Return to Transcripts main page
Early Start with John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin
Fauci: I'm Not Pleased With How Things Are Going; President & First Lady Request Mail-In Ballots; NCAA Cancels All Fall Championships Except Football. Aired 5-5:30a ET
Aired August 14, 2020 - 05:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[05:00:22]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: Bottom line is, I'm not pleased with how things are going.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN ANCHOR: Dr. Anthony Fauci worried about more coronavirus surges and warning about reopening too soon.
LAURA JARRETT, CNN ANCHOR: The president and the first lady are requesting mail-in ballots even as Trump continues his attacks on mail-in voting.
Welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. This is EARLY START. I'm Laura Jarrett.
ROMANS: Good morning. So great to see you.
I'm Christine Romans. It is Friday, August 14th. Happy Friday. Five a.m. in New York, 81 days to the election if you're counting.
But a dire new warning from America's top coronavirus expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci says the U.S. must control COVID-19 and cautiously reopen schools and businesses or the consequences could be devastating.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
FAUCI: Think that you can ignore the biologics and get the economy back is not going to happen. It's just not going to happen. You've got to do both. You've got to get control of the biologic as you carefully open the country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ROMANS: Dr. Fauci's warning comes as the country reports yet another day with more than 1,000 deaths.
More now from CNN's Athena Jones in New York. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
FAUCI: Bottom line is, I'm not happy with how things are going.
ATHENA JONES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Dr. Fauci raising concerns about disturbing trend in parts of the country.
FAUCI: This is the thing that's disturbing to me is that we're starting to see the inkling of the upticks in the percent of the positives, which we know now from sad past experience that that's a predictor that you're going to have more surges.
JONES: This warning comes as the U.S. confronts the deadliest day of the summer, 1,499 people lost to COVID-19 Wednesday, and as CDC Director Robert Redfield makes this blunt admission.
DR. ROBERT REDFIELD, CDC DIRECTOR: This is the greatest public health crisis to hit the nation in a century that we were under prepared for and we need to owe it to our children and grandchildren that this nation is never unprepared again for a public health crisis.
JONES: Redfield warning that if at least 95 percent of Americans don't follow basic public health recommendations, like mask wearing, hand washing and social distancing --
REDFIELD: This could be the worst fall from a public health perspective we've ever had. I'm not asking some of America to do it, we all got to do.
JONES: While new cases are steady or falling in 43 states, deaths have averaged more than 1,000 a day for 17 days now, and COVID test positivity rates are on the rise in 35 states, with Texas leading the nation at nearly 24 percent. Even as the number of tests being conducted nationwide continues to decline.
Meanwhile, in Martin County, Florida, north of Palm Beach, an entire elementary classroom and bus route were placed under quarantined one day after the district reopened for in-person instruction, and a student begun exhibiting symptoms.
Nationally, more than 2,000 students, teachers and staff members across five states are under quarantine due to COVID-19 concerns.
DR. PETER HOTEZ, PROFESSOR AND DEAN OF TROPICAL MEDICINE, BAYLOR COLLEGE OF MEDICINE.: There is just no way right now where this epidemic is raging across the south, in Florida and Georgia and Alabama and Mississippi, Louisiana and much of Texas, that you can open up schools safely.
JONES: Still, it's game on in Utah, a state with the positivity rate of almost 9 percent. Two high schools facing off in the first football match of the season.
DR. CARLOS DEL RIO, PROFESSOR OF INFECTIOUS DISEASES, EMORY UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE: I feel like the "Titanic." We have hit the iceberg and trying to make the decisions to what time should we have the band play. Not having fall sports this year in controlling this virus to me would be the number one priority.
JONES (on camera): And we're getting more insight into the pandemic's impact on Americans. A new CDC survey find that 41 percent of respondents are struggling with anxiety and depression, increased substance use or suicidal thoughts.
Athena Jones, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
JARRETT: Athena, thank you.
New this morning, Palm Beach County records show President Trump and first lady have requested absentee ballots for Florida's primary on Tuesday, that despite his many attacks on voting by mail like these.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Voting by mail is wrought with fraud, and abuse, and people don't get their ballots.
When you do all mail-in voting ballots, you're asking for fraud. People steal them out of mailboxes. People print them and then they sign them and they give them in.
These mail-in ballots where they send millions of them all over the country, it's going to be a rigged election.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
JARRETT: So all of that rhetoric seems out of step with his recent claims about Florida's mail-in voting system.
[05:05:01]
Quote, whether you call it vote by mail or absentee voting, in Florida, the election system is safe and secure, tried and true. Florida's voting system has been cleaned up, but we defeated the Democrats attempts at change, so in Florida, I encourage all to request a ballot and vote by mail.
The White House tried to clear up the apparent inconsistency here, telling CNN: The president supports absentee voting, not universal mail-in voting, which contains several safeguards that prevent fraud and abuse.
Now, here's the thing: election experts tell CNN there is no real difference between absentee voting and no excuse voting by mail, where you don't have to have a reason. Mail-in voting has been in the spotlight recently, given the pandemic, of course, as states try to make it easier for voters to avoid polling centers where COVID can potential spread.
Nevertheless, Trump and other Republicans, even the attorney general, have railed against voting by mail, baselessly claiming it encourages voter fraud. On Thursday, the president said he's against much needed funding for the postal service, because he says it will be used to ease mail-in voting this November.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Need that money in order to make the post office works so it can take all these millions and millions of ballots, and you said that will be fraudulent. So, it sounded like you said --
TRUMP: Well, now, I'm going to say it will end up being fraudulent, because if you look at what's happened over the last few weeks, just look at the few instances where this has happened, it's turned out to be fraudulent.
We have to have an honest election. And if it's not going to be an honest election, I guess people have I to sit down and think really long and hard about it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
JARRETT: CNN's Kristen Holmes has more now from Washington.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: President Trump is admitting that he opposes funding to the Postal Service because of mail-in voting. Now, this is fueling allegations that the Trump administration is using the postal service to meddle in the election.
Here's what he said yesterday.
TRUMP: Now they need that money in order to have the post office work so it can take all of these millions and millions of ballots. Now, in the meantime, they aren't getting there. By the way, those are just two items. But if they don't get those two items, that means you can't have universal mail-in voting.
HOLMES: And, Christine and Laura, this is coming as postal service workers across the country are sounding alarm bells over the removal of mail processing machines from several postal service facilities. Now, we obtained documents, CNN did, that show there was a plan to remove about 700 of these machines that sort through letters and pieces of mail.
Why is this important? Well, many people, postal workers are concerned doing something this big before the election could cause massive delays.
That is not the only thing that we are monitoring here. We did also learn that while the Postal Service is sending out letters that say essentially they have to use first class mail which is more expensive if they do ballots or risk the ballots getting lost or not getting there in time, the postal service, they told us about that letter which was standard procedure. They have been asking people to use first class mail, recommending it for years.
But sources told us that that wasn't entirely true, that even if states used in past elections the regular bulk mail did not purchase the extra first class, that extra priority, that they were still treated, ballots were still treated as first class mail. So, something we're looking into here. But all of it really unclear as we see all of this concern from Democratic and Republican lawmakers from postal service workers, from state officials.
If this is going to get sorted out by the time it needs to be in November -- Christine and Laura.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ROMANS: All right, Kristen. Thank you so much for that.
New Jersey is about to announce November election will be largely conducted through mail-in voting in the state. Democratic Governor Phil Murphy is expected to make it official as soon as today. The plan means 66.2 million people will automatically receive ballots in the mail with limited in-person polling.
JARRETT: Meanwhile, Pennsylvania officials say they are willing to count mail-in ballots for three days after the November general election, as long as they are mailed by 8:00 p.m. on November 3rd. That deadline change comes after the U.S. Postal Service informed the state that it could not guarantee the timely delivery of ballots.
ROMANS: All right. Stimulus standstill. Millions of Americans are out of work right now and the Senate went home. The true cost can't be measured in dollars and cents.
CNN business is next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[05:13:38]
ROMANS: So, millions of Americans are out of work but action on a new stimulus deal will have to wait likely until September. The two sides have not met or negotiated for nearly a week. No other talks are planned.
Lawmakers are now home for the August recess. On a private conference call with GOP senators Thursday, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows claimed it was House Speaker Nancy Pelosi who would rather have no deal at all than agree to $1 trillion deal that the White House is open.
Speaker Pelosi fired back.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA), SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gave a damn. That isn't the case. So, this is very far apart.
And unless they see the reality of what it means in the lives of the American people, what good is it for us to agree to something that has no relationship to meeting the needs of the American people? (END VIDEO CLIP)
ROMANS: One thing that is clear: more stimulus is needed now. A second round of direct checks to help Americans pay for rent and groceries has been put on hold. Without a deal, there are no more small business loans. States face layoffs of public workers without emergency aid to plug big holes in their budgets caused by the pandemic.
Schools hoping for funding to help them safely reopen in the fall will also have to wait.
And, Laura, this fight is so urgent for the millions of people who are still waiting here.
[05:20:04]
I mean, when the first round of the CARES Act was signed into law, it was expected that by now, they thought they would be back to work.
JARRETT: Right.
ROMANS: They are not. There is still a jobs crisis and bills to be paid.
JARRETT: Yeah. Obviously, this has gone on longer than anyone could have imagined. But the idea that they just went home is pretty amazing.
ROMANS: Yeah, it is.
JARRETT: All right. President Trump revisiting an old racist conspiracy theory, now aimed at the first black woman on a major party's presidential ticket, feeding into a new fringe of birther theory about Senator Kamala Harris. Trump refused to pour cold water on it when asked about it last night, during the coronavirus briefing.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Do you or can you definitely say whether or not Kamala Harris is eligible to meet the legal requirements to run as vice president?
TRUMP: So, I just heard that. I heard it today that she doesn't meet the requirements. And, by the way, the lawyer that brought that piece is a very highly qualified and talented lawyer. I have no idea if that's right.
I would have -- I would have assumed the Democrats would have checked that out before she gets chosen to run for vice president. But that's a very serious -- you're saying that -- they're saying that she isn't qualified because she wasn't born in this country.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
JARRETT: There's nothing to take a look at here. Senator Harris was born in Oakland, California. She's eligible to serve as vice president or president, when she is a black and Indian-American woman. And then citizen Donald Trump has done this to a black candidate before.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I wanted to show his birth certificate. There's something on that birth certificate that he doesn't like. People have birth certificates. He doesn't have a birth certificate.
Now, he may have one, but there's something on that birth -- maybe religion, maybe it says he's a Muslim, I don't know.
And if he wasn't born in this country, which is a real possibility, I'm not saying it happened. I'm saying it's a real possibility.
A lot of people do not think it was authentic certificate. Many people do not think it was authentic. His mother was not in the hospital. There were many other things that came out.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
JARRETT: Five years after actively propagating the myth about President Obama, Trump retreated from his birther campaign, acknowledging Obama was, in fact, born in the United States.
ROMANS: All right. So, White House adviser Jared Kushner confirming the recent friendly discussion with Kanye West in Colorado. GOP operatives are actively helping West get on the presidential ballot in several states.
President Trump's son-in-law told reporters they focused on policy, but wouldn't confirm they discussed the rapper's presidential campaign.
"Forbes" reports West has been telling associates he talks with Kushner almost daily. Republicans, including the president, has speculated West will siphon votes away from Joe Biden, especially among African-Americans.
JARRETT: Well, fans are about to find out what college football looks like without championships this fall. "Bleacher Report" is coming up next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[05:22:20]
ROMANS: All right. The NCAA cancels all fall championships with college football being the only exception.
Andy Scholes has more in this morning's "Bleacher Report".
ANDY SCHOLES, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, good morning, Christine.
So, you know, big time college football not affected by this. For now, the SEC and ACC and Big 12, the college football playoffs still in place for those conferences.
But women's volleyball, soccer and field hockey are not going to have championships at the end of their seasons. NCAA president Mark Emmert announced the fall championships are off. If you don't have half the schools playing, it's not a legitimate championship.
But Emmert did not rule out holding those seasons and championships at a later time.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARK EMMERT, NCAA PRESIDENT: That doesn't mean we shouldn't and can't turn toward winner in spring and say, OK, how can we create a legitimate championship for all those students? There are ways to do this. I'm completely confident that we can figure this out. If schools and conferences want to move forward and try to have more than half want to do it and that's surely the indication right now, then let's do it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SCHOLES: All right. In the meantime, multiple Florida State wide receivers are accusing the school of mishandling health and safety protocols, during the first week of football camp. Warren Thompson accusing the schools athletic department of lying multiple times about player health conditions. The red-shirt sophomore made the accusations in a lengthy Instagram post, saying in part, our leadership is based off an "I" mentality, with them only worried about their own future rather than their own athletes.
He added, I have been ridiculed about speaking up regarding this issue and it needs to be addressed for myself to safely continue this season.
CNN has reached out to the university for comment. New Florida State coach Mike Norvell previously said: It's obviously disappointing to see what was said. We've been very open and transparent throughout this process.
All right. The Williams sisters gearing up for the U.S. Open, meeting each other for the 31st time yesterday in Kentucky. Now, Serena lost the first set and move down a break in the third before rallying to win the match. Serena saying afterwards, this was a top five match they ever played against each other. U.S. Open just over two weeks away.
All right. NBA playoffs and the bubble are set. They begin on Monday. But before the playoffs, we have the very first eight-seed play-in tournament this weekend between the Blazers and the Grizzlies. Damien Lillard leading Portland to a win over the Nets last night, securing their spot.
[05:25:02]
The Blazers need to beat the Grizzlies once to advance. Memphis would have to beat Portland twice. Winner gets to play the Lakers in the first round.
And for the first time since 1997, we won't see the San Antonio Spurs in the NBA playoffs. They won five NBA titles during the record-tying 22-year playoff run. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, 117 players were born on or after the Spurs last elimination from the playoffs.
So, just so many players, Laura, they don't know what it is like to not see the spurs in the playoffs. Just congrats to that organization on an incredible run.
JARRETT: Yeah, tough for Spurs fans.
All right. Andy, nice to see you this morning as usual.
SCHOLES: All right.
JARRETT: Russia is now offering to help the U.S. develop a coronavirus vaccine. We're live in Moscow, next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
END
