Return to Transcripts main page
CNN Newsroom
Policy Spotlight: Biden's Tax Plan For Americans; What Happened To All Of Trump's Campaign Cash?; Melania Trump Canceled First Campaign Appearance As She Recovers From COVID; Update On Coronavirus Responses Across The Country; Officer Involved In Breonna Taylor Raid Speaks Out For First Time; Grand Juror Says They Were Not Given Opportunity To Consider Homicide Charges Against Officers. Aired 1:30- 2p ET
Aired October 21, 2020 - 13:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[13:30:14]
BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Restructuring America's tax code and making the wealthy pay their share. It's a campaign play that Biden hopes will actually energize his supporters as President Trump moves to weaponize it.
Rapper 50 Cent, clearly not a fan of Biden's proposal, is tweeting his outrage at the top tax bracket produced by the Democrat and he's endorsing Trump instead.
CNN's Christine Romans explains who will really feel the impact under a Biden tax plan.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Brianna, Joe Biden wants to raise taxes on the super-rich. He wants to roll back 2017 tax cuts for businesses and reward companies that bring jobs and production back to the U.S.
Here is what it looks like. A top federal tax rate of 39.6 percent. It would mean higher taxes for people making over $400,000 a year.
The very rich also would pay Social Security taxes on income above 400 grand, capped now at $47,400.
The corporate tax rate rises to 28 percent from 21 percent. That's still below the 35 percent corporate rate before the president's tax reform.
He proposes a minimum tax on foreign profits and a 10 percent tax credit for investments that reopen closed plants here.
Now, for families, Biden wants to expand the child tax credit and restore first-time home buyers' credit. And vows not to raise taxes on anyone making under $400,000 a year. Conservative economists argue that taxing the super wealthy and taxing
companies could trickle down to middle-class workers if companies spend or hire less.
But the Tax Policy Center forecasts, under the Biden plan, the richest households would see substantial tax increases, tax burdens would fall for the poorest Americans.
And by 2022, the expansion of the child tax credit would cut taxes for everyone in the middle -- Brianna?
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KEILAR: Christine, thank you for that.
Where did all of President Trump's campaign cash go? He's been raising money for his re-election bid since 2017, yet coffers dwarfed by Democrats.
Biden and the DNC are holding north of $430 million and spent nearly $200 million on ads in September alone.
As for Trump and the RNC, $251 million cash on hand. And they were outspent on ads last month by more than double according to FEC filings.
Mark McKinnon is a former adviser to George Bush and John McCain and the creator and co-host of showtime's "The Circus."
Mark, it's great to see you.
I wonder, if you were on Trump's election campaign, how worried you would be about the gap between Trump and Biden. Is this worrisome?
MARK MCKINNON, FORMER POLITICAL ADVISER TO GEORGE BUSH AND JOHN MCCAIN & CREATOR AND CO-HOST, "THE CIRCUS": Sure it's worrisome. The fact the incumbent has less money than the challenger is where -- I'm not sure that's ever happened.
As my colleague and friend, Mike Murphy, said, you could give a monkey a flame thrower and it would be more efficient in a pile of cash.
KEILAR: Well, I mean, all right. So when you look at what they have done, do you feel like they have just been burning money, like lighting it on fire then?
MCKINNON: Yes, I do. They spent exorbitant amounts of money, early on, on a lot of extravagant plays, like the Super Bowl, spending tons of money really early when -- this is the time when you need to be pressing for the advantage in a race that could arguably be very close.
What you want to have is all your maximum impact in the last 20 days of the election.
Last thing you want, to be outspent 3-1, some cases 5-1 by the challenger.
KEILAR: How does that happen that they blew so much money early? They weren't strategic about it? Was there a sense they had so much money they had money to burn --
MCKINNON: Sure. It --
KEILAR: -- or do you think this is political misjudgment.
MCKINNON: It's classic incumbent fever. A lot of this was pre-COVID, in the sense that people thought, we're incumbent, we have a strong economy, pretty good shape. We're raising a lot of money now.
They made the assumption, having raised a lot of money then, they would continue to raise money without realizing they could get into a false situation where, suddenly, the strategic calculations changed considerably, largely because of COVID.
At a time when you needed more cash than ever, you have less cash than you need.
KEILAR: I wonder what you think of the president in the homestretch. He should be making his pitch to voters for what he wants to do with another four years.
And yet, it seems like he's just airing grievances, attacking everyone and everything.
I wonder how you would describe what he's doing. I'm not going to call it a strategy. I wonder what you describe what is, this behavior he's exhibiting.
MCKINNON: I call it impulse. That's what Donald Trump does, all by instinct and impulse.
Here is the problem. The last thing Donald Trump wanted the last 20 days to be is a referendum on COVID and how he's handling it.
[13:35:03]
And part of the strategic problem is he's doing what he always does, and goes to as a natural instinct, which is huge rallies and people are turning out.
That's part of the problem. A lot of these rallies are in states where COVID is spiking.
So all the local stories there are going to be leading with the idea that Trump has come to town at a time when COVID is spiking, having huge rallies where people are not socially distancing, very few wearing masks.
So not only is it not helping Trump, it's hurting Trump when he goes to those states and holds rallies where COVID is a problem.
KEILAR: He's going and he's not accompanied by his wife. First lady, Melania Trump, has canceled what would have been her first appearance on the campaign trail. And her team says it's because she's still recovering from COVID.
How bad is that for him?
MCKINNON: That's really bad. That emphasizes the worst part of the story, which is COVID is a problem.
In fact, it's such a problem that his wife who contracted, as did he, is still suffering symptoms from it and unable to come out and campaign with him.
He goes to those states. What's the big story? Where is Melania? Well, she's back at the White House suffering from COVID because the president hasn't done a good enough job protecting people during this health crisis. It's a problem.
KEILAR: It is a problem.
Mark, before we go, any predictions for what we're going to see in the final almost two weeks, under two weeks now?
MCKINNON: Well, listen, the last and best chance Donald Trump has to change the equation -- pretty tough at this point -- but this third debate arguably is more important than the others.
Because, normally, a third debate would be -- we've seen a couple already. We know the first one was a train wreck. The second was canceled.
Everybody knows this is the last chance, including Donald Trump. You know he's going to do something dramatic. He'll throw deep. The question is what he does.
The one thing he could do, which is unlikely, is surprise people. We're probably going to get what we expect from Donald Trump.
But the interesting thing, you know, there will be mute buttons on the microphones. It will be interesting to see how Donald Trump handles that.
KEILAR: Interesting. There may be a mute button but he'll still be speaking so how does that play out?
MCKINNON: I have a feeling that will be the case. I have a feeling he'll be screaming over the microphone.
KEILAR: Exactly. We may not hear that at home but certainly hear it at the debate, which could be problematic for Joe Biden.
Mark, we'll be watching along with you.
Mark McKinnon, thank you.
MCKINNON: Thank you. KEILAR: Just in, two new studies on a rise of COVID in children and
also how black patients are more likely to be hospitalized than whites.
Plus, Boston schools are now reversing on their in-person reopening. Hear why.
And the Louisville officer involved in the raid that led to the death of Breonna Taylor is speaking out for the first time about race, the raid, and why Breonna Taylor did not have to die.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[13:42:47]
KEILAR: Two and a half million years of life. That is what the coronavirus has cost Americans, according to Harvard University researchers who calculated the life expectancy rates for many in this country who died from the virus.
Roughly half of those years lost were taken from middle-aged Americans, those in 40s, 50s, 60s, who, prior to the pandemic, had decades of life ahead of them. His research has not yet been peer reviewed or published in a medical journal.
For more coronavirus headlines, let's check in with our CNN correspondents.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm Elizabeth Cohen in Atlanta.
A new report from the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Children's Hospital Association shows a 13 percent jump in the number of children with COVID from October 1st through October 15th. That's a jump from about 657,000 children to 741,000.
Now children do tend to stay healthier with COVID when you look at hospitalizations. Children represent only between 1 percent and 3 percent of hospitalizations depending on the state.
JACQUELINE HOWARD, CNN HEALTH REPORTER: I'm Jacqueline Howard in Atlanta.
The coronavirus pandemic continues to hit the black community hard. A new study finds black COVID-19 patients are more likely to be hospitalized than white patients are. There's a 1.7-fold difference.
The study found no significant difference when it came to ICU admissions or deaths, although other previous research has.
The new study included data more than 5,000 people tested for COVID-19 in Michigan.
And the researchers call for more investment in testing and prevention efforts across racially diverse communities.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KEILAR: All right. Thank you so much for those reports.
President Trump abruptly ending an interview with "60 Minutes" and he's now threatening to release it himself. Threatening but he hasn't yet.
[13:44:42]
Plus, cracks emerge in the coronavirus task force at the White House.
And a Louisville police officer involved in the Breonna Taylor case says what could have been done differently that would have saved her life.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
KEILAR: A Louisville police officers is speaking out about the March raid that cost Breonna Taylor her life. Sergeant Jonathan Mattingly, one of the officers involved, appeared for the first time in an interview with "The Courier Journal" and ABC News.
He says the shooting had, quote, "nothing to do with race."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SGT. JONATHAN MATTINGLY, LOUISVILLE POLICE OFFICER: This is not relatable to George Floyd. This is nothing like it. It's not Ahmaud Arbery. It's nothing like it.
It's not a race thing like people want to make it to be. It's not.
This was a point where we were doing our job and returned fire. This is not us hunting somebody down. This is not kneeling on a neck. This is nothing like that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KEILAR: This is as we are learning from an anonymous member of the grand jury, they were not given the opportunity to consider homicide charges against the officers in Breonna Taylor's case.
[13:50:09]
CNN Legal Analyst, Laura Coates, is joining me now.
I want to know what your reaction is to the officer saying that, that this this isn't like George Floyd, not like Ahmaud Arbery, that they were fired upon and returned fire.
Do you see it that way?
LAURA COATES, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: The most obvious distinction is Ahmaud Arbery, who died from people who were engaged in a perverse form of vigilante justice.
The common denominator is about the power dynamic, about information that's given, much like the cases -- though George Floyd is an anomaly in the sense that the officers being fired right away.
You have both the prosecution and the investigators having cement blocks for feet, Brianna, about the delay in information, about the type of information that was given, and ultimately about the type of conclusions that could be drawn.
Here is an officer is trying to draw a distinction. But you cannot look at the case in a vacuum and exclude the conversation on race when the power dynamics at play were very evident.
We only have a charge for shooting a wall, not for killing a black woman.
KEILAR: Charges for wanton endangerment have to do with another officer whose bullets went into an adjacent apartment. They don't have to do with Breonna Taylor.
Sergeant Mattingly discussed how he remembered approaching Breonna Taylor's home with other officers.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MATTINGLY: After the first bang, nothing happened. I banged again. I yelled, "police, search warrant, police search warrant." You're yelling this.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: How many times?
MATTINGLY: Probably three times with each bang. There was a total of six bangs, six different knocks at the door while we're doing this.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KEILAR: That's something that stands out to what -- in contrast to what Breonna Taylor's boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, said. He said he didn't hear police, notifying it was police.
There was only, it appears, there's only one other witness hearing police notifying it was police, and they only ahead it once.
What do you make of what you heard from the officer?
COATES: Remember, this is supposed to be a no-knock announce warrant, where you're supposed to go into to avoid people from confiscated material or to have a surprise attack.
He's now saying this was not a no-knock warrant and he alerted multiple times. That's in contrast just to Breonna Taylor's boyfriend, but to multiple witnesses.
If you recall, in September, we were sitting here watching as Daniel Cameron, the A.G. in Kentucky, talked about this, and said you have one witness who said they may have heard something, but multiple witnesses saying they never heard a thing.
The person who was in the room when Breonna Taylor was shot also did not hear it, which is why he fired the warning shot out of fear for his life.
This if the kind of inconsistency that undermines the credibility of the entire investigation. It needs to be rectified in some manner.
KEILAR: Unfortunately, there's no body camera footage that could corroborate what he's saying.
He talked about body cameras and what could have been done differently. Let's listen to that part.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Do you believe if you had body cameras, this wouldn't have happened?
MATTINGLY: No. The incident would have still happened, but it would have been shown on camera what happened.
This wouldn't even be an issue. This wouldn't be a case. You would never hear about it. Michael Strahan would never have known about this case if we had cameras on.
UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: How would you have done it differently, if you could have?
MATTINGLY: We would either served the no-knock warrant or we would have done the normal thing we do, which is five to 10 seconds to not give people time to formulate a plan or give people time to get their senses so they have an idea of what they're doing.
If that had happened -- I'm telling you, if that had happened, Breonna Taylor would have been alive.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KEILAR: What do you think about that, what he said about body cameras?
COATES: First of all, body cameras would have been instructive and would have illustrated what happened.
Oftentimes, officers look to have body cameras to justify their behavior and explain to the public what actually happened to resolve an issue of self-defense or justify shooting allegations.
But, of course, here, what he tells you is there was a departure from normal protocol.
We know that by virtue that one of the officers charged with endangerment of the neighbors was already released and let go early in the investigation.
Because he disregarded the training and the protocol that is in place about shooting blindly and indiscriminately.
But ultimately, here, you have the discussion whether or not there was a justifiable and a holistic approach to the prosecutor's detailing the evidence in front of a grand jury.
What does the grand jurors have available to them at the time they made the decisions of whether to charge or even pursue or contemplate homicide charges?
[13:55:04]
We're learning it was never even presented, body cam footage or not.
KEILAR: Laura, thank you so much.
COATES: Of course.
KEILAR: As medical experts warn that the country is a week away from seeing a rapid acceleration of the virus, a number of officials on the White House Coronavirus Task Force are breaking with or contradicting the president. We're going to roll the tape, ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
