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The Situation Room

Postal Service Issues Warning About Election; President Obama Praises Biden V.P. Selection; U.S. Death Toll tops 168,000 with 5.2+ Million Cases, New CDC Forecast Projects 189,000 U.S. Deaths by September 5; Postal Service Warns It May Not Meet Some Mail-In Ballot Deadlines as Trump Opposes New Funding, Attacks Mail-In Voting; Teachers, Students, Parents Face the Challenges of Remote Learning. Aired 6-7p ET

Aired August 14, 2020 - 18:00   ET

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

[18:00:42]

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

JIM ACOSTA, CNN HOST: Welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. Wolf Blitzer is off. I'm Jim Acosta in THE SITUATION ROOM.

And we're following breaking news on the firestorm over mail-in voting ahead of the presidential election. The U.S. Postal Service is now warning states that it may not be able to deliver ballots in time for them to be counted.

This comes after President Trump has been misleading Americans about the integrity of mail-in voting and refusing to support additional postal funding.

Tonight, former President Barack Obama is weighing in, accusing Trump of trying to kneecap the Postal Service to suppress votes. This comes as worries about keeping voters safe in the midst of the pandemic are more urgent than ever. The U.S. coronavirus death toll just passed 168,000. And a new CDC forecast projects about 21,000 more deaths in the next three weeks.

First, let's go to the White House.

CNN White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins is there.

Kaitlan, as we're seeing this new warning from the Postal Service, the president still refuses support funding that would assist mail-in voting.

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, he has.

And this week, Jim, he acknowledged that in order for there to be widespread voting by mail this November, which experts are saying they're very well could be because of the pandemic, the president knows that they do need more money for that.

But now he says he's resisting it. And, today, he revealed why, that he sees it as what could amount to basically a bargaining chip with Democrats, as they have been negotiating on Capitol Hill to try to get another coronavirus legislation bill signed, though, so far, those talks have completely collapsed.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS (voice-over): Even though it could be critical to carrying out the November election, President Trump made clear today that his refusal to give the post office more funding is a direct shot at Democrats.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Because they want $1 trillion to go to their friends doing a bad job running certain cities and states that are doing very badly.

COLLINS: The president argued he wouldn't block new funding for the U.S. Postal Service if Democrats meet his demands in coronavirus legislation.

TRUMP: They're not giving it to me. They're giving it to the American people. I mean, giving it...

QUESTION: But if they were to agree with that.

TRUMP: Yes, I would -- I would certainly do that. Sure.

COLLINS: The effort to sow doubt about mail-in voting isn't just coming from the president. His top Cabinet officials are also issuing their own warnings.

WILLIAM BARR, U.S. ATTORNEY GENERAL: The idea of conducting our elections by wholesale mail-in ballots is reckless and wrong.

COLLINS: President Barack Obama accused the Trump administration of attempting to suppress votes.

BARACK OBAMA, FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: What we have never seen before is a president say, I'm going to try to actively kneecap the Postal Service to encourage voting, and I will be explicit about the reason I'm doing it. That's sort of unheard of.

COLLINS: Cost-cutting moves at the post office have come under scrutiny because it's causing delays in delivery and sparking concerns there will be widespread slowdowns.

Trump recently claimed he hadn't spoken with the U.S. postmaster general, an ally of his and longtime GOP fund-raiser.

TRUMP: Well, I didn't speak to the postmaster general of the post office.

COLLINS: But the White House is now confirming Trump not only spoke with Louis DeJoy. He met with him last week ahead of the postmaster general's tense meeting with Democrats.

Despite being the nation's most outspoken critic of voting by mail, Trump and first lady Melania Trump have requested their own mail-in ballots ahead of the election.

TRUMP: Absentee, good, universal mail-in, very bad.

COLLINS: The president also came under fire this week after he refused to knock down a racist conspiracy that Senator Kamala Harris may not be eligible to be vice president because her parents are immigrants, even though she was born in the U.S.

TRUMP: I heard it today that she doesn't meet the requirements.

COLLINS: Today, he was asked if he saw her addition to Joe Biden's ticket as a threat.

QUESTION: Do you have an issue with a strong woman of color being in this presidential race? Do you see...

TRUMP: None whatsoever.

QUESTION: You don't see her as a threat?

TRUMP: As you -- as you know, none whatsoever.

COLLINS: The answer from Trump the day before wasn't surprising, given he built his political career in part by sowing doubt about President Obama's birthplace.

Today, Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, declined to denounce the move.

JARED KUSHNER, SENIOR PRESIDENTIAL ADVISER: I personally have no reason to believe she's not, but, again, my focus for the last 24 hours has been on the historic peace deal that we have been able to achieve here.

[18:05:02]

QUESTION: She was born in Oakland, California.

KUSHNER: Yes.

QUESTION: Makes her a qualified candidate. Why didn't the president take the opportunity to debunk that theory?

KUSHNER: I have not had a chance to discuss this with him. But, again, I will let his words speak for himself.

COLLINS: It wasn't the only conspiracy the White House didn't disavow this week. Trump recently congratulated and endorsed a Georgia Republican congressional candidate who has openly embraced the QAnon conspiracy, a movement the FBI has labeled a potential domestic terrorist threat.

Today, he avoided a question about whether he agrees with Marjorie Taylor Greene.

TRUMP: She comes from a great state. And she had a tremendous victory. So, absolutely, I did congratulate her.

Please. Go ahead.

QUESTION: But specifically -- specifically on QAnon...

TRUMP: Go ahead, please.

QUESTION: ... and her decision to embrace that conspiracy theory, do you agree with her on that? That was the question.

TRUMP: Go ahead, please.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COLLINS: And, Jim, the president just arrived in New Jersey at his golf club, where he's spending the weekend.

But, before going there, he made a stop in Manhattan, because his younger brother, Robert, who is 72 is in the hospital. The president hasn't said why he's in the hospital. He did say he was ill. He said he was going to check on him.

He was -- seemed like he was still learning more information about it. And, so far, that's really all we know, is that he is in a hospital in New York. No further details so far, Jim.

ACOSTA: All right. Kaitlan Collins, thank you very much for that.

Let's get more on that new warning from the U.S. Postal Service about potential delays in delivering mail-in ballots.

We're joined by CNN political correspondent Abby Phillip.

Abby, what does this tell us about how fast voters' ballots can be delivered, compared to the expectations that everybody has?

ABBY PHILLIP, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, everyone should know that requesting their ballot, receiving their ballot and returning their ballot can take a lot more time than they're probably expecting.

The U.S. Postal Service is now warning dozens of states, according to "The Washington Post," that these ballots could take longer in the mail system. And some of that is because of recent changes, cost- cutting changes that have been made that have resulted in election- related materials being slowed through the system.

Now, these warnings aren't necessarily entirely new. There have been, over the years, piecemeal warnings like that given to states about their deadlines and making them realistic. But what is different about this is that it is so widespread. And we are now expecting millions and millions of ballots to go through the Postal Service system this year because of expanded mail-in voting in a lot of states.

It's also coming at a time as there are now questions about the USPS and whether there is political influence being exerted over that organization, due to the fact that it's being headed up by Louis DeJoy, who is a top Republican donor, a top donor to President Trump and his allies, who has led that agency since May.

Now, DeJoy has said that these measures are being put into place because of the need to make the Postal Service more efficient. But I have already spoken to postal workers who tell me that these changes are having a deleterious effect on the ability of the Postal Service to do this very essential function that it has.

ACOSTA: Indeed.

All right, Abby, stay with us, as we bring in CNN legal and national security analyst Carrie Cordero.

Carrie, the Postal Service is warning that some voters may not have their ballots counted in time because of delivery time delays. But those delays are the direct result of cost-cutting measures by the postmaster general. In an election year, the timing just seems suspicious.

CARRIE CORDERO, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: Yes, well, I think there's a few different things going on here, Jim.

So, on one hand, there's the Postal Service, which clearly needs an infusion of money. And Congress needs to act on that front to be able to help it get through this new additional increase in volume that it's going to have to support the election and make sure that the fall election can go through efficiently and smoothly.

So, there's a legislative battle that has to do with money and the ability of the post office to function in that way.

Then I think a separate issue is the fact that the president himself is trying to undermine confidence in the election. And he's doing that by talking about mail-in ballots as if they are corrupt or they are fraudulent, when there is a history of them not being.

And I think what he's also doing is, he's laying the groundwork for potential legal challenges. And that's where voters are really going to have to be patient, because the combination of the increased use of mail-in ballots, the stress on the post office, and then litigation that we may have to wait for right after the election may potentially all delay the actual outcome and result.

ACOSTA: And we have been reporting in the last couple of hours that the inspector general is going to be looking into some of this over at the Postal Service.

Are you concerned that this inspector general will face some of the same problems that other I.G.s and the Trump administration have faced? They have been thrown out because the president didn't like what they were up to.

CORDERO: Yes, I am worried, to some extent, because this president has a very bad relationship with inspectors general. He doesn't want them to be able to do their independent job. [18:10:06]

They usually function in a very independent way. And so we will see whether he allows this particular inspector general. But he fired the director of national intelligence inspector general, and the State Department one has been released.

Other -- throughout the government, other inspector generals have been removed from their positions. And so this is obviously an issue that is of the highest attention that the president has, which is a very difficult place for that inspector general to be.

ACOSTA: And, Abby, the postmaster general is a Trump ally and fund- raiser.

When the president was asked, have you spoken with the postmaster general -- this was last Sunday -- he didn't tell -- he didn't tell the truth, either willingly or mistakenly. He had met with the postmaster general the week prior to that.

Does this warning from the Postal Service actually play into President Trump's efforts to undermine voter confidence in this election?

PHILLIP: Well, that remains to be seen.

It remains to be seen what the consequence of this warning will be. We have already seen in one state, in Pennsylvania, for example, where, just yesterday, there was a filing made by state election officials essentially saying that, because of these delays, they are going to try to accept ballots -- or they're looking for a court decision that allows them to accept ballots that are postmarked on Election Day.

That's something that President Trump and his allies have actually been fighting against in the court. So, this could actually end up backfiring on the president. And, as you noted, it's prompted all these calls for an investigation that the inspector general is going to be looking at whether or not these delays that they're seeing are a result of the cost-cutting measures and what's been going on behind the scenes there.

I do you think that, for Democrats -- I have already heard from many Democrats. They are urging their voters to use alternatives, to use ballot boxes to return their ballots, to go physically to polling places to return their ballots, instead of using the Postal Service, and they're upping those warnings to their voters, because they're concerned that these delays will continue or be exacerbated by the fall.

ACOSTA: And, Carrie, President Trump has now explicitly said he's holding up funding for the Postal Service to limit voting by mail.

Do his actions amount to voter suppression, do you think?

CORDERO: Well, I think what he's trying to do is, like I said, is, he's trying to undermine confidence in the election. And he's trying to suppress the vote. I mean, he's trying to discourage people from having confidence that,

if they vote in a certain way, mailing in their ballot, that their vote will matter. And so, by doing that, he is discouraging -- he is just de facto discouraging people to exercise their right to vote.

Now, whether his judgment politically is correct that that will help him or hurt him, I think, is up for debate. Some political observers observe that that might actually hurt Republican voters who might mail in their ballot.

But what's clear is that he is trying to undermine confidence...

ACOSTA: Could any of this amount to fraud, do you think, Carrie? Could any of this amount of fraud, do you think?

CORDERO: Well, I don't think -- he's not going to be charged with fraud. So fraud, as a criminal matter, I don't think he's going to be charged with.

But I think what he's going to do is, he's going to use these allegations that he softening the ground for to then challenge the outcome of the vote, and he's going to be working behind the scenes to have those legal challenges ready to go.

ACOSTA: OK.

Abby Phillip, Carrie Cordero, thank you very much for that perspective.

Just ahead: The Trump team goes all out in its racist and sexist attacks on Kamala Harris, Jared Kushner joining his father-in-law in refusing to debunk a birther conspiracy theory that's a flat-out lie.

Don Lemon, our Don Lemon, weighs in next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:18:15]

ACOSTA: Tonight, as Republicans launch racist and sexist attacks against Senator Kamala Harris, president -- former President Barack Obama is praising Joe Biden's new running mate. Take a listen.

(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)

OBAMA: She is smart. She is tough. She is somebody who I think will be able to share the stage with Mike Pence or whoever-body else and dissect some of the terrible decisions that have been made over the last four years.

(END AUDIO CLIP)

ACOSTA: Let's bring in CNN anchor Don Lemon to talk about all of this.

Great to see you, Don. You just heard for President Obama described Senator Harris as smart and tough. President Trump and his allies have been turning to their insults, calling her nasty and angry and everything else, questioning her legitimacy to be vice president and so on.

What do you make of Barack Obama coming out so quickly in defending her?

DON LEMON, CNN HOST: Listen, I'm not surprised that Barack Obama, the former president, came out quickly to defend her, because he's worked with her. He knows her.

I'm also not surprised, Jim, that the president and his acolytes would come out and criticize her. Of course, she is still -- she's an opponent in this election.

What I am surprised by is that they -- is that this president would quickly, so quickly go to the birther, the racist birther trope again, and not really having any sort of strategy to criticize Kamala Harris, something that would be substantive.

It's OK to criticize your opponent, but to go to that racist trope already that the president should have learned about, I think, is really disgusting at this point.

[18:20:02]

But I'm not surprised that the former president is speaking out and saying very nice things and giving the senators accolades. That does not surprise me.

ACOSTA: And, Don, why do you think the president did that so quickly, go to the birther stuff almost right off the bat? It sounds desperate.

LEMON: Well, it's hard to -- you can't teach an old dog new tricks. I'm not calling him a dog, but that is a cliche.

He goes to these certain tropes every time he has an issue with someone, every time he wants to criticize someone. Either they're nasty or they have a low I.Q., and on and on. And he comes up with a little kindergarten nickname for them.

So, it's out of his playbook. But it's a worn and tired playbook, Jim. Consider what's happened just in the last few months in this country when it comes to race. Consider what's happened over the last four years when it comes to race. Consider what's happened since this president originally brought out the racist birther thing about President Barack Obama.

We have gone so far since those days. I don't really think that this is going to stick. I think people see -- most people see right through it. Maybe the folks who will ride or die with this president won't see through this B.S. But I think most of us just -- I hate to even give it airtime, Jim. I really do.

I know that we have to bring light to dark places and we have to call it out. But I hate to give this stupidity, this nonsense a platform, because the more you spread it, I think, sometimes, the more people believe it, and it sticks. And it's not worthy of that.

ACOSTA: And it's unoriginal too. It sounds like something from the first season of "The Apprentice," when we're on season four or something.

LEMON: It's just tired. Yes, it's old.

ACOSTA: Don, I want to listen to Senator Harris reflecting on Joe Biden's decision to select her as his running mate and what she sees as the significance of the moment. Let's take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. KAMALA HARRIS (D-CA): Joe Biden had the audacity to choose a black woman to be his running mate. How incredible is that?

And what a statement about Joe Biden, that he decided that he was going to do that thing that was about breaking one of the most substantial barriers that has existed in our country, and that he made that decision, with whatever risks that brings.

I think, as much as anything, it's a statement about the character of the man that we're going to elect as the next president of the United States.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: And how do you see it, Don?

LEMON: I see it's a statement about this country as well.

Think about it. In this moment in time, we have a woman of mixed descent, a black woman, a woman who was reared as a black person, and socialized as a black American, of Indian and also Jamaican descent. She is seen as the safe choice and the choice that will get the Democratic nominee over the line to become a president and for her to become the first woman, female, black vice president of United States.

I think that says more about this country, a lot about Joe Biden, but also about his moral compass and where he sees his country. But it says a lot about this country that people will -- are going to go out and vote for this woman.

And, by the way, back to your first question. There's something that I wanted to mention when you talked about the former president saying nice things about Kamala Harris.

Listen, I have shared the stage with Kamala Harris a number of times for debates or town halls. She is formidable. And when you're on the stage with her, if you're challenging her, if you're interviewing her, you had better know your stuff, because she certainly knows her stuff.

ACOSTA: Absolutely.

LEMON: So, in the debate with Mike Pence, he should get ready for it, because Kamala Harris will be prepared, and she will bring the heat.

ACOSTA: And I noticed Barack Obama there sort of worked in a dig at Mike Pence and said that Kamala Harris will be squaring off with Mike Pence or whoever they put up, as if Mike Pence might not be there for that vice presidential debate.

Don Lemon, thanks so much for that. We appreciate it.

LEMON: I didn't catch that, but that's interesting.

ACOSTA: Be sure to watch...

(LAUGHTER)

ACOSTA: It's there. Go back and listen.

All right, thanks, Don.

Be sure to watch Don this evening on "CNN TONIGHT" at 10:00 Eastern. And listen to his podcast, it's a great one, on the racial divide called "Silence Is Not an Option." It's important listening. Please check it out.

And more breaking news ahead, as we're getting new information about hundreds of coronavirus hot spots.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:29:08]

ACOSTA: And we're back with breaking news on the coronavirus crisis, as the loss of life grows more staggering by the hour, the death toll now above 168,000, with more than 5.2 million cases.

The CDC forecasts that figure will be nearing 200,000 deaths in just a few weeks.

And CNN national correspondent Kyung Lah has more.

Kyung, we have a new measure of the coronavirus hot spots across this country.

KYUNG LAH, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, and it really gives you a sense, this data from the CDC, on how many people have been affected.

Eighty percent of Americans, according to the CDC, have lived in a county defined as a COVID hot spot, a hot spot for at least one day. That's a county definition. So, that is 818 counties, so many Americans affected, and really praying for a vaccine that we heard the president today touting.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TRUMP: We currently have three candidates in phase three clinical trials and are on pace to have more than 100 million doses very shortly thereafter.

LAH: Although, the reality of clinical trials show it will still be months before Americans have a safe vaccine.

In China, early results suggests a vaccine treatment in phase one and two trials may be safe and produce a reasonable immune response, news that comes at the end of a very long back to school week.

HILARY PORTERFIELD, PARENT OF QUARANTINED STUDENT IN GEORGIA: It was terrifying. It was -- my worst fears had come true.

LAH: Her child quarantined, says this Georgia mother, like the more than 2,000 Georgia students, teachers and staffers across five states. At least 230 positive COVID cases have now been reported from schools. The head of the CDC says reopening schools can't be done quickly.

DR. ROBERT REDFIELD, DIRECTOR, CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION: Yes, we don't want to pressure anybody. Our guidance, the timing of that is going to have to be decided one school at a time.

LAH: Given what he has seen, this Arizona teacher says he is quitting.

MATTHEW CHICCI, ARIZONA TEACHER: We weren't given the option to teach from home, no. It is a small room. There is one exit. There is the ventilation isn't all that great for schools. And so it's just -- it's not a good situation.

LAH: But the Trump administration continues to insist schools reopen. The radiologist test should back up the president's own theories as driven by this belief.

DR. SCOTT ATLAS, WHITE HOUSE CORONAVIRUS ADVISER: We know the risk of the disease is extremely low for children, even less than that of seasonal flu. We know that the harms of locking out the children from school are enormous.

LAH: While COVID does rarely kill children, they can infect their homes and community.

The spread of COVID in California is slowing, but the state reported a grim marker, more than 600,000 cases, the most of any U.S. state.

REP. RAUL RUIZ (D-CA): They are much higher in underserved and disproportionately affecting people of color and Latinos here in California.

LAH: Nationwide cases are trending down in most states, seen here in green. But in the last week, the U.S. reported more than 360,000 cases and the death toll continues to stands at more than 1,000 lives lost every single day.

In three weeks, predicts the CDC, between 180 to 200,000 Americans will have died from COVID. The CDC also updated their guidance. After contracting coronavirus, patients are protected for three months.

MICHAEL OSTERHOLM, DIRECTOR, CENTER FOR INFECTIOUS DISEASE RESEARCH AND POLICY, UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA: Right now, we are not even getting close to driving it down. I think what we are going to do is probably level off at the high 40s to low 50,000 cases per day and then post-Labor Day, we're going to have an explosion of cases.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LAH: Now, of course, the experts are saying that one way to control that explosion of cases is to wear a mask. And we got this unvarnished reaction from Dr. Anthony Fauci. He says when he sees people inside a bar not wearing masks, he gets so angry that his blood doesn't just boil, Jim, his blood evaporates. Jim?

ACOSTA: All right. That is putting it as tough as you can. All right, Kyung Lah, thank you very much.

Joining us now, Dr. Peter Hotez, Professor and Dean of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, and Dr. Vivek Murthy, the former U.S. Surgeon General who is advising the Biden campaign on COVID-19 and brief the former vice president and his running mate, Kamala Harris, just yesterday.

Dr. Hotez, let me start with you. Overall cases here in the U.S. are slightly down but California just surpassed 600,000 cases, just staggering. And Florida has reported more than 4,000 cases, new cases a day for the past 52 days straight. That is just unbelievable. Taking a step back, what is all of this number -- what do all of these numbers say to you about the fight that we are in right now?

DR. PETER HOTEZ, PROFESSOR AND DEAN OF TROPICAL MEDICINE, BAYLOR COLLEGE OF MEDICINE: Yes. So, if you take the 30,000-foot aerial view, Jim, here is where we are at. We are more or less plateauing now, but plateauing at what I call 100 miles per hour, meaning 40 -- between 40,000 to 60,000 new cases every day.

And the transmission is especially aggressive in the southeastern United States where it is high as it's ever has been in Northern Florida, in parts of South Carolina and Georgia and Mississippi and Western Tennessee and in parts of Texas. So it is still absolutely terrible and you still cannot open schools in many states in the country, especially in the southeastern United States. That's point one.

Point two is the deaths are continuing. This is just this very somber telling of the same story every day, 1,000 deaths every day.

[18:35:00]

Sometimes it goes up to 1,500, but 1,000 deaths per day. It is like you can bank on it tragically. So, we are easily moving to 200,000 to 300,000 deaths by the end of the year and now new numbers are coming out suggesting that it is an undercount, meaning there are many unaccounted deaths, meaning people that die at home or die suddenly who don't officially have a COVID-19 diagnosis but clearly have that. So when we account for the excess, that is going to higher than that.

So the bottom line is we'll record 2020 as a time of terrible devastation and a White House that never took on a federal response even when they could have.

ACOSTA: And, Dr. Murthy, I want you to watch, speaking of the administration, what the administration's testing czar just told CNN, my colleague, Pamela Brown, about testing in this country just a short while ago. Let's listen to what he had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PAMELA BROWN, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Has the administration actually exhausted it to get more supplies, like reagents and tips other testing supplies to the labs? Is that true, everything has been done?

ADM. BRETT GIROIR, TRUMP'S CORONAVIRUS TESTING CZAR: I am going to say, definitively, yes.

BROWN: Definitely, yes, there is nothing else the administration can do could to more testing?

GIROIR: Well, you will hear a DPA action coming up early next week.

BROWN: Would you say enough has been done to make sure that everyone who needs a test gets a test in this country?

GIROIR: Everything that can possibly be done has been done.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

ACOSTA: As the former surgeon general, what is your response to that?

VIVEK MURTHY, FORMER U.S. SURGEON GENERAL: Well, Jim, it's good to be with you today. And what I would say is that we have certainly come a long way on testing thanks to the work of many people inside and outside the government. But there is no question that we have a long way to go and that we don't have what we need right now.

And think about this, test positivity rates in many parts of the countries are still extremely high. And regardless of what the national labs are telling us, the on-the-ground-experience still shows that for many, but not all people, the wait times for tests are in excess of three days, which is simply too long.

And I'll tell you as somebody who has been working with schools and with sports organizations around the country, a lack of available and affordable testing has been one of the key reasons that so many of them have decided to forego in-person learning and athletic competitions.

So, testing absolutely needs to be a part of our overall COVID-19 strategy and we need to recognize that we don't have enough of it right now. And what we need is a moon shot effort to develop a rapid, low cost point of care testing, ideally, home testing.

We have great talent and resources in our country and I think we could create such testing capacity but it takes to, I think, the focus, investment and leadership. ACOSTA: Absolutely, and leadership is the key in all of this, and we just haven't had it up until this point, especially on this issue of testing.

All right, Dr. Vivek Murthy and Dr. Peter Hotez, we appreciate your time very much. Thank you, both of you, for that and have a great weekend.

Just ahead, more states are altering their vote by mail policies as concerns grow over an expected surge in ballots and postal delays. Next, I'll speak with the governor of Delaware who recently signed a bill expanding mail-in voting in his state.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[18:40:00]

ACOSTA: President Trump attacks mail-in voting. The postal service has just issued a new warning to states that it may not be able to deliver ballots in time to be counted under their election laws.

Let's discuss that and more with the governor of Delaware, John Carney. Governor, thanks so much for joining us.

You signed a bill expanding mail-in voting in Delaware just last month. Does this warning from the postal service concern you that your constituents won't be able to take advantage of this new option?

GOV. JOHN CARNEY (D-DE): It is concerning, Jim. It is actually outrageous that somehow, we would not provide the funding necessary for the postal service to process those ballots submitted by mail by Delawareans. We did pass the legislation at the end of June. I signed it on July 1st.

In light of the pandemic conditions here in our state and across the country, we wanted every Delawarean to vote in a way that was safe so that they could do it by mail. And if the postal services -- we are ballot-in-hand state, meaning the ballots have to be in hand on Election Day. And the postal service needs to process those mail-in ballots in order for every ballot to count. It's just outrageous that the funding would not be there to allow that to happen.

ACOSTA: And this is, of course, all coming as the president is waging his own battle against mail-in voting. How concerned are you that the people of your state may believe the mistruths that we're hearing out there, that he is putting out there about this process? It has to make your job tougher because you're trying to get that information out there about what's really happened.

CARNEY: Yes, absolutely, it does make it much more complicated for the constituents, the people that are represented here in Delaware. They are confused by what they hear. They know that we just saw a report from the intelligence agencies that the Russians plan to interfere with our elections this time, as they did in 2016. It is hard to believe that we would have to worry about the president trying to interfere with the processing of vote by mail ballots. And I hear that from my constituents, the confusion just unnecessary and certainly not helpful.

ACOSTA: Is that what you think is going on, that the president is trying to interfere in the election?

[18:45:01]

CARNEY: Well, it seems to be if he's openly saying that he is not going to provide the funding. We ought to be looking for ways to provide funding so that the Postal Service can make it possible for those mail-in ballots to be received on time as they would have to be here in Delaware, and so that every vote counted.

The Postal Service sent letters out I think to 46 states, many of those states there is evidence they are interfering with those states that are toss-up kinds of states or interfering with the elections in that -- in those states, and that's very concerning obviously.

ACOSTA: All right. What would your message be to the president, just very briefly, on all of this?

CARNEY: Yeah. My message would be to do whatever you can and whatever is possible to fund the Postal Service so that we can conduct an election here safely, where all the ballots can be counted in states like Delaware which as vote by mail process, where ballots have to be received on Election Day and they are processed -- will be processed mostly through the Postal Service.

We need the resources at the U.S. Postal Service to make sure that that happens. The president and Congress can provide funding to make that possible.

ACOSTA: All right. Governor John Carney, thank you very much for joining us. We appreciate it.

And just ahead, as teachers and students grapple with the challenges of remote learning, I will ask an expert about the best ways to make online education successful.

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[18:51:16]

ACOSTA: As the new school year begins, teachers and students are being welcomed back into digital classrooms, a challenge many are struggling to grapple with.

Let's discuss with Sal Khan, founder and CEO of the Khan Academy.

Sal, thanks for doing this. You celebrate and champion online learning. Your free online courses have reached millions of students. And yet you insist online education is not an equal substitute for in- person education.

So, what's the solution when students can't be in the classroom during the pandemic? How do we solve this? SAL KHAN, FOUNDER & CEO, KHAN ACADEMY: Yeah, exactly as you mentioned.

I mean, I'm something of a poster child for online education. If I had to pick between a great in-person experience, with a great teacher versus the most amazing technology, I would take the great in-person experience with a great teacher for my children or anyone's children any day of the week.

And so, we're clearly dealing with a suboptimal set of constraints with everything that's going on with COVID. And the thing to realize is, school isn't just about learning the standards, learning how to factor a polynomial. There's a whole social component of it, and especially because students' day to day lives are more distant because of the pandemic generally. They're not able to see their friends as much even outside of school.

It's key that whatever happens in distance learning leverages technology to create as much human to human as possible. So, that means, yes, you can use Khan Academy for getting as much practice and feedback on core your academic subjects, but when teachers get on a video conference at Zoom or Google Hangout, or Skype, with students, that needs to be human interaction. It shouldn't be a one-way lecture. As much as possible we've got to pull kids out of the screen and make it as engaging and interactive as we can.

ACOSTA: Sal, in your new op-ed in the "New York Times," you offer some concrete recommendations for teachers to keep kids engaged while learning virtually. What are you suggesting that educators do at this point?

KHAN: So, the number one thing is to have several touch points a week, where teachers -- it doesn't have to be this really well-baked lesson plan. In fact, that actually might be counterproductive. It should be extemporaneous. There should be a component of socializing teachers, really making an effort to, as I said, pulled the kids out of the screen, ask them about their lives, give them a problem, something to work on and encourage them to work with each other on it.

Not only is that pedagogically, but that's going to allow them to build bonds and friendships if they're using video conference tools that allow for breakout sessions, leverage those, allow them to interact with each other, because these kids -- you know, it's important they not atrophy their academic schools, but it's more important that they don't atrophy their social, emotional, their collaboration skills, that their mental health stays in a good place. A lot of that's going to happen in these virtual video conference academic settings.

ACOSTA: And there's still a problem with the digital divide in this country. What needs to happen to ensure families so they can, you know, access the resources they need to make this successful for their families? Not all of these online classrooms are created equal.

KHAN: Yeah, this is a super-difficult situation right now where depending on the school district, anywhere from 10 percent to 30 percent of families don't have sufficient internet access. Some of them do. They may only have one device at home. They might not have a suitable connection for the type of video conferencing that's necessary. And even where there have been heroic efforts to get devices out to families, we're still seeing that 5 percent, 10 percent of the kids for whatever reason aren't able to engage.

And this could be a protracted situation. A lot of people are treating this as a one-month, two-month situation, but it's about a five-month two-month situation that keeps carrying out. And folks I'm talking to are saying it's likely on the entire school year in some way, shape, or form.

So, we've got to figure out ways to engage these kids and these families.

[18:55:02]

ACOSTA: All right, Sal Khan, very important information. Thank you.

And we'll have more news just ahead.

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ACOSTA: Finally, tonight, we pay tribute to some of the men and women who have died in the coronavirus pandemic.

Janet Marie Collins of Maryland was 60 years old. She was an avid card player, puzzle solver, photographer and crafter. Born with Down syndrome, she was the fifth of ten children, her sister says Janet's life was about being accepted and loving one another.

Jerome Lipnick of Texas was 76. He was proud to be a first-generation American who prized education and practiced law for 35 years. He loved golf, a good burger, and above all, his family, including his beloved health provider, Alex.

And may they rest in peace. And to all the caregivers during this crisis, we say thank you.

I'm Jim Acosta. Thanks very much for watching.

"ERIN BURNETT OUTFRONT" starts right now.