Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

McConnell Says Trump Within His Rights to Wage Legal Fight; Pfizer Says Early Analysis Shows COVID Vaccine Is Over 90 Percent Effective; U.S. Adds 105,000 Plus New Cases on Sunday; Balance of Power in Senate Hinges on Georgia Runoff. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired November 09, 2020 - 15:30   ET

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

[15:30:00]

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN HOST: OK, so that was the Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, wrongly comparing what we have all just lived through, witnessed, reported on these last couple of days with all of the major networks projecting Joe Biden the winner of this past election to the Bush V. Gore down in Florida back in 2000 where, you know, the outcome was very much in doubt.

And Mark Preston is with me now, and obviously, you know, Mark was just having a conversation with Gloria Borger on whether Republicans stands on acknowledging Joe Biden as the victor, and clearly, he's toeing the President's line.

MARK PRESTON, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, he certainly is. And what's interestingly, Mitch McConnell is for all the viewers out there who have I guess come to know him over the years, but to really get to know Mitch McConnell is to know he is not going to be pressured by anybody to waiver from the position he is in right now.

I mean, when he takes a position, he does not move on it. So when he talks about moving forward right there and allowing President Trump to have his day, to let all these legal battles battle out, he's going to stick by that.

You know, a lot of people, too, are wondering what's going to happen as we head into the next year and can Mitch McConnell work well with Joe Biden. Well, I think that he can, but I do think that a lot of groundwork and spadework needs to be done right now as opposed to poisoning the well. And I fear, I do fear that we're going to have a poisoning of the well in the next couple weeks, next couple months that could hurt next year.

BALDWIN: Isn't that -- I mean again, just keeping in mind, you know, 75 or so million people voted for Joe Biden, but 71 million people voted for Donald J. Trump. And how dangerous is this to have -- you know, the President is the leader of the party but still to have the, you know, Senate Majority Leader casting doubt after all of this?

PRESTON: Well, it's not just him, too, I mean we see the House Minority Leader, Kevin McCarthy, has not come out, either. Now he's an ally of Donald Trump, but, you know, there's one thing about being an ally with somebody in politics, right, and standing by their side and being loyal. There is another thing of following somebody off a cliff right now. And unfortunately --

BALDWIN: Exactly.

PRESTON: -- I do think we're seeing some Republicans right now following Donald Trump off the cliff because they fear, just to your point, that he got 71 million votes, and that's an incredible amount of support. And let's not forget, heading into election day, Donald Trump's approval rating was in the high 80s, right? So these Republicans are fearful of Donald Trump and really fearful of his supporters.

BALDWIN: Mark Preston, thank you so much. Let's stay on us. Trevor Potter is with me, former Federal Election Commission Chairman. And Trevor, you were just listening to Mitch McConnell, listening to my conversation with Mark. What do you think of this?

TREVOR POTTER, FORMER FEDERAL ELECTION COMMISSION CHAIRMAN: Well, you know, I think McConnell is trying to put the best face on this, and he's, of course, correct that when you have close elections, under state law, there are circumstances in which you can have recounts, and there are going to be some recounts. It looks as if there will be in Wisconsin and Georgia and probably Nevada.

So he's correct in saying that all the votes haven't finally been counted and recounted yet, but we are almost in the place. Arizona is the one everyone is looking at where, when Arizona with a Biden lead that looks substantial enough that he will get those states --

BALDWIN: Yes.

POTTER: -- once that has happened, even with the recounts, there is not sufficient room for Trump to win this. That I think is the key fact. Even though McConnell wants to wait for recounts, Joe Biden will have a majority in the electoral college of states where he has won the popular vote in those states beyond the states that are going to be subject to recounts.

And that's before you get to the fact that recounts, unless you're dealing with a Florida situation with a couple hundred votes, none of these are, recounts do not change much. They are feeding the ballots through the machines again. Last time Hillary Clinton asked for a recount in Wisconsin, she had a 20,000-vote margin, which is about what Biden has now, and Clinton was behind, so she had to make that up. She got 200 votes in the recount. That's a pretty typical result.

BALDWIN: That's a huge difference and obviously, in numbers. Because I wanted to ask you, you know, Biden is leading by thousands of votes in several states, and just in all your years of experience, you know, have you ever seen that many votes overturned across multiple states?

POTTER: No. That just doesn't happen. Recounts are when you are very close. You see recounts change a couple hundred votes which, in some very tight Congressional races, could make a difference, but not thousands of votes across the state. And we're talking several states.

[15:35:02]

But, again, the point is, even if every one of them went against Biden and for Trump, it looks to me as if Biden will still have a majority in the electoral college, because Pennsylvania is beyond the level of having a legally required recount. The Biden win in Pennsylvania is bigger than the statutory recount requirement.

BALDWIN: Got it. And I'm also just curious from you, and we led the newscast with this news today that President Trump has just up and fired Mark Esper, his Defense Secretary. I think you could easily argue he's trying to change the narrative from the fact that he lost the election to a position of power, he's firing this guy. I'm wondering though with many, many weeks left, you know, until, you know, President-elect Biden becomes President Biden, what can President Trump do?

POTTER: Well, as the President, he is in charge of the executive branch, and he can fire political appointees. Not civil service, even the head of the FBI is not a political appointee. He has a ten-year term and can only be fired for cause. But if you're a cabinet secretary and for some reason you rub the President the wrong way, he has the legal right to fire somebody.

I think, you know, that sort of instability of changing senior people in our foreign policy and Defense Department apparatus, I think it is potentially dangerous at a time when we're in a transition and we are also going to be looking as if we're going to be having to bring aboard Biden transition teams in those departments.

But the President has the legal authority if he wants to change someone in his cabinet to say goodbye. Now that just means there's an acting defense secretary, because presumably there'll be no attempt to get someone new confirmed in Congress.

BALDWIN: Right. Trevor Potter, thank you so much, sir. I appreciate all your expertise there.

And just going back to what we are hearing from Senate Majority Leader, Gloria Borger, you and I were just talking about him. As if on cue, there he was. We were talking about the very few, I think it's four Republican Senators who've actually spoke out acknowledging in some form or fashion that the victor in this election. What kind of message does Mitch McConnell there send to the rest of the Republican Senators?

GLORIA BORGER, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL ANALYST: He's playing the long game here. He's looking beyond 2020 to the Senate races coming up. He doesn't want to be seen as the leader who broke with Donald Trump. Donald Trump is very important to the future of this Republican Party, he believes. And that you're not going to go down as somebody who kind of threw in the towel until and if the President ever concedes the election.

And, again, you know, Mitch McConnell plays the long game always, always, always. He wants to keep his majority in the short term with these two Georgia races coming up, and he wants to keep his majority in the long term if he doesn't, you know, if those races go his way.

And one of the ways to keep his majority is not to cross Donald Trump right now. Donald Trump got over 70 million votes. That is very significant and very important to those Senators who are up for re- election. And that is exactly what Mitch McConnell is talking about. There is -- you know, as he said, it's not the end of the Republic if this takes a little longer, and that's the message he's going to continue until it's over.

We don't know when that will be. You and I talked about it. Could it be December 14th when you choose electors, could it be before? But he's not moving from that position.

BALDWIN: Yes, that is clear. Gloria, thank you so much.

BORGER: Sure.

BALDWIN: Let's go quickly back to the White House, back to Kaitlan Collins. And what does this mean for the White House -- Kaitlan?

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think this is the way that we are saying how Republicans are going to try to appease the President and how we've seen people who are feeding the President's accusations about voter fraud, while we're hearing from Republican secretaries of state in places like Georgia saying that they have not seen any evidence of any kind of widespread voter fraud. That no legitimate claims have been made to that effect.

But despite that, they are going to stand behind the President firmly, as we were saying from the top Republican, with Mitch McConnell making those statements he just did, standing by the President.

And what McConnell does is not just speaking for himself, but that really speaks for the entire party, and it gives clearance to those other Republicans who have been kind of teetering on the edge of not sure what to say in recent days about the President's claims and about whether or not they're going to recognize Joe Biden as the next President. And it really gives clearance to clearance to the rest of the Republicans who are going to be on Capitol Hill this week when they get asked by reporters about the President's claims.

[15:40:00]

And so I think that McConnell does give his party cover in that sense, but, of course, it's going to raise so many questions about what he is saying here. Because we existed in these few days where it seemed like people weren't sure what to do about what the President was saying. A lot of them had been silent, a lot of Republicans, but today we've seen the Vice President, Mike Pence, say that he told all of his staff at a meeting today that this is not over, and they're not going to act like it is.

Now we've got Mitch McConnell doing similar. So these more traditional, mainstream Republicans who are now going to bat for the President and standing with him on his baseless claims about voter fraud. And so the question is, how long does that delay the formal certification of the results of this election, and how does that move going forward?

But they're making clear they are not breaking with the President on this, and I think that's because, Brooke, we saw how much support the President got on the day of the election, and they know how their base feels, and they are not going to break with this President.

BALDWIN: 70 million, north of 70 million votes. Kaitlan, thank you so much for all of that.

I want to turn the corner and talk coronavirus, because by the way as all this is going on, cases continue to skyrocket across this country, surpassing that 10 million mark today. What local officials across this country are planning to do to stop the spread.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:45:00]

BALDWIN: The United States just hit a devastating milestone today, surpassing 10 million coronavirus cases. As experts say we are entering the worst phase yet of this pandemic. Right now not a single state is trending in the right direction. You see the map, you see the alarming sea of red right there indicating the fall surge is spreading rapidly as cases climb. Just yesterday the nation added more than 105,000 new infections, marking the fifth consecutive day that cases topped that 100,000 figure.

And it's not just new cases, deaths and hospitalizations are also climbing. But as CNN's Nick Watt reports as some states implement new restrictions to slow the spread, there is some good news on the horizon.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

NICK WATT, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Did the light at the end of this tunnel just get closer? Pfizer says its potential vaccine might be more than 90 percent effective, well beyond expectations.

ALBERT BOURLA, PFIZER CEO: I think that likely based on impact that would be the greatest medical advance in the last 100 years. It's a very important day for humanity.

WATT: But challenges remain.

GOV. ANDREW CUOMO (D-NY): Just to put it into focus, we did 120 million COVID tests in this nation over seven months scrambling, doing everything we can. We now have to do 330 million vaccinations, maybe twice.

WATT: Meantime in the U.S., this virus is spreading at record rates. For the first time averaging over 100,000 new infections every day. And nearly 1,000 deaths. And -- DR. SCOTT GOTTLIEB, FORMER FDA COMMISSIONER: We're going to have a

record number of hospitalizations this week. Now 56,000 people are hospitalized, 11,000 are in the ICU. These are very big numbers nationally, and it's accelerating very quickly.

WATT: While attention was understandably elsewhere.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: As election night in America continues --

WATT: During what became election week in America, at least three- quarters of a million caught this virus, and it killed 6,571 people. Utah now finally has a mask mandate.

GOV. GARY HERBERT (R-UT): Masks do not negatively affect our economy. And wearing them in the easiest way to slow the spread of the virus. We cannot afford to debate this issue any longer.

WATT: In Minnesota, more than 10,000 cases confirmed just over the weekend.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: These rates of growth are truly chilling.

WATT: In New York City, they're nervous again.

MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO (D) NEW YORK CITY: Now, unfortunately, we're seeing a real growth in the positivity rate in this city, and that is dangerous. So we have one last chance to stop a second wave.

WATT: If you look at nationwide spread, these last five days were the worst five days of the pandemic. The next five might be even worse.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WATT: And the fear right now is both the scope and the speed of this spread, the scope, as you mentioned, but a single state right now where cases are falling, not one. And the speed, well, to get out first million confirmed cased back in the spring took us 98 days. This latest million took us 10 days. Just 10 days -- Brooke.

BALDWIN: Yes. At least we have the Pfizer news today. That could be a step in the right direction. Nick Watt, thank you.

Coming up next, the runoff elections that could turn the state of Georgia deep blue and decide which party controls the U.S. Senate.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:50:00]

BALDWIN: The balance of power in the U.S. Senate now hinges on Georgia. Two runoff races are set for January. Republicans Senator Kelly Loeffler who was appointed to her seat earlier this year is up against Democratic challenger Raphael Warnock, a pastor in Atlanta. In a crowded field of candidates Reverend Warnock was the top vote getter with 33 percent, Senator Loeffler was second with 26 percent.

[15:55:00]

As for the other runoff, Republican Senator David Perdue faces Democratic challenger Jon Ossoff. Perdue fell just short of the 50 percent needed to avoid a runoff and that is where we are for now.

With me for Atlanta LaTosha Brown cofounder of Black Voters Matter, and Georgia State Senator Nikema Williams who just won the late John Lewis's congressional seat. So Congresswoman-elect Williams, first to you, welcome and congratulations on your House win.

REP. NIKEMA WILLIAMS (D-GA), ELECTED TO JOHN LEWIS'S SEAT: Thank you, Brooke.

BALDWIN: Let's start with these two special elections coming up. You know, how will your party keep this momentum going come early January in the depths of a pandemic winter?

WILLIAMS: So, Brooke, that's the beauty of deep organizing and making sure we never made this about one candidate or one individual or one election cycle. We've been organizing on the ground, building the infrastructure for the Democratic party. I'm the first black woman to ever chair this party. So we're breaking all norms this cycle.

So when people tell us that we won't turn back out to vote I also tell them that we also didn't expect other people, didn't expect us to flip Georgia blue and we've never had a black woman chairing our party. So we're going to get our people back out because we have given the power back to the voters. And they understand that it was never about just Donald Trump, it was never about just the November election cycle. This is about giving the power to the voters and we're going to prove everybody wrong once again on January 5th.

BALDWIN: Latosha to you, I wanted to talk to you in particular today because Stacey Abrams name checked your organization in that first tweet from her after the news, you know, as a thank you. And we also just learned that she has already raised now more than $7 million for the runoffs. What would you like to publicly say about Stacey and just what's happening in Georgia?

LATOSHA BROWN, COFOUNDER OF BLACK VOTERS MATTER: I think Stacey's leadership has been key. I think that the work she did, I think the foundation and her vision has been extraordinary. That when we look at as Nikema said when we're looking at what has happened in the last decade. And, you know, I think it's poetic justice. That here the site where we saw voter suppression live and in color in Georgia that we would actually take as my grandmother used to say, take lemons and make lemonade.

That in fact what we did, is we went deeper, we actually connected and continued to register and continued to organization in groups like the New Georgia Project. You know, as a result, what we're seeing is we're seeing the state that is making history. We have not seen this in 27 years, and this is because of a deep organizing that has been happening and the work that groups are doing on the ground.

BALDWIN: Looking ahead, Congresswoman-elect to you, depending how these special elections go in your home state, you know, you may be working with a Republican-controlled Senate, many who have supported Trump's policies over the last couple of years. How do you plan on working with them?

WILLIAMS: So I tell people all the time, I'm willing and able to work with anyone except for those people who don't believe in my humanity as a person. Brooke, unfortunately, there are still people who don't think a black woman should be going to the United States Congress.

And so as I look across the country and that goes for voters and everyone alike. As long as we can come to a shared sense of uplifting those most marginalized in our communities, I say let's do it, let's get to work for our people.

BALDWIN: Lastly ladies, just talking about black women in this election. When you look at the numbers, this is according to the CNN exit polls, 91 percent of black women polled voted for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. And I read this piece over the weekend on "The Washington Post" by Taylor Crumpton she wrote this op-ed.

Her first line was Black women saved Joe Biden. But she concluded with this graph, she wrote, the Black women's movement has never centered exclusively on the ballot box in our journey toward liberation and freedom. We're not your political mules. We're not your monolith -- so especially now, after we turned out all over the country to sweep Trump from office, Democrats had better support and listen to Black women even in odd-numbered years. We are not here to save the world. We're just here to protect ourselves.

LaTosha, what say you?

BROWN: Absolutely. I think part of we want to see is we showed up for America. You know, we showed up for the Biden/Harris ticket, we showed up for the Democratic Party, we showed up for people who experienced feeling disenfranchised for the first time in their lives. And so what we expect is that they will show up for us as well. We want to see sweeping policy to really be able to center black women and the needs of black women.

When we're talking about health outcomes, when we're talking about economic parody, when we're talking about those things that we want in our community that everybody else wants. We want quality health care. We want affordable homes. We want to make sure that we're addressing that 68 percent of black women are low-wage workers. So we need to make sure that we're having policy that how do we protect those that are most vulnerable? how do we give them a fair wage?

When we're looking at healthcare, you got 20 million Americans who are without health care. In the midst of COVID-19 if we haven't learned anything else is that we need comprehensive health care. So certainly we want this moment to not just be a transactional moment but be a transformative moment that in fact black women as well as all Americans are centered as we go forward.

BALDWIN: LaTosha, Nikema, I've got to leave it, ladies, thank you so, so much. Again congratulations, Congresswoman-elect. Thank you both and thank you all for being with me, we'll see you back here tomorrow.