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Family Cautions Against COVID-19; Retail Experts Predict Record Holiday Sales; Interview with Former Presidential Candidate John Delaney (D). Aired 10:30-11a ET

Aired November 27, 2020 - 10:30   ET

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

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[10:31:58]

BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN ANCHOR: Thankful this holiday season to be alive, a Minnesota family crippled by coronavirus has a new mission: share their stories so that others won't experience their nightmare. Here's Adrienne Broaddus.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ADRIENNE BROADDUS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): When Charles and Kirstin Johnson-Nixon pledged for better or worse, the Minneapolis couple didn't know where life would lead.

CHARLES JOHNSON-NIXON, RECOVERED FROM COVID-19: COVID --

BROADDUS (voice-over): -- and they had no idea the coronavirus --

KIRSTIN JOHNSON-NIXON, RECOVERED FROM COVID-19: I've had pneumonia before, I didn't feel what I felt with COVID.

BROADDUS (voice-over): -- would write life's most painful chapter.

CH. JOHNSON-NIXON: My father-in-law tested positive and was hospitalized. My mother-in-law tested positive and was hospitalized. My wife and I tested positive.

K. JOHNSON-NIXON: I'm a black woman, I am overweight, I have some underlying issues. But I thought how could this happen, you know, to us? We are doing all the right things.

BROADDUS (voice-over): The virus attacked everyone in their family including the couple's three boys. And while recovering, this family received a call they hoped would never happen.

K. JOHNSON-NIXON: I felt hopeless --

BROADDUS (voice-over): At this hospital, Kirstin's father William was placed on a ventilator. CALEB JOHNSON-NIXON, RECOVERED FROM COVID-19: My grandpa was in the

hospital for 50 days. The doctors kept saying that when a person over the age of 80 years old went on a ventilator, they usually didn't come off.

BROADDUS (voice-over): According to the COVID Tracking Project, black people in the U.S. are dying at more than double the rate of white people. Native Americans and Latinos are also dying at significantly higher rates than whites and Asian-Americans.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Apart from our friends --

BROADDUS (voice-over): Charles feared he wouldn't be around to watch his kids grow up or see them play another lacrosse game.

CH. JOHNSON-NIXON: That for me was my biggest fear. You know, I'm -- I lost my father when I was young, and one of my goals when I became a father was to make sure that I was going to be here for my kids. And the idea that this thing could turn on me and take me away from them was the hardest thing to deal with.

God kept me here for my boys and got me through this.

BROADDUS (voice-over): So in this season of Thanksgiving --

CH. JOHNSON-NIXON: -- you can cut the apples when we get home.

BROADDUS (voice-over): -- the Johnson-Nixon family overflows with gratitude.

CH. JOHNSON-NIXON: We're alive.

K. JOHNSON-NIXON: I'm also thankful that my parents are alive.

BROADDUS (voice-over): Six months have passed since Kirstin wrapped her arms --

K. JOHNSON-NIXON: It's hard not to hug him.

BROADDUS (voice-over): -- around her father.

K. JOHNSON-NIXON: Or to kiss him.

BROADDUS (voice-over): He still needs oxygen.

K. JOHNSON-NIXON: I'm glad I still get to, you know, hug and kiss these guys, so.

(LAUGHTER)

BROADDUS (voice-over): Charles and Kirstin say for better or worse, their work isn't done.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The cough, loss of appetite --

BROADDUS (voice-over): They're speaking on panels and vow to educate the hardest-hit communities about a virus that changed their lives.

[10:35:00]

K. JOHNSON-NIXON: It's important to wear your mask, to wash your hands.

CH. JOHNSON-NIXON: It makes you want to yell out and be on a mission to bring awareness to people and say, hey, we have to take this serious because we're already dealing with all the other problems that we have to deal with in being black in this country.

2020 will be gone soon, thank God. 2021, hopefully, will -- will give everyone the opportunity to rethink how they do things, change how they do things if they need to.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BROADDUS: And as they look toward the future, Charles says he is worried about what will happen across the country in the next three weeks. This, after millions traveled for the Thanksgiving holiday.

Meanwhile, a visit to the doctor earlier this month, Kirstin says, revealed her doctor believes one of the lingering side effects she's suffering from right now? Microscopic blood clots in her lungs causing some congestion. But despite the lingering side effects, the family says when they tally their blessings, they have more than they can count -- Bianna.

GOLODRYGA: That is for sure, Adrienne, and I'm sure their story will save lives across the country. Thank you so much for bringing it to us, we appreciate it.

Well, still ahead, what it's like to be a retail store on Black Friday in the era of COVID. How the pandemic has shifted one of the biggest shopping days of the year.

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[10:41:03]

GOLODRYGA: Despite millions in this country still without work and an economic crisis in full swing, retail experts are projecting that the 2020 holiday shopping season will bring record sales this year.

Here with me is the president and CEO of the National Retail Federation, Matthew Shay. Matthew, welcome. So you say --

MATTHEW SHAY, PRESIDENT AND CEO, NATIONAL RETAIL FOUNDATION: Good morning.

GOLODRYGA: -- this is a holiday unlike any other. We're dealing with a pandemic, millions out of work and hungry, and people are still going out to shop. How do you explain this?

SHAY: Well, I think we have to recognize that as this whole year has been unlike any other, this holiday season -- Thanksgiving weekend, Black Friday will be unlike any other. You've seen retailers take extraordinary steps to protect their teams, their associates, their partners and of course the customers and the communities in which they live and work.

And we're going to continue to see that. And consumers are altering their behavior as well, we've seen people move online, make fewer trips to stores, respect social and physical distancing barriers, wearing masks.

So we've got to get through this together, and we will. Nevertheless, I think we're going to still see a very strong holiday season. Consumers are out there spending -- as they have been for the past six months.

GOLODRYGA: Yes, it really does appear to be a tale of two economies, right? We show images of lines of people waiting to get food from food banks, and then obviously we're going to see better than expected holiday sales in the coming weeks from today and this weekend.

But when you look at a stimulus from the U.S. government, you still are going to see many retailers begging for as much aid as they can get. A lot of retailers have been suffering throughout the year; a couple of weeks of people coming in to shop isn't going to bring that revenue back.

SHAY: Yes, that's right. And we've been very vocal, consistently, in our support for additional fiscal stimulus, working with the administration and the Congress, have had a number of conversations recently with Secretary of the Treasury Mnuchin, with congressional leaders; we're talking to President-elect Biden's transition team.

So our view is there needs to be more done to support the economy. There are families that are hurting, there are communities that are suffering. We need to do more. There are segments of our economy that have not rebounded, so we're going to have to work together to make that happen, and that's why we think we should make an effort to get some more stimulus before the end of this year.

GOLODRYGA: We spend a lot of time talking about shopper safety and making sure they are following appropriate protocols, wearing masks, trying to get out to stores early, staying further away from fellow shoppers. But what about the store workers? What do we know about any safety measures that's being enforced to make sure that they are taken care of, that they are wearing masks and that they don't have to worry about coming home from their jobs sick?

SHAY: Yes, we started very early this year with retail industry leaders, working on a program called Operation Open Doors that brought together executives that represent the leading retail companies across the country to learn from each other, to share experiences, to have conversations about the lessons they were learning, how to protect their employees, how to adjust their business practices, how to take care of their customers.

And we've continued to make investments in that area, building on Open Doors with a program called the New Holiday Traditions, encouraging customers to alter their behavior as well this season. And we see retailers invest billions of dollars in pay, in benefits and of course in personal protective equipment.

So we're going to continue to see retailers step up in a big way. Their number one concern is -- and will remain -- keeping their team members safe and supporting their communities and keeping their customers healthy as well.

GOLODRYGA: Well that is good to hear. Matthew Shay, always appreciate the time. Thank you.

SHAY: Nice to see you, thanks.

GOLODRYGA: Coming up, my next guest says the way to avoid vaccine skepticism and get people to actually take it once it's widely available is to pay them. So could it work?

[10:45:04]

And, it's a place where we are all welcome, another powerful season of "THIS IS LIFE WITH LISA LING" premieres with back-to-back episodes Sunday night at 9:00 Eastern, right here on CNN.

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GOLODRYGA: As COVID-19 vaccine researchers celebrate early findings of success, polling in recent weeks has shown that there's still widespread skepticism among a majority of Americans to actually take it when it's ready. My next guest says a solution to this vaccine skepticism is simple: pay people to take it. With me now is former Democratic presidential candidate John Delaney. He's also a former Maryland congressman.

[10:50:06]

Congressman, great to have you on. As I said to you in the break, you always come up with interesting ideas. Tell us more about this one. You're saying the federal government should pay every American $1,500 to get vaccinated.

JOHN DELANEY (D), FORMER 2020 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Yes that's right, Bianna. I think it's a fairly straightforward approach because, as you know, we will likely do another economic relief stimulus program. The most popular part of the last program we did was the direct cash payments to individuals. That has a fair amount of bipartisan support, we're likely to do that again, which I fully support.

So my view is we should simply tie that to also an incentive to take the vaccine. It's kind of two birds, one stone. You know, we'll get cash in the pockets of hardworking Americans and we'll create a real incentive for people to get the vaccine as soon as possible. And that will save lives, and that will allow our economy to snap back much faster. So I think it's a pretty straightforward approach.

GOLODRYGA: Sort of a double stimulus, as you say. But where did you come up with $1,500? Where did you come up with that number?

DELANEY: Well you know, I can't say that I've done a ton of amount of research on what the precise number should be, but the stimulus numbers that people talk about are always a thousand to $2,000, right? So this program would work if it was a thousand, $1,200, $1,500, $2,000. So I just assume, you know, $1,500 is kind of what people are talking about on average for the direct cash payment.

My idea is really just to not make it a direct cash payment, but make it a vaccine incentive. It accomplishes the same objective but it also, as you said, accomplishes this other objective of getting people vaccinated.

And it will work. There's lots of data and examples of this around the world. I cited a situation in India where they provided food -- lentils and actually household products -- to incentivize families to get their children vaccinated, and the vaccination rates went up 600 percent. You know, not a little bit, they went up sixfold. So this will work, and I think it's in our national interest.

GOLODRYGA: And do you think that coming up with this specific rationale for the stimulus -- to get people vaccinated -- will be more palatable in what is clearly a divided government right now, where we have Republicans not wanting to meet Democrats, Democrats not wanting to meet Republicans in terms of a stimulus number, a final number? Is this what you think will get them to the table?

DELANEY: I do. I think you're getting on the real important point there, Bianna, which is, you know, I think Democrats rightly, we're very supportive of direct cash payments, stimulus to the American people. A lot of Republicans are too, but a lot of Republicans are starting to get worried about the size of these relief bills.

And the thing about this proposal, it'll cost, call it, you know, $380 billion, which is a lot of money. But arguably, it's the best investment we can make because not only will it save lives and get money in the pockets of the American people, but it'll end the pandemic. It will absolutely end the pandemic because we'll get 75 percent of the country vaccinated, that will kill the virus and everyone can get back to work, our economy can reopen.

All these other programs that we need to keep funding will be able to end sooner, so it'll save a lot of money. I believe this plan would pay for itself right away in terms of the savings associated with opening up the economy three to six months sooner.

And that's what we're really talking about. You know, polls say only about 58 percent of the American people are comfortable with the vaccine, right? That's a terrible thing, but that's another discussion. And we need 75 percent, so this incremental incentive will get us to that 75 percent much faster, kill the virus, save lives and open up our economy and then pay for itself.

GOLODRYGA: Let me ask you about the vaccine, because the president has been touting it. Yesterday he said you know, it should be called the Biden vaccine or he shouldn't be getting credit for it, it's my vaccine, people shouldn't forget that. That having been said, should the president get credit for the effort, right? In such a quick, historic amount of time to be able to get vaccines out into the market within a matter of a few weeks.

DELANEY: So the fact that we have now three vaccines, it appears, that appear not only effective but safe, we may have four or five by the end of the year. That's a heroic accomplishment, and it happened because of public and private collaboration.

That's the thing that people aren't talking about, there was an enormous amount of public and private collaboration around this vaccine development. You know, the private sector did it but the government provided funds, incentives, et cetera.

So yes, clearly the -- you know, the administration deserves credit for things they did to get this vaccine, you know, to hopefully to market as soon as it did. I mean, I've got a lot of other issues with this administration in terms of how poorly they handled this situation, but there's no question hardworking people in the government really contributed to getting this thing, you know, in record time.

[10:55:09]

GOLODRYGA: Yes. Well, credit where credit's due, right? With Operation Warp Speed and so many brilliant scientists working so quickly to save lives.

John Delaney, as I said, it's an interesting idea, maybe some people on President-elect Biden's team will reach out to you for further details on this. In the meantime, thank you so much for joining us, we appreciate it.

DELANEY: Thanks, Bianna.

GOLODRYGA: And thank you so much for joining us. I'm Bianna Golodryga. NEWSROOM with Boris Sanchez starts right after a quick break.

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