Source: CDC director feels there's a target on his back; All 50 states reopening despite cases up in at least 18 states; Trump falsely claims states illegally send absentee ballot applications to voters, threatens emergency funds; Health experts caution companies are rushing to claim progress on treatments without releasing data
The Lead with Jake Tapper
CNN
3.5 • 1.7K Ratings
🗓️ 20 May 2020
⏱️ 38 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Pence doesn't wear mask or social distance in crowded restaurant; HHS Secy Azar: Navarro blaming the CDC is "inappropriate"; WH awards contract to produce COVID-19 drugs & ingedients in U.S.; Trump attacks China on handling of coronavirus but is reluctant to criticize China's President Xi; Vaccine study in monkeys showed promising results; Union: at least 68 grocery workers have died of coronavirus; Ford briefly closes two plants after employees test positive for coroanvirus; CDC: Arkansas coronavirus outbreak linked to church services; Florida gov. defends coronavirus response, disputes claims about state death rate; WH again pushes false claim that mail-in voting could lead to widespread fraud; Trump voted by mail two months ago; New vaccine studies show promising signs in treating, preventing coronavirus in monkeys; Russia surpasses 300,000 cases, U.S. sends ventilators to help
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is CNN breaking news. |
| 0:05.0 | Welcome to the lead. I'm Jake Tapper breaking this afternoon a rift between the White House and the nation's top medical experts emerging in full view |
| 0:14.0 | with the fate of the CDC director now in question, a Trump administration source |
| 0:19.0 | telling CNN that there are conversations happening inside the White House about potentially replacing |
| 0:24.4 | the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, Dr Robert Redfield. |
| 0:29.4 | And Redfield has become concerned that he may have a target on his back, a separate source tells |
| 0:34.5 | CNN. |
| 0:35.5 | As the White House looks for others to blame, fairly or not for the fact that the U.S. has around |
| 0:40.4 | a third of the world's coronavirus deaths, with only 5% of the world's population. |
| 0:46.2 | Right now, the US has surpassed 92,000 deaths |
| 0:48.9 | from coronavirus, and there are new allegations |
| 0:51.6 | from unnamed CDC officials that some of these deaths could have been |
| 0:55.5 | prevented but that the White House has been driven by politics and not science. |
| 1:00.0 | Six CDC sources telling CNN that their agency's efforts to mount a coordinated response |
| 1:05.0 | to the novel coronavirus have been hindered by the White House. |
| 1:08.5 | One CDC official telling CNN, quote, we've been muzzled. |
| 1:11.8 | Now we should note that the CDC officials saying this to |
| 1:14.6 | CNN are doing so during a week when White House officials have been publicly |
| 1:18.6 | blaming the organization for botching the initial creation and rollout of a test for the novel coronavirus. |
| 1:25.9 | Is it possible that they're both right? |
| 1:27.8 | That the White House is right and the CDC botched the rollout and the CDC is right that too often the White House let politics not science drive the response |
| 1:36.4 | CNN's Jeremy Diamond picks up our coverage from the White House |
... |
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