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House Leaders Discuss Returning Early To Capitol Hill To Address Postal Service; Trump Backs Postmaster General As Inspector General Begins Review Of Changes, Ethics Compliance; Protesters Face Off With Police In Chicago; Sources: Democrats Considering Cutting House Recess Short; Trump Doesn't Refute False Birther Theory About Senator Harris; Trump COVID Response: "We Have Done It Right". Aired 9-10p ET

Aired August 15, 2020 - 21:00   ET

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

[21:00:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is CNN Breaking News.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Welcome to our viewers here in United States and around the World, I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington. This is a Special Edition of THE SITUATION ROOM.

And as breaking news right now, Democrats in Congress floating the possibility of a move that is rare, it would be historic and potentially so critical. House leaders may cut their summer recess short, get back to Capitol Hill and gavel back into session.

Now, the reason to try and undo some of the actions taken this week by the postmaster general of the United States, as the notion of a widespread mail-in presidential election becomes more and more likely. Sources telling CNN this evening that there significant support among House Democrats to return to Washington early from their vacation, to get back to work and call this postal service crisis into action. We're going to get into all of that in just a moment.

But there's also breaking news out of Chicago right now. Protesters calling for an end to police brutality, and they are in fact facing off with police. Right now, the confrontation reportedly leading to arrests. Organizers of the rally, originally plan to shutdown the Dan Ryan Express Way.

But the protest was rerouted through Chicago's South Side. CNN's Omar Jimenez is on the scene for us. It's pretty dramatic what's going on. Omar is joining us in the phone.

The organizers of this march apparently worked with law enforcement to try to coordinate the shutdown of the express way. Omar, tell us what's going on. What is happening?

OMAR JIMENEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, right now, that's how they started. There protests were supposed to go in the Dan Ryan Express Way, as it's known here in Chicago. They are rerouted out of that and work their way from the South Side toward downtown.

Now, some of the clashers that we're seeing right now, it's actually -- there are different type of clashes because they are clashing with new security protocols, that it didn't put in place over the course of the past week in Chicago. Last week, last Sunday night to be exact.

We've got images of people looting and breaking into businesses in the downtown area of Chicago. So in response, the mayor and police department really made extreme efforts to protect this part of the city. With that, I mean, they've raised the bridges in downtown, so the access is much tougher.

They've closed exists from the highways to get in, in the overnight hours. And they've also instituted a curfew in the overnight hours as well. So these clashes that you are seeing are new types of clashes with police that every night, over the course of the past week, have formed and added security presence to protect some of these downtown areas.

Now, let's contextualize a little bit. This has been already a very tough year for the city of Chicago. And a lot of the protest that we've seen, week-in and week-out, have sure been sparked by the death of George Floyd back at the end of May. But also, this is a city that has seen spikes in violence this year, with homicides and shootings up more than 40% at points this year compared to the same time last year, after violence had been declining year after year for three years in a row.

So the city has really tried to get a hand on this, within the context, the complicating context of the pandemic that we are in. And, of course, as we are now seeing added resources to hopefully trying to help the mayor, the mayor hopes, from the federal government and operation. But there are a lot of things, a lot of factors coming together, even though the numbers might not has been extreme here in Chicago.

We are seeing the passion and the emotion play out in some of these clashes, Wolf.

BLITZER: Yes. And let's hope that it gets back and be peaceful. Omar, we'll stay in close tough with you. Thank you very much. Omar Jimenez reporting from the streets of Chicago.

Now, there are some news we're following, including some fast growing battles emerging over the US Postal Service, with just 80 days left before Election Day here in the United States. And more states offering mail-in voting well before that.

Let's go to CNN's Kristen Holmes. She's joining us from New Jersey, outside not far from the President's country club where he's staying right now. You were there, Christine, at the President's news conference a little while ago, where he stood by his postmaster general against slammed mail-in voting here in the United States. Update our viewers.

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, that's right. This is the first time we really heard him talking about the postmaster general. Here's what we knew about Louis DeJoy.

That he was a Trump ally, a mega donor, to the point where he was actually the 2020 finance chair for that Charlie Convention that is not going to fully happen now. But at that time, that is a big job there.

[21:05:02]

Now, Louis DeJoy has instituted several different policies, changes to the postal service, that he says are part of a good business model. However, is raising a lot of red flags, particularly among Democratic and Republican law makers, state officials, as well as postal workers who believe this could have a negative impact on the 2020 election.

Now, as you said, President Trump also talked about how there was fraudulent voting when it came to mail voting, something that we know is not true in terms of a widespread effect of mail-in voting.

And he also slammed Democrats over funding for the postal service. Take a listen to what he said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF UNITED STATES: The Democrats aren't approving the proper funding for postal. And they are not approving the proper funding for this ridiculous thing that they want to do, which is all mail-in voting. If universally, you could call it mail-in voting.

Again, absentee voting is great. You request -- I'm an absentee voter because I requested, I got, and then I sent in my votes. So that works out very well. That's what we've had.

But now they want to send in millions and millions of ballots. And you see what's happening. They are being lost, they are being discarded. They are finding them in piles. It's going to be a catastrophe.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HOLMES: And I know that you've talked to our CNN fact checker Daniel Dale about this. But the instances that Donald Trump list as widespread voter fraud are generally not about actual voter fraud.

And we should be clear here, there has been fraud in voting before, but it is extremely limited. So the idea that people, when we know that there are millions of them, who are going to, probably for the first time, cast a ballot through the mail, through the post office. And then, the fact that they are listening to this and thinking that it might be widespread fraud is really going to impact the system.

And it's just not true, particularly when it comes to this idea of widespread fraud. There is no evidence of that. And I think we need to make that very clear because, things are not going to change. A pandemic is still raging around us. People are scared to go to the actual ballot box. They want to use mail-in voting. And the idea that you would try to diminish this system and say that it is going to be filled with fraud, is actually terrifying when people don't know what else to do. That's the only way they feel safe voting. Wolf?

BLITZER: All right, Kristen. Thank you very much, Kristen Holmes reporting for us.

President Trump is returning right now to one of the uglier chapters in his political playbook, we're calling it birtherism, and his target this time in newly-knitted vice presidential candidate Senator Kamala Harris. He was pushed on it at the news conference he held a little while ago. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: I have nothing to do with that. I read something about it, and I will say that he is brilliant lawyer, that I guess he wrote an article about it. So I know nothing about it, but it's not something that bothers me.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: But, sir, when you do that, you'd create --

TRUMP: Why do you say that? I just don't know about it, but it's not something that we will be pursuing. Let me put it differently.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Mr. President, you know.

TRUMP: Let me put it differently. Don't tell me what I know. Let me put it differently. Let me put it differently.

To me, it doesn't bother me at all. I don't know about it, I read one quick article. The lawyer happens to be a brilliant lawyer, as you probably know.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: All right. Let's discuss this in more with the former Obama Senior Adviser, Valerie JARRETT, worked with the president at the White House for eight years. She's also the author of a new book, there you see, the cover, "Finding My Voice when the Perfect Plan Crumbles: The Adventure Begins."

Valerie, thanks so much for joining us. And I'm anxious to get your take on the President revisiting this type of conspiracy theory, what, less than three months out of the -- out from the presidential election.

VALERIE JARRETT, FORMER OBAMA SENIOR ADVISER: But the same old playbook he tried with President Obama, the birther conspiracy is unfounded and it's outrageous. And it actually takes away from our conversation about the issues that should be debated in this election.

Senator Harris was born in the United States, full stop. He should say, with absolute passion, she's a citizen. I don't support this talk. I don't care about somebody who wrote an article, move on from here. And let's have a debate on the issues in particular.

BLITZER: I think we've just lost our connection. We'll see if we can reconnect with Valerie. We've got lots to discuss. So we're going to try to fix it.

We'll take a quick break. Our coverage will continue right after this.

[21:09:50]

BLITZER: Welcome back. We've reestablished our connection with former Obama senior adviser Valerie Jarrett.

Valerie, we were talking about the President now leaving open this possibility of Senator Kamala Harris, raising questions about whether she's really eligible to be vice president or president because her parents were immigrants. And he's refusing to walk away from this article that this conservative legal scholar had written up.

The President eventually, after years of raising the birther conspiracy theory about President Obama, he eventually, in September of 2016, during the campaign, he eventually walked it back. But listen to how he did it then.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: Hillary Clinton and her campaign of 2008 started the birther controversy. I finished it. I finished I, you know what I mean. President Barack Obama was born in the United States. States, period.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

[21:15:02]

BLITZER: All right. So let me get your reaction when you heard. He's accusing Hillary Clinton of actually starting the birther movement. And then, finally, after years of refusing to do so, acknowledging that President Obama was actually born in the United States.

JARRETT: And if I remember correctly, Wolf, he made that announcement at one of his properties, where he knew all of the press would be there, paying attention. Look, he was one of the major proponents of the birther movement. He fielded, he reinforced it for years. He said he had people who had evidence in Hawaii that President Obama's birth certificate wasn't legitimate. He kept calling for it.

And so finally, President Obama released it just to silence it. But all of this is a distraction, and it's moving away from the real issues that we should be talking about. He has now a track record as president. It should be debated. We should be hearing from Vice President Biden and Senator Harris about what their plans are to move our country forward with everything that is at stake right now, Wolf. It just does not make sense to have any distractions.

We should be talking about how are we going to cure this illness, how are we going to contain it, how are we going to make sure that Americans get back to work, how are we going to keep our essential workers safe, how are we going to make sure that children can go back to school, that college students can go back on campus without worrying about their health. There are so many important issues to be debated. And for him to once again bring up this old tired, really racist playbook is outrageous.

Why is it that the only people whose citizenship was ever questioned are people of color?

BLITZER: And I remember back in 2012, I had a lengthy interview with then candidate, within private citizen, I should say, Donald Trump. I used to interview him all the time. He was on the phone, and I pushed him on this on this birther issue involving President Obama.

I want to play the exchange I had with him then.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Donald, have you seen the actual newspaper announcements within days of this birth in Honolulu? For example, the Honolulu Star Bulletin will put it up there. You see the birth announcement back in 1961. The Honolulu -- can I ask the question?

(CROSSTALK)

BLITZER: Donald? Donald, you're beginning to sound a little ridiculous. I have to tell you.

TRUMP: No, I think you are, Wolf. Let me tell you something. I think you sound ridiculous.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: The interview took place right after the state of Hawaii formally, officially publicly released the original birth certificate, the birth certificate of President Obama. And he was still suggesting, in the course of that interview, well, maybe it was a forgery. There were Democrats involved. He didn't believe it. And he wanted to continue the investigation. Then four years later, we know he finally acknowledged that Barack Obama was born in the United States.

So, do you see something like that going on right now involving the vice president, the Democratic vice presidential candidate Senator Kamala Harris?

JARRETT: Of course, it is. And I think what we should do is just nip it in the bud. It's important for the media to nip it in the bud. It's important for members of the Republican Party to say this playbook doesn't work. You see what you try to do with President Obama, and he was elected not once, but twice.

And again, I think it's actually just an attempt to avoid talking about his track record as president. If he can dangle a shiny object, get everybody to go and focus on that, then perhaps we're not looking at the fact that we have over 160,000 Americans who've died, millions of people who've lost their jobs, people who are scared to death about sending their kids back to school, people who can't visit their loved ones in the hospital at the time when they are on the verge of dying or have died.

What Americans are going through right now, Wolf, is devastating, and it's on his watch. And that's what we should be talking about.

BLITZER: Valerie Jarrett, I'm glad we reconnected. Thank you so much for joining us.

JARRETT: Me too. Thank you, Wolf. Have a good night.

BLITZER: Thank you. In the President's news conference earlier tonight, he spoke about the pandemic. The President also said and I'm quoting him right now, "We have done it right." We're going to speak to our panel of doctors about whether they agree.

Stay with us. We'll be right back.

[21:19:22]

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BLITZER: It's very disturbing, now for three weeks, the United States has averaged more than 1,000 coronavirus deaths each day. But today, President Trump actually said this. He said and I'm quoting him now, "We have done right." Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TRUMP: If you look at these numbers, they're coming down very substantially. And I do believe that Americans, many are wearing masks, which is a good thing. Again, some people thought that you shouldn't wear masks, you know, when this whole thing started. Dr. Fauci who I liked and respected, don't wear masks, OK, and so did Dr. Redfield. And then, all of a sudden, it was like everybody should wear a mask. And that's OK. People could change their mind.

But wash your hands, good hygiene, all of those things. I think people are really doing it to a level that they've never done before. And when you look at the numbers, the way the numbers are coming out, I mean, it's very impressive when you see what's happening. We've done it right.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: I'm joined now by the Epidemiologist and Public Health Expert, Dr. Abdul El-Sayed. Also with us Physician and Assistant Professor at George Washington University Hospital, Dr. James Phillips. Dr. El-Sayed, your reaction to the President of the United States saying we have done it right.

[21:25:00]

ABDUL EL-SAYED, EPIDEMIOLOGIST & PUBLIC HEALTH EXPERT: It is astounding. If you would just put a fifth graders voice onto what he just said, you would be talking about a fifth grader's understanding of this pandemic. There is very little to point to, to say that we've done anything, right. We account for nearly 25% of all deaths to COVID-19 in the world. And we still are breaking records, thousands a day. In fact, for the last two weeks, we've seen that testing has gone down rather than going up to meet the scale of a crisis.

It is almost impossible to look at what this administration has done and say anything about the fact the idea, that anything was done, in fact, right.

We missed the opportunity to put it down when there was an outbreak abroad. We missed the need for crucial contact tracing early on. We missed the leadership we needed to be able to provide the kind of masking ordinance and lockdowns at scale. And we are still missing when it comes to being able to do those things in any real way. And so, this is astounding from the President of United States here.

BLITZER: You know, Dr. Phillips, while the President expresses his belief that the administration has "done it right," the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention predicts that the coming fall and winter will be dire. Listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. ROBERT REDFIELD, CDC DIRECTOR: The fall and the winter of 2020 and 2021 are going to be the probably one of the most difficult times that we've experienced in American public health.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: So, Dr. Phillips, we're seeing the merging of the ongoing pandemic with the traditional cold and flu season. Do you share Dr. Redfield's concerns?

JAMES PHILLIPS, PHYSICIAN & ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL: Wolf. Yes, I absolutely do. You know, as the cold weather comes, it's going to drive people indoors. And the temperature changes and the humidity changes, what that means is that the ability to transmit virus actually increases. That's why we have cold and flu seasons.

And in particular, when we have a novel virus, like the coronavirus that we're dealing with right now, we don't have any form of herd immunity that is going to protect us. So as people are driven into those indoor environments, they're closer together. There's more people inside. And it coincides with the start of the college and K through 12 school years, both of which are enormous drivers of viral spread. Not just for cold and flu, but now with this new virus we're dealing with.

And so my major concerns are that when we evaluate these patients as doctors, of any emergency department for me, we see people with fevers and coughs, and flu-like symptoms. We may diagnose them immediately with a positive flu test. We may diagnosed them with a nasal swab, to have Rhino virus or RSV. But we still have to test them for COVID-19 as well. Because as we saw out of some other early data in China, which was lackluster but telling, is that about 8% of people had a co-infection between COVID and an additional virus. And so, we can't just say you have the flu and sends you home, come back out 24 hours after your last fever, because the convalescent period is totally different.

My hope is, is that people will continue to wear masks in greater and greater numbers, distance themselves, and by doing that we stop the transmission of all respiratory viruses to a degree. And so hopefully, we'll see less flu and less cold if people will get on board and abide by these public health interventions.

BLITZER: That's a huge if. Dr. El-Sayed, as the amount of testing is actually declining across the United States, right now, we got word today that the FDA has approved the use of a new saliva test that the NBA actually funded. It was developed at Yale University, still has to be sent off for results. But could this test be potentially, as far as testing is concern, a game changer?

EL-SAYED: There's no doubt, Wolf. We are unable in this country, yet in still, even months into this pandemic, to provide testing at scale. Testing is one of the most important things we can do to enable contact tracing and to bring down the scale transmission.

This test, which would require just a small bit of saliva, it doesn't need the same reagents and swabs that have been the rate limiting step to being able to create testing at scale in this country. It really could be a game changer if we can deploy it. And hats off to the NBA and also hats off to Yale University that's not looking to profiteer off of this. And they are giving it, giving the information open source to other laboratories to produce, expecting that they're going to be able to produce a test at $10.

This really could be a game changer. And we eagerly await that because God knows this country needs it.

BLITZER: Let's hole. You know, Dr. Phillips, the President, including tonight in his news conference, he continues to push for the start of the college football season, the Big 10 and Pac 12 conferences have said they're not playing while other conferences have been decided.

Meantime, the reports out today of several COVID clusters that have already broken out at the University of North Carolina, in dormitories and fraternity house, should college campuses even be open right now and should football players be playing football right now, given the fact that we're in the midst of a deadly coronavirus pandemic?

[21:30:05]

JAMES PHILLIPS, PHYSICIAN & ASSISTANT PROFESSOR, GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL: Wolf, I think these are two extremely important questions. And once that public health expert says, then I'm thinking about for a period of time now. And the reality is that, I don't believe that there's anyway that college football or football at any level, can be played safely this fall, that's high school through NFL. You know, the NBA has had some success in their ability to remain virus free. But the key to that is that, they've established a bubble within which all of the coaches and players, and staff are sequestered. There's no in, there's no out. And by establishing that very extensive perimeter, they've been able to have the success they've had so far.

But let's be honest, high schools and colleges can't do it, they carpet afford it. And you're dealing with players who want to have a normal life, who are going to go out and do the things that normal college students do. That is socializing, making new friends, going to bars, going to parties, living in dorms, apartments and Greek houses places. And all of those things pose significant risk.

Our college is safe in general to open up right now? I would say, probably not. I think that when we look at high schools, there's a much more controlled environment there for the students and teachers.

But for college students, there's a new degree of freedom in their lives. There's a level of immaturity, unfortunately, and there is so many other variables that go in, that are going to make it incredibly difficult to keep virus out of the classrooms and out of those living spaces.

BLITZER: You're absolutely right. All right, Dr. Phillips, thank you very much. Dr. El-Sayed, thanks to you as well.

Coming up, it's happened twice in our lifetime, the winner of the popular vote goes on to lose the presidency. A closer look at the controversy, that is the Electoral College here in the United States and what it might actually mean for the presidential election coming up in 80 days on November 3rd.

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[21:36:03]

BLITZER: Here in United States, the last of the -- I should say, again, here in United States, two of the last three presidents won the White House without actually winning the national popular vote, thanks to the Electoral College, it could happen again in 2020.

A CNN Special Report "Count question on Controversy: Inside the Electoral College" seeks to answer that tonight. Here's a preview.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The present system is dangerous. It's outdated. It's archaic. It's one that needs to be revised.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN HOST: Born hundreds of years ago,

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It really was a Frankenstein's monster of sorts.

BERMAN: Challenged and criticized, but fiercely resilient until now.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There are some issues, for better or worse, I tried a Hail Mary.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He said, I think we can do something about this.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I decided maybe someone should take a stand.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Who were the bad news bearers of the political world.

BERMAN: Going (inaudible) meant taking risks. Did you think you were committing a crime?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, no.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We were fined $1,000.

BERMAN: And the backlash was brutal. Plenty of deference and hate. A desperate political play to try to keep one man from becoming president. I think it scare people because no one's used Electoral College this way, that you thought you had the power to change history.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I thought that we had the power to prevent a demagogue from kicking off.

BERMAN: Election 2020.

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: The path to defeating Donald Trump.

BERMAN: Could happen again.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF UNITED STATES: America should not take lectures on racial justice from Joe Biden.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are going to be in uncharted territory. This is a Pandora's Box.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: And the host of the upcoming special report, John Berman, is joining us right now. John, tell us why you and your excellent team have decided to put together this documentary, which will air right after THE SITUATION ROOM at the top of the hour.

BERMAN: It was sort of a perfect storm of events, Wolf. We've had two out of the last five elections, where the popular vote winner did not win in the Electoral College. That was the first thing. The second thing is when the mathematicians like our friend, Harriet, and started running the numbers, they discovered that Donald Trump could lose the popular vote by even more and still win the Electoral College.

And the final thing was that this year, the Supreme Court took up at least part of the issue surrounding the Electoral College for the first time in nearly 70 years. So I think it was an important time to examine this system, which has been in place since 1787.

And I think it's been misunderstood for that long. I think that it never worked the way that founders intended. And it's just, I think, an important time for Americans to understand how we put our presidents in office.

BLITZER: And let me thank you on behalf of all of our viewers for putting together this special report that we're really looking forward to watching it. John Berman, thank you very much.

And once again, you can catch John's special report on the Electoral College, "Count on Controversy Inside the Electoral College," that's coming up at the top of the hour, right after THE SITUATION ROOM.

Also coming up here in THE SITUATION ROOM, US military life overseas, it has its share of challenges, but now add to it a global pandemic. American troops in South Korea and the tough measures they're taking to keep the coronavirus from spreading. We'll have a report when we come back.

[21:39:25]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: US military members of their families are certainly not immune to infection by the coronavirus. Even active duty troops have to follow mask and health protocols wherever they are stationed. At this gets even more complicated when military duty calls on them to travel abroad. CNN's Paula Hancocks reports from South Korea.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Keeping fit with a five-month-old baby is a challenge, working act when your whole family is in isolation with coronavirus is something else.

Sarah and Lincoln Henjum, their infant and one of their six-year-old twins tested positive shortly after arriving in South Korea from the United States. They are amongst thousands of military personnel switching in and out of the country this summer.

LINCOLN HENJUM, US ARMY: My wife has a little bit of chest congestion, so it's -- she's coughing a little bit. Myself, I just have a weird sense of taste. So everything I eat or drink tastes like burnt bread.

HANCOCKS: And they're all saying in two rooms in a special isolation facility on base, along with the family dog.

L. HENJUM: So that's my son's bed here. All the beds are twins. And then, there's my bed over here.

HANCOCKS: How are the children coping? I mean, how are you keeping them busy?

L. HENJUM: We do get one hour of outside time between 3:00 and 4:00. We play kickball. We play some tag. We walk the dog a little bit.

[21:45:00] HANCOCKS: Not the best start to a new posting but not unusual either. US forces Korea say, of 152 positive cases the vast majority have been incoming personnel since June, when the Pentagon started to lift transfer and travel restrictions. The US military in Japan is facing a similar challenge.

LEE PETERS, US ARMY: When we come here, we can't control what happened where they're at. We can control upon arrival here.

HANCOCKS: The US military insists once their personnel land, they enter and remain in a bubble.

MICHAEL TREMBLAY, US ARMY: The direct bus right from the airport, we're going to walk into the reception center. Wash their hands, after they signed in, so we make a clear accountability of everyone we have here.

HANCOCKS: After a short briefing, they have their first coronavirus test.

ANDREW OH, US ARMY: They sit down, like this soldier is doing, fills this out. And then we're preparing to do a laboratory sample which is behind you.

HANCOCKS: From that, straight into special quarantine quarters for 14 days.

TREMBLAY: Nobody's exempt. I mean for the private to a three star general, everybody goes through the quarantine process.

HANCOCKS: Everyone is allowed 90 minutes a day outside so long as they social distance. Colonel Peters says the second test before being released from quarantine is key. A fifth of those who tested positive then had no symptoms at all.

The USFK says they haven't had a single local transmission case in more than three months. All cases have been important. For Henjum family, all they can do now is play games, watch television, workout, and wait for recovery.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HANCOCKS: So motto for US Forces Korea is ready to fight tonight. And USFK tell me that that is the key to make sure that they don't have too many cases, that they can continue their mission. And they say at this point, less than 1% of the fighting force is testing positive.

Now, they were supposed to have joint drills with South Korea, starting from today, but that had to be pushed back a couple of days. A source within the South Korean military says that one of their soldiers tested positive just Friday. Wolf?

BLITZER: Well, we wish them only the best for them and their families. Paula Hancocks in South Korea, thank you for that report.

Coming up, President Trump's entire presidency has puzzled a lot of foreign policy experts. CNN's own Jim Sciutto has a new, book just out, taking a look at the strategy behind how the president deals with foreign leaders. Jim is standing by live, we'll discuss when we come back.

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[21:52:04]

BLITZER: President Trump, for his entire presidency has baffled a lot of analysts and foreign policy experts with his certainly unconventional approach to international affairs, and as often erratic relationships with world leaders.

A new book just out about the President on the world stage looks at his global strategy through the people who saw it from the inside. The book is entitled "The Madman Theory." There you see the book cover. "Trump Takes on the World."

The author, CNN's very own Chief National Security Correspondent and Anchor Jim Sciutto, also a very good friend. Jim, your book is amazing. It's terrific. I learned a lot of things about President Trump that I didn't know. I used to interview him for about 20 years before he became president. Tell us first of all, why you tackle this project and why you call it "The Madman Theory."

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: Well, I started with taking stock of four years of Trump, his effect on the world. He came in as a disrupter, not only in this country, but to really all of America's relationships with its adversaries and its allies. That's what he claimed he was going to do with great success.

For the book, to be clear, I spoke only to people who work for this President, appointed by him at the most senior level to get their first hand accounts of this. "The Madman Theory" is a throwback to Richard Nixon, because, as you remember, Wolf, Richard Nixon famously liked to keep folks off balances well.

He famously communicated in North Vietnam, in a shocking way, frankly, that he was just mad enough to launch a nuclear war against North Vietnam in the midst of negotiations to try to gain advantage there. Donald Trump hasn't quite threatened nuclear war but he has sought to disrupt relationships with China.

I mean, we see that the worsening standoff with China we're experiencing that today. Certainly very brazen threats against Iran. But also and this is what's unique about Trump's madman theory. He's just as likely to upset the relationship with an ally, NATO allies Canada, Mexico, as he's proven to be with, say, China or Iran.

BLITZER: Yes. We're all pretty familiar, I should say, Jim, with the President's international highlights are ranging from his on and off, again, a bromance with Kim Jong-un of North Korea, his recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital, his trade war with China. But what didn't make the news? What will we be surprised to learn about when we read your new book? SCIUTTO: Well, one thing is that, oftentimes his own advisors were concerned about his decision making. So much so for instance, at the height of tensions with North Korea in late 2017, the height of fire and fury, Pentagon officials hesitated to give him military options because they were afraid he was taking this country on a path to war, which would have been a very bloody war, there was no way that that would be in their view, a limited engagement.

And that wasn't the only time, at the height of tensions with Iran more recently, in 2019. His own diplomats and military officials were, again, concerned about a path to war, so concerned that they communicated to their Iranian counterparts that this President was unpredictable. They did not know what he was going to do next, because they wanted to reduce the chance of miscalculation of a military exchange.

That is a consistent message you heard here was that, yes, the President disrupted, sometimes justifiably with China, for instance, standing up to years of cheating and trade, theft of intellectual property, et cetera. But oftentimes, those decisions were so disruptive, they surprised his own advisors. And often upset or contradicted his own policies, and stands up to that point. I mean, it's a bit of a story of chaos from within this administration.

BLITZER: Were you surprised that there was this agreement announced this week, peace agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates? Clearly, the President and his son-in-law, Senior Advisor Jared Kushner, were very much involved in trying to put it together.

SCIUTTO: They were. And here's the thing about Trump's foreign policy. There were certainly failures with North Korea, four years of diplomacy and fire and fury. It's more of a nuclear threat than it was when he came into office. Iran is closer to a nuclear bomb than it was when he came into office.

But there have been victories and one of them is a peace deal that just a few years ago. You've covered the Middle East for years, Wolf, you know, this well, but would have been thought insurmountable. But they found overlap there. Of course, they were not able to get the bigger peace plan between the Israelis and the Palestinians, but still no small thing.

And it does show that here is a president who's willing to shake things up, but the trouble is, on some of the most consequential relationships beyond China, the path to escalation that is happening right now with Russia. I mean, one consistent theme, that his own advisors talk about, is an inexplicable deference to Russia. One that contradicts, frankly, his own administration's policy.

BLITZER: When you say inexplicable, you did a lot of research, a lot of reporting and putting this terrific book together. Why is the President so reluctant to overtly criticize Putin, for example?

SCIUTTO: I asked everyone I interviewed for this book, Fiona Hill, senior Russia advisor, Susan Gordon, one of the most senior intelligence officials in this country, Peter Navarro, Steve Bannon, you know, a whole host of people who work for him, to explain why, why the difference.

And the best explanation I could get, and this was consistent, was that he has an admiration for Vladimir Putin. He admires his power. There's even a sense that he envies Putin's power to some degree, but also, and this was the most surprising to me, that he shares, they share a nihilistic view of the world and kind of zero sum view that no one's better than anyone, that everybody is a dirty player in a dirty game.

You know, one of the chapters is entitled the "End of American Exceptionalism" because in Trump's view, you know, this idea of America as a city on the hill, right, et cetera, you know, he says, listen, all bets are off. Other people playing dirty, I'm going to play dirty as well.

The trouble with Russia, is that Russia has played very dirty, but the President has allowed them to be more aggressive over the last four years, not less so. So that's another sphere of his policy, where that approach didn't work.

BLITZER: It's a great book. Once again, it's entitled "The Madman Theory: Trump Takes on the World." I recommend it highly to all our viewers here in the United States and around the world. There you see the cover of the book.

Jim Sciutto, thanks again. Thanks for writing this important book. Really appreciate it.

SCIUTTO: Thank you, Wolf.

BLITZER: I'm Wolf Blitzer here in Washington. To our viewers, thanks again for watching. I'll be back tomorrow, Sunday, with another Special Edition of the THE SITUATION ROOM at 5:00 pm Eastern. CNN's Special Report on the Electoral College, "The Count on Controversy" with our own John Berman, that's coming up right at the top of the hour. That's next.

And as the coronavirus death toll nears 170,000 people here in the United States, I want to close tonight by honoring those who have lost their lives. We can't forget that these are not just numbers we're talking about. These are mothers and fathers, husbands and wives, brothers and sisters and friends.

Cedric Crumpton was just 42 years old. His wife Katrina says he was healthy, no underlying health issues, no fever, no cough. What they thought was a stomach bug was actually coronavirus. After spending weeks in a Georgia hospital, Cedric sadly died on July 17th. He leaves behind his wife Katrina and eight children.

Breana Maclin was just 22 years old. She pursued her passion of studying broadcasting and video production at Arkansas State University before realizing she love teaching as well. In fact, she loved both so much she would even go back to her old high school and help teach the same broadcast class she took when she was a student. Breana passed away last Sunday.

May they rest in peace, and may their memories be a blessing.