10/05/20 10/05/20 [captioning made possible by democracy now!] amy: from new york, this is democrcracy now! pres. trump: i just want to tell you i am starting to feel good. over the next period of the next two days, i guess that is the real test. we will see what happens next couple of days. amy: president trump has entered his fourth day hospitalized at the walter reed national military medical center after testing positive for covid-19.

he has been administered dexamethasone, a steroid that is recommended only for patients suffering for severe covid-19. we will get the latest and look at how at how a growing number of prominent republicans, including three senators, have also become infected. we will speak to dr. ashish jha, dean of public health at brown university and reuters reporter jeff mason, former president of the white house correspondents association about the infection election. then we go to louisville, where the family of breonna taylor has asked kentucky's governor to reopen the case and appoint a special prosecutor after the state's attorney general refused to seek charges against officers for shooting taylor dead in her own home. we will speak to kentucky state representative attica scott and attorney benjamin crump. >> breonna taylor's entire family is heartbroken.

devastated. an oututraged. and confused. and bewildered. just like all of us come as to what the kentucky attorney presentdaniel cameron to the grand jury. amy: all that and more, coming up. welcome to democracy now!, democracynow.org, the quarantine report. welcome to democracy now!, i'm amy goododman. presidenent trump could be discharged from walter reed medical center. he could be discharged as early as today according to doctors after a weekend of mixed messages from trump's team about his health status following his covid-19 diagnosis last week. on saturday, white house chief of staff mark meadows reportedly told staff trump's vitals were very concerning and that "we are still not on a clear path to a full recover."

however, president trump's physician sean conley painted a much rosier picture of the president's recovery, even as doctors shared his oxygen levels dropped twice and that he had been on steroids that are usually reserved for critically ill covid patients. on sunday, calmly admitted he misled reporters about trump given oxygen. >> i was trying to reflect the .pbeat attitude of the team i did not want to give any information that might steer the course of illness in another direction. and in doing so, it came off that we were trying to hide something, which was not true. amy: president trump's medical records show he received the powerful steroid dexamethasone along with the severe and experimental antibody cocktail made by regeneron that is still

in nickel trials. dr. say president trump may be the first reason ever to receive all three drugs at once and there is no data about the safety or efficacy about using the drugs in concert. throughout theeekend, trump twtweete out. video messages from hi presidential suite at walter reed hospital. pres. trump: i came here. i was not feeling so well. i feel much better now. we're working h hard to get me l the way ck. amy: on sunday, trump broke his quarantine, leaving the hospital to take a short drive for a photo op to wave at supporters. trump appeared aware just a cloth mask inside the hermetically sealed vehicle, putting the secret service agents who accompanied him at ririsk of infection. meanwhile, the number of prprominent republicans to get infected keeps growing. the list now includes -- first lady melania trump, senators mike lee, thom tillis and ron johnson, trump advisor hope

hicks, trump's campaign manager bill stepien, former trump advisor kellyanne conway, republican national committee chairwoman ronna mcdaniel and former new jersey governor chris christie, who has been hospitalized. trump's personal assistant has also tested positive. many of those infected attended ceremonies on september 26 at the white house for trump supreme court nominee amy coney barrett. three journalists who cover the white house also now have covid-19. press secretary kayleigh mcenany said the white house will no longer reveal the number or names of staffers who test positive for the coronavirirus. on saturday, ron johnson of wisconsin bebecame the third senator in recent days to announce he tetested positive fr covid-1919 after he had contacat with an infected person n earlir in the week. despite this, senate majority leader mitch mcconnell vowed to

move forward with supreme court confirmation hearings for trump nominee judge amy coney barrett on october 12. democrats have said virtual confirmation hearings would not be acceptable and are calling for a postponement. in related news, the president of the university of notre dame, who attended barrett's nomination ceremony at the white house's rose garden, announced friday he tested positive for covid-19. barrett was previously a law professor at notre dame. there are over 7.4 million confirmed covid-19 cases in the united states as numbers continue to rise across many states, with the midwest and west particularly hard hit. "the washington post" found cases have risen in 33 states and puerto rico since the end of august. in new york k city, mayor bill e blasio is calling for schools and businesses to closose down again in nine neneighborhohoods

where new spikes have been reported. in immigration news, in washington state, dozens of prisoners at the northwest ice processing center were tested for covid-19 friday after a guard became infected. this is a prisoner at the ice jail who was recently tested for covid-19. i inw because we e are quarantine and everything, now they are w watching out for us. befofore that, ceos were comingn without mask, withouout g glove. amy: in azerbaijan, armenian a d azeri forces exchanged heavy fire throughghout the weekend as the war over the dispuputed regn of nagorno-karabakh spilled into civilian areas. on sunday, at least one resident of azerbaijan's second-largest cicity, ganja, was killed and fr others injured amid heavy rocket and mort fire. the e fighting has threatened do bring regional powers into conflict, with turkey backing azeri forces and russia backing ititmilitary a ally armenia. a warning to ourur viewers, , ts

story contntainsns disturbing is ofof police violence. in chile, a video ththat has sie gone viral shows a police officer in santiago chasing a 16-year-old boy during a protest, who the officer then grabs and throws over the railing of a bridge into a river channel. the boy is seen floating face down, motionless in the dirty shallow water. he is reportedly at a hospital in stable condition. chileans are preparing to vote on a referendum that could replace the country's pinochet-era constitution. ode -- over 8500 human rights violations have been attributed to chilean police. in guatemala, , over 3500 membes of a caravan t that fled hondurs last week have now been deported. the guatemalan government unleashed police and military to apprehend the asylum seekers as they arrived to regions clososeo the border with mexico over the weekend.

back in the united states, immigrations and custom enforcement has installed billboards on how is across pennsylvania with the faces of immigrants who according to ice, "pose a public safety threat" but are protected from being transferred to ice custody by localities with sanctuary policies. buzzfeed says the billboards are designed to o help trump gain support and a key swiwing state. key swing state. the historic, climate-fueled wildfires in california have killed at least 26 people and scorched over 4 million acres so far this year. cooler weather and rain forecast for later in the week could help provide some relief to firefighters as they combat the blazes, including the still-raraging glalass fire inia and sonoma counties, which is now 26% contained.mí meanwhile, record heat in south america has triggered devastating wildfires in

paraguay, brazil, and argentina. the brazilian amazon is recordining its worst fires in a decade, and the wetlands of brazil and argentina are also seeing a dramatic loss of wildlife due to record-shattering blazes. in voting news, an appeals court hahas overerturned a an extensin georgia's election day absentee ballotot deadline. a judge previously extended the poststmark deadline by three da. votingng rights advocates say te moveve will disenfranchise georgians s who face additionanl hurds to voting during the pandemic. meanwhile, i in texas, voting rights groupups are suing govern greg abbott's order last week limiting absentee ballot drop-off locations to just one per county. in other election news, south carolina democratic senate candidate jaime harrison stood behind a plexiglas barrier that he brought as he debated senator lindsey graham saturday night. >> it is not jusust about mamakp e ins about the people

my life that i to t take care of as well. we have had 750,00000 people unemployed heree in sosouth carolina because of covid. 3000 people to die. over 1 100,000 to be infected. let's takeke this issue serious. amy: federaral judge issued an order maintataining the u.s. census bureau must continue its counting efforts through october 31. u.s. district judge lucy koh called a tweet by the census bureau last week, announcing it would end counting by today in defiance of her order to extend it through the month, an egregious s violation.n. kentucky's attornrney general hs released 15 hours of audiotapes from grand jury proceedings into the death of breonna taylor, the 26-year-old african american louisville resident and emt shot to death last march inside her own home by officers executing a no-knock warrant.

the tapes confirm that republican attorney general daniel cameron did not ask jurors to consider homicide charges for the white police officers who fired 32 bullets into taylor's apartment, striking taylor six times. her boyfriend kenneth walker testified he rushed out of bed and grabbed his handgun on the night of the fatal raid, fearing a home invasion after he heard loud and repeated banging on taylor's front door. >> i was scared to death. yelling at the top of her lungs. amy: over the weekend, a second anonymous member of the grand jury asked a judge to allow them to speak publicly about the case. later in the broadcast, we will go to kentucky for latest on the police killing of breonna taylor. we will speak with attica scott, the first african-american state legislator of kentucky and

breonna taylor family attorney benjamin crurump. in california, 17 people were arrested friday during a protest outside governor gavin newsom's mansion over the june police killing of 22-year-old sean monterrosa. among the people arrested were monterrosa's two sisters, ashley and michelle monterrosa. the protest was held to mark the four-month anniversary of sean 's killing as the family continues to demand justice. sean monterrosa was kneeling and had his hands up outside a walgreens when a police officer in an unmarked car shot him five times through the windshield, as police responded to a call of alleged looting during a black lives mamatter protest. and in los angeles, harvey weinstein wawas charged fridayay with three more counts of rape and other sexual crimes involving two women. weinstein, who is serving a 23-year prison sentence in new

york, now faces 11 counts of sexual assault in the state of california, where extradition proceedings have been put on hold due to the pandemic. and those are some of the headadlines. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the quarantine report. i'i'm amamy goodmaman. president trump has entered his fourth day hospitalized at the walter reed national military medical center. trump tested positive for covid-19 on thursday and was flown to the hospital on friday after suffering a high fever and a drop in oxygen. trump has received supplemental oxygen at least twice. after his blood oxygen level fell. doctors say trump could be released back to the white house to continue his treatment as early as today. over the weekend, his medical team repeatedly gave limited and conflicting information about his health and refused to answer key questions. lied about other issues. on saturday, white house chief of staff mark meadows said "we're still not on a clear path to a full recovery."

on sunday, doctors revealed trump had been given dexamethasone, a common steroid that is recommended only for patients critically ill with covid-19. his treatment has also included the experimental monoclonal antibody made by regeneron and the antiviral drug remdesivir. cnn reports trump may be the only covid-19 patient to ever receive this combination of drugs. on sunday, trump broke his quarantine by leaving the hospital to take a short drive to wave as supporters outside. trump appeared to wear just a cloth mask inside the sealed vehicle, possibly infecting the secret service agents who accompanied him. meanwhile, the number of prominent republicans to get infected keeps growing. the list now includes -- first lady melania trump, senators mike lee, thom tillis and ron johnson, trump advisor hope

hicks, trump's campaign manager bill stepien, former trump advisor kellyanne conway, republican national committee chair ronna mcdaniel, and former new jersey governor chris christie, who has been hospitalized. trump's personal assistant nicholas luna has also tested positive. many of those infected attended a ceremony at the white house for trump's supreme court nominee amy coney barrett. notre dame university president john jenkins, who also attended the event, has tested positive as well. democratic presidential joe -- candidate joe biden who debated trump on tuesday tested negative on friday. as well as on sunday. dr.egin today's show with ashish jha, dean of the brown university school of public health. he was previously the director of harvard university's global health institute. we're also joined by reuters white hohouse correspondent jeff mason, the former president off

the whwhite house correspondents association. we welcome you both to democracy now! jeff mason, let's begin with you. you are covering joe biden. you were the white house correspondent president in the beginning of trump's. can you talk about, would we know almost any of this on thursday if it had not been a reporter at bloomberg news reported that hope hicks had tested posositive for covid-19?? great questioion. wewe would not havave known it n we did. it ended up beingng confirmed by otheher news organanizations, inclcluding my own. that l led to a trickle of news about essentially president trump. he came on fox news news later that evening and also confirm that hope had gotten sick. and at that time,e, said he had

been tested and also sort of gave an indication he wasn't sure if hehe had it and whetethe would need to go into quarantine. it is hard in retrospect to know what -- if he still would have gone on fox in that case. eventually, they would've had to say he had the disease. outfor sure, it started from good reporting from one of my colleagues. amy: this issue is so critical because it is clear president trump knew at leastst before he left the tarmac for that new jersey fundraiser where he was inside with at least 18 of his donors and there was an inside/outside event of like 250 people, he knew that hope hicks had tested positive. thee significance of this at ths point -- it is not clear whether he had been tested at that point, and it is not clear certainly that hope hicks gave a temple suffer all we know, he gave it to her. so many people around him, at

least 10 people, tested positive for covid-19. but the signifificance of him going then in a plane to new jersey for this fundraiser? it is the opposite of what pupublic health offials s have been encouragiging everyryone no do. if you have e been expose,e, certainly if you feel symptoms, people are encouraged to say home. not been arump has regular mask k where. the white house is not g gettina lot of details abobout what will call tiktotok, which are te executivive details about aa timeline when he first found out, but the timeline that you have laid out is also what is generally known at this point and it's really raises questions about the decisions that were travel, forw him to him to decide to travel, and to

expose what seems like a lot of people. amy: and t the critical questio, when was trump last tested befofore thursdaday? wendy the last two of covid test? i mean, the significance of this question is clear because the white house is refusing to answer it, his doctor is refusing to answer it. when was s hey, last tested? any reporting on that? >> yeah, you're asking the question i think a lot of people would like to know. he wouould have been tested -- e would have been tested before the debate i believe -- amy: no, chris matthews -- sosorry, chris walallace said tt trumump arrived too late to actually have a test and they workrked on the "." hononor system." >> ok. that's right. i'm glglad you corrected me on that. i know the biden campaign said he was tested before going to obviouslyand that is

a big breach, if f that is what happened with the whitee house. the one thing theyey have been sentnt repeatedly throughout the last several weeks and months of this pandemic is that he has tested regularly. i think many people assumed he is tested on a daily basis, which would have included that tuesday of the debate. i can tell you that reporters and others who are around the president regularly at the white house obviously before this diagnosis are tested on a daily basis. so i think there is certainly an assumption that was happening with him, to. amy: another critical question, your colleagues who were there that we can covering the events around amy coney barrett, three have now tested positive e as fr as we know. one of them michael scheer of "the new york times." you are a strong advocate of reporters at the white house. you were the head of the press

association there. the significance of this and how hard is it to work safely at the white house when you have a presidentt who the people around him are discouraged from wearing masks and you have a white house press secretary who o does not wewear a mask when she comes to brief the press? >> yeah, it is very tricky. it is a tricky time because myself included, feel a responsibility to cover this, , which is the biggegest y in the world and to get ththe infoformation ouout to the amern people a and the resest of the d -- that only about the president himself, but the p policy resese to the pandemic and everything else. it is definitely a challenge. say, ththatlal, i would reporters have to put themselves at risisk just by going to do their jobs at the white house, but that has been the case. amy: j jeff mason, i want to go

back to you questioning president trump. i believe it was a september 7. president, the issue of what happened -- pres. trump: you're going have to take that up. take it off. how many feet are you awake? >> i will speak louder. trump if you don't take it off, are very muffled. if you take it off, it w would e easier. >> i will speak a lot louder. is that better? pres. trump: it is better. amy: jeff mason, you truly -- you clearly stood your ground wearing a mask and refused to take it off. talk about the significance of that and him telling other reporters at different times, a month ago today, telling them to takeke off their masks? close e at thihink it is representative of the thosee araround mask wearining the president trump hass employed dd used. as you were referring to earlier, he does not like wearing a mask, does not like when people around him are

wearing a mask and in that particular case, h he is rightt that i wasas far enough aw f frm him that we had enough distancee it which i would not have e need to wear r a mask, but i was standing next to my colleagues. that is why left it on. amy: and then what happened yesterday, this moment when president trump does a drive-by wave to supporters outside the hospital. it was an astounding moment to see him in this hermetically sealed presidential -- i don't know if it is an suv -- with two -- >> i think it was an suv. with two secret service driving him. he is a sick covid patient, forcing his secret service to be in a car with closed windows and the press, the white house press the premises leave

at that point because there were be no more newews from p presidt trump? >> right. to give a specific timeline on that, the small pool of reporters that covers the president's movements that travels with them, that is called the pool. we are given instructions and warning as to what time to show up at the white house and in yesterday'y's case, nation o ofe white h house andnd then wewento waltlter reed and were given instructions t to leave because they were the no more movements. there were other reporters out there, and i think that is why we were able to get some video. the pull itself had been -- pool itself had been dismissed. i should clarify something i said earlier, distrust the pool of reporters that 30 member group, it's tested every day when they go to the white house. there are lots of other reporters, including on that day of the nomination ceremony for judge amy coney barrett who do not get tested. the percussions are limited to a small group of people. but to get back to your specific question, yes, he certainly

breached protocols with regard to the press and certainly also breached put calls with regard to help by leaving the hospital and doing that. it is the opposite -- the opposite of what covid patients are encouraged to do all around this country, , certainly ifif they're in the hospital but also specifically if you are atat ho. if you are d diagned with the disee -- let's be clear, he has the disease and is bebeing treated d with thatat -- yours o stay quarantined and in this case, in t the hospital or otherwise at home. yesterday.oke secret service is there to take a bullet from the." president, not for him during a news conference, sean conley was asked about statements made by white house chief of staff mark meadows, who directly contradicted him the day before. cooks yesterday you told us the president was in great shape has been in good shape and

fever-prepare the previous 24 hours. minutes later, park meadows told reporters the president vitals were concerning over the past 24 hours. simple question for the american people, whose statement about the american president should we believe? >> the chief and i work side-by-side. i think a statement was misconstrued. what he meant was 24 hours ago when he and i were checking on the president, there was that momentary episode of a high fever and that temporary drop in the saturation, which prompted us to act expedediently to move him up here. fortunately, that was really a very transient limited episode. a couple of hours later, he was back up mild again -- i'm not going to speculate what that limited episode was a about to rlrly in the course, but he iss dodoing well.l. amamy: it was painfuful to watch these news conferences both on satuturday and s sunday with the level of evavasiveness and

misinforormation. dr. ashish jha is with us dean , of the brown university school of public health. previously the director of harvard university's global health institute. we welcome you back to democracy now! i was wondering if you could talk about the significance of what he was not telling the truth about, , dr. seanan conle? >> good morning. thank you for having me. a lot of information thahat can frfrom dr. conley over this weweekend was c confusing and ii think in general, he made things much worse than making them better. the evasiveness arouound information saturday wasas a disasterer at the press conference. yestererday was aa bit better, t it was not that muchch better.r. at this point, most people e think in this country are confused about the president's medical conondition bececause of both inconsistency and evasiveness in a sense that we're just not getting the f ful picture at all. amy: so what about dr. conley,

the personal physician f for president trump, saying he was just trying to be upbeat so did not want to tell the truth about getting oxygen? and what it means to get oxygen? why this is so significant? and go back to thursday night/friday morning it is announced ththat president trump -- president trump announces that he and the first lady have tested positive for covid and very soon after he is -- he has serious symptoms, which suggests he did not just turn p positivie that night? >> that's right. the natural course of this disease varies from person to person, but typically what w we see is a after somomebody is infefected, three to five days later, they mimight turn positie and a couple of days later theyy develop symymptoms. if they're going to develop symptoms. the time when very confusing. with dr. conley on saturday

saying it had been 72 hours, that puts back to wednesday is the day of diagnosis. so there's been a lot of clarification, a lot of back and forth. at this point we think you turn positive for the first time on thursday and then had symptoms on friday. instead of guesswork, it would be helpful if the white house came forward and gave us the basic data and facts and i think that would be helpful. amy: and w we have no idea whene turned positive bececause they won't t say when he last took a test before thursday. now it looks like on tuesday, the fox moderator chris wallace said,, you know, as i was saying to jeff mason, that trump came too late to take a test. reporters have reported that both on wednesday and thursday when he flew to new jersey for his fundraiser that he was not looking good. he was tired. his voice was hoarse. >> president have difficult schedules and they can get tired, their voices can get

hoarsese, so we don't know of those are symptoms of covid. in retrospect, it is concerning that is the case. one of the things that people bring up is that in a situation like this, again, he is the president and allowed some amount of privacy, but he is the president. and transparency is incredibly important to assure the american people. all of the speculation and guesswork and kind of trying to read between the lines could be made to go away if the white house just released basic information about his testing history, about his symptom history, his therapy history. none of this stuff would be difficult to pull together -- i bet summit he could do it in about an hour. and we could put thehe speculatn to resest. the fact the white house is not doing this is creating a lot more speculation and unease and guesswork andde actualllly pricy rumormongering then what would

happen if they came out and told us what was going on. amy: let's talk about what president trump is getting right now. the only person we know that has gotten this combination of drugs, the experimental nerontigational rege cocktail, if you could explain what that is, and then remdisiver and dexamethasone -- whwhich is extremely serious, nt usually g given to anyone by critically ill covid patients. he has gotten one after another of these. what they are, first of all, dr. and is this because he is president of the united states and they're just hitting him with everything at once because they have access to it and they can or is it because h he is crititically ill? >> let's talk about the three therapies and then talk about his particular treatatment couo. the three therapies come the experimental regenereron,

antibobodies. these are proteins made against viruruses, against bacteria. regeneroron and other countries have test companies have created in the left synthetic antibodies against thehe protein of thee virus. there is gooood reason to beliee that is going to bee useful ththerapeutic. it is u undergoing critical studies. a lot of us are hopeful.l. but hope is that evident. amy: about 260 p people take th, right? >> yeah. we have not seen the full data from t those 260 people yet. we h have seen a press release. and we need a lot morore d datan what hasas happened. eieither way, it is not unreasonable to give thee presidident this in spearman all thererapy. -- experiment on therapy. reremdisiver is an antiviral and blocks the repeplication of the virus and d is had some evidence of efficacy this specific virus.

dexamethasone i is a a steroid. you ususe the steroid -- it is n immunosuppreressive and we tendo k kindfofor this diseasese and of later phases because whenen e think therere are two p phases - therere's a viral phasese wheree virus replicates and people get cash son get sick and then and immunologic phase where the immune systetem overreacts. so the deaeal with that second phase whwhen you use dexametethe . it is rare to use all of this together in one over a two day period.. i'veve a little -- look, i d dot have his clilinical record in front of me. i generally don't like to second-guess other physicians. he has excellent doctors takingg care of him. but it i is a bit unusual to hae all of thisstuff hapappening the way y this w was to vivisceralle sensee worry that he is getting what we often call vfp carare,

which is often worse care becaususe with v vips, we tend n throughout the scientific guidebook and startrt i improvig because we want to do everything for them. but that is not necessarily better care. can meet overerdoing things. agagain, i d don't have enough details about his clinical condition to know if he is getting the rightht care but certainly this is concerning. amy: and the dexamethasone, w which a steroid answer is an anti----- it is dangerouso give them too soon, correct? plus we have one clinical trial that some people who got it earlrly, whenn t there was no respiratory compromise, actually did worse. that is probably because their mean system was actually necessary not overreacting and to give dexamethasone too early, could do more harm than good. with the president, i i trust te physicians come ththe experertst waltlter reed and hopkins were involveded, so i'm assumuming

they're making good decisions. but it is really hard to know. that's talkish jha, about thursday. whether or not president trump new. there were a number of lies s tt spew from the white house and from the president himself. whether he knew he was positive when he took off to fly to new jersey. he clearly knew -- i mean, the white house spokespeople have said, mark meadows has had he knew before he took off that hope hicks had tested positive and he is with her constantly a and there weren light together of air force one she was feeling sick the night before. talk about the dangers that he put people in on that flight and then when he arrived in new jersey. the people at bedminsnster, his dononors, did not know about the circumstances before. apparently, the white house has refused to turn over the list to

the new jersey governor so they can to c contact tracing. hundrs of people were there for an inside/outside event. talk about this. clear,cdc guidelines are and d for g good reasason. the evidence here is clear. let's assume he had not gotten tested positive on thursday morning when he took off her bedminster. hicks wasew that ms. posititive, yet output t was a contact, 70 whoho needed to quarantitine for 1 14 days. irrespective of any positive or negative test. the reason is because he had some significacant risk of havig been infected and in fact having bebecome infnfectious. so the idea that once you know you are a contact, you get on a plane and you go to a fundraiser, it is deeply responsible. people keep thinking of this as somehow these quarantines and isolations are nice to have, would be nice to do most of know, this is essential work.

-- nice to do. no, this is essential work. people are missing work and school because of quarantine. it poses a huge burden on everybody but you have to do it because that is how w you break chains of transmission with this highghly infectious virus. it applies to everyone. the president is not immune frfm this virus as we know and also not immune from spreading the virus. the idea that he knew he was a contact to somebody who was positive and should have known -- everyone around him should have known he needed to quarantine for 14 days, and yet still went to an event? it is deeply responsiblele. it is disrespectful to everybody he came in conontact with becaue he was essentially saying that i could be transmitting to the virus to you and it doesn't matter.. it also undermines our ability to ask other americans to do this. bebecause of the president won't do it for a f fundraiaiser, howo

we ask a c child to do it to avd school?? how do we expect thee sigil worker to miss days of work k ad do t this? -- essential worker to miss days of work into this? i find it upsetting and frustrating. it is a responsible. amy: one of the people president trump met with recently foster father to covid. this is not mentioned, the number of workers at bedminster at his private golf club that are exposed, not to mention what is happening at the white house right now. and we won't even know how many or who have tested positive because the press secretary says she will not reveal this anymore. michael shearer of "the new york times" who covers the white house has tested positive and said he is napping contacted by the white h house -- she has not been contacted by the white house. ce a contactan tracing, the president's sons not wearing a mask on his own surrogates, people like jason

miller, people who work with him, once again even as trump was in the hospital mococked joe biden for wearing a mask. let''s go back to contact tracing. contacact tracing is not a n nie thing g to have. it gives you information. no, no, it is essential to ststopping the outbreak.k. ththere is an o outback -- outbk happening at the white e house. it will l continue to spreread. it will not magically disappear. it will continue to s spread wiwithin the whitete house. it will spreread to other pepeoe tside e the whitee house. that is how the virurus workrks. the way you stop p it is you te, trayays, and isolate. you test people, identify who is been infected. you isolatetein folks who are infected, you quarantine all of their contacts. you keep going until you have got the virus under controrol. it really feels like the white house has seen this as an inconvenience.

sure, it is an inconvenience, it is also essential. the other part to me as a all pay through our taxes payay for the people o work at t the white house. we absolutely have a right to knowow what is h happening. -- i't needed of don't need to know people's personal information but i need to know who has beeeen tested, o is quarantine. thatat is a basic c right of americans to understand abobout their r government. i don't t believe it is s at all reasonable that information was somehow be -- i want to emphasize there is a lolot of popolitical leaders on bototh ss of the politital aisle, bubut certaiainly this white house, tt have taken things l like quararantiningng and testing a d tracing as nice things to do if you cacan do it come i if y youn get around totot. i want to empathize that is thee only real tool we havave for stopping the chains of transmission and bringing the virus under r control. anything elseng

is a responsible. amy: we are a at 210,000 peoplen this country who have died. more than 7 million have been infected. can you talk about, as we wrapp up right now, the most egregious mistakes this administration that president trump is to be continuing eveven as he isis sik with covovid? > when you lolook at other countries that have done a much better job, there is one thing that differentiates them m from us, , and that is about taking e virus s seriously. therere isn't one formula -- you could do masking, testing and tracing, really aggressivee social distancing or somee combinatioion of all three.. what has happened is our federal govevernment at every stepep has downplayed the virus, has demised d its impact, h has lede amamerican people it is somehow about to go away. and that has undermined every effort that it has made an every effort of state andnd localal

government and individuals. it i is created confusion and spread misinformation. this is a very seserious s viru. let's take a serious. let's do what we know to briring it u under control. if we do, can open up schools and workplaces. we can get a a lot of our lives back. but only if we control the virus. the failure to control the virus i i think will go down as ononef the biggest catastrophes of amererican domestic and hehealth policy in generations. and cocontinues to baffle me we still are not doing a. amy: dr. ashish jha, thank you for being with us, dena brown universityy school of public health.h. i want to thank jeff mason, reuters white house cocorrespondent. instead of the question what are the president know and we did he knowow it, when was the presidet infected and who did he in fact? as we c continue to covover the infection election. when we come back, kentucky's attorney general has comomplied release judges order to

15 hours of audiotape from the disputed grand jury proceedings. we will speak with the family attorney for breonna taylor benn crcrump stay with us.. ♪ [music break]

amamy: this is democracy now! i'm amy goodman. kentucky's attotorney general hs complied with a judicial order to release 15 hours of audiotapes from the disputed grand jury proceedings intnto te police killing of breonna taylor, ththe 26-year-old africn american louisville resident who was shot to death last march inside her own home by white police officers executing a no-knock warrant. the tapes were filed friday just before the judge's noon deadline. they confirm that republican attorney general daniel camero did not ask jurors to consider homicide charges for the white police officers who fired 32 times into taylor's apartment, striking her with six bullets. cameron has claimed a witness heard officers announce themselves before breaking down breonna taylor's front door. that witness now says he only heard the police identify themselves quietly and in passing. meanwhile, lawyers for taylor's family say a dozen other witnesses did not hear police announce themselves.

taylor's boyfriend kenneth walker testified he rushed out of bed, grabbed his hand that on the night of the federal rate, fearing the home invasion after you heard loud and repeated banging on the front door. listen closely to these recordings in the grand jury. the audio is hard to understand. >> i was scared to death. she is yelling at the top of her lungs. no response. know anything. amy: that is breonna taylor's boyfriend testifying. death, "i was scared to so she says there is another knock at the door, she is yelling at the top of the lungs and i am, too, who is it? no answer, no response, no anything. so we're like, what the heck? this comes as a second anonymous member of the grand jury is asking the judge to allow them to speak publicly about the case. legal analysts have raised

concerns the instructions from prosecutors were not wooded in the grand jury audio recordings just released. kentucky attorney general daniel cameron's office said in a statement -- "juror deliberations and prosecutor recommendations and statements were not recorded, as they are not evidence." now breonna taylor's family is calling on kentucky governor andy beshear to appoint a new special prosecutor to reopen the case, saying in a statement -- "cameron did not serve as an unbiased prosecutor in this case and intentionally did not present charges to the grand jury that would have pursued justice for ms. taylor." for more, we're j joined in tallahassee, florida, to speak to civil rights ben crump who is representing the family of breonna taylor. welcome back to democracy now! the significance of the recordings released and not released and what your demand is come the demand of the family of breonna taylor. >> it is so good to be with you, amy. thank you for covering these important matters because

breonna taylo's life matters, black women's lives matter in amamerica and we have to contine to rememind america of thahat. the grand jurury recordings that were released werere just as we assumed theyey w were, that noby wawas presenting evidence on behalf of breonna taylor in the grand jury proceeding. in fact, there is one exchange where you hear the prosecutors i've they -- after they have offered a ststep in a bodycam video, grandnd juror says like a black woman says, well, to be good to see the rest of the body cam video? in the prosecutor ma'am, we have 15 hours a bodycam video and that would take too much time. which, amy, she retorts fact, we have the time. and so, when you listen to the recordings come it is as if the

prosecutors are trying to an unjustifiable killing of breonna taylor, this black woman in thehe sanctctity of hen apartment aftfter t they illega, based on a lie, busted open her , executing this no-knock warrant and then you have the jurors who seem to be advocating for evidence for breonna taylor far more than the prosecutors are doing. so the family of breonna taylor is demanding that a new grand jury be convened, and you have an unbiased prosecutor present the evidence to o the grand jury so that breonna may h have her e process thatdm her family can he their day in court,t, and that e could have a chance at achieving ,uststice for this unjustifiable unnecessary and senseless killing of this black woman. amy: the significance of none of

these three white police officers being charged with breonna taylor's death? only one charge, brett hankison, who is indicted on three counts of wanton endangerment -- ultimately was charged only with shooting into a neighbor's apartment. and if then, can also talk about that hankison and the others, , and, were not chchargn this case? >> cerertainly. amy,y, it is a slap in the faceo breonna's mother and her family when you actually make recommendations when daniel cameron, the attack attorney general's office, made kentuckyations -- attorney general's office made recommendations, 99.9% of the time whenever the grand jury -- whenever the da oncnce the grand jury to do, they do.

you can get an indictment on a sandwich ifh -- ham the prosecutor wants it. when he said wanton endangerment charges for the bullet someone into the walls of breonna white neighbors but not new wanton endangerment for the bullets that when in b breonna's black neighbors that lived above her or even the e bull is wanted to brbreonna's apartment were wantn endangerment and worst of all, not even wanton murdeder or homimicide or manslaughter oror anythihing for the bullets that mutilated breonna taylor's body while she was in her underwear. amy: ben crump, soon to have an inkling of this when it was announced the $12 million settlement because i remember you saying, remember, even second-degree manslaughghter. >> amy, it was clearly reckless

and blindly how these police officers w were shooting in this apartment. i mean, executing this no-knock warrant. we have to remember, he never presented evidence about the lie that was in the probable cause affidavit which helped form the basis ofof why the judge signed the no-knock warrant in the first place, which was they said that breonna taylor had suspicious packages being delivered to her apartment for the united s states postal inspector. well, the postal inspectctor and came o out and said he never mae such a statement and that wasn't true. officel hammond and his never presented that to the grand jury. so it begs the question for me, what did they present to the grand jury? now we know these recordings. and we know, amy, they did not put forward second-degree

manslaughter charges or homicide charges, and the law clearly suggests they would have been well reasoned to do so. amy: before we go, what does i t mean to be calling on the -- governorer beshear to reopen this and appoint a second second or secure? how does that happen? exact, we now know the governor does not have that authority, it is the attororney general. i governor can only trtry to use the bully pulpit. i think he has been doing that to try to cite wasn't right what happened to breonna taylor. the power lies within daniel cameron, the kentucky attorney sureal, so we want to make ---- we want to put our frustration exactly where it needs to be, his office and the county attorney who is daniel

wine. those are the two men that can give breonna justice. apparently, with the exception of the department of justice, they are the only two individuals that will determine whether this blalack woman even has due process of the law to have her day in court. so we want to make sure everybody continues to say her name until dananiel cameron in e county attorney that we need to reconvene a new grand jury and have an independent prosecutor who is not trend advocate for the police but is presenting the evidence in an unbiased manner because breonna taylor's life matters. amy: benjamin crump, thank you for being with us, several rights attorney. we will continue with this after break and we wilill speak with e first african-american state legislator in kentucky. stay with us. ♪ [music break]

amy: this is demococracy now!, democracynowow.org, the war d peace report. i'm amy goodman. fofor more on ththe breonntaylor case, we go now to l louisville, kekentucky, to speak with democratic statate representatie attica scott. in 2016, she became the first african american woman to serve inin kentucky's state lelegislae in 20 years. representative scott, last month as you and hundreds protested in downtown louisville, you were live-streaming when police surrounded your group. -- 22 othershers

face charges on rioting, failure to disperse and unlawful assembly. this coming guest officers were directly charged in grantedd tayloror's killing. the signinificacance of youou bg chcharged wiwith a felony? > thank you so o much for hag me on n this morning. yes, w we were figining fo justice for r breonna taylor. as we have done e more than 130 days here in louisvilllle, kentucky. and on that thursday, septemberr 24, we were trying to get to sanctuary before the and :00 curfew. -- 9:00 curfew. we were stopped by police. they told d us to turn around. as we turneded around, they'll "circlcle them." i asked, w what do you u nt us o do? it was two mininutes before curfew. away fromteralally f feet the sanctuary. they told us toto get onn the ouound and s started arresesti s and refused to tell us whwhy thy were arrtiting u

en we fofound out wewe were beig accud d of trying to burn down a librarary that i r represent iny district, i was in shock. could not believe it. amy: and the significance of white werere protesting,g, the e of brereonna taylor and the release of these audiotapes nono and whatat you'' dememanding? >> yes. we were protesting beforore the was able toto get thehe tapes releaseded. it wasas the weekk of david ka's press confererence wheree told us -- dad karen'n's press coconference where he told us se was s going toto d do no justit. that is basisically what he told us. we continued our proteststnd on that wednesday night, the e nigt of his announcemenent, 127 peope were arrested.d. thursdsd night we e were out, we had 24 people arrested. the next day, friday, we had more than 100 people arrested. we are detetermined to getet jue for brbreonna ylor..

no law e eorcement body isisoing stop us from exercising our first amendment rights and from stopping us from havining civil disobedience in the city that refuses to have justice for breonna taylor, her family,y, or her r communitity. amy: w what are you demandingngw asas we wrap up? then we will d do part two to tk about what you're goioing to be doing in the state legislature arouound the killing of brbreona taor.. >> they give her that question.. as weace cocourt tomorrow afafternoon, t tuesday afternooe are clelear we will contntinue o demand jususticeor breonna taylor. what that lookoks like rig n now is e exactly whahat attorney crp said. we need a new special prorosecur who is independent, who o is now politically mototivated, who is not direrectly tied to mitch mcconnell and donald t trump. we need d an indepdedent instigator who willl listeten to the witnesses, whoo lives w whee breonna taylor lives in n her apartment complex. there arare many witnesses who need to be heard.

receivedaylor has not justice. amy: attica scott, thank you for being with us. we will post part two online at democracynow.org. [captioning made possible by democracy now!] aiog