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Georgia Election Audit Results Expected at Any Moment; U.S. Surpasses 250,000 COVID Deaths, More Hospitalized Than Ever; Officials Warn Against Holiday Gatherings as Deaths Exceed 250,000. Aired 1- 1:30p ET

Aired November 19, 2020 - 13:00   ET

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

[13:00:01]

POLO SANDOVAL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: As for when schools will reopen again here, Dana, it could be possibly the week after Thanksgiving, but that is still up in the air.

DANA BASH, CNN HOST: It sure. Polo Sandoval, thank you so much for that reporting. And thank you for joining us. Brianna Keilar picks up our coverage right now.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: Hi there, I'm Brianna Keilar, and I want to welcome our viewers here in the United States and around the world.

We are expecting big news any moment now, the results of that by-hand election audit in Georgia. Officials are expecting no significant change in vote total, just the affirmation that Joe Biden won the state. This is the first time that a Democrat has won Georgia in nearly three decades.

And in Michigan, two voters dropped their pro-Trump lawsuit there, challenging the Biden win in Michigan. The Trump team also dropping their lawsuit in Michigan today, they're still though moving ahead with other lawsuits, including in Pennsylvania.

President Trump still refusing to concede and refusing to drop baseless claims of widespread voter fraud. He's also refusing to do anything to aid a smooth transition to the Biden administration. But now we are starting to see daylight between Trump officials, both former and current, who are reaching out on their own to their Biden counterparts, some quietly because they fear reprisal.

Today, President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris hear from members of the national Governor's Association Executive Committee. These are governors who are on the frontlines of the fight against the coronavirus. And while the Biden team formulates plans to battle the virus, President Trump largely ignores it, even as the U.S. is crossing this grim milestone here. take a look, a quarter million people dead.

There are no tweets from Trump about that. There's no sympathy for the dead or for their families. In fact, the president's Twitter feed presents as if we're not even in a pandemic. We are hearing from the vice president's office. There will be a briefing today with members of the coronavirus task force, which is the first that we have seen in months.

And as we do await results of that election audit in Georgia just moments from now, here is how the Georgia secretary of state described this to our Jake Tapper yesterday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BRAD RAFFENSPERGER (R), GEORGIA SECRETARY OF STATES: We have not seen any widespread voter fraud. The president has picked up some votes in a few of the counties that made some clerical errors, that wasn't the machines. But at the end of the day, he started with 14,000, he is about 12,000 now. We are finishing up. We're waiting for a few counties to get back to us, the large counties. But I don't believe at the end of the day that it will change the total results.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: So, you still think that Joe Biden, President-elect Biden, will be the winner of Georgia?

RAFFENSPERGER: Yes, I believe that's the way it will turn out.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Our Amara Walker is in Atlanta tracking this, as she has been now for quite some time. Tell us what we know now, Amara.

AMARA WALKER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Brianna. Yes, we are still waiting on the Georgia Secretary of State's Office to give us the full reporting, the full results of the statewide audit. They had ballparked it around noon that we would be getting the report, it is now after 1:00.

But, look, it doesn't come as a surprise. This has been such a labor intensive process from the beginning with the hand recount county by county, and once all of those numbers are put together and sent over to the state, the secretary of state's office has to go through those numbers and do the final checks up against the voter registration database.

So once we get the report, of course, we will pass it on to you. But as you heard from the Secretary Brad Raffensperger, he has maintained all along he is confident, election officials are confident that the results of this hand recount are going to affirm the original result. We already know that 112 out of 159 counties here in Georgia are already reporting that they have seen virtually no discrepancies.

State election officials have repeatedly said there has not been evidence during this audit of any widespread fraud as the president has been baselessly claiming, and also they're confident that this audit will show the voting machines were indeed accurate and fair, despite the fact that President Trump has been tweeting repeatedly and falsely that these voting machines have been voting votes for him by the millions and changing them in Joe Biden's favor. Brianna?

KEILAR: Thank you so much for that, Amara, for the update in Georgia, and also fact check, always important.

So while we are awaiting these audit results in Georgia, the president spent the morning taking aim at Georgia's Republican governor, Brian Kemp. The president tweeting baseless accusations of widespread voter fraud and that the results would shift the state in his favor, just like Amara was telling us.

I want to bring in White House Correspondent Boris Sanchez to talk more about this. I mean, how is the president spending time, Boris? Because it seems like he is entirely not focused on the crisis that is confronting the country he is in charge of.

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Tragically, you're right, Brianna.

[13:05:00]

The president clearly focused on trying to overturn the results of the election or at least sow doubt about them. But this is largely playing out on Twitter. We haven't actually seen the president much lately. Last week, he had a public event at Arlington National Cemetery for Veterans Day. Other than that, we've really just seen him golfing. So most of this is playing out on Twitter.

Meantime, his legal team is flailing, filing contradictory measures in different states. Rudy Giuliani making all sorts of contradictory claims, incendiary claims, conspiracy theories about Venezuela, blatantly things that don't make any sense, but he continues to push them, to push the president's agenda that this election was stolen from him.

As you noted, the president also battling even fellow Republicans on Twitter too, and we can't ignore the backdrop of all this, coronavirus cases surging across the country, the country in the middle of a crisis right now. But, really, the only thing that the president has been tweeting about coronavirus is basically seeking credit for positive news on a coronavirus vaccine from Pfizer and Moderna.

The president clearly still obsessed with an election that he lost. We should point out, the coronavirus task force is holding a briefing today at 4:00, but it's unclear, Brianna, if we'll actually see the president during that briefing.

KEILAR: All right. We'll be keeping our eyes peeled. Boris, thank you so much. Boris Sanchez reporting on the White House for us.

So, President Trump is clinging to conspiracy theories, he's declaring victory on Twitter, but reality has set in for others in the administration. Some current and former Trump officials are now reaching out to members of President-elect Biden's team. They're finding ways around obstructions of the White House to offer help with the transition, and we have CNN's Jeff Zeleny, who has been working very hard on this story from Wilmington, Delaware, where he is following the Biden transition.

Okay. So, tell us about this, Jeff. What are these interactions that these folks are having with the Biden team?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brianna, we are hearing reports from across the government, that there are some current Trump administration officials and some former Trump political appointees that have left in the last few months who are quietly behind the scenes reaching out to some of their incoming counterparts in a Biden transition.

We should point out, this is just a handful of examples, we have been told, and they're really across the range of the government. They are doing everything they can do to help, in the words of one former official. They are trying to put country over party. These are not people who voted for Joe Biden necessarily. These are not fans of Joe Biden necessarily, but they do believe a transition is appropriate, like it always happens after every presidential election.

So this is something that, again, is not widespread, and it doesn't replace the transition that should be going onto provide information, to provide data to the Biden team in waiting.

And the Biden officials we spoke to offer their thanks and gratitude to this, but they point out that this does not replace what should happen.

So, let's take a look at a statement from Kate Bedingfield, the former deputy campaign manager, that is now transition adviser as well. She says this. It requires more than former officials choosing to step forward and be helpful to ensure a smooth transition of power. GSA, that's the General Services Administration, should follow the law and ascertain the results of the election so that Americans get a smooth and effective handoff between administrations.

So, Brianna, again, as this drags on, really, we're hitting two weeks come Saturday, there is a sense inside the government that this needs to happen. And these are officials generally reaching out to people in the same line of work, if you will, from a national security realm or a health realm. Even though they're being told to not do it, these are people who are quietly giving all the help they can as the president is dragging this out for what seems to be heading into come Saturday, the second week. Brianna?

KEILAR: Well, so some assuring signs there. Jeff Zeleny, thank you so much, live for us from Wilmington.

The president is losing or dropping lawsuits challenging the election outcome left and right. It is because there is no evidence of the widespread voter fraud, he is alleging but also his lackluster legal team is certainly not helping matters. We're going to take a closer look at the players, including Rudy Giuliani.

And the U.S. hits a tragic landmark of 250,000 COVID deaths. I'm going to talk to a doctor warning that if you would see what he is witnessing in the E.R. right now, you would consider canceling those in-person holiday gatherings.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK) [13:10:00]

KEILAR: The pandemic has now taken more than 250,000 lives in this country. It's a milestone that model after model has shown it could have been avoided.

Now, tens of thousands of families will miss loved ones at the Thanksgiving table a week from today. Among them, mothers, fathers, uncles, grandparents, sisters, people you're seeing here who will not be sitting at the table.

Other victims include an elderly father and his grown daughter who died within minutes of each other, two parents who died before their son's fifth birthday, and in rare cases, children with no known prior health conditions.

These faces, they're a fraction of people who are no longer with us. Many of them did not have to die.

More people have died from coronavirus than, yes, the flu. That's more than typically die from the flu, suicide and strokes in a year combined.

And as hard as it is to believe that 250,000 people have died from one virus in just a matter of months, there are plenty of indicators that darker days are in front of us. Just yesterday, the U.S. reported over 1,800 deaths, more than 170,000 new cases. It was the second highest single-day total.

On Wednesday, like every day this week, hospitalizations broke records, and there are now nearly 80,000 people in the hospital fighting COVID right now.

[13:15:07]

There are 21 states reporting who are more people in the hospital from coronavirus than they have seen before in that state.

But while weeks ahead look grim, health officials do predict that this will be the last big surge of the coronavirus. Both Moderna and Pfizer plan to produce 70 million doses in total of vaccines, which are still awaiting authorization and approval by end of this year.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. RICHARD BESSER, FORMER ACTING DIRECTOR, CDC: If we can get through this winter together and do this, the vaccines are coming. And I have never been as hopeful as I am now but we have to come together, give people what they need through winter, so that when spring comes, we can have a new beginning.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Joining me now is E.R. Dr. Craig Spencer, who is also the director of Global Health and Emergency Medicine at New York- Presbyterian/Columbia University Medical Center. I mean, Doctor, what is your reaction, something about when we hit theses milestones that they just put into perspective the type of loss that we are talking about, 250,000 people?

DR. CRAIG SPENCER, DIRECTOR OF GLOBAL HEALTH IN E.R. MEDICINE, NEW YORK-PRESBYTERIAN/COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER: Well, I think about this, because I have been seeing this really since March and April in New York City when things were really bad. I remember hitting 100,000, I think that was in May, and people just really being blown away at such a high death toll.

Right now, COVID-19 is the third leading cause of death in the United States. It is so much deadlier than the flu. And we're seeing that play out, as you eluded to, with 1,600, 1,800 deaths per day. And that number is only going to rise. We still see cases increasing a huge amount on a daily basis. We see hospitalizations increasing. And we know that deaths follow both with those indicators.

We do know that this winter is going to be really tough regardless of the fact that we have at least two promising vaccine candidates, and maybe more. The problem is, is that to get to that place of safety into the spring, into the summer, we're going to have to climb Mount Everest together and it's quite dangerous, and we need everyone together to do so to reduce spread in our communities and to lower the risk of COVID-19, especially to vulnerable populations.

KEILAR: So, look, you say that if people could see what you are seeing in the E.R., if they were privy to what's really going on in the halls of hospitals, that they would cancel their in-person family gatherings for the holidays. Can you talk to us a little about this? Because I know there are people out there who -- they're trying to do this, they're doing testing before they see people, but they really do want to get together and they're having a hard time saying no to Thanksgiving with the family. So, talk to them.

SPENCER: Look, I completely understand. I haven't seen my parents in a long time. I've got a toddler that I would love to have spend more time with her family, but we're not doing it because the reality is right now in the United States, with our lack of testing, with the amount of virus that's spreading everywhere around the country, there is virtually no full-proof way to make any of these gatherings zero risk.

I'm sure there will be many families that get together where they won't be spreading COVID, but there are going to be many instances where a kid comes home from college or family members come from a different state, and even if tested a few days beforehand, are going to bring COVID with them and are going to infect other people in their family.

Yes, you can get tested, yes, you can try to reduce risk, but, again, there is no full-proof way to prevent the spread, especially when you have so much going on right now, and we see this. It is a small proportion of people that get severe COVID. But when they do, they come into the emergency room --

KEILAR: I think we just lost Dr. Spencer's signal. Can we try to get it back quick? Let me see. No, we don't.

Okay, we're going to try to get Dr. Spencer back up. He has some very important words that we need to hear.

Now, the number of losses, legally, are piling up for Rudy Giuliani and the president's legal team fighting election results, and their defenses are either breaking down or they are baseless. We're going to roll the tape, next.

Plus, a Virginia nurse is sounding the alarm that PPE is running out, and it's so bad, they are reusing gloves multiple times, putting hand sanitizer on them between patients.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:20:00]

KEILAR: I do want to bring Dr. Craig Spencer back in because he has some really -- an important message for people. You were saying that -- you had said that if people could see what you're seeing in the E.R., they would cancel their in-person family gatherings for the holidays. And where we left off with you was, you said there's no way to get risk to zero even if people are testing ahead of time. You would have people coming back from college, you would have people traveling in from other places or even in town. And there's just no way to avoid the risk. So where would that leave us?

SPENCER: I think that's exactly it. There is just too much virus all over the community, all over the United States, even if you're getting tested beforehand, even if you're trying to stay isolated beforehand. The likelihood is that many families are going to have COVID brought to the dinner table.

[13:25:01]

And, yes, we all want this to be a wonderful, happy holiday together, but I think we need to wait because we have an end in sight. We know that we have at least two vaccines and maybe more, but we have so much work. There's going to be so many more cases, so many more hospitalizations and, unfortunately, so many more deaths before we get there.

And as you alluded to, look, it's really horrible to see patients struggling for any reason in the emergency department. But seeing so many continuing to struggle with COVID-19, short of breath, needing oxygen, maybe even needing a ventilator, when, for many months, we've known how to keep ourselves safe, how to keep our community safe.

I am afraid that right now, we just have spread all throughout the country and getting people together right now and over the holidays is only going to make it worse. The one way that we can protect ourselves, we can protect our communities and we can protect our family is being safe, go virtual if you can, do whatever you can to prevent the spread of COVID-19 over the holidays.

KEILAR: What do you think the country needs from the president right now?

SPENCER: Action. I think the president either needs to step up and do all of the things that we have been calling for this administration to be doing, really, since February and March. We need leadership. I'm really heartened to hear that the CDC is going to be back out talking to the American public. We need the transition team for President- elect Biden to be given access to all of that really critical internal data that right now they don't have access to.

We need to let that team lead because even if we have a vaccine and we have hundreds of millions of doses of vaccine sometime in the next few months, making a vaccine is one thing, logistically getting it out is going to be so much harder. We need billions of dollars, we need resources, we need to be working with communities and public health departments. They need the resources to be doing that.

And the incoming transition team needs to have access to those teams, needs to have access to those resources to hit the ground running, to be able to get a vaccine out as quickly as possible to people. Every day that this transition team is able to work together with the outgoing administration, more people will get infected and more people will die.

KEILAR: So important. Thank you so much, Dr. Spencer, for sharing the message with us.

SPENCER: Take care.

KEILAR: Yes, everything that we're hearing about a vaccine is optimistic, the timeline, the distribution plans, effectiveness rate. Truth is, though, people are being infected and they are dying today in heartbreaking numbers. And the vaccine will not come soon enough for them.

I want to bring in Carole Rashid. She is a nurse practitioner at an urgent care practice in Arlington, Virginia, here outside of Washington, D.C. Carole, thank you so much for joining us, to tell us what's really going on inside medical centers like yours.

I can't imagine what it is like to be in your world, day-in and day- out for months. It must be exhausting. And you have been watching this pandemic spread. And we understand that supplies are running short again. Can you tell us what's going on?

CAROLE RASHID, URGEN CARE NURSE PRACTITIONER: Yes. Thanks for having me, Brianna. I'm happy to be here.

Yes, it's definitely been a long haul. The last several months have been really exhausting and tough. And, unfortunately, things don't seem to be going in the right direction, yes.

So, the critical shortage we are having now is gloves. At first, we had a shortage of masks, gowns, and that seems to be catching up. But the critical shortage that what I am being told that it is worldwide, that the supply of gloves is not keeping up with the demand. The manufacturers are not keeping up with the demand now and what we are anticipating that the demand is going to increase over time.

And so we are having a hard time getting glove shipments from our suppliers. And at our practice in particular, we are almost exclusively doing COVID testing. We are doing rapid COVID tests which gives results in 15 minutes, which is a really, really critical part of getting the pandemic under control. We have to get accessible testing in the community where people can get an answer right away.

In order to do that safely, we have to have gloves. We have to be able to change our gloves in between each patient. And that's more important for not only for the safety of my staff or the health care workers who are on the frontlines, but it's also important to keep patients safe. Because as we are moving from patient to patient to patient to patient, the last thing we want to do is to spread germs from one patient to another.

So that's why it is important to have a new pair of gloves and to sanitize all of our equipment, our thermometers, the pens, the pulse marks (ph), everything that touches one patient has to be cleaned, (INAUDIBLE) has to be completely cleaned --

KEILAR: So, Carole, let me ask you something. If -- what do you -- if you don't have gloves, if you don't have enough gloves for the number of patients you're seeing, then what do you do?

RASHID: Well, so we haven't gotten to the point where we have run out, so that's what we're trying to -- you know, we're trying to prevent that from happening.

[13:30:03]

So, the CDC has put out some guidance, you know, in any other situation.