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Trump Once Again Claims Election Fraud Without Real Evidence; How Nursing Homes are Coping with COVID-19; Pandemic Hits Restaurant Industry Hard; Paralympian with Spinal Muscular Atrophy Succeeds at Boccia. Aired 4:30-5a ET

Aired November 27, 2020 - 04:30   ET

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

[04:31:12]

PAULA NEWTON, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome back to our viewers in the United States and all around the world, I'm Paula Newton, and you are watching CNN NEWSROOM.

Now we want to return to Donald Trump's impromptu and frankly stunning news conference at the White House Thursday. His first since the election three weeks ago. Now the courts already have tossed out his numerous legal challenges to the election results because frankly they're not supported by any evidence. Yet the president still can't bring himself to admit defeat. In fact, his answers to reporters' questions were so far removed from reality, we thought it was important for you to hear it and judge for yourself. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Mr. President, (INAUDIBLE) last right now?

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We don't know what is last, if you look at what's going on. You have to really look at what's going on. They're finding tremendous discrepancies in the votes. And nobody believes those numbers. Those numbers are incorrect numbers. A lot of numbers have already been reported that's incorrect. You're going to see things happening over the next week or two that are going to be shocking to people.

If you look at the numbers in Michigan, if you look at the numbers in Pennsylvania, if you look at fraudulent voting and fraudulent votes, so I can't say what's first and what's last in terms of is this the last one or is this the first one of a second term? We'll see what happens. Nobody wants to see the kind of fraud that this election has really come to represent. We are looking at things that are so bad in Georgia.

They don't want to show us signatures. The reason they don't want to show us signatures is very simple. Because we will find thousands and thousands -- it's a very close race, it's hair thin, but we'll find thousands and thousands of discrepancies, fraud. Why they aren't wanting to show those signatures is amazing. They're doing recounts and even in the recount, they found thousands of votes that were off, but now we want to look at the signatures, and you will find tens of thousands of false ballots, forged ballots. You'll see it all over. You're going to see a lot of it.

And you go to Pennsylvania, you saw the meeting we had yesterday with Pennsylvania. You saw people come up and they went to vote and they said, no, you can't vote, somebody else already sent in a ballot. And a woman -- but this is happening tens of thousands of times. I think it was 600 and some-odd thousand, 687,000 fraudulent votes cast in Pennsylvania. And I will tell you, if you look at the statehouse now, the Republican statehouse, they're starting to see what's going on there. But they've really known it for a long time.

Then you go to Michigan, and you look at what happened in Wayne County and Detroit. I went through a list. I won almost every county, and you see it, almost every -- 78 percent, 72 percent, 68 percent. Going through the list, and you get to Wayne, and something happened. Tremendous numbers. You saw the canvassers, they refused to sign their documents because they said we can't sign a fraudulent document.

Horrible things went on. That's in Wayne County, Detroit. But you look at the votes that were just tabulated, and they were left today. Look at all the counties. I won almost all of them, except Detroit was so egregious. It was phony. Look at what's going on in Wisconsin. Wisconsin, they're finding tremendous discrepancy. You just take a look at that. Tremendous discrepancy. And elsewhere.

So we're going to see what happens. But you can't have somebody assume office and already they want to get rid of America first. I mean, they want to get rid of America first. They don't want America first. You know why? Because China doesn't want it. China expressed their wish. Please get rid of America first, and the Biden administration said, that's OK, we're getting rid of America first.

[04:35:08]

No, we don't want to get rid of America first. We want to put America first. And other countries should put themselves first, too, and I tell them that all the time. But we don't want to get rid of it. So I don't know what is going to happen. I know one thing, Joe Biden did not get 80 million votes. And I got 74 million but there were many ballots thrown away so I got much more than that. But I got 74 million. 74 million is a 11 million more than I got last time.

It's millions more than Ronald Reagan got when he won all -- he won 49 states, I guess. He won 49 states, yes. And it's millions more, millions more than Hillary Clinton got. Joe Biden did not get, and by the way, Joe Biden did not beat Barack Obama with the black vote. He didn't beat him. OK? But they have him as beating him. And if you look at the numbers, the numbers are false. The numbers are corrupt.

It was a rigged election, 100 percent. And people know it. That's why you have people marching all over the United States right now. They know it was a rigged election, and look at what's happening in Georgia. A lot of things are being found in Georgia and they are absolutely against showing -- I mean, it's a sad thing. They don't want to show signatures. It can be solved if you show signatures.

But you're going to find out the people that signed aren't the people that are supposed to be signing. You're going to find that the people that signed those envelopes, they didn't do the ballots, envelopes, and then somebody said maybe the envelopes were thrown out. There's tremendous fraud here. If you look at -- wait, just one second. If you look at 10:00 in the evening, you saw what happened. Then you had these massive dumps. Nobody has ever seen anything like it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

NEWTON: You know, for weeks, despite trying to prove that there has been no evidence, once again none of what the president said about that widespread election fraud is correct at all. He is not being cheated out of the presidency. Joe Biden won the election and he will be the next president of the United States, inaugurated on January 20th, 2021.

Still ahead here on NEWSROOM, the restaurant industry reels under the coronavirus. Lockdowns, restrictions and nervous customers are all taking their toll and threatening the livelihoods of millions of workers. What restaurant owners say they need to survive?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[04:40:38]

NEWTON: The current spike in cases may be most concerning for elderly Americans. They're among the most vulnerable and nursing homes have been hit especially hard.

Our Brynn Gingras takes us inside a facility in Connecticut that isn't taking any chances.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CATHY COREY, BEECHWOOD LONG TERM CARE RESIDENT: That's (INAUDIBLE) Island at my sister-in-law's house.

BRYNN GINGRAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Since the pandemic began, it's the physical connection with family Cathy Corey and other residents at this Connecticut nursing home ache for.

COREY: It's like my heart got ripped out sometimes.

GRACE BARNUM, BEECHWOOD LONG TERM CARE RESIDENT: I'm just waiting.

GINGRAS (on camera): Waiting for what?

BARNUM: Yes. To be able to hug again.

GINGRAS (voice-over): Especially this time of year.

COREY: The holidays are all about memories of a family. It's hard enough not being with your family, but when they can't even come up and eat a meal with you or anything or visit. It's hard.

GINGRAS: In the spring, the coronavirus ravaged the northeast. Nursing homes may have paid the heftiest price. To date, residents in long term care facilities make up 8 percent of all cases in the U.S., but nearly half of the country's total deaths.

BILL WHITE, OWNER, BEECHWOOD LONG TERM CARE: It's like being in a battle. It's the same mentality.

GINGRAS: Bill White is the owner of Beachwood Long Term Care in Connecticut.

WHITE: What are going to do on Thanksgiving?

GINGRAS: To keep residents safe, White put in place a strict multi- layer system of checks to prevent COVID-19 from infiltrating these walls. A health questionnaire and testing requirements for visitors. Beechwood has gone through periods of denying visitations outright to allowing them with restrictions.

WHITE: You don't know what works and at the end no one is going to care if you keep it out.

GINGRAS: So far Beechwood had just 14 cases since March, three of them residents, the rest staff. A success by all accounts.

BARNUM: We were really lucky to have such precautions taken. We didn't see that everywhere, and the people really paid the price.

GINGRAS: In the last week alone, Connecticut saw 306 confirmed coronavirus cases of nursing home residents, 39 people have died. A sign of where the state may be headed, last week, this once abandoned nursing home became fully operational again. It's reserved for COVID- 19 positive long term care residents. They're moved here to mitigate the virus spreading like a brush fire inside their home facilities.

NICOLE SHEEHEY, DIRECTOR OF NURSING, WESTFIELD CARE AND REHAB: The amount of referrals that we're getting and, you know, people calling, asking, can we take patients. You know, it's been very consistent since the day that we opened. I mean, we haven't really had a slow moment.

GINGRAS: With help from the National Guard, the state first opened this facility in April. It was one of four like it needed in the spring to get control of cases. It closed in the summer when the numbers went down. For now, the state is relying on just this building. But it hasn't ruled out the possibility of needing more space as cases surge.

On this day, eight sick elderly patients were expected to arrive. We talked to Charles Miller who was one of the first patients admitted. He's a Beachwood resident who tested COVID positive while recovering from a stroke at the hospital.

CHARLES MILLER, BEECHWOOD LONG TERM CARE RESIDENT: It's tough on the elderly. I think it's tough on everybody.

GINGRAS: Miller tries to keep a good spirit.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You look good.

MILLER: I feel great.

GINGRAS: Because this Thanksgiving will be the first away from his wife and family.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We have next year.

MILLER: Yes, we sure do.

SHEEHEY: Seeing their loved ones' face even if it's just via a Facetime visit is sometimes a critical piece in their care.

GINGRAS: Miller's goal is to fight the virus, get back to Beachwood and joined the family these residents have become, as they stick together and stay healthy, all anxiously waiting for that one thing.

(On camera): You'll give them a hug after this is all over?

COREY: I will indeed.

(LAUGHTER)

COREY: A lot of hugs.

GINGRAS (voice-over): Brynn Gingras, CNN, New London, Connecticut.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

NEWTON: Now all across the U.S. hospitals are still being flooded with new COVID patients. Some ICU nurses are reviving the "how it started versus how it's going" meme. Now they're posting photos of before and after their shifts or how they looked pre-COVID compared to now to show just how hard they're working.

CNN talked a short time ago to the nurse who posted this one as you see there. She said she only wanted to be identified by her first name but says she's feeling incredibly overwhelmed.

[04:45:06]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

KATHRYN, NURSE, NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE: I can't believe that so much is being asked of health care workers with so little resources. We're being asked to take care of this massive increase in patients whereas resources haven't really increased. And we are not some superhuman invincible force. You know, we can only do so much. I think at this point we've gone numbed. We've been through a couple of surges here in my hometown, and we are fully expecting the next few weeks to be brutal, and at this point, honestly, we just want to get it over with.

We know it's going to be awful. We know that people are going to die, and there's nothing else we can do at this point other than get through it.

(END VIDEO CLIP) NEWTON: Now, one place people turn for comfort, of course, is the local restaurant. It is normally a place for nourishment, but also for company community, but now restaurants right across the country and around the world for that matter are under pressure like never before. In Los Angeles, indoor dining has been banned again with establishments scrambling to try and survive on takeout and delivery only. In Nashville, bars and restaurants can open but with major restrictions. They're only allowed 50 percent capacity and are subject to a curfew.

Now the patchwork of restrictions such as these is having a huge impact. It's estimated 11 million jobs could be lost and that 500,000 independent restaurants may close.

Joining me now is cofounder of the Independent Restaurant Coalition, Amanda Cohen.

Amanda, good to see you, and thanks so much for giving us some insight into what it's like to be you right now, and so many different restaurants, owners and employees all over the United States and the globe really.

Here in the United States, what has it been like trying to come through this second wave? Because we saw so much resilience and determination after the first wave. It's my impression that it's much tougher this time.

AMANDA COHEN, CO-FOUNDER, INDEPENDENT RESTAURANT COALITION: It's so much tougher. I think it's pretty disheartening for everybody. And it feels like we're on a roller coaster that we just can't get off of. We don't know if there's more federal aid coming down the pipeline, and we're just increasingly getting more restrictions on how we can do business for the greater good. But it's still really hard to handle as a business owner, and we just don't know when it's going to end, and it's almost impossible to keep holding on.

You know, I walk home every night and restaurants are just empty. There's nobody in the dining rooms, and it's too cold for customers to sit outside, and it's just bleak out there.

NEWTON: Yes. Unfortunately bleak probably sums it up right now. And I want to get the impression of what this means in communities like yours replicated again all over the country? What it means in so many communities to have these restaurants, focal points for neighborhoods, and obviously employment for people who really need it.

COHEN: Right. So, you know, I used to have 35 employees, I have six. Hopefully I won't have to lay off anymore. You know, we're seeing jobs disappear. Jobs that aren't going to come back. And we're watching the hearts of neighborhoods disappear. You know, restaurant -- if the kitchen is the heart of a home, then restaurants are the heart of a city, and we're watching them just disappear. And I don't know when they're going to come back. It's going to take an incredibly long time, and so the mood is sort of overwhelmingly depressed.

NEWTON: Yes, and not helped obviously by the fact that -- I guess you guys feel like there is no rescue package coming from the restaurant. I mean, what's on the table now, and do you have any optimism that Congress will be able to get it together and pass something?

COHEN: I'm holding on to my last little bit of optimism. You know, we do have the Restaurant Act. It has been passed in the House. We're waiting for it to get passed in the Senate. It has huge bipartisan support. 49 senators have supported it, which is amazing. We just need to get it over the finish line, and really it's a revitalization plan for the industry. It will allow us to survive through this pandemic, and then we can be there on the other end so that when the country reopens, we're there, and the jobs are there, and you can be there for the customers and for tourists, but we need that money to be able to keep our doors open.

NEWTON: What's your fear if it doesn't pass?

COHEN: We're just going to see hundreds of thousands of restaurants closing. I mean, none of us have any money left in the bank. When we first got shut down, you know, we all had some savings and we were able to keep our restaurants running. But now in this second wave, my bank account is depleted and I can't put more into the restaurant. There is just -- I have no more left. And so I will be in the same situation as every other restaurateur in this country, which is I will have to shut my business, which will mean millions and millions of jobs lost.

[04:50:03]

NEWTON: The legendary soccer great Diego Maradona has been buried near the grave of his parents at a cemetery outside Buenos Aires. Players with the Italian football club Napoli honored the soccer giant as all of them wore his number 10 jersey in their against Croatian club Rijeka. Napoli won that match 2-0.

Now fans lining the streets, meantime, in Buenos Aires to good-bye to Maradona's funeral procession passed by. Officials say Maradona died of heart failure. He was 60 years old.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

NEWTON: All week long we've been sharing stories about Paralympians from around the world. They're defying the odds and fighting for athletic glory in the upcoming Tokyo games which begin in August.

Now our last story comes from Hong Kong where one athlete is excelling in a sport that requires precision and strategy.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRISTINA MACFARLANE, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): At the Hong Kong Sports Institute, Yuen-kei Ho is playing Boccia with her longtime coach and assistant Jet Li. Boccia is one of the only Paralympics sports with no counterpart in the Olympic program.

[04:55:04] YUEN-KEI HO, BOCCIA PLAYER: Boccia is a kind of sport for disabled people. The objective is to throw your ball near the target ball which means right ball so who got the closest will win.

MACFARLANE: The game is mixed gender and divided into various categories depending on the functional ability of the athlete.

Ho is classified as BC-3, meaning she can use a ramp and an assistant while propelling the boccia ball herself. Born with spinal muscular atrophy, a disease that progressively weakens her muscle, Ho is a full time boccia athlete and ranked number two in the world in her class. She trains five days a week, honing her precision and strategy.

HO: Being an athlete is a kind of job that I never thought about in my life before. But when I knew about boccia, I found that, OK, quite interesting. I'm not only playing a sport, I can represent Hong Kong.

MACFARLANE: Christina MacFarlane, CNN.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

NEWTON: Now our international viewers can watch "SUPERHERO" Saturday at 6:00 in the morning Eastern Time, that's 7:00 in the evening in Hong Kong right here on CNN.

And that wraps it up for this hour of CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Paula Newton. Thanks for joining us. "EARLY START" is straight ahead.

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