Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

New Cases, Hospitalizations Soar as Pandemic Worsens; Race to Finish Line as Campaign Fight for Last-Minute Holdouts. Aired 10- 10:30a ET

Aired October 28, 2020 - 10:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:00:00]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN NEWSROOM: A very good Wednesday morning to you, six days to the election. I'm Jim Sciutto.

POPPY HARLOW, CNN NEWSROOM: And I'm Poppy Harlow. We're glad you're here.

A big hour ahead for us. The breaking news on Capitol Hill this morning, the CEOs of Facebook, Google and Twitter are all set to face important questions from senators just moments from now. It is a critical time as misinformation is rampant online. We're going to bring you some of their testimony live right here.

But, first, there are the facts and then there's what many in the White House are telling us. Six days, as Jim said, from a critical election and record number of early votes cast, here is where we are.

SCIUTTO: Listen, these are the facts, it's in the data. 40 states are seeing new spikes in new infections. That is 80 percent of this country, 29 states are reporting their highest day, single day of new infections just this month. 226,000 Americans have died so far.

So why is the White House claiming victory on this pandemic, why a member of the president's own task force is warning state and local lawmakers could be forced into shutdowns if Americans are not disciplined. That's coming from inside the White House, adding that this threat is, in no uncertain terms, real.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ADM. BRETT GIROIR, ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF HEALTH, HHS: So we do assess that the cases are actually going up, they're real because hospitalizations and deaths are starting to go up.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: I mean, we know that. The numbers prove it.

CNN Senior Medical Correspondent Elizabeth Cohen joins us now. Elizabeth, those comments, contradictory, of course, because the White House, the president claiming we're turning the corner, we've accomplished all this, the actual experts dealing with it, appointed by this president, saying it is not true. And the concern now, right, as we look at the graph, you have predictions of maybe 100,000 new cases a day if things don't change. Tell us why they believe that.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: So, Jim, sometimes you just have to call a spade a spade. And when we hear the administration saying, oh, we're turning a corner, oh, the pandemic is -- it's going to be over very soon, it is just baloney and baloney is my second choice of words. And I'm going to show you some maps that explain exactly what I mean.

When you take a look at this map, you can see that case numbers are going up. They're going up in all of the states that you see in orange and red, and this is basically a sea of orange and red. 40 states are showing COVID rates that are going up. They're not steady. They're not going down. They're going up. How in the world can you declare victory when 40 states have rising case numbers?

Now, let's take a look at this, 29 states are showing record numbers for new daily cases, highest ever since the pandemic began. How in the world can you declare victory, how in the world can you say we're turning a corner when 29 states are showing their highest daily case numbers?

Now, let's take a look at deaths. The states here that are in red, those are the ones with the highest death rates compared with other states in the country. A lot of these states, as you can see, are in the middle of the country. So when you look at this, there's no way you can conclude that things are getting better. In fact, all you can conclude is things are getting worse, especially bad as we move into the winter. Jim, Poppy?

HARLOW: One of those deep red state, Elizabeth Cohen, state of Wisconsin, where their hospitals are overwhelmed and yet the president is still going today and going to hold a rally. We appreciate your reporting, as always, Elizabeth. Thanks a lot.

All right, take a look at Colorado, because they are seeing more coronavirus cases now than they ever have. The governor says more people are hospitalized now than at any point since May. And right now, parts of the state are putting restrictions back in place. Denver among them moving to its second highest level of COVID restrictions.

The mayor of Denver, Michael Hancock is with us this morning. Good morning, thank you for being here.

Sir, you have called this a clarion call to anyone who doesn't believe the science here and the mitigation efforts here. And you've warned about a possible stay-at-home order. How close are you to having to issue that?

MAYOR MICHAEL HANCOCK (D-DENVER, CO): Glad to be with you, Poppy. Stay-at-home order is really the next step. The people of Denver, a lot of our businesses, our restaurants have done just a tremendous job to really help us flatten that curve from the spring. And, unfortunately, because some folks didn't take the science serious and that we needed to stay focused with the mission at hand, wearing our mask, social distancing, not gathering in large groups, we are seeing our numbers rise.

[10:05:04]

And we are seeing it rise across age demographics. All age demographics are vulnerable right now and it's unfortunate, because now we have to step back and address this from a more serious point of view and, again, we're one step away from going to the stay-at-home order, and that's something we want to avoid at all costs.

HARLOW: I know that as of yesterday, at least 77 percent of intensive care unit beds at Denver's hospitals were occupied. Are you approaching a moment soon, you believe, where choices in care will have to be made, meaning hospitals may have to turn people away from their ICUs or prioritize who gets care and who doesn't?

HANCOCK: I don't see that happening at this point in time. Obviously, that is a question for our medical and public health professionals. But when we look at the whole model, Poppy, step back and look at the whole model, we are seeing our 14-day cumulative average almost more than double, actually. We want to be about 175, we're at 385 right now. And that is really, really concerning.

We are seeing our positivity rate, we were at one point below 4 percent, we're now at 7.3 percent. And we are seeing our hospitalization rates rise, as well as our ICU capacity decrease. Those -- that whole model is extremely concerning to us, which means that we could be just a couple of weeks from major challenges within the hospitals or we could do everything we can to reverse it and hopefully people don't have a more severe reaction to having been infected with the virus.

HARLOW: You have moved to return most school-aged children back -- back to their homes for remote learning. And I wonder what that level needs to get to, Mayor, for you to allow kids to go back to school and also your sort of your thinking and your calculus on that. Because The New York Times just last week reported from two studies in the U.S. and Britain that they say showed that schools at this point do not seem to be, quote, stoking community transmission of COVID. Not to say there's no cases in schools but they're not seeing broad community transmission. Where is your mind on schools right now?

HANCOCK: Well, in Denver, the superintendent and board of education, the independently elected board of education, have come to the decisions -- control with the decisions regards to when kids are in school and when they're not. And, of course, they are also being advised and directed by the state, Department of Public Health and Environment, as well as consultation with the county, the city county or Denver County Department of Public Health and Environment.

Those decisions are made. We lean in, we try to give the best guidance to the board of education and to the superintendent to make those decisions. They decided at this point that K through two can be in person and 3 through 12, I believe, are at home.

But they've got to take into consideration as well our teachers and teachers unions and their positions and desires as well, which I'm not sure the other nations have as forceful of a voice, vociferous unions who are engaging in this conversation as well, not a bad thing that we try to do this collaboratively.

But let me say this because you're asking a question that I think also has broader implications, and that is a lot of kids are disconnected. A lot of them don't have access to the technology and Wi-Fi necessary. They've done a tremendous job to stay in contact, get kids up and online and able to participate in remote learning. There's no better place for them to learn than in the classroom.

But the reality is this, we recognize that every decision we make has impact from the class rooms to the restaurants and from every business sector across the economy. Nothing trumps saving lives. So we have to stay in contact, we have to make these decisions collaboratively and we have to understand what the collateral impacts are of those who are going to be disproportionately hurt as a result of this decision. That's why taking these orders seriously is so very important for us while we're in Denver or in Green Bay or in Washington, D.C.

We also need national leadership, which we have not had.

HARLOW: Well, and, namely, as you see, disproportionately impacted black and Latino communities working on the frontlines and also disproportionate amount of those kids disconnected when it comes to remote learning. We wish you luck, Mayor. Thank you very much.

HANCOCK: Thank you.

HARLOW: Jim?

SCIUTTO: Well, we keep telling you, if you can believe it, six days out from Election Day, but the number of ballots already cast by Americans like you has surpassed half of the total number of ballots cast in the 2016 election. As really Poppy noted, no precedent for this kind of early voting interest.

HARLOW: It's good to see an engaged electorate.

Right now, candidates and surrogates are blitzing the battleground states. Our Sara Murray is in Philadelphia.

Sara, good morning to you. The president's adviser, daughter, Ivanka Trump, courting voters there today.

[10:10:00]

What more do we expect to see in the coming days?

SARA MURRAY, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right. I have a feeling this is going to be a busy state in the coming days. We saw long lines here yesterday. It was the last day to apply for mail-in ballots. We know there have already been more than 3 million mail-in ballot applications in Pennsylvania alone.

And election officials here are saying, look, it could take a while to count up these ballots. If we don't know who won Pennsylvania on election night, that is okay. We're going to keep counting the next throughout the night and in the days that follow.

The other thing we're expecting to hear later from the secretary of state and other top officials in Pennsylvania is what they're doing as far as election security and securing their networks and prepping. We just got a release from the state saying that they are working with U.S. attorneys, as well as FBI agents across Pennsylvania to make sure that this is a safe, secure election, a safe, secure voting experience for everyone who is going to be turning up on the polls in Election Day. So important in light of some of this rhetoric we've been hearing around the election this cycle. Back to you guys.

SCIUTTO: And there's a lot of it. Sara Murray, good to have you there.

Well, just stunning numbers out of North Carolina on voting as well, more than 75 percent of the total 2016 votes have been cast there, three-quarters.

CNN's National Correspondent Dianne Gallagher is in Charlotte this morning. Dianne, the pre-election numbers staggering. Why folks people coming out early, the combination of interest and concerns about the pandemic?

DIANNE GALLAGHER, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Jim, and most of the people we've talked to, that's their reason for doing it, but also because this state had expanded its early voting period.

So, to give you an idea, more than 3.6 million people in North Carolina have already cast ballots. The overwhelming number did it, just like what you're seeing here, which is early in-person voting. Don't be fooled by the fact there aren't people in here. Some of that is they because they have so many locations.

Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, the largest county. They have 33 different locations for people to vote in. There are still many days left. They don't finish early voting until October 31st.

And so we're looking at, right now, just under 50 percent of every single registered voter in the entire state. They've already cast a ballot.

Now, the state of North Carolina is currently tied up in lawsuits that have been appealed all the way to the Supreme Court, waiting on an opinion there. But no matter what, ballots that are mailed in and have a postmark on Election Day can be counted after election day, either three or nine days after. That's still being decided. Hopefully, we'll hear something from the Supreme Court soon.

HARLOW: Dianne, thank you for being there. It's an extraordinary number, that's for sure. We appreciate it. Well, Joe Biden is not on the trail again today and said he is staying in Delaware. He is being briefed, we're told, by health experts on COVID-19. M.J. Lee is there this morning.

I understand he is going to make some sort of comments or address later. But, I mean, it is notable, it's interesting not to be on the campaign trail six days out, no?

M.J. LEE, CNN POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: It is. Guys, this final stretch of the 2020 election truly is the coronavirus election. And Joe Biden at least is fully embracing that. Though you're right, he's doing it from here in Wilmington. We do expect him to not leave the state today, at least based on the schedule we've been given so far. In just a little bit, he is going to get a briefing from public officials on the state of the virus and then give remarks on his plan to try to contain this pandemic.

Every speech, every campaign event from Biden recently have either centered around or has had some big COVID-19 angle. Obviously, this is in such stark contrast from what we are seeing from President Trump, who keeps saying that the country is turning a corner.

Just to give you a quick look ahead where everybody is, Kamala Harris is campaigning in Arizona today, and then tomorrow, Joe Biden heads to Florida. On Friday, he is going to Iowa and Wisconsin. On Saturday, he is in Michigan.

And at some point over the weekend, former President Barack Obama is going to be joining him on the campaign trail, whether that's in Michigan or a different battleground state, we don't know yet, guys.

SCIUTTO: M.J. Lee, thanks very much.

Well, two candidates, two very different strategies certainly, but also different closing messages. We're going to discuss.

HARLOW: Also, the gulf coast about to feel the force of yet another hurricane. This is Hurricane Zeta, the fifth named storm to hit this area just this year so far. We're tracking its path.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:15:00]

SCIUTTO: Welcome back. President Trump is blitzing Arizona and Florida today. Vice President Mike Pence making stops in Wisconsin and Flint, Michigan.

HARLOW: John Harwood joins us at the White House this morning. Good morning. I mean, it's totally opposite of what Joe Biden is doing, which is interesting and notable. The strategy in these final days, tell us what you know.

JOHN HARWOOD, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, there is a small amount of offense being played by the Trump administration. The president is going to go to Nevada, which is a state that Hillary Clinton won last time. His prospects for carrying that state are not good. Joe Biden has got a lead. He's over 50 percent.

The president is also going to go to Arizona. That's a state where he was -- where he did win in 2016 over Hillary Clinton but he's now losing to Biden. BIDEN is not quite as high there as he is in Nevada but that's a promising state. And the president is looking at a pretty ugly map.

Vice President Pence in Wisconsin and Michigan, we've got new polling out this morning from the Washington Post and ABC News showing the president down 17 points in Wisconsin. That seems very high, nevertheless, he's got a significant deficit, down seven in Michigan.

So this is a difficult situation For the administration but they're out and scrambling.

SCIUTTO: John, remarkable moment last night after a Trump campaign event in Nebraska.

[10:20:00]

Our Jeff Zeleny covering this had some striking reporting about what happened afterwards. And these are some of the pictures of people waiting, hundreds of them for hours, long after the president took off and left on Air Force One. What do we know?

HARWOOD: Well, what we know is that the president, throughout the -- this homestretch of the campaign, has been putting his followers in danger by having these maskless, no distance rallies all over the country.

In this case, in Nebraska, a state where the president isn't really even competitive for the electoral vote he was there seeking, you had some older people who had to traverse a long distance between where they parked their cars and where the rally was and it was cold. And there were people who had to be treated for hypothermia.

So, again, one of the consistent patterns with President Trump is concern for himself over others, and he has put his followers in danger with respect to COVID and last night with respect to the weather.

SCIUTTO: John Harwood, thanks very much.

Well, let's bring in Dr. Paul Offit. He is Director of the Vaccine Education Center at the Children's Hospital in Philadelphia, also a member of the FDA's Vaccine Approval Advisory Committee. In other words, he knows a thing or two about this virus.

I just want to show those pictures again there, because this is a consistent theme. I mean, these folks in Nebraska were left behind. I look at the crowd there. I don't see social distancing. Can't tell in the dark whether they're wearing masks but this, of course, a pattern because we know outbreaks have been traced to Trump events, in Oklahoma, here in Washington, D.C., Minnesota.

Can you speak for a moment, set aside the president here, to folks like that what the health danger is to them to go to events like this?

DR. PAUL OFFIT, DIRECTOR OF VACCINE EDUCATION CENTER, CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL OF PHILADELPHIA: Right. I don't know how much more information needs to get out there to make it clear that this is a virus that's transmitted by small droplets, that if you stand within six feet of somebody and you're not wearing a mask and they're not wearing a mask, then you can catch it. That if you were wearing a mask and you stand six feet away, that you're not going to either catch or transmit this virus or very less likely to do that. I mean, how much more information do you need for that?

What Donald Trump has done is he has been able to convince a significant number of people to not believe what they see, to not believe the rate (INAUDIBLE) are going up. It's amazing. I would like a sociologist or anthropologist to look back on this and explain to me how it is that he's able to get you to not believe what you see.

I mean, it's started, I guess, when he was inaugurated, the size of his inauguration crowd was a third of that of Obama's and he (INAUDIBLE) to say it was much greater. It's amazing.

HARLOW: Yes. Except that didn't cost lives and this does. So I think there will be one or two case studies on this, Dr. Offit. I think you're right.

Listen to this from Dr. Fauci just this morning.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: I think it will be easily by the end of 2021 and perhaps even into the next year before we start having some semblances of normality.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: No semblance of normality he's saying until perhaps 2022. Do you agree with that assessment?

OFFIT: Yes, I do. I think it's going to take a while for a vaccine to get out there, even if the vaccine works well, let's say, it's 75 percent effective against moderate to severe disease, it's probably not going to be as effective against either asymptomatic shedding or mild disease, in which case, even if you've gotten the vaccine. It may just convert people who would have been much sicker into that are asymptomatic shedders, which means, you're still going to need to wear masks.

I think until we get control --

HARLOW: Wait, wait, can you say that again? Doctor, can you say that again, the vaccine may not be effective enough so people may have to wear masks?

OFFIT: No. I think what the vaccine will do is the vaccine will be effective against moderate to severe disease, which means that it will keep you out of the hospital and it will keep you from dying. What it will be less good at is protecting against asymptomatic shedding or mild disease, which is, frankly, the story with many vaccines.

That's the story with the influenza vaccine, with the rotavirus vaccine, which is an intestinal virus, with the whooping cough vaccine. Those vaccines are very good at preventing moderate to severe disease, not as good at preventing asymptomatic shedding or mild disease.

HARLOW: Okay.

SCIUTTO: Okay. So that's going back to complete pre-early 2020 normality that we all remember with fondness, right? But how about the incremental steps we've seen so far? Because we have seen some schools reopening in places in so-called green zones, where positivity rates are down, New York, here in Washington, D.C., et cetera, are you concerned that some of those incremental steps in places where they meet the benchmarks might have to be rolled back as we see the kinds of case numbers rising around the country?

OFFIT: I think in those areas where people have been very good about setting down what are the rules for engagement here, the best you can for wearing masks and social distance, wash hands. If we continue to do that, and we're good about doing that, then you can start to go back to school and you can start to go back to work, but you have to continue to do that.

[10:25:00]

You can't just get tired of it and give it up.

We can -- I mean, look at other countries, like South Korea, even our northern neighbor, Canada, are much better at this than we are. It's the most powerful thing you can do.

I mean, I was on service last week in our hospital, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. We see children occasionally with this virus. And if you gave me the three following choices, which would I choose? Choice number one, stand six feet away, choice number two, if I can't stand six feet away, what would I choose, a mask or a vaccine, assuming a vaccine is 75 percent effective, I would choose the mask. And then third, I would choose the vaccine.

So the most powerful things we can do are the masks and the social distancing and we have chosen in many cases not to do it.

SCIUTTO: That's interesting, it really is, right, that the mask maintains its kind of power and safety even in the age of the vaccine.

HARLOW: I need some new masks with fall patterns. Paul Offit, Dr. Offit, thank you very much. We appreciate it.

Okay, the president made this appeal last night to women, female voters. But he did it by promising jobs for their husbands. What about their jobs? Don't they want their jobs back too? We're on it, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[10:30:00]