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New Day

McCarthy Officially Backs Ouster of Cheney, Endorses Stefanik; G.O.P. Falsely Claims Biden Sending Economy into a Tailspin; H.H.S. to Enforce Ban on Gender-Based Discrimination in Health Care; Pipeline that Provides U.S. East Coast Gasoline and Jet Fuel Shut Down after Cyberattack; Dr. Anthony Fauci says U.S. Should Consider Loosening Indoor Mask Mandates; Doctor Associated with Treatment of Russian Dissident Alexei Navalny for Poison Found after Going Missing for Weekend. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired May 10, 2021 - 08:00   ET

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

BRYNN GINGRAS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, the "Journal" reporting that was really a source of concern for her.

You may remember, let's back up, to October of 2019. "The New York Times" reported Gates held several meetings with Epstein and stayed at his Manhattan home until the early morning hours on one occasion. According to documents viewed by "The Wall Street Journal" Melinda Gates held a number of calls with her advisers around that same time of that reporting. She's a global advocate for women and girls, and one source telling the paper that she was uncomfortable with Epstein ever since she met him in 2013, but Bill Gates continued a relationship with him. Now, Gates said in a 2019 interview with "The Wall Street Journal" about Epstein, "I met him. I didn't have any business relationship or friendship with him." A spokesman for Bill Gates stood by that statement and didn't comment further to the paper regarding this morning's reporting, and CNN hasn't independently verified the reporting of why Gates was seeking a divorce. The couple hasn't publicly said what led to their split either.

In the divorce filing, Melinda Gates said their marriage was, quote, irretrievably broken, and the file also says the couple, which Forbes estimates is worth $130 billion, has agreed to divide their assets. And Melinda Gates also not commenting to the paper, John.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Brynn Gingras, thank you very much for all of this.

NEW DAY continues right now.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, I'm Brianna Keilar alongside John Berman. On this NEW DAY, a major pipeline shut down, causing fears of a gas price hike. Was it the work of Russian hackers?

And the debate over wearing masks indoors, is it time for some new rules? The president's health secretary joins us live.

BERMAN: Republicans claim Joe Biden's stimulus has slowed job growth in the country, but what's really going on here? Plus, we'll talk to the quick-thinking officer who's sprint through

New York's Times Square may have helped save a little girl's life.

KEILAR: A very good morning to viewers here in the United States and around the world. It is Monday, May 10th.

And it is being called the most significant and successful cyberattack on America's energy infrastructure ever. Right now, a pipeline that provides the east coast with nearly half of its gasoline and jet fuel is shut down. A former senior cybersecurity official telling CNN that a criminal group from Russia is believed to be behind this.

BERMAN: The Biden administration held emergency meetings over the weekend to figure out whether the U.S. fuel supply might become an issue and how to respond. Because of this attack there are growing concerns this morning about cybersecurity vulnerabilities in America's critical infrastructure.

Let's bring in CNN's chief national security correspondent, anchor of Newsroom, Jim Sciutto. Jim, there are superlatives here that can describe what's going on with this attack, correct? Why don't you tell us?

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: No question. The most significant attack on a piece of U.S. infrastructure via cyber the country has ever seen. It's not the first attempted attack, it's not the first successful attack. You've had water systems targeted, power systems, et cetera, both by state and nonstate actors, at least to explore vulnerabilities. So here you have one that worked, right, and it has significant impact. You have this system shut down several days.

It appears that the broader pipeline system can make up for this, but keep this in mind. Everyone is watching the success of this attack. This is a group that appears to be a criminal gang, but state actors. China, Russia, North Korea, Iran, all of whom attack this country every day thousands of times are watching this to say, huh, that's a vulnerability we weren't aware of, we weren't aware of to that degree. What can we learn from this to take advantage of that vulnerability?

KEILAR: Because the fact is there are giant holes in the security, in the cybersecurity of this nation from where the NSA can and cannot operate to this being carried out in a -- this is a private company, right?

SCIUTTO: Yes.

KEILAR: This is a private company, but it provides these services that I think people almost associate with what government would provide, something like utilities. And there is -- we're really behind the eight-ball here.

SCIUTTO: We are. Listen, we're a connected world, right, today. And no country is more connected technologically than the U.S. We have by our nature an open system. And that makes you more vulnerable to this kind of stuff. Really, the only solution is turn the switch off, right, disconnect yourself from the Internet. A country like Estonia did that when Russia attacked it 10 years ago. But of course, we can't do that.

So if you can't close all the doors, some people are going to come in those doors. What we've struggled to do as a country both at the government level and the private sector level, is to close those smaller doors to prevent this kind of attack.

[08:04:57] Now, what we should note about this attack, this is a hacker gang in effect. They're doing what's called a ransomware attack. This happens every day, we don't know about it, to private companies and to governments. They attack you, they take your stuff, and they say we're not going to give it back until you pay us x amount of money. It's a great money-making business. That's what these Russian hackers have done. So this is not like the Kremlin doing this.

That said, we know the way Russia operates. We are certain that Russian intelligence is aware of this group. And by the way, the Russian government has used groups like this before to carry out their own plans. So regardless of whether this was directed by the Kremlin, they look at this and say, huh, that's a vulnerability that we can exploit.

BERMAN: So Jim, what do we know exactly about how the Biden administration is responding to this?

SCIUTTO: Listen, we don't know how they're going to respond to this in particular, right? The U.S. under the Biden administration, under the Trump administration, Obama administration going back, they've tried a whole bunch of things against Russia, China, North Korea. They've tried sanctions against individuals, sanctions against entities, companies, all this kind of stuff. The U.S. just sanctioned Russia for the bigger SolarWinds attack, which we believe was run by the Russian government.

And yet Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran keep doing it. So it's like that old thing, the definition of insanity is keep trying stuff that doesn't work, and that's kind of where we are because these solutions, these penalties aren't preventing this behavior. So you can be certain that they're already convening an interagency group to discuss this. They're trying to find new solutions, but they haven't found them yet, right. They haven't found the penalty big enough to prevent the crime.

KEILAR: Jim, thank you so much. This is such an important story, and we will see you here in just under an hour.

BERMAN: Hopefully he used all his best material here.

KEILAR: Right?

BERMAN: Don't tell Poppy that.

(LAUGHTER)

KEILAR: We won't. She'll never know. Now to the pandemic and the declining demand for doses of the vaccine.

The U.S. is now averaging around 2 million shots a day. This is down from more than 3 million a few weeks ago.

Joining us now is Dr. Rob Gore, who is an emergency physician at SUNY Downstate Medical Center and the recipient of a 2018 CNN Heroes award. Doctor, thanks so much for being with us this morning. I want to start with the big headline, which is that Dr. Fauci says the U.S. should consider loosening indoor mask mandates. What do you think that would look like?

DR. ROB GORE, EMERGENCY PHYSICIAN, SUNY DOWNSTATE MEDICAL CENTER: Thanks for having me, John and Brianna. I understand why Dr. Fauci wants to loosen restrictions about masks. If you look at the country right now and the issues related to economics, particularly related to businesses, people need to be out and about and actually spending money. My wife is a small business owner and relies on customers. So if you don't have customers coming in and out of the restaurant to eat, you don't make any money. So I get that.

But we also have to consider what it means to be vulnerable. I work in a community which is a highly vulnerable population, many black, brown, immigrant, many are undocumented, and those are the patients that wind up coming in with increased rates of COVID-19 infection and have the greatest numbers of casualties. And so opening up the country and decreasing those masks, the mask requirements may affect them. It's not necessarily the people who are going to be young and healthy and have access to resources. It's going to be those who are considered to be most vulnerable.

KEILAR: Dr. Anthony Fauci also said something that I want to get your perspective on. He said that America will be as close to back to normal as we can by next Mother's Day if certain conditions, like a drop in new cases and more Americans get vaccinated. Do you think he meant that that's actually the date or the target for that, or do you think he was just sort of playing off the day that it was and saying, next year Mother's Day is going to be different? What is the timeline do you think?

GORE: I think the timeline, honestly, is going to be about two to three years. And so you're looking at 2022 versus 2023 before we actually could see a level of normalcy or at least an improvement in the number of COVID-19 infections as well as deaths.

And as a physician, you have to have -- there are two sides to the story. One, you have to be a pessimist because if you're not a pessimist and you're not thinking about worst case scenario, then you miss a lot of things, which means people wind up dying. If you're also not an optimist, then you don't inspire levels of confidence in the patients that you're treating, which can definitely impact your decision-making. And so we have to be very cautious. It's important that we give hope to the American public, but we also have to remain cautious and vigilant about ensuring that we continue to vaccinate people and we continue to make sure that we do protect ourselves in spaces and places where people may not do as well with the disease process. KEILAR: We do not love the pessimism, but we need the realism, and so

we certainly appreciate you being here to give us a dose of that. Dr. Robert Gore, thanks.

GORE: Thank you for having me.

[08:10:00]

BERMAN: After vanishing over the weekend during a hunting trip, the former chief physician who treated Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny after his poisoning last summer has been found alive. He was missing, now they found him. That's according to Russian state media. Two other doctors who worked at the hospital that treated the Russian opposition leader have died mysteriously since February. CNN's Frederik Pleitgen in Moscow tracking the latest developments. Why don't you explain what is going on here this morning?

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Hi, John. One of the reasons, or the main reason why this raised so many eyebrows is because, indeed, doctors who were working at that hospital when Alexei Navalny was being treated there after getting poisoned by Novichok, bad things seem to be happening to them. You had those two cases, one doctor dying suddenly. He was actually one of the main one's who treated Alexei Navalny. Another doctor then dying in March of this year. Didn't really have that much to do with Alexei Navalny's case, but he was one of the chief physicians at that hospital.

So now you have this new case where you had the chief doctor back then of that hospital who now is actually the health minister for that region, he mysteriously disappeared on a hunting trip on a Friday. They couldn't find him anymore. They then found an ATV that he had used about four miles away from the base camp. He was nowhere to be seen.

And all this, John, happening in an area that has a lot of swamp, a lot of forest, and worse yet, a lot of bears. So there were a lot of people who were very, very concerned about this, and obviously a lot of questions as well because of the links to the Alexei Navalny case. The Russians then used drones and helicopters to try and find this doctor.

He, by the way -- and you can see some of that on your screen, right now -- he, by the way, is the doctor who gave the press conferences as Alexei Navalny was in a coma in that hospital, and he also put forward that hypothesis that Alexei Navalny, they allegedly believed, had not been poisoned but had suffered from a drop in blood sugar levels. He was heavily criticized by Alexei Navalny afterwards, saying that he had lied in order to get a promotion. So there is some history between Alexei Navalny and this doctor as well. And again, a lot of concern there over the weekend.

Then this morning he walked into a village about 40 miles from where he had disappeared, said he was fine, and now claims he's going back to work tomorrow morning, guys.

BERMAN: Still a lot of mysteries here, Fred. Maybe too many. We know you'll stay on this for us. Thank you so much for your reporting. Appreciate it.

Up next, new developments in the House leadership fight. The top Republican publicly paving the way for a shakeup this week.

KEILAR: And Republicans claim Joe Biden is sending the economy into a, quote, tailspin. We will fact check. This is NEW DAY.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:16:07]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy is confirming who he wants as the number three Republican in the House.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY (R-CA): We are in one of our biggest battles ever for this nation and the direction, whether this next century will be ours. As conference chair, you have one of the most critical jobs of the messenger of going forward.

That's why we need a conference that's united. That's why we need a conference chair that is delivering that message day in and day out and uniting the nation to make sure that we are on the right footing going forward.

MARIA BARTIROMO, FOX BUSINESS NETWORK ANCHOR: Do you support Elise Stefanik for that job?

MCCARTHY: Yes, I do.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: So joining us now is Tim Alberta, a staff writer at "The Atlantic."

Tim, I was reading a quote from you that is so on target here. You were saying, essentially, the biggest challenge for politicians now is to find a way to tell their constituents the truth.

In some ways, you have wings now in House Republican Leadership that's just saying we're not going to bother. We're going to continue to tell our constituents the election lie. In fact we're going to make that the price of admission in house leadership now. Your thoughts?

TIM ALBERTA, STAFF WRITER, "THE ATLANTIC": Yes, John, this has been sort of the defining characteristic of the modern Republican Party and its transformation over the last decade or so. You know, you have Republicans who are unwilling to confront their constituents and tell them, hey, you know what, Barack Obama actually was born in the U.S., so you should probably tone down the birther stuff. Hey, guess what? The Affordable Care Act is not going to be repealed because we don't have majorities to do it. And by the way, the guy whose name is on the law, he is still President, so we're going to tone that down, too.

Oh, this election that you believe was stolen because you're watching too much FOX News and you're living off of the President's Twitter feed? It's nonsense. There's zero evidence to substantiate it.

This is the world that Republicans have been living in for some time, and they have in large part, created this atmosphere where they are a part of this sort of vicious cycle where they help to enable these lies and these falsehoods, these deceptions that then sort of hypnotize so many of their constituents into believing these things that become self-destructive to the ends of the party.

And when you do have some brave soul like Liz Cheney, who has the courage to stand up and say, actually, this is not true. This thing that you're all -- that you're all believing in and that you're basing so much of your sort of political existence on is a lie and we need to confront it, that person no longer finds themselves welcome in the party and Liz Cheney is obviously the highest profile example we have of that today, but there are others.

Jeff Flake, Mark Sanford, Justin Amash, Bob Corker, you go down the list of some the Republicans in the recent years who have been willing to speak some modicum of sanity and truth inside the party apparatus and they are ejected out.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Tim, I want to ask you about this. You know, we've seen this unexpected slowdown in hiring nationwide, there's an uptick in unemployment and the answer for some Republican governors has been to end that Federal unemployment benefit. We are talking about 300 bucks, and they're saying, look, it's incentivizing people to not work.

Of course, there may also be other reasons why people cannot logistically get to work. I think we need to mention that, too. But I wonder what your reaction is as you look at this prescription coming from Republican governors.

ALBERTA: Yes, look, I think it makes a lot of sense that Republican governors are taking this approach now. And I say that from a political standpoint more than necessarily from a policy standpoint because when you talk to Republicans locally, I'm talking like at the county and grassroots level, this is now an issue that is really animating a lot of small business owners, a lot of people who have had now hiring signs hung up on their businesses for the last couple of months and are getting no bites.

[08:10:10]

ALBERTA: A lot of small restaurants are closing back down voluntarily just doing to-go and takeout orders because they can't staff their restaurants with bartenders, with waiters, with hostesses and bussers and whatnot.

So this is an issue, really in the last few months that I've noticed on the ground that has gotten enormous traction among Republican activists, among Republican operatives. And so it's not, I think, accidental that that has filtered up to Republican chief executives in a lot of states who are trying to both be responsive to the pandemic, but also be responsive to the business community it feels like it's in a state of crisis right now. BERMAN: So we mentioned, Tim, you are now at "The Atlantic." For

people who follow you and follow your career, that's a new thing, and your first piece is this really touching piece about a small town opera house in Ohio reopening and, like all good stories do, it involves an Elvis impersonator. Tell us what you found.

ALBERTA: Yes, John, I was really privileged to get down to Nelsonville, Ohio, which is a small town in Appalachia sort of near the West Virginia border and there is this beautiful historic opera house there called Stuart's, and it has been around since the late 19th Century and it has gone through some incredible periods of tumult and has almost burned down twice. It is still standing as sort of a symbol of that region's resilience.

And after shutting down for a year due to COVID, it reopened back in March and I had the chance to be there as it reopened, and it was really quite a scene to be around a lot of folks who had been holed up for much of the past year and some folks, frankly, who didn't know if they were going to survive COVID.

And I think it just sort of stood as a testament to not only the joys of reopening, but frankly also to some of the trauma and the guilt and the things that people are carrying with them beyond this pandemic that they have experienced over this period of time.

It was an incredible experience for me to be there and I hope that people get a chance to read about it.

BERMAN: They should absolutely go read it. Do it now. It's a great piece, Tim. All your writing is so great. Thanks for joining us this morning.

ALBERTA: Thanks, guys, I appreciate it.

BERMAN: So some Republicans making false claims about President Biden and the economy. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JIM BANKS (R-IN): Republicans are almost completely unified in a single mission to oppose the radical dangerous Biden agenda and win back the majority in the midterm election.

And any other focus other than that is a distraction from stopping the Biden agenda from what it has already done in three months, sending this economy in a tailspin.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: All right, chief business correspondent, Christine Romans joins us now. The economy not actually in a tailspin.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN BUSINESS CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: No, what's happening in the American economy, John, is the opposite of tailspin. Let's start with jobs: more than 1.5 million jobs created over the

first full three months of the Biden presidency, compare that with his predecessors. So, it is triple the total from Trump's first full three months. For Obama, the great recession wiped out 2.2 million jobs in that period, and for bush, 235,000 jobs were lost then. That was the dot-com bust, remember?

But today, signs everywhere of an American comeback from a COVID collapse. Vaccinations mean reopenings. Layoffs are slowing.

Wages, John are finally rising. We learned, Friday, of 21 cents an hour in April. The emergency aid is flowing. The latest installment as of last week, 164 million payments of up to $1,400.00 sent to Americans.

It's been record financial support from the Federal Reserve and from Congress and more is coming. Direct payments to parents with children begin in July, up to $3,600.00 per child. It's probably why, John and Brianna, for the first time in the pandemic, a majority of Americans polled by CNN rate the economy good, evidence that Main Street is finally catching up to Wall Street.

Now, even as President Biden pursues lifting taxes on corporations, stocks are setting records. Just this year, the S&P 500 up almost 14 percent. Of course, you know I always say this. Presidents get too much credit and too much blame for what happens in the economy on their watch.

The first direct payments to Americans happened under the last Congress and the last President. This is no mission accomplished yet. The economy is still down 8.2 million jobs since the pandemic began, and there are downsides to a red-hot recovery, right? Surging demand from consumers, supply bottlenecks mean higher prices for a lot of people.

There's also this fascinating new debate about whether those extra jobless benefits meant to cushion all that job loss are keeping workers from taking new jobs. A few Republican governors as you have reported are trying to opt out of that program calling it a disincentive to return to work. But these are good problems, John, and it is a sign that the economy is recovering.

BERMAN: Christine Romans, thank you very much. A dose of reality.

So Dr. Anthony Fauci says it might be time to relax some indoor mask mandates. We'll hear from President Biden's Health Secretary, next.

KEILAR: And college kids kicked out of classes for partying off campus without masks, and their parents are fighting back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:29:15]

BERMAN: Just released, a major new directive from the Department of Health and Human Services enforcing a ban on discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity in health care.

Joining me now is Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra. Secretary, tell us what this new directive means.

XAVIER BECERRA, U.S. HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES SECRETARY: John, thanks for having me. It simply says what everyone should know. You should not discriminate against people: that includes those based on sexual orientation or gender identity. And when it comes to health care, we want to make sure that's the case. There is a provision in the Affordable Care Act which said that, and so now it's clear. There's no ambiguity. You cannot discriminate against people based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

BERMAN: A move being made today by H.H.S. We appreciate you announcing it here.

I want to ask you about something that Dr. Anthony Fauci said yesterday. He said it might be time to relax mask mandates indoors, particularly among vaccinated people.

[08:30:11]