william foege. among his many achievements, dr.ge is largely responsible for the eradication of smallpox. he served for six years as the director of the cdc and for his lifetime of public service was presented with the nation's highest civilian honor, the medal of freedom. so what he says carries real weight, and in that letter to dr. redfield, he did not mince words about the need to stand up to the trump administration, telling redfield, quote, resigning is a one-day story, and you will be replaced. but you could send a letter to all cdc employees laying out the facts. you could upfront acknowledge the tragedy of responding poorly, apologize for what has happened and your role in acquiescing, and assure them that you will defend their attempts to save this country. don't shy away from the fact that this has been an unacceptable toll on our country. it is a slaughter and not just a political dispute. the white house will, of course, respond with fury, but you will have right on your side. when they fire you, this will be a multi-w

foege's advice even before shocking new reporting by "the new york times" this evening which reportsat the cdc, quote, drafted a sweeping order last month requiring all passengers and employees to wear masks on all forms of public and commercial transportation in the united states, but it was blocked by the white house. this comes on top of another damning piece of reporting from "the times." the rachel maddow show has reported previously about how the cdc's scientific work at the smithfield meatpacking plant in south dakota was compromised and changed because of political pressure from washington. now "the new york times" has published new details about exactly what happened. quote, in april a team of cdc scientists inspected a smithfield foods plant in south dakota and wrote a report to the company about new guidelines that needed to be adopted to ensure the safety of workers and the sanitation of the food. vice president pence's chief of staff, marc short, directed redfield to soften the language of the report, reducing the agency's recommendations to suggestions. not long after d

in a letter dated september 23 and obtained by "usa today," william foege asks redfield to apologize to cdc employees for acquiescing to donald trump and to publicly repudiate his administration. foege writes -- "the failure of the white house to put the cdc in charge has resulted in the violation of every lesson learned in the last 75 years that made cdc the gold standard for public health in the world." he added "when they fire you, this will be a multiweek story and you can hold your head high." on the campaign trail, republican candidatetes for thte house anand senate a are increasingly distancing themseselves from donanald trum. in arizona, republican senator martha mcsally -- who o trails democratic challenger r mark key byby double e digits in recent s -- refused to answer a debate moderator tuesday night who asked her if s is prproud of her support for trtrump. >>>> senator, the question was, aryouu proud of your support for president trump? >> i am proud to be fighting for arizona evevery single d. cloak so you're proud of yourur support t for the e presidenent? >> y you loo

foege is one of my heroes, you know? responsible in large part for the eradication of smallpox around the world and somebody we look up to in public health. i know that was meant as a private letter to dr. redfield. what he was doing was calling on the cdc director to ensure he was doing everything he could to defend the agency and the scientists. he expressed deep concern over the loss of trust that has taken place because cdc has not been allowed to lead. he called on dr. redfield to call that out, to call out where there has been political interference and let the cards fall where they may in terms of whether he got fired or not. we will see over time what dr. redfield decides to do but it's absolutely essential that we do everything we can to regain the trust in one of the world's best public health agencies, a trust that now is really in tatters. >> yeah. dr. richard boeser, thank you for joining us. great to see you. >>> what message is president trump sending by violating his own administration's guidelines will c

william foege, who worked under president reagan, calls the government's response a "slaughter," and says the current cdc director needs to expose the administrations mistakes even if it costs him his job. >> and i kept hoping that the task force would see what they're doing isn't working and would change. but this is going to go down as one of the worst responses to a pandemic. >> reporter: here at the cdc, the director has shared no public sponts to that letter, but there is something new tonight from "the new england journal of medicine." the respected medical journal is out with an unusually harsh critique of the trump administration's response to the covid crisis, using worlds like reckless and dangerously incompetent. david? >> steve osunsami, who has been at the cdc for us for months. steve, thank you. >>> coming up, newly released video this evening showing an officer attacked inside a police station. >>> and we remember a very >>> now to the body cam images made public tonight in a brutal attack on a los angeles police officer. jose guzman fighting with officer anthony freem