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CUOMO PRIME TIME

Georgia Governor: Gyms, Hair & Nail Salons, Bowling Alleys Among Businesses That Can Reopen As Soon As Friday; Chris Cuomo On His Coronavirus Recovery; U.S. Source: North Korean Leader Kim Jong-un In "Grave Danger" After Surgery. Aired 9-10p ET

Aired April 20, 2020 - 21:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


[21:00:00]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RANDI KAYE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This protestor, carrying a sign, pointing out, how most recover from the virus, but what about her business?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Who has the right to tell me I can't get a haircut, I can't go here, I can't go there?

(PROTESTERS CHANT USA!)

KAYE (voice-over): While the governors of those states stand by their decision to remain closed, the protesters seem to have found a cheer leader in President Trump.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: I've seen interviews of the people. These are great people. Look, they want to get - they call it "cabin fever." You've heard the term. They've got cabin fever. They want to get back. They want their life back.

KAYE (voice-over): He seemed to take pride in the patriotism of it all.

TRUMP: I have never seen so many American flags at a rally as I have in these rallies. These people love our country. They want to get back to work.

KAYE (voice-over): And then there were the counter protesters protesting the protesters.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It makes me angry when people ignore the science that seems to be working.

KAYE (voice-over): The politics of protesting in the midst of a pandemic, Randi Kaye, CNN, West Palm Beach, Florida.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN HOST, ANDERSON COOPER 360: And that's it for us. The news continues. Want to hand it over to Chris for CUOMO PRIME TIME. Chris? CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST, CUOMO PRIME TIME: All right, Anderson, thank you very much. I am Chris Cuomo. Welcome to PRIME TIME.

We mark five weeks of COVID now. We may well learn that this virus has been around, even longer than that. But let's stick with the bigger point. Are you proud of what the greatest country in the world has managed during this time?

For all the talk about testing, we still don't have enough. I don't care what the White House is telling you. The reality comes from the ground, and the governors, and you know what they're telling you. They're not ready.

So, how do we reopen if we don't have the right tools? And more directly, about those tools, how can America, the greatest country in the world, the richest, the most powerful, how can we be stymied by a Q-tip? How can we not have figured out how to make swabs and PPE?

The President promised us that he would make America great again. Well this is the moment to make that message manifest. And remember, he said it was about bringing back manufacturing. Well where is it right now, swabs and gowns?

The only thing that has checked this contagion is our collective conscience to stay home. Together, as ever as one, we know that is our true power. The question is when will it really be put to this problem? What do you say? Let's get after it.

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TEXT: CUOMO PRIME TIME.

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CUOMO: All right, the latest sign of what appears to be a rush to reopen, we see it from the Governor of Georgia.

He admits, "Look, there will be more cases when we reopen." He says "Will continue to go up." But they want to get business open. People want to get back to life. You know that. I know that. Who doesn't want to get back, OK?

But four days from now, bowling alleys, tattoo parlors, barber shops, I mean, you know, that's an obvious one, you'll even be able to get a massage there, by Friday, is that good? Sounds good, but what does it mean?

Governor Kemp argues his State's a lot more prepared than a month ago. Can they handle testing the populations that will be back out in the public? Can they trace? Can they treat?

I've been trying to get the man responsible for testing on the federal level here, OK? His name is Admiral Giroir. He actually spoke today at the press briefing, a very rare appearance.

Hopefully, the White House is hearing our calls for more transparency. This is the man in control. We've almost never seen him. He is welcome here, tonight and every night.

The same goes for Governor Kemp from Georgia. We invited him on the show. He declined. He is invited again tomorrow. We want his perspective on this.

We are lucky to get some truth of the reality on the ground in Georgia, specifically the City of Atlanta. We have the Mayor here, Keisha Lance Bottoms.

Mayor, thank you so much for joining us on PRIME TIME.

MAYOR KEISHA LANCE BOTTOMS, ATLANTA, GEORGIA: Thank you for having me, Chris. And I just wanted to say, I'm so grateful that you're doing better. My entire family has been thinking about you and praying for you and your family.

CUOMO: Mayor, thank you so much. I am blessed. I am lucky.

My wife has once again proven that she is the stronger part of the couple. The Mrs. powered through this. She's out of quarantine. She dealt with it in a fraction of the time. So, we are among the blessed.

And you know what? My kids, Mayor, they feel exactly what you're being told by your constituents. "Man, I got to get out of here. I got to get back. It's been too long. I can't take it anymore." And that is strong medicine.

The Mayor says, in Georgia, "I hear you, and it's been long enough."

[21:05:00]

Now, what is your level of comfort that when all of these appetizing things open back up, things you know you want, Madam Mayor, and that I want, if I lived in Atlanta, that you can do the testing, do the tracing, and do the treatment that may be necessary, what's your level of confidence?

BOTTOMS: Chris, I have four kids in my house. And no sooner than the Governor made his announcement, my 18-year-old, who'll be 18 tomorrow, came running into the room to announce to me that the Governor said he could leave home.

So, as a parent, I am concerned. Because what I know is that, when I look at the data that we receive from our Public Health Department, each day, our numbers are going up. We get a count at noon, and we get one at 7 P.M.

When I look at the 24-hour period for the 7 P.M. count we got today, our death rate is up by almost 14 percent, our positives' up almost 7 percent, and we are not testing asymptomatic, and people with mild symptoms. And so, it concerns me.

I have a great working relationship with our Governor. But I did not speak with him before he made this announcement.

I spoke with Mayor Hardie Davis, who is the Mayor of Augusta, Georgia, the second largest city in the state. He did not speak with the Governor. I've spoken with several leaders across the state. So, we really are at a loss.

And I am concerned as a mother and as the Mayor of our Capital City.

CUOMO: Well the Governor makes the talking to him part easier because he says "You don't have to talk to me because you can't undo this. No locality can overturn this statewide reopening."

Now, that's a political play, to make this uniform, and for him not to have to deal with infighting, and that's OK on one level.

But now, the bigger concern will rest directly on his shoulders, which is why Madam Mayor, we invited him on tonight. The Governor's invited every night to come on and make the case on this.

He says you guys are in a better position than you were a month or so. And the data shows that over the last couple of weeks you've seen a flattening in cases.

Is that enough for you to have confidence that there's enough testing capacity, there's enough treatment capacity of what could happen in Atlanta, which is a huge density area?

BOTTOMS: Chris, if we're in a better position, it's because we have been aggressive in asking people to stay home. That's why we are in a better position.

Our Metro area has about 6 million people, more than half the population in the entire state, but we have less than half of the people who have tested positive. Where are our hotspots? Our hotspots are in areas like Bibb County around Macon that didn't shut down.

When we open up houses of worship, we have to think about Albany, Georgia, which has had one of the worst outbreaks in the country. That, by and large, came from two funerals.

And so, I'm - I'm perplexed that we have opened up in this way. And again, I can't stress enough, I work very well with our Governor, and I look forward to having a better understanding of what his reasoning is.

But as I look at the data, and as I talk with our public health officials, I don't see what that it's based on anything that's logical.

CUOMO: But here's the strong pull. And what do you say to people, you know, literally, in your own house, when they say, "I got to get out of here. I got to get out. I've had enough.

The Governor says it's OK. Everybody's sick of this. It's been long enough. Everybody's not dying. It seems like we're doing better. More and more States is starting to do this."

Look, full disclosure, my brother worked with Connecticut and New Jersey, as the Governor of New York. They're opening up golf courses, marinas, parks.

You know, I don't think they have a great plan for testing in place, among the states. I don't think they have great pooled capacity. But the pull of opening seems to be the strongest part of the mix right now. What do you do about that?

BOTTOMS: Chris, my mom owned a hair salon for over 25 years. So, I understand the economic pull on this. This would have been devastating to my family for her to have to shut down her business for weeks on in.

But you have to live to be able to fight another day. And so, when we're talking about this economic pool and getting to recovery, if we're not alive on the other side of it, then there won't be a recovery to be had.

And again, let's look at the data. We see our numbers are continuing to tick up in this State. We see that our deaths are rising. We have some of the highest asthma rates in the country right here in Atlanta.

Our Governor often defers to local control, and I wish that this were an instance that he deferred to local control. I don't know how you get a haircut and keep a safe distance from someone who's cutting your bangs. It just doesn't make sense to me.

[21:10:00]

And so, I look forward - go ahead.

CUOMO: Go ahead. No, no, go ahead, Mayor. We're here to hear you.

BOTTOMS: Yes. I - I want to understand the logic behind this. You know, there are people hurting economically. I think that the better use of our energy would be to do things like we've done in Atlanta.

We have launched a small business fund to help people in need of grants. We're launching a beauty and barber shop fund to help people who have hair salons.

We have deferred water bill payments. We've suspended evictions through our Housing Authority. There are a lot of things that we can do to make this more palatable for people to be able to stay home.

But when you talk about small businesses, a lot of people don't even have health insurance, who own small businesses. And so, these are our most vulnerable in more ways than one.

CUOMO: So, I just want to make something clear. You say you have a good working relationship with the Governor. But, just to be clear here, he makes this move faster than even the President is asking anybody to make it.

You never talked to him about this? He didn't consult with you as the Mayor of Atlanta about what it would mean for your city before he pulled the trigger? BOTTOMS: Let me be clear, the Governor is the Governor. So, he did not have to consult with me. But the answer is no, he did not consult with me. And as the largest City--

CUOMO: What's your read on that?

BOTTOMS: You know, I - I can't explain it because I know the Governor to be a man of reason. And so, I don't know why the Governor didn't consult with me. I'm not sure who the Governor--

CUOMO: All right.

BOTTOMS: --consults with, other than who he said he consulted with. But we've created a Business Council in Atlanta, to help advise us, on when and how we should begin to open back up for business--

CUOMO: OK.

BOTTOMS: --at the appropriate time.

CUOMO: Well Mayor, let's do this. You're obviously going to have eyes on the situation.

You always have an open channel here to tell us what's happening, what you're able to respond to, and what you can't, so we have full information for people there and, of course, all over the region and the country.

Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, thank you very much, and be safe, best to your family.

BOTTOMS: Thank you.

CUOMO: All right, so look, here's what the experts tell us. You have to have the virus under control to get the economy back. That's common sense. But how do you balance the two.

Governors, Left and Right, say opening fast without the tools is not reasonable. So, let's take this decision in Georgia, Tennessee, and elsewhere, to reopen in just days to another health professional, Dr. Gupta. What works, what doesn't, next.

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TEXT: CUOMO PRIME TIME.

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[21:15:00]

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TEXT: LET'S GET AFTER IT.

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CUOMO: All right, let's do a little bit of "We" here, in terms of what this Georgia reopening means for the rest of us and obviously to the people there, and a little bit of "Me" here as well.

We had a huge day today in Casa Cuomo. Take a look at this.

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CUOMO: All right here it is. The official reentry, from the basement, cleared by CDC. Little sweaty, just worked out, happens. This is what I've been dreaming of, literally, for weeks.

My wife, she was cleared by the CDC. She doesn't have fever. She doesn't have the symptoms anymore, more than seven days from her quarantine.

We're still a little scared, so I'll just give you one of these, just give you one of these, just give you one of these, just give you one of these. Bella is of course taking the video.

This is the dream, just to be back up here, doing normal things.

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CUOMO: Let's bring in Dr. Sanjay Gupta.

Doctor, one of the things you may observe in that, and by the way, it's very important tonight, especially that Sanjay is in Atlanta. He lives there. So, we'll get a little kind of cross-purpose about how he feels about what's about to happen in his own State.

But what you may have noticed there, Sanjay, very quiet welcome to me, when I walked up the stairs. Two reasons for that.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: I noticed that.

CUOMO: As the - as the onion captured, they really don't want me out of the basement. But secondly, this has spooked the family. You know what I mean? We're spooked by this, like families that you've talked to all over the country.

It really rocked us when Cristina got a case, albeit much more mild than mine. And I think she's just stronger than I am. But the Missus going down took a toll on us. It spooked the kids.

And there's a little bit of a trauma and a recovery process that we're going to have to go through as you see families all having. I never heard of recovery. I didn't know that this was like, you know, having some kind of like--

GUPTA: Right.

CUOMO: --baby trauma. And now, I have a three-week recovery process. I did the first part today. I could barely breathe, doing a walk, 25 minutes, I felt like I was exhausted. I did some little bands that usually I wouldn't even work, you know,

warm-up with. I felt pain. I felt strain, you know, this really knocked people sideways in a way that it'll take weeks.

GUPTA: Yes.

CUOMO: But today, I'm a lucky guy, was even luckier than ever, Sanjay. This was a day I've dreamed about, literally for weeks.

GUPTA: I loved seeing your family there, Chris. And Bella did an amazing job being a camerawoman there.

It is - it is the physical and the psychological, Chris. And I think you've talked us through this.

I mean the physical part of this, even after you're recovered, right, because we always put this in binary terms. You have it, and then you've recovered, but what does that really mean, you know?

We're getting some insight by looking at the studies coming out of China now, some out of the United States, and then we're seeing you.

We're seeing how you're - I know you're a healthy guy. You - you exercise a lot. This has really knocked you down physically.

[21:20:00]

But that psychological component, Chris, I think is going to dovetail nicely into this next conversation because we cannot ignore what it's going to be like for people, even in places that may be reopening too early. We can talk about that.

But what about the psychological part of that for people? Is this safe? Can I touch that door handle?

CUOMO: And we don't want to talk about it because it's stigma.

GUPTA: Is this person been tested.

CUOMO: It's stigma. We'll play to the paranoia, right, because that's a little bit easier. That's about us and them, and the sick versus the not-sick. But people don't want to talk about how they feel from this.

I see it when I talk about it that "Man, this put me into a depression. I've never had anything like this in my life."

GUPTA: Yes.

CUOMO: "It humbled me." I know so many--

GUPTA: I'm sorry.

CUOMO: --deal with so much worse. I've covered it. You've covered it. I'm just saying, for me, personally, I'm not that strong, and it really tore me up inside-out, in terms of making me reassess things about myself, and my life. It scared me like with some people when they get a heart attack. I

know this is nothing like a heart attack. But, for me, it was. And when I talk about it, people go like this, "Mm! Is he talking about - is he crazy now?"

You know, they don't want to talk about the emotional and the psychological. It makes you seem strange. It makes you an "Other." But I think it's going to be a big part of this story, Doc. What do you think?

GUPTA: Yes, no doubt. And I'm - look, I'm glad that we've been able to talk about it.

I hope that everybody has somebody to talk about it. It's not strange. This is real, I mean, and any kind of illness can sometimes not just have an impact physically but also have an impact psychologically. It's a brush with mortality.

I - I knew you were going to be OK. I mean I was very certain of it. Obviously no one can be a 100 percent certain of anything. But I felt good you were going to be OK.

But I saw you, Chris. I saw you go through that doldrums. And I have known you for a while. I've never seen you like that before. And I'm not talking about the physical part. I am talking about the psychological part.

This is affecting young, healthy people. And this, for a lot of people, is the first brush they've had with something serious. They're seeing it around them. And then, they're seeing it in them, you know, within them as well.

So, I mean, again, I - I think it's so important for people to have heard your story because maybe they are getting some of that people just wanting to keep their distance. And then, you know, you've sort of let them know that there's other people out there like them talking about it. So, you know, I think they appreciate it. I certainly do.

CUOMO: And they've been so helpful to me, my new COVID Fam. You know, I can't tell you how many have told me "It's not over, brother. It's not over. Don't go jumping outside like you're going to do something."

GUPTA: Right.

CUOMO: "You're going to faint." That this was two weeks for me, three weeks for me, four weeks for me. "I'm four weeks out. I just tested positive again."

GUPTA: Right.

CUOMO: You know, all these wacky things that are happening.

The one thing I know for sure is I'm going to give myself a week or 10 days, take your guidance, Dr. Fauci's guidance, and others, and then I'm going to give you guys all the blood you want. Hopefully, the plasma will help. I've never donated blood. I am completely a wuss about it. I go right down. They got to lay me down. I got to look to the side, and someone's got to tell me a story.

But I'm going to do it because I want to give people the antibodies. Hopefully, they help. I want to give them the plasma. I want to do anything I can, to help anybody avoid what I had to do.

GUPTA: Yes. That's - that's amazing. And that's something I did not know about you, your fear of needles, and blood, good thing to keep in the back of my mind.

But you could help four people, you know, that's - that's the - that's what the data shows, four people. So, I hope your plasma is full of those antibodies. You're a big guy, so maybe you can donate a lot, and you help a lot of people, hopefully.

You know, we - the study still need to be done.

CUOMO: I hope so.

GUPTA: We believe that the antibodies are in the blood. We believe that there's enough to actually give you immunity. We don't know that for sure yet, as we've reported on, Chris.

But hopefully, if there is, it can help other people. That's how we start to actually see some significant light at the end of this tunnel, is through these therapeutics potentially.

CUOMO: I hope that's true. But I have to tell you, when I hear about the reopening, even again, full disclosure, my brother is Andrew, he is the New York Governor, I was a little surprised by the deal with New Jersey and Connecticut.

GUPTA: Yes.

CUOMO: To open up marinas, and golf clubs, and parks, not beaches but, you know, I think there's going to be a cascade effect, first of all.

And second of all, can you test all these people. I don't believe I can't get it anymore. I know that it's an open question in science. But paranoia-wise, I'm worried I'll get it again.

And when I heard about Georgia, and him jumping, which is obviously a political move here, in part right, he looks good-going early, he didn't even talk to your Mayor in Atlanta about doing this.

What is your thought about the process and the potential?

GUPTA: I think people don't realize that what we've been going through for the last several weeks in the United States of America is a totally unprecedented situation, and it has had a significant beneficial impact.

And we've been physically distancing. People look at the situation now, and they say, "Well it's not that bad. There wasn't that many people who got sick, not as many people needed to be hospitalized. We didn't need as many ventilators."

That's because we did something wholly unprecedented in this country, and a lot of people didn't want to do it in the beginning. Some people were late to doing it, including here in Georgia. But it made a huge difference.

[21:25:00]

Chris, I - I don't relish the decisions these governors have to make. I mean I'm glad I'm not in their shoes right now. I know they're getting a lot of pressure from these businesses. I hear it as well from people that I know in this State.

The problem is the State is not ready to do this. And the data is clear on this. Let's show some of the graphs here. Look - look at the curve of what's been happening in Georgia, in terms of the number of cases overall.

And you'll ask yourself, when you look at a graph like this, is this a State that looks like it's ready to open? You know, you're seeing this - the numbers go up week by week in the State. Maybe there's been a little bit of a plateau.

CUOMO: That's what they say, by the way, Sanjay.

GUPTA: Maybe there hasn't been a bit of a plateau.

CUOMO: The Governor's - the Governor's argument is put up the - there - thank you. There's the graph.

The Governor argues, in the last two weeks, he has met the criteria of the federal government of being flat to down over that two-week process. Now, the Mayor in Atlanta says that's not what she's seeing where she is, and obviously, you have a lag effect, and the reality there of more deaths.

So, is he right about the projections? Or do you think we're playing with numbers?

GUPTA: No, I don't think we're playing with numbers. The numbers don't lie. I mean that's the one thing about data and evidence.

I mean the - the mortality numbers for, you know, Georgia, overall, went up 14 percent in the last 24 hours. There's no - and, first of all, it's not 14 days of plateau, first of all. That's not what the guideline says. It says 14 days downward trend of Coronavirus cases.

That graph did not show 14-day downward trend. It showed - the - the guidelines say 14-day downward trend of symptoms of influenza-like illness. We're not seeing that.

I mean the graph - look, the numbers are what they are. People can look this up. We're not making these numbers up. The numbers have gone up. Yes, they bounced around a little bit. But the numbers do continue to go up. There's certainly not been a 14-day downward trend. We just calculated the number. Some 84,000 tests have been done, roughly 19,000 have come back positive. That's about 23 - 24 percent positive. We need to be doing enough testing where one out of 10, 10 percent come back positive.

We're more than double that. So, we're not testing enough. The testing that we are doing is showing that the numbers continue to go up. The data - the data doesn't lie.

Again, the Governor, I don't relish these decisions. I know the Governor is getting a lot of pressure.

But, you know, the thing about it is that psychologically, going back to that, Chris, because I think this may be the most important point, what are we telling people right now? "Go back out. Take your chances. You might get it. You might not."

Let's - let's show this graphic of this restaurant. This came out of a study out of China. I thought this was really interesting. It shows basically how - how one person who's sitting at a particular table could potentially infect other people at the other tables.

A little bit small there. But there's three tables. There's - there's A, which is in the middle. There's B and there's C.

There's one person at Table A that goes into this restaurant, and subsequently is found out to be infected. Four people at his table get infected. Three people at the table right behind him get infected. Two people at the table one over get infected.

Is this the sort of situation that we are ready for? Is this a sort of situation that people are comfortable putting themselves in?

I know that hopefully in restaurants that they do open. There's going to be more social distancing, more physical distancing. They're going to try some of these things.

But when we say we're not ready, it's not - it is about the testing, making sure we can test adequately. It is about hospital capacity, making sure a hospital can handle the added volume. It is about the fact that--

CUOMO: Right.

GUPTA: --we know more people will get this infection. We know that. As a result of this decision, people will get infected. Any time we reopen, to be fair, there will be people who get infected.

But, right now, the numbers are likely to be higher than necessary. And I think that that's - that's the matrix, and that's the decision, and the data would suggest it's too early to do it.

CUOMO: Well--

GUPTA: I want it to be open too. My kids, they were jumping up and down when they heard this. But it - we're not ready. That's - that's the bottom line.

CUOMO: The gamble - the gamble will be, Sanjay, and this is a very dangerous gamble, there's no question about it, will people tolerate the increase in cases without panic?

GUPTA: Right.

CUOMO: Because that's what every politician is betting on that what is moved is the needle of what we'll tolerate that we're not as panicked anymore by this.

GUPTA: Right.

CUOMO: Some cases will be OK because we want to get back and open. Now, if they get that gamble wrong, and people get spooked, it's going to set us a long way back.

All right, I got to jump. Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thank you for being such a great friend.

GUPTA: It's not - and it's not just you.

CUOMO: Such a great doctor.

GUPTA: It's you could - you could separate - you could - you could transmit that to people you don't even know as well. It's not just about your health--

CUOMO: True.

GUPTA: --my health. We're codependent on each other.

CUOMO: Absolutely. That has always been true for you and me. But it is true for all of us in this matrix. What you have to do is not just for you, as Sanjay said. We're all in it together better or worse.

All right, let's take a quick break.

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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is CNN Breaking News.

TEXT: BREAKING NEWS.

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[21:30:00]

CUOMO: Told you it was quick. We have breaking news involving North Korean Dictator, Kim Jong-un, all right? Right now, let me bring on the phone to get this as accurate as we can, in real time, CNN Chief National Security Correspondent, Jim Sciutto.

Jim, the headline is that this is about Kim Jong-un in North Korea and questions about his health. What do we know? JIM SCIUTTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Chris. I'm told by a U.S. official with direct knowledge that the U.S. is monitoring Intelligence that the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, is in grave danger following a surgery.

Now, we should note that Kim, he recently missed the celebration of his grandfather, Kim Il-sung's birthday, this on April 15th. This raised speculation about his well-being, about his health. He had been seen four days earlier at a Politburo meeting.

But it was that absence in recent days that had begun to raise questions about his well-being. And now, the U.S. monitoring Intelligence that he had undergone a surgery that there were problems and that his health is now in grave danger.

CUOMO: Jim, give people little context on what that means from a reporting standpoint that the U.S. is going off of Intelligence that, what does that mean?

SCIUTTO: Well, let's say, the U.S. is always monitoring Intelligence, particularly regarding countries that - that are national security threats or a great interest to the U.S. Of course, North Korea falls very much into that category.

We should always note with any Intelligence from a country such as North Korea that it is the - the deepest, most impenetrable, of black boxes, right? So, it's not an easy country to get information like this from. But the U.S. very focused on it.

The significance here, a whole host of things. First of all, he's a very powerful leader of a dangerous country with nuclear weapons, and the ability now, to put those nuclear weapons on the tips of missiles, and threaten large portions of the globe. There's that.

It's also a very top-heavy administration. Kim Jong-un, over the last several years, has gone to great - gone through great lengths to eliminate any potential suitors to his throne including, you may remember, Chris, you and I have talked about this, his half-brother who - who--

CUOMO: Right.

SCIUTTO: --North Korea assassinated in an airport with a nerve agent a number of years ago. That created questions--

CUOMO: So, Jimmy--

SCIUTTO: --if Kim - if - we don't know this is going to happen. But we know his health is in grave danger. If he were to die, who would follow him? This raises enormous questions.

And then, added on top of that, of course, is President Trump's enormous investment in Kim Jong-un.

Three face-to-face summits, a relationship the President has described as a love affair, of course, consequences for the President's relationship with North Korea, but also for North Korea itself, and the threat that North Korea poses to the U.S.

CUOMO: So Jimmy, just a couple of high points here.

So, this is about Intelligence. This is about information that the United States has gotten from a monitoring perspective. It wasn't put out by North Korean state media, obviously. Nobody else is reporting this directly from Pyongyang.

But you say grave danger. What is the best suspicion about what that means, like is he on his deathbed, or did the surgery go badly? What's the context?

SCIUTTO: Well I think it's safe to say the U.S. is uncertain how grave that is. They - but they're - they're concerned enough that they're monitoring the Intelligence closely.

And that you - listen, when you put your lead - leader through a surgery like that, and there are complications following, and you have Intelligence to that, you know, to indicate that then you pay very close attention. Well, like I said, North Korea is a black box.

CUOMO: Is there any word, Jimmy, about it being COVID-related?

SCIUTTO: To my knowledge, no. I have not - it has not been described to me as a COVID issue. There's another - Reuters has been reporting, citing North Korean exiles, speculation about this being overwork, the fact that he smokes et cetera.

Listen, oftentimes when you have information like this, about the health of a leader, from a - from a totalitarian state, there are smoke screens put up, right? You might play down the seriousness of it. You might - you might put out other potential explanations for what it is.

But to the best - to the best knowledge of the U.S., at this point, is that that - that there was a surgery, there were problems, complications with the surgery, and now, his health is in danger.

And, of course, given - given that he was absent from what - what normally would have been the kind of celebration ceremony that he would attend, celebrating his grandfather, you know, clearly these health concerns did not begin just in the last day or so that they've been present for a number of days.

[21:35:00]

CUOMO: One known. One unknown.

One known is, as you just suggested, Kim Jong-un, is knowing - is known for going out into public and wanting to be regaled.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

CUOMO: And wanting to be seen at high-profile events. He is not a discreet leader. He's not somebody who's known to skip these types of pageants and things of mass recognition. So, that's what we know. SCIUTTO: Exactly.

CUOMO: What we don't know is he's a young man. But has there ever been suggestion about his health in the past?

SCIUTTO: There have been concerns about his health in the past. There - there's been talk about issues, such as gout, right?

I mean this is - and his weight has been monitored, you know, you might describe him as overweight. I mean this create - this creates questions about how healthy he is. So, there have been questions in the past.

But - but this is in a different category, right, because it references specifically a surgery, and - and something that has been going on for a number of days now. And as it is going on for a number of days, the U.S. has paid closer and closer attention to what it means for him.

CUOMO: Well Jim, thank you so much for bringing this reporting to us, on the fly.

Obviously, major national security implications, depending on what happens, to fill the vacuum of this very dangerous state and, of course, the big question is how real is the danger to Kim Jong-un.

The reporting from Jim Sciutto, and CNN, is that United States sources in our government have been monitoring Intelligence that Kim Jong-un, the Leader of North Korea, his health, could be in grave danger, reportedly after complications following a major surgery.

I asked Jim, do we know anything about COVID? Surgery doesn't sound like COVID. Could it be a secondary infection? No word on that. We're waiting on more. But this is breaking news, latest information from us.

Jim Sciutto, thank you very much.

All right, I wanted to bring you that. Let's take a break. When we come back, we'll start talking about what matters in flattening the curve. Testing is not just talk. Let's bring in a Governor, to get context, next.

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CUOMO: All right, states around the country are going to start reopening. The pull is just too hard. Yes, the curves have been flattening in different places.

But is it enough? It certainly seems to be enough to start fueling the appetite to get back to normal. We know how powerful the pull is. But how we do it is just as important as when.

Today, the Vice President declared that states have all the tests they need, OK, that's his quote, to begin Phase one of reopening. Some governors and labs are pushing back. They say they need more to get up to speed.

President Trump says testing is a local thing. Then why does he and then - have an Admiral in charge of it at HHS? Admiral Giroir, who talked about it today, why is he the appointed person on the Task Force to coordinate testing, if it's a local thing? Is that just a duck move?

So, what does this mean for governors, all right? Importantly, what does it mean for you and your family?

Joining us now is Ohio Governor, Mike DeWine. Now, the Governor's State is set to reopen on May 1st. Governor, thank you for joining us. I hope I find you well.

GOV. MIKE DEWINE (R-OH): Thanks, Chris. Well hey--

CUOMO: So--

DEWINE: --good to see you and your family. That was - that was a great shot.

CUOMO: Thank you.

DEWINE: About 15 minutes ago, that was great.

CUOMO: Listen--

DEWINE: Congratulations.

CUOMO: --I've been dreaming about it for weeks. I'm one of the lucky ones.

DEWINE: That's great.

CUOMO: And I continue to get more lucky. Thank God, my wife went through this much more easily than I did. The Missus is good. The family is good. So, thank you, Governor.

Now, look, in my family, we want to get back. My kids want to get reopened. They hear about what's happening in Georgia. They're like, "Yes! What's going on with Uncle Andrew? Why just the marinas?" What is your word of caution about why you're waiting to May 1st and what the reality is of your ability to test, trace, and treat, when you reopen?

DEWINE: Well we're putting together a group of community health folks to do the tracing. It's going to be very comprehensive. We've got to have more testing than we have.

I talked with the Vice President this weekend about it, and he's been helping us, and working with us, and it's going up. Our testing's going up. But we need - we need to continue to take - take that up further.

You know, Chris, it's important that we do this right. I talked to some business men and women. One of the things they say, you know, they're very anxious to get back, they want to go.

But they've also said, "Look Mike. Don't start down this path, and then stop it. Don't be in a situation where we start our business back up, and then we have to stop it again."

[21:45:00]

So, I think it's important how we do this, Chris. I think it's important that we do it in a methodical way. I've asked my Lieutenant Governor, Jon Husted, to be in charge of working with the business community.

And what we're trying to look at is some of the lessons that we learned over the last three weeks, four weeks, when we had some of the, quote, essential businesses that were still working.

And a number of them, frankly, did a really bang-up job in regard to the social distancing, putting barriers up, wiping things down every 15, 20 minutes, I mean, really did a phenomenal job.

So, we got to take those lessons, and take them over to the other businesses that we're thinking about allowing to open up. And - and, you know, the challenge is that you don't get the data really for two or three weeks. So, we're going to be careful.

CUOMO: Right.

DEWINE: But - but really, people want to open. We want to do it. We can't let this economy just, you know, continue to go down. But, at the same time, we're doing it, we've got to have the tracing, we've got to have the testing, and we're going to be very, very aggressive.

It's not in my nature or Ohioans' nature or Americans' to kind of sit back. And so, we've been sitting back for a while, and we had to do it.

CUOMO: Right.

DEWINE: It was - we have flattened the curve. But we got to get aggressive with this. We're working with a group I've worked with when I was in the U.S.

Senate, Partners In Health, and had a conversation with them tonight. They're going to come in and give us some help in regard to the tracing part of this. And we're very excited about it.

So, I think the Ohioans will be happy to know we're going to become pretty aggressive about this. But the same time, we got to be careful and we just got to do this in the - in the right way. And we got to think it through and move forward.

CUOMO: All the deliberate speed, as they often would say in the law. You know, and look, you know, you are known for taking action. You're also known for not being rash.

And the obvious, you know, what's the obvious concern is that the only thing we have going for us, and that you have going for you in your State, is the discipline, and the collective consciousness, that led people to socially distance and isolate.

And now, we're taking that away. And every time we take it away, we're vulnerable, if you can't match the testing.

See, that's the part I'm worried about is the expectation that people say, "Well look, VP says, and the President says, DeWine's got it that it's a local thing on testing, and he can handle it all himself," and it seems like an unfair burden-shifting to me.

Whether it's Ohio or New York or New Jersey or Oregon, you guys can't do it all alone. Is that a fair assessment?

DEWINE: Well it really has been a partnership though, Chris. I mean I described this to the Vice President this weekend. I said, look, I look at this as a partnership.

And, you know, the - the talks, for example today, an hour and a half on the phone, longer with - with the Vice President, very candid with members - members of both - both political parties.

But I think that, you know, as we move forward, my message to the people of Ohio has been we have to continue the social distancing. This is not a case where we're going to stop doing that. We've got to do that.

When we open the businesses, the businesses have to have this - that social distancing. And what we've seen in the last--

CUOMO: Very tricky, Guv.

DEWINE: Oh, it's tricky. It's very tricky. But it can be done.

CUOMO: Because once you let me out there--

DEWINE: And I think--

CUOMO: --and if there's food and booze, and I'm having a good time, the masks come off, the distance is going to close, you know, those - those are the concerns.

DEWINE: Well what I've said - people have said "Well what's the business going to look like?"

I said, "Look, I think the way it's going to look is that the employees are going to have masks on, and we're going to ask the - the people who come in to have masks on, and we're going to have - ask them to do the social distancing."

We got to keep doing that. And - and kind of a deal is we can open up some businesses. We can get back to business. We can get more people working methodically and lay that out. But we can only do it if we continue to do the social distancing. And - and that's kind of the bargain. That's kind of the deal.

And I think if we do that, and if we have the discipline to do it, Ohioans are pretty disciplined, I'm confident that we can make some progress with our economy, get back to work, but we also got to be doing the testing, the tracing, and - and be more aggressive against this - against this virus, which is much more in our nature than sitting back.

CUOMO: Well look, it is a delicate balance. Sanjay was saying earlier--

DEWINE: It is.

CUOMO: --he does not envy the shoulders upon which this decision rests. But this is why you wanted the job, Governor DeWine, and we wish you well.

DEWINE: That's absolutely right.

CUOMO: And we are always here for you to discuss the issues as they arise.

DEWINE: Thank you.

CUOMO: And what the way forward is.

DEWINE: Good luck, Chris, that's great, thank you.

CUOMO: Good. Thank you, Governor, be well, best to you and the State.

[21:50:00]

All right, let's take a break. Five weeks in, five weeks in, is this as good as we can do? Five weeks in, America, the greatest country in the world, are we handling this the way that we should? Are we being made great again? Let's discuss, next.

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CUOMO: Five weeks in, man, time for a reality check. The President showed us what we needed.

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TRUMP: This is what it's about, right? Is it - does it remind you of something? It reminds you of this, right? One is a swab. One is a Q- tip. It's actually different. It's very sophisticated, actually. But it's a little bit like - so this is the swab.

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CUOMO: And why can't we make them? They are vital in the fight. We don't have near enough. We can't even source them.

[21:55:00]

You hear the story about Governor Hogan, down in Maryland, having to get them from South Korea, Republican Governor, and then the President goes after him, mocking him?

The guy had to go to South Korea to get swabs. The greatest country in the world, and we can't make these things?

The national stay-at-home guidelines, three months to the day, since the first case was announced on our shores, one company, one company, is working with the United States government to make more of these simple little swabs.

This is the moment for this President to make his own message manifest. He promised "Make America Great Again."

Full disclosure, I dismissed it during the campaign, as a call to the days before we were as diverse and as respectful of diversity as we are now. I took it as a culture play and as jingoism.

But Trump said "No. It's about this."

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TRUMP: We are restoring our nation's manufacturing might.

We're restoring the glory of American manufacturing.

And I will never ever disappoint you.

(END VIDEO CLIP) CUOMO: Is he disappointing you right now? This is the greatest need for old-school factory work in manufacturing since the big test, WWII, right?

Ford's Willow Run plant turning out B-24 bombers every hour by the end of the war, companies that made things like brass buttons, upholstery nails, they started making bullets, cartridges, and clips.

America launched more ships and boats in 1941 than Japan did in the entire war. It wasn't easy. We had time. We built up to it. But we built more planes in one year than Japan did in six.

Right now, we got millions suddenly out of work. Where is that spirit of derring-do on the federal level, instead of excuses, instead of lies about having enough? Why aren't we making enough?

There were millions unemployed in World War II. They didn't just stop fascism. They stopped that economic collapse and got rid of unemployment at home.

Rosie the Riveter, 8 million women unleashed a power so strong, they turned a red bandana and blue overalls and a can-do spirit into an icon, Rosie the Riveter, ordinary Americans stepping up to do what was needed in the moment. That is what made America great.

Will we do it again? We've got our heroic healthcare workers. But we're leaving them out there without PPE. We're not doing the minimum that we could for them. This is not sophisticated stuff.

The President said "You can get the reagent. You can get the stuff for the testing." Then get it.

He makes fun about the swabs, "Oh, they're pretty sophisticated." One company? That's making America great again?

You say you have enough tests. No, you don't. None of the governors agree with you. They're going down to D.C. tomorrow to have exactly this conversation.

I can't believe that after five weeks, this is all we've got going. Talk is cheap, man. We need the greatness that only America can achieve in the past by coming together as ever as one.

All these super citizens we have, these big corporate moguls, why aren't they getting involved? Why aren't they doing more?

Why hasn't this President pulled the trigger on them to make them do it the way FDR did? He used the Defense Production Act hundreds of thousands of times. Why hold back when the need is so dire?

Why is the greatest country in the world mustering no greater response than hiding? And look, I'm happy we're doing it. It's flattening the curve. But that's all we got? A lot simpler than B from - B-24s, right, and tanks.

A cotton swab, gloves, gowns, visors, fashionistas can make them. Kids are making them at home. We can't find a way, to do it here, on a large scale, really? Kids do more with hefty bags for Halloween than we figured out how to do with PPE.

You got governors competing with the federal government, and other countries, like I told you with Hogan, this is what we're doing, States fighting against each other and bidding against the federal government, for stuff that somebody else is making because we can't get it done ourselves?

Holy cow! Where is that MAGA mentality? It's more than just a hat, isn't it? Who knows where the hats were made? Hopefully, in America. You figured that out, why can't you figure this out? It's just a Q- tip, some gowns, gloves.

Where once we found solutions, we now put a premium on blame, and excuses. But this is our moment. This is our test. Is our response as great as the need is? If not now, when? When the next wave comes, and we get caught unaware again, with excuses?

Thousands and thousands of people winding up like me and worse, all over the country, families worried, life disrupted? We've got to be able to do better than this. We've got to do better than what we're doing right now.

This is America, the greatest strongest country with the most resilient people. Hard times make strong people. These are hard times. Will we show our strength? Five weeks in, I argue, no, we have not. And we have to do better.

That's my argument for you tonight, all right?