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Erin Burnett Outfront
Trump Claims "We're Going to Quickly End This Pandemic"; Surgeon Gen.: U.S. Likely to See Record Case Count This Week; U.S. Nears New Record for Daily Coronavirus Cases; Study: Wearing Masks Could Save More Than 100,000 Lives; Biden: We Saw Trump "Repeatedly Lie" to Americans at Debate: Trump: Biden Showed He's "Not Capable". Aired 7-8p ET
Aired October 23, 2020 - 19:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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Erin Burnett OUTFRONT starts right now.
ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: OUTFRONT next, Dr. Anthony Fauci is my guest. I'm going to ask him about the coronavirus surge ravaging the country. What anything Americans can do to turn this pandemic around and those persistent attacks on him by the President of the United States.
Plus, Trump seizing on Biden's comments about oil and fracking. How damaging was it?
And the race to 270, who's ahead in the all-important state of Florida and why there could be bad news for Republicans in safe red states like Kansas, Alaska and South Carolina. Let's go OUTFRONT.
And good evening. I'm Erin Burnett.
OUTFRONT tonight, just 11 days until Election Day. And tonight, the candidates laying out stark differences on the defining issue of this campaign, the pandemic. The President about to speak at a rally in Pensacola, Florida, his second big rally in the sunshine state today.
His first was at a retirement community, The Villages. The biggest retirement community, in fact, in this country. Many of the seniors there not wearing masks. No need to remind you that elderly people are at an increased risk of dying from coronavirus, something masks help prevent.
Meanwhile, Joe Biden doing the exact opposite, laying out his plan to combat the virus including specifically wearing masks.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: Wearing a mask is not a political statement. It's a scientific imperative.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: Biden wants mask mandates in all of the states. The President, of course, actively encourages no mask wearing at his own rallies and today before the event in Florida with the seniors wearing few masks, at the White House, Trump once again mocked a reporter for wearing a mask.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: This is Jeff Mason. He's got a mask on. It's the largest mask, I think, I've ever seen.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: And while the President is painting a rosy picture tonight, here he is.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We're going to quickly end this pandemic. This horrible plague that came in from China. You look at what's going on and we're rounding the turn, we're rounding the corner. We're rounding the corner beautifully.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: Biden sees things very differently.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BIDEN: Last night, we saw the President of the United States lie to the American people and repeatedly lie about the state of this pandemic. We saw him refused to take responsibility. If this is a success, what's a failure look like? We're more than eight months into this crisis and the President still doesn't have a plan. He's given up. He's quit on you. He's quit on your family. He's quit on America.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: Voters tonight have two polar opposite choices that became even clear on that final debate stage last night.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BIDEN: We're about to go into a dark winter, a dark winter and he has no clear plan.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... that you have no plan.
TRUMP: I don't think we're going to have a dark winter at all. We're opening up our country. I say we're learning to live with it.
BIDEN: People were learning to die with it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: I'm going to speak momentarily with the nation's top infectious disease doctor, Anthony Fauci. But first I want to go to the two campaigns tonight, Arlette Saenz is covering the Biden campaign, Kaitlan Collins OUTFRONT of the President's rally tonight at The Villages.
Let me start with you, Arlette, though Vice President Biden today laying out new details of his plan to combat the virus. What did he say?
ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN POLITICAL REPORTER: Well, Erin, it's very clear that Joe Biden is trying to keep the coronavirus pandemic front and center in these closing days of this campaign. The former vice president arguing that President Trump is ignoring the realities of the state of the pandemic right now in this country and also arguing that the number of deaths due to COVID-19 show that the President is ill-equipped, that he didn't develop a sufficient plan.
So what you heard from Joe Biden today in a speech in Wilmington, Delaware was starting to lay out some of that strategy of what he would do in office if he's elected. Now, one of those things Biden said is he's not going to wait till he's in the White House to get started working on this pandemic.
He said that during the transition, he would begin reaching out to governors, Republicans and Democrats to gauge what kind of resources they need to combat the pandemic. He also said that he would call on Congress to put a bill on his desk by the end of January to provide the resources for public health and economic initiatives. A contrast to the current state of play in Washington right now as negotiations are tied up over that COVID relief bill.
Biden also talked about the need for Americans to wear masks saying that it's not a political statement, that it's something that people need to do to curb the spread of the virus and consider the other people that are around them. Biden has acknowledged that he can't implement a nationwide mask mandate, but he said he would go to the governors asking them to do so.
[19:05:03]
And if the governors did not do that in their states, he would then take that to the mayors and local officials. Biden here in these closing days of the campaign really believes that he can hone in on the COVID-19 crisis as well as the economy. His advisors believe this is the defining issue of the campaign and that voters will ultimately believe that the President's mishandling of the pandemic will be a reason to vote for Biden in the coming weeks as the election winds down.
BURNETT: All right. Arlette, thank you.
And I want to go now to Kaitlan, she's in Florida, as I mentioned with the President. And Kaitlan, I mean, the two visions here could not be more starkly different. A very different picture from Donald Trump tonight.
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes. They couldn't be more different. You heard it last night. But Erin, we're seeing it today, the difference in these events that Joe Biden and President Trump are holding. And so that's the question that ultimately pans out here, because what the President was saying last night, mocking Joe Biden for saying that we're going to have a dark winter ahead, something that medical experts have said as well, the President repeated that here today.
And let me remind people, this is what this rally would have looked like, Erin, if they had held it a year ago before there was a pandemic, before anyone knew what coronavirus was. Because it's not just mask wearing, which is what we talked about so often with the President's rallies and we saw few and far between here today, but also the social distancing.
There is no social distancing here. And this is a retirement community, a massive one. And everyone is seated next to each other. And yes, we are outdoors, which medical experts say helps. But we saw how that played with the Rose Garden event and how it can still spread, even if you're outdoors, if no one is wearing a mask and they think they're protected when they're not and they're certainly not social distancing.
And so the President was here, Erin, to try to shore up his support with seniors, something that he has been hurting with. And of course, it's what helped him carry him to the White House in 2016. And of course, he's got these people who attended this rally wearing Trump shirts on his side.
But the question is what about those vulnerable seniors who are worried about COVID, who are worried about what's going to happen? Did the President win any votes over by holding rallies like that? That's the big question for the Trump campaign that they're going to find out in about 11 days.
BURNETT: Absolutely a crucial question, because they need those votes to win. Thank you, Kaitlan.
And just to be clear, here is where things stand in this country right now. More than 223,000 Americans are dead, 32 states tonight showing upward trends in new cases, only one state in the entire country is on a downward swing.
The daily case count in the United States topping 70,000 and we don't even have today's numbers, so I'll give you yesterday's. The count then was the fourth highest day of cases overall since the pandemic began. Today, we are already over 65,000, so we're on track for another near record.
Twelve states seeing their highest seven-day averages for new daily cases yesterday. The seven-day average of deaths continues to climb. Now, it's 763 which is the highest level of average weekly deaths in a month, hospitalizations also on the rise, 41,010 Americans reported hospitalized with COVID on Thursday.
OUTFRONT now, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. And Dr. Fauci, I appreciate your time. We look at these numbers and they're sobering. And there's been this chart out there that has been deeply concerning comparing the U.S. to Europe. And you know this well, I'll put it up for everyone to see. Europe a
couple weeks ahead of the U.S. at the beginning, we saw the surge and then there and then here. The numbers there came down then significantly, but that never really happened here.
We always were at a much higher plateau. Now in Europe a super spike in cases, well ahead of what we're seeing here in the United States. Are you concerned that we could be about to follow suit with a massive spike?
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: Yes. Erin, I am concerned about that. And the reason I'm concerned is the numbers that you gave our baseline is really quite high. If we hang around 50,000, 60,000, 70,000 and we're there, that's the reflection of community spread.
And then as you look at the map of the country, you see more than 30 states are having upticks in test positivity, which is a pretty good predictor that you're going to have a surge in cases which will lead to surge in hospitalizations. The reason I'm particularly concerned, as we get deeper into the cooler months of the fall and the cold months of the winter, that activities out of necessity are going to have to be done indoors and that's going to be a problem.
So that's the reason why I say we really need to double down on the kind of public health measures that we've been talking about so long. And I don't mean shutting down the country, Erin, because whenever I talk about amplifying and just stressing the public health measures, people think that that means we're going to shut down. It doesn't mean that. It means there are some fundamental things that you can do.
[19:10:01]
Universal mask wearing, keeping a distance, avoiding congregate and crowded sections, particularly indoors and wash your hands as often as you possibly can. They sound very simple, but we're not uniformly doing that and that's one of the reasons why we're seeing these surges.
We can control them without shutting down the country. And we've got to pay particular attention now, particularly these congregate settings indoor more than outdoor that we will lose control over it if we don't do that. So that's the reason why as much as I can essentially plead with the American public to please take these things seriously. We can turn it around.
BURNETT: There is a new study, Dr. Fauci, from Columbia University. And it had a big range but a horrifying range, 130,000 to 210,000 Americans would be alive if we had had a stronger response to the virus. Up to 94 percent of the people who have died in this country could still be alive if we had done some of the things you just mentioned, national mask mandates. They also cite the insufficient testing response early on and delayed overall response, some of the reasons that they think these deaths could have been prevented.
Like I said, it is a stunning study to read. Do you think that that many lives could have been saved by those simple but fundamental things?
FAUCI: Erin, I don't want to put a number on it, because that's a model study. But I feel quite confident that if we had uniformly done the things that I was talking about just a moment ago, that certainly considerable number of lives could have been saved. Remember back when we were having the daily press conferences at the White House and I was saying when we were talking about opening up the economy and opening up the country again, we had the gateway, the phase one, the phase two, the phase three.
And I emphasize that it's not going to be an all-or-none phenomenon. It's not like turning a light switch on or off. It can't be that you can go from being relatively locked down to just opening up and just not worrying about anything. You've got to do it in a graded fashion.
And a graded fashion means you abide by the guidelines, but you do it with some fundamental common denominators. And that's what I refer those five things to, they're almost like minimal common denominators that we've got to do. I mean, you got to it across the board.
We can't be having some not doing it all and others adhering to it. Otherwise, you're right, lives likely could have been saved if we had done it that way but it's not too late.
BURNETT: Yes.
FAUCI: I mean, that's the point I want to make. I don't like we throw up our hands and say, well, this was terrible.
BURNETT: Yes.
FAUCI: We can turn it around, we can.
BURNETT: So we can by doing those things. What you're talking about though some of your concern about what we're seeing in Europe and whether that could happen here is obviously inconsistent with what the President is saying. I don't need to tell you that. But he did just speak moments ago at a rally and here's what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We're going to quickly end this pandemic, this horrible plague came in from China. You look at what's going on and we're rounding the turn. We're rounding the corner. We're rounding the corner beautifully.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: Dr. Fauci, do you agree?
FAUCI: Well, if you look at the numbers, Erin, it tells us that that we really are facing a very challenging situation. And if we don't do something in the sense of paying stricter attention to the kinds of public health mitigation issues that we were talking about, it's not going to spontaneously turn around. So the good news on the horizon is that vaccines look promising and hopefully by the time we get to the end of November, the beginning of December, we will have shown that we have at least one or two and maybe more but at least two vaccines that are safe and effective. That's going to be an important issue.
But from the public health standpoint, if you look at the numbers of the daily infections, the upticks on the map of more than 30 states that are having upticks, it's not going to spontaneously turn around unless we do something about it. We don't want to throw our hands up and give up, that's ridiculous to do that. But on the other hand, we don't want to just say that nothing can happen.
We have control of this. We can do things that could turn that around.
BURNETT: So I understand you don't want to wade into politics, but masks are not political. They shouldn't be political. And we see the President in these rallies and people don't wear masks.
And Joe Biden does have a really different plan and today he talked about it and he specifically talked about making mask wearing mandatory. Here's how he put it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BIDEN: First, I'll go to every governor and urge them to mandate mask wearing in their states and if they refuse, I'll go to the mayors and county executives and get local masking requirements in place nationwide.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[19:15:10]
BURNETT: He also wants to make masks mandatory in federal buildings, interstate transportation. Do you think this is a good idea? Is this what a President of the United States would be helpful if they were doing fighting for mask mandates?
FAUCI: Well, one of the issues that people that talk about mandating not be a good idea, because then they'll say they have to enforce it and there's going to be a difficulty enforcing it. But if everyone agrees that this is something that's important and they mandated it and everybody pulls together and say, we're going to mandate it, but let's just do it. I think that would be a great idea to have everybody do it uniformly.
One of the issues though, I get the argument, say, well, if you mandate a mask, then you're going to have to enforce it and that'll create more of a problem. Well, if people are not wearing masks, then maybe we should be mandating it.
BURNETT: So in other words - but it sounds like what you're saying is sort of the power of the comments, that you're gonna have some people who don't wear them, you only need to have a certain amount and the mandate could get you there.
FAUCI: Right.
BURNETT: Even if you don't have enforcement, right?
FAUCI: Right. Right, exactly.
BURNETT: OK. So you mentioned vaccine and I know you spend a lot of time on that, and you also spend a lot of time on therapies, a considerable amount of time. And the President did just speak about that as well and his own experience recovering from the virus in the debate last night, let me just play it again.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I can tell you from personal experience that I was in the hospital, I had it and I got better. And I will tell you that had something that they gave me, a therapeutic, I guess they would call it. Some people could say was a cure.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: OK. Cure is a really big word and it's a word that all of us cling on to when we hear it. I know, you've talked about that antibody cocktail that he received as possibly being extremely effective in his case. Would you call that though a cure?
FAUCI: It's semantics, Erin, it really is. I mean, when you talk about a cure, you're talking about something that if you don't intervene, it's not going to get better by itself. Many of these cases spontaneously recover without any intervention. So when we intervene and the person gets better, I would rather say it hastened or improved greatly their recovery, because cure means that, for example, you have cancer, and you give someone chemotherapy, they're cured. If you didn't give them chemotherapy, they would have died.
But when you have a situation where someone might ultimately get better anyway, the semantics of saying cure is just that means different things to different people. I would rather say these therapies are highly effective. If they are, I hope they will be, in essentially making someone improved much, much more rapidly than they normally would.
BURNETT: And is that how you - is right now the antibody cocktail sort of the most promising thing that you are seeing out there or are there things in the wings that we're not even yet aware of?
FAUCI: Well, the antibody cocktail is really directed specifically against the virus itself. So that's something you would want to give more early in the course of infection. We have some good therapies that are for people who have advanced disease. What we really need to do much more of is get therapies to prevent people from getting into the hospital, as opposed to when they're in hospital and very ill to help them to get out of the hospital so that's where we're focusing.
Monoclonal antibodies, Erin, are quite promising. The monoclonal antibody that the President received is quite promising. We're in the process right now of doing clinical trials for that antibody in anybody from other companies to show that they are safe and effective. Myself, I'm cautiously optimistic that they are going to be an
important tool in our armamentarium of treatment. We were very successful with those type of antibodies with Ebola and it made a big difference in Ebola. I would hope and I think it might make a big difference here.
BURNETT: One final question, Dr. Fauci, the President again last night called you a Democrat to disparage you and it's not the first time. He's been saying it a lot lately, like here.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I think he's a Democrat, but that's OK.
He's a Democrat. He's actually a very good friend of the Cuomo family.
He's a Democrat. Everybody knows that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: You made it clear obviously, you're not registered to either party. And as I've said on the show, it's irrelevant what you are. It's not relevant to what you do. But he keeps saying this to disparage you to kind of bring your reputation down among people to whom that would seem to be a negative. Do you think he's trying to get you to quit?
FAUCI: I don't think so, Erin. I don't pay attention to that kind of thing. And I have the ability that I had for a long time to just focus like a laser on what I need to do.
[19:20:06]
And my job through vaccines, through therapies and by public health measures is to safeguard the health, the safety and the welfare of the American public. That's all I concentrate on.
These are the kinds of things, though people may find it difficult to believe, are mere distractions. They don't bother me. I know what my job is and I've got to do it and I'm going to do it. So that kind of whatever you want to call it is to me, it's noise.
BURNETT: Well, we all really appreciate, this whole country appreciate your laser focus on trying to do those things and protect the American people. And I thank you for your time tonight, Dr. Fauci.
FAUCI: Good to be with you, Erin. Thank you for having me.
BURNETT: And next debate fallout. Trump giving himself props, Biden cleaning up comments about fracking, who has the edge right now? Plus this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: So I'd like to terminate Obamacare, come up with a brand new beautiful health care. (END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: More than four years later though, there is still no plan. Where is it?
And red state warning, the season's campaign watcher says Republicans have reason to worry. Perhaps even in states like Kansas and Alaska. He's OUTFRONT with his election predictions.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:25:01]
BURNETT: New tonight, dueling victory laps. Joe Biden and President Trump both claiming they came out ahead in last night's debate and that their opponent did more harm than good with Election Day 11 days away.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BIDEN: Last night, we saw the President of the United States lied to the American people and repeatedly lie.
TRUMP: I think Joe Biden proved last night that he's not capable of being President of the United States.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: Trump also saying that he sees no need for another debate because he is ahead in the race. Of course, this was the last debate, but one obviously had been canceled.
A CNN poll of debate watchers found the Biden won the debate by a 14 percentage point margin. OUTFRONT now the host of CNN SMERCONISH, Michael Smerconish, and National Political Reporter for Politico, Laura Barron-Lopez. Thanks to both.
Michael, let me start with you, 11 days and the current news cycle is an eternity. You have though been talking to voters, is Trump's confidence merited?
MICHAEL SMERCONISH, CNN HOST, SMERCONISH: I think that there were no fatal mistakes made in the debate last night. I think that the President had a good night and I think that the Vice President, former Vice President had a good enough night.
And by that what I mean, Erin, is that as I told you going into the debate, I thought that Vice President Biden simply needed to do no harm, commit no gaffes, come out of it as he went in. It's President Trump who needs a momentum shift according to all of the data. Did he get a momentum shift last night? I don't think that he got what he needed.
Now he's hoping to build on live events like you have been covering today at The Villages. He'll do three live events in three different states tomorrow and hope that he can create the perception of a momentum shift.
BURNETT: Right. Right. And, of course, these images, this crowded crowds is what he wants to do just that.
Laura, you're in Arizona right now, which I want to point out is a state that has not voted Democratic for president in a quarter century. Biden though is fighting hard to flip it, so what are you hearing from the voters you're talking to?
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes. Arizona is a very much feels like a toss up right now. People that I've talked to in the last day or so have said that they wouldn't be surprised if Trump wins it by a percentage point or if Biden were to win it by two percentage point.
But what it comes down to in Arizona is Maricopa County, which is where I am and that this county accounts for 60 percent of the electorate in the state. And so what's key here are the suburbs, which are predominantly white and they could swing Biden's way the way they went for Senator Kyrsten Sinema in 2018. She was the first Democrat to win statewide in decades.
And so Biden really needs to turn up voters in the suburbs. He also needs to get about 70 percent of the Latino electorate. And from what I'm hearing, Latinos are energised. But again, it's all about how many of them are going to turn out. Is the pandemic going to affect that which some of the Latino Democrats I've been speaking to on the ground think that, they're a little bit wary of the fact that even though Arizona is very familiar with voting by mail, that the pandemic could impact some of that turnout.
BURNETT: So Michael, the Biden campaign today is trying to clean up the exchange that Biden had with Trump on fracking. Let me just play it again for you.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Biden to respond.
BIDEN: I never said I oppose fracking.
TRUMP: You said it on tape.
BIDEN: I did - show the tape, put it on your website.
TRUMP: I'll put it on.
BIDEN: Put it on the website. The fact of the matter is he's flat lying.
TRUMP: He was against fracking. He said it.
BIDEN: Fracking on federal land, I said, no fracking and/or oil on federal land.
(END VIDEO CLIP) BURNETT: OK. Well, Trump's team was quick to pull up Biden had said in
the past. Here it is.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Would there be any place for fossil fuels, including coal and fracking in a Biden administration?
BIDEN: No. We would work it out. We would make sure it's eliminated and no more subsidies for either one of those, either - any fossil fuel.
No more. No new fracking.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: Now, Michael, obviously, you're from Pennsylvania. You're not just there tonight, you're from there. You know the state so well. People who are employed in fracking and their families in Pennsylvania total more than Trump's margin of victory in the state in 2016. So it may be a big, big issue. I mean, do you get that sense that this issue impacts votes?
SMERCONISH: I do. I think it's very big and very big, in particular for high school educated white males who provided the base of support for that upset victory that the President scored by just a razor thin margin in the Commonwealth four years ago. So it was an unforced error. It was something that the former vice president knew or should have known was going to come up and I think that he didn't speak clearly in the debate and yes we'll pay price for it.
BURNETT: Laura, the suburbs in Arizona where you are, what's the top issue you're hearing?
[19:30:05]
LOPEZ: A lot of it has to do with the coronavirus. Part of the reason that President Trump in Arizona has started to see slippage with college educated white voters, with seniors in the suburbs is because of the pandemic.
And over the summer, that really hurt him when there was a spike in cases. We're starting to see increases again in states like Arizona. And so, the president's inability to really shift the conversation away from the pandemic has hurt him in places like the Maricopa suburbs.
BURNETT: Thank you both, Laura, Michael, I appreciate it.
And next, this Trump claim --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I'm the least racist person. (END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: The former chairman of the RNC, Michael Steele, is OUTFRONT, next on that point.
And next, a campaign observer says he's seeing something very interesting in the red states and very important. We'll tell you what it is. Larry Sabato is here with his maps and predictions.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:35:02]
BURNETT: Tonight, where is the president's health care plan? President Trump in the debate insisting that he will have a plan to replace Obamacare.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: What I would like to do is a much better health care, much better. It will always protect people with preexisting. So I would like to terminate Obamacare, come up with a brand new, beautiful health care.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: However, this is something that we have been hearing from President Trump since his 2016 campaign.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: We're going to repeal and replace Obamacare so quickly.
Our health care plan is really going to be something excellent.
We're coming out with tremendous health care plans.
We're going to have fantastic health care, and the plan is coming out over the next four weeks.
Obamacare is a disaster. We want to terminate it. We want to get great health care.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: Just to be clear, that four-week plan he said was on May 20, 2019, which was 74 weeks ago, just to do the math.
OUTFRONT now, Hogan Gidley, national press secretary for the Donald Trump campaign.
Hogan, he has described it over the past four years in various sound bites you heard there as excellent, tremendous, fantastic, beautiful, and great. Where is it?
HOGAN GIDLEY, NATIONAL PRESS SECRETARY FOR THE TRUMP CAMPAIGN: The very fact that we're having a conversation at all about health care in this election in 2020 proves that Obamacare has been a complete and total failure. You remember the lies we were told by Joe Biden, that if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. If you like your health care plan, you can keep your health care plan.
All of that was completely untrue. And the American people saw skyrocketing premiums by hundreds of percentage points in various states. Tens of millions lost their health care.
The president came into office and had to act and had to act quickly. He got rid of the individual mandate right off the top, the most unpopular part of Obamacare that really hurt middle income Americans and lower income Americans. He made sure to declare that we will protect preexisting conditions, signing an executive order saying that that is the policy of this country.
Also very important --
(CROSSTALK)
BURNETT: So, Hogan, the preexisting conditions were the core of Obamacare, in part financed by the individual mandate.
GIDLEY: Right.
BURNETT: But I -- I just want to get, the reason we're talking about health care right now is because the president has repeatedly said he's going to put this plan out. And now we're 11 weeks away from the election and he has not done so. Why not? I want to understand, why not? Where is the plan?
GIDLEY: But you have already seen so many pieces of what he wants to do. That's the whole point. The American people needed relief from Obamacare. It was crippling the nation. I mean, the costs were outrageous.
Already, we've seen a reduction in drug prices because this president made sure that generics got on the market faster. We saw re- importation from other countries for prescription prices. That brought down prices.
We've seen EpiPens go from hundreds of dollars down to $35 a month for Medicare recipients. And thankfully, because of President Trump's leadership, I'm happy to report --
BURNETT: Yeah.
GIDLEY: -- CMS data shows that for three years, for the first time of history of Obamacare, three consecutive years, we've seen a reduction in premiums and Medicare for seniors. The costs have come down for three years in a row.
So you're seeing pieces of the plan already. He couldn't wait on Congress and he couldn't wait on the courts.
(CROSSTALK) BURNETT: OK, look, costs going down is a good thing where they have. But, right, OK, the courts -- President Trump says he wants the Supreme Court to end Obamacare, right? That's -- he's been very clear about that. Now, according to an analysis by the HHS in 2017 in this administration, if Trump is successful, as many as 133 million nonelderly Americans have preexisting conditions that could disqualify them from getting health care.
That is a stunning number.
GIDLEY: It is.
BURNETT: So what happens to those people? Because we don't have a plan to show what he would do.
GIDLEY: Well, a couple of things. As I said, he already signed an executive order saying that protecting preexisting conditions is the policy of this country. In the CARES Act, already, we have billions set aside for testing and treatment for coronavirus. That's a preexisting condition right there. He'll protect them.
Let's be clear, thought, what we saw last night on that debate stage -- it was Joe Biden who said he wants to add in the public option. That would kick off 180 million people right out of their own private health care plans.
BURNETT: Yeah.
GIDLEY: It would potentially close 1,000 rural hospitals that people in those remote areas need. And you know it's one step away from universal takeover of healthcare --
BURNETT: Yes, so, Hogan, the thing is though --
GIDLEY: -- because Barack Obama, Kamala Harris and Pete Buttigieg all said that's what it would take to get to that takeover of the healthcare system.
BURNETT: Protecting preexisting conditions, right, it costs money, it's crucial, people want it. But it does cost money, part of the reason there was an individual mandate.
One -- our Phil Mattingly asked a Republican senator about a comprehensive health care plan from the president, you know, sort of where is it? It's easy to say you support preexisting conditions but difficult to do it. The senator said, a Republican senator of teh president's plan, quote, it's B.S.
[19:40:03]
What do you say to that? That's from your own party.
GIDLEY: I don't know what -- I don't know what senator that is, but look, it was this president -- one of the reasons I came to work from Donald Trump is when I used to work for Mike Huckabee, he and Donald Trump had the same position here. Social Security and Medicare should be protected at all costs.
Just because -- you know, you paid into this, you should get the benefits from it. Just because the government misspends that money, it shouldn't punish the American people. This president is the only one who is pulling other Republicans along to say we are going to protect Social Security, we are going to protect Medicare.
BURNETT: OK.
GIDLEY: It was Joe Biden just a few years ago from the Senate floor saying multiple times that he has tried repeatedly to stop funding into Social Security and Medicare. And the claims that Donald Trump is going to end Social Security, for example, have been fact checked false many times by independent fact checkers.
BURNETT: All right. Hogan, I appreciate it -- I appreciate your time. Thank you very much.
Obviously I was talking about health care there. I want to bring in Michael Steele now, former chair of the Republican National Committee.
I want to be clear, Michael, you do support Joe Biden for president.
MICHAEL STEELE, FORMER CHAIRMAN, REPUBLICAN NATIONAL COMMITTEE: Yeah.
BURNETT: So, when you hear this conversation, right, it comes in the context of people care, and they care in the context of coronavirus, and they care in the context of their lives. Ninety-one percent of respondents say health care is important to their vote. And yet, I don't blame Hogan Gidley, it's not his job to put a plan out, it's his job to explain why the president hasn't. He doesn't have an explanation why we're 74 weeks past the president's due date.
Will the president actually pay a political price for not being a plan or not?
STEELE: I think he'll pay less of a price because there is no plan and more of a price because health care and all these other elements are tied into COVID-19. COVID-19, the president's handling and management of that, his rhetoric around it, his on again, off again love affair with Dr. Fauci, the misguided information, the disinformation, all of that is far more troubling at this stage of this campaign for a lot of voters than whether or not the president has a plan.
Now, what reinforces that concern is the point that you made and the discussion you just had with my buddy, Hogan, and that is, okay, since you are going after Obamacare after Republicans have been pronouncing repeal and replace for now ten years, and you don't apparently have a plan, but you are also now taking out preexisting conditions in the Supreme Court, what am I going to do? You asked the right question when you said 130 million Americans could suddenly find themselves in a very different world of hurt beginning January of next year.
So, all of that is baked in now for a lot of voters on the health care issue. Even though this is not a policy-driven election, this is -- this is something that sticks in the draw because we're dealing with COVID.
BURNETT: So, the president was asked at last night's debate whether his rhetoric is contributing to hate and division that we have seen in this country, and I wanted to just play specifically how he responded.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I am the least racist person, I can't even see the audience because it's so dark, but I don't care who is in the audience, I'm the least racist person in this room.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: People, you know, all day have been clicking on that story trying to understand what he's saying there. What's your reaction to that?
STEELE: Well, my momma raised me, if you got to tell me something like that, then maybe you're protesting a little bit too much. Maybe you're trying to convince me of something that you know is not true. And I think that a lot of Americans, again, I can only go by what you say. I can only go by how you connect or don't connect. I can only go by what you do.
So when you factor in all of these elements for a lot of Americans, going back to his, you know, how he would discriminate in housing, how he would, you know, employ African-Americans at his casinos. How he approached the Central Park Five. Then we get into his time as president.
So the record clearly says one thing. The rhetoric says something else, which I think a lot of Americans discount at this point.
BURNETT: All right. Rhetoric versus reality often not the same thing.
STEELE: Yeah.
BURNETT: Michael Steele, thank you very much. I appreciate your time.
STEELE: It always bites.
BURNETT: Yeah.
And next, the stakes in Florida, they could not be higher. Is there a path to victory for president Trump without winning Florida? I'm going to ask a man who knows the map better than anyone.
And the Trump campaign not just watching voters cast ballots, it is videotaping them. Is this okay or illegal voter intimidation?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:49:19]
BURNETT: Moments from now, President Trump kicking off his rally in Pensacola, Florida. His second rally in Florida today. So, is there any way he can win the White House without the state?
OUTFRONT now, Larry Sabato, the founder and director for the University of Virginia Center of Politics.
So, Larry, great to have you back tonight.
So, Florida, you know, we always hear it's must win. President today, two stops, West Palm Beach casting his early vote tomorrow. You say it's a toss-up, but Trump cannot win the White House without Florida.
So if the election were held tonight, do you think he would win it?
LARRY SABATO, FOUNDER AND DIRECTOR, UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA CENTER OF POLITICS: I think it would be very close. And remember, the polling average at least, and we remember polls from 2016, but the polling average had Biden up a little.
[19:50:01]
It's well within a margin of error.
Look, that's 29 electoral votes. It's a packet of electoral votes, a third to Texas and California. If Trump loses that, it is a very bad sign about what's happening. After all, he's now a registered voter in Florida, he could technically win without it, he would have to win everything he won except for Florida and 2016 of a straight electoral vote or Maine or something like that. He can do it but very difficult.
BURNETT: And one of the group that's going to determine it for him are seniors, right? He went to the largest retirement community in the country, The Villages, we saw it, very few masks, no social distancing. Right now, a trademark Trump rally among those who, of course, are among those vulnerable to the coronavirus. But he's there and he's betting that this is going to work.
How is this playing with seniors in Florida? I mean, are you seeing them as equally split or is that is a group that has turn towards Biden?
SABATO: It depends on the state. In Florida, it's a little bit toward Biden. But remember, even a split, even a 50/50 split among seniors means Trump loses. He needed to carry seniors by substantial majority, and he did 52-46 in 2016. They have moved away from him in part because of COVID.
So, that's a bad sign for him. He's compensating some what with certain categories of Hispanic supporters.
BURNETT: OK. So, I want to ask you about this, control is at stake this year and you are watching a lot of races carefully. On your map, Larry and your current calculation, you have been looking at some traditionally Republican states. On that list, Alaska, Kansas, Georgia, South Carolina, Texas, reliably Republicans, and you are seeing some warning signs there.
What and why?
SABATO: The key is, Erin, Democrats recruited a very good class of Senate challengers. And they are competing in places where arguably they should not have much of a chance of winning, but they do.
One of the factors is that Trump is not carrying these deeply red states by the 15 percent or 20 percent that he won the last time. He's winning in these states but 7 percent or 8 percent or 10 percent. And so, these candidates can climb that hill. It is not climbing Mount Everest.
BURNETT: So, basically, all right, let's take Kansas, Alaska, and South Carolina, where you've been looking.
Biden is trailing Trump as you point out in the polls there, but not as much as Hillary Clinton was in 2016. So, let's take Kansas because you point out the seven margins. Seven points there, Trump is ahead in the latest polls.
Hillary Clinton was 20 percentage behind Trump in Kansas last time around. That's the difference you're talking about, right?
SABATO: Absolutely, that's an avalanche of votes. And it's really difficult for somebody down ballot to pull enough vote on the other side to win. But 7 percent is manageable, especially when you have a strong candidate, and Democrats have that in Barbara Bollier there.
BURNETT: All right. Larry, thank you very much. We're going to be talking to you over these next few days here, focusing on what he's focusing and what will likely happen.
And next, the Trump campaign under fire for videotaping voters. Is it allowed or is it voter intimidation?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:56:51]
BURNETT: Tonight, accusations of illegal voter intimidation as the Trump campaign videotaped voters placing ballots at drop boxes in Philadelphia.
Pamela Brown is OUTFRONT.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
PAMELA BROWN, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): With the election just 11 days away, new concerns about possible voter intimidation after the Trump campaign filmed voters at a Philadelphia polling station, the campaign claims that found at least three people dropping off more than one ballot each. What Trump's attorney believes it is the tip of the iceberg and what could constitute unlawful absentee voting.
The voters are allowed to drop ballots for people who are disabled, and state officials warned the video might be interpreted as intimidation.
KATHY BOOCKVAR, PENNSYLVANIA SECRETARY OF STATE: Voter intimidation is only go under state and federal law, videotaping you, taking pictures is -- without consent is apart of that.
BROWN: Which the Trump campaign calls categorically absurd.
On election interference, intelligence officials confirmed Russian hackers have stolen election data, but it is unclear how the information will be used.
Officials say Iran used voter information to send threatening e-mails that came to light this week.
JOHN RATCLIFFE, DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: Iran and Russia have taken specific actions to influence public opinion relating to our elections.
BROWN: The federal government issued two new cybersecurity alerts. Warning that state and local governments were targeted, but officials say election infrastructure had not been compromised. The intelligence community general agrees that Russians interfered four years ago to help Trump win. Despite that President Trump slammed the assessment again at last night's debate.
TRUMP: They both want you to lose because there is nobody tougher to Russia, with -- between the sanctions. Nobody is tougher than me on Russia.
BROWN: Intelligence experts agree stopping Russia should be the priority.
JAMES CLAPPER, FORMER DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE: Russia has been interfering of the run up of our election already, and for my part at least is a far more serious threat than Iran.
BROWN: More than 50 million Americans have already turned in their ballots.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Well, I've already get it done and over with, and do it early, the way I know I voted.
BROWN: More than half of those votes came from CNN's 16 most competitive states, and one of the fiercest battlegrounds, North Carolina, over 2.5 million ballots have been cast. That's more than half of the total turnout in 2016.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BROWN: And, Erin, we are learning of the first 2020 election ransomware attack. It happened in Georgia. And in Georgia County, officials there said the hack affected a voter signature database and precinct maps. Experts did not believe it affected the election infrastructure that it was more of profits than politics. But these ransomware attacks are concerning to security experts as we get closer to election day because they can cause confusion and chaos -- Erin. BURNETT: Certainly, that is the case, no lies on that.
Pam, thank you very much.
And thanks very much all of you for joining us. Have a good weekend, safe weekend. And don't forget, you can watch OUTFRONT anytime anywhere, you just have to go to CNNgo.com.
"AC360" with Anderson starts now.
