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Live Coverage of Trump Campaign Event; Trump Continues to Spread COVID-19 Confusion; Interview with Former FBI Chief Peter Strzok. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired October 16, 2020 - 14:00   ET

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

[14:00:00]

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We've worked together for a long time. As president, I'm deeply aware that America's 54 million seniors have borne the heaviest burden of the China virus. Many older Americans have endured months of isolation, missing weddings, births, graduations, church and family reunions. You know that very well, you know it all too well.

My heart breaks for every grieving family that has lost a precious loved one. I feel their anguish and I mourn their loss, I feel their pain. I know that the terrible pain that they have gone through -- and you lose someone, and there's nothing to describe what you have to bear, there's nothing to describe it.

In times of challenge, we turn to our fellow Americans for a shoulder to lean on, and we turn to God for healing and strength. And together, we will overcome, we will overcome.

(APPLAUSE)

My message to America's seniors today is one of optimism, confidence and hope. Your sacrifice has not been in vain. The light at the end of the tunnel is near, we are rounding the turn. I say that all the time, some of the media doesn't like hearing it but I say it all the time. We're rounding that turn.

(APPLAUSE)

Don't listen to the cynics and angry partisans and professional pessimists. We are Americans and we will prevail. We are prevailing, and we are. It's amazing, what's happening, if you look at what's going on, it's been really very amazing.

I'm moving heaven and earth to safeguard our seniors from the China virus to deliver life-saving therapies in record time and to distribute a safe and effective vaccine before the end of the year. And we're really doing it even sooner than that. You'll see what's going on, we have the vaccines getting ready to go.

Seniors will be the first in line for the vaccine, and we will soon be ending this pandemic. Hasn't happened, a thing like this, since 1918, 1917. That was a bad one too, that was a real bad one. I will not rest until we've eradicated this plague from our country and our lives and our world. We want it out. When the China virus arrived, we launched the largest mobilization since World War II. Our aggressive and early action saved more than 2 million lives compared to the best estimates from last spring -- you remember when they were giving you estimates.

Since the beginning, our nation's seniors have been my top priority. It was obvious very early on that it was affecting the seniors. Not young people, young people are -- they have that strong immune system and I give all credit to them, but they have a strong immune system. And 99.99 -- think of that.

But when you get into people that have a few more years, it's a little bit -- it's a little bit more difficult. When you get a lot more years, it's a lot more difficult. But what they've done with therapeutics now and what they've done with all of the other things that they're doing, it's incredible.

We heightened (ph) mitigation and surged testing to protect those at highest risk. We sent billions and billions of dollars in funding to personal protective equipment, and distributed rapid testing to 15,400 nursing homes all over the country. We've worked with a lot of governors.

(APPLAUSE)

Yes, we've worked with a lot of governors and some have done a great job, and some have done not a great job. And some have done a very poor job actually, but some have done a great job. But we're working very closely with the governors of the states.

Just this week, even the "New York Times" -- this was shocking -- was forced to admit that, quote, "Experts are saying with genuine confidence that the pandemic in the United States will be over far sooner than they expected."

(APPLAUSE)

And they're right, but I was shocked to hear it coming out of "The New York Times," right? I was a little (INAUDIBLE). And it's thanks to my administration's Operation Warp Speed, incredible people.

(APPLAUSE)

Because of advances in treatment we pioneered -- and we have (ph) many treatments, but because of these great advances, we've reached the point where the fatality rate is reduced by 85 percent since April, and now it's up to probably 91 percent.

(APPLAUSE)

Well, I'm here, I'll tell you.

(LAUGHTER)

(APPLAUSE)

[14:05:05]

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Four more years. Four more years. Four more years. Four more years.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Four more years. Four more years. Four more years. Four more years.

TRUMP: Thank you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Four more years. Four more years. Four more years.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Four more years. Four more years. Four more years.

TRUMP: Well, I don't know what they gave me, but give me some more of it right now and you can have some. No, I know exactly what they gave me. It was actually pretty amazing.

I'm also working with the FDA and HHS to make the antibody treatment that I received -- it's called Regeneron -- plus also, it's incredible. And you know, what they can do today is incredible. And they felt very confident even six months ago, when they started.

Think of it, we got this all done in a very short period of time, and now we're going for emergency use because we're going to make it available to everyone who needs it for free, anybody in the country.

(APPLAUSE)

And Eli Lilly is making a very similar drug --

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: All right, we're jumping out of this event by President Trump. Quite frankly, there are so many falsehoods we just need to interject and fact-check some of this. This is supposed to be a substantive address to seniors, and the president has said just a myriad of lies that I want to go over.

He said that there will be a vaccine sooner than the end of the year -- we do know that this has been something that has been sliding. At this point in time, he said a vaccine would already be out. It's very clear that that is not something that is going to be in the works here in the immediate future. He also said that this is going to be over far sooner than expected and he seemed to indicate that his recovery from coronavirus is really just kind of the norm, which it really isn't.

We know that he was on a monoclonal antibody, and only the 10th person in the U.S. to receive that Regeneron cocktail, which he has said will be free -- that's what he just said. That is a lie according to the fact-checking that CNN has done. This is something still very much in its early stages, it doesn't even have emergency use authorization. It was used on a compassionate basis for the president.

I do want to bring in Randi Kaye, who is there monitoring this event. And I think one of the hardest things to watch of it, not just the factually challenged parts but looking at that cutaway shot of the room, Randi, where you have -- and this is a lot of senior citizens who are there in this room, they're sitting awfully close. They're -- I mean, I don't know, you might have a better count of how many were there. But there are a lot of people and they are indoors, where of course transmission is a problem.

RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes absolutely, Brianna. We are outside, safely outside the convention center. But the president has gathered hundreds of seniors and supporters of his inside this convention center here behind me. They did get temperature checks on their way in, they were offered masks. Many of them are wearing masks, but we've seen many of them not wearing masks as well inside and also sitting very, very close to each other.

But the president is here to sort of shore up his base with these seniors. He is making all kinds of promises, not only that vaccine that you mentioned but he also has promised them that they will have a $200 drug discount card coming. We haven't seen that yet, that was a surprise even to his administration.

He's also said, as you said, that they -- seniors will get the same treatment that he got. He says it's coming soon -- no sign of that. He says it will be free -- no sign of that either.

But this is friendly territory for him. We are in Fort Myers, Florida, in Lee County. The president won this county back in 2016 by about 20 percentage points, although I have been talking to seniors here and across the state of Florida and many of them, Brianna, are very concerned about his response to the pandemic.

I talked to one 77-year-old here in Fort Myers, a lifelong Republican. He told me that he is not voting for Trump again this time around. He called him a charlatan, he called him a scoundrel. He said that this pandemic has broken the camel's back and the president will not be getting his support here this year, Brianna.

KEILAR: All right, I want to bring in Sara Murray to this conversation too. Another thing we just have to fact-check too, Sara, is that he was saying that "The New York Times" was basically saying that things are getting better and taking an optimistic view.

There is a story out, a column out from "The New York Times" about a dose of optimism as the pandemic rages on. But to be clear, it actually says that lives would have been saved with better leadership, and it talks about Americans personally taking that initiative to course-correct, and that that has saved lives. I mean, we just need to be very clear about the thing he's touting, isn't something he should be touting.

And talk to us about, you know, this promise that he's giving of these therapeutics, of this Regeneron cocktail where if you're in that audience you're thinking, amazing, this is something that is a cure and it's going to be free, when really that's not the truth.

[14:10:00] SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes. I mean, I think that's important to note. This is not something that is actually a cure, and it's not something that everyone's going to be able to get. These antibody cocktails are promising, but they're still unproven.

They have not yet been authorized by the FDA, and the FDA may come forward and say, look, we are going to authorize this but for just a small sliver, a certain kind of high-risk patient. Or they may come back and they may say, we're going to authorize this for a broader use. And in that case, there just aren't going to be enough doses of this for, for instance, everyone who falls sick or the companies would like you to be able to use it just if you live in the same household as someone who gets coronavirus.

And I think we have some sound of the Regeneron CEO explaining how this supply is going to be limited.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LEONARD SCHLEIFER, CEO, REGENERON: They bought, from us, several hundred thousand, maybe around 300,000 doses, which they are going to make (ph) for free.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Who decides who's going to get the supply of your drug?

SCHLEIFER: Right, so I think this is going to be worked out by the government, in consultation with the FDA, in consultation with ethical experts. Coming up with a distribution system where we take what's limited and we try and give it to the people who most need it, who would most benefit from it, the vulnerable people, elderly people, people who are high at risk, household contacts perhaps. We have to figure out ways to ration this.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MURRAY: Now, it's important to note that these first doses are going to be free. They will be the ones the government has bought, and if the FDA clears this they will be made available free to some patients. But the thing that experts worry about is what happens when this becomes a commercially available treatment and potentially is available to more Americans when the supply chain kicks in, what is the price going to be?

The federal government insisted they're going to try to keep that low, but it's impossible to make that kind of guarantee for these kinds of treatments, which tend to be extremely expensive.

And, Brianna, we should note that there was an opportunity -- you know, months back -- for the administration to really invest in this kind of manufacturing capacity and ramp up the availability of these kind of antibody cocktails once they are approved. And there were folks inside and outside the administration trying to get them to do that.

But administration officials tell us, you know, they were really more focused on a vaccine, they knew that was the kind of thing that was going to work and they really didn't feel like the science was there, months ago, to be able to pour all of this federal investment into this antibody cocktail that now the president is promising to everybody.

KEILAR: Yes, and you can see, as they're having issues with that vaccine timeline fitting his narrative, he's trying to shift towards this idea of therapeutics.

MURRAY: Absolutely.

KEILAR: But, you know, Sara, I want to ask you because you covered the president in 2016, and you went to so many events. And this has been a very different experience for him campaigning, but just looking at that room in Florida, which is a senior citizens event and it is indoors and there are so many people.

They don't actually appear to be appropriately socially distanced indoors. And just because they are indoors, is something that creates considerable risk in a particularly vulnerable group. I mean, a lot of folks would look at that and say, why is the president doing this? Why is he talking to them indoors?

MURRAY: There's not a good answer for that, there's not a defensible answer for why you would do something like this indoors, and why you would put the people who are your biggest supporters at risk. I mean, these people are literally risking their lives to be in this room to hear the president speak.

And it just kind of shows you what little value he has, even on his supporters, that he's willing to put them in this position, that the campaign isn't even interested in, you know, looking for a different kind of venue, an outdoor venue, encouraging people to wear masks.

You know, Brianna, I think it's important, when you were talking about "The New York Times" saying that there's a dose of optimism? Yes, there's a dose of optimism in an extremely bleak year where people are still getting sick and people are still dying. And the president could, you know, really try to turn this around by wearing a mask, by leading by example and he's doing the opposite. I mean, he's literally risking the lives of the people who are there to support him.

KEILAR: Sara Murray, thank you so much. Randi Kaye, thank you so much for the fact-check as well and being our eyes on the ground, appreciate it.

The White House has refused to answer questions about when the president last tested negative for coronavirus before he tested positive. At issue really is did he actually get tested for the first presidential debate? At last night's presidential town hall, here is what he claimed.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Before the debate -- which I thought it was a very good debate, and I felt fantastically. I was -- I had no problem before. SAVANNAH GUTHRIE, NBC HOST: Did you test the day of the debate?

TRUMP: I don't know, I don't even remember.

GUTHRIE: Did you take a test on the day of the debate, I guess is the bottom line.

TRUMP: I probably did.

GUTHRIE: Then you don't know if you took a test the day of the debate?

TRUMP: Possibly I did, possibly I didn't.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: The president, it's worth noting, has claimed that he has one of the greatest memories of all time. And of course his doctors would know when he was tested and if he was tested leading up to the debate.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GUTHRIE: Did you take a test, though, on the day of the debate?

TRUMP: You -- you know, if you ask the doctor, they'll give you a perfect answer.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Only if you think the perfect answer is not an answer, because reporters have pressed the president's physician, Dr. Sean Conley, on this. And his answer was far from perfect.

[14:15:05]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Do you remember when he had his last negative test?

SEAN CONLEY, PHYSICIAN TO THE PRESIDENT: Yes, I don't want to go backwards.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Doctor, one last time, when was his last negative test and what was his viral load?

CONLEY: Everyone wants that.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But we've been exposed.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Why is there hesitancy to say when the last negative test was?

CONLEY: Again, HIPAA kind of precludes me from going into too much depth, things that -- that, you know, I'm not liberty -- or doesn't wish to be discussed. (END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: As for next week's debate, former Vice President Joe Biden says he will demand that President Trump take a COVID test and receive a negative result before he will share a stage with the president.

Next, federal authorities are now investigating whether e-mails surfacing are tied to an ongoing Russian disinformation campaign.

Plus, disturbing new reporting that the president was warned Rudy Giuliani was being targeted by Russian agents.

And former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie says it was a mistake not to wear a mask at the White House.

You're watching CNN's special coverage.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:20:22]

KEILAR: Just in to CNN, federal authorities are now investigating whether recently published e-mails that purport to detail the business dealings of Joe Biden's son are tied to an ongoing Russian disinformation effort targeting the Biden campaign. CNN's senior national security correspondent Alex Marquardt is joining me now.

I mean, Alex, tell us what's happening here.

ALEX MARQUARDT, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, we're being told by two people who have been briefed on what the FBI is doing that they're looking into whether these unverified e- mails about Hunter Biden that were published by the "New York Post" about foreign business dealings are part of that bigger Russian disinformation effort, which of course is well under way in these final days of the 2020 presidential election.

Now, the intelligence community has said for months that Russia is very actively engaged in a disinformation campaign against the election, in this election -- in particular, against Joe Biden trying to denigrate his campaign, as they said, in favor of President Trump.

So the "New York Post" says that they got these Hunter Biden e-mails from Rudy Giuliani and Steve Bannon, that they were found on a laptop left in a repair shop in Delaware which, according to Giuliani's lawyer, reached out to him. Bannon, according to the newspaper, indicated that he also knew about these e-mails last month.

Now for a long time, Rudy Giuliani has been openly working to dig up dirt and promote disinformation on the Bidens. One person he has teamed up with is a Ukrainian politician whose name is Andriy Derkach. Derkach has been named by the U.S. intelligence community as a Russian agent, and has even been sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department.

So here you have Giuliani, openly working with a known Russian agent. And now the "Washington Post" is also reporting that the intelligence community was so concerned that the Russians were using Giuliani to feed Russian disinformation to President Trump, that they warned the White House about it last year.

Giuliani, as you might imagine, is denying this. Listen to what he said on "Fox News" earlier today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RUDY GIULIANI, PERSONAL ATTORNEY TO PRESIDENT TRUMP: No one in the Trump administration warned me, no one in the intelligence community warned me. President didn't say that to me. This is the first time I'm hearing that. And I have a pretty good idea of where it's coming from, and these are people who are trying to tear down Donald Trump and destroy his presidency --

BRIAN KILMEADE, FOX ANCHOR: And Mr. Mayor --

GIULIANI: -- from inside the intelligence community, of which there are many.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MARQUARDT: So people trying to tear down President Trump. Again, that classic deep state argument that we hear from the president and his supporters time and time again -- Brianna.

KEILAR: Alex, great reporting. Thank you so much for sharing it with us.

Joining me now to discuss is Peter Strzok, he served as the chief of the FBI's counter-espionage section before he was fired from the agency in 2018 after disparaging comments that he made about the president in text messages were revealed. He is now suing the Justice Department, saying that his firing was politically motivated.

And I should also mention he's the author of the book, "Compromised: Counterintelligence and the Threat of Donald J. Trump."

So Peter, there's a saying of someone who is considered a person of utility by foreign intel, that they are a useful idiot. Perhaps they are not an actual foreign agent, but they essentially operate in purposefully for a foreign government. Is that how Russia sees Giuliani, as a useful idiot?

PETER STRZOK, FORMER CHIEF OF FBI COUNTERESPIONAGE SECTION: Well, I think -- Brianna, thanks for having me on. I think one of the hallmarks of any sort of disinformation is you can't give it directly to somebody that is your target audience, so you need to find a way to essentially launder that disinformation, to get it into the dialogue and legitimize it and allow it to be used. And this is kind of a routine way that disinformation is seeded and planted into the larger dialogue.

What's concerning about Rudy Giuliani is he's no, you know, kind of unwitting mope (ph). He was the former mayor of New York City. He's no sucker, he's no rube. He is -- should be -- wise in the ways of the world.

And when I see this reporting out of the "Washington Post," that multiple officials briefed the president himself in December of last year about concerns that Giuliani was the target of Russian disinformation, it's staggering to think that there was nobody who reached out to Giuliani to warn him.

Because I can tell you one of two things are going to happen. In my 20-plus years at the FBI, if we saw somebody targeted as part of a disinformation campaign, either we're going to open a counterintelligence case or we're going to go out and warn them. And if, after warning them, they continue the contact, we're going to open a counterintelligence case.

So I find it very hard to believe when Giuliani says he has absolutely no idea that he was being targeted by these folks associated with Russian intelligence.

[14:25:00]

KEILAR: So I mean, that's not exactly a useful idiot, that is someone who is purposefully using that information they may receive to help their political interests or that of their -- basically their boss.

STRZOK: That's right. And I think, you know, when the "New York Post" story, when you look at this computer store owner in Delaware who allegedly received Hunter Biden's laptop, that is more in line when you think about somebody who's a useful idiot, that's kind of the entry point that is kind of, again, a classic indicator of the potential presence of disinformation.

But again, the concern with Rudy Giuliani is he is far down the chain. He isn't the entry point, although he's actively running around, was actively running around the Ukraine (ph) soliciting this information.

And what's really staggering, when you step back, Brianna, and look at this story, President Trump was warned that his attorney, Rudy Giuliani, was being targeted by a disinformation campaign by Russian intelligence. Nevertheless, after that, he sent Rudy Giuliani to Ukraine to dig up information on Biden, he actively met with Giuliani after his return from Ukraine -- multiple times in December, at the same time his impeachment was brewing -- and then after that, not only used this information but continues to use it to this day.

So you have a president who is asking to obtain Russian disinformation, knowing that that is what it is. He is accepting that same information, and he is then turning it and using it on the campaign trail against his opponent. And that's mind-blowing. There's no president in modern history that I can think of who did anything remotely close to this.

KEILAR: All right, Peter, I want you to stand by because I also want to ask you about something that President Trump said at last night's town hall -- or really, what he didn't say. He once again refused to denounce the QAnon conspiracy theory.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: -- about QAnon --

GUTHRIE: I just told you.

TRUMP: -- I know very little. You told me, but what you tell me doesn't necessarily make it fact, I hate to say that. I know nothing about it. I do know they are very much against pedophilia, they fight it very hard. But I know nothing about it.

GUTHRIE: They believe it is a Satanic cult run by the deep state.

TRUMP: If you'd like me to study the subject -- I'll tell you what I do know about, I know about Antifa and I know about the radical left and I know how violent they are and how vicious they are.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Now, the president continued to insist he knows nothing about this movement even though he regularly retweets its theories and followers, and he did seem to have some information at least about themes that they discuss or are prominent for them.

Let's be clear though, this is a wild, dangerous and completely factless conspiracy claim -- series of claims -- that dozens of Satan- worshiping politicians and celebrities are working with governments around the world to engage in child sex abuse.

CNN recently spoke with one former follower of QAnon to learn how he was sucked into this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JITARTH JADEJA, FORMER QANON BELIEVER: I didn't realize the nefarious kind of impact it was having on me because it was very insidious, how it slowly disconnected me from reality.

I would have been so happy to see Hillary Clinton dragged in front of a military tribunal. That still bothers me to this day, that how willing and happy and joyfully I would have reacted to something that I would normally want no part in.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: You know, Peter, the FBI has deemed QAnon a potential threat. What risk is the president posing for the country by not denouncing this and calling it out for what it is?

STRZOK: Well, he's legitimizing a group that his own government has said is encouraging violence and is also espousing a number of things from anti-Semitism to various racist beliefs. Any time the president says something that aids or otherwise normalizes the group, it brings them into the mainstream, it immediately allows and enhances their ability to recruit people. It's simply not believable that the president doesn't know what QAnon

is. And furthermore, it's absolutely not believable that he hasn't heard or been briefed about the concerns of his own government about that group.

KEILAR: Peter, thank you so much. Peter Strzok, we appreciate you being with us.

And still ahead, I'll be speaking to a former federal prosecutor who just quit after nearly four decades at the Justice Department. Why he says he couldn't bear to work any longer under Attorney General Bill Barr.

[14:29:41]

Plus, we'll solve the biggest mystery of President Trump's town hall: Who was the woman constantly nodding over his shoulder?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)