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Michelle Obama Highlights Importance of 2020 Voting; Hunger Crisis Worsens as Employment Questions Remain; Election Decisions Reversing on Appeal. Aired 10:30-11a ET

Aired October 06, 2020 - 10:30   ET

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

[10:30:00]

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Well, today marks exactly four weeks -- that's it, 28 days -- until Election Day. Of course, a lot of Americans are already voting. And as the president continues to downplay the severity of coronavirus, the former first lady, Michelle Obama, is delivering her closing argument, trying to urge folks from either party to vote for Joe Biden. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MICHELLE OBAMA, FORMER FIRST LADY OF THE UNITED STATES: I wanted to take a moment to remind you what's at stake, and to urge you to make a plan to vote today. Because let's be honest, right now our country is in chaos because of a president who isn't up to the job.

If you're a parent like me, you're feeling the consequences of this president's failure to take this pandemic seriously from his constant downplaying of the importance of masks and social distancing, to his relentless pressure on schools to open without offering a clear plan or meaningful support to keep students and teacher safe.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: All right, let's break it all down. Michael Steel, Republican strategist, former spokesman for former House Speaker John Boehner. And Matt Paul, former chief of staff for senator and former V.P. candidate -- of course -- Tim Kaine during the 2016 campaign. Matt also ran Hillary Clinton's Iowa operation in 2016.

Thanks to both of you for being on this morning. Michael, if I could begin with you, last night highlighted, you know, that the president has his strategy and he's sticking to it, right? Both political and both in terms of responding to COVID. That is downplay, you know, attack the masks, et cetera, but also bigger picture. I mean, it's a base strategy in effect.

I'm just curious, inside Republican circles, do folks believe this is enough to win?

MICHAEL STEEL, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: No. I think that this is a mistake (ph), I think that he has wasted every opportunity to waste an opportunity, he's never tried to expand beyond his base and down double digits in many polls including yours. He is once again focusing on his base and trying to pretend to the American people that 200,000 Americans haven't died of this virus.

People know that this is real. They can't go to baseball games, they can't go to movies, they have to put on a mask to go to the grocery store. Older Americans in particular are dying, and they're dying alone and they can't even go to their friends' funerals. This is sad, this is awful and pretending it isn't true just won't change anything.

HARLOW: Except not everyone in the Republican Party feels that way. Take a look at this, a tweet from Republican Senator Kelly Loeffler of Georgia, let's pull it up.

Her words are, "COVID stood NO chance against" the president. What you can't see there -- we don't have the rights to show it -- but it's basically WWE wrestling video sort of edited to make it look, Matt, like the president is wrestling COVID.

I'm asking you this as a Democratic strategist and because, you know, many on the right have tried to portray Joe Biden as weak, as hiding in his basement even though that's not true. How does Joe Biden respond effectively to Republicans now saying, look how strong the president is, he's beating COVID?

MATT PAUL, FORMER CHIEF OF STAFF FOR SEN. TIM KAINE'S 2016 CAMPAIGN: Well, I mean, that video's terrible. I don't know who advised on that, but I thought it was awful.

I think what the vice president needs to continue to do is exactly what he's doing, which is laying out a plan to build back better from COVID. This election clearly is a referendum on Donald Trump and his failure to put together a sound strategy to combat this virus, and it's taken a horrible toll on our country.

And I think the vice president, as he did last night in South Florida in a network town hall, taking questions and demonstrating that empathy that he's known for, understanding and listening to the American people, continuing to do that. And lay out a plan forward to get us beyond this.

SCIUTTO: Michael, I wonder if I could get your reaction. Because I want to play a little sound from the Joe Biden town hall last night, particularly on the question of masks and what was a slightly new attack line against Trump from Biden. Have a listen, I want to get your reaction.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Anybody who contracts the virus by essentially saying masks don't matter, social distancing doesn't matter? I think is responsible for what happens to them.

I would hope that the president, having gone through what he went through -- and I'm glad he seems to be coming along pretty well -- would communicate the right lesson to the American people: Masks matter. These masks, they matter. It matters, it saves lives, it prevents the spread of the disease.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: So the Biden campaign, very careful after the president's diagnosis, pulled negative ads, et cetera. That opening line there, saying, you know, in effect if you're dumb about this -- right? -- you don't follow the medical advice, you know, responsible for what happens to him. Is that -- does that work in your view?

[10:35:10]

STEEL: Yes, I think it's a fair criticism. I think that the president had the opportunity, coming out of this experience, to talk about safety, to talk about social distancing, to stress the importance of wearing masks, to really expand his appeal to the American people by being an empathetic and sympathetic figure.

And that just doesn't seem to be in his DNA. Instead, he's doubling down in this sort of machismo sort of response to this, that he's tougher than the virus and anyone who isn't or anyone who is responsible and takes these precautions is somehow weak or foolish. I think that's a real mistake.

HARLOW: So, Matt, there is a debate -- if you haven't heard -- tomorrow night, a vice presidential debate that's going to look at lot different than the last debate. And I assume maybe some more answers hopefully for the American people, and less interrupting. But substantively, what -- how would you advise Senator Kamala Harris in this debate?

PAUL: Well, the V.P. debate often gets panned, that it's not a primetime event, that really it's all about the top of the ticket. But I think these are really important conversations. It was in '16, I think it'll be, again, an important conversation tomorrow night.

And I think number one, you've got two people on that stage that (INAUDIBLE) and have been on this before. I think Senator Harris is uniquely positioned to do very well here, she was a strong debater in the primary. That's going to help her tomorrow night.

And we'll begin to hear how the vice president tries to defend the administration's failure around this pandemic, frankly. And I think you'll hear a very different path forward about building back better from Kamala Harris. That is going to be important as voters begin voting, as we're under way in voting across the early (ph) states.

HARLOW: Yes. Thank you both, we'll have you both back soon. Lots of headlines in the next 28 days for sure.

Still ahead for us, a heartbreaking look at the impact the pandemic is having on everyday families as they struggle to keep roofs over their heads and food in the pantry.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:42:05] SCIUTTO: I know we don't have to tell many of you this, but the nation is of course battling both a health crisis and an economic crisis at the same time. And for millions of Americans, that means struggling with the most basic need: hunger.

HARLOW: That's right, let these numbers sit with you for just a moment. According to the Hamilton Project, 14 million children here in the United States right now are not getting enough to eat, that is three times more than during the Great Recession and five times more than before this pandemic.

Our Kyung Lah spoke with a mother of three who was furloughed. Kyung, this reporting is so important. What did she tell you?

KYUNG LAH, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It's important because what they tell us is what the jobless picture is looking like for the working class, and the impact on children. We started with that number, that 14 million number, but we wanted to look at how it could happen and why. Well, one family allowed us to see it.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROSE RODRIGUEZ, FURLOUGHED WORKER: Mami (ph), wake up, Mama, you've got to go to school.

LAH (voice-over): The morning routine for Rose Rodriguez and her three girls.

RODRIGUEZ: You're going to go play in school. You're going to (INAUDIBLE) too

LAH (voice-over): Three-year-old Alejandra (ph) --

RODRIGUEZ: Come on, get up.

LAH (voice-over): -- and 12-year-old Terry (ph) sleep in one bed. Thirteen-year-old Yelitsa (ph) sleeps on the couch. Breakfast --

RODRIGUEZ: All right, you want this one?

LAH (voice-over): -- is what she scrounged from the day before.

RODRIGUEZ: It's good, yes?

I'll eat whatever is left over.

LAH (voice-over): Everything has changed since coronavirus.

RODRIGUEZ: Thank you, ma.

My pantry, that's all I have.

LAH: Before coronavirus, was this full?

RODRIGUEZ: Everything was full. LAH (voice-over): This was Rodriguez at her full-time job at LAX

Airport. She worked for Qantas Airlines Cargo, making more than $20 an hour.

RODRIGUEZ: I thought everything would be good. I thought, you know what, I have money for my rent, I have money for the food, I don't have to worry about the girls' health. So I never thought that on Wednesday, I'll show up to work? No, it wasn't that way. You could lose your job at any time.

LAH: How about the food? I mean, how much --

RODRIGUEZ: The food? That's what we struggle with.

LAH: Tell me about that struggle.

RODRIGUEZ: The struggle is sometimes we eat, sometimes we don't.

LAH (voice-over): What she manages is cheap, unhealthy food. Rodriguez says she's applied for 50 jobs. Thirty interviews later, still nothing. Her unemployment application stalled, part of the more than one million stuck in a logjam in California's system. Her car and most of her furniture, repossessed. She's months behind on rent.

RODRIGUEZ: And when we go to the laundromat, we see homeless washing themselves. And one day, if I don't go back to work, I'm going to be one of them. Yes, I'll (ph) live check by check. But now it's not a check, it's a box. A box that I have to stretch out for seven days.

[10:45:13]

LAH (voice-over): That weekly box is donated food from the L.A. Food Bank and Salvation Army.

While her older daughters learn virtually on public school laptops --

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Who's ready for lunch?

LAH (voice-over): -- Alejandra (ph) gets free child care and lunch at the Salvation Army, too young to understand a virus' impact on her family.

RODRIGUEZ: My youngest, she wants what she sees. But I tell her, Mami (ph), I can't. I have to tell her tomorrow so she could forget.

LAH: And every day it's tomorrow?

RODRIGUEZ: Yes, everything's tomorrow.

LAH (voice-over): Food banks across the country have seen hours-long lines as record unemployment devastates working families.

MORTIMER JONES, THE SALVATION ARMY SIEMON CENTER: So we do have our peas --

LAH (voice-over): At the Salvation Army Food Bank in Los Angeles, they fed 10 times the number of people as last year.

JONES: It is not like it happened for a week or two week, it's been happening for months. And even though we're trying our best to help, we know that we're barely scratching the surface because we can only do so much with the limited resources that we have.

LAH (voice-over): Today, fresh food bank supplies mean their shelves are more full.

RODRIGUEZ: Mac and cheese.

LAH (voice-over): But the joy is short-lived, counting down the days until the next food box has begun.

RODRIGUEZ: They shouldn't go through this. They don't have to be worrying, like, how we're going to eat the next day. Like, my mom has to go look for food. Or has my mom eaten? And they shouldn't worry about that. Like, I should be working and they should be just worried about school and their futures. It just hurts.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LAH: The hunger crisis is most acute among Latino and black families, as are the nutrition issues. Nutrition issues in those demographic groups have surged to 25 and 30 percent, that is an estimate.

And one last thing, Jim and Poppy, I just want to point out something that the Salvation Army told us about giving out fresh produce. On those days that they are able to give out fresh produce, the line wraps around their building and down the block -- Jim, Poppy.

SCIUTTO: Listen, a hunger crisis in America in 2020. Kyung, I'll ask you off-air about a site we could tweet out for people to help if they want to make donations to those food banks, we'd appreciate that. I'm sure folks watching at home might want to help.

LAH: Yes, absolutely. I mean, there are a number of ways you can help out, there's a CNN.com impact page that you can turn to as well as look at your local food bank, look at your local Salvation Army. Those are places that say that they need donations.

HARLOW: Yes.

SCIUTTO: All right, they need help, we'll share it. Kyung Lah, thanks very much.

HARLOW: Thank you.

[10:48:03]

SCIUTTO: And we'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HARLOW: Welcome back. A CNN survey finds that more than 3 million ballots have already been cast nationwide in this election, with less than a month until Election Day.

And take a look at this, folks, this is a live look out of Cleveland from our affiliate WEWS there. The first day of early in-person voting in Ohio and Indiana is today, and people are eager to vote. The lines are long and they come as courts continue to weigh in on voting and ballots.

SCIUTTO: Federal courts in Ohio sided with the Republican secretary of state, allowing him to mandate that counties install ballot drop boxes for absentee ballots only at the County Board of Election Office, which effectively limits them to one location in each county.

We saw something similar in Texas earlier this week. And the Supreme Court just reinstated a South Carolina law requiring absentee ballots to have witnesses' signatures. That's new and different. CNN's Kristen Holmes is with us with more.

And Kristen, you know, across the country, we're seeing efforts like this in a number of states, led by the Republican Party, with the potential for tremendous impact on this election. Bring us up to date.

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Jim and Poppy. Yes, I mean, it's extraordinary to think that these cases are still happening when people are actually voting, that some of these laws could change.

Now, it's not entirely surprising the Democrats are starting to face an uphill battle after some early victories. You have to keep in mind what we've seen in the courts in the last four years. I mean, President Trump and Senate Republicans have confirmed more than 200 judges, many of them sitting on appeals courts. And that's what you're starting to see now.

So let's start in South Carolina. Democrats had argued that this witness law that you just mentioned was dangerous in the time of pandemic, and that eventually it would lead to a burden on the right to vote.

The Supreme Court said no, mostly. Now, what that means is that they will allow anyone who voted with those ballots coming in within two days of the ruling to still not have a witness. But you have to remember, 8,000 people in South Carolina have already voted, so it's unclear how many ballots this is going to affect.

Take a look at Georgia. Now, this was a federal appeals court. This was a blocking of a lower court ruling that would have allowed Georgia to continue to count absentee ballots for three days after the election, as long as those ballots were postmarked on Election Day. Obviously, no longer.

[10:55:00]

And then we'll look at Texas. As you said, we saw those drop boxes earlier in the week, there have been quite a few cases in Texas. And this one, this was about straight ticket voting, which is that idea of voting for one party or another. Democrats had tried to overrule a Republican ban, trying to get some kind of momentum with Joe Biden's popularity there. But no, again, blocked.

But I do want to say one thing, which is voters need to pay attention in their own state to their own laws, because they're different everywhere and we are getting very close to the election.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

HARLOW: Very, very close, 28 days. Kristen, thank you for this reporting.

And thanks to all of you for being with us today, we will see you tomorrow morning. I'm Poppy Harlow.

SCIUTTO: And I'm Jim Sciutto. NEWSROOM with John King will start after a short break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[11:00:00]