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AstraZeneca Trial Paused; No Delay for Barrett Nomination; North Carolina Trump Rally as Early Voting Begins; Harris County in Texas Shatters Voting Numbers. Aired 9:30-10a

Aired October 15, 2020 - 09:30   ET

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

[09:30:00]

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Tens of thousands of participants on September 9th. So, really, quite soon afterwards this pause was announced, the company announced it. And then just last week, the week of October 5th, that's when AstraZeneca got their safety data to the FDA according to the source that I spoke with.

Now, I want to note here that the source said he thought it was a technical issue, that there were records in the U.K. that weren't in the same format as in the U.S. because the patient was in the U.K. And, of course, the FDA is in the U.S.

But, I will say that the commissioner of the FDA, Dr. Steven Hahn, he told "Bloomberg News" yesterday -- he wouldn't comment on this particular situation, but he said that in safety situation there is a lot of back and forth between the company and the FDA.

And I spoke to a former FDA commissioner, Dr. Robert Califf, and he said, look, the FDA is going to be asking a lot of questions. You have one person with a neurological -- with neurological symptoms, that's this patient, which has caused this pause, plus AstraZeneca had a pause back in July. That person, that study subject, also had neurological symptoms.

You've got two people with neurological symptoms who got the same vaccine. That is concerning. He said the FDA is going to be super, super careful about asking for test results, images, everything that they can think of to see if the vaccine might be to blame here.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: There is another trial that's also paused. This one is by Johnson & Johnson. What do we know about that pause and also is it -- is it a similar situation to AstraZeneca or completely different?

COHEN: It is similar, Poppy, in that a patient -- I'm sorry, a participant, a study subject illness is the cause of the pause. Somebody got sick. They want to make sure that the vaccine is now involved. But it's difficult in a really significant way.

Johnson & Johnson voluntarily did this pause. They took it upon themselves to say, hey, wait a second, somebody got sick in this trial, let's ask some questions and we're going to pause it. In the case of AstraZeneca the FDA put on what's called a regulatory hold. The FDA said, hold on a second, guys, we're going to ask you to hold off for a moment while we look into this. Those are two very different situations.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: Yes. Well, that's why you do the trials, right?

HARLOW: That's right.

SCIUTTO: It was good news, big picture, right, there are a lot of different approaches here and most of them seem to be proceeding quite well.

Elizabeth Cohen, great, as always, to have you on top of them.

COHEN: Thanks.

SCIUTTO: Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee have set a date to vote on advancing Judge Amy Coney Barrett's Supreme Court nomination, rejecting Democrats' call for a delay. What that means, coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:36:57]

HARLOW: All right, welcome back.

So just a few moments ago Senate Judiciary Republicans rejected Democrats' call to delay the vote to advance Judge Amy Coney Barrett's Supreme Court nomination to the full Senate.

SCIUTTO: They're going to do it. The vote is now scheduled for next week, October 22nd. Committee now in day four of confirmation hearings listening to witnesses this time. Bottom line, the Supreme Court is set to change in a very big way, with big consequences going forward.

Here with us now to discuss, CNN chief legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin.

Jeffrey, first on Amy Coney Barrett. I mean she punted on a whole host of issues, whether the president can delay an election, can the president pardon himself, on -- a question on voter intimidation, I mean even on climate change, right? I just wonder, are these truly open questions as a matter of law?

JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN CHIEF LEGAL ANALYST: Well, you know, even -- even -- ever since 1987 and the Robert Bjork hearings, Supreme Court nominees have really gone out of their way not to answer questions in any sort of substantive way. But even by those standards, Amy Coney Barrett has been reluctant to give opinions on much of anything. I mean I -- I don't think she would have been going out on a limb to say that climate change is real, to say that -- you know, to talk about pardons in a little more detail. I mean she really was a very protective of her own opinions. But, you know, what she did was, she kept her Republican support and it's a Republican majority on the committee and a Republican majority in the full Senate and that means barring some completely unexpected development, she will be confirmed before the election.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

HARLOW: She said and made a point to say on the first day, Jeffrey, I am not Justice Scalia. You know, I'm Judge Barrett and originalists can disagree. But then I don't feel like we learned how so. Did -- what is the most important thing we learned about her this week or maybe didn't learn?

SCIUTTO: Yes. Good point.

TOOBIN: Well, I think the most important thing we learned was that the super spreader event that a couple Saturdays ago at the White House where she said Justice Scalia was my mentor, I believe in interpreting the Constitution the way he does. And, yes, of course, it's true, no two justices, even who agree on most things, vote exactly the same way.

But when you think about the core opinions of Justice Scalia, that the Constitution does not protect the right to an abortion, that affirmative action should be prohibited under the Constitution, that the health care laws are unconstitutional, all of that seems very much in line with what Amy Coney Barrett suggested her own views would be. So, of course she won't be identical to Justice Scalia --

SCIUTTO: Yes.

TOOBIN: But she will be much more similar to Justice Scalia than she will be to Justice Ginsburg, whose seat she will be taking.

[09:40:01]

HARLOW: Yes.

SCIUTTO: Yes, there's a great exchange where Senator Whitehouse (ph), I believe it was, like ran through all these 5-4 decisions, which were very consistently by that same conservative majority, liberal minority, now, of course, it would switch to 6-3.

Just for folks at home, on some of those issues you mentioned, what does this mean for those big legislative questions, health care, gun control legislation, voting rights legislation going forward? Under this court, are those things in danger?

TOOBIN: Well, I -- you know, the -- much -- the answer is, yes. I -- I think you have to draw some distinctions. You know, the health care case, the one that's going to be argued on November 10th, there are a lot of peculiar facts of that case and I don't think you can take from Judge Barrett's testimony exactly how she will vote on that.

But will she vote to prohibit states from limiting gun possession and limiting ammunition and -- and, you know, using gun safety laws? Absolutely she is going to be very tough on the Second Amendment.

You know, will she allow states to restrict or even ban abortion? Absolutely. I mean will she vote to limit universities from using affirmative action, considering race in admissions? Absolutely. Those sorts of issues I think are absolutely -- you know, there couldn't be any doubt about how she'll vote.

SCIUTTO: Wow. Big deal.

HARLOW: Jeffrey Toobin, thank you very much.

TOOBIN: All righty, team, see ya.

HARLOW: Well, nearly 300,000 people lined up to cast votes over the first two days of early voting in the most populated county in Texas. We will be joined by the man leading the effort on this, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:46:13]

SCIUTTO: Welcome back.

President Trump is set to hold an afternoon rally in North Carolina today as that state begins in-person, early voting. Voters lining up this morning as a federal judge issued a mixed ruling for that key swing state, determining what will happen to flawed, mail-in ballots already cast there.

CNN's Dianne Gallagher has more from Charlotte.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DIANNE GALLAGHER, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Every day for more than a month now Lee Zacharias checks the mail and comes up empty.

LEE ZACHARIAS, NORTH CAROLINA VOTER: I submitted my application August 20th in person at the board of elections office.

GALLAGHER (on camera): You have not voted yet, though?

ZACHARIAS: I have not received a ballot.

GALLAGHER (voice over): Like thousands of others in North Carolina, because of the pandemic --

ZACHARIAS: I have a compromised immune system.

GALLAGHER: Zacharias is voting by mail for the first time this year, or trying to. According to Ballot Trax, a new tool that North Carolina voters can use to check their status, her original ballot was mailed on September 11th. She contacted Guilford County in late September and was told Ballot Trax might not be accurate. So, to be safe, they canceled the original and sent her a new ballot, which she's still waiting to get. ZACHARIAS: Makes me angry.

GALLAGHER: Across town, a different kind of voting problem. Forty- seven-year-old Vincent Gager returned his and his 83-year-old dad's ballots weeks ago. So he was shocked when we told him state data shows their ballots haven't been accepted.

VINCENT GAGER, NORTH CAROLINA VOTER: I've been doing it the same way for years. I sign his, you know, I'm -- I'm the witness because, you know, I'm his son.

GALLAGHER: He's not alone. So far, more than 1.3 million North Carolina voters have requested an absentee ballot and almost 40 percent of them have already been returned. But according to state data, nearly 7,200 are still under review, meaning the vote hasn't yet been accepted. Now, black voters make up only 16 percent of the total statewide ballot returns, but they account for almost 40 percent of the ballots listed as pending.

T. ANTHONY SPEARMAN, PRESIDENT, NORTH CAROLINA NAACP: This is no way to run an election.

GALLAGHER: Dr. T. Anthony Spearman is the president of the North Carolina NAACP. He's also a member of the board of elections in Guilford County, where nearly 6 percent of ballots returned by black voters are still listed as pending.

SPEARMAN: So many of them are for the first time undergoing this process and their naivety to it is causing some of these rejections.

GALLAGHER: As election workers review ballots for processing, they're supposed to notify a voter if they find a problem. Most issues can be fixed or cured without having to fill out a new ballot, but a slew of lawsuits surrounding what to do with ballots that are missing witness information led to the state board telling counties to do nothing and just wait for court guidance, leaving thousands of voters in limbo as the clock ticks down to Election Day.

SPEARMAN: And people are losing confidence. They're losing trust in the election cycle.

GALLAGHER: Creating suspicion in the shadows of North Carolina's ugly history of minority voter disenfranchisement.

GAGER: And I feel like they're trying to do voter suppression.

GALLAGHER: Still waiting on her ballot, Zacharias is suspicious, too.

ZACHARIAS: So I want to cast a vote.

GALLAGHER (on camera): Are you afraid that your state is going to prevent you from doing that?

ZACHARIAS: I don't know the answer.

(END VIDEOTAPE) GALLAGHER: Now, the state board of elections actually just issued some guidance about those types of ballots, saying that they're still working through it because there are other lawsuits out there. But that ruling last night should allow a voter like Vincent and his father to get some sort of contact from their county board of elections and tell them what they need to do about their ballot.

Jim, that's what a lot of these voters just want, they want an answer. They want to know what to do.

SCIUTTO: Yes. They want it to be secure. They want it to be easy, too, understandably.

[09:50:02]

Dianne Gallagher, thanks very much.

HARLOW: Well, this just into us at CNN. A campaign staffer for Senator Kamala Harris, of course the vice presidential nominee, has tested positive for COVID. We're told she was not in close contact -- the senator was not in close contact with this staffer. Senator Harris, though, is now canceling all her travel plans as a precaution through Sunday.

Now back to voting.

A record number of early voters, for a second straight day in Texas, just under 115,000 people voted in person early in Harris County. That, of course, is home to Houston. These are the lines from yesterday.

Chris Hollins is the Harris County clerk. He joins us now.

Good morning, sir.

CHRIS HOLLINS, HARRIS COUNTY, TEXAS, CLERK: Good morning, Poppy. Thanks for having me.

HARLOW: Good to have you.

Record numbers once again. Is this just because it's the first few days or are you expecting this all the way until Election Day?

HOLLINS: Well, Poppy, it turns out that when you make it easier for people to cast their ballots, they're more likely to vote. And so we saw a shattering of our early voting records on the first day of elections. And just yesterday, as you mentioned, we topped 100,000 again. And so we're seeing no signs of slowing down here. We have nearly 15,000 that have voted just this morning in about an hour and a half. And those lines are still moving.

HARLOW: So "The Houston Chronicle" this morning reports this, quote, delays in the traditionally Republican west Harris County were particularly lengthy, where more than half of the early voting sites had 40-minute-plus lines. They also report that the precinct four commissioner has asked you specifically to deploy more voting machines there.

Are you going to do that?

HOLLINS: Yes. So we're looking at our operations on a daily basis in every part of Harris County to make sure that we have the infrastructure, the machines to be able to accommodate as many voters who are going to cast their vote.

HARLOW: Well, he says you don't there. He says you don't there and that the lines were 40-plus minutes long. So he's asking you specifically for more machines. Are you going to supply those?

HOLLINS: There were lines all over the county. People are really enthusiastic about casting their votes. And those lines have been moving. And so we are working with all of our county commissioners to ensure that every voter across Harris County had every single opportunity they can to cast their vote and to do so conveniently (ph).

HARLOW: Do -- just -- I hear you, but I'm just trying to get a direct answer on that direct request from that precinct head as to whether or not they're going to get the machines they need. Do you have enough in the state and will they get them?

HOLLINS: Here in Harris County we have -- we have machines in our inventory that we are deploying out to locations that need more of them.

HARLOW: OK. We'll stand by on that.

Also, there's been a lot made, and it's become a national story, I think importantly, the back and forth in the courts on the one ballot box per county, especially in a big county like Harris County. So the latest legal move on that is that the federal appeals court has sided with Texas Governor Greg Abbott. So right now it's still legal to only have that one official ballot drop box. So now what? I mean you can appeal higher. Is that the plan?

HOLLINS: So the Supreme Court of the United States is the only court left. But, frankly, it's unlikely that we're going to prevail in this matter. It's deeply unfortunate. It's abuse of the governor's power to make a county like Harris County, larger than the size of Rhode Island, to have a single drop off point for our seniors and people with disabilities to be able to drop off their mail ballots.

But we're working to accommodate those voters. We do have curb side voting at every single voting location. And we're seeing a number of seniors (ph) come in and surrender their mail ballot to vote in person because people are really enthusiastic about having their voices heard right now.

HARLOW: OK. In fact, you guys won an appeal on that, that was brought by Republicans trying to get rid of some of that drive through, if you will, if I can use that term, ability for people to drop off their ballots. But when it comes back to the governor, his argument here on the

ballot boxes is, in his words, to, quote, maintain the integrity of our elections.

And I would just note, he did -- like, you know the response from them is, look, we moved to make early voting three weeks long and not just two weeks long. He's the one who moved to extend it longer. Not enough?

HOLLINS: Yes, he did extend that early voting period and he did that after I wrote him a letter requesting that he do it. And we applaud that effort. But you don't get to suppress votes after you make voting easier. We should be making voting easier for everyone. And so the process at all of our locations was secure, your photo ID is checked, you watch yourself as your ballot is placed in a lock box. And that lock box is transported to our headquarters every evening.

HARLOW: Let me ask finally, Chris, just about what this is like for you. I mean you're 34 years old. You are a young leader in the party for sure. You got this job just in May after your predecessor had to withdraw for health concerns. You've been named in pretty much every lawsuit that Republicans have brought in the state on voting. What's it like to be in this position, to be responsible when you've got 2.4 million registered voters in your county?

[09:55:03]

HOLLINS: Well, it's a -- it's a huge honor to be entrusted with protecting the right to voter of more than 2.4 million voters. And we have a huge team that's working hard to protect the right to vote. And we're giving voters more options than ever, like drive through voting, like 24 hour voting, both of these that have never happened in the history of Texas. And so we're thrilled to be doing that and voters are excited about it too.

HARLOW: I appreciate your time. Good luck to everyone whose trying to make sure that everyone can vote.

Thanks, Chris.

HOLLINS: Thanks, Poppy. Have a good one.

HARLOW: You got it.

Jim.

SCIUTTO: Well, just in, a staffer on Senator Harris' team has tested positive for COVID. Harris is now off the trail for several days as a precaution. We're told no direct contact with this person up to 48 hours before the positive test. We're going to be on the latest.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:00:05]

HARLOW: Good morning, everyone, I'm Poppy Harlow. SCIUTTO: And I'm Jim Sciutto.