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New Day

Interview with CDC Director Rochelle Walensky; Delta Variant Surging; Capitol Siege Investigated. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired July 28, 2021 - 07:30   ET

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

[07:30:00]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: If you have a health pass, is that something that the CDC would ever lean into? Or perhaps advise here?

DR. ROCHELLE WALENSKY, CDC DIRECTOR: You know, I think some communities are doing that. And that may very well be a path forward. I do want to sort of comment that in some fully vaccinated venues, if there are people -- if they're unmasked, and there are a few people who are transmitting there, as a fully vaccinated person, it is possible to pick up disease in those settings. We've seen that in some of our outbreak investigations this summer, which is why overall, it's so very critical to just get the huge amount of disease in some of these areas down.

BERMAN: Again, the vaccinated people getting it by and large, they're not getting sick or ill. They're just, you know, carrying the virus and can maybe then pass it on. The vaccination is the easiest, best, most direct way to stay healthy and keep other people healthy.

WALENSKY: Absolutely.

BERMAN: Dr. Rochelle Walensky, I appreciate you being with us this morning. Thank you.

WALENSKY: Thanks so much for having me.

BERMAN: All right, hospitals in some states sounding the alarm. We're going to speak with one doctor says the spread is happening too fast to even grasp.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Plus how the Capitol Riot hearing played on some right wing media outlets for the people who really needed to see it the most.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:35:38]

BERMAN: Hospitals across the country suffering from capacity and staffing issues as cases of COVID-19 surge again. In Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Our Lady of the Lake Hospital announced they are not taking appointments for new non-emergency procedures for the next three weeks, because of the influx of COVID-19 patients. Joining us Dr. Catherine O'Neal, Chief Medical Officer at Our Lady of the Lake Regional Medical Center. Doctor, thank you so much for joining us. How fast is the spread right now in your community?

DR. CATHERINE O'NEAL, CHIEF MEDICAL OFFICER, OUR LADY OF THE LAKE REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER: Right now in the community, the spread is exponential. And that exponential spread is because of the Delta variant. We know now that Delta variant carries thousand times more viral load and everybody who's sick with it. And that spreads to more and more people than previous variants.

So last year's variant that we thought was bad enough was far less contagious than this variant. And that's resulting in just an exponential number of patients coming into the hospital. So this morning, we're sitting at 119 COVID positive patients in our hospital that's a 50 percent increase from just last week.

BERMAN: We're looking at that chart right now. And that incredibly steep rise, you say exponential, you have your arms around it, is this something, you know, you can grasp?

O'NEAL: You don't get your arms around something like this. This isn't a controllable thing. At this point, this is blocking and tackling. This is everyday making a new plan. We had a physician meeting last evening. The ER physicians coming into the meeting look a little shell shocked. They're asking about things like I need some more oxygen tanks, there are people outside that we can't get to that we know are hypoxic. How are we going to get those people in tonight? What are we going to do in the morning?

This is an every 12-hour decision for our hospitals now. We don't have a game plan for three days from now, except that we know that three days from now will be far worse.

BERMAN: Dr. O'Neal to an extent, I almost can't believe what I'm hearing. This sounds like New York City in March of 2020. It sounds like right now you've got a runaway situation.

O'NEAL: You know, it was so hard. We were hit so hard in March and April of 2020. But we never got to that point that we heard stories about in New York and that was our conversation last night, but that it feels like we're headed that way. And now I can see what they were feeling and how do we take out that playbook with that we've never -- we've been through multiple surges with just incredible numbers of patients. But we've never seen this cadence and that speaks to the Delta variant.

The Delta variant is more contagious. It's spreading throughout community too fast and mitigation measures just aren't out there right now.

BERMAN: The patients, what's the vaccination status of most of the patients you're seeing?

O'NEAL: Almost wholly unvaccinated, we are seeing some breakthrough cases. But if you look at everybody under the age of 50, and I say that again, because under the age of 50 should be rare in the hospital. But today that accounts for about 50 percent of our COVID positive patients and they are all unvaccinated.

When you get to the elderly, especially over the age of 80, you are going to find some breakthrough cases. These are patients that we don't expect to make great antibodies. We don't expect them to respond to their vaccine. We were supposed to protect them by being vaccinated ourselves.

BERMAN: Dr. Catherine O'Neal like I can hear the frustration in your voice. I hope you get the help you need. I hope this situation turns around sometime in the near future but it's going to take work. It's going to take work and it's going to take vaccinations from all of us.

I thank you for being with us this morning.

O'NEAL: Thank you for having me.

BERMAN: Up next how the Capitol riot hearing played on some of the former president's favorite media outlets.

CAMEROTA: And big city police chief speaking out they're frustrated by the recent surge in violent crime.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:43:31]

KEILAR: The testimony before the Select Committee on the January 6 Capital attack warranted wall to wall coverage here on CNN. Meanwhile, most conservative networks tried to downplay and discredit the hearing and one seemed to pretend that it didn't deserve coverage at all.

CNN is Brian Stelter is with us now. Not maybe too hard to guess which one Brian, tell us.

BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA CORRESPONDENT: Trump's favorite channel, One America News. That's the one that completely ignored the hearing only air the GOP's counterprogramming. So imagine that the people that needed to see this the most, the people who don't believe there was violence on January 6, they may not have seen it at all as for Fox and Newsmax. Yes, you know these channels did show the hearing live but they surrounded it with so much spin.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

STELTER (voice-over): For a few short hours on Tuesday, Fox and Newsmax viewers did hear the violent truth.

OFFICER MICHAEL FANONE, DC METROPOLITAN POLICE: I heard people in the crowd yelling, get his gun, kill him with his own gun.

STELTER: But then right wing media reverted to form.

GRANT STINCHFIELD, NEWSMAX HOST: I refuse to lead my show with it tonight.

STELTER: Newsmax host Grant Stinchfield dismissing the hearing. STINCHFIELD: It is all theater.

STELTER: And distributing talking points that can be heard all across the right wing web, radio and TV.

STINCHFIELD: I'm having a real hard time believing a lot of what I'm hearing because the video doesn't back up nearly all of it. One officer said he thought it was going to be the moment he died. Well, there were no guns at this place.

STELTER: Of course, there were guns and there were weapons that injured scores some officers.

[07:45:01]

SGT. AGUILINO GONELL, U.S. CAPITOL POLICE: Rebars, bat, PVC pipes, copper pipes, rocks, table legs raking broken down.

STELTER: Newsmax and Fox did air the hearing live but wrapped it in Republican commentary.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They already know this is a political stunt by Pelosi and Democrats and nothing more.

STELTER: And the whitewashing extended into primetime with pundits attacking the politicians who were at the hearing.

REP. ADAM KINZINGER (R-IL): Were defined by how we come back from bad days.

TUCKER CARLSON, FOX NEWS HOST: Kinzinger hadn't cried this hard since he drank too much rose a while watching the final rose ceremony on The Bachelor, the one where they were mean to Brianna.

STELTER: And even insulting the officers who testified.

LAURA INGRAHAM, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: They weren't for best use of an exaggeration in a supporting role, the winners Aquilino Gonel and for best performance and an action roll the winner is Michael Fanone.

STELTER: Newsmax's Greg Kelly went so far as to cast doubt on officer Dunn's account that rioters hurled racial slurs at him and other black officers.

GREG KELLY, NEWSMAX HOST: Where's the audio? I've heard all kinds of audio but I haven't heard that. I haven't heard that. And I doubt that. I do.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

STELTER: Audio proof, video proof, it's never enough. For MAGA media it's not a quest for proof. It's a quest for power. And if anything, the hearing yesterday just intensified the backlash and right wing media intensified the what aboutism (ph). Sadly, there's never going to be a moment of national catharsis about January 6. I think what I'm seeing right wing media who's doing is going deeper into rabbit holes of denialism, Brianna.

KEILAR: Yes, indeed. Brian, thank you so much for putting that together for us. Brian Stelter.

You know there is an alarming surge in violent crime and it has frustrated police chiefs who are now speaking out.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHIEF ROBERT CONTEE, DC METROPOLITAN POLICE: People are really mad as hell right now and I don't blame them. I am too.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: One big city police chief joining us live, next.

BERMAN: And raw emotional testimony from one of the police officers who defended our Capitol. Officer Michael Fanone joins us next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:51:22]

KEILAR: A recent spike in violent crime in the U.S. has police chiefs in major cities across the country frustrated and calling for accountability.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CONTEE: People are really mad as hell right now. And I don't blame them. I am too. That's the reality. And the other reality is I think that people are sick and tired of being sick and tired. I think that people want to ensure that there is accountability for what's happening now.

SUPERINTENDENT DAVID O. BROWN, CHICAGO POLICE: There is documentation from our list in this city that violent offenders are being released back to these communities that are seeing violence.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Let's talk about this now with Art Acevedo. He is the chief of Miami Police Department and President of the Major Cities Chiefs Association. Chief thanks for being with us this morning to talk about this issue. I know it's concerning so many Americans right now. Why is this happening? And what do communities need to do to combat this?

CHIEF ART ACEVEDO, MIAMI POLICE: Well, I mean, it's happening first and foremost, because we have a lot of judges and prosecutors, attorneys, district attorneys across this country that are thinking that their role is to be activists, their roles to coddle and protect violent criminals, instead of protecting our vulnerable communities that are being impacted by the revolving door justice that has this country is turned into and it's time for the American people to speak up, pay attention and realize that it's not just COVID that's killing people. It's the activism of judges and prosecutors across the country.

KEILAR: So you're agreeing with the chief in Chicago? What are you seeing specifically to that issue in Miami?

ACEVEDO: Well, look, I'm fortunate that when I got here, I kind of rang the alarm here in Miami and our judges here actually met with me right away. Our DA met with me right away. But I've only been here for a few months. I came from Harris County which is the largest county in Texas, in Houston, where there are 100 -- 100,000 cases waiting to go to court. Waiting to go to trial.

People going in murder suspects on $100 bond, personal bond four, five, six, seven bonds on violent criminals are going out and hurting people, killing people. And it's time to get the courts running.

And it's time to bring transparency to what the judges are doing and to what the prosecutors are doing in terms of the coddling of these violent offenders because the people in this country deserve safety. They deserve security, and they deserve respect.

KEILAR: You've also spoken out previously about guns. What specifically would you like to be seen done?

ACEVEDO: Well, listen, we have seen violent gang members who have been committing so much fraud with all the COVID money and that just being given out by the government that they're actually using this money to go out and use straw purchasers to buy tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of firearms. They're ending up in the wrong hands. It's time for the Congress. It's past time for the Congress to start dealing with the gun show loophole, a universal background checks having a real straw purchaser law that can go out after these people are buying the guns for these crooks.

And honestly we need to start having people that use firearms that hurt others go to prison. They're not afraid of death, but they are afraid of going to prison. They've got to be held accountable and the justice needs to be swift not taken three to five years to get their cases through the court system.

KEILAR: Last, no this week, a former senator, California Senator Barbara Boxer was assaulted and she was robbed. And this is what she said in the aftermath of that.

[07:55:07]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BARBARA BOXER (D), FORMER U.S. SENATOR FROM CALIFORNIA: We need to come together. And we need to get at the root causes of it. And we need to be very strong, with tough love on our kids, real enforcement and more community policing. I believe in that, and I always have.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: What do you say to that, a call for more community policing. ACEVEDO: You know what community policing is about helping good people, justice. And accountability is about holding bad people accountable. Community policing is not going to be stopping people from pulling the trigger. We've got to -- we'll continue to do our community policing. But we need people that are in the other parts of the criminal justice system to do their job, which is hold violent criminal accountable, and start being transparent, stop hiding behind the road, which is what judges do. They will never answer for their actions.

And start looking at this media, look at how many of these judges are kicking cases for so called no probable cause when all the cause exists, the evidence is there. And they're just kicking cases because they can't. It's time for people to start seeing what's going on with these activist judges across the country.

KEILAR: Chief, can I just ask you finally, before I let you go?

ACEVEDO: Yes.

KEILAR: I mean, look, this is a complex situation. And you know that you are going to have some critics who say, what about the role of police in all of this? You know, they may -- you're pointing the finger somewhere else. What do you say to that criticism?

ACEVEDO: I say that the law enforcement in this country, there's about 800,000 plus police officers are involved in 1,000 shootings a year, more or less. We have almost 1,000 murders between Chicago and Houston, and New York in just three cities. Well over 1,000 murders so far this year, that's what we're approaching.

So we can do both. We can walk and chew gum at the same time. We can reform policing. We can make it better, but let's -- what point at what we think is wrong, and we will point ourselves but ultimately takes all of us rowing in the same direction. And that's not happening right now in our country sadly enough.

KEILAR: Chief, thank you for joining us this morning. We appreciate it.

ACEVEDO: Thanks.

KEILAR: Just ahead. The new Simone Biles bombshell overnight, the superstar gymnast dropping out of another Olympic competition.

BERMAN: A new testimony and video evidence of the Capitol siege will reality ever sink in for the riot deniers?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)