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Crime Surge Takes Center Stage In NYC Mayoral Race; Powell: "Extraordinarily Unusual Time" For U.S. Economy; Biden Plans To Address Crime Spike In Wednesday Speech. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired June 22, 2021 - 12:30   ET

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

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ANDREW YANG (D), NYC MAYORAL CANDIDATE: -- and falling crime rates have endorsed me.

KATHRYN GARCIA (D), NYC MAYORAL CANDIDATE: Making sure that everyone feels safe in the city, regardless of the color of their skin is an imperative.

ERIC ADAMS (D), NYC MAYORAL CANDIDATE: We want safety and justice. We don't have to surrender the safety we deserve for the justice we need.

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JOHN KING, CNN HOST: With us to share his insights is CNN political commentator, Errol Louis, he's political anchor of Spectrum News and NY1 and host of the You Decide Podcast. Errol, good to see you on this important day. Let's talk about the rise of crime as an issue because this race often people watch one race sometimes they read too much into it. But this New York City mayoral race comes in the middle of a national uptick in violent crime. And so what happens in the city is going to be watched across the country. How important is that? And how much of an issue did it become late in the race?

ERROL LOUIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: It's tremendously important. And it ended up really dominating the race, at least according to every poll that we've seen, a good half dozen or so polls over the course of the last couple of months have consistently put crime and public safety at the top of the agenda in voters' minds. New York is so much bigger than the rest of the country, John, that just statistically, if crime goes up here, it makes it look like it's a national trend. So we might actually be pushing those numbers up just out of New York City right here. But nothing else comes close to the concerns of crime. And that has really sort of structured the race over the last several weeks.

KING: And so you wrote about this in an op-ed piece you wrote the other day, in the talking about Mr. Adams, Eric Adams and Maya Wiley, two candidates who are different on the spectrum, we'll get to the spectrum a minute. But you wrote, if Mr. Adams or Ms. Wiley wins in Tuesday's primary, he or she will become a national voice on crime, their arguments are revealing about the trade-offs facing Democrats and the urban voters who helped make up the party's base.

It is fascinating that this race is taking place. You know, we're not all that far removed from progressives and defunding police being a major theme, less so in this mayor's race because of the changing times and changing statistics.

LOUIS: That's right. We say it all the time, John, that six months or a year could be an eternity in politics. Well, about a year ago, people were marching in the streets in New York and everywhere else in the wake of the George Floyd killing, and people wanted to reform and people were demanding change, and they want a transformation of the NYPD and other law enforcement agencies.

And then a year later, you know, we have a vaccine, we have people who are able to go back to work, we have different concerns that have come to the fore. And at the same time, we've had this spike in violent crime shootings, in particular in New York, as well as a sharp increase in homicides. And the entire agenda has changed. So these two questions that are on the table, how do we keep everybody safe? And how do we not lose the threat of those very necessary reforms that so many people marched in the street for last year? How do we sort of put it together?

It really became a very sharp point of contention and debate in the race for mayor and one of those visions is going to prevail after we count up the votes following today. And then we'll know which way New York is going to go. And I think Democrats all over the country will be watching to see what kind of a decision New York voters make.

KING: You mentioned counting the votes. And let me use that opportunity to just show on the screen. New York City for the first time is using what's called a ranked choice voting, meaning you've mark your first choice, but you also mark your second choice. And if you so choose, you can mark your fifth choice, your third, fourth, and fifth choice as well, which means the count is going to take a considerable period of time. What else about this system stands out to you is noteworthy?

LOUIS: Well, the noteworthy thing is it under certain circumstances can make sense for rival candidates in the same race to actually form an alliance and campaign together. And we saw that for the first time over the last few days. And it freaked a lot of people out including the front runner, Mr. Adams, the two of the candidates who have consistently ranked second, third or fourth, have sort of formed an alliance in Kathryn Garcia and Andrew Yang are out campaigning together.

And under certain circumstances in a rank choice voting election, that can actually lead to a victory by somebody who initially was not the number one choice of the voters. And I won't go down that rabbit hole trying to explain it. But it has happened before. And it has really caused quite a stir in the closing hours of the campaign.

KING: Right. What are you looking for in terms of what this tells you about the mood of Democratic voters? We should -- anyone not watching us and get this, the winner of the Democratic primary is going to be almost certainly the next mayor of New York City. We can show you on the screen, yes, we have three candidates that we characterize as more liberal in the race and you have the five candidates with -- moderate progressive.

Everybody running for New York City Mayor, if you're watching this in Nebraska, is left of center. The question is, is there going to be a message out of this if a candidate -- if a more liberal or a less liberal, I guess the best way to put it wins, Errol, what are you watching for the signal New York City might be sending here that will be read by Democrats nationally?

LOUIS: Well, the signal that we'll be sending is that New York as we often do, get very practical, somewhat moderate despite the fact that it's a largely progressive town when it comes to the executive position of mayor which is enormously important and very powerful.

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You know, as you know, John, in the 1990s, we have five consecutive Republican mayors. And it tends to be the kind of position where we don't necessarily want a lot of speechifying, not a whole lot of -- we want execution, we want the garbage picked up, we want public safety, we want 1.1 million school kids taken care of properly.

I think the message is going to be if Democrats really want to govern in the long term in executive positions, the -- whoever emerges as the mayor is going to be the kind of figure that I think Democrats will want to think about nationwide as the kind of Democratic executive that can get things done, but also remain true to Democratic values.

KING: That's been a fascinating race. We will await the outcome as the guy who likes to count votes. We'll run a clock on how long it takes. Errol Louis, grateful for your time and your insights throughout this race. Appreciate it very much.

LOUIS: Thank you, John.

KING: Up next for us, the uneven COVID recovery, stocks are up, home prices too. But many Americans are leaving the workforce and millions of pre COVID jobs are still missing.

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KING: The Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell is sharing his take on the COVID recovery with Congress later today. Expect more of this.

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JEROME POWELL, FEDERAL RESERVE CHMN.: I'll say is, this is an extraordinarily unusual time. And we really don't have a template or a, you know, any experience of a situation like this. And so I think we have to be humble about our ability to understand the data.

(END VIDEO CLIP) KING: Let's walk through what the chairman is talking about there, the unpredictability, the mixed messaging sometimes in the data. Number one, let's just look at the unemployment statistics. The unemployment rate right now, 5.8 percent, not down to where it was pre pandemic, but way down from the pandemic hike of just near 15 percent but still, if you can see the top there, more than 7.6 million jobs still missing, jobs that were in the economy in February 2020 that have not come back yet.

So we're still down more than 7 million, almost 8 million jobs. An interesting phenomenon is even though there are a lot of help wanted signs out there and postings out there, people are leaving the workforce, 3.95 million Americans left the workforce in April. Some of that's COVID safety concerns. Some of that's conditions at home they need to be home to deal with and more. This is an anomaly when there's hiring. Why are so many people leaving the workforce?

If you own stocks while the pandemic didn't do much to your portfolio, actually you're up, look, that's where you were at the beginning of the pandemic, couple of bumps along the way, but stocks have consistently, the stock market consistently going up. If you own a home, the pandemic has helped your net worth or at least it hasn't taken a hit. May 2020, here's your average median home sale, look where it is now. If you own a home, your financial net worth if you will has gone up throughout this pandemic but everybody is paying more for key issues.

This is the largest increase year to year inflation 5 percent since back in 2008 that's the big number. You know this if you go, if you're buying milk at the grocery store, it's up 7 percent, if you drink alcohol it's up 1.6 percent, fresh fruits and vegetables up more than 3, airline fares up more than 25 percent, used cars up nearly 30 percent, prices on things are going up big time.

One last look at a map like this, some states are already back, you see Montana back to where it was pre pandemic, Idaho back, Nebraska back, some of these other states, the lighter states you see Illinois, they are still lagging in the economic comeback. This is something we'll keep an eye on as we get through the year and then next year into the election year where we know the economy will be a giant issue.

Up next for us, though, the President is preparing a big speech on crime. We have some brand new reporting on the key details.

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KING: This week, the Biden White House confronts a crime spike. The President plans a Wednesday speech to lay out a new anticrime strategy. It is a response to bad facts, homicides across the country are up, though, White House officials worried there's a brutal summer ahead. Let's get to CNN's Jeff Zeleny for some of the details. Jeff, what are we going to hear from the President? JEFF ZELENY, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: John, we are learning that President Biden is going to be announcing a series of executive actions really targeting gun violence. That is going to be the center of his remarks tomorrow afternoon. We're also learning that he'll be meeting with a group of state and local officials who really have been on the front lines of this spike in crime.

This is something the White House has been watching very carefully. It's the thing that they hear almost more than anything else from local officials, the rise in gun violence as well as assault, carjackings. So this is something that no White House wants to be caught flat footed on a rise in crime. And this President, I'm told has given a directive to his staff to find executive actions on gun violence that they can use.

He's also going to be calling on Congress to do more, but we know that the plate is already pretty full in that respect. But John, this is a very complicated issue for the President. Of course, he was at the front and center of that 1994 crime bill, but a different moment now. He'll be talking about it highlighting it tomorrow.

KING: A very different moment, very different moment. Jeff Zeleny, appreciate the preview of that there.

ZELENY: Sure.

KING: Let's bring it in to talk about this with the panel. Look, a president does not give a speech on crime unless the White House believes politically it is necessary. The numbers are up. He's the President. It's his legacy, if you will, his first turn on the ballot in the midterm elections. Republicans have already served notice. Let's listen that they want to make crime a big issue.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In Minnesota, we know the results of letting radical liberals destroy our state. Minnesota parents know the fear of having police defunded. Our communities burned, and feeling unsafe in our own homes.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When the angry mob came to destroy my house and kill my family, I took a stand against them.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Call Congressman Kind and tell him to stand up to Democrats attacks on law enforcement.

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KING: It's a tough challenge for a president from a policy standpoint, because the numbers are up. And it's a tough challenge for the President from political standpoint because this potentially could hurt his party.

JULIE HIRSCHFELD DAVIS, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Absolutely. And we've already seen that Republicans are going to use this issue. I mean, they seem to be coalescing around this message of crisis. You know, the country is in crisis. They had a news conference in the House last week where the Republican leadership said crisis once a minute, and the crime issue is certainly front and center and that strategy and it worked for them we saw to talk about defund the police in the last midterm elections, in the last elections.

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And I think Democrats are rightly concerned that it could work for them. Again, so they need to have an answer in the White House understands that they need to have an answer. The issue is that, you know, as Jeff mentioned, there isn't that much that Congress can do, the President can talk about executive action. But this is a pretty intractable problem that it's going to be hard to show any progress on in just a couple of years, a few months.

And so the question is, can they figure out a message that actually speaks to people's anxieties here without alienating the very large portion of their base that really does think that policing needs to be overhauled in a fundamental way, and wants to hear you know, that that disgust and that push forward?

KING: And -- go ahead.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: And so he's giving a speech to also provide the context, as you mentioned, John, around the crime numbers, and then the White House is trying to say that the increase in crime started before he even took office. And so he is trying to control the narrative, as Julie is mentioning, all as police reform is stalled in the Senate, as gun legislation to increase background checks is not moving. And it appears as though they're having a really hard time to find any kind of bipartisan support for it.

JONATHAN MARTIN, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: I mean two fast points. One, call me skeptical that during a crime wave there's going to be a police overhaul bill passed in Congress. I think the GOP wants the issue next year, politically, and are not going to want to muddy the waters of the issue by being party for that legislation. Secondly, I know from talking to folks in the White House, they are watching this New York mayor's race today very, very closely, in part of the reason is because they believe if Eric Adams wins, Eric Adams, a black man, a former cop, who is at once both very much pro cop and is not ruling out stop and frisk, but at the same time has made his career in policing by being a reformer.

They believe that that will send a message to especially white liberals about this sort of more nuanced nature of the crime issue. And where folks in the black community actually stand on the issue because, of course, Adams says support in New York overwhelmingly coming from the black community, so I think a lot of folks tonight in the West way, we're going to be watching to see how well Adams does in New York, they believe that that's going to help them politically, potentially if he wins.

KING: Because when this splits out into the midterms, it depends on what state you're looking at, what race you're looking at, you know, where you're the country you are. But if you just look, this is just Fox News. And this to your point about crisis, America's crime crisis spirals out of control, as large cities rocked by crime surge is what you see what voters who are inclined to maybe lean right are seeing, and Republicans believe they've been hammered in the suburbs throughout the Trump presidency, because Trump turned off suburban voters. They believe this is a potential to start to build back.

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I mean, I think that this is entirely about messaging, because it's not as if, on the conservative side, there are solutions being offered, it's more that they are using the issue of crime to raise the specter of fear among voters. And Democrats, I do think have an opportunity here to take back control of some of the narrative. This is not just a crime, because of, you know, defund the police where defund the police hasn't actually been happening. We're in the middle of a dislocation because of a pandemic.

And I think that the track record of this message actually, in congressional races for Republicans has been mixed. In some in some ways, it's helped them to gain momentum in the suburbs. In some races, they've lost on the issue of crime. And so this is, it's important for the White House to do something because I think they knew that ignoring it was not going to be a viable option. There are ways for them to address it by actually putting the facts on the table, and not sort of allowing this to devolve into just fear, fear, fear, which, you know, it could work but only if there's nothing on the other side of the back.

KING: Nothing on the other side. One of the many subsets we will watch as we go forward.

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Up next, for us a very important story, the first active NFL player to announce he's gay. It's historic and it could save lives.

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KING: (INAUDIBLE) for some time. It will not reach its goal of having 70 percent of all adults get at least one COVID vaccine shot by July 4th. But the White House did say that 70 percent of adults aged 30 and older do have at least one shot. Listen.

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JEFFREY ZIENTS, WHITE HOUSE COVID-19 RESPONSE COORDINATOR: We have succeeded beyond our highest expectations. Instead of just small backyard gatherings, America is getting ready for a truly historic 4th of July. We already met the President's 70 percent goal for all U.S. adults 30 and older.

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KING: Carl Nassib, you see him right here is the first active NFL player to announce he's gay. That is a historic announcement. The Raiders defensive lineman coming out in this Instagram video.

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CARL NASSIB, LAS VEGAS RAIDERS DEFENSIVE END: I'm pretty private person. So hope you guys know that I'm really not doing this for attention. I just think that representation and visibility are so important. I actually hope that like one day, videos like this and the whole coming out process are just not necessary. But until then, you know I'm going to do my best and do my part to cultivate a culture that's accepting, that's compassionate.

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KING: The NFL this morning expressing support by echoing Nassib's own words about suicide prevention for LGBTQ youth.

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This quick programming reminder for us sex, power, feminism, she wrote the book on it, but this is the only story she never told. CNN film Lady Boss, The Jackie Collins Story, Sunday night at 9:00 on CNN. Appreciate your time today. Hope to see you back here tomorrow. Ana Cabrera picks up right now.