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First Move with Julia Chatterley
Ceremony for Justice Ginsburg on Capitol Hill; U.S. Democrats Say They are Willing to Start Stimulus Talks; How Social Networks are Disrupting Democracy. Aired 9-10a ET
Aired September 25, 2020 - 09:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[09:00:53]
JULIA CHATTERLEY, CNN BUSINESS ANCHOR: Live from New York, I'm Julia Chatterley. This is FIRST MOVE and here is your need to know.
Economic encouragement. U.S. Democrats say they're willing to restart stimulus talks.
TikTok ticking. Time is running out for a deal with Oracle again.
And misinformation mayhem. A special report on how social networks are disrupting democracy -- and more.
It's Friday. Let's make a move.
Welcome once again to FIRST MOVE. Thank you for joining us this Friday as another historic day unfolds in Washington, D.C.
The casket bearing the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg will soon be taken to the U.S. Capitol, where she will then lie in state, the first woman ever
to be given that honor. Those proceedings are set to begin just after 9:30 a.m. Eastern Time this morning, and we will take you live to Washington,
the moment that begins.
For now, a look at global stocks. We are mostly lower here in the United States pre-market, after a pretty volatile week, to say the least. Asia
also finishing the week pretty mixed. Shares of Hang Seng listed Chinese property developer Evergrande, one of the biggest in China by the way, has
tumbled some 10 percent on reports they're facing a cash crunch. It's viewed as a too big to fail test for the Chinese government, so certainly
one to watch.
Let's bring it back to the United States, the NASDAQ trying to avoid a fourth straight week of losses. We retraced earlier a pullback yesterday on
reports that House Democrats are working on a new $2.2 trillion financial aid plan, there's a big jump, of course, between that and actually getting
both sides around the table to agree to a deal and that remains the key.
The S&P meanwhile did bounce from near 10 percent correction level, that's 10 percent pullback from recent highs once again. Helping us along, too,
some positive vaccine news. Novavax is the latest firm to start late stage Phase 3 trials of its COVID vaccine. Its shares as you can see, up some six
percent premarket.
So we're back to the science and the stimulus, and the politics of all of that, wherever you are in the world, not far behind. Let's get to the
drivers.
Top U.S. Republicans, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have promised an orderly transfer of power if President Trump loses the General
Election.
Earlier this week, the President refused to guarantee a peaceful handover when pressed on the matter. Joe Johns, joins us now. Joe, the message seems
to be, democracy will prevail. Your vote will count. It could just take a bit of time to reach a decision and that's the message.
JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: That's the message that most election officials around the country are trying to push, and quite
frankly, it is the states that handle elections much more so than the Federal government. Nonetheless, the President of the United States for the
second day in a row out there essentially refusing to commit to a peaceful transfer of power, once again repeating his baseless claims that there will
be massive fraud in this year's election, and there's really no evidence of that.
In fact, the President is getting pushback from high places, including his own hand-picked F.B.I. Director, Christopher Wray, testifying just
yesterday indicating there is no widespread fraud, and there has been no widespread fraud.
He's also gotten pushback now from the administration, in fact, the White House Chief of Staff, Mark Meadows, just a little while ago on national TV
as well as right out here on the North Lawn putting out some pretty spicy quotes, if you will, including saying that perhaps Wray needs to get
involved on the ground, and he would change his testimony on Capitol Hill.
He was also asked if the President still had confidence in his F.B.I. Director and Meadows, the Chief of Staff, said he couldn't speak as to
whether Trump has confidence in Wray.
So we have the administration at different sides of this controversy, depending on who is in what office. What we also know is the President's
allies up on Capitol Hill, many of them have tried to tiptoe delicately around the issue of fraud or no fraud, but what they do say to a fault,
many of them, is that there will be a peaceful transfer of power -- Julia.
[09:05:43]
CHATTERLEY: Yes, it is very worrying. The last thing we want to do is discourage voters to go out there and vote, whatever their preference of
party or President. Very quickly, Joe, I mentioned the stimulus negotiations or financial aid. We can't ignore the economy. Probability
that a deal can be reached before the election?
JOHNS: There is still a degree of talk about that here, nonetheless, both sides are entrenched in different places. The White House and Republicans
looking for a very skinny deal. Democrats looking for a much more expansive deal to help people in the country, and there are some indication that both
sides see an advantage to taking the issue into the elections and letting voters decide who they want handling this issue of more aid for Americans
as we suffer through the coronavirus pandemic -- Julia.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, quite frankly, it can't come soon enough. Joe Johns, thank you so much for that.
A new weekend and a new deadline for TikTok. The U.S. ban on new TikTok app downloads is now set for this Sunday, but the courts could stop the clock
once again. Selena Wang joins me. Selina, the story that never ends. Where are we on this deal? And what do we have to watch for this weekend?
SELINA WANG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Julia, just when we thought this deal couldn't get any more convoluted, it does. Now ByteDance had filed a motion
to essentially delay this impending Sunday ban and now the U.S. government has until Friday to decide if they're going to agree and let this delay for
this ban continue or if they are going to oppose it by filing court papers.
If they do oppose it, then a hearing will be held on Sunday. Now, sources have told us that the companies and U.S. regulators are hoping to finalize
a deal before the end of the weekend.
If they are successful, that means, this entire ban could be lifted and we don't even have to worry about a delay. But Julia, that is a massive if.
Trump needs to approve this deal and he has given wavering statements on his views on the deal. Earlier this week, he said that he was not going to
approve this deal unless Americans had control of the company and this question of control and ownership has been very contentious.
We've gotten conflicting statements from the companies involved. Oracle recently coming out and saying that ByteDance is not going to have any
stake in this company. ByteDance meanwhile putting out a statement that they were going to continue to have 80 percent ownership in this new
entity, TikTok Global.
Sources have explained it to us that it's going to look like this, essentially ByteDance's international and Chinese investors are going to
have a partial stake in this new entity, but ByteDance itself is not, and if you add that existing previous investors in ByteDance plus Walmart and
Oracle, that would, our sources say, bring American ownership in this new TikTok entity to more than 50 percent and that then would allow the Trump
administration to claim a sort of victory.
CHATTERLEY: It's like looking at a bowl of spaghetti, quite frankly. I don't know how you keep on track and in line with all the details on this.
Very quickly, I believe that ByteDance -- well, I read that ByteDance has requested a technology export license from the Chinese government.
Now, the last I read on ByteDance was that they said they will not transfer technologies or algorithms to Oracle as part of any deal. So why would they
need to apply for an export license if they don't intend to hand over the technology?
WANG: Julia, like every part of this deal, it's incredibly confounding. You're right, ByteDance had said this deal does not involve the transfer or
sale of any technologies, so Oracle will be allowed to review the source code.
Beijing had updated its rules so that any transfer sale of technology to a foreign buyer would basically require Beijing's approval, so this includes
technologies like data processing, speech, and text recognition. Those are all important for ByteDance and empowering TikTok's recommendation
algorithm.
Unclear exactly what Beijing is looking for in this approval, since as I just mentioned, it doesn't involve the sale of technology, but what is
clear in all of this is that Beijing wants to have leverage. They're not going to make it this easy for D.C. to dictate this company and as we saw
from state media, they've called this dirty and unfair, bullying and extortion.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, they have. Selina, it feels like deja vu from last Friday where we were debating whether or not I would download TikTok before the
deadline here. We can continue to debate on social media over the weekend.
Selina Wang, thank you so much for that. We will do it.
[09:10:20]
WANG: Well, I heard it's your birthday so maybe today is the day to download it.
CHATTERLEY: Very naughty, Selina, yes, I keep that one quiet. Thank you.
All right, let's move on. Tokyo slimming down next summer's Olympics with the pandemic driving concerns about big gatherings. The organizers are now
revealing how they'll be scaling back the games.
Will Ripley joins us from Hong Kong. Will, the story here is that they are still planning to do it at all. It feels like a political and economic
salvage operation here. What do we know?
WILL RIPLEY, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Halt for a second though, Julia. Today is your birthday? Happy birthday.
CHATTERLEY: Allegedly. Yes, it is my birthday. Thank you, Will. Thank you.
RIPLEY: I'll tell you what, I'm going to be 40 next year, and every year I say there's less and less need to celebrate. You know what I'm saying? It's
one of those things.
But, yes.
CHATTERLEY: Twenty-five feels great, Will.
RIPLEY: Happy birthday. Birthdays are great. I don't mean to be -- so let's talk about the Olympics, right, because we've already run out of half of
our time here.
The bottom line with Tokyo 2020 is that Japanese organizers are saying with or without a vaccine, they are going to hold these games and they are
trying to make them seem as normal, whatever normal is now as previous games, but there are going to be some really big differences, and I think
they're going to be noticeable.
We're talking about reducing the number of spectators by 30 percent, even though millions of tickets have been presold, some people paying hundreds
or thousands of dollars for seats and now, they have to wonder if they are going to be able to get into the event that they wanted to see.
You have the delegations from the countries also being cut in size by 10 percent to 15 percent. They're looking at canceling some ceremonies and
events that aren't really necessary and simplifying the big opening and the big closing ceremony, simply because of cost.
One problem and one reason that the Olympics had been so deeply unpopular amongst many members of the Japanese public lately, they were thrilled to
get the bid, but now, you look at public opinion polls and most Japanese say they don't want the games to happen, because they're just so darned
expensive and it's going to cost billions more to move them back by a year.
So by getting rid of like for example the smoke machines apparently, they can save money. They can scale back some of the dazzle that we expect to
see, but they are still hoping to retain the spirit and essence of the games. But some of the perks the athletes and their handlers are used to
like luxury transportation and all of that, that might go away.
But they're still trying to calculate, Julia, how much they will actually save as a result of this. In terms of health-wise, we don't know how
spectators, people coming into Japan are going to be treated. We don't know if there's going to be a vaccine. We don't know if there is going to be a
five-minute COVID test, but for athletes themselves, the plan right now is they don't do a 14-day quarantine, because there's just no way for an
Olympian to do that.
But what they will have is at least five COVID-19 tests before they arrive, just after they arrive and basically leading all the way up to the
competition itself, and that's in addition to having their movements tracked by an app and by their respective governments, and even having to
submit a plan of action ahead of time saying on this date at this time, this is where I'll be and they're going to have to stick to it for this to
all work -- Julia.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, I mean, this austerity style Olympics, isn't it, by comparison, but safety comes first and hopefully the science will look very
different by the time we get to summer of next year.
Will, great to have you with us. Thank you. Will Ripley there in Hong Kong.
All right, more to come after the break. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[09:16:46]
CHATTERLEY: Welcome back to FIRST MOVE and a look at how social media is influencing election strategies and voter perceptions ahead of the U.S.
Presidential Election.
Our Donie O'Sullivan investigated the impact of misinformation on some Trump supporters.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
AUDIENCE: (Chanting "Four more years. Four more years. Four more years. Four more years.)
DONIE O'SULLIVAN, CNN BUSINESS REPORTER (on camera): So we've come to a trump rally in Bemidji, Minnesota to ask from supporters what they see when
they open their Facebook feeds.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DAVID, TRUMP SUPPORTER: No one has been more wrong more often than Biden.
CARRI, TRUMP SUPPORTER: The November 3rd election result may never be accurately determined.
O'SULLIVAN: On that post, is there any label or fact check or anything?
CARRI: Yes, they have a little thing at the bottom that says voting by mail has a long history of trust worthiness in the U.S.
O'SULLIVAN: Are you a Facebook user?
SCOTT, TRUMP SUPPORTER: I use Facebook, yes.
O'SULLIVAN: Yes, so what sort of pages do you follow on there?
SCOTT: Anybody that agrees with me.
O'SULLIVAN: Only people that agree with you? You don't want to hear --
SCOTT: That would be a Republican and anti-abortion guy and pro-gun and pro-beer.
O'SULLIVAN: But you're not thinking it would be good to follow pages of people you disagree with, see their opinion?
SCOTT: No, because they call me stupid, ignorant. Why would I follow people that throw rocks at me constantly because they don't agree with me? I've
got tens of thousands of people that do.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'SULLIVAN (on camera): So Trump, his campaign, a lot of senior Republicans over the past few weeks have been sharing doctored and manipulated videos
on social media. Now, the Trump campaign and Trump supporters will often say, these videos are clearly jokes. They are memes. People know they are
memes. People know they are fake.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHRIS, TRUMP SUPPORTER: When they say, well, this is fact checked, it's wrong, because it's taken out of context. Like when Joe Biden fell asleep
during a live interview on television.
O'SULLIVAN: They claimed he fell asleep. I think that was an edited one, right? That was --
CHRIS: I didn't think it was. It looked pretty live to me, with no cuts in it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Live this morning, from New York, hey, good morning. Wake up. Wake up, wake up.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He can't hear anything.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: This is your wake-up call.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'SULLIVAN: Is this the video that you are talking about.
CHRIS: Could be. Yes.
O'SULLIVAN: Biden falling --
CHRIS: Can I watch it really quick?
O'SULLIVAN: Sure.
CHRIS: This is "The Washington Post."
O'SULLIVAN: So an article there is saying that it was faked, but it looked real, right? I mean, it looked real.
CHRIS: Well, I mean -- I definitely wouldn't doubt that it would happen.
O'SULLIVAN: Even if it is fake, does it change your opinion of Biden?
CHRIS: God no. You've got to sift through it. I missed that one, but it was a good laugh. It was a really good laugh, and like I said, I wouldn't doubt
it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'SULLIVAN: A lot of people we spoke to today are sharing posts on Facebook that later get fact checked by Facebook's third-party fact checkers.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARY PARSONS, TRUMP SUPPORTER: Anything I put on there about our President is generally only on for a few minutes and then all of a sudden, they are
fact checking me saying this, that and the other thing, which I know is not true. Their fact checkers are wrong.
[09:20:03]
JOHN JENNIGES, TRUMP SUPPORTER: They will right away go to the conservative site and say that's wrong and then they pull it, and they're not going to
the liberal sites, and them are the real lies. They are the real liars out there.
O'SULLIVAN: Also circulating online, more insidious forms of misinformation including baseless claims about Vice President Joe Biden being a pedophile.
Do you guys seriously think that Joe Biden is a pedophile?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, I do, but that's my opinion.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I feel he is. I feel he is part of the game of the whole thing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'SULLIVAN: That baseless fabricated claim about Biden is circulating among supporters of QAnon, a conspiracy theory that the F.B.I. says is a
potential domestic terrorism threat.
Some of these false claims have been amplified by the President himself.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
O'SULLIVAN: The F.B.I. is saying QAnon is a dangerous conspiracy theory. Does that make you think should I be following this thing?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, because QAnon is bringing up the bad things about the F.B.I. that's why they're saying it. That's why they're afraid of it.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHATTERLEY: Donie O'Sullivan reporting there. And that was just one side. It's clearly a problem for supporters of all -- both parties in the United
States and it is just a small subset too of what users are facing. The question is how did we get here?
Well, a new Netflix documentary says we're going manipulated. Here is a quick look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What I want people to know is that everything they're doing online is being watched, is being tracked, every single action you
take is carefully monitored and recorded.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A lot of people think Google is a search box and Facebook is a place to see what my friends are doing. What they don't
realize is, there are entire teams of engineers whose job is to use your psychology against you.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CHATTERLEY: The director of "The Social Dilemma" Jeff Orlowski is now with us. Jeff, great to have you on the show. I have to say, I wasn't surprised
when I watched this documentary but I know many people who were shocked, really shocked.
JEFF ORLOWSKI, DIRECTOR, "THE SOCIAL DILEMMA": Yes.
CHATTERLEY: Was that the intention?
ORLOWSKI: Yes. Well, when we were doing a research, it was very shocking to me, so I think for sure the hope was to share some of those revelations
with the general public. I think there are people who -- it is kind of ironic, there's a conversation around filter bubbles, and there's a filter
bubble of people who know about what's going on in tech and then, there is the rest of the population that kind of don't know what's going on behind
the screen, and in many ways, the film was designed for that audience.
CHATTERLEY: There was a brilliant bit at the beginning of the documentary, where a former employee said we were just 50 white guys in Silicon Valley,
able to influence two billion people.
ORLOWSKI: Right.
CHATTERLEY: And I have to say the hairs on my arms rose. Because that's exactly what's going on in many different ways.
ORLOWSKI: It is. It is. I mean, a handful of engineers are programming our entire society at this point, and that was one of the things I realized. We
all interact with these devices every day and the phone itself isn't the problem in my mind. Screen time, like there's some concerns there, but
that's not what's causing the real polarization and the breakdown in mental health and the breakdown in politics and civil discourse and conspiracy
theories.
Those are happening through these platforms that we don't pay for. There's a saying that we have in the film, if you aren't paying for the product,
you are the product, and what that results in is this kind of domino effect of consequences, all through this one business model that is micro targeted
advertising business model that is having impacts on teen mental health, having impacts on democracy, as a whole.
CHATTERLEY: I mean, you do pay because you pay with giving your data and I think the documentary spells out very, very cleanly how this data is used.
ORLOWSKI: Yes. Right, right.
CHATTERLEY: It's manipulated. It is used to predict people's behavior and then it is used against consumers effectively to monetize them, but to your
point, it has an echo chamber effect, where people only really see the views that they already agree with.
ORLOWSKI: Absolutely, and the clips that you just played a second ago is a perfect, perfect example of what we're seeing for everybody.
You know, when I was working on the film, I started to learn that Russia was pushing out anti-fracking propaganda, and I had a stance on fracking
that I had to really question like why do I think what I think? Why do I believe what I believe?
I've told many friends, if you are getting your news through social media, I'm not going to trust your opinion on news and politics. It is really,
these platforms have broken and distorted our entire information ecosystem at this point. The way that news and information is distributed in our
world has been morphed through these platforms.
CHATTERLEY: It's interesting, because some of the employees as well were saying we started out just trying to connect people.
ORLOWSKI: Yes.
CHATTERLEY: There was a utility value, a good purpose for doing this and it almost became Frankenstein's monster and it got out of control. Social
media is a drug. That was one of the other strong lines from this.
ORLOWSKI: Yes. Yes. Absolutely. I don't -- I feel a lot of empathy for the tech insiders who went into this very innocently or very positively, trying
to build tools that would help society, but they went down this path, this inherent vice of designing around a business model that was not compatible
with society.
[09:25:23]
ORLOWSKI: I draw the same parallel to the fossil fuel industry. When we first discovered fossil fuels, it seemed like this great opportunity for
humanity and civilization to travel farther and to have more power available to us and only years later did we realize, wait a second, there
are some really bad consequences to burning fossil fuels.
The same thing with our technology, we're realizing a decade into this, the consequences that this business model is having on breaking down the fabric
of society itself.
CHATTERLEY: Oh, speaking of that, former Facebook executive Tim Kendall in this documentary, he said his biggest short-term worry was Civil War.
ORLOWSKI: Yes.
CHATTERLEY: And I think you look at what's going on in the United States and the anger and the conflict between two political parties, two months
out from an election, and ...
ORLOWSKI: Right.
CHATTERLEY: ... it resonates.
ORLOWSKI: It does. You know, we did that interview over a year ago and we were constantly asking ourselves, okay, if this thesis is correct, if this
mindset here around what this technology is causing to society, happening - - creating in society, what will this look like a year out or a few years out? And that was sort of this trajectory that we always had in mind.
And Tim Kendall's line around this will lead to Civil War, it just -- it feels everything is boiling up more and more along those lines.
It has been harder and harder to have conversations with friends that you might disagree with politically and just based on that clip from a few
minutes ago, we're all operating off of different facts now.
We have different facts that we're bringing to the table. How can we, as, a society possibly have a shared conversation when we are coming with a
completely set of -- completely different backgrounds on an issue?
CHATTERLEY: Jeff, we have about one more minute to discuss this. If I had to criticize, I would say it comes down to self-help, and users ultimately
switching off notifications or fact-checking.
ORLOWSKI: Right.
CHATTERLEY: What about the tech companies? What about lawmakers, doing more?
ORLOWSKI: Exactly. Exactly. For me, the self-help mindset is problematic just from the same perspective of climate change. To say that, oh, we're
only going to solve climate change by you not driving or you not eating meat, it is missing the entire system at play.
These are systemic problems and they need to be solved at the systemic level, with our -- the tech that we've created now, the only paths forward
in my mind are either the tech companies changed their business model from the inside, where they can do it with their own control and power and can
set up the terms of how they want to change or it's going to be forced to happen through regulation, and politicians are going to have to continue to
learn more and more very quickly around what exactly is going on and how to regulate it to serve in society's interest.
These things have become public utilities at this point. They have become a public square, and yet they don't have any of the regulations that we
would, with any public utility. So I think there's a lot that individuals can do to sort of protect themselves.
I've been suggesting that people do a reality swap, if there is the person you disagree with, look at their Facebook feed, show them your Facebook
feed, swap Instagram or Twitter feeds so that you can see what facts they're being shown every day and they can see what you see every day, and
you can start to have a more meaningful conversation and break down and fact check and get to the root truth of any particular issue.
But those are all Band-Aid solutions. Right? That's all just like an individual, small thing to kind of protect yourself, protect your own mind
and your own brain and your own family, but really this comes down to a huge systemic change needed to come from the tech companies themselves.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, and regulators, though, I think social media needs regulating. I actually think all forms of media need better regulation,
quite frankly, in this country, too.
ORLOWSKI: Yes.
CHATTERLEY: From the former employees that you were speaking to, we can pick out Facebook just because it's so topical -- oh, now I have to go. How
depressing. We will reconvene on this conversation. I say that a lot.
ORLOWSKI: Absolutely.
CHATTERLEY: Jeff, we'll talk offline.
ORLOWSKI: Well, thank you so much for the time.
CHATTERLEY: Great to have you with us. Thank you so much.
ORLOWSKI: Thank you so much. Bye-bye.
CHATTERLEY: The director there of "The Social Dilemma." Everybody needs to watch this documentary.
That's it for me. I'll have to be quiet. I am going to hand you now over to my colleagues, Jim and Poppy, for coverage of the Memorial for the late
Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
SUZANNE MALVEAUX, CNN U.S. CORRESPONDENT: ... first woman to lie in-state as well as the first Jewish person to lie in-state and she is also the
second Justice to lie in-state as well.
It was President William Taft who was first President before becoming Chief Justice who had that honor. We are just seeing the motorcade now as well as
the hearse pulling up here to the Capitol as they move slowly along the procession here.
[09:30:12]
MALVEAUX: We are just seeing the motorcade now, as well as the hearse, pulling up here to the Capitol, as they move slowly along the procession
here.
You can see everyone standing at attention. There is the deputy sergeant of arms who will actually escort the family inside of the U.S. Capitol. House
Speaker Nancy Pelosi, as well as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, will greet the motorcade and greet the family as they make their way here.
They are precisely on time. We are expecting that they will get out of the motorcade. There will be a group that will be escorted outside to the back
entrance and then, of course, you will see the casket as it will travel up those east steps, up to the rotunda and through to the Statutory Hall.
And at 10:00 is when that Memorial Service will begin. It is a private ceremony because of the coronavirus. That has been many -- many
opportunities for the public, as I've seen thousands and thousands of people gather outside the Supreme Court since Friday to pay their respects.
But this is really a moment, a journey, if you will, that is so appropriate for the Justice to simply make her way from the Supreme Court to the U.S.
Capitol where so many of these legislate live battles have been fought and where there is one underway for her replacement -- Jim.
JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: Suzanne, thanks so much. Of course, we noted that her dying wish, as recounted by her family, was that she be replaced by the
next President -- Poppy.
POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: How appropriate and how perfectly said, Suzanne, I'm just thinking as we wait for her casket to emerge, how appropriate that
the woman who called herself a flaming feminist litigator, as she was for decades before she sat on the high court, will also be the first woman ever
to receive the honor of lying in state at the Capitol there in Statuary Hall.
A woman and a Justice and a mother and a wife who contributed so much to this country and who, remember when she was nominated in that Rose Garden
announcement, President Bill Clinton called her a person of immense character.
Ariane de Vogue, you have a beautiful piece this morning on CNN.com where you and Joan looked at the life that she was living just before she died, a
life that she expected would go on much longer and that she wrote to a dear friend recently, "I am looking forward to brighter days when this eerie
time ends."
ARIAN DE VOGUE, CNN SUPREME COURT REPORTER: Right. You know what's interesting, it's almost remarkable that -- how surprised her former
colleagues, her former clerks, even some journalists were by her death. I mean, after all, she was 87 years old. But this tiny woman had herculean
strength.
You remember she worked through those five bouts of cancer. I remember when she stayed up all night, pulled an all-nighter to write a voting rights
dissent.
And then, this last term was very brutal. There were big cases. She knew she had cancer. She continued to work. She was the dominant voice in an
abortion case.
And then after the term, the emergency petitions kept coming in. Meanwhile, she was communicating with friends. And, in fact, she was writing a book
with one of her former clerks.
So that's what was so extraordinary about her. And it was picked up a little bit by Chief Justice John Roberts yesterday because he seemed
surprised, but he said finally, in the end, Poppy, fate won out on this remarkable life.
HARLOW: Yes. Yes.
SCIUTTO: I spoke to one of her former clerks this morning who said that one thing he noted about her was that Ginsburg was every -- worked every bit as
hard on the smallest cases as the biggest ones. She wanted to get everything absolutely right.
What you're seeing there right there is the Military Honor Guard that will escort her casket into Statutory Hall in the Capitol. Each -- there are
five guards of honor, each representing the five branched of the Armed Forces: Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Coast Guard. And, again, one
more sign of the special honor that this is, as we noted, first woman to lie in state in history, in the long history of this country, remarkable,
and the first woman to lie in state at the U.S. Capitol.
Suzanne, who's up there on the Hill as we wait for the casket to leave the hearse, this is an invitation only ceremony today. The invited senators
have been requested to be in their seats in Statutory Hall. Tell us why. Statuary Hall, I should say.
MALVEAUX: Well, one of the reasons clearly is because of coronavirus. The Capitol has been closed to the public since the virus began and they are
keeping the numbers quite small. They are trying to -- it's invitation only. And what you'll see is dignitaries. You'll also see the leadership in
Congress.
[09:35:01]
MALVEAUX: A small group. We will -- we do expect to see the Democratic nominee, the vice president -- former Vice President Joe Biden and Jill
Biden, as well as his running mate, Kamala Harris, that they will be attending this private ceremony.
There will be some opportunities, however, for senators and Members of Congress to go by and pay their tributes and respects to the casket later
after about 10:30 or so. Groups of 40 will be going from the House and the senators as well, and that will be about opportunity.
But as Poppy had mentioned, you know, the history that's being made and Speaker Pelosi, as her peer, you are going to see at the very end as the
casket is leaving the Capitol, a group of women, a bipartisan group of Members of Congress, who will be giving the final farewell.
HARLOW: They were actually quite close friends. Speaker Pelosi remembered and said just a few days ago when the Justice told her before the public
knew that she was battling cancer. So Speaker Pelosi there not only a peer, but also a close friend of the late Justice.
Jeffrey Toobin, to you. The arc of her life. This is a woman, who other than the Chief Justice, argued the most cases before this court for decades
before she sat on the court, who head the ACLU's Women's Rights Project. I mean, because of her, women could have credit cards. Because of her, women
could sit on juries in all states. I mean so many things just in the early '70s women didn't have but changed because of her.
JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN CHIEF LEGAL ANALYST: You know, she is the only member of the Supreme Court since Thurgood Marshall who would have been a major
figure in American history, even if she had never served on the Supreme Court at all. Put aside the 27 years on the Supreme Court. That's how
significant her contribution was.
You know, I'm just -- I was sitting -- you know, I'm staring at the same picture that we all are and looking at the magnitude and the honor and
thinking about where she came from.
HARLOW: Yes.
TOOBIN: You know, she was born in 1933 at the peak of the Depression. When she was a little girl, her even younger sister died of leukemia. When she
was 14, her mother died, you know? A transformative, horrific event that, you know, after a long bout with cancer.
And, you know, her father tried to -- you know, raised the family by himself. He was a mostly unsuccessful furrier in New York City. I mean the
distance she came from those really difficult, early days to a farewell like this is really one of the great American stories.
SCIUTTO: Yes.
TOOBIN: And it's just -- it's just the arc of her life is epic in its scale and importance.
HARLOW: Yes.
SCIUTTO: Yes, you go to her high school in Brooklyn, James Maddison High School, you look at the alums from there. Bernie Sanders.
TOOBIN: Chuck Schumer.
SCIUTTO: Chuck Schumer. Norm Coleman. Chris Rock. I mean it's a cross section of America through the years.
HARLOW: There you go.
SCIUTTO: Again, there's the Honor Guard waiting to escort the casket of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Joan Biskupic, you've covered the court.
You've covered Ginsburg. I wonder if you could tell us the change that the court is about to experience as a result of her passing, and we should note
the President has said, tomorrow, he is going to announce his nominee to replace her. And the Senate has said they will vote on that nominee.
JOAN BISKUPIC, CNN SUPREME COURT ANALYST: We really can't overstate the transformation that's about to happen. We've already had a very
conservative court, a five-four conservative court. It's about to go six- three conservative.
And the equality rights that Ruth Bader Ginsburg fought for are just one of many, many types of rights and liberties that are now in the balance in a
much more serious way.
And she, you know, when she started, Jim, she was a much more measured jurist. She was -- she herself was more of an incrementalist from her time
on a lower court. But through the years on the Supreme Court, as it became more conservative in the majority, she moved to the left and certainly had
inspired the total of four Justices who are still liberals on the court and now there will only be three.
And the contrast between a Donald Trump successor to Ruth Bader Ginsburg really takes us back to, you know, at minimum when Clarence Thomas
succeeded another Civil Rights icon, Thurgood Marshall.
HARLOW: Yes.
BISKUPIC: So, so much ahead from immediately with the election to, you know, gun rights, Civil Rights, everything, Jim. Everything.
[09:40:04]
SCIUTTO: Yes. Poppy, you know, yesterday I got in a conversation with someone who studied her cases as a lawyer in law school waiting in line to
view the casket and he made the point, which I had heard before is, part of her brilliance in arguing these equal rights cases early on was that she
took on cases where men were impacted negatively by the law to argue for equal treatment under the law, knowing at the time she would most likely be
facing only male judges, right? And that was her path to argue some of the cases early on, which is, you know, just one of those signs of her
brilliance.
HARLOW: You're so right, Jim. I'm glad you brought that up. And I love the picture you sent me yesterday while you were waiting in line. I just think
it spoke -- it spoke a thousand words to see how long the line was for people to pay their respects and just to have a glimpse of her casket.
And, Jeffrey Toobin, to you. I mean it was brilliant. You and I together interviewed Stephen Wiesenfeld, a case she took to the high court and
argued before, guess what, nine male Justices. She knew to convince the men that things were unequal for women, she might need to use a man to make the
case.
TOOBIN: I mean, the Wiesenfeld case is such an interesting and tragic story that really I think was her favorite case that she ever argued because the
facts were so resonant. If I can just summarize it very quickly --
HARLOW: Yes.
TOOBIN: Stephen Wiesenfeld was married and his wife died in childbirth. A terrible, terrible, sad story. He -- under the prevailing tax law at the
time, as a widower he received less benefits than a widow would have received. And that was on the assumption that men make more money than
women. But it was an explicit discrimination in the law.
She took that case to the Supreme Court and she won. The Supreme Court said that there was no basis in the law to distinguish between men and women and
they have to be treated equally.
That principle was one that was used in several different cases where she and other feminist lawyers brought cases that -- where men were
discriminated against. Another one of those famous cases involved beer, I believe it was in Oklahoma --
HARLOW: Yes.
TOOBIN: Where there was a lower drinking age for women than there was for men --
HARLOW: That's right.
TOOBIN: For 3.2 beer, for low alcohol beer. That case, the court decided that that was unlawful discrimination.
And there are two points to make about this. One is that these victories were, of course, later used to change laws that discriminated against
women. But the other point -- and this is something Ruth Ginsburg often stressed -- was that she felt that when laws against discrimination against
women were invalidated, were ended, it helped men as well as women. That equality was a value that wasn't just something women benefited from, it
benefited everyone.
HARLOW: Yes.
TOOBIN: And she always talked about how women's rights were actually human rights in a phrase that came to be used later by Hillary Clinton.
SCIUTTO: Yes.
TOOBIN: And I think history has proved her right about that.
SCIUTTO: Well, a message that still is so meaningful today in the midst of the racial crisis in this country.
Suzanne Malveaux, of course, Ruth Bader Ginsburg was a jurist. She was also a human being. A wife, a mother with loves. Tell us about her loves outside
the law.
MALVEAUX: Well, Jim, one of the most interesting stories and passionate stories that she loves to tell, we will actually hear from Denise Graves.
She is the soprano opera singer. It was -- it really is her love of opera and of music.
And she tells the story of -- it was back in 1944, 1945, she was just an 11-year-old girl and she happened to meet a man by the name of Dean Dixon.
And he actually was a train conductor. He was an African American man. He was a train conductor. But he was also a musician and he was a musical
conductor. But at the time he couldn't find a job. Could not get a job in the United States at that time.
So he went from city to city and specifically New York City, where he played these concerts, little, small concerts for children. And Ruth Bader
Ginsburg was one of those children. And she heard his story. She learned about his story. And she became keenly aware, even as a child, of the
racial disparities and the inequality.
[09:45:04]
MALVEAUX: And it really is an interesting intersection, if you will, of the two loves, the fact that she was very much aware of racial inequality and
that it was, in fact, this African-American man who introduced her to music and to the love of opera, which, of course, she carried well into her
adulthood.
HARLOW: We are just seeing some of these first images inside there as they await -- inside the Capitol as they await the casket of the late justice.
We know that the former Vice President and former Second Lady, Joe and Jill Biden, have arrived. You'll see them in moments.
Joan Biskupic, I'm reminded of something she said -- there you see them right there as they're waiting -- I'm reminded of something she said. This
was a while ago, 2002, at Brown University. Quote, "Do your part to help move society to the place you would like it to be for the health and well-
being of generations following your own."
She did that, as Jeffrey just explained, for women and for men on the equality front. And that is why, as you said, she has been compared so
often to the late Justice Thurgood Marshall.
But she didn't like that comparison. Tell us why.
BISKUPIC: Well, you know, it's interesting, she -- she had a certain personal wisdom about her. And she felt that all of us -- all of the
Justices, all of the litigators came to the position with their own distinct empathies. And she really broke ground that was different than her
predecessors.
And, Poppy, earlier, when you were referring to that scene in the Rose Garden and what President Clinton said of her --
HARLOW: Yes.
BISKUPIC: I was reminded of what she then said in return that pulls together many of the strands we've been talking about here. She talked
about her late mother who died right before her high school graduation and made it impossible for her to go and pick up all the honors she had won
academically.
And she said on national television that day in June of 2000 -- in 1993, "I just pray that I can be the Justice that my mother could have been if she
had lived at a time when women were allowed to aspire and achieve and at a time when daughters were as cherished as sons."
SCIUTTO: Yes.
BISKUPIC: So, you know, she -- all of these things that you're bring up here --
SCIUTTO: Joan --
BISKUPIC: Oh, pardon me, Jim?
SCIUTTO: Just as you mentioned daughters and sons --
BISKUPIC: Yes.
SCIUTTO: At the top of the steps now greeting her casket.
BISKUPIC: Right.
SCIUTTO: Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, but also members of her family. Her daughter Jane, who is a Law Professor at Colombia, following in the family
business, if you want to call it that. Her son James as well.
Let's listen in as we watch this moment.
(STEPS GREETING CASKET)
[09:50:03]
(STEPS GREETING CASKET)
SCIUTTO: So what's happening now is the casket being escorted there into Statuary Hall in the Capitol. Sergeant at Arms that will escort along with
the Military Honor Guard.
Already seated there, senators invited, also escorting the casket, we should note, the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's family, her daughters -
- her daughter Jane, her son James. She also has two grandchildren, Clara and Paul.
One note, when she arrives in Statuary Hall there on that black platform, it's known at the Lincoln Catafalque. It was built for President Lincoln.
And since then it's been something of the great unifier because Republicans, Democrats, nine Supreme Court Justices have lain on that same
platform. Presidents, JFK, Eisenhower, LBJ, Reagan, Ford, Bush, all lain on that same spot.
But what's unique about this, this is the first woman in our country's long history to lie in state in the U.S. Capitol building. Something reserved
for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
HARLOW: Jeffrey Toobin, one of the things that people may not know about her, who didn't have a chance to spend time with her, and you covered her
just so closely, is that she really was also quite humble, didn't have the loudest voice, didn't speak the most words, but every word she spoke,
people listened to intently, right? A precise jurist.
TOOBIN: She was a precise jurist and a precise person.
HARLOW: Yes.
TOOBIN: And, you know, one of the -- one of the unnerving things about talking to Justice Ginsburg is that she was a person uniquely comfortable
with silence.
HARLOW: Yes.
TOOBIN: That when -- when you --
HARLOW: Epic silence, Jeffrey. Epic silence.
TOOBIN: Yes. And you would talk to law clerks and particularly people coming in for interviews with her to become law clerks, and they would be
sitting, talking to her, and, obviously, they were nervous in such circumstances.
[09:55:00]
TOOBIN: And Justice Ginsburg was comfortable with pauses in conversation. But many of us are not comfortable with those sorts of pauses. So,
particularly with these nervous recent law school graduates, they would often describe starting to babble like idiots because they were so anxious
to fill the silence. But Justice Ginsburg didn't mind silence in conversation.
HARLOW: Right.
TOOBIN: Another thing, though, about her personality that I think is worth pointing out, she had one of the great marriages that I think that any one
of us, who knew them, you know, were aware of.
Marty Ginsburg was a lawyer himself. They were, of course, law school classmates at Harvard and Columbia, and he was a very distinguished tax
lawyer and tax professor.
But he was a very outgoing person. He was very friendly. He was the life of the party. He was a famously great chef. Ruth Ginsburg was sort of in the
background when they were together.
When Marty died in 2010, that was kind -- I mean God knows it was a terrible thing for Ruth to lose her husband, but it also was a kind of
social blossoming for her. And one reason why, you know, the cult of RBG, and notorious RBG, and all of the celebrity she achieved late in life, that
was because she was much more of a public figure after 2010. But I will be quiet and let us see the proceedings.
HARLOW: Okay. So you have her family members have come in. You saw Speaker Pelosi, Minority Leader of the Senate Chuck Schumer. And now they will
bring in the casket of late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Again, let's just listen to this moment in history.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Mark time. Bearers, halt.
[10:00:10]
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Center face. Side step. March.
END
