the white house, the precedent to invert adams' declaration will have been set. good evening, thanks for joining us. out of the 50 united states, tonight, coronavirus infections are dropping in just four of them. think about that for a minute. four months into the outbreak in this country. more than 126,000 lives lost. and there are only four states in the entire nation, the ones in green, where the infection rate is actually going down. in 31, the ones in orange and red, cases are rising and have now been rising for several weeks. 15 other states, the numbers are holding steady. the surge is happening in small states and large, red states and blue. though, mostly now in the south and west. it's not, as the president likes to say, because we're just so gosh darn good at testing. we represent so good at testing.

in fact, many places, tests continue to be hard to get. long lines of cars outside a clinic in austin where people are here for the second or third time, having been turned away before. and this is in the capital of texas, one of the largest, wealthiest, most populated states in the country. not only is the case count rising, so is the number of people being hospitalized every day. in a moment, we will talk with the doctor in houston, where hospitals are operating at or near capacity. a greater percentage of tests are coming back positive, meaning there are more infected people out in the community. in texas, it's about 15%. triple what it was in may. in los angeles, the positivity rate has doubled in the last month. and this new surge has prompted state and local officials to take action. cities in florida are closing beaches for the independence day weekend, requiring people to wear masks. governor of kansas just enacted a statewide mask order. and late today, the governor of arizona reimposed restrictions closing bars and nightclubs and gyms and movie theaters and water parks. even new jersey, which like new york, has seen its

hospitalization rate plummet and positivity numbers drop into the low-single digits, even that state is slowing down plans to reopen. and new york is considering doing the same. but all of this is proceeding state by state. sometimes, locality by locality. or even one public official at a time. senate majority leader mitch mcconnell today. >> we must have no stigma. none. about wear masks when we leave our homes. and come near other people. wearing simple face coverings is not about protecting ourselves. it is about protecting everyone we encounter. >> so, there's that. and it does mark a change. and the vice president this weekend, who rarely lets the word mask fall from his lips, preferring to say face covering, actually did it. he said the m word. >> if your local officials are directing you to wear a mask, we encourage everyone to wear a mask in the affected areas.

and where you can't maintain social distancing, wearing a mask is just a good idea. and it will, we know from experience, will slow the spread. >> we know from experience. this is being touted by some as a sign of progress, what he's just said. and just think about it. how incredible that is. the man who, allegedly, heads the coronavirus task force, grudgingly, and haltingly, encouraging people now to wear masks. if their local officials say they should. that seems like progress? after all these number of people who have died, after all we've known, and how long this thing's been going on, that's progress? after rarely wearing a mask in public for weeks, and backing the president who doesn't wear a mask. and lives, like the vice president does, in a biological bunker, with everyone around them subject to repeated testing and temperature taking and mask wearing. now, he is pretending to be responsible and suggest wearing a mask. why don't you put on your own mask, mr. vice president? and keep it on.

the only reason he doesn't is because he is scared about the president. i mean, certainly, not a profile in courage with this one. this is the guy running the coronavirus task force, allegedly. allegedly, running what he is fond of calling the whole-of-government effort against the disease. what whole of federal government effort? oh yeah, he did wear a mask at sunday services at a mega church in dallas. which might count for something, if it hadn't been at a mega church in dallas, with a hundred-person choir. many appear in the upper age ranges, not wearing masks. singing their lungs out. spraying aerosol into the enclosed, indoor space. and onto the people singing all around them. so, yeah, this is where we are. going to a manifestly unsafety event. but wearing a mask some of the time now accounts as progress. perhaps, were an improvement over his flatout dishonesty at

friday's first in two months task force briefing. >> we slowed the spread. we flattened the curve. we saved lives. >> clearly, someone wrote that statement. yes, it's written to make headlines. and yet, some states did do that but not enough. and notice he is speaking in the past tense. this is ts same virus we had months ago. it didn't vanish, like the president predicted. didn't diminish into local brush fires, like the president promised. it's the same deadly virus. the federal government and a whole lot of governors just decided to stop giving a damn about it. also, the vice president today defended the president holding big rallies in tulsa and phoenix as a first amendment issue. then, when asked a second time, he rambled on for more than three months without answering the question, before abruptly ending the briefing. we do not know if or when there will be another briefing. what we do know is as far as the president's concerned, the picture that is plain to see, especially compared to other parts of the world, simply does not exist. before -- before i play you what his press secretary said today, i just want you to look at this

graph because it's really telling. european countries are the pink line there. we're the green. we don't want to be that green line. they trended up. european countries. about a month before we did. remember all those stories about italy, how terrible things were in italy? well, we are now italy. they came back down because of strong, coordinated national measures. they were forced to stay at home. it was hard. it was devastating, economically. but it worked. just like it worked other places but not here because we didn't have strong, coordinated, national measures and we didn't stick with it. south korea never even had a big bump. same virus. they had their act together, on a national level, on testing and tracing. they took it seriously. that was back when cases were low enough to get a handle on. the u.s. is the green line, which plateaued and is now rising, sharply. that is what failure looks like. and that's where we are. here's how the spokesperson who speaks for the president characterized the outbreak and mask wearing. >> we're aware that there are embers that need to be put out.

but these signs of decreasing fatality, increased and enhanced therapeutics that we've identified. four of them. de de dexamethasone, convalescent plasma, remdesivir, and one other they are working. remdesivir in particular reduces hospital time by a third. so these things make us uniquely equipped to handle the increasing cases that we've seen. the cdc guidelines are there, recommended but not required. and we've -- the president would encourage everyone to follow the orders of their local jurisdiction and cdc guidelines. >> embers, she calls them. i'll say it again. 31 states are seeing rising cases. those aren't embers. if that's an ember, i don't want to see what ms. mcenany calls. as we know, every night, the president is done with it. never mind what experts say, never mind what state and local officials are now saying and doing. how many times do you hear the president urging people to, you

know, wear masks if their local officials say so? never mind that, just yesterday, alex azar, his own secretary of health and human services said, quote, the window is closing, unquote, when it comes to stopping this surge. he might have said the same four months ago, wh when the window really was closing. but the president then, as now, was too busy saying other things. >> when you have 15 people and the 15, within a couple of days, is going to be down to close to zero, that's a pretty good job we've done. >> now, azar says, the window is closing. he said nothing then. perspective now from cnn chief medical correspondent dr. sanjay gupta. also, dr. peter hotez, dean of the national school of tropical medicine and the baylor college of medicine in houston. sanjay, the principal director of the cdc said she thinks people engage in wishful thinking. they thought summer would come and everything would be fine, which is obviously what the president said would happen. it's just stunning to me. when you see that graph, of where the european -- countries

of the european union are and where we are. and we were on the same trajectory. we were on the same path. and they got it right and we didn't. and it's just about leadership. >> no doubt. i mean, because you do see that we are all humans. this virus is the same, in terms of how it behaves in humans around the world. and those -- those lines do tell a story. tomorrow, anderson, will be six months since the world health organization, first, heard about this mysterious pneumonia cluster out of china. six months. and during that time, we've had 10 million people around the world who have become infected. 500,000 people who have died. and as you know, i mean, a quarter of that -- those numbers are, here, in the united states. the concern, obviously, anderson, is as bad as those numbers are, when you start to see what's happening in some of these states around the country. and i have talked to some of the officials on the ground today in these various places. there's a real concern that the numbers will increase. i think that that's significant because this is like a -- it starts to gain momentum. and then -- and then, it's no

longer growing linearly. it starts to grow into exponential growth. but the bigger concern, and you mentioned italy, is why was the fatality rate so high in italy near the beginning of their -- their epidemic? part of it was because the incredible strain on the hospital system. right? there were people who couldn't get in to get care. there were people who died preventable deaths or, as you know, the doctors without borders called stupid deaths. deaths that are absolutely unnecessary and preventable. that's a real concern. and you know, peter is here. he's in houston. houston's -- is -- is obviously on the cusp of something like that. where people may not be able to get care. i mean, they could be saying my loved one is having shortness of breath. they need to go to the hospital. and they may be told, hey look, keep him at home as long as possible. we're not sure we got room right now. not the position we want to be in. >> dr. hotez, i know states are implementing what you call -- cake and eat it. can you explain what you mean by that? >> what i mean is we are seeing

this incredibly scary rise in the number of cases. exponential growth in the large metropolitan areas of the southwestern part of the united states. so phoenix, dramatic rise. austin. san antonio. dallas. houston. and the -- and there seems to be no end in sight with those projections. so potentially, in houston, we could go from 1,000 cases a day to 4,000 cases a day, if the model's right. and eventually, no health system could be able to accommodate this. and we're not really seeing a lot of federal guidance. so, in terms of how to respond. and what we heard, for instance, from secretary azar over the weekend, is they are providing fema support and ppe and that sort of thing. but in terms of a strategy, a roadmap, for how to handle this, that's what i'm, so far, not hearing. maybe it's there, behind the scenes. but i'm not seeing evidence of it. so the states and, in some cases, even the counties, are on their own across the

southwestern united states. and how do you handle that very aggressive rise? so far, most of the governors have not been willing to do that full lockdown, that was so successful in new york and in the northeast, back in march and april. so they're trying to see if they can do this surgically. meaning, just close the bars. or -- or 50% restaurants. and -- and encourage use of masks or, in some cases, mandate masks. but stop short of that full lockdown. and my point is, what's the evidence that that will work? have they been looking at epidemiologic models? we've seen what the impact of these surgical strikes, whether they are going to have a reduction in the number of cases. and, that, i haven't seen. so what they are trying to do is they are trying to keep the economic opening going. hoping that these surgical

measures are -- might also work. that's what i meant by have their cake and eat it. it's a noble cause but is there any evidence for it? is there any sign that will actually work? and that's what i haven't seen. andwear gambling wi and we're gambling with a lot of lives. especially, one of the unspoken parts of the story is i'm pretty convinced that most of these cases, or a lot of these cases and deaths that will follow over the next three weeks are happening in low-income narkds. neighborhoods. so african-american populations, hispanic, latinx populations, native american populations. and that's why i -- i use that term humanitarian catastrophe because we're not protecting our -- our vulnerable populations. and also, not only just the deaths that will lag but also, now, we're understanding better the permanent injury from this permanent lung injury. neurologic injury. so this is -- and that's why i -- i -- i resort to using that

term. >> sanjay, you know, again, i just don't understand. i mean, early on, the administration referred to this as a -- you know, as war. you know, a mobilizing against, you know, an insivisible enemy coming from overseas. if that's the case, in any war, if we had the kind of national leadership we've had to offend any kind of incoming invasion, and the leader said it's just going to be up to the to the states to figure out what the best defense is on a state-by-state basis. i mean, that would be unacceptable. i don't understand, you know, why we're sitting around four months into this and sort of shocked -- shocked that this hasn't gone away. >> yeah. and -- and, anderson, it might even be worse than that. like, even the -- not even the federal versus the states. but just this idea that maybe this was sort of minimized. you know? that we buried our heads in the sand for a while on this. >> yeah, absolutely. the entire month of february was

lost. >> entire month. i mean, when you're dealing with a contagious virus like this and you lose a month, i mean, we're now getting an idea of just how widespread this is. and the reason we're getting an idea of how widespread this is in the end of june is because we just weren't testing for this. i think ultimately, when we look back on this, there's a lot of failures. no question. somebody asked me today, name a success. and i had to really scratch my head and think about it for a little bit. i think if there's one success, in certain places, people have risen up and done the right thing. but for the most part, it's hard to name a success. when you look at that map you just showed, i think of that as the human body. and, you know, peter was talking about surgical strikes. at one point, back near memorial day, you could have said there's focal disease in various places. maybe we can attack the localized disease. no longer. i mean, anderson, i don't think there's anywhere on that map that i'm not worried about. even the places in the beige and the green because every place is vulnerable now. >> and for all the staying at

home and sacrifices that people have made. and people have done extraordinary things, as you said, around country. those efforts will be squandered by the places that aren't doing it. just as we said they would back then. and that's what people were worried about back then. sanjay, thank you. dr. hotez, as always, thank you. coming up next, florida, where localities are closing beaches but the governor's often hard to pin down. we will speak with a top official in florida state government who is speaking out against him. later, new reporting on what absent a pandemic would be a lead story. intelligence that russia's been paying a bounty for killing american troops in afghanistan, which the president claims he wasn't briefed about. we'll talk to former president previous briefer about whether that claim holds water. -that's how a home and auto bundle is made.

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recorded more than 5,000 new cases of coronavirus today. started announcing holiday beach closures and mandating mask wearing. the latest in jacksonville where the president moved the republican national convention because he wanted a no-mask,

packed hall kind of event. when asked today whether he would override that jacksonville mandate, a spokesperson for governor ron desantis said the governor is, quote, focused on state business, and has not given any thought to that. joining us now, florida's commissioner of agriculture and services. commissioner, thanks for being with us. what do you make of -- that an effort to reduce infection there before the president arrives for the rnc? and if it's warranted there, i guess my question is, why the not the rest of the state? >> thank you for having me on tonight. you know, florida hit 32,000 new cases since friday. and you are seeing a lot of our local governments step up and mandate these masks wearing. and for a while, even, the mayor from jacksonville said it wasn't going to happen. so he did actually put that into place today. who knows if it's actually going to stay in place for the rnc. he could actually override it beforehand. that's why i called for the statewide ordinance.

but certainly, with these upticks in cases and not just upticks in cases but the skyrocketing of our positivity rates. you know, i'm not surprised that we, here, in the state of florida, are where we are today. and looking for ron desantis to be more engaged. to take his head out of the sand. and to realize that we have a healthcare crisis that needs leadership at this time. and that we just haven't been seeing from him. >> why do you think he is not doing something, statewide? i mean, would it make a difference if the president, all of a sudden, urged people to wear masks? i mean, the white house is now saying the president believes people should listen to their local officials. >> yeah, i think that's exactly the case. it seems like here in florida, we need to get permission from president trump before we do anything. that includes closing down our state. i called on the governor to close down the state three weeks prior to him doing that. and he only did it once the white house gave him the nod. and same thing opening our state. we had a very methodical plan for opening the state. very data driven points.

and he arbitrarily just went into phase one, went into phase two. there was absolutely zero enforcement, whatsoever. and so when you had all these arbitrary openings, people thought we had mission accomplished because he went on a competitive news cycle, and basically declared victory. that we had flattened the curve. so until the time that the white house gives him permission to do anything, you're not going to see leadership from governor desantis. >> governor desantis has blamed spread of the virus in florida on young people partying, long-term care facilities, migrant workers, the media. for a while, he also blamed it on increased testing, like the president. i mean, he is blaming everyone but himself. yeah. i mean, why do you think he -- he pushed to open so hard? simply -- i mean, obviously, there's, you know, very legitimate economic, you know, fears about that state and every state. and people's livelihoods. is that what it was about? was it politics? >> yeah. unfortunately, we've seen partisan politics at its worst, when it comes to the covid

response. but that's exactly what's happened. you know, they put our economy before the health and safety and wellness of our citizens. you know,v of course, we're all concerned about the economy. our unemployment numbers are through the roof. another big problem the governor tried to push off to his predecessor. even, to the people of the state of florida for not filling out the forms correctly. and so every single time, he's tried to blame everybody else but his poor leadership when it comes to the response to covid. and so, i do think that he's put all these different blames into place. you know, to try to hide the ball of what's really happening here, in the state. and you know, i'm not surprised that he would blame the spike on young people because he says they're not taking it seriously. how can they take it seriously, when our governor and our president has had their head in the sand, has ignored covid. has been, you know, giving wrong information, misconception, every step along the way. and has declared mission accomplished. you know, on an interview. and gone on to say that this is behind us. so i -- i can't imagine why they

would think that this is, you know, not to be taken seriously when they're not seeing that leadership from the tom tp. >> thank you. >> just ahead tonight breaking news on intelligence report about russians offering afghan militants bounties to kill u.s. and nato soldiers. details, when we continue.

first brought you on friday night about an intelligence report on russian bounties on the heads of u.s. soldiers in afghanistan. the absence of a response from the trump administration. tells cnn information about payments to afghan militants was indeed in the president's daily

brief earlier this year, sometime in the spring. that appears to contradict what president trump tweeted less than 24 hours ago. they did not find this info credible, therefore, did not report it to me or the vice president. he then calls the report a possible hoax. the new cnn report also directly contradicts the white house press secretary, today, who said the president was not personally briefed. >> there was not consensus among the intelligence community. in fact, there were dissenting opinions in the intelligence community and it would not be elevated to the president until it was verified. >> two former officials tell cnn it would be standard to brief the president, verified or not. the u.s. official with direct knowledge, also told cnn the report was backed up by evidence. and while there was other information that did not corroborate the view, and that the information was serious now for national security council to discuss options. presidential daily briefer

during the george w. bush administration, he is author of "the president's book of secrets." david, as someone who deliveried the president's daily brief, what do you make of this that it was included at least once this spring? >> it doesn't surprise me because this is exactly the type of serious threat, with grave consequences, to u.s. troops and national security that, typically, does go into the president's daily brief. and, across decades of history, the president's daily brief, of course, there's information that isn't verified going into the d pdb because it's intelligence. that's what intelligence is. it's about uncertainty. it's about the unknown. and it's little bits of information, pieced together by analysts, to make the best picture they can for the president and those around him. the idea that it has to be verified, before it goes to the president, that defeats the entire purpose of giving the president advanced knowledge of what's going on in the world,

through the best analysis that the intelligence community can offer. >> and if something is in the president's daily brief, do most presidents read the president's daily brief? i mean, obviously, this president, it's well known he doesn't really read much. and you know, there's been a lot of reporting on how he likes to have briefings verbally. and, you know, pictures and briefers are well aware of what he wants to hear and not wants to hear. but normal times, if something is in the president's daily brief, does the president actually read the brief? >> right. going back more than 50 years, presidents have almost always read the president's daily brief, every day. several of them have also had oral briefings, with either their nagdstional security advi, most often. or sometimes, intelligence officers who come in and brief them. richard nixon may not have read it but he was meeting with his national security advisor every day, who was reading it and getting the information that way. donald trump, famously, does not like to read. he admitted so before taking office. so, almost certainly, the reports that he is not reading the president's daily brief, in

depth, are -- are true. the problem is, by the white house saying that he wasn't briefed on this, they're implying that this was not brought to his attention. but if the reporting from barbara starr and others is true, actually, it was brought to his attention, through the president's daily brief. which takes a few minutes to read. and he just chooses not to. again, if that's true, it leads to another question, which is, the national security advisor, the secretary of defense, secretary of state and others who read the president's daily brief, not bring this to his attention if they knew it was in the pdb but they knew that he wasn't reading it every day? that's dereliction of duty, on their part. >> and as you note, there has been a lot of reporting about the reticence that people around the president to discuss things about russia or bringing up matters of russia because the president, immediately, has a very visceral reaction to that. the president, obviously, has reacted to this story by

attacking "the new york times," calling it a hoax. just -- the president's daily brief, we're not talking about a hundred to 200-page document. i mean, we're talk being ing ab couple of pages. my recollection of this is it's quite a small document and usually tailored to how any president likes to get information. >> yeah, it is tailored to each individual president. you're right. therefore, it changes. some presidents have had longer documents because they really wanted the details, to get into it. some presidents have had shorter presentations. we don't know what donald trump's pdb looks like. he said to axe kno"axios" beforg office that he likes bullet points, s points and he doesn't like long reports. well, the intelligence community almost certainly has adapted to that. and probably gives him a format that includes short bullet points. even then, if he doesn't read it, you have to have a way of getting intelligence information to the commander in chief. that might be the oral

briefings, that he still takes one, two, sometimes three, times a week. irregularly from the intelligence community. but if that message wasn't getting through, then, it's incumbent upon the people around him to get him what he needs to know. now, if they're choosing not to, either because the president has said don't bring me anything that's negative about russia. i don't want to hear it. or, if they've simply decided to not even try because they don't like getting yelled at. that's a very serious issue for us because, then, the president, by definition, is not getting information about grave threats to national security, including the lives of u.s. servicemen overseas, in any form. and that's just dangerous for a commander in chief. >> it's incredible. david, appreciate it. thank you. president trump's conduct with world leaders has also been dicey. he criticizes allies we know but praises autocrats like russia's vladimir putin. conduct in private with leaders has been even more alarming than most people realize. joining us with details, cnn

political analyst, carl bernstein. you report calhundreds of phone calls. the recurring them particularly with putin and turkish leader erdogan, i was stunned at how much access erdogan has to basically call the president and go directly to him every time. and the response of people around the president to these calls. what are people telling you a about how the president deals with foreign leaders? >> well, the first point goes to exactly what you said. in dealing with these autocrats, particularly putin and erdogan, erdogan in particular had a free pass to get through to the president of the united states. he would call at least twice a week. turkish security it appears would keep track so erdogan knew when and where to reach him. but their dialogue, one of the sources said, putin gave -- putin -- trump gave away the --

to erdogan in syria. he allowed american troops, both putin and erdogan wanted to withdraw. he ordered the withdrawal of american troops from syria. and the result was that the kurds, our allies, were open for slaughter. and that's what erdogan wanted. and -- and he had a willing partnership in it, with donald trump. but the real thing about these calls is that they show that -- that the president's closest national security aides, his secretary of defense, his chief of staff, his secretary of state. all, came to the conclusion that, in these calls especially, they showed that the president of the united states, through being incompetent and being a a extraordinary thing, unique our history. >> also, seemed like they were concerned he essentially was

kind of a chump to -- to these autocrats. and as you said, gave away the story. that -- that -- that a lot of the people around the president were really stunned at just how terrible he was and how much he thought he was able to just kind of cajole and charm and bully people. but, in fact, he was -- just didn't know what he was talking about. >> well, as one of the sources said, a very high-level source in his administration, said that in deal beining with putin, puts like a grand master in chess and trump was like a weekend checkers player. and the result is back to what you had a moment ago in the segment. trump would not take briefings before the calls, which is traditional. putin was well-briefed, knew what he wanted to get in these phone calls. and trump would sit there in the calls, mostly build himself up. talk about putin. about what a great businessman he was. he would trash obama and george w. bush, his predecessors. said that they were full of bs.

that, now, that putin could deal directly with him and that the results would be better, for all concerned. but, in fact, his national security advisers came away horrified. and there are transcripts, voice-generated transcripts, of these calls, which i'm told if, particular l particularly, republican senators were ever to see and hear and read these conversations in realtime and talk to those who have heard them. it's very doubtful that he could retain the confidence of republican senators because they are so extreme in their negligence and his lack of competence. his lack of preparation. and his concern for nothing, except his own goals, including re-election. >> well, i'm not sure we'd be surprised. i mean, got the transcript or the -- the -- you know, such as it exists the call with the president of ukraine. so carl bernstein, fascinating report. we will have more on the president's conduct just ahead. this time, stoking partisan rage

along racial lines. dr. cornell west joins me when we continue.

you ever wish you weren't a motaur? sure. sometimes i wish i had legs like you. yeah, like a regular person.

no. still half bike/half man, just the opposite. oh, so the legs on the bottom and motorcycle on the top? yeah. yeah, i could see that. for those who were born to ride, there's progressive.

president trump's mostly ignored the spike in coronavirus cases, he did have time for two things this weekend. golf and using race to stoke partisan anger. he tweeted and was forced to delete support for what appears

to be a retirement community in florida. one, posters, chants white power. the white house says the president did watch the video. he just didn't hear the man before he tweeted they were, quote, great people. president has yet to condemn the use of the phrase white power. president wasn't done, however. today, he retweeted video of the st. louis couple who drew weapons on a crowd of protestors. no comment on this one. though, the picture of an armed white couple facing off against white and black marchers, certainly, well, it speaks volumes. joining us now, dr. cornell west. public philosophy at harvard, professor emeritus at princeton. dr. west, it's great to have you on. i -- i keep getting the feeling, this weekend, that the president is doing everything he possibly can to amplify, promote racist language. and just division in this country. and the idea that he retweets a

picture of these, you know -- this couple clutching weapons, threatening protestors, in their, you know, brooks brothers outfits. it just seems so insane that the president of the united states is doing this. >> no, you're absolutely right, my dear brother. you know, i was just talking to my beloved son cliffton. and i was saying we don't want to become obsessed with brother trump. we know, as a neofascist gangster, he recycles these kind of xenophobic recordwords. he began attacking precious mexican brothers and sisters. now, he is attacking asians with this talk about the virus. he attacks the maxine waters. and i still haven't got over he calling the sons b-i-t-c-h-e-s. you know what i mean? theresa, kaepernick, and sister heidi, they are precious. they are not b-i-t-c-h-e-s's.

and i will tell you this, anderson, i will defend mary anne trump, the mother of donald trump, because she as mother, is precious, too. so the question is, how do we create and exemptilify a countervaili countervailing force against? he seems to get regeneration from expressing contempt that could easily lead toward violence. we saw the guns and so forth just recently on the streets of -- on the streets of the country. how do we create countervailing voices? examples, movements, of love and justice in the face of that kind of hatred, contempt, and move toward vicious forms of violence. because we got to keep in mind, my brother, not just brother trump. what, 52% of white sisters and 65% of white brothers voted for trump. see, these are fellow citizens.

he is leading the country off the cliff. and yet, you got these folk in denial, still, somehow, holding on for him out of desperation for dear life. many of them, dealing with poverty. not enough jobs with a living wage. decrepit school systems and indecent housing and so forth. but they holding on for him for dear life. how do we transform that, in such a way that, low and behold, we can hit these issues of poverty and unemployment and what have you? >> i despair, though, at times. he went to an evangelical church the other week, after his rally in tulsa. and to watch the video where he was -- he was repeating the various names he says people call covid-19. getting to the slur that he was going to use. and the audience, you could tell, they were egging him on, waiting for him to say it. and then, when he finally used the -- the -- the slur that we all know, they erupted into

cheers and applause. and this was in a church. these were among people who identify as, you know, strong christians. they were cheering this racist terminology, and waiting for it, and eager for it. i mean, what have we turned into? or what -- i mean, i don't know that it's we turned into. we certainly have been this before. so -- >> no. you know, the great -- used to say will america move from perceived innocence to corruption without a mediating stance of maturity? we've grown powerful. we've grown rich. but we haven't grown up. we have to realize, though, you know, there's a long history of my fellow christians, the constantinian christians hating jews, gays, lesbians, trans, black people, indigenous people, and so forth. so it's the countervailing voices we need to keep track of.

those folk on the ground and in the street. those folk who remain home but realize i want to hold on to some kind of integrity, honesty, and decency. and bear witness to love and justice. but we'll see. if we can't overcome the kind of despair you are talking about, we're in deep trouble. but remember, now, he or she was never despaired has never lived. nothing wrong with wrestling with despair. the question's not allowing it to have the last word. >> but -- but what do you -- what gives you hope, then, today? i mean, i know, you know, there is people marching in the streets. and, you know, people, from all different backgrounds, joining them. and people calling for change. and it seems like, you know, that's in the air. and that's possible. but, all those things are fragile. those things can, you know, tides can turn. >> and they've always been fragile. as you know, this is not objeth first generation for this. this has been true from the very beginning.

and we do have witnesses of all colors, all genders, all sexual orientations, all national identities. this is a global struggle against forms of evil. be it predatory capitalism, white supremacy, male muslim, anti mexican practices. we got to keep track of each and every one of us, hope is as much a verb as a virtue. we have to stay in motion and know we have memories of love and justice. we have some joy tied to our witness that the world can never take away and if we have a collective effort, low and behold we can hold up this bloodstained banner a little longer. there is no guarantee that the american empire will not collapse. there is a real possibility it may. we have to fight until the end. we have to go down swinging. don't mean a thing if we don't have that swing. [ laughter ] that's my tradition, my brother. oh, yeah. >> dr. west, thank you as

always. appreciate it. >> all right. >> take care. just ahead an update on the officers charged in george floyd's killing and their day in court and when the trial will be.

let's check in with chris, see what he's working on for "cuomo prime time." >> sad to say, my friend, as we sit where we are, even as we're in new york, the possibility that you may see me in a basement again at some point, maybe not into the not too distant future. why? this thing is not going the right way. you do not ignore a pandemic and think it goes away. florida is as much a metaphor as it is a case study in and of itself. i have sanjay coming in tonight to look at it directly through

that lens of what the -- what the range of options are for us. we know that azar, the health and human services secretary says the window is getting smaller to control this. what does that look like? what does that mean for the places that think they got through it already and for the places that are looking at it right many in the eye. also i have chris stewart on tonight, the congressman from utah who got briefed on the allegations and suggestions of intel that russia may have been involved in a money for kills scam with the united states. what does he believe of the intel? what does he believe the right action business the president should be. >> all right, chris, we'll look forward to that about four minutes from now. we'll see you then. next up, details from the day in court for the officers involved in george floyd's killing. the four fired minneapolis police officers charged in the george floyd killing appeared in n from vmware helps you redefine what's possible... now. from the hospital shifting to remote patient care in just 48 hours... to the university moving hundreds of apps quickly to the cloud... or the city government going digital to keep critical services running. you are creating the future--

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it would be for me to discover all of these things that i found through ancestry. i discovered my great aunt ruth signed up as a nursing cadet for world war ii. you see this scanned-in, handwritten document. the most striking detail is her age. she was only 17. knowing that she saw this thing happening and was brave enough to get involved and do something- that was eye opening.

find an honor your ancestors who served in world war ii. their stories live on at ancestry. the four fired minneapolis police officers charged in the george floyd killing appeared in court today for a pretrial hearing. derek chauvin, who pressed his knee into mr. floyd's neck, faces several charges, including second-degree murder. the three others are each charged with aiding and abetting second-degree murder and aiding and abetting second degree manslaughter. the judge announced the next hear willing be in september. he would like the trial to start in early march of next year. he also said he would likely issue a gag order if public statements on the case continue, and if that happens he would likely grant a motion of -- a change of venue motion if one is in fact filed. that's it for us. the news continues. i want to hand things over to chris for "cuomo prime time." chris? >> thank you, anderson. i am chris cuomo. welcome to "prime time." ignoring a pandemic does not make it go away.