Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

20,000 National Guard Troops Expected in D.C. for Inauguration; Official Says No National Mall Access on Inauguration Day; Pelosi Announces Stiff Fines for Members Not Following Security Rules on The Hill; Biden to Lay Out Specific Proposals for COVID Rescue Package. Aired 3:30-4p ET

Aired January 14, 2021 - 15:30   ET

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

[15:30:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN HOST: CNN has learned resident-elect Joe Biden's team is preparing the celebrity-filled prime time special for his inauguration next Wednesday. But preparations for January 20th go beyond of course just the main event with more fencing going up, more National Guard troops descending on Washington, CNN's Jeff Zeleny is in Wilmington, Delaware. And Jeff, six days to go. What should Americans expect?

JEFF ZELENY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Brooke, basically it is going to be a made-for-television inauguration. This is, you know, intended to be viewed on television at home or on your phone wherever you may be, except not at the National Mall.

It's not designed to be, you know, a large-scale event where people can come and watch it in person. In fact, the Biden transition team are -- you know, they're telling people do not come. Watch this on television. So it is designed around that.

And we are learning today that Lady Gaga will be delivering the national anthem, she will be singing "The Star Spangled Banner." Jennifer Lopez will be singing. So it will be a star studded group or performers like every inauguration is.

But, Brooke, it will be so different just because of the events of the last week of course but also because of the pandemic. So it is just going to feature. And in the evening instead of inaugural balls, it is going to be a prime time entertainment extravaganza, a concert, if you will.

[15:35:03]

The central question here is President-elect Joe Biden. He is going to take the oath of office outside on the west front of the Capitol. He is insistent on doing that. Some of his allies are wondering if that's safe to do. So there are security briefings happening every single day. There is precedent to doing it inside the chamber that during the Reagan inaugural, the second one. It was so cold outside they moved it in. But next week it's supposed to be fairly temperate in Washington, but certainly security concerns are hanging over this -- Brooke.

BALDWIN: Speaking of the president to be, we're expecting to hear from him as he lays out the plans for a coronavirus relief package. What do you know about that?

ZELENY: He is giving a prime time address tonight here in Wilmington really talking about what is the biggest challenge he will face once he takes office. That is trying to get a handle on COVID-19, this deepening pandemic. So it is going to be a sweeping package, some $2 trillion he'll be asking Congress to help him out with. That is on a variety of fronts.

Everything from the giving of direct payments of $2,000 to Americans to, you know, really funding that vaccination rollout plan. That is probably the biggest difference Americans will see once the Biden administration takes office is how these vaccines are being distributed. So I am told that we'll learn more on that tonight from Joe Biden.

BALDWIN: Great. We will be watching. Jeff, thank you, in Wilmington.

Coming up, some Republican lawmakers are going ballistic over new security measures on Capitol Hill taken in the wake of deadly insurrection last week. Dodging metal detectors, shouting at police who are there to protect them. Whatever happened to law and order?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:40:00]

BALDWIN: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is proposing hefty fines for lawmakers in the thousands of dollars who refuse to follow new security measures on Capitol Hill. This comes after some Republicans threw a fit over the addition of metal detectors outside the U.S. House floor.

Colorado Congresswoman Lauren Boebert who has bragged about her desire to carry a weapon on The Hill refused to show Capitol Police officers what was actually in her handbag.

Congressman Markwayne Mullin called it a breach of his quote, constitutional rights. Congressman Andy Biggs called it crap. And Congressman Steve Womack shouted at Capitol Police.

Now if they don't comply, they could face $5,000 for the first offense, $10,000 for the second. With me now CNN political analyst and national political reporter for the "New York Times" Astead Herndon.

Astead, good to see you.

ASTEAD HERNDON, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Nice, to see you also. BALDWIN: These Republicans, you know, purportedly they're the party of law and order complaining about safety measures and yelling at police in the U.S. Capitol. Is this not total hypocrisy?

HERNDON: I mean, what all we have heard from Republicans, particularly since the Black Lives Matter movement has sprouted up in, you know, 2014-15, has been about complying with law enforcement, has been about the kind of sanctity of law enforcement instruction.

And in the last week, we have seen a total hypocrisy from the kind of Trump loyalist sect here who have not listened to Capitol Police, and that mob who overran and injured and, in some cases, killed a police officer.

And so this is Speaker Pelosi trying to impose that order and from a kind of safety standpoint as something that they feel like they need to do, which is just a stunning admission. You know, as someone who's been in the Capitol, the real power of the place is a how it feels like a real flowing seat of democracy, the kind of ways that you can walk in and out. Even some media and the kind of places that Congress folks are just kind of accessible, that's really a moving kind of experience.

And to see that really be overrun by the safety and security concerns are, one, just a sad sight to see, and then, two, to see these Republican Congressmen and women push back against police officers, as you said, is kind of the height of hypocrisy from what we've already seen from them.

BALDWIN: I want to go back to -- you were making the point with these comparisons to BLM. And I think this is a really important point. You know, we're hearing a lot about, what about-ism, from Republican lawmakers who were wrongly trying to compare the insurrection from last week to some of the violent protests that occurred over the summer. Especially in the wake of the killing of George Floyd. And some Republicans have tried to claim that the media and the left did not condemn the violence. They did.

But, more importantly, what does any of that have to do with the president of the United States inciting a mob to attack the United States Capitol?

HERNDON: You know, those are completely different event. We know that what happened last summer was, one, in the kind of limited violent instances were denounced by almost every member of the Democratic Party including President-elect Joe Biden.

You had Black Lives Matter leaders themselves say that this was not about the kind of more violent portions of it but about a largely peaceful protest. And then by itself they were not attacking the seat of government in Washington with the explicit kind of agenda of inflicting harm on lawmakers in the name of a president who was inciting the insurrection.

It is a kind of willful misunderstanding and a willful of both sides- ism that really flattens what we saw last week. This was a mob that was acting on the president's ideology under his instruction. And that is something that is completely different from what we saw last summer, much less the type of privilege that we saw from that group last week that is completely distinct from the police response that we saw against black and white protesters, of folks who came across all races to stand up and kind of civil rights movement last year.

[15:45:06]

BALDWIN: Total white privilege. Like, the guy with the Camp Auschwitz sweatshirt was released from jail on his own recognizance. White privilege. Astead Herndon, thank you.

HERNDON: Thank you.

BALDWIN: Coming up next, the pandemic is at its worst point ever in the U.S. the virus is spreading faster. Hospitals are overwhelmed, and the vaccine is sadly lagging behind schedule. There could be a potential game changer on the way. We'll tell you what that is, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:50:00]

BALDWIN: President-elect Joe Biden later tonight will lay out specific plans to tackle the COVID pandemic. And his address comes as cases and deaths across the U.S. are surging in a way like never before. And officials say the worst may be yet to come.

The CDC reports the overall death rate in this country saw a huge jump last year because of COVID. And the pace of vaccinations still remains dismally low. Erica Hill, CNN anchor and national correspondent, has more.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ERICA HILL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice over): The surge is getting worse.

DR. JONATHAN REINER, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: Until we see hospitalizations drop and until we start to see a sustained drop in daily cases, we're going to see this terrible toll.

HILL (voice over): That terrible toll growing by the thousands on a daily basis. More than 3,800 deaths reported just yesterday.

JOE GERALD, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, PUBLIC HEALTH POLICY AND MANAGEMENT, UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA: Four to six weeks from now, we could be seeing twice as many deaths or maybe as much as four times as many deaths a day.

HILL (voice over): Hospitalizations hovering around 130,000. Daily new cases now averaging more than 245,000. That's up 10 percent in the last week.

In Los Angeles County one in three residents has been infected since the pandemic began. And now officials warn outbreaks are growing. One metric moving in the right direction, testing. Up nearly 20

percent in the last week. Though as sites like Dodgers Stadium shift to vaccinations, there's concern testing may take a hit. More Americans are now eligible for the vaccine, 6.6 million in California, alone.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I decided to get here early.

HILL (voice over): But finding that first dose isn't easy.

SHIRLEY JENSEN, TRIED TO GET VACCINE: They all said no.

HILL (voice over): Especially as the pool grows.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Pharmacies, we called hospitals, we called health departments, doctors' offices. And they all just said that they don't have it.

HILL (voice over): Major league stadiums across the country stepping up to the plate as mass vaccination sites. New York opening its first drive-through facility Thursday morning.

MICHAEL KOPY, DIRECTOR NEW YORK STATE EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT: We're only held back at this point by the number of vaccines.

HILL (voice over): Distribution still a major hurdle.

MAYOR LORI LIGHTFOOT (D) CHICAGO: At the rate we've been on, Chicago won't be fully vaccinated for another year and a half. And that is completely and totally unacceptable.

HILL (voice over): Mississippi has already exhausted its supply. As issues mount, more states questioning President-elect Biden's pledge to get 100 million shots in arms in his first 100 days.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They're going to need resources.

HILL (voice over): A third vaccine is on the horizon. Johnson & Johnson could apply for emergency-use authorization by the end of the month.

REINER: This vaccine would really, I think, open up any bottlenecks that we have in vaccine distribution.

HILL (voice over): It's not only easier to store, early data from J&J's initial trials also shows immunity with a single shot.

DR. CARLOS DEL RIO, EXECUTIVE ASSOCIATE DEAN, EMORY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE AND GRADY HEALTH SYSTEM: Having a single-dose vaccine will be a game changer.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HILL (on camera): And Brooke, I just want to update you, we're getting some new information from the CDC in terms of vaccinations at 30.6 million doses distributed of those, a little over 11 million have been administered.

You know, we talked about all the issues but one state that's bucking the trend is West Virginia which has now administered or assigned every single dose that state has received, so why is it working so well in West Virginia?

Governor Jim Justice telling CNN a short time ago, it's because they didn't adopt the federal program, they took a practical approach. They prioritized older residents. They partnered with local pharmacies, brought in the National Guard, worked with the department of health to very simply get shots in arms. He said you don't need committees, you don't need to set of systems, you just need to do it -- Brooke.

BALDWIN: You don't need the meetings, all of it, it's just being practical. Erica Hill. Good on West Virginia. Thank you so much.

I do want to talk vaccines here. With me now, Dr. Rob Davidson, an emergency room physician and Executive Director of The Committee to Protect Medicare. Dr. Davidson, let's dive in. This Johnson & Johnson, it's a one-shot vaccine. It's showing an immune response in 90 percent of volunteers with minimal side effects. How much of a game changer could that be?

DR. ROB DAVIDSON, EMERGENCY ROOM PHYSICIAN, AND EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF THE COMMITTEE TO PROTECT MEDICARE: Listen, anything we can add to the growing need of vaccines will be huge. A single-shot regimen will be enormous, if it is 90 percent efficacious, you know, I think that absolutely could be a game changer.

There's a little bit of concern about production, but, you know, I think we need to then have a president who will use the Defense Production Act to really, you know, force industry to do everything they can to get them the supplies they need to ramp that up so we can meet the need.

BALDWIN: Got to get vaccines in arms. I'm hearing about MLB, Major League Baseball, they're offering up every stadium in country as a mass vaccination site. You know, getting vaccines in arms is the crucial piece of it. I know Dodgers stadium they're actually going to be, you know, taking away the COVID testing in favor of mass vaccinations. Does that make sense to you?

DAVIDSON: It does, I mean, this is exactly why having so many cases, having this so out of control, is such a concern because we still need to do the testing.

[15:55:00]

You know, we have to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time. And so I'm confident that we'll have a president in just a little under a week that will prioritize both of these. So you know this is key to getting out of this. Because testing still matters. We still need to be able find those cases, trace them back to their source, and isolate people, so we can start bringing the numbers down and the hospitalizations down.

BALDWIN: We do need both the testing and the vaccinations. Dr. Davidson, thank you so, so much.

And just, again, a reminder to all of you, minutes from now Vice President Mike Pence will be briefed on the drastic security measures taking place in Washington in response to inauguration day, in Washington and really around the country.

And notably, President Trump will not be there. Be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)