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tv   Anderson Cooper 360  CNN  June 22, 2020 5:00pm-6:00pm PDT

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volumes. >> when the people see you and feel your presence and know you've been here for decades you don't have to jammable for the microphone. >> reporter: when he asked about that hot mic moment he said he feels very, very strongly black lives matter. bowman said this is deeply personal for him. he told cnn as a black man, he has been dealing with police brutality his entire life and his first run in with the police he said happened just when he was 11 years old. erin? >> thank you very much, m.j. all eyes on that primary and now, arouno now, anderson. good evening, at the end of the day american coronavirus fatalities surpass 120,000. the white house was busy defending the president's use of a racist name for the disease and his claim he ordered a slowdown on testing, which the people who get taxpayer salaries and speak for him are saying was made injust. none of which is doing anything to contain this disease. in tulsa, oklahoma where he made that so-called joke new cases of the virus are rising sharply as
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you see there as they are in phoenix where the president spokes tomorrow at a mega church. if it's a joke what he said again is his defenders call it, he made it on a trip in which eight of his campaign staffers have tested positive for the disease. we learned of the latest two today. so that makes them the president's so-called joke as well and if it was a joke it came at the expense of tens of thousands of people who may not have died had more testing been available to contain the outbreaks instead of letting them grow. national plan for it were in place which it was not and which it still is not. the plan put out by the white house is one that the white house and the president is now actively working to divert. if it's a joke, it landed on the first of many father's day weekends in which some children will not have their fathers around anymore. here is what the president said. >> so i said to my people, slow the testing down, please. they test and they test, we had
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tests for people that don't know what's going on. we got tests. we got another one going on here. >> the white house may have claimed it was a joke but the lack of testing that's existed is no joke. calling it a joke is what people like hailey and sarah sanders always do when the president says something that seriously reflects what he's really thinking. >> there was a comment he made in passing. specifically with regard to the media coverage and pointing out the fact that the media never acknowledges that we have more cases because when you test more people, you find more cases. >> is it appropriate to joke about coronavirus when 120,000 people died. >> he was not joking about coronavirus. >> the way it always seems to go when the president's defenders claim he wasn't serious about something, their work is usually undone completely by the president himself. here he is today speaking to a reporter for the script's chain of outlets. >> we're doing so much testing. 25 million tests. >> did you ask to slow it down?
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>> if it did slow down, frankly, i think we're way ahead of ourselves if you want to know the truth. we've done too good a job. >> doesn't sound like a joke to him, does explicitly ordered testing to go down, he's okay with it. very clear that he didn't like a lot of testing because it made him look bad. he said it repeatedly over the past weeks and months that he doesn't like testing if it makes his numbers look bad as if other people's tragedies are merely his numbers instead of his sworn responsibility and speaking of, it's hard to know where to begin with this next one and the absurd way the white house today tried to defend it. first, the offensive and racist remark. >> by the way, it's a disease without question has more names than any disease in history. i can name kung flu, i can name 19 different versions of names.
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>> lady in the hat in the background is like woo, kung flu, yeah. the president said in tulsa to a farr le far less than full cowarrowd, h thought the racism would give the crowd a jolt. kaley is saying he didn't say what you saw him say. >> last july president trump declared himself the least racist person there is anywhere in the world. why does he use racist phrases like the kung flu? >> the president doesn't. >> i don't know how much they made kayleigh mcenany, when the president called himself the least racist person of anyone in the worls, kayleigh mcenany is
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like yeah, that's what he is. let's play again what kayleigh said the president did not say. >> by the way, it's a disease without question has more names than any disease in history. i can name kung flu. i can name 19 different versions of names. >> woo, yeah. clearly the president didn't think twice about saying it. what is predictable about this, again, how many times have we seen this? senioranne conway called it wrong when asked in march about allegations white house staffers were using the exact same phrase. >> i'm not dealing hypothetic s hypotheticals, of course it's wrong. you can't make an accusation and not tell us who it is. who is it? that's highly offensive so tell us all who it is. >> she's so clever.
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highly offensive. find out who it is. kellyanne conway wasn't lying about that. yeah, it's highly offensive. what she might not have known at the time is that she would be talking about her boss. >> i can name kung flu. i can name 19 different versions of names. >> so clearly the president did say it and clearly one of his closest advisors says it's offensive, so much so she wanted the names of whomever said it presumably so she could discipline then. i'm sure she walked in the oval office after this speech looking exhausted and unhappy saying i can't believe you used that phrase. why stop half way down the rabbit hole? >> kung flu is extremely offensive to many people in the asian american community. to be clear, are you saying the white house does not believe it is racist? >> to be clear, i think the media is trying to play games
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with the terpnolominology of th virus where the fact is china let this out of their country. the same phrase the media condemns has been used by the media. >> the media has never called it the kung flu. calling a chinese coronavirus and the kung flu -- >> the media and your network specifically -- >> called it the kung flu. >> the media and your network specifically repeatedly used the term china virus and wuhan virus and saying the president is using a term they themself haves never used. so we can go through cnn's history. i would be more than happy to go through cnn's history on february 9th, you talked about the wuhan coronavirus on january 23rd you talked about the wuhan the coronavirus, the wuhan virus. i can write it out and detail it for you in an email. >> it is not the same thing as calling it the kung flu. >> oh, kayleigh.
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this is the white house talking about instead of formulating testing, containing a disease it is claiming more lives here than anywhere on earth. instead of continuing to follow the guidelines of their coronavirus task force which they no longer allow us to hear from directly in daily briefings because the president embarrassed himself when he entertained the notion of injecting human beings with disinfectant in order to potentially maybe cure them of the coronavirus and some, you know, lackey health care official said yeah, we'll find the people and look for the right people to do those tests. this is what they're focussing on. they're telling people not to wear masks. they're making wearing of masks seem like you're not macho, you're not masculine if you wear a mask. this is where we're at. there is a virus pandemic going on in this country, and the white house is actually having
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their own guidelines the coronavirus task force put out months ago. joking about the idea of testing while failing on funny names that insult entire nationalities and doing hard work for the nation and boasting and raging about crowd size instead of lamenting the fact so much of this simply did not have to happen and working hard to make sure it does not get worse, which it very well may, that is where we are right now and where we are right now tonight. get reaction to the president's remarks from democratic senator of hawaii but first, even as the president stepped out of marine one, his tie undone and a crumpled up cap in one hand not looking happy about the turnout in tulsa, maggie haberman was reporting behind the scenes. the lead for the times annie reads president trump and several staff members stood back stage engaged at the empty bank of oklahoma center in horror. maggie haberman joins us with
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cnn senior political commentator, any evsenior advis david axelrod. president trump relied on racial divisiveness and calling protesters thugs, which he's obviously done many times before talking how confederate statutes coming down are an assault on our heritage. the president had hoped to run on a strong economy. the absence of that now is this what the presidency sees as the strategy to win november because this was supposedly the kick off to his reelection campaign. >> anderson, i think the difficulty with that sentence is strategy. there isn't a strategy. the president is winging and it trying to latch on to whatever he thinks can help him evright w at any given moment but at that moment he was stunned by what he saw at the box center in oklahoma, which was these row after row of empty seats, particularly on the upper level but not only the upper level but the arena and he was trying to recover from that leaning into
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white grievance politics and talking about our heritage. he's a man who claims confederate heritage is not his heritage. that is something he thinks appeals to some of his supporters, if not all and he is burroing into this political base of his that he has always over the course of the last three and a half years been afraid would lead him to a point that was supposed to be the reset for a campaign that officially launched a year ago this month, this was not the reset they were hoping for and it really brought into stark relief the fact that two things are real that the president has been saying are fake. one is that his standing in the polls has changed and fortunes have changed over the course of the last four months and the other is the general public, the majority of people are afraid of coronavirus. they're still afraid of catching it. even as reopenings are taking place and the president has tried to will public opinion to be less afraid of the coronavirus and willing to
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reopen states, it has not worked the way he hoped. >> it surprises me people are not offended that the president is encouraging, you know, people not to wear masks by his own example and, you know, his vice president can't wear a mask. the people around them don't wear masks and yet, he's got people like testers around him at all comes into contact with him and probably gets tested whenever he wants at the drop of a hat. i can't believe people don't kind of see this guy hiding in not a literal bunker, although that did happen though he denied it, hiding behind walls of testers and everybody else having to wear a mask in his immediate vicinity in the white house telling people ignore the coronavirus task force recommendation, which i used to back until i made a fool of myself. >> yeah, well, i mean, that's one of the great paradoxes here. he's the leader of a government that is providing guidance to
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americans about how they can keep themselves safe, keep others safe and try to limit the spread of this virus and he's the leader of the movement that is rebelling against his own government's advice and by doing what he's doing, he is encouraging that behavior. the thing that was so stunning about saturday night was how so few people followed that advice. so many people stayed away, and i think look, there is another thing that's happening here, which is the president was counting on a strong economy and an i'm pamage of a guy who is competent and strong and he looks like none of those things now. the economy is obviously in bad shape but there's nothing about his performance lately that looks strong or confident and that story line, which they hoped to change with that rally on saturday night actually was accelerated by the fact that they had the size of the crowd
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that was going to be there and called for an outdoor rally, as well and the turnout and then the strange disjointed hour and 50 minutes was a new version of his old routine in the middle of a pandemic, in the middle of an economic crisis and in the middle of a country divided by racial concerns. he had no material, nothing to say. this was a disastrous outing for the president and he clearly knew it when he came hat in hand back to the white house on saturday night and sunday morning. >> maggie, it was interesting. van jones did a piece we had on this program on friday night and he basically went back and met up with some trump voters he met that voted for trump in 2016 and they had problems and a lot of issues with trump and what he's done. all of them in the end, though,
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said if my memory serves me, the three he talked to that they were going to vote for the president again. do you think there's a danger of democrats, you know, seeing all these things and thinking that this is going to be an easy election? we still have a long way to go before votes are cast. >> i don't know any democrats honestly anderson that will think this will be an easy election. david can speak to that more than i can. i don't think they will think it will be easy. a lot of people are scared thinking 2016 would be easy and democrats were scared by thinking hillary clinton was naturally going to defeat donald trump, hillary clinton thought that. her top advisors all thought that and sort of appalled and couldn't allow for the fact that he was doing as well as he was in reality he over took them. there are democrats who are concerned that that is what will happen again.
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look, as much trouble as donald trump is in politically right now, a lot of it of his own making, certainly not all of it, joe biden is a very flawed candidate. he is running a flawed campaign so far. there are still four months left. they have to have what are supposed to be three general election debates. four and a half months ago, we were not talking about the coronavirus the way we're talking now. a lot can happen. i do think it's important to remember at the end of the day, elections are still buy n binar people will have to make a choice between these two men and there will be people if they aren't happy with donald trump now, there will be people that still decide to vote for him in the end. it is a real mistake for anybody to start calling the election today based on -- and it's important to not over play what happened over the weekend, which was ultimately a rally in a red state. >> i want to hear your thoughts on that. the campaign manager tried to
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blame the media saying they were stoking fears of coronavirus keeping people away from the rally. that's not what -- i mean, what do you make -- >> people have fears of coronavirus may be because tulsa was being over run by coronavirus but beyond all that, look, they over promised and under delivered. that the a horrible mistake for a campaign. i agree with maggie. look, we didn't know four months ago that we were going to have the virus, the economic downturn, george floyd. we don't know what the next four months will bring. if you're joe biden against a candidate and donald trump who is willing to do virtually anything to win and that makes it asemimetric war fafare and h could win in the battle ground states. one thing that is interesting to me about this rally is a tale of
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the president. he ripped biden as the tool of the radical left and he sort of ad libbed, he's not part of the radical left but weak and he's a tool of the radical left now. under scored his biggest problem and the reason he bought an impeachment to try to stop joe biden, joe biden is culturally inconvenient for donald trump. he looked too much like the people donald trump is trying to scare and he's a comfortable figure. so they have to work very hard to impeach him. right now polling is showing he's not doing as well as he did against hillary clinton with non-college educated white women in particular. he's evangelical vote is down. so, you know, i think it's going to be a close election but there is plenty for the president to be worried about right now. >> david axelrod, maggie haberman, thank you. >> we have breaking news, there is heavy police presence in lafayette square. protesters are apparently trying to take down the statute of
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andrew jackson. we'll bring you a live update as this situation unfolds. asian american lawmakers take on what the president said and how the white house is spinning it. next, too, the best experts we know on cases spiking in florida and elsewhere. sanjay gupta and william who says we all may have to live our lives quite differently for quite sometime to come. just swap your sim card you can also keep your phone, keep your network, keep your number, $20 a month, no contract. don't keep that case though...available 24/7 at tracfone.com tracfone wireless.
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i buy a lot of makeup. shampoo, conditioner. books, food. travel. shoes. stuff for my backyard. anything from clothes to electronics. workout gear. i even recently got cash back on domain hosting. you can buy tires. to me, rakuten is a great way to get cash back on anything you buy. rack it up with rakuten, sign up today to get cash back on everything you buy. the president said he doask his people to slow down testing. the actual number of coronavirus infections is rising again including in his campaign staffers. two more revealed testing positive today bringing the total to eight people so far. take a look. here is the seven-day national moving average showing cases moving to the 30,000 per day mark. now here is the city of florida upward sloping bar showing why some experts already consider florida to be the next epicenter of this outbreak. in the president's hometown, the
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palm beach post the headline reads as cases go up, icu beds go down. joining us now is william chair and president of access, health international, access health international and former presser at harvard university medical school and written a book titled family guide to covid questions answers for parents, grandparents and children and chief medical correspondent dr. sanjay gupta. what is your reaction to the rising cases in florida? how concerned should people be? >> we've been reporting on florida since the beginning and there's always been concern about florida. you know, in fact, initial days we were worried that the numbers were going to go into growth going back to april. the concern really i think more than anything, the numbers are obviously going up and up out of proportion to just testing alone. we're seeing obviously the demographics, younger people, obviously, being more affected by this now but the idea that ultimately it could affect
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people who are vulnerable in this state and possibly increase more hospitalizations. take a look at this graphic, anderson. people ask about this all the time. who is most likely to get infected? who is most likely to get sick? who is most likely to die? break this down by age group. you look at the graphics, you look at the data coming out of these various places. keep in mind that florida 20% of the population is 65 years or older. so they are a vulnerable population. cases go up in a vulnerable population, that's a real concern, anderson. >> i understand you've been looking at the rise in case numbers and i know you're upset by the spikes. i heard you compare and people talk about a wave, a first wave, a second wave. i heard you refer to this pandemic as a tsunami. >> right. the reason i call it a tsunami is i think the image most people have of tsunami is of a giant, very high wave. that's not actually a tsunami.
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a tsunami may be a two or three-foot wave but ten miles long and keeps coming and coming and coming and goes into any area where it can. so it pushes deep in. if you ever look at the pictures of a tsunami. it just doesn't go away. that's what this looks like. i'd like to say something else about what sanjay said briefly. it's a realization the people that think they got off scott free because they are young and just been infected, if you do a cat scan, they have been severely infected in their youngs. they just don't know it yet. it's like having cancer and not being diagnosed. their lungs, 60% of them have ground glass ocho past topacity show up later. i got infected and got off scott free, it's not scott free. they are affected and it will cause them harm. >> i've heard some
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epidemiologists, virologist talk about saying things are moving too fast in opening up. i understand you don't think closing down things is the answer. >> no, you know, we can't close our economy down forever. we have to have an economy. and we can't have economies that grow and flourish when disease is all around us. i was born at just the cusp of the change when we had antibiotics. i was born in 1944. civilians didn't get antibiotics then except very rarely. so we did build our cities. we built our railroads and great country but we lived very carefully. i remember when poll oio was ou. we didn't go out in groups more than three. we didn't go to the pool. we didn't go to the movie theaters. there was fear. i remember rumatic fever. we were much more careful.
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what i worry about is yes, we have to open but we're not being careful. in some places we're being careful like new york city and the infection is waning but in other places, we're not careful and we can see the results. you know, you mentioned how much the infection is increasing. it's increasing four to five times what it already was. so it was 1,000, it may be 5,000 a day. 5,000 a day means 50,000 infected people because everybody is infected for about ten days. so you have 50,000 people walking around florida infectiinfecting other people and in texas it's about 40,000 people. this is not a small matter. this is a very big matter that we can learn to live with, but we have to be careful. >> sanjay -- >> that's one of the reasons i read the book, how people live with it. >> the professor's point is important. the very thing that the administration is trying to do of open things up, the -- it's
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not either open up or close down. there is a middle ground, which is open things up to the degree it's safe but wear masks and social distancing and doing the things that we all know actually work, sanjay and yet, that's the very thing this administration is -- they have given up on their own criteria. >> i call this -- >> back to the future. >> we should have learned some lessons here. by the way, i should point out south korea, they never really shut down. they just did the things that they should have been doing well. tested early, wear masks, physical distancing. they were able to mostly keep their economy open throughout this and they have fewer than 300 people who have died. there is absolutely middle ground and people who are absolutely against shutting the economy down are the same people
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that don't want to adopt middle ground strategies. masks really make a difference. they are not foolproof. physical distancing makes a huge difference. add these things in and you can have a open economy, just it would feel different in someways. >> professor, appreciate it. dr. sanjay gupta, thank you. administration fires a top official who investigated the president's inner circle. former fbi deputy director and andrew mccabe joins us what we may have learned about the ouster when we return. many of their stories remain untold. find and honor the veterans in your family. their stories live on at ancestry. curry. cacciatori. chimichurri. fried turkey. blueberry. mcflurry. cheese cake. grilled steak. clam bake. milkshake. we are america's kitchen.
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the white house today had trouble on the continue verrove the firing. william barr announced the prosecutor for the southern district of new york was prosecuting but berman said he wasn't. berman's office michael cohen according to sources it's conducting an investigation involving rudy giuliani and parnas and furman. individuals prominently in the impeachment of the president. berman agreed to leave after the deputy was named as the immediate successor. he told reporters saturday he wasn't involved. not the message from the white house today. >> why did the president say he wasn't involved in the firing of jeff berman when the attorney general said he -- the president was the one who fired him? >> because the attorney general was taking the lead on this matter. he did come to the president and report to him when mr. berman decided not to leave, and at that point is when the president
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agreed with the decision of the attorney general and that to fire mr. berman and to promote mr. clayton. >> so he was involved in it then? >> he was involved in the sign off capacity. a.g. barr was leading the way but in a sign off capacity, he was. >> the white house provided in justification for the firing. the target of the investigation by the justice department after his ouster and cnn contributor andrew mccabe. thanks for being with us. are you surprised by the mixed messages and lack of clear explanation or any explanation for why mr. berman was unser moan -- fired? >> i'm not surprised by that. quite frankly, we've seen this level of confusion and incompetence with other maneuvers around certainly administration and now the j justice department. it's a series of deliberate misrepresentations to the
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people. the letter on friday night clearly misrepresented the circumstances around berman's leaving the post as the head of the southern district of new york and the attorney general and president's conflicting stories about the firing on saturday only made the matter even more confused. this repeated misrepresentation to the american people have to really undermine people's confidence in the department of justice in the way they are doing their job and i think that's a very bad thing long term for the country. >> in the attorney general's letter to jeffrey berman, he writes about mr. berman's refusal to design saying you've chosen public spectacle over member li public service. does that make sense because there was never an agreement for mr. berman to step down? >> audio. >> i think we just lost you. we'll try to reestablish that. i believe we have you back. you're back. so does it -- i mean, there was apparently no agreement for mr.
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berman to step down so i'm not quite clear what attorney general barr is talking about saying that he's chosen public spectacle over public service. >> well, i mean, you know, we all know what happened here. the attorney general looked bad. he jumped the gun. he said something that wasn't tru true. >> sorry, we're having problems with that. we'll try to reestablish contact with andrew mccabe. more on the disparaging material the president used to describe the coronavirus. later, the latest on the federal investigation into the noose, the only black driver in nascar's top circuit and the man that led to ban the confederate flag at races.
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and we're back with andrew mccabe, former deputy director of the fbi. hopefully it stays up. just finally, let me just ask you, is this anything -- is there any other way to look at this other than the white house justice department doesn't like the fact the southern district of new york continues to investigate allies of the president apparently rudy giuliani and others, they investigated michael cohen and they're just trying to get rid of him, you know, late at night on a friday with a lot of stuff
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going on? >> yeah, there is no other way to look at it. we know that for two reasons. one, the way they did it. they took berman out and tried to put in the u.s. attorney from new jersey to sit in as the acting until their new selection could be confirmed because they didn't want berman's deputy to run that office in the same way berman had. also, historically, we know anderson, this is the way this administration is. if you are someone who becomes identified by the president as an enemy of his, either because you tell the truth or because he feels that you're running the risk of exposing something he doesn't want exposed, you get fired. it didn't just happen to me. we seen it happen to half a dozen i.g.s in front of the entire united states. it is the way they move. they eliminate threats, fire people and try to destroy them publicly. i sincerely hope that doesn't happen to mr. berman now. >> andrew mccabe, thank you and
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apologies for the technical problems. we're getting reports the white house is asking reporters to evacuate from the white house. kaitlan collins joins us. what is going on. >> reporter: anderson, we were inside the whoit houite house. the secret service asked us to leave. i don't think that's ever happened. often they say you can't go outside, the white house is on lockdown. press is instructed to actually leave the white house grounds and out here, you can see there is a swarm of protesters out in front of the white house. there are reports that they were trying to take down the statute of andrew jackson that is in the square right in front of the white house and as we were walking back through here, we saw several protesters who said they had fired some substance at them. they aren't sure if it was tear gas, pepper spray, that was a big debate. they cleared the protesters. i'll step out of the way. the police moved this barrier to we wiare right now.
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earlier today this is not where the barrier was. there are several protesters standing around and police officers forming a bit of a happen hazard line in front of the white house as we wait to figure out more details about what is going on but clearly, they believe there was some kind of threat happening and that's why they had reporters leave the white house in that very unusual move, anderson. of course, this is the very spot i'm standing where they moved those protesters not that long ago where they forcefully cleared them out of the way when the president made his walk over here to st. john's church next to me. we're still learning a little more about what exactly is going on, what chance pytranspired. >> we're seeing on the right of our screen from earlier looks like law enforcement personnel moving in to clear, i assume, the area around the statute. can you explain where you are. is that the white house in the back and then is that the
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jackson statute there also in the background? >> reporter: yeah, that's the jackson statute. it's right there in the middle of the park. it's andrew jackson on a horse, of course, that is lafayette park in front of the white house. we're standing here on 16th street right next to the church that of course, the president had that infamous visit. so that is the question, you know, as we've seen this debate raging over the last few days across the nation about these statutes across the nation, and what's going on, and there is something going on and the police felt the need to move it. the question of course, is how they move these protesters, what tactics they used and what the response of the protesters is going to be. tensions definitely seem to be running higher than they have been in the last several weeks over here. >> so lafayette square park has been cleared of protesters? >> yeah, there is no one in lafayette park that is not a police officer at this moment. we're at this barrier. it's exactly where you saw the
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protesters standing when they forced them out so aggressively. so now police have come here. you can see these concrete barriers here in front of it and it is police officers on bikes. you can see a few more but the park right now has been cleared. >> and do you -- approximately how many protesters would you say there are? obviously, it's always hard in a situation like this. >> reporter: it's always hard especially if you're on the ground but we have been over here reporting a lot so we have a pretty good idea when it's a lot of mprotesters. it's somewhere in the medium change. not as many as some days where they fill this. the street i'm on is where the d.c. mayor renamed it black lives matter plaza and you saw so many protesters and demonstrators over the last several weeks. there is a good amount of people around. everybody seems to be watching, looking to see what it is going on as they are waiting and of course, the question is, you know, do they move the
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protesters further back? how does that go? that was a decision they had to make the last time. >> it's interesting that the white house, the secret service chose to ask reporters to leave. it doesn't seem like at this stage there's an immediate threat on the white house itself. >> reporter: no, and that's what is so unusual. i'm telling you, i've been reporting on this white house since the day donald trump was inaugural rated and we've never been asked to physically leave the white house. they will take us off of the front lawn. they will move us slightly indoors, keep us indoors if they think there say sis a security t but they had us leave the white house grounds tonight. it's not clear why the secret service made that decision. we're clear far back from the white house, probably 200 yards back as we try to figure out why the secret service made that decision to clear reporters out, a very, very unusual move.
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>> kaitlan collins, we'll continue to check back in with you. we want to turn our conversation back to what we were discussing at the beginning of the hour. the phrase the president used to describe the coronavirus and the racist phrase he used kung flu. not only do many asian americans and others find it offensive, it's being used at a time they are fueling attacks on members of the asian american community. senator, the term kung flu, when you heard the president say that, what did you think? >> he was racializing of the virus and again, anti immigrant, this is what the president does. he's a very divisive person and he's up against it and so he uses these kind of phrases, china virus, kung flu and members of his administration
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used those terms and he must know there is a rise in harassment and out right physical attacks but of course he takes no responsibility for what he says and what -- that might engender. >> the white house press secretary defended the president, tried to equate it to chinese virus or wuhan virus. which is an argument i don't quite understand. kung flu has nothing to do with the actual origin of the virus. they're not the same thing at all. >> constantly using -- they're not even dog whistles anymore. these are outright racist kind of terms and making excuses but we know what they mean and it makes them look more racist and pathetic in my view when they
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try to act as we really weren't saying that. please. so he continues to use divisive rhetoric and harming people in this country. >> when -- i'm wondering what you think of the response overall to covid by this administration. what is the situation in hawaii, which you represent? and what do you make of the administration's response overall? >> the administration's response has been totally incompetent and lacking, uncoordinated and living up to what he said, not my responsibility. states, you are on your own. our governor and the other governors have to go against each other for ppe and necessary items as the democrats call on the president to have a nationwide testing so that we are not doing haphazard testing and of course now we wasn't
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joking saying ease up on the testing equating the tests with the increasing numbers of people getting the virus and this is a president who does not pay attention to science or facts. so yes. what is happening in hawaii is that we have had a stay-at-home kind of provisions. we are slowly opening carefully reopening various businesses, et cetera. we've had, you know -- because we have social distancing and wear your masks to prevent i think the spread of the virus in a way that some other places have not but we are being cautious and realize that we have not tested enough people. that is my view. in hawaii as well as the rest of the country. >> senator hirono, appreciate your time. thank you. >> you're welcome. up next, the racism directed at a star of nascar helping in the drive against hate and the use of the confederate flag
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there. the question of how someone go in bubba wallace' garage stall to leave a noose. iew that's been through multiple market cycles for over 85 years? with capital group, i can. talk to your financial professional or consultant for investment risks and information. talk to your financial professional or consultant no no no no no, there's no space there! maybe over here? hot! hot! oven mitts! oven mitts! everything's stuck in the drawers! i'm sorry! oh, jeez. hi. kelly clarkson. try wayfair! oh, ok. it's going to help you, with all of... this! yeah, here you go. thank you! oh, i like that one! [ laugh ] that's a lot of storage! perfect. you're welcome! i love it. how did you do all this? wayfair! speaking of dinner, what're we eating, guys?
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-excuse me. uh... do you mind...being a mo-tour? -what could be better than being a mo-tour? the real question is... do you mind not being a mo-tour? -i do. for those who were born to ride, there's progressive.
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-i do. here's what we want everyone to do. count all the hugs you haven't given. all the hands you haven't held. all the dinners you didn't share with friends. the trips you haven't taken. keep track of them. each one means one less person vulnerable, one less person exposed, and one step closer to a healthier community. so for now, keep your distance. but don't lose count. we'll have some catching up to do.
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tonight the fbi and the justice department are investigating after a noose was left inside bubba wallace's garage stall at the talladega superspeedway in alabama. he is a pioneer among black drivers in the sport and displayed the black live matters hash tag in his car and asked nascar to ban the confederate flag at its events. sunday someone made it into the secure garage area and leave the noose. randi kaye on the show of unity this afternoon. >> all of nascar's -- >> reporter: a show of force. nascar drivers walking in
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solidarity with bubba wallace's car, a source saying also today that wallace never saw the noose hanging in his driver's stall. >> there is no place for racism in nascar and this act only strengthens our resolve to make this sport open and welcoming to all. >> reporter: wallace has yet to speak about the incident but tweeted last night he was incredibly saddened and called it an act of racism and hatred and a painful reminder how much further we have to go as a society and how persistent we must be in the fight against racism. he went on to say this will not break me. i will not give in nor will i back down. i will continue to proudly stand for what i believe in. wallace's fellow drivers escorting the car to the front of the grid and standing together for the national anthem. ♪ wallace tweeting this selfie writing together nascar also showed support painting an i
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stand with bubba hash tag in the infield. bubba wallace' team gave him a pep talk over the radio. >> i love you, man. we all do. put us in a good spotted. get your mind right. let's go shut the haters up. >> anderson, they're trying to figure out who did this and because there's been limited access to the track, because of this pandemic, that may make their job easier because really it is just essential employees like race teams and nascar employees so the president of nascar says they're investigating along with the u.s. attorney's officer, the department of justice and the fbi and wouldn't say if security cameras might have picked up anything and did say that they have ramped up security around bubba wallace himself. they're concerned about his safety and let the team inspect his car today before the race to make sure it was not tampered with and the race ended. wallace came in 14th but said
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all in all we win today. back to you. >> thanks very much. to everyone just joining us, chris cuomo is off tonight. we have breaking news. reporters asked to leave the white house. we want to go back to kaitlan collins across the street. if you can, explain what's been happening the last couple of minutes. >> reporter: so, anderson, we are in front of lafayette square and maybe a half hour ago protesters put ropes around a statue of andrew jackson in the park they're trying to topple that statue and then very quickly you saw police try to move those protesters back. they were using some kind of chemical irritant, we are not sure what, and now pushed back. the park is closed and we are back here standing of course exactly where you saw the president do that walk where he came and posed in front of st. john's church and they pushed protesters back a