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Coronavirus Hits Record Highs In Most Populated States; New Poll: Trump Trails Badly In Battleground; Cities Coping With Spike In Violence And Animosity For Police. Aired 5:30-6a ET
Aired June 25, 2020 - 05:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[05:30:00]
COY WIRE, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Pro athletes pulling out of competitions as more athletes test positive, Christine. How are teams at least going to respond and what, if any, pressure will other athletes feel? Something to keep an eye on in the coming days.
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: Just a reminder we're still right in the middle of this. I mean, we're -- in Washington, they're trying to project normalcy but all of these athletic organizations know you have to be careful. You could have 50,000 people flying into New York City in November. Sounds pretty wise to me.
All right, Coy, nice to see you.
WIRE: You, too.
ROMANS: EARLY START continues right now.
Almost back at the peak. Record coronavirus spikes in the most populated states. Scientists say wearing masks will save tens of thousands of lives. Some governors reject that.
LAURA JARRETT, CNN ANCHOR: And new poll numbers out just moments ago show the president struggling badly in key states as voters reject his handling of the twin crises dominating this election year.
Good morning, this is EARLY START. I'm Laura Jarrett.
ROMANS: Good morning, everybody. Thirty minutes past the hour. I'm Christine Romans this Thursday morning.
And this morning, record increases in new Covid-19 cases in the country's three most populous states. California, Texas, Florida all setting single-day records. More than a quarter of the U.S. population, about 90 million people, live in just those three states.
Yesterday, the U.S. reported its fourth-highest number of new cases since this pandemic began. Tuesday was the third-highest. We haven't seen numbers like this since April.
JARRETT: Yes, Christine, an alarming spike in California -- more than 7,000 cases in a day. The governor says counties that don't enforce health restrictions risk
their funding from the state.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. GAVIN NEWSOM (D), CALIFORNIA: If you're unwilling to keep people safe and keep people healthy then, by all means, the state of California has a responsibility -- an obligation, legally and otherwise, to enforce those laws and to utilize the tools that are afforded us. And one of those tools is the power of the purse.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
JARRETT: Meanwhile in Texas, new cases and hospitalizations are climbing at their fastest rate ever. Houston says 97 percent of its ICU beds are now full. And the state is scaling back parts of its reopening plan.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MAYOR STEVE ADLER (D), AUSTIN, TEXAS: If we continue on the same trajectory that we're on right now, our hospitals, we think, are going to get overwhelmed by mid-July.
DR. PETER HOTEZ, DEAN, NATIONAL SCHOOL OF TROPICAL MEDICINE: So I think metro areas seem to be rising very quickly and some of the models are on the verge of being apocalyptic.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROMANS: In Florida, the percentage of positive Covid tests hit an astonishing 20 percent, a real sign of spread. Still, Gov. Ron DeSantis doubled down on his decision not to require masks statewide.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. RON DESANTIS (R), FLORIDA: There's an enforcement that has to follow in that and we have a lot of places in Florida where that would not be a good use of resources. Ultimately, we've got to trust people to make good decisions.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROMANS: Both of his home state senators disagree.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. RICK SCOTT (R-FL): You've got to wear a mask, you've got to social distance, you've got to get more information out. I hope everybody takes it seriously because we haven't beaten this.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROMANS: And, Sen. Marco Rubio put it even more bluntly. Quote, "Everyone should wear a damn mask." A prominent model used by the White House now projects almost 180,000 deaths by October. Think of that -- 180,000 deaths by October. But, 30,000 lives would be saved if most Americans wore a mask. Nevada and North Carolina have now joined the list of states requiring masks in public.
JARRETT: And despite the uptick in Florida, neither Orange County nor Disney are revisiting plans to reopen Disney World. A phased reopening is set to begin on July 11th there.
In the other Orange County, Disney is delaying its phased reopening of Disneyland in Southern California. It had been set to welcome guests back starting on July 17th but they now don't have a date for taking it -- reopening.
In the absence of a national plan, though, states are taking bold action on their own to keep the virus from returning. New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut are now requiring people from eight spiking states in the south and the west to self-quarantine for 14 days upon arriving. Each state will handle its own enforcement mechanisms.
These states have been through the worst of it and have seen cases dramatically reduce -- and the governors, they want to keep it that way.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOV. ANDREW CUOMO (D), NEW YORK: It's only for the simple reason that we worked very hard to get the viral transmission rate down. We don't want to see it go up because a lot of people come into this region and they could literally bring the infection with them.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROMANS: One person who won't adhere to New Jersey's mandate is President Trump. He plans to visit his Bedminster golf club this weekend.
The White House says anyone that's close to him -- in close proximity to the president -- those people are tested for Covid-19 and they have to be confirmed to be negative to be in his presence.
[05:35:01]
The president just returned from Arizona, one of the hotspots on New Jersey's quarantine list.
JARRETT: A new report lays out how schools might reopen safely. The study by Harvard School of Public Health suggests increasing ventilation, adding touchless technology, and changing class schedules so students' arrival and departure times are staggered.
The study's authors say it's actually worse to keep schools closed than to open them safely, considering the risks that students face being kept at home. They say kids cooped up at home are more sedentary, they have less access to school meals, and may face mental health problems from all of the social isolation.
ROMANS: I think there's so many big questions to be answered, right, about that. And I'm so glad the teachers have been so innovative here.
But you can't get people back to work, Laura, until you get schools opened as well because some people are not going to be able to go back to work if they don't have childcare for their -- for their kids.
JARRETT: That's exactly right. It affects the economy because what are you going to do --
ROMANS: Right.
JARRETT: -- if you kids are still stuck on Zoom calls?
ROMANS: Right, exactly. Multiple Zoom calls, right?
All right, 35 minutes past the hour.
A toxic mix in big cities right now. A big spike in violence and growing animosity toward police. How can both epidemics be addressed?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[05:40:46]
ROMANS: All right, 40 minutes past the hour.
President Trump heads to Wisconsin today for a town hall on Fox and a shipyard tour.
New numbers out this morning show he has a steep hill to climb in big battleground states. This "New York Times" poll, out moments ago, shows Joe Biden with big leagues -- leads, rather, in most of the states critical to him in November.
Biden has built on his lead in all of these states compared to late last year. He's now strongly ahead in Arizona, Florida, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
JARRETT: A Quinnipiac poll released just yesterday shows Ohio voters evenly split. Note that Republican Gov. Mike DeWine is 30 points ahead of President Trump in his job approval rating.
The president's poll numbers have suffered badly since peaceful protesters were forcibly cleared so he could hold up a Bible for a photo op in front of a church near the White House.
A number of top Republicans tell CNN that the president needs to change course, and quickly, even though they freely admit he's not likely to take that advice.
Senate Majority Whip John Thune says, quote, "All of the people who are going to decide in November are the people in the middle, and I think that they want the president at a time like this to strike a more empathetic tone." ROMANS: All right, 14 weeks of layoffs or furloughs and unemployment claims are still expected to be in the millions. Another 1.34 million Americans are expected to file for first-time unemployment benefits last week. More than 45 million workers have filed for benefits since mid-March. These numbers are huge and unprecedented.
First-time claims have been declining since the peak in the final week of March but we're still seeing these numbers, every week, in the millions.
And a dire forecast from the International Monetary Fund. The IMF now expects global GDP to contract by nearly five percent this year. The U.S. economy is expected to shrink by eight percent. The IMF says the global labor market has taken a catastrophic hit.
But the group warned of a higher than usual degree of uncertainty around its forecast because of the difficulty of charting the trajectory of the virus and the measures to contain it, as well as the impact of voluntary social distancing on spending, consequences of new workplace safety measures, and lingering unemployment.
JARRETT: All right.
Well, with more people at home, some U.S. cities saw significant drops in crime during the first month of the pandemic shutdown. But now, cities across the country are seeing some spikes in violence, combined with a growing animosity toward police. One police commissioner believes a storm is coming.
So is there a plan to turn things around? Well, Brynn Gingras reports.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRYNN GINGRAS, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In many major cities across the country, gun violence is on the rise.
In a Chicago suburb, a 13-year-old girl hit by bullets while watching T.V. The gunfire outside her window among more than 100 shootings in the Windy City last weekend.
In Minneapolis --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I saw people just shooting, just 30, 40, 50 shots.
GINGRAS (voice-over): -- officials say more than 100 people have been shot in the last month since the death of George Floyd.
And in New York City, NYPD crime data shows the number of shooting victims is up 414 percent last week compared to the same time period last year. Chief of Department Terence Monahan calls it troubling.
TERENCE MONAHAN, CHIEF OF DEPARTMENT, NEW YORK POLICE DEPARTMENT: It goes back to 1996 that we haven't seen this level of violence.
GINGRAS (voice-over): Researchers with the Council on Criminal Justice looked at homicide rates across 64 cities this year compared to the previous three years.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If you see significant sudden changes in crime trends across the country, you need to look at some type of national shock to the system. Sort of broader, underlying structural trends are not going to explain it.
GINGRAS (voice-over): As part of their study released this morning, the authors cite two major trends, the coronavirus pandemic and the aftermath of Floyd's death. Historically, incidents like the police- involved killing of Michael Brown, in Ferguson, and Freddie Gray, in Baltimore, have led to a period of more gun violence.
Now, many cities are seeing more violent crime as protesters call to defund police departments, and police reforms across the country are put into place.
In Atlanta, a task force is working to rethink training policies for the city's officers.
[05:45:03]
MAYOR KEISHA LANCE BOTTOMS (D), ATLANTA: There is a fierce urgency of now in our communities.
DERMOT SHEA, COMMISSIONER, NEW YORK POLICE DEPARTMENT: It will be felt immediately in the communities that we protect.
GINGRAS (voice-over): Last week, the NYPD disbanded its anti-crime unit -- plainclothes officers who combated violent crime -- but those aggressive tactics were often met with controversy.
Monahan says constant police changes are causing confusion among the rank and file.
MONAHAN: How do the communities want us to police? Quality of life policing in New York was one of the things that got us to where we were. Cops are questioning what do communities want us to do and there are people out there that are taking advantage of it.
GINGRAS (voice-over): And then there's the pandemic.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Public resources -- police, hospitals, service providers, community-based providers -- means there's less resources to fight violent crime. And, the pandemic has placed people under great financial, mental, and emotional strain. And so, all of those things can trigger more violence.
GINGRAS (voice-over): The council's research had already found killings in major cities were on the rise this year, starting in January and February. Now, a dramatic increase in numbers as cities reopen after shutting down in the spring, a nationwide trend many believe will continue.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are deeply concerned that in the months ahead we may see more violence in the future. GINGRAS (voice-over): Researchers and members of law enforcement say the burden to bring crime down can't solely rest on the shoulders of police.
MONAHAN: We need to hear from the communities that are living through this gunfire -- that have to see it each and every day. What exactly do they want us to do? This is a monumental period in policing.
GINGRAS (voice-over): Brynn Gingras, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
JARRETT: All right, Brynn. Thanks so much for that report.
We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[05:50:57]
JARRETT: The maker of Roundup will pay more than $10 billion to settle most lawsuits claiming the weed killer causes cancer. Thousands of suits were filed by cancer patients and their families against Bayer and Roundup's previous manufacturer, Monsanto. Bayer says the settlement brings a long period of uncertainty for the company to an end.
Well, parody Twitter accounts from Devin Nunes' mom and cow can keep the jokes coming. A judge has dismissed defamation lawsuits against the House Intelligence ranking member Devin Nunes filed against Twitter over the accounts. The ruling found Twitter is not a publisher or speaker of the content posted by its users nor is it biased against conservatives.
Nunes filed suit over satirical insults made by anonymous users, Devin Nunes' mom and Devin Nunes' cow. No comment from the congressman on this.
ROMANS: All right, let's get a check on CNN Business this Thursday morning. Taking a look at markets around the world right now, after a really rough day in the stock market yesterday, European shares mixed and Asian shares closed down.
Wednesday was the worst day in two weeks for U.S. stocks. We'll see if that continues this morning. It's kind of undecided in terms of futures at the moment.
The Dow closed down 710 points. The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq both finished more than two percent lower. The Nasdaq falling just a day after hitting a record high. It is still up 10 percent for the year.
States are slowing reopening but major companies are still laying off workers.
GNC has filed for bankruptcy, warning it will close up a quarter of its stores. Reports say Universal Orlando has laid off an unspecified number of workers two weeks after reopening its theme parks. Bed Bath & Beyond is laying off hundreds of employees in Florida and New Jersey. That's according to a notice filed with the Departments of Labor in both of those states.
A Facebook executive admits the company has a trust deficit as an advertiser boycott grows over misinformation on the platform. Facebook's head of Trust and Safety made this admission on a call with advertisers after being asked why companies should risk their brands' reputation.
Goodby Silverstein & Partners, one of the country's top ad agencies, joined the boycott Wednesday and encouraged its clients to do the same. Its clients include Adobe, BMW, FritoLay, Liberty Mutual, Cisco, and Comcast.
Google has announced new limits on how long it will keep users' data for some of its services. Google, last year, began giving users an option to automatically delete information after either three months or 18 months. Now the default setting will be 18 months for new accounts and users turning on location history for the first time.
Google also announced a new delete option for YouTube, allowing users to delete data there after three years.
JARRETT: Well, New York City wants to make sure President Trump gets the message or at the very least, sees it. The mayor's office says the words "Black Lives Matter" will be painted onto Fifth Avenue, the street outside Trump Tower -- the president's residence in Manhattan. It will be one of seven murals being created in the city and is expected to be completed before the Fourth of July.
NASA is naming its Washington headquarters after the agency's first female African-American engineer.
Mary W. Jackson was hired in 1958 among a small group of black mathematicians and engineers who helped get American astronauts into space. Their story was brought to light in the 2016 book and movie, "Hidden Figures."
Jackson's family said in a statement they are honored that NASA continues to celebrate her legacy.
And she is a national treasure for sure.
ROMANS: She really is. That movie really brought that story to so many people. I think that was such a -- such a great thing.
All right, thanks for joining us, everybody. I'm Christine Romans.
JARRETT: I'm Laura Jarrett. Have a great day, everyone. "NEW DAY" is next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[05:59:14]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NEWSOM: We cannot continue to do what we have done over the last number of weeks.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: California shattered daily highs, adding more than 7,000 new cases.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have to get a grip on this virus because right now, it has a grip on Texas.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We need to do something to halt community transmission right now.
DR. CHRIS MURRAY, UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON'S INSTITUTE FOR HEALTH METRICS AND EVALUATION: If we can get people to wear masks, we can not only save lives, we can also save the economy.
CUOMO: People coming in from states that have a high infection rate must quarantine for 14 days.
GOV. PHIL MURPHY (D), NEW JERSEY: We've been through hell and we don't want to go through hell again.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: This is NEW DAY with Alisyn Camerota and John Berman.
ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: And we want to welcome our viewers in the United States and all around the world. This is NEW DAY. It is Thursday, June 25th, 6:00 here in New York.
A public health train wreck in slow motion. That's how one expert describes the coronavirus pandemic in the United States, and here's why.
END
