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CDC Says, Cases Hospitalizations Still Too High to Change Mask Guidance; Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) Says, What Happened on Jan. 6 was a Violent Insurrection; Russia's Top General Arrives in Belarus for Joint Military Drills. Aired 10-10:30a ET

Aired February 09, 2022 - 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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[10:00:00]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: A very good Wednesday morning to you. I'm Jim Sciutto.

BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Bianna Golodryga.

Next hour, a major announcement expected from the governor of New York as more states are rolling back indoor mask mandates. But one major question still looms. Will this include schools?

SCIUTTO: All this as CDC director, Dr. Rochelle Walensky says now is not the right time to change guidance, citing relatively high levels of hospitalizations and deaths. So, when is the right time and what does it all mean when you have governors defying the CDC guidance? We're going to have much more on that in a moment.

Let's discuss with the former acting director for the CDC, Dr. Richard Besser, who is also now the president and CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Good morning, Dr. Besser.

DR. RICHARD BESSER, FORMER ACTING CDC DIRECTOR: Good morning. Good to be here.

SCIUTTO: So, where do you stand now? You have now really diverging paths between not just Republican governors but Democratic governors, including here in New York, which has been the epicenter of several surges of this virus, ending mandates. Walensky says now is not the time. What's your view?

BESSER: Well, Jim, I think these periods of transition are always the most challenging. And when you here the CDC director speaking, she is really taking a nationwide perspective on what's been going on.

I'm here in the northeast, in New Jersey, where we were hit really early by omicron and are seeing now dramatic declines in cases and hospitalizations and deaths. We are not out of the woods but we are seeing some light, which is really wonderful.

As a pediatrician, I think it's absolutely critical to keep kids in school, and we've had a big focus on that. But now there may be an opportunity to work on improving the experience children have at school. For a lot of children, wearing a mask is a real barrier to fully participating. A child who is hard of hearing may have real challenges if they can't see another person's mouth. A child who speaks another language as their first language will have real challenges.

And now parents have opportunities that they didn't have the last time we were talking about masks and whether they should be required. Parents whose children are five years and older have the opportunity to get their children vaccinated, and I recommend that to all of my parents.

But we are going to see different things taking place in different places. It's important to learn from that, and it will probably be a number of months before we see, you know, the kind of alignment that will make people more comfortable.

GOLODRYGA: So, Dr. Besser, I hear you when you say the CDC has sort of a nationwide federal mandate in terms of the guidance that they put out. But with regards to states, now we're seeing red states, blue states, governors announcing almost on a daily basis that they will be lifting these mandates, who is advising them? Is it health officials, or their local, state health officials that are telling them that the science shows that now is safe or are they succumbing to pressure? I think that's sort of a crucial question that a lot of people are asking right now.

BESSER: Yes. I think it's a great question and I think it's probably a combination of all of that. If you listen to public health experts to infectious disease experts, you don't see uniformity of opinion. You see quite a number of different opinions there in terms of this the right time to try and remove some of the public health measures that are in place? When you look at parent groups, you see divisions there between parents who say it's too soon to do this, I worry about my child. When you talk to teacher groups, you hear a variety of opinions there as well.

And politicians, our elected officials, have to weigh all of those factors when they're coming forward with recommendations. It's a messy playing field right now. I think it would be wrong for any governor to ban mandates if a school district says, you know, for our school district, we want to keep these in place for several months longer. We're seeing that here in New Jersey. New York has decided that. They should have the right to do that.

And any parent who wants to send their child masked, their child should not feel to be stigmatized or ostracized if they're wearing a mask. Different people risk tolerance and people's actual risk will vary.

SCIUTTO: Let me ask you this though, Dr. Besser, because some of the folks pushing -- first of all, there is an exhaustion factor here. I understand it. We all feel it with this kind of step (ph). But some parents pushing to end mask mandates say they just don't work, right? What does the science show? Because you mentioned also keeping schools open, which I want and folks want as well, and so my question is, do masks, wearing by children, reduce outbreaks in schools and, therefore, make it less likely that schools have to close?

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BESSER: Yes. You know, Jim, I wish there was a simple answer to that. One of the real challenges in terms of the public health science is that it lags the current situation. So, when you look back at the implementation of school mandates in the pre-delta phase, they were found to be effective. They were done with other measures as well, so social distancing, improving ventilation, wearing masks. Those measures were shown to be effective. For delta, they were shown to be effective.

For omicron, I think the jury is out and this is a much more contagious strain. For this strain, what we're seeing is that it's very important to have higher quality medical masks, the KN-95s, the N-95s. And a lot of those masks were not designed for a small child's face. But a parent who wants to send their child to school with a KN- 95 should be able to do that, and that opportunity shouldn't be in any way related to whether a governor removes the statewide mandate to require masks.

But I am concerned that we have this sense of protection in wearing a cloth mask, that this is really doing a lot more than it actually is. It's a combination of all the measures, vaccination, improving ventilation, social distancing, screening and ensuring that anyone who is sick isn't in school, and testing, all of these things combined. There's nothing magical about this one component in terms of protection.

GOLODRYGA: Listen, the goal has remained the same, and that is keeping schools open and keeping children especially and the public healthy. Dr. Richard Besser, thank you for helping us break this down. We appreciate it.

BESSER: My pleasure. Thanks so much.

GOLODRYGA: Well, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell drawing a line in the sand over the January 6th insurrection. He rebuked again the RNC's censure Representatives Adam Kinzinger and Liz Cheney for serving on the committee investigating the Capitol attack and called out those who were trying whitewash the riot.

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SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY): Now, we all -- we're here. We saw what happened. It was a violent insurrection for the purpose of trying to prevent the peaceful of power after a legitimately certified election.

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SCIUTTO: CNN Chief Congressional Correspondent Manu Raju is in Capitol Hill. Manu, of course, McConnell, his comment is very different minority leader in the House side, McCarthy. I mean, he was literally running away from this question. You managed to track him down on this and get the question to him about this.

I wonder, I mean, are McConnell and McCarthy speaking behind closed doors on this as they clash publicly?

MANU RAJU, CNN CHIEF CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: No. They're really trying to avoid this topic altogether. Even though Mitch McConnell did call out the RNC, he does not want this to be a discussion for this party in the run-up to the midterms. He wants to draw the line and rewriting what happened on January 6th and move forward and litigate the election on what the Biden agenda is doing.

And that's actually what McCarthy agrees on too. He also agrees that they should be focused on the Biden agenda, not dealing with this issue. But McCarthy also does not want to separate himself from Donald Trump, from the Republican National Committee, because so many members of his conference are aligned with Donald Trump and he himself is aligning with Trump as he tries to take back the House majority.

Now, when I asked McCarthy about this yesterday, they're talking about legitimate political discourse, whether it was appropriate for them to say that, he defended their language.

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RAJU: The RNC resolution last week referred to the events of January 6th was a legitimate political discourse. I wonder what you --

REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY (R-CA): See, that's not correct. But the RNC was talking about -- they were talking about -- everybody knows, anybody who broke things and caused damage, that was not called for and those people, they've said from the very beginning, should be in jail. What they were talking about were the six RNC members who were subpoenaed who weren't even here, who were in Florida that day.

RAJU: So, you support that resolution?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

RAJU: McCarthy said that they were referring to people who had been subpoenaed, former RNC members, six of them now. Now, that is not what the resolution itself addressed. In fact, it is silent on that issue altogether. But we've learned separately what the committee was going after, where Republican National Committee officials were involved in a so-called fake elector controversy, or might have been involved. And that's why the committee wants to talk to those individuals.

But, nevertheless, Republicans on the Hill want to move on, see this issue as divisive and that is not productive in their efforts to take back the House and the Senate. Guys?

SCIUTTO: I mean, the thing is you have what happened on January 6, but then you have the broader efforts to straight up overturn the election, which has become now part of this investigation. Manu Raju, thanks very much.

The North Carolina State Board of Elections says that it has the power to block GOP Congressman Madison Cawthorn from running for re-election because of his actions over January 6.

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GOLODRYGA: Yes. The bipartisan board made that argument in a court filing to respond to a case Cawthorn brought against them as he's hoping to shut down a constitutional challenge to his candidacy.

CNN Law Enforcement Correspondent Whitney Wild joins us now. So, Whitney, explain what's going on here. It literally goes back to what's written literally in the Constitution.

WHITNEY WILD, CNN LAW ENFORCEMENT CORRESPONDENT: Well, right, I mean, people are clearly seeking to boundaries and definitions here, and they're looking for the courts to do that. So, let's back up and explain the broadly just kind of landscape here.

So, liberal activists filed the challenge to his candidacy last month. Their argument revolves around this little used disqualification clause in the U.S. Constitution, which was ratified after the civil war, to prevent confederate officials and those who supported, quote, insurrection from returning to office. Cawthorn, who has denied any wrongdoing regarding January 6th, filed a federal lawsuit last week to shut down that challenge.

The elections board in its court filing said his lawsuit is premature, it should be dismissed. The board also said it has the power to disqualify candidates based on constitutional considerations, not just based on state laws.

Liberal activists who have mounted this effort to disqualify his candidacy said Cawthorn stoked violence and aided the insurrectionists. Days before the attack on the U.S. Capitol, he said it was, quote, time to fight. And at the January 6th, 2021 rally at The Ellipse, he railed against what he called cowards in Congress who planned to certify Joe Biden's election victory. Back to you.

GOLODRYGA: Whitney Wild, thank you.

And still to come, Russia now scaling up joint military exercises in Belarus. Is the drumbeat of war getting louder? We'll take you live to Moscow, next.

SCIUTTO: Plus, a CNN investigation has uncovered new details on a deadly terror attack during last year's withdrawal from Afghanistan. Our investigation now raises further questions. Did the Pentagon thoroughly investigate that attack? A CNN report just ahead.

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SCIUTTO: This morning, the Kremlin has announced that Russia's top general has arrived in Belarus ahead of joint Russian-Belarusian exercises right on Ukraine's border.

GOLODRYGA: Right. This follows Russia saying that the joint drills have scaled up as the two countries face what they are claiming are unprecedented threats. Ukraine would obviously differ with that.

CNN International Diplomatic Editor Nic Robertson is live in Moscow. Nic, this comes as the foreign minister from the U.K. is traveling to Moscow today to meet with her counterparts. They are trying to defuse the situation. Any sense that we are getting anywhere at all?

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: No. I think we're going to get a situation again where parties are talking past each other. And why do I say that? Because the British foreign minister is saying, that Liz Truss is coming here to tell Russians that a de- escalation is the way forward if there is going to be successful diplomacy. And we've just heard from the Russian foreign ministry, and, of course, it's the foreign minister she should be meeting here tomorrow.

We just heard from the Russian ministry saying, yes, sure, we can have a de-escalation around Ukraine, but the way to do that, okay, here is our list of demands. So, those demands are stop supplying Ukraine with military hardware, pull out all the NATO, U.S., British and other foreign military trainers and advisers, stop joint military exercises between NATO and Ukraine. And also this is perhaps the big kicker here, remove all the military hardware that's already been supplied. There are hundreds of tons of Javelin missiles, ammunition and other things that have been supplied by the United States, the U.K. and others.

So, at the moment the Kremlin is on the front foot on this, and their point is it's the United States that's causing the problem, it's the U.K. that's part of that problem too, it's NATO that's at fault here, it's not us, not Russia, and we're going to stick to our demands. As yet, of course, President Putin yet to say what his real next move is going to be.

GOLODRYGA: And this just in to CNN, pretty interesting, Vice President Kamala Harris will be traveling to the Munich Security Conference to work with allies to try to defuse this situation.

SCIUTTO: CNN's Jeremy Diamond joins us now live from the white house. Jeremy, what's the White House hope here?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, listen, we've just confirmed that, indeed, Vice President Harris will attend this Munich Security Conference late next week, which is a really high- profile security conference. And, of course, it comes in a moment of incredibly tension with the situation between Russia and Ukraine.

The U.S. has been trying to defuse those tensions and to try and deter Russia from carrying out an invasion of Ukraine. But we've seen and we've heard from White House officials repeatedly in the last several weeks that an invasion could take place at any time but they don't know whether or not President Putin has decided to.

So, enter now Vice President Kamala Harris, who is expected to deliver a high-profile speech at this conference. She is also expected to meet with a number of U.S. allies on the sidelines of this conference, and it's going to be watched very closely by players in the region for how Harris articulates this policy at a time when there is really no room for error at all in articulating that policy and getting the nuances of the situation in the region down.

And, of course, it will come towards the end of those Winter Olympics, which is potentially the timeline when U.S. officials have warned that Russia could move forward with an invasion.

[10:20:07]

But while the Olympics are going on, Putin may not want to embarrass his close ally, Xi Jinping. But once those games finish and as the ground in Ukraine is expected to freeze over more, making it easier for tanks to move forward, that is potentially one of the most tense times when Russia could potentially move forward with an invasion.

So, this is going to be a high-profile trip, one that will be closely watched in the region and one in which the vice president will now play a central role in formulating and expressing that U.S. policy in the region. Jim, Bianna?

GOLODRYGA: Yes. There have been reports that the Russian foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, would not be attending this conference. I wonder if this changes the calculus there. Jeremy Diamond, thank you.

SCIUTTO: Joining us now to discuss Beth Sanner, she's CNN National Security Analyst, she's a former Deputy Director of National Intelligence. Beth, thanks so much for joining us this morning and a warm welcome to CNN. We appreciate your experience.

BETH SANNER, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Thanks for having me.

SCIUTTO: You have watched, in your role and intelligence, Russian for years. And I wonder, as you watch Russian forces continue to build on the border, these exercises underway in Belarus, while you have all this diplomatic shuttle diplomacy going on, is that diplomacy real or is it, in your view, more likely a Russian delay tactic to build up its forces?

SANNER: I think it can be both. I think we have to remember that Russia has multiple goals in play at all times, right? One of these goals is to divide. One of these goals is to try to force Ukraine's hand. This is getting played out in this diplomacy over the next few weeks. But that doesn't mean that Putin has kept his eye off the ball, and he's made it quite clear we have not met his demands and that he can only negotiate with the United States. And, of course, these negotiations don't include the United States. So, there are limitations here. I have low expectations.

GOLODRYGA: Well, On the question of limitations, have we limited ourselves, Berth, to think that an imminent attack is all that we're focused on right now as opposed to Putin extending this? Yes, maybe he'll recall some of the troops there that are surrounding Ukraine, but keep enough in place to keep the situation in a tense mode, as it is right now. I mean, what happens then if we go into weeks and months of this crisis continuing to play out? SANNER: Yes. Well, I don't think that we can see this readiness and forward deployment for weeks and weeks on end. You just can't do that militarily. So, at some point Putin is going to have to decide to fish or cut bait. But if he wants this to be an off-ramp, he can have this as an off-ramp, right?

So, this gets back to Putin's intent. And if he doesn't, you know, I think we're going to see some activity probably in the end of Olympics, beginning of March zone.

SCIUTTO: You have advised presidents before. If you were advising this president on the U.S. and NATO response, is it your view that the U.S. and NATO have deterred Russia sufficiently? Have they done all necessary to do their best to prevent an invasion?

SANNER: This is what we call an asymmetry of interest. Really, the only deterrent that is absolute is being able to fight force with force. We are not willing as a nation or as an alliance to do that. But I think outside of that, this deterrence by dissuasion and also by disruption, the use intelligence to expose what Putin may do and make him own what he may do, I think, is really important.

So, yes, I think at this point we can look backwards, but where we are right now, we're pretty much pedal to the metal, maximum.

GOLODRYGA: As you've noted before, Putin sees himself as a co-equal with only one other person, and that's President Biden. And as we see European leaders scurry to meet with him in Moscow, we have the German chancellor meeting with him next week, do you think that it would be wise for another summit between President Putin and President Biden if you do say that an attack, if it happens, would be within the next week or two?

SANNER: That's a really interesting point. You know, definitely, you're right, Bianna, that Putin sees three powers in the world, China, the U.S. and Russia. Putin is getting a lot out of this kind of shuttle diplomacy and attention, but if it does look like Putin is willing to discuss a broader European security dimension, I don't really see a huge harm in that. It's not about the talking. It's about what you do during the talks and what you agree upon. But that's something that really needs to be thought through with the bellicose activities, not just in Belarus but in the Black Sea, raising tensions with Ukrainian exercises at the same time.

[10:25:10]

It may not be the time. We'll have to see.

GOLODRYGA: Yes. He continues to mobilize even though, thankfully, we're not at war yet, though we have been, one could argue, for eight years now. He continues to move troops around that center. Thank you and welcome to CNN.

SANNER: Thank you. Thanks, Bianna.

GOLODRYGA: And ahead, new details on the police shooting death of Amir Locke as calls intensify to end no-knock warrants. I'll speak with George Floyd's aunt about what must change.

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GOLODRYGA: Police in Minneapolis now say they were looking for Amir Locke's cousin the night that he was killed by police executing a no- knock warrant. Locke was sleeping in one of the apartments police had a warrant to search. His cousin, Mehki Speed, was wanted in a homicide investigation. Speed has since been arrested.

But as we've seen, Locke's death has sparked mass protests in Minneapolis, and my next guest understands the loss his family is dealing with.

Joining me now is Angela Harrelson, aunt of George Floyd. She just published a book called, Lift Your Voice, How My Nephew, George Floyd's Murder, changed the world. Angela, welcome to the program. Thank you so much for joining us.

And I want to get to your book in just a moment, but I have to ask you, it's been two-and-a-half years now since the murder of George Floyd, your nephew.

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