and do this and reach these people they really wanted to reach before Election Day.

And all indications are that that is all moving ahead, especially as we see Vice President Biden traveling here to Michigan today and continuing forward with the plans that he has in place. Brianna?

KEILAR: All right. Jessica, following it all for us from Michigan, thank you.

And we did just hear that the president is suffering mild symptoms from coronavirus several hours after announcing that he has COVID-19.

I want to bring in CNN's Senior Medical Correspondent, Elizabeth Cohen. And, Elizabeth, the president has risk factors here, right? He has several risk factors that could make him a candidate for more severe symptoms.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Brianna. He is in a much higher risk category than most Americans. Having said that, I will say, the numbers tell us that chances are, thank goodness, he will be okay. He will recover just fine from this. However, he is at higher risk than most other people.

Let's take a look at what puts him at higher risk. First of all, he is obese, and that triples the risk of hospitalization. Also, he's 74. People in the 65 to 74-year-old age range are at a five times greater risk of hospitalization than younger people, also a 90 percent greater risk of death. He is also a man and men tend to be more likely to die or get very sick from COVID than women do.

He also has been treated for high cholesterol. We know that various medical conditions can put someone at a higher risk for getting very sick or dying.

But, again, to emphasize, the numbers also tell us that he is most likely going to get through this just fine. Brianna?

KEILAR: Which is very good news. Thank you so much, Elizabeth Cohen. I really appreciate it.

Dr. Saju Matthew is a primary care physician, he's a public health specialist. Thank you so much for being with us.

We are hearing from the White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, a description of the president as having symptoms that are mild. So he has symptoms but they are mild. What does that mean considering the timeline for his announcement of his diagnosis and what does that mean, if anything, for the longer term?

[13:10:04]

Can we tell anything from that?

DR. SAJU MATTHEW, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: Yes, those are good questions, Brianna. When you're exposed to COVID-19, on average, it takes about five days before you actually develop symptoms.

But, remember, the incubation period, which is from the time you were exposed to when you develop symptoms, can be as long as 14 days. So if the president tested positive this morning and he has mild symptoms, you have to also remember that you are more symptomatic almost two days before you actually test positive, so a lot to digest.

And I think the most important thing is the contact tracing that we have been talking about to make sure that people that he has exposed people to should be traced and they need to be quarantined.

KEILAR: Yes, and there are a lot of them, right? And there is testing going on at the White House, so we're keeping our eye on that.

What are the options for early treatment? There has been talk about remdesivir as an early intervention. There has been a lot of talk about how steroids can be helpful in treating. At what point would a decision like that be made and just how would a doctor be treating the president in these early stages?

MATTHEW: Right. So, if you really look at the numbers game, as Elizabeth Cohen just mentioned, 80 percent of people actually do well, Brianna, and they have mild symptoms. If you have mild symptoms, a runny nose, maybe some drainage (ph), a sore throat, mild fever and chills, basically, we call that symptomatic treatment. There is not necessarily a specific treatment like an anti-viral or an antibiotic.

Now, if the president should falls into the category of where his symptoms progress to now where he becomes what we call hypoxic, or the oxygen level drops, that's when we are talking more about a possible hospital admission. And God forbid this happens, but if he gets into the ICU and needs to be intubated, then at that point, Brianna, we're talking about remdesivir and possibly dexamethasone, which, by the way, would come a long way in treating the really patients with those two drugs.

KEILAR: And so that's the point where those drugs come in, is actually a little later, is what you're saying, right? So right now, it's sort of monitoring and see where this naturally takes him, in which direction.

We know the White House doctor has been using the Abbott Labs rapid test and we know that these are about 85 percent reliable even though they're very quick, which is why they're convenient, right? Would you expect that aides are now getting a different, more reliable test in light of the president's infection?

MATTHEW: So, you know, the testing, the rapid test you just mentioned is about 85 percent to 90 percent accurate and the PCR test, which basically looks at a genetic material. The rapid test just looks at the antigen, if you will, or a viral protein. The PCR tests are up in the 90-97 percentile, but the advantage of a rapid test is that come back fairly quickly.

Quick thing also, Brianna, about the testing is we need to understand that from the time you've been exposed to somebody with COVID-19, it could take you, like I said, 5 to 14 days. So if you get tested early, a lot of people are panicking when they heard about President Trump turning positive and people have been in close contact with him want to get tested, I understand.

But if it is negative today, like three days later, like for instance, the Biden's test, that came back negative today, technically, you should wait about five to seven days for a more accurate testing because you could be negative today and be positive three days from now.

KEILAR: So, no one should be -- when we're talking about, for instance, Mark Meadows, he is standing in front of reporters, he's had exposure to the president, and he says, I have a negative test, so, essentially, he is communicating to reporters, also I'm socially distanced, I don't have nothing to worry about, that's not really the case. All of these -- that's what you're saying, right? All of these people who were saying, but I have testing negative, I'm at the White House because I have been testing negative, they can't actually hang their hats on that?

MATTHEW: That's exactly right, Brianna. If there's one thing our viewers should take from our conversation today is that a negative test doesn't give you the green signal to go out there and take your mask off and not socially distance. What a negative test should reassure you is that there's an 80 percent to 90 percent chance that I'm negative now. And if I'm going to meet people and be in close proximity, I need to still wear my mask and try to be six feet away from those people as best as I can. KEILAR: The president, shortly before announcing his positive test, still traveled and held an indoor fundraiser despite knowing that one of his closest aides who he had had considerable exposure to, had coronavirus. What is your assessment of that action?

[13:15:00]

MATTHEW: That's very dangerous, Brianna. It goes without saying that if you just follow the science, if you know that a close aide of yours tested positive, in my opinion, as a physician, that entire event should have been canceled and people need to be quarantined.

You see, there's a difference between using the word, quarantine, that's where people that were exposed and isolated, like the Trumps are currently because they tested positive. But I would have canceled that event to be more cautious because, remember, there are so many people that are involved now in this web, Brianna, and contact tracing is going to be a nightmare, but you have to do it to make sure that you don't cause a surge within the White House and outside of the White House as well.

KEILAR: Yes. And I think we are already starting to see that. The chief of staff has indicated that he expects there to be more. Dr. Saju Matthew, thank you so much for being with us.

MATTHEW: Thank you, Brianna.

KEILAR: So what does this uncertainty mean for the election, what does it mean for national security? Carl Bernstein and Gloria Borger will join me to answer those questions.

Plus, we'll look at the plans for the continuity of government and what plans are in place for every scenario.

Also, new reaction from Capitol Hill, where a Republican senator tests positive after visiting the White House and meeting with the president's SCOTUS pick, Amy Coney Barrett.

This is CNN's special live coverage.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:20:00]

KEILAR: We are learning of some breaking news. Two additional cases of COVID-19 at the White House, one is a journalist, one is a press staffer.

I want to get some more information now on this from CNN's Brian Stelter. What can you tell us? Who is this? Who have they come in contact with?

BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: Right. We don't know the names of these individuals but this is further evidence of a White House outbreak of the coronavirus, not just the president and the first lady but also others at the White House complex. This is an internal memo from the White House Correspondents' Association, Brianna, that I have obtained. It say that there's one journalist who was preliminarily tested positive and then there's one White House staffer who sits in the press area who works with journalists who has received a confirmed positive result.

I fear this, of course, is the beginning of something much bugger, but all the other journalists who were tested today did test negative.

Brianna, throughout this experience, throughout this pandemic, the White House Correspondents' Association, the members of the media have been taking more precautions than the administration. And this memo just now reaffirms that point.

It says, make sure you don't have to work at the White House, don't work at the White House right now. Quote, we cannot stress enough the importance of mask wearing, social distancing and common sense, especially at the White House complex.

KEILAR: Brian, I mean, I used to cover the White House. One of the things that people are very surprised about it, when you tell them, as journalist, is just how close the quarters are, not just for the reporters. I mean, we are talking about very small areas that make it very difficult to socially distance. And so you do have to take as many precautions as possible.

But I'm also talking about the press offices. I mean, there are people sitting there chock a block at desks. They're very close. There's almost like a classroom feel about how close people are sitting.

STELTER: Definitely, right. And that's why it was a mistake for Kayleigh McEnany to hold a briefing yesterday when this was all going on and keeping people in the dark. If this news had not leaked, thanks to Bloomberg News last night, would we even know right now, there's a lot of murkiness about that.

But I think this -- the fact that there is a White House staffer who sits with press, who is confirmed positive, this speaks to how many other cases there might be. Of course, there's privacy issues here so we're not going to have names, but might there may be other cases at the White House right now.

KEILAR: All right. Brian Stelter, thank you so much for the news.

Will this infection change the president's mindset on the coronavirus after downplaying it for months? We're going to discuss.

Plus, new reporting that the Trump family refused requests to wear masks at the debate the other night.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:25:00]

KEILAR: The president's positive COVID test throws more chaos into an administration that has failed the public time and again coming to coronavirus. He repeatedly downplayed the massive pandemic, he openly has mocked measures, like wearing masks, which have proven to help slow the spread. I want to bring in now CNN Chief Political Analyst Gloria Borger to talk about this.

I mean, here we are. We have a month before the election. How does this affect this crucial time period?

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, look, it completely upends the election, Brianna. And what it does is it highlights the issue of COVID, which is, of course, the issue that the president wanted to avoid at all costs, but it also brings up issues of his own recklessness, the incompetence of his administration, the negligence of his administration, his willingness to put his campaign above the health and safety of the people who work for him, of the people who donate to his campaign, and, really, above the duties of his office, because it is his duty to make sure that he stays safe and did not do that.

KEILAR: No, he certainly did not. And the fallout from the recklessness of the president's response to coronavirus has now really come knocking at his door. He has become a number that he has constantly downplayed.

BORGER: Right, right. He has become a number and we should all hope that he has a mild case of coronavirus. But this is a president who was saying, you know, we have turned the corner, coronavirus is in the past. And now, we know he is Exhibit A inside the White House of all places that coronavirus is not a thing of the past.

[13:30:05]