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Jury Continues Deliberations in Ghislaine Maxwell Trial; Remembering Harry Reid; Omicron Surge. Aired 2-2:30p ET

Aired December 29, 2021 - 14:00   ET

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

[14:00:12]

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: Hello, everyone, welcome to CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Alisyn Camerota. Victor is off today. Thanks so much for joining me.

Nearly two years into the pandemic, the U.S. is seeing more coronavirus infections than ever before. The seven-day average of new cases has hit 265,000 a day, much of it fueled by the Omicron variant.

But Omicron is proving to be unlike past peaks. The last time the U.S. hit case numbers this high, which was last January, the average daily death count was more than twice what it is today.

Meanwhile, CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky is defending the agency's decision to shorten the time to isolate or quarantine.

CNN's Tom Foreman joins me now.

So, Tom, the White House COVID team just held their briefing. What do they want all of us to know?

TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: One thing they want you to know is that they expect to sign a contract next week for these 500 million at-home tests. They have been criticized for shortages of tests. They're hoping that this will warm up what has been a really bitter winter in many American households and at the White House too.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

FOREMAN (voice-over): As a pandemic blizzard sweeps the country with an average of more than a quarter-million new cases a day, another storm is engulfing the Centers for Disease Control, facing sharp questioning over its new guidelines for COVID-weary Americans.

DR. ROCHELLE WALENSKY, CDC DIRECTOR: It really had a lot to do with what we thought people would be able to tolerate.

FOREMAN: The recommendation of five, instead of 10 isolation days for those testing positive, but showing no symptoms, then five days of masking, is aimed at keeping people working. But it's raising alarms too.

ERIN BROMAGE, UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS-DARTMOUTH: There is absolutely no data that I'm aware about with the Omicron variant that supports people coming out of isolation five days after they were first diagnosed with the virus.

FOREMAN: Nothing in the guidelines mandate testing for these people. And the Biden administration, which is promising to distribute a half- billion tests beginning in January, has been harshly criticized for a shortage of tests now.

So the lack of testing is also drawing fire, even as top health officials push back.

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, CHIEF MEDICAL ADVISER TO PRESIDENT BIDEN: It has nothing to do with a lack of tests. That is not the reason why.

FOREMAN: Add in new questions about the effectiveness of some at-home test in detecting the Omicron variant, and it is all becoming a muddle at a terrible time.

DR. LARRY KOCIOLEK, LURIE CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL CHICAGO: We're right now seeing more cases per day than at any point in the pandemic.

FOREMAN: Infections among children are rising rapidly in many places.

DR. CHRIS PERNELL, PUBLIC HEALTH PHYSICIAN: We're seeing here even in New Jersey a fourfold increase in pediatric hospitalizations. We're seeing our daily case rates skyrocket.

FOREMAN: In Connecticut, the National Guard has been called up to help with testing.

In New York City, 17 percent of the police department's uniformed officers called in sick yesterday. In Washington, the Pentagon is tightening its COVID safety protocols. Along the coast, authorities are now investigating 86 cruise ships for COVID outbreaks.

And with talk of a vaccine mandate for domestic air travel swirling, the questions about what comes next seem endless.

QUESTION: When might you make a decision domestic travel vaccine requirements?

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: When I get a recommendation from the medical team.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FOREMAN: That's the president's assessment.

As you can tell, Alisyn, keeping track of all of this, even for those of us who do it for a living, is getting really complicated. There's so many moving parts, but don't forget one really positive part of all of this, hospitalizations. The really severe cases, have not been rising nearly as fast as simply new cases. That is a bit of a silver lining, because maybe it means, as many people as may get infected, maybe not so many of them will be so badly hit by this wave of the virus.

CAMEROTA: That is reason for optimism. Tom Foreman, thank you very much for all that.

FOREMAN: Sure.

CAMEROTA: OK, so this just in. Washington, D.C.'s mayor just announced that all students and staff must show proof of negative test, a negative test before returning to school on January 5.

That's the first time that we're hearing that kind of mandate in Washington.

Let's turn now to pediatrician and vaccine researcher Dr. Peter Hotez. He's the dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine.

Dr. Hotez, always great to see you.

Let's just start with testing, OK, because, as you know, so many people are desperate for reliable at-home tests. And that's why I need your help understanding what Dr. Fauci said about these at-home tests yesterday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FAUCI: The tests are still worthwhile. Don't let anybody think that the FDA were saying the tests are no longer good. They say they're less sensitive now.

[14:05:00]

They never were 100 percent sensitive. Some of the tests have a diminution further of the sensitivity, but they still say the tests are useful and should be used.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: OK, a diminution of the sensitivity, does that mean that the at-home rapid tests work to detect Omicron or not?

DR. PETER HOTEZ, BAYLOR COLLEGE OF MEDICINE: Well, they do and they don't, in the sense that, if you are symptomatic, most of the antigen tests are pretty good. In other words, if you're having COVID symptoms, cold headache, et cetera, the sensitivity for picking that up on an at-home antigen test like the Binax test is about 70 percent, which is reasonable.

Where it breaks down is if you're having no symptoms, and you just do a random test. There, the sensitivity does go way down. So you still could be shedding virus without any symptoms and have a negative test. And that's what makes it tricky.

CAMEROTA: Yes.

HOTEZ: So...

CAMEROTA: And I guess there's nothing to do about that. You just wear your mask. I mean, there's no other solution to that one, right? HOTEZ: That's right.

And, again, you have to have -- make a judgment call about who you're interacting with, et cetera. So -- and so I think what you're seeing now is both the White House and CDC are kind of drawing a balance. They're trying to give a realistic assessment of these antigen tests, pointing out their strengths and weaknesses, but not throwing too much cold water on them, because they just announced they're going to -- they're going to buy and signed contracts for half-a-billion of them.

So, if they are too dismissive of them, then what's the point of that? So I think they're trying to walk that tightrope. And it is tough, and especially with this Omicron variant. It's so highly transmissible, and it's so disruptive.

Even if the hospitalizations are not going up, you're knocking out a significant chunk of the health care work force. So it doesn't take a lot of increase in hospitalizations to cause that kind of disruption and breakdown.

CAMEROTA: And that leads us to schools. Schools across the country are reopening five days from now. Many are opening on January 3, and you don't like this idea. So what's wrong with it?

HOTEZ: Well, first of all, I understand the importance of bringing back kids to school. I was -- I'm a parent of -- now they're four adult kids. But when they were little, we understood the importance as well as any one of that.

And we just had this pretty serious report from the surgeon general about the mental health aspects on children on this COVID pandemic. So I get we have to bring them back. It's just that this -- what I call screaming level of transmission, what my friend Mike Osterholm calls a virus blizzard, it's going to be pretty tough to get -- to do this over the next couple of weeks.

And so, if we had a crystal ball, and we knew that the level of transmission was going to go way down, like it's doing in the U.K. and South Africa, we could take a step back and say, hmm, maybe we will delay things a couple of more weeks, and then add it on in the summer.

But, of course, we don't know that for certain, but it is going to be a real challenge. And the other problem, Alisyn, is our state and local health departments across the country have been so depleted. And we have not fixed that during COVID-19. So you see what's happening.

We're actually balancing it on the back of teachers and superintendents and principals. We're asking them -- and school nurses -- to become mini-public health departments and figure out how to do the testing and the algorithms. And that's really unfair as well.

CAMEROTA: Yes.

HOTEZ: So we're just kicking the can down the road a lot.

CAMEROTA: Well, let's talk about this. Let's talk about what the future looks like, because if they were to -- if schools were to delay, let's say, for two weeks, let's look at what happened in South Africa, and if that gives us any road map for what the next two to three weeks would look like here.

So, in South Africa, I think that the cases of Omicron started to spike. That's around November 23 where you start to see that precipitous uptake there. And then, three weeks later, it started to fall.

Now, when you look at the map -- I mean, the graph, on the right-hand side, the U.S., I'm not sure that we're following exactly that same model. But can we look to South Africa for what our next three weeks look like?

HOTEZ: Well, we might, but, remember, because we're such a huge country, that the country doesn't behave in all the one fashion.

So what you're starting to see now is, it's really peaking in New York, New Jersey, in a band across the Northeast into Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois. But the worst part of Omicron has not hit yet where I am here in Texas and in the South and in the West.

So, the decisions may have to be made on a regional basis about when to reopen. So, the tough part might be coming now for New York and New Jersey, may be better in a couple of weeks. But then you're going to see this go up elsewhere in the country.

And we saw this with Delta. We had a terrible Delta wave here in the South in Texas in the Southern states, not so much in the Northern states. And now it's the inverse.

[14:10:02]

CAMEROTA: OK. Dr. Peter Hotez, thank you for all the information. We will talk again soon.

HOTEZ: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: OK, so, for the first time, the jury in the Ghislaine Maxwell trial has asked for transcripts from defense witnesses. What does that tell us about which direction they're heading in?

And next, from hardscrabble beginnings to Senate majority leader, the life of Harry Reid.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DAVID AXELROD, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: How do you hope you will be remembered?

FMR. SEN. HARRY REID (D-NV): David, I have five children. I have 19 grandchildren. I want those children grandchildren to understand what a love affair I have had with my little wife.

AXELROD: More important than any of your public accomplishments?

REID: Oh, yes. That's all I want.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:15:03]

CAMEROTA: Tributes are pouring in for longtime Nevada Senator Harry Reid.

He died Tuesday after a four-year battle with pancreatic cancer. Reid was 82 years old. Flags at the Capitol and White House are at half- staff in his honor.

CNN chief political correspondent Dana Bash has more on Reid's life and legacy.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): He led Democrats in the Senate for a decade, but Harry Reid called one of his proudest accomplishments the impact he had on presidential history, encouraging Barack Obama to run.

REID: I did call him into my office and tell him he should take a look at it. And he was stunned that -- because I was the first one that ever suggested that to him.

When he was reelected, that was one of the most moving phone calls I have ever received, because he said: "You're the reason I ran."

BASH: He spearheaded epic legislative battles, like Obamacare, with a scrappy style he learned during his impoverished childhood.

Reid was born, shaped and scarred in Searchlight, Nevada, essentially a truck stop outside Las Vegas. He grew up in a shack with no running water, where this trailer now sits. He took us there in 2006.

His mother did laundry for the local brothels, his dad always looking for work as a miner. Both drank heavily. During that 2006 visit to Searchlight, he casually pointed out where his father took his own life at 58 years old.

REID: This house right here, that last room is the bedroom. That's where he killed himself.

BASH: He fought his way out of poverty as a boxer. As a politician, he was never afraid to punch below the belt. He even took on the mob as a young politician in Las Vegas.

(on camera): A wide variety of adjectives have been written about you.

REID: Some good, some bad.

(CROSSTALK) BASH: Some good, some bad. Let me read a few, scrappy, tough, blunt, canny behind-the-scenes mastermind, ruthless.

Are all those fair?

REID: Well, that's what people think. If that's what they think, they're entitled to their opinion.

BASH (voice-over): As Senate Democratic leader, Reid was a polarizing figure. Republicans argued a lot of congressional gridlock stemmed from his hardball tactics.

REID: Seen the turning of the tide.

BASH: But he reveled in playing the political bad guy, calling then- President George W. Bush a loser and a liar well before politicians use those L-words.

REID: I don't really care. I don't want to be somebody I'm not.

BASH: During the Trump presidency, however, Reid changed his tune about Bush.

REID: In hindsight, I wish every day for a George Bush again. I think that he and I had our differences, but no one ever questioned his patriotism. There's no question in my mind that George Bush would be Babe Ruth in this league that he's in with Donald Trump. Donald Trump wouldn't make the team.

BASH: In 2012, he used the Senate floor to accuse Mitt Romney of not paying his taxes, even though he had no evidence.

REID: He's refused to release his tax returns, as we know. Let him prove that he has paid taxes, because he hasn't.

No, I don't regret that at all.

BASH (on camera): Some people have even called it McCarthyite.

REID: Well, they can call it whatever they want. Romney didn't win, did he?

BASH (voice-over): Years later, we did ask to meet with Romney to make amends.

REID: Shook hands and put stuff behind us.

BASH (on camera): Why was it so important for you to tie up that loose end?

REID: I try to do that with everybody.

BASH (voice-over): Reid also inspired fierce loyalty from many of his longtime aides, as well as fellow senators, not all out of fear, but affection. He often told colleagues he loved them, even in public.

REID: I love you, John Kerry.

BASH: He had a storybook romance with wife Landra, his high school sweetheart. The two converted to Mormonism together when they married.

REID: She had on a pair of Levis. And, man, she just looked so good.

(LAUGHTER)

BASH (on camera): That's amazing.

REID: But it is true.

BASH (voice-over): In January 2015, Reid, a workout addict who ran numerous marathons, had a brutal exercise accident that left him severely bruised and blind in one eye. It cemented his decision to retire.

A few years later, he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. The effects of chemo made it hard for him to walk. We went to see him in Las Vegas.

REID: That's one of my keepsakes from Donald Trump.

BASH: Never any complaints.

REID: I'm doing fine. I'm busy. I work quite hard.

BASH: Reid was an unlikely political leader in today's media age, soft-spoken and gaffe-prone. But he played the inside game like no one could.

REID: I didn't make it in life because of my athletic prowess. I didn't make it because of my good looks. I didn't make it because I'm a genius. I made it because I worked hard.

[14:20:00]

One of the things I hope that people will look back at me and say, if Harry Reid could make it, I can.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CAMEROTA: And Dana Bash joins me now.

Dana, what a fascinating look back at his life and his career. And Reid strikes me, from watching your piece, as really a study in contrasts in so many ways. He was, in some ways, old-fashioned. And I think some of his gaffes fell into that category.

And then yet he was also ahead of his time in so many ways.

BASH: It's so well said, Alisyn, ahead of his time, just for example, on mental health.

As you saw in the piece, his father committed suicide. And he didn't talk about it for decades. He didn't do so until Mike Wallace was testifying before Congress. And he talked about his own mental health issues. And, suddenly, Senator Reid started talking about what happened in his own family and really spearheaded the notion of having a public debate in Congress about mental health.

But, for sure, his -- the legislative legacy is Obamacare. And he -- it wasn't easy. I was in many a hallway waiting for them to after months and months and months finally come up with a deal. But he didn't do it by strong-arming. In fact, I went and talked to him before he became majority leader and asked him if LBJ was going to be one of his role models.

And he didn't even let me finish the answer, Alisyn. He said: No way. I didn't like -- I don't like LBJ, because I don't like the way he treated people.

So it was a very different kind of approach that he took. He treated people well by making them promises, but also keeping his own promises.

CAMEROTA: And you say that also extended to his -- the people who worked for him in his office, and particularly how he treated women.

BASH: That was another area where he was so far ahead of his time.

I just know because I have friends who -- female friends who worked for him for years. And they stayed in his office largely because they liked their jobs, but they were able to stay even after having families because he really allowed for a family-friendly office.

And when I talked to him in February of 2019, I asked him about that. Let's listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REID: I think what I did, and I'm very satisfied -- I feel really good about what I did with women in my office.

Before it was the thing to do, I started bringing women to my office, and I instructed my chief of staff, you tell them that, if they have a child, if they want to have a child, that's good for me. And if that baby is sick, let them stay home. If that baby-sitter's not available, they can stay home.

And everybody thinks, well that was very generous of me. It was very selfish, because I knew that it would benefit me, because that's what it did. Those women became very -- because I was the only senator that did that originally.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BASH: And, Alisyn, he really was.

He did that really, frankly, before a lot of the female senators did it. And he wanted to really lead by example. He says it was selfish. And, in some ways, it was. It allowed him to keep talent. Now, in workplaces across the country, good ones, they recognize this. But he did it really early on. And it did help to solidify the loyalty again and, like I said, the talent in his office, the female talent.

He liked strong women.

CAMEROTA: Yes, it sounds like it. I mean, it sounds like it.

And, also, the love affair that he had with his wife for so many decades, that was really interesting to hear about, to hear about also.

BASH: Oh, my gosh, yes.

CAMEROTA: So, Dana, thank you.

BASH: Since they were teenagers. Since they were teenagers.

CAMEROTA: That's incredible. I mean, it's incredible.

BASH: Yes.

CAMEROTA: And it was incredible to hear that he still loved how she looked in Levis. So that was great. That was a great interview that you did.

(LAUGHTER)

CAMEROTA: So, anyway, thank you very much for that look back, Dana.

BASH: Thanks, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Well, some January 6 defendants tried to compare the attack on democracy to the unrest in Portland in 2020. A pair of Trump- appointed judges are not buying that argument. So, we have more on that coming up.

And the jury in the Ghislaine Maxwell sex trafficking case requests testimony from five witnesses. We will tell you what that might mean. We are live at the courthouse.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[14:29:06]

CAMEROTA: Day six in jury deliberations in the Ghislaine Maxwell case, the judge telling the jurors they will have to keep working through New Year's Eve and New Year's Day until they reach a verdict.

CNN's Sonia Moghe has the very latest.

So, Sonia, I understand the jury has now sent 14 notes to the judge. That sounds like a lot, and the latest one requesting testimony from these five defense witnesses. So do we know what the jurors are looking for?

SONIA MOGHE, CNN REPORTER: Yes.

Well, actually, Alisyn, just moments ago, we got yet another transcript request, this time for a former pilot for Epstein who testified, so, today, in all, six requests for transcripts of testimony.

And this is just adding on to the requests that they have already put in the past six days. So, they have requested testimony from more than a third of the witnesses who have testified at this trial.

And it's really hard to know exactly what they're thinking behind those closed doors. But what we can say is that it appears that this jury is taking its job very seriously. They're combing through this testimony. They're asking lots of questions, and they're hard at work.