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How Would American Lives Be Different if Senate Had Convicted Trump?; Actor Richard Schiff, Who Battled COVID, Discusses Celebrities Speaking Out About Coronavirus and Mask Deniers; Austan Goolsbee, Former Chair, Council of Economic Advisers Under Obama, Discusses Coronavirus Stimulus Relief Bill Negotiations. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired December 18, 2020 - 13:30   ET

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

[13:30:00]

DOUGLAS BRINKLEY, CNN PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: This incredible scenario of Donald Trump's refusal to ever criticize, say anything wrong about Putin and the Russian government and willing to encourage interference on our elections, Donald Trump.

If he had been impeached and the Senate got rid of him, it would have been a large message to foreign countries, don't mess with the United States. Your tool in this case, Donald Trump, is gone, we have a new government.

And also Michael Pence coming from Indiana, the big state of the pharmaceuticals, would have been trying to unify the country on the COVID.

If we're going to have a war on it, let's do it united in a way that a Franklin Roosevelt would or John Kennedy.

Instead, we got Donald Trump's mixed messaging about the response to the coronavirus on a daily basis to the point we all became dizzy in 2020.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: I mean, you wonder if Mike Pence or really any other more conventional politicians might have looked at something like this crisis, as so many politicians have done, and seen where the good of the country intersects with what is good politically.

Which is to unite and to try to create a united front that would have benefitted a president running for re-election.

BRINKLEY: Early on in 2020, Donald Trump, when COVID hit, acted like Herbert Hoover. Spent two months doing nothing. We could have saved tens of thousands of lives if President Trump acted sooner.

Here we are at the end of the year, 2020, he is acting like Herbert Hoover, do nothing now when we are under cyberattack from Russia and he seems to be unconcerned about it. Meanwhile, just today, Trump is saying he is not sure masks work. We

watched Donald Trump hold a rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, over the summer where Herman Cain died.

I doubt Mike Pence would have had a maskless rally in such a reckless fashion. So the tone and tenor of the year would have been better.

Who knows, Pence may have been able to unify the country through COVID and gotten reelected. Could have a President Pence.

Alas, you have Donald Trump, one-term president with impeachment on him, who lost the country's votes but also has become a laughingstock around the world.

And we're being toyed with now by Russia because they know Trump won't respond.

KEILAR: Doug, thank you so much for your perspective. We really appreciate it.

BRINKLEY: Thank you.

KEILAR: This week saw several celebrities, including George Clooney, Tom Cruise, speaking candidly about the coronavirus and mask deniers. I'll speak with "West Wing" Actor Richard Schiff, who is recovering from his own battle in the hospital with coronavirus. Stand by for that.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:37:29]

KEILAR: The impact of Actor Tom Cruise's reported outburst about crew members not adhering to COVID safety rules is reverberating in Hollywood and beyond.

British tabloid, "The Sun," released audio of Tom Cruise reportedly threatening to fire crew members who did not comply with guidelines on the set of his new movie.

Now others are coming to his defense and speaking out about wearing masks.

Former New Jersey governor and Trump ally, Chris Christie, who recovered from COVID, admitted it was a mistake not to mask up attending a White House event back in September.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHRIS CHRISTIE, (R), FORMER NEW JERSEY GOVERNOR: You know, lying in isolation and ICU for seven days, I thought about how wrong I was to remove my mask at the White House.

Today, I think about how wrong it is to let mask wearing divide us, especially as we now know you're twice as likely to get COVID-19 if you don't wear a mask. Because if you don't do the right thing, we could all end up on the

wrong side of history. Please wear a mask.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Now, most recently, Actor George Clooney said crews had a right to be upset and was it wrong.

He told Howard Stern on Sirius XM this:

"This thought where everybody is like well, it is my freedom, it is like that's not how this "S" word works, dumb "A" word. Here is your freedom. You're free resist. You're free to smoke until your lungs turn black but you can't do it on the bus. And you're free to drink until your liver comes out your "A" word. But you can't drink and get behind the wheel of a car. There have to be certain rules."

My next guest knows the dangers of contracting coronavirus. He is Emmy Award-winning actor, Richard Schiff, of "The Good Doctor" and the hit drama, "The West Wing," here to talk about this.

Richard, you and your wife survived the virus. Last time we spoke, I wanted to check in with you, you were doing better. I wonder how you are feeling now because we know these things can change.

And how your wife, Sheila Kelley, who our viewers will recognize from "The Good Doctor," is doing. She was still coughing quite a bit last time we spoke.

RICHARD SCHIFF, ACTOR: Yes, and I have a little cough going on now. We are both grateful and lucky to be doing OK.

I am getting better progressively every day. I think about 80 percent now. Sheila is struggling a little bit. But still getting better. Excuse me.

So we're very lucky and grateful, relative to other stories, of course, that we know about.

[13:40:09]

KEILAR: So one of the things we talked about last time was that you actually felt -- you went through quite the process. You and your wife stared down the fact you might not make it, you had to have a tough talk.

You were thankful for when your symptoms showed up because, if they hadn't showed up in the middle of the night, you could have gone on set the next morning.

SCHIFF: That's right.

KEILAR: We have seen this outburst from Tom Cruise on the set of the latest "Mission Impossible" movie. He got very upset. I'm sure you heard about this.

George Clooney said it is not his style to take everybody to task that way. Said it doesn't necessarily help.

But someone like you that knows the risk of going on set and possibly giving it to someone, what do you think about the debate this sparked? Was that a justified or too over the top?

SCHIFF: I don't judge people's behavior unless it hurts somebody else.

You know, Tom Cruise is really like a studio head. He's responsible for the entire franchise of "Mission Impossible."

I heard the outbreak, and as he says, "Mission Impossible" is a test for the rest of Hollywood. If they do well, more and more pictures and films will go into production.

Same is true with "The Good Doctor." We were the first television show in Vancouver to go back to work. Everybody was watching us. The negotiations over the protocols was intense. I was part of that.

My reaction, first time I worked on "The Good Doctor." there were some violations. And what I did was I got the producers and the ads together and said, hey, this and this and this and this didn't happen the first day I worked.

It's very possible to make this strict and workable but people have to be vocal about it. They have to tell each other, remind each other to put the masks on. Keep away from actors who don't have masks when preparing to go on a scene.

And we were on location. There were a lot of jammed activity in one space, which doesn't work per COVID protocols. And they have gotten it really well. And so I didn't get sick on set.

Had I gone to work that day, had the symptoms come later, very likely that someone would have gotten sick.

But everyone gets tested two to three times a week. The likelihood is reduced but still possible that someone will get sick. As strict as we need to be is what we have to do.

If Tom Cruise felt it was necessary to yell at people to kind of, probably a performance of some sort, so everyone heard it, so everyone could be reminded at the same time, if that saves that group from having to shut down, saves someone getting sick or worse, then so be it.

KEILAR: Richard, you're in Vancouver, but you're very much aware of the surge that we are experiencing here in the U.S., certainly Los Angeles, my goodness right now.

And just from your perspective, having contracted coronavirus, before the worst of the worst, I wonder how you've kind of reflected on that as you're hearing stories about how ICU capacity is at its limit and just knowing what it would have been like for you, someone that went in the hospital, who struggled to breathe, thought they may end up on a vent.

What is your perspective on this time?

SCHIFF: I'm shocked at what's happening in Los Angeles. They were early on favorites, if you will, because their protocols were working and we had low numbers, and now it's out of control.

I can't imagine what I would have gone through had I not been able to get a bed in a hospital.

I went to Vancouver General in Vancouver. I was taken care of. I actually got a private room with a view, no less.

Now Vancouver General, there's a spike. It is happening here on a much less scale, lesser scale, but it is still happening,

And Vancouver General is overwhelmed and are experiencing COVID fatigue and they're running out of space. So it is happening here as well.

Imagine me having to go to emergency, or anyone, and not being able to get treated and not being able to -- it is like if there was a mass accident of some kind and there were no spaces, no way to treat someone who had trauma and whose life was threatened.

[13:45:03]

Well, it's the same thing now. There's no space. It is unfathomable to me.

I hear from people, talk to people from Los Angeles, and it is apocalyptic. We have to work harder to stay home and to not continue to spread this horrible thing around as best we can.

KEILAR: Richard, look, we appreciate your perspective. It is so valid on so many fronts, especially this week.

Please give our best to Sheila as she's trying to recover from this.

SCHIFF: I appreciate that, Brianna. Thank you.

KEILAR: Richard Schiff, thank you.

A chaotic chain of events at the White House on the coronavirus relief bill. The president talked out of larger stimulus checks for struggling Americans.

Plus, eight nuns dead from COVID in a week. I will be talking to a sister from their province coming up.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:50:31]

KEILAR: We still do not know exactly what lawmakers will include in the $900 billion pandemic relief bill or, in the midst of these negotiations, how they will avert the government shutdown that's supposed to happen at midnight. What we know is there's a lot of sticking points here, including how

long to extend the eviction moratorium, the GOP push to restrict the Federal Reserves' emergency lending authority, and who is eligible for individual stimulus checks.

The amount of these checks is also a point of contention, though it looks like lawmakers have compromised on an amount of $600 per person.

Initially, President Trump wanted to call for checks up to $2,000 per person but aides talked him out of it over concerns it would derail relief negotiations. This is according to a new report in "The Washington Post."

Let's talk about this with Austan Goolsbee. He's the former chair of the Council of Economic Advisers under President Obama, now an economics professor at the University of Chicago Boothe School of Business.

Austan, I wonder what you think. Did President Trump have a point here? Would $2,000 had been better than $600?

AUSTAN GOOLSBEE, ECONOMICS PROFESSOR, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO BOOTHE SCHOOL OF BUSINESS & FORMER CHAIR OF ECONOMIC ADVISERS UNDER PRESIDENT OBAMA: Well, $2,000 is better than $600, for sure.

I think the president wants to be there anymore. I think he's not directly involved, and that's part of the problem.

Now it's Mitch McConnell and Nancy Pelosi trying to sort it out among themselves and there's a lot of bad blood between them. So I'm a little nervous about this.

KEILAR: OK, you're nervous about this. Here we are on the precipice of a shutdown and this is very needed right now.

Republicans, as you're aware, are focused on the price tag. They want to keep it under a trillion dollars because of the deficit.

Knowing what you know, from being involved in the response to the 2008 financial crisis, what do you say to that?

GOOLSBEE: Look, I think, if they don't pass a bill, we're likely to be looking at another recession. That's certainly a high possibility.

It's not just the target number. It's what you use the money for. This is not really stimulus that's trying to jump-start the economy. This is a disaster relief package that's trying to prevent people from getting evicted and having their gas shut off.

It needs to be a big number. If it isn't, we'll be back having this same debate very soon. Because all across the country, everybody is getting hit hard by this.

KEILAR: The latest relief package, no state and local government aid. What's the impact there going to be? GOOLSBEE: I think it's not a good impact. Look, we have to spread this

vaccine widely and rapidly. To do that, you need partners at the state level.

The states' costs are through roof, not just in blue states but across the board. Because Medicaid expenses, one of their biggest expenses, are way, way up during this crisis.

States will have to fire teachers, police people, first responders, firefighters, that kind of thing. That certainly doesn't help on the economic front.

And you saw that in 2009. And you're about to see it again here.

KEILAR: I want to get your reaction to this moment we saw on the Senate floor this morning. This is Republican Senator Jim Inhofe.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. JIM INHOFE (R-OK): I say to the Senate leadership that you better get this last vote done tonight, or you'll have to do it without me, because I will be with Kay for our anniversary on Saturday, the 61st wedding anniversary.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: All right, 61 years together is a lot for his anniversary. Congratulations to them.

But what did you think about that, where he basically set, I'm out of here, I'm going to go home and celebrate my wedding anniversary?

GOOLSBEE: Look, I'm sorry that our pandemic timetable does not match to his social calendar. I applaud his long marriage. Let's do the job.

I think the premise behind his statement was, let's do the job and get the job done. So I applaud the literal statement. Let's get it done today so he can go celebrate his anniversary.

KEILAR: All right, Austan, thank you.

GOOLSBEE: Thank you.

[13:54:42]

KEILAR: The pandemic is the worst right now that it has ever been. It has states like California on the brink of sweeping new restrictions, and hospitals reaching capacity.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KEILAR: Hello. It's the top of the hour. I'm Brianna Keilar. I want to welcome our viewers in the United States and around the world.

America's worst-case scenarios are coming true as the pandemic is overtaking the country like never before. A new end-of-week tally finds that there were 1.5 million new cases in

the last seven days. That means that one out of every 216 Americans reported getting infected in the past week. More than 3200 were reported yesterday.

[14:00:03]

And we have had a 9/11-magnitude loss of life on three different days this week. And the president stilling has not said a consoling word.