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New Day

Supreme Court to Hear Case Concerning Mississippi Law Restricting Abortion; New Book from Former Trump White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows Reveals Former President Trump Tested Positive for COVID-19 Days before Debate with Joe Biden. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired December 01, 2021 - 08:00   ET

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

[08:00:00]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: I think it's illuminating, and this reporting is just so essentially. Kyung, thank you for it.

KYUNG LAH, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: You bet.

KEILAR: NEW DAY continues right now.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning to our viewers here in the United States and all around the world. It is Wednesday, December 1st. I'm John Berman with Brianna Keilar. We do have a lot of breaking news today. The Supreme Court is about to hear oral arguments in what could possibly be the most consequential abortion rights case since Roe versus Wade.

KEILAR: The case today centers around a Mississippi law that bans most abortions after 15 weeks. It grants no exception for rape or incest. Prolife and prochoice protesters have already gathered in anticipation of this ruling. So let's go now to CNN's Jessica Schneider who is live from the Supreme Court. Jess?

JESSICA SCHNEIDER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Brianna. This is one of the most consequential cases this court has heard in decades, and the protesters are out here to prove it. At issue here is whether Mississippi can ban most abortions with few exceptions after 15 weeks. If this solidly conservative court rules that it can, it will be rewriting its own precedent. And that would trigger a wave of abortion bans in states across the country.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

SCHNEIDER: The Supreme Court is about to revisit a hot button culture war issue it hasn't taken head on in decades. Should the landmark case Roe v. Wade be overturned?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're saving more of the unborn than any state in America.

SCHNEIDER: Mississippi's Republican governor signed the abortion bill and issue into law in 2018, but it has been blocked by lower courts ever since because it directly conflicts with Supreme Court precedent. Roe v. Wade in 1973 and the follow-up case Planned Parenthood v. Casey in 1992, established that the Constitution protects a woman's choice to have an abortion and that states can only ban abortions after the point of viability. That's when a fetus can survive outside of the womb. The court said in 1992 that point is between 23 and 24 weeks.

But the Mississippi law bans abortions much earlier, after 15 weeks, with exceptions only for medical emergencies or severe fetal abnormalities. And now the state solicitor general will argue before the Supreme Court that there is nothing in the Constitution that even supports a woman's right to have an abortion. If the court won't go that far, the state wants the justices to erase the viability line and uphold its 15-week ban.

GOV. TATE REEVES, (R) MISSISSIPPI: I believe very strongly that if you read the Constitution, there is nowhere in the Constitution that prohibits individual states, states like Mississippi, to limit access to abortions. And so I think Roe was wrongly decided.

SCHNEIDER: The case will be heard exactly three months after Texas successfully banned most abortions after just six weeks. That law has sparked protest and outrage nationwide. But so far abortion clinics and even the Justice Department have been unable to convince a court to block the law because of the unique way it's structured, empowering private citizens rather than state officials to enforce the law by allowing regular people to sue others who violate the restrictions.

The Supreme Court is still considering whether various challenges to the Texas law can move forward. Now the six-three conservative court will also consider whether to redraw the viability line or overturn Roe v. Wade completely.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Roe v. Wade has got to go.

SCHNEIDER: Abortion rights activists are concerned the court will give states much more leeway to restrict abortions.

NANCY NORTHUP, PRESIDENT AND CEO, CENTER FOR REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS: By the estimation of our analysis, about half the states in the United States would ban abortion if Roe were overturned. And that means large swaths of the south and the Midwest where people have to cross multiple state lines to get access to abortion care. And not everyone has the means to be able to do that.

SCHNEIDER: A recent "Washington Post" poll found that 60 percent of U.S. adults believe the court should uphold Roe v. Wade. But the composition of the court has left the fate of abortion law in doubt. Conservative Justice Clarence Thomas has publicly called for Roe to be overturned, and former President Trump predicted his three picks, Justices Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett, would overturn abortion precedent, though all three described Roe as settled law during their confirmation hearings.

LILA ROSE, PRESIDENT AND FOUNDER, LIVE ACTION: It's historic the Supreme Court is taking up abortion once again at this particular time with the current composition of the court. I think that there is a very good chance with who is on the court now that they will finally acknowledge the science, that human life doesn't begin at birth, it begins before birth, that these are human beings like you or me.

(END VIDEO TAPE)

SCHNEIDER (on camera): And if the court were to overturn Roe v. Wade, would have immediate repercussions. There are actually a dozen states that have post Roe trigger laws on the books. That means they would ban abortions the second that Roe is overturned. So if this court rules in favor of Mississippi, this could change the landscape across the country. But Brianna, it is not likely a decision will come quickly.

[08:05:01]

The court will hear arguments at 10:00 this morning but likely won't issue a decision until this spring, probably in June, when they often issue their most consequential decisions. But no doubt this is a decision that people across the political spectrum will be bracing for. Brianna?

KEILAR: Certainly. Jessica, thank you for that report.

BERMAN: We have still more breaking news this morning. Donald Trump tested positive for coronavirus days before the White House ever told anything to the American public and three days before his first debate with Joe Biden. That stunning revelation is in a new book by former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows. It was obtained by "The Guardian." He says Trump tested positive on September 26th, 2020. The debate was September 29th. Meadows does say there was a subsequent negative test, but no real answers over why they were relied on one test rather than another.

KEILAR: According to "The Guardian," Meadows writes that he knew each candidate was required to test negative for the virus within 72 hours of the start. But nothing was going to stop Trump from going out there, he says. CNN has not confirmed this independently. We, though, have reached out to all parties involved. We're waiting to hear back.

BERMAN: So this is the timeline as we know it with the new claims. On Saturday, the 26th, Trump hosted the Rose Garden event for now Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett. Few masks, no social distancing in what is suspected to have been a super spreader event now. Many who attended would later test positive.

That is the day that Trump first tested positive. Then later that day, tested negative in a Binax rapid test according to Meadows in this report. The day after that, Trump attended indoor events with gold star military families. Two days later, on Tuesday, the 29th, Chris Wallace at FOX says Trump was not tested at the debate because he arrived late, and they allowed him on stage due to what Wallace called the honor system. Later that week on Thursday, the 1st, Trump did officially test positive according to his doctor. That's had they told us he tested positive and other tests. And on Friday the 2nd Trump went to the hospital.

KEILAR: Joining us now, CNN anchor and chief domestic correspondent Jim Acosta. And this confirms, I think, what we knew about the timeline, but what we're learning here that is so, I think, significant, is just the stunning disregard for life that the former president and those around him had for so many people, these gold star military families, White House staff, potentially exposed -- at least knowingly, potentially exposing them, and perhaps the next president of the United States who, because of his age category, was vulnerable.

JIM ACOSTA, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF DOMESTIC CORRESPONDENT: Yes, and not to mention people in the press covering the White House every -- not that we should worry about that. But Brianna, this just goes to how totally reckless Donald Trump and his White House was about COVID. They were just totally reckless the entire time.

I've been talking to my sources this morning, and one of my sources who was in the administration at the time said you have to remember, not only were they keeping this close to the vest, but they were keeping Trump's COVID battle close to the vest. Remember how sick Trump was with COVID at the time. And what were we told in the press? We were told he just has mild symptoms, and so on. Meanwhile, he's struggling to hang on to life at the hospital, at Walter Reed.

At the time, Dr. Sean Conley, the White House physician, was reassuring Americans that the president was doing OK, while Mark Meadows, who wrote this book, was going around Dr. Conley and telling reporters individually, and this has come out subsequently, that, no, Trump was doing much worse than what was being reported at the time.

Keep in mind also, Chris Christie got COVID right after this. He was doing debate prep for Donald Trump at that time. And some of this may explain why Trump was so erratic and crazy during that first presidential debate. Remember, this was the debate where he said that the Proud Boys should stand back and stand by. And so there were just tons of red flags that were popping up at the time. But this one White House source, Trump White House source I talked to just a short while ago this morning was saying this is totally consistent with how they were behaving at the time.

BERMAN: I will tell you, look, according to Meadows there was this negative test after, a Binax rapid test, which Sanjay earlier said probably wasn't as reliable as the first positive test. But they have two conflicting tests. They don't do a tiebreaker. So if you believe Meadows here, there is at a minimum a conspiracy of denial that there is a major issue here and maybe a conspiracy of deceit. And the reason I say that, you brought up Sean Conley. And this was after the president was hospitalized, the former president was hospitalized and sick. I want you to listen when Sean Conley was directly asked, directly asked about the timing and timeline, the testing timeline.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Can you tell us when he had his last negative test? Was it Thursday, was it Wednesday? Do you remember when he had his last negative test?

[08:10:00]

DR. SEAN CONLEY, PHYSICIAN: I don't want to go backwards. (END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: He knew when he said that to the American people. He knew exactly when the president had been tested and when the positive and negative tests were, and he chose there to dodge.

ACOSTA: And John, that was a remarkable day because, remember, after Dr. Sean Conley gave those remarks to the press, Mark Meadows, who is there at the time, who was with Trump throughout his bout with COVID at Walter Reed, Mark Meadows went around Dr. Conley and told reporters, no, Trump is doing far worse than what the Dr. Conley is telling everybody.

This was -- I don't want to call it a conspiracy to deceive everybody. It was a conspiracy of dunces in the way they were handling this. It was just stupid lying the way they were -- the way they were communicating this to the American people.

And remember, the thing that people have to remember about Donald Trump and the way the White House handled COVID, they were reckless the entire time. Remember, Donald Trump while at Walter Reed got in an SUV with other Secret Service agents and went on a joyride while he's sick with COVID just to wave to people outside of Walter Reed. This show you once again how they were completely out of control and how they were handling this pandemic the entire time. From telling people they could inject themselves with disinfectants, to saying it was all going to go away, time and again this is how they behaved.

And I will tell you, John, Brianna, when I was inside the White House covering all of this, this trickled down to the rest of the staff. Kayleigh McEnany, other top officials in the communications and press office, would not wear masks inside the White House while we were all walking around wearing masks, because they just didn't believe in any of this stuff. They just thought that getting COVID was like getting the common cold. It was absolutely reckless.

KEILAR: And maybe they believed in it, but they wanted to keep their boss happy, right? I just -- there are so many people who lost loved ones, and they're angry at the disregard that the Trump administration, that President Trump showed for the lives of their family. I would say don't feel too special because he did the same thing to his own family. And he also knowingly potentially exposed gold star families to infection. And reminder, this is what he said after his battle with COVID about where maybe he got it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: Sometimes I would be with -- in groups of, for instance, gold star families. I met with gold star families. I didn't want to cancel that. They all came in and they all talked about their son and daughter and father, and I can't back out and say, give me room, I want room, give me 12 feet, stay 12 feet away when you talking. They come, they come within an inch of my face sometimes. They want to hug me and they want to kiss me. And they do. And frankly, I'm not telling them to back up.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KEILAR: Sure wish he had for their sake because that day, he knew, he had tested positive at that point in time, and furthermore, he was symptomatic, according to Meadows.

ACOSTA: And the other thing, Brianna and John, the other thing you have to keep in mind with the way they handled this, they were completely trying to pull the wool over people's eyes in terms of disclosing when staffers caught COVID. There were instances throughout those months that we were dealing with this pandemic that we would find out later on that other individuals inside the White House, other individuals inside the president's team, had caught COVID. And they did not tell the American people right then and there.

And so they were putting members of the press at risk, they were putting visitors to the White House at risk, gold star families. That's just the beginning of people who were coming in and out of that White House. They were having holiday parties, remember, Brianna, during the month of December. They were having rallies, press briefings. Dr. Anthony Fauci was coming -- all the health official who were trying to tackle the pandemic, they were coming into close contact with all of these Trump officials, and they just didn't -- they cared more about themselves than they did the American people.

So why should we be surprised about things like the insurrection, things like the big lie, and so on? This is -- when I tell always people the one lesson learned from the Trump administration, the Trump White House, is that they all thought they were working for Donald Trump. They always forgot who they were working for, and that's the American people. And I think that was their downfall at the end of the day.

KEILAR: Yes, look. We focus on this because it is important. He's still very much a fixture in politics. He's the central nervous system of the GOP.

ACOSTA: Can you imagine if he were handling COVID now? What kind of trouble we would be in --

KEILAR: Actually, I can. I actually can because we went through it the first time, I would say. Jim Acosta, thank you so much.

ACOSTA: Sure.

KEILAR: Coming up, the chilling video from inside a classroom as high school students sheltered in place during a deadly shooting. We're going to go live to Michigan next.

And why were some of the world's most powerful men named at the trial of accused sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell.

[08:15:01]

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Plus, the Biden administration rolling out new guidance in response to the Omicron variant. What it could mean for everyone travelling from overseas? (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BERMAN: New details emerging in the deadly shooting in Michigan where a 15-year-old student opened fire at his high school, killing three and wounding eight others. You saw this chilling video from inside one of the classrooms as students sheltered in place and spoke to someone outside the door.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're not willing to take that risk right now.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I can't hear you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're not taking that risk right now.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Okay.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, bro, he said, bro.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He said, bro, red flag.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Go.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Slow down. You're fine.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BERMAN: That's just chilling.

Joining me now is Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard.

Sheriff, thank you for being with us. We're so sorry for what your community is going through.

If I can just ask you, we just played that video which really is chilling there, those students apparently the person trying to get in the room there was the shooter, misrepresenting who he was and those students had the good sense to recognize that and flee.

[08:20:10]

What does that tell you?

SHERIFF MICHAEL BOUCHARD, OAKLAND COUNTY, MICHIGAN: Well, I actually have heard about some of the videos, but we haven't seen them all, we're asking people to send them to us. A lot have been posted on social media.

But based on, you know, what I saw last night, I went back to the school, and was there most of all night, and the evidence I've seen there shows he was very clearly trying to kill people. And so a ruse like this wouldn't have surprised me given the way he was acting.

BERMAN: What's the latest on the condition of those who were injured? Do you have any updates? BOUCHARD: You know, most of the remaining victims are stable, except

two are critical. And one is extremely critical. So, those are the two that we're watching. As you know, we had three tragically already passed, but we've got two that are critical and one that's extremely critical.

BERMAN: One that's extremely critical. Obviously, they're in all of our thoughts this morning.

Sheriff, can you give us an update on the investigation, we know you have the shooter in custody.

BOUCHARD: Yes. He is not talking and his parents have asked for an attorney and under Michigan law, we can't speak to a juvenile without parental permission and they have refused that permission.

So, we can't get the motive from the suspect that we have in custody, but we think that we have got a path to get a lot of supportive information as to how and why this occurred. We have recovered some evidence that we're now beginning to pore over.

I've seen some of the actual video of the shooting itself, and, you know, it is clear that he came out with the intent to kill people. He was shooting people at close range, oftentimes towards the head or chest.

BERMAN: You say that it was clear he wanted to kill people. You talk about the distance he was at. What else does the video tell you?

BOUCHARD: It's chilling. I mean, it's just absolutely cold-hearted murderous. And our forensic team was working all night, and so far, I believe they've recovered over 30 shell casings. So, we believe he fired at least 30 shots.

BERMAN: I'm sorry, I keep wincing when you tell me these things. It is so hard for me to hear some of the details. So hard for all of us to hear the details he clearly went there to kill people and was shooting at very close range.

Look, what other evidence have you recovered from the residence?

BOUCHARD: We're not releasing right at the moment. They're still poring through it. Our investigators, you know, they executed a search warrant there and the detectives that were at the school. We believe we have some writings that contain some of his thoughts and they're beginning to go through that. We're going through, you know, hours of video.

And we've obviously got to interview, you know, over 1,800 people, our students at that school, so we got to interview every student or every potential faculty member that may have seen or heard something that's relevant. We want to make sure we get everything 100 percent done.

I want to hold this person accountable. And the community needs to see that happen. I mean, this is a very calm, sweet, peaceful, quiet community and this has shaken them to the core. BERMAN: You have these writings, you say. Do these writings reveal

intent?

BOUCHARD: That's -- they're beginning to go through those. Those were only picked up in the middle of the night last night when there was talking to some of the investigators.

BERMAN: I have a couple more specific questions here. I mentioned the video that to us sounds like the shooter was going classroom to classroom.

Was the shooter -- do you have evidence the shooter was knocking on classroom doors trying to get in after it had already begun?

BOUCHARD: We know he tried to breach classroom doors. He actually fired through a number of the doors that I looked at last night through the barricaded doors.

I know this much -- that the training of our people who went in immediately and within two minutes of arriving on scene had taken him into custody with a loaded operable firearm, that saved lives.

You know, he still had seven rounds in a magazine and one in the chamber. So, potentially eight lives saved there. We know that the classrooms were barricaded in a form and fashion that we trained with them and encouraged them to do.

And some of those barricades were struck by gunfire. So we know he couldn't get into some of those classrooms. And I think that saved lives.

So, the only silver lining is that our training and their training saved lives. The tragedy is not lost on us because we still have lost lives.

BERMAN: I know. The silver lining which, again, it could have been much worse. It does seem like so many people did correct things here that did save lives, but, still, three people were killed and we have two in critical condition this morning.

[08:25:01]

Sheriff, just one last question about the law in Michigan. I do know that parents can be held accountable in some cases when child commit crimes with firearms. This was a gun, purchased by the father, we understand, four days before.

Is there any legal liability, any investigation about what the parents might be responsible for there and not securing that weapon inside the house?

BOUCHARD: Yeah, sure.

You're correct. Our information is that the parent purchased the firearm four days prior. Obviously, the child was breaking the law, taking, possessing and certainly using that firearm. How he came into custody of it, where it was and those questions are going to be part of our investigation. And the totality of that will then be presented to the prosecutor for charging decisions.

BERMAN: Sheriff Michael Bouchard, I appreciate you answering these questions. We appreciate the work that you've done. The entire community really stepped up to keep this from being even worse.

But even so this morning, it's a tragedy. And we are grieving with you.

BOUCHARD: Thank you, yeah. Terrible, terrible, heart-wrenching tragedy. I appreciate the thoughts and prayers.

BERMAN: All right. There is more news this morning out of Washington, where there is infighting within the Republican Party. Why one lawmaker is calling Marjorie Greene crazy.

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: And controversial TV Dr. Mehmet Oz wants a new title, Pennsylvania senator. But does he even live in Pennsylvania?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)