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Floodwaters Could Pose Serious Health Risks; CDC Warns Of Glass, Metal, Snakes In Floodwaters; EPA: Toxic Water Biggest Threat To Public Health; Fierce Legislative Battles Ahead For Congress; Trump Administration Seeks $7.85 Billion For Disaster Relief; WH: Debt Ceiling Must Be Raised By September 29th; President Wants Once In A Generation Tax Reform; President Pushes GOP To Dump Filibuster Rule; Congress May Consider Stop-Gap Budget Bill; Congress Braces For Funding Fight Over Harvey Aid; How To Fund Future Natural Disasters; Trump Talks Reform, Wants Lower Corporate Tax; Congress Agenda: Harvey Aid, Debt Ceiling, Border Wall; Video OF Nurse's Takedown Prompts Police Apology. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired September 02, 2017 - 07:30   ET

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

[07:30:00] PETER HOTEZ, TEXAS CHILDREN HOSPITAL CENTER FOR VACCINE DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR: -- West Nile Virus infection. So there's a big uptick in then the doubling of neuroinvasive disease. So we're going to be on the lookout for West Nile Virus Infection. And of course, now, on the gulf, we have Zika, we have Chikungunya, we have some Dengue and so, we are going to be on the look after that. So we're going to have some serious health problems to look at in the coming weeks. We also have the problem with mold and allergies from that and the possibility of inciting asthma. So we'll have our work cut out for us.

CHRISTI PAUL, CNN HOST: So, doctor, what do you say to people who have been in the floodwaters who are starting to feel badly? I mean, what do they -- what do they do especially in the conditions they have right now? And how long should they be watching the symptoms?

HOTEZ: Well, certainly -- that's a great question. So I think right now if you have been exposed to floodwaters, if you have wounds, you want to get those medically treated because that's how the flesh eating (INAUDIBLE) could enter or staphylococcus. If you have symptoms of diarrheal disease, you want to seek medical attention because you might need antibiotic therapy. But then, also, you want to minimize your exposure to mosquitos because the mosquitos are going to start ramping up in the coming days and weeks. And so, minimizing exposure to mosquitos is going to be very, very important. And if you have mold in your house or if you start to accumulate mold, you want to do everything you can to do some mold abatement and get rid of it.

PAUL: Oh yes. That can be horrible. Doctor Peter Hotez, thank you so much for sharing some really helpful information with us, we appreciate it.

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN HOST: All right. So let's list them off. You've got Harvey aid package, you've got the funding the government, raising the debt ceiling, tax reform. The list that Congress that Congress has to get done. I mean this is growing by the day. Work starts Tuesday. Next, where the battle lines are being drawn here.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:35:00] BLACKWELL: All right, time to get back to work. Congress returns on Tuesday.

PAUL: And when they do, by the way, oh, what a packed plate they have. Here's CNN's Boris Sanchez with the look at what top s the list.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Lawmakers return to Capitol Hill Tuesday with a long to-do list and some fierce legislative battles looming. First on the agenda --

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The basket is now clear of the roof.

SANCHEZ: Hurricane Harvey relief funding.

TOM BOSSERT, HOMELAND SECURITY ADVISER: We're going to need to go up and ask for a disaster supplemental shortly if there are. And there will be needs for additional funding in the future. As those draw down, construction numbers become more clear on the recovery phase. We'll be able to look at them and ask for a third you know, kind of bite at the apple on it.

SANCHEZ: Another item on the agenda that needs immediate attention, the White House asking Congress to raise the debt ceiling before September 29th to avoid the government defaulting on its loans.

REP. PAUL RYAN (R-WI), SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE: We pay our debts in this country. We will continue to do so. So, I'm not worried that that's not going to get done because it's going to get done.

SANCHEZ: Despite assurances from Republicans on a debt ceiling hike, they'll also need to jump another divisive hurdle by the end of the month, passing a new bill to fund the government. After that chaotic September, the President then wants Congress to take up tax reform.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: This is a once in a generation opportunity to deliver real tax reform for every day, hardworking Americans. And I am fully committed to working with Congress to get this job done. And I don't want to be disappointed by Congress. Do you understand me?

SANCHEZ: Democrats saying they will not go along with a plan that cuts taxes for the wealthiest Americans.

SEN. CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY), MINORITY LEADER: This is going to be one of the biggest fights of the next three, four months and Democrats are ready for it.

SANCHEZ: Frustrated by the lack of legislative accomplishments, the President is pushing Republicans to dump the filibuster rule and only require a simple majority of 51 votes to pass a bill, instead of 60. TRUMP: And if we don't, the Republicans will never get anything passed. You are wasting your time.

SANCHEZ: Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell says, that is not a starter.

MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY), MAJORITY LEADER: There are not the votes in the Senate. As I've said repeatedly to the President and all of you, to change the rules of the Senate.

SANCHEZ: Trump's frayed relationship with McConnell and his recent attacks on GOP allies like Tennessee Senator Bob Corker have led to questions of whether the White House may be hindering Republican's efforts to get something done, especially with only 43 shared legislative days left in 2017.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SANCHEZ: One possible option for Congress when it comes to the budget is to pass a stopgap bill that would fund the government at least through the end of the year and then they would pick up the budget battle once again in December. Victor and Christi?

BLACKWELL: All right, Boris, thank you so much. So what will get done and how quickly? We'll talk with our experts Stephen Moore and Peter Morici in just a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:40:00] PAUL: So, three days from now, Congress is going to be back at work and, oh, my goodness, what a month they're going have.

BLACKWELL: I mean, it's a growing list. Let's start here with approving money for Harvey recovery efforts. The President submitted about $8 billion requests, going to prevent government shutdown, then crafted a good tax reform bill that could pass through Congress in the coming months. There's a lot to do, lot to talk about. Let's bring in Stephen Moore CNN Senior Economics Analyst and former Trump Economic Adviser and Peter Morici, International Business Professor at the University of Maryland. Gentlemen, good morning to you.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Good morning.

BLACKWELL: So, Peter, let me start with you. And I don't think there's anyone who doubts there will be an aid package for the people along the Texas Gulf Coast and Louisiana as well. The question is, how soon will it pass and under what conditions? How do the Republicans from that part of the country who voted in2013 either against Sandy funding or to offset that funding, reconcile that decision with not holding the funding for their state to the same standard?

[07:45:21] PETER MORICI, UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS PROFESSOR: Well, I think they simply have to apologize and say, we need some help and their colleagues will respond because face it, no state can handle a disaster like this. We're going to get an initial funding package and we're going to get it quickly. Republicans in Washington, Democrats in Washington, don't want to be in a position of saying no to distressed folks in Texas.

BLACKWELL: Well, Stephen, I think it's also important that you know, although these Lawmakers are called out, these once in a century, once in a millennium storms are happening more often and the Congress, the country will have to have a serious reconsideration with how to fund these recoveries, these multi-billion dollar recoveries.

STEPHEN MOORE, CNN SENIOR ECONOMICS ANALYST: Well, look, I agree with what Peter just said. I mean, I don't think there's any question that they're going to approve this $8 billion aid package and they're going to do it quickly. They'll probably do that the first couple days back because Houston needs the money. I think big fight is going to come over the weeks ahead as more and more money is requested to rebuild Houston. I'm one of these people who think that the best kind of aid is the charitable aid, the aid from the private sector.

You know, we -- I was looking at some of these historical events like the Chicago fire, I'm in Chicago when that happened in the late 19th century and the San Francisco earthquake. And those cities were rebuilt with very little federal money. So there's not a need to just deluge the city with money. And by the way, we found after Katrina that there was tens of billions of dollars wasted. We don't even know what happened with a lot of that money. We don't want to repeat that again.

BLACKWELL: You're not -- you're not suggesting that the Red Cross and some of the charities should come up with tens of billions of dollars to rebuild Houston?

MOORE: No. I'm just saying that the more that it can be done by the private sector and with charitable relief, the better. Because I think federal money -- I mean, as I said, with Katrina, we still to this day don't know what happened with billions and billions of dollars of that money. And by the way, when Congress passed that bill that you're talking about, Victor, a lot of money didn't even going to New Orleans. It became a big pork barrel bill where the states say you know, 100, 200, 300 miles away were getting funds. So we want to make sure it's very targeted to the people who need it.

BLACKWELL: Yes. That was one of the criticisms that we heard from the lawmakers who tried to justify their decision about the Sandy funding. Let me come back to you, Peter. I want to talk about tax reform now. The President was in Missouri a couple days ago. He will be with Dakotans a little later, actually coming up this week. You really don't believe that the White House and Congressional Republicans will be able to pass a tax reform bill and get it to the President's desk for signature?

MORICI: I don't think they will be able to do that, even under reconciliation because they don't have a working majority in the Senate. There are -- the basic problem with the budget is 60 percent of the budget goes for entitlements. And within ten years, it will be close to 100 percent. So, you really can't find money for tax cuts without entitlement reform. With the health care debate indicated as Senators like Murkowski, Capito and Collins and so forth just simply will not sign on for even the most basic entitlement reform, like requiring for example men who are healthy, of working age, who refuse to work to get out look for a job to get Medicaid. Lacking that, you simply can't find the money.

Now, we talked about border tax adjustments but on the right, the Koch Brothers have essentially vetoed that. And the President won't support that. You know, Brady, in the House, has got some creative proposals, but basically Mnuchin who doesn't really have much of a background on taxation has vetoed them all. So my feeling is, they don't have -- you can't make bricks without straw and they don't have any straw.

BLACKWELL: Stephen, I heard a groan there. Put some (INAUDIBLE).

MOORE: Look, I agree with a lot of what Peter just said. I mean, it is true. By the way, who can argue against able bodied people having to work for welfare benefits? I think you're exactly right about that Peter, only the Democrats would be against that. But look, I don't -- I think this is going to be, Victor, a tax cut. That's where I disagree a little bit with Peter. I think, Peter, they are going to pass a bill that over, say, ten years is a $2 trillion tax cut. We believe that if you get this tax bill done, we have the highest business tax rates in the world, it will bring a lot of companies and jobs back to America. If you get the growth rate up, you know, the economy grew up 3 percent in the second quarter.

So far, this quarter is growing at 3.5 percent. I really believe we could potentially get economy growing at four percent with a very well designed program tax cut. And then you are going to get a lot of revenues into the government, Peter. I'm not saying it is going to pay for itself but I will think, you have to get more people back to work.

BLACKWELL: Yes, I don't -- I don't know that -- I saw Peter's head shake here, that he doesn't believe it's going to pay for itself --

MORICI: I think you get about $0.30 back on the dollar if you lucky and as a consequence, one of the basic problems that we have is the White House doesn't want a permanent tax cut, which means, a ten-year bill doesn't do it.

[07:50:08] MOORE: That won't happen.

MORICI: They're going to have to settle for what Mr. Bush settled for, the one that expires.

BLACKWELL: And then you got ten years on that. But let me get to one more thing before we run out of time here. I want to talk about the wall and remind people what the President said about the funding of the border wall just a week and a half ago in Arizona.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: The obstructionist Democrats would like us not to do it but believe me, we have to close down our government, we're building that wall.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLACKWELL: All right, Peter, close this segment down for us. So the President according to a reporting is not going to push to have it in the September funding bill, push it off to December. Why the hold-off and what is the indication that he'll have any more support even from the Freedom Caucus that says that they're willing to vote for a funding measure without wall funding in December.

MORICI: The hard reality for the President is not just the Democrats. There are a good rock grid Republicans who own ranches along the border who don't think a wall is the best way to invest federal funds to deal with the inflow of illegal migrants. The technology means are much more effective. This is a symbolic gesture on the part of the President. You know, people that may be affected, they believe by illegal immigration and other parts of the country somehow are the thing, if we put enough cinder blocks together that somehow rather the problem will go away. Hard truth, the number of number illegal migrants in the United States has not been rising in recent years. Changes in the population in Mexico have basically caused the flow into the United States to much lessen. This is fixing a problem that has already done been fixed. The president should get off it and move on to tax reform and other important issues.

MOORE: Now exactly --

BLACKWELL: Ten seconds, Stephen, ten seconds.

MOORE: This is one of the central promises he made to voters from the very first day he started running for office. Look, I think you got to get this wall built before you could do the substantial immigration reform that I think we all would like to see. So I think you are going to see you know, a clash on this, Victor, in the weeks ahead. But I don't think it's going to lead to a government shutdown.

BLACKWELL: But he's not -- he's not requiring it in September. Do you think we'll get to that point potentially in December?

MOORE: You mean the wall or?

BLACKWELL: Yes, we'll be facing a shutdown.

MOORE: You know, I think the big issue is how do they get to 218 votes to pass a debt ceiling extension because there is a lot of republicans, Victor, who do not want to have voted to raise the debt ceiling and that means Paul Ryan is going to have to go get Democrats to do that. That's going to be a heavy lift to get that debt ceiling.

BLACKWELL: Yes, Mnuchin said the full faith and credit of the United States will not be questioned.

MORICI: It's not.

BLACKWELL: We will continue the conversation. Stephen and Peter, thank you, both. MORICI: Thank you.

MOORE: All right.

PAUL: All right, listen, we have some alarming video of a police officer here shoving a nurse out of a hospital and then arresting her.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: OK. No, we're done. We're done. You're under arrest. We're going.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (INAUDIBLE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're done.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Somebody help me. Stop.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PAUL: Why at arresting officer said the nurse was interfering with a police investigation even though she was following hospital policy?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:55:00] BLACKWELL: Salt Lake City Police Department is apologizing after an officer arrested a nurse who was following hospital protocol.

PAUL: Yes. This is pretty interesting video, let's say. It's kind of hard to watch at points. But here's the background. The nurse refused to allow the officer to draw blood from an unconscious crash victim without legal consent. Dan Simon has what happened next.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

DAN SIMON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The disturbing video comes from the inside of an emergency room. And the woman screaming, a burn unit nurse who has been arrested by a Salt Lake City Police Officer.

ALEX WUBBELS, UNIVERSITY OF UTAH HOSPITAL NURSE: Please -- you're hurting me.

JEFF PAYNE, SALT LAKE CITY POLICE OFFICER: Then walk.

WUBBELS: No.

SIMON: The incident captured by police and hospital cameras happened in July, but now the district attorney says he wants a criminal investigation.

WUBBELS: What department are you with?

PAYNE: Salt Lake City police.

SIMON: University of Utah nurse Alex Wubbels says she was just doing her job, following hospital protocol by refusing to let police take a blood sample from an unconscious patient.

WUBBELS: Is this patient under arrest.

PAYNE: No.

SIMON: Wubbels says Detective Jeff Payne demanded a blood sample from a car crash victim who is in a coma and severely burned. His truck smashed by a car racing from police, according to local media. Wubbels calmly explains the policy for obtaining blood.

WUBBELS: The three things that allow us to do that are if you have an electronic warrant, patient consent or patient or patient under arrest. And neither of those things -- the patient can't consent.

SIMON: She even gets her supervisor on the phone who backs her up. The tension only escalates.

PAYNE: She's the one that has told me no.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes, but sir, you are making a huge mistake right now. Like, you are making a huge mistake because you are threatening a nurse.

PAYNE: OK. No, we're done. We're done. You're under arrest. We're going.

WUBBELS: I can't be under arrest.

PAYNE: We're done.

WUBBELS: No!

SIMON: Salt Lake City's Police Chief apologized and said what happened was unacceptable.

MIKE BROWN, SALT LAKE CITY POLICE CHIEF: I was alarmed by what I saw in the video. I want to be very clear, we take this very seriously.

SIMON: For now Wubbels isn't filing a lawsuit.

WUBBELS: I feel strongly in giving people the benefit of the doubt. And I truly believe that he was honest in his apology and sincere in his willingness to try to make change and make things better.

SIMON: Police released Wubbels without charges that day after she sat in the police car for 20 minutes. Detective Payne said in a written report that his watch commander advised him to arrest the nurse for interfering with a police investigation. Payne and another officer now on administrative leave as internal investigators look into the startling incident. Dan Simon, CNN Salt Lake City.

END