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Joe Biden Scores Stunning Super Tuesday Victories; Elizabeth Warren Loses Her Home State of Massachusetts; Nearly 94,000 Confirmed Cases of Coronavirus and 3,200+ Deaths Worldwide; 127 Confirmed Cases, 9 Deaths in the United States; Fed Chief Says Tuesday's Cut Will Boost Confidence; Bloomberg Drops Out of 2020 Presidential Race. Aired 10-11a ET

Aired March 04, 2020 - 10:00   ET

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

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(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN (D) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: It's a good night. It's a good night. And it should be getting even better.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

LYNDA KINKADE, CNN HOST: What a great night indeed. Campaign resurrection for former Vice President Joe Biden scoring a stunning series of wins on

Super Tuesday.

Plus, Italy announces plans to shut schools and universities in an attempt to contain the coronavirus outbreak.

Hello and welcome to CONNECT THE WORLD. I'm Lynda Kinkade sitting in for Becky Anderson. Good to have you with us.

Well, first to the race for the White House. And former Vice President Joe Biden is riding high on a wave of victories in the Super Tuesday primaries.

This is the biggest single day of voting on the Democratic calendar, and the former Vice President dominated, winning at least 9 of the 14 states

holding Presidential contests. That includes a stunning upset in the delegate-rich state of Texas.

Bernie Sanders who led going into Super Tuesday comes away with wins in at least three states. And is leading in California where the votes are still

being counted. Maine is also undecided at this point in time. And Biden says this shows he can take his campaign all the way to the White House.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: Just a few days ago, the press and the pundits had declared the campaign dead. And then came South Carolina, and they had something to say

about it. And we were told when we got to Super Tuesday, it would be over. Well, it may be over for the other guy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KINKADE: The takeaway after Joe Biden's dramatic comeback, this appears to be a two-man race. CNN political analyst Julian Zelizer joins me now from

Princeton. Good to have you with us, Julian. So 14 states turning out to vote and clearly after Super Tuesday, despite only one win going into this,

Joe Biden has -- his campaign has completely been resurrected.

JULIAN ZELIZER, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Absolutely. He did very well in terms of the delegate count. Not only winning in the South, but also doing

well in Massachusetts where Warren or Sanders was supposed to win in Minnesota. And turnout was very good in states like Virginia. And we've

been talking about Bernie Sanders and the turnout he will draw. But last night showed that the Biden campaign is capable of doing the same. So he

walks away, not secure with the nomination, but feeling good about his campaign.

KINKADE: So I'm wondering what changed for him Julian, because he was on shaky ground after his first couple of debates. Many people were asking if

he was past his prime. And going into Super Tuesday, he spent a lot less on advertising than most of his competitors. And he had less of a ground game

in some of the states he visited, some of the states he won, he never even visited. So why did he do so well, and how much of an impact did the

endorsements from those that dropped out of the race from Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar, how much of an impact did that have?

ZELIZER: Well, his strong performance in South Carolina the week before, that was important. Winning matters in politics. It makes you look like you

could win again. So I think that energized the campaign. But then the endorsements that took place, Senator Klobuchar who is from Minnesota,

Mayor Pete Buttigieg from Indiana and Beto O'Rourke, I think all three of those had a lot of weight among primary voters. And then finally for some

Democrats, the reality of a Sanders nomination was enough to make them finally decide to go Biden, even if they don't love Biden.

KINKADE: Right. And I mean, that's the point where in terms of what we are seeing from some of the polling. Democratic voters, it seems, care less

about the policy platform of any given candidate. They care more about finding someone that can beat Trump. Is that why we saw such a massive

turnout, do you think?

ZELIZER: Yes, I think that's the defining part of the Democratic campaign. I don't think it's issue based this time around. It's about defeating

President Trump. So whichever candidate can make the most plausible case that they are the most electable, they are in the driver's seat. And

Sanders has an added burden in that a lot of his campaign is really policy heavy. It's about pushing American public policy to the left.

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So voters also add that calculation with him where Biden is more about simply defeating Donald Trump.

KINKADE: And Biden even captured Elizabeth Warren's home state of Massachusetts where she came in third. But as far as we've heard, she has

no plans to bow out. Surely, if she decides to do that, it's only going to help Sanders' campaign, right?

ZELIZER: It would. You would assume that a lot of her support would go toward the progressive part of the competition. It's not clear she will,

though. I mean, even though Biden did well last night, he is not going to win inevitably. This is still a very close competition. Senator Sanders won

the biggest state it looks like, California. So I think Senator Warren is thinking that this could go to the convention. And there, there could be

the possibility of another candidate emerging. We'll see. But I think that's the calculation right now.

KINKADE: All right, Julian Zelizer, as always, good to get your perspective and analysis. Thanks so much.

ZELIZER: Thanks for having me.

KINKADE: Well, extraordinary measures are being used to stem the novel coronavirus even as it spreads right around the globe. The deadly virus has

now infected nearly 94,000 people in 77 countries and territories. More than 3,200 have died.

Italy says it's now going to close all its schools and universities across the country until mid-March to stop the outbreak. And South Korea's

government will use a GPS app to monitor those in self-quarantine. And in the Iranian city of Qom, no one who appears sick is allowed to leave. Our

Christiane Amanpour reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR (voice-over): A worldwide shortage of protective equipment is hampering the response to the

coronavirus outbreak and leaving countries scrambling to prepare for public health emergencies. Rapidly depleting supplies of goggles, gloves and masks

have left doctors and nurses dangerously ill equipped, according to a new warning from the W.H.O., the World Health Organization.

China announced a further drop in new cases, raising hopes that the outbreak is beginning to level off there. The hardest hit country and where

it erupted. But across Asia, the number of confirmed infections continues to grow.

In South Korea, where a spike was recorded, authorities are battling the contagion with technology. A GPS-based app is expected to monitor thousands

of people under quarantine and set off an alarm if they leave their designated locations.

Iran, one of the worst affected countries, will activate a 300,000-strong team of health care workers after reporting more than 90 deaths from the

virus, including an adviser to the supreme leader. An outbreak of the virus in Iran's prisons prompted the temporary release of more than 54,000

inmates, including the British Iranian Nazanin Ratcliffe. And the country's Parliament has been suspended until further notice after some 23 lawmakers

tested positive for the coronavirus.

Across Europe, authorities are taking early precautions to stop person-to- person transmission and several governments have banned large-scale gatherings and have closed some public places.

Italy announced a significant increase in its death toll bringing the number there to almost 80 dead. And most of them living in the north of the

country.

The disease and its knock-on effects have rattled markets all over the world. And a sudden interest rate cut by the U.S. Federal Reserve on

Tuesday was designed to stimulate the economy and could be followed by similar actions from other countries.

As for developing nations, grappling with their public health response, the World Bank has now committed $12 billion in aid.

Christian Amanpour, CNN, London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

KINKADE: Well, here in the United States, the death toll has now climbed to 9 while the number of infections has risen to 127. And the Centers for

Disease Control and Prevention is urging local communities to encourage social distancing to reduce face-to-face contact.

Well, for more, I want to bring in CNN's Clare Sebastian who is tracking the market reaction. As well as senior medical correspondent, Elizabeth

Cohen. Good to have you both with us. Elizabeth, I'm going to start with you because so much of this revolves around the numbers we are seeing. And

the World Health Organization has just come out with some new data that shows that the coronavirus is significantly more deadly than the seasonal

flu, but the silver lining is that it's not as contagious.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Right, and we should take both of those things as something that is true right now but may not

be true in the future. And the W.H.O. is very clear about this. That this keeps changing.

So what it looks like right now is that the difference in the mortality rate is sort of roughly -- it's 3.4 percent, approximately, for the

coronavirus. The flu is much lower than that. But that number could come down because as we discover more and more cases of coronavirus, that means

that the mortality rate goes down.

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More nonfatal cases, that means the mortality rate goes down. And this is perhaps even the more important part which is that it appears the

coronavirus doesn't spread as easily. And they think that's because, while both of them can be spread by people who aren't yet sick, it seems to

happen more with the flu. Again, those things could change. We could be told later on, you know what actually, it does seem to spread more easily

asymptomatically. Or you know the mortality rate is a bit lower or a bit higher than we thought. But for now, what we think is that the mortality

rate is higher for this new coronavirus but it doesn't spread as easily as the flu.

KINKADE: Right, OK. So we are seeing around the country a lot of -- not just in the U.S. but obviously around the world, people stockpiling on

toiletries and food, toilet paper, shortages we're seeing. Is that an overreaction or should people actually go out and buy some things just in

case the supply chain is so affected that we can't get basic essentials?

COHEN: You know, what experts have told me is, think about what you'd do for any other kind of disaster. So for example, here in the U.S., there's a

lot of advice about what to do in case of a blizzard if you live up north or hurricane if you live in an area that's prone to hurricanes. And the

advice in that case is to have two weeks supply of food and water.

And that's also the advice from the U.S. government for a pandemic, which we're not in right now but which this could become. And so, two-week supply

of food and water. You can maybe, you know, extend that, obviously, to toilet paper and other things that you don't want to live without. And so

it's -- when I hear stockpiling, I hear like enough toilet paper for the next decade. You don't need to do that but it's never a bad idea to have

two weeks of toilet paper in your home as well as a two-week supply of your medicines, which is perhaps the most important, food and water. Think about

what you'd do in other situations.

You know, there is a chance wherever you live that you will be told that you need to stay at home for two weeks. There is a chance that you could be

quarantined. And so, you want to think about that in advance. And a two- week supply of those things is not a huge amount. Many of us may even already have that in our homes.

KINKADE: And obviously, here in the U.S., the Center for Disease Control is no doubt concerned there may be cases out there where people have the

coronavirus and it's undetected. They don't know about it. So I understand from this piece you've written online on CNN.com that they're setting up

these surveillance labs to try to detect those people. Just tell us about that.

COHEN: Right. So there's been a lot of question about whether there's coronavirus out there that we just don't know about. Because many younger

and healthier people just -- they get no symptoms sometimes. Or maybe they get a runny nose and scratchy throat. You don't think coronavirus when you

get a scratchy throat and a runny nose, or at least you haven't up until this point.

So it is possible that there are many more cases out there that we don't know about. It's also possible, because China suppressed information about

this virus in the beginning, that people flew from China to other parts of the world, including the U.S., in the sort of December 8th, January 15th

time period. In fact, some modeling shows that that did happen. That there were a few cases that went from China to the U.S. and that that may have

spread the disease even before the U.S. really started talking about it.

So the surveillance sites that are being set up, that Lynda just mentioned, they are surveillance sites all over the U.S. during flu season. And so

when people come down with signs of the flu, they test people for the flu. What the U.S. is going to start doing is when people don't have the flu,

when those specimens are negative for the flu they will then test for coronavirus.

This was actually announced weeks ago. They haven't quite -- they're not quite up and going at full force because there's been this problem with the

shortage of tests. But once that shortage is gone, then hopefully they will be up and going and we may find out there's all sorts of cases out there we

didn't know about.

KINKADE: And that indeed will then lower the mortality rate possibly. If there are many more cases out there.

COHEN: For sure.

KINKADE: Elizabeth Cohen, thank you.

I want to go to Clare Sebastian. In terms of the impact we are seeing on the markets. And, Clare, obviously, the U.S. Federal Reserve slashed

interest rates yesterday. In what was the first unscheduled emergency cut since the 2009 financial crisis. The hope was that it would ease investors'

concerns but, clearly, it had the opposite effect. How are things looking now?

CLARE SEBASTIAN, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Well, things are bouncing back a little bit today, Lynda. I think that probably has slightly more to

do with Super Tuesday and the strong showing by Vice President -- former Vice President Joe Biden. The biggest gainer right now on the Dow is United

Health. That is up some 12 percent. A relief rally, I think, because many people on Wall Street were worried about Bernie Sanders' policies of a sort

of national health care system.

But in terms of what the Fed did, this was a very fine balancing act for them. They were sort of backed into a corner a little bit by the markets

who were really pricing in the prospect of not only a half percent cut but a sort of unscheduled one or increasingly start to.

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So they risked doing nothing and spooking the markets or doing something and using this tool reserved in the past for the likes of the collapse of

Lehman and 9/11 and risked spooking the market as well. So it was a lose/lose situation for them.

But it's interesting because this is similar in a way to what we saw the Fed do last year with their three cuts. What they were doing in this case

was really an insurance cut, trying to get ahead of this really showing up in the economic data we see in the U.S.

Right now we're only starting to see very small signs of it appearing in sort of manufacturing and sort of business activity data. It hasn't shown

up yet in consumer confidence. Hasn't shown up yet in jobs. We may get more details on that when we get the February jobs report at the end of this

week. But the Fed making it clear they're trying to get ahead of a drop-off in economic activity by doing this.

KINKADE: All right. Clare Sebastian, as always, thanks so much for joining us. We'll have to leave it there for now. Thank you.

Well, for the latest on the coronavirus and to separate fact from fiction, you can subscribe and listen to our podcast. CNN's chief medical

correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta is making sense of the headlines speaking with the experts and giving you all the information you need to stay safe

and healthy.

We are going to take a quick break now. You are watching CONNECT THE WORLD. We'll be back with much more news. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KINKADE: We've got some breaking news just in to us. In the presidential race, Michael Bloomberg has just dropped out after what was a poor showing

in the Super Tuesday primaries. Bloomberg had spent hundreds of millions on advertising. Now the big question is, will he throw his support and money

behind Joe Biden? My colleagues Jim Sciutto and Poppy Harlow have more.

(SEE U.S. CNN NEWSROOM)

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