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Pfizer CEO Says, Booster Dramatically Improves Efficacy Against Omicron; Progressives Move to Strip GOP Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) of Committee Assignments; January 6 Panel to Meadows, Testify or Face Contempt Charges. Aired 10-10:30a ET

Aired December 08, 2021 - 10:00   ET

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

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ERICA HILL, CNN NEWSROOM: Pfizer's CEO says preliminary lab studies show three doses of its vaccine are able to neutralize this new strain.

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ALBERT BOURLA, CEO, PFIZER: Three doses against omicron are almost equivalent to the two doses effectiveness we have against the wild card original variant.

We are waiting to see, so you may need to go to get the third booster faster, and that's something that the health authorities should consider very carefully and make their recommendations.

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JIM SCIUTTO, CNN NEWSROOM: Three shots to neutralize the strain. That's important. We're going to have much more on that in moments.

But we are also watching Capitol Hill this morning where former White House Chief of Staff to former President Trump Mark Meadows is scheduled to show up this hour for a deposition with the January 6th committee, scheduled. However, he is expected to be a no-show. If he does not appear, the committee chair says they will hold Meadows in contempt.

Let's begin with the breaking news on omicron. CNN's Senior Medical Correspondent Elizabeth Cohen joins us now.

Elizabeth, this is significant here because the wording after three shots is not that this gives a little boost, right, but that it increases immunity dramatically. How should folks at home take this news?

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Jim, I think we should take this very seriously. Now, of course, larger studies need to be done. But what Pfizer is announcing today, it jives very nicely with what South African researchers announced, from what they found in their labs yesterday, and also with what South African doctors are finding when they take care of their vaccinated patients who get the omicron variant. The bottom line is that two shots really seems to do quite well, but three shots seems to do even better.

Let's take a look at more of the specific. What's been found so far is that two doses may not provide good protection against infection against omicron. In other words, you may still get omicron, but two doses does give significant protection against severe disease. I got that from speaking yesterday with Alex Sigal, who is the lead researcher on the South African study. And a third dose may give more robust protection. So, really, the messaging stays the same. Of course, get vaccinated. Also, if you're more than six months out from your second shot, get yourself booster.

Now, as I said, this also jives with what doctors in South Africa are seeing in their vaccination patients who get omicron. Let's take a listen at Dr. Angelique Coetzee. She , the chair of the South African Medical Association.

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DR. ANGELIQUE COETZEE, CHAIR, SOUTH AFRICA MEDICAL ASSOCIATION: For now, it still protect against severe disease. As the disease patterns, what we are seeing are mild on these people that's been vaccinated.

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COHEN: So, again, this is way better than what people thought it might be. This is mutation -- a variant, rather, with a lot of mutations. People feared the vaccines might not do much at all. It turns out they're actually doing, not perfectly, but they're doing pretty well. Jim?

HILL: And certainly a lot better than not having the vaccine at all. That is perhaps the most important. Elizabeth, we really appreciate it. Thanks for breaking it down for us.

Also with us this morning, Dr. Carlos del Rio, he's Executive Associate Dean of Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta.

So, as we look at what we've learned this morning, one of the things that stood out to me, both -- we heard from the head of Pfizer saying maybe we need to look at boosters coming a little sooner and also one of the doctors out of South Africa who has been one of the first doctors to treat omicron patients, she's also the national chair of South Africa's Medical Association, she said based on omicron infections that she saw that perhaps -- breakthrough infections -- that perhaps three months instead of six would make more sense for a booster. Do we have enough information yet where we should start talking about shifting that timeline?

DR. CARLOS DEL RIO, EXECUTIVE ASSOCIATE DEAN, EMORY UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE AT GRADY HEALTH SYSTEM: Good morning, Erica. No, I don't think we have enough information, but the information is emerging. And I think also what's becoming pretty clear is that maybe full immunization with these vaccines, like the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine, it's really not two doses, but it may really be three doses. So, rather than calling it a booster, it may be that being fully immunized and fully protected actually requires three doses. And the data is increasingly showing us that many of the vaccines we use are three-dose vaccines, you give them at point zero, at one month and at six months. Maybe somewhere between three and six months is the right time to take that third dose. But, increasingly, I think the data is pretty clear that the third dose is required primarily to be protected against infection with strains like delta and now with omicron.

HILL: So, the information that we have right now is from Pfizer. We don't have information yet from Moderna, from J&J. But it's a little confusing. I mean, I was actually having this conversation this morning with a colleague. We each have two doses of Pfizer. The question now is which booster do you get. There seems to be different information everyday about whether or not it makes sense to mix vaccines in terms of protection. What's the answer?

DEL RIO: Well, the answer is a little confusing.

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But I think what we are learning over and over is that at some point in time, you need to get mRNA vaccines. That's the best booster. So, if you got J&J, I would say get boosted with an mRNA vaccine, whether it's Pfizer or it's Moderna.

If you got Pfizer or Moderna, you need to get boosted. And I don't think it makes much of a difference whether you get boosted with Pfizer or with Moderna, there's some data suggesting that maybe with Moderna you get a little higher antibody response, but it's not that significant. So, at the end of the day, my response is get boosted and get boosted with what's available, either Pfizer or Moderna.

HILL: Take whatever you can get. That's the most important thing.

Remind us, too, we've been talking so much this morning about maybe fully vaccinated is three shots. That's not a bad thing, right? We're learning as we go. But for people who have two shots so far or even only one shot of the J&J, just remind us what is their protection this morning?

DEL RIO: Well, we're going to get more data from South Africa. South Africa, almost all their health care workers, over 500,000 health care workers got immunized with J&J. They're currently giving a booster dose of J&J to those workers. So, we will know more about their level of protection against omicron.

The data I'm getting from a colleague in South Africa is that health care workers that have one dose of J&J are getting infected, but they're not getting sick, they're not ending up in the hospital, they're not requiring oxygen when they get hospitalized. They're having very short hospital stays. So, it looks like J&J, even a single dose of J&J, is protecting you against severe disease from omicron, it's not protecting you against infection.

HILL: Bottom line, get your booster. That's what I'm hearing from Dr. del Rio this morning. Always good to talk to you, thank you. DEL RIO: take care.

HILL: Coming up at the top of the hour, Dr. Anthony fauci joining CNN. He will be, of course, weighing in on the latest news about the vaccine's effectiveness and all things COVID, so be sure to join us for that.

SCIUTTO: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has just turned down a chance to say if she supports efforts to punish Congresswoman Lauren Boebert for making deeply offensive anti-Muslim remarks. Progressive Democrats now planning to introduce a resolution to strip Boebert of her committee assignments after the Colorado Republican suggested more than once that Ilhan Omar, because she's a Muslim, might be a terrorist.

HILL: CNN's Chief Congressional Correspondent Manu Raju joining us now from Capitol Hill.

So, drafting that resolution, but will it get a vote, Manu?

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It's really unclear at the moment. In fact, behind closed doors just now, the issue came up. Nancy Pelosi actually complained that she had been asked by reporters about what will be done about Lauren Boebert, and she said that is the Republicans' issue. She said Republicans need to discipline their members.

And one Democratic members came out and told me that, quote, Nancy deflected it, not saying exactly what she plans to do. And behind closed doors in private, other means that she has had, she has not said one way or the other how she'd move forward. But she has indicated some level of concern about going forward some punishment because she says it could essentially elevate the stature of one of these Republican members, potentially help their fundraising, and I'm told also leery about continuing to go after what they consider outlandish behavior by Republicans time and time again.

But the reason why Pelosi is in this position is because of the push by progressive Democrats and because the House took unprecedented action earlier this year in punishing a member of the minority party. Remember, the first that occurred with Marjorie Taylor Greene. The House Democrats stripped her of her committee assignments after past controversial remarks came to light. And also more recently stripping Paul Gosar, the congressman Republican from Arizona, after he tweeted that animated video showing him committing violence against Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and President Joe Biden. That led to a censure of Paul Gosar, and also removed him from his committee assignments.

So, a number of progressives are saying what Boebert said about Ilhan Omar, equating her essentially to a terrorist is just as bad as the last two examples. Why shouldn't the House move forward and punish her now. But you can tell from our reporting the speaker is just not there yet and says it's up to Republican leaders to deal with it. The republican leader, Kevin McCarthy has no plans to deal with it, putting the pressure back on her. And the question, will she move ahead, she's going to continue to face calls, including this afternoon, when progressives call on her to act. But will she? That's going to be the question in the days ahead. Guys?

HILL: We will be watching. And those reporters may just keep asking questions, won't they, Manu? Thank you.

Still to come, the House select committee investigating the January 6th riot informed Mark Meadows they have no choice but to advance criminal contempt proceedings against him given that Meadows has decided to no longer cooperate with the committee, according to a new letter released by that committee. We'll take a closer look at the strategy here.

SCIUTTO: Plus, Russian President Vladimir Putin sharing some details about his call with President Biden. What he says his concerns are regarding Ukraine.

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And in his first television interview, President Biden's new drug czar talks to CNN's Sanjay Gupta on his plans to tackle the ongoing opioid crisis plaguing this country.

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HILL: Breaking right now, the January 6th committee says it has no choice but to hold the former White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, in contempt after he failed to show up for a scheduled deposition this hour.

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SCIUTTO: CNN Law Enforcement Correspondent Whitney Wild joins us now.

So, the letter from the committee chair, Bennie Thompson, also has new details about correspondence so far between Meadows and the committee. What are we learning?

WHITNEY WILD, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT CORRESPONDENT: Well, we're learning what documents Meadows has handed over to the House select committee, and here are a couple of examples. So, I'm reading right from this letter, he produced documents that apparently Meadows agrees are relevant but are not protected by executive privilege. That's going to come up in a very important way in just a minute once I'm done getting through what he has provided.

So, for example, he has handed over a November 7th email discussing the appointment of alternate slates of electors as part of a, quote, direct and collateral attack after the election. He's also handed over a January 5th email regarding a 38-page Powerpoint briefing titled, election fraud, foreign interference and options for January 6th, that was to be provided, quote, on the Hill. Among other things, a January 5th email about having the National Guard on standby.

I mean, this letter provides the most detail we have seen to date about what Meadows has handed over in this trove of documents that he apparently thinks is available for the committee to review. And here is why that's important, because he's at the same time saying that he cannot appear for a deposition that was supposed to be right now because of these claims of executive privilege. So, the committee is basically saying, look, you gave us all these documents. We'd like to ask you about them. Now you won't come in because you say we're not respecting executive privilege? How do you square those two things?

So, Bennie Thompson, look, we've given you enough lead time, we've negotiated with you, you've given us documents, we'd like to ask you about them. You're refusing, and so we must move forward with a criminal contempt charge.

So, again, he now joins, we talked about this earlier, this growing list of people that the committee is really trying to throw the book at by trying to charge them with criminal contempt. Steve Bannon was the first, he's going through that process first. Jeffrey Clark is in sort of limbo state here, the resolution has passed has not yet gone to the House floor, which is required before it goes to the DOJ. Meadows now at the very beginning of this process, so we'll see how this all plays out. But if there had been any question about how they're going to treat Meadows, if they're giving him leniency, they are not. They're going forward with this criminal contempt charge.

SCIUTTO: Whitney, a quick follow, because this is relevant to the broader part of the investigation here, a January 5th email about deploying the National Guard for what exactly?

WILD: Well, this letter that I'm just reading through basically in real-time with you, does not say, but hopefully we'll get more of that. And what is beneficial in my perspective as someone who is covering this, is that once they start to move forward with these criminal contempt charges, we get a lot more information about what the committee knows.

So, these long resolutions that the committee puts out, sometimes they're up to 20 pages or more. And they detail very specifically their case against these people that they're trying to refer for criminal contempt. So, it's certainly possible, Jim and Erica, that we'll find out more from about that email, maybe we'll get a quote from it. The transparency is paramount here, so we could very well learn a lot more about that.

SCIUTTO: We'll see.

HILL: Yes, we look forward to that. Whitney, thank you. Jim, I had the same question, so I'm glad you asked it.

Joining us now to dig a little deeper, CNN Senior Legal Analyst Elie Honig, former Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York.

So, Elie, picking up -- let's pick up where Jim's question left off, right? It definitely makes you perk up when you hear that one of the documents was a January 5th email about having the National Guard on standby. The fact that that too was specifically put into the letter is, of course, done on purpose.

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Yes, Erica. And the question Jim just asked, what's behind that communication, what was happening on January 5th, that's exactly what the committee would want to ask Mark Meadows. And all those other revelations that Whitney just went through show us just how central Mark Meadows was, right, communications about direct and collateral attacks on the election, communications about alternate slates of electors. I mean, that's the heart of what this committee is looking at. That shows why Mark Meadows' testimony is so important and that shows you why the committee is taking his failure to appear right now so seriously.

SCIUTTO: We also have Dana Bash with us. And, Dana, because you've been doing some reporting on this, on Meadows' motivation here, the timing of this is telling. Because it was only earlier this week that Meadows' book revealed many things President Trump did not want revealed about how severe his COVID case was and then this happens. Connected?

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: It seems to me it is connected. I've been speaking to sources in Trump's orbit who say that one of the biggest things to look at is the fact that the former president is furious at Mark Meadows for putting out this book, which was released this week. The timing could not be worse for Mark Meadows or more consequential for the committee because he -- my understanding in talking to at least one source just today, is that what Meadows didn't really consider was how angry the former president would be about putting out all this information about the real deal about his health.

I'm not really sure why or how Meadows didn't anticipate that by putting everything out there, but apparently he didn't anticipate the former president getting as mad as he is and he is very mad. So, you have that anger. You have Mark Meadows saying that he's going to talk to the committee, also before that giving him these documents that are now at least -- there's some bread crumbs in this letter, which are really fascinating and saying, never mind, I'm not going to come talk to you.

And it is about the former president saying you don't understand -- I mean, saying without saying, if you're in my world, I control your fate. That's kind of a quote from somebody I spoke with this morning, a paraphrase of how the gist of how it works in Trump world if you're Mark Meadows.

SCIUTTO: That's remarkable to imagine Trump, in effect, ordering Meadows not to cooperate.

BASH: I'm not sure if it was a direct order, but it was something that somebody like Mark Meadows understood to be the reality based on how mad the former president is about his book.

HILL: And, look, even if it wasn't, to your point, even if it's not a direct quote, we know that that's how the former president communicates, right? We've been told that by Michael Cohen, we've been told that by a number of people. You are made aware, right, of not only where you stand but of how the former president feels, what he wants done, that is communicated with you in some way. Another as we're -- Dana, you mentioned the crumbs there in this letter, what we're learning about. The other thing that's sort of fascinating to me, Elie, is once we saw this reversal is that we heard from Meadows' attorney, right? So, he had been willing to play ball to a certain point, right? As Dana points out, he wrote about a lot of stuff in this book, but they were claiming, his lawyers, that it was the subpoenas for phone communications and for records that really just took it a step too far.

How will all of that play out ultimately if he is held in criminal contempt, referred, right, as we move forward potentially with that process, the fact of what went before, how will that come into play, Elie?

HONIG: Erica, well, Dana's reporting explains a lot. Because, remember, it was about a week ago when Meadows reached this at least tentative cooperation deal with the committee. Now something has changed very drastically, and you can see Meadows and his attorney trying to find some explanation for why they've now gotten cold feet.

What they said in a letter to the committee is, well, we're really offended because you subpoenaed phone records and how dare you. And this gets into intensely personal communications. That's what the letter says. That's nonsense. That's not what these phone records are. The committee doesn't get the content of communications. They get a list of what phone number called what phone number at what time of day and for how long they were connected. That's it. It's the most normal, fundamental, basic investigative tool out there.

So, Erica, in terms of what happens next, now the committee has said in its letter that it intends to move forward with contempt proceedings. But it's important to keep in mind all that the committee can do, all that Congress can do is refer it over to the Justice Department, DOJ and Merrick Garland ultimately make that decision about whether they'll bring criminal charges against Mark Meadows. I don't think that's going to be as easy a call as Steve Bannon was.

SCIUTTO: Dana, when you talk about implied pressure, it reminds me of that statement in the midst of the Ukraine scandal, bad things are going to happen to Marie Yovanovich, of course. Remember, bad things are going to happen. Of course, bad things did happen, non-specific but almost mob-like. Where does this leave the committee? Because some folks are cooperating, Marc Short, the former vice president's chief of staff, that's no small witness. Are they getting what they need here even without the stonewalling?

BSAH: They're getting a lot. And, I mean, I think, again, I mentioned the bread crumbs. I'm just looking again at this letter that was just released that Whitney was reporting on. I mean, they had a 38-page Powerpoint briefing that was made by somebody in the then White House titled election fraud, foreign interference and options for January 6th. I mean, it sounds as though they have a -- Mark Meadows voluntarily turned over a Powerpoint presentation with a potential roadmap for overturning the election.

We haven't seen the specifics, we don't know what it is, but that is -- even that in and of itself is a really, really big deal for him to give that over.

SCIUTTO: In particular, that mention of foreign interference, this based on reporting to this point, is based on a whole bunch of cockamamie B.S., right? I mean, there's a talk about changing the ballots and Chinese computers. I mean, like the conspiracy theories were off the wall.

BASH: They were off the wall, and I'm just looking at this because we just got it.

Another thing that it says is talking about Meadows producing documents that include a November 7, 2020 email discussing the appointment of an alternate slate of electors.

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Again, this is an email from the then chief of staff to the president of the United States who just lost a free and fair election, talking in an email about an alternate slate of electors. I mean, we're kind of numb to this, and we shouldn't be. That's huge.

So, yes, they would like to talk to him. They would like to ask him questions. But even if they don't, just those things that Bennie Thompson put in this letter suggest that they have a lot more than maybe they even thought that they would get, especially since he didn't claim executive privilege. He gave these documents to the committee voluntarily.

SCIUTTO: Erica, that's remarkable.

HILL: It really is, and I'm sitting here letting it all sink in. And, Dana, you make such a great point. And I think it's something that we may talk amongst ourselves and remind ourselves about it, and Jim and I do a lot, that none of this is normal. And we do need to continue to call it out and not be numb to it.

Elie, when we look at what we've learned even in just the last 10 to 15 minutes or so, is there one thing in particular that sticks out to you, especially from a legal perspective, because we're learning a lot? There are a lot of people who would like to see some sort of criminal charges here. But the reality is what we're learning may not necessarily be criminal, but it is certainly not okay.

HONIG: Well, let me start, first of all, looking at this from an investigative standpoint. These documents that are referenced in the letter, this is a gold mine for the committee. And it's worth also keeping in mind, these are not documents that were sort of being kicked around by fringe players on the outside. This is a document that was produced and possessed by the chief of staff and by the president, hence, of the United States. I mean, we are going right to the heart of the matter with these Mark Meadows' documents. And the fact that he's now had this change of heart after producing the documents, I think, is going to make his legal case a little dicier.

Now, the big question here is will Merrick Garland, will DOJ have the committee's back? Will they support the committee if there's a contempt referral? It's different from Bannon though, I want to say, in two respects. One, Steve Bannon did not work in the executive branch at the time of his communications. Mark Meadows was the chief of staff for the White House. Second of all, Bannon just put up a straight up stop sign, red light, said I'm not giving you anything. Here, meadows will say, well, I gave you significant documents. I mean, these are important documents, which sort of cuts both ways. Because on the flipside, it underscores just how important Mark Meadows, how central his testimony could be to the committee.

SCIUTTO: A Powerpoint presentation, a plan to overturn the election. The committee has that, remarkable development.

BASH: Yes. It doesn't say that he produced it, I just want to say. But obviously as you said, Elie, possessed it. So, one of the questions that certainly if any of us were on the committee, what we want to know is who watched this, who saw this, how far did it go? I mean, there are so many questions.

SCIUTTO: What steps were taken?

BASH: Exactly.

HILL: Yes. And why did they need the National Guard, right, on standby?

SCIUTTO: Well, that's the key.

BASH: And there's that.

SCIUTTO: Thanks to both of you, Dana, Elie, we appreciate it.

HILL: Also developing here just moments ago, Russian President Vladimir Putin claiming he doesn't want a confrontation, in his first comments, since that sometimes tense call with President Biden. So, those warnings from the U.S., could they be enough to deter a Russian invasion of Ukraine?

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