Return to Transcripts main page
CNN 10
Special Runoff Election In Georgia; Congress To Certify The Electoral College Votes On January 6th; Olympics Update; Pompeiian Discovery. Aired 4-4:10a ET
Aired January 05, 2021 - 04:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CARL AZUZ, CNN 10 ANCHOR: It`s January 5th. The election day in one particular U.S. state but it has ramifications for the whole country. So
that`s where we start today`s show. I`m Carl Azuz. U.S. President Donald Trump, U.S. Vice-President Mike Pence, U.S. President-Elect Joe Biden and
U.S. Vice-President Elect Kamala Harris, they`ve all been spending time in Georgia.
On Tuesday, voters there are deciding who will fill two U.S. Senate seats and that will determine which political party controls the Senate for the
next two years. A party needs a simple majority of 51 seats to have control of the 100-member Senate. After the November 3rd Presidential Election,
Republicans were projected to hold 50 seats.
Democrats were projected to hold 48. Georgia had two seats to fill on Election Day but none of the state`s candidates won enough votes then to
clinch a spot in the U.S. Senate. So Tuesday`s runoff there has been proceeded by weeks of fierce campaigning, relentless political ads,
unceasing robocalls and barrages of text messages as both political parties have poured million of dollars into the Peach State trying to influence the
outcome of the vote.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The road to socialism does not run through Georgia.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We`re living out a moment of crisis.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We win Georgia. We save America.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Elections are a matter of life and death.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Georgia law requires that any candidate running for state, local or Federal office wins at least 50 percent of the vote. That
didn`t happen on Election Day so now these races are headed for a runoff in January leaving the make-up of the U.S. Senate hanging in the balance.
The (inaudible) will determine who controls the power on Capitol Hill. If Republicans can manage to win one or both of the seats, Republicans will
maintain control of the U.S. Senate and Majority Leader Mitch McConnell will remain the majority leader.
If Democrats however can win back both seats, they`ll manage to create a tie in the U.S. Senate. That can only be broken by the Vice- President
handing Democrats control not just the U.S. House but also the entire Congress. The two Republican Senators running David Perdue and Kelly
Loeffler are running against Democrats Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock.
Two Democratic underdogs who are hoping to find the same success Biden found in Georgia during the General Election. If Loeffler wins, she`ll add
to the Republican ranks and the record-breaking number of Republican women on Capitol Hill. If Warnock wins, he`ll become the first black Senator from
the state of Georgia. All eyes are on Georgia and January 5th.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AZUZ: Another date coming up on the U.S. political calendar is January 6th. That`s when Congress is set to count Electoral College votes which American
states certified last month. This is normally a ceremonial exercise but at least 12 Republican Senators and 140 House Republicans plan to oppose
counting electoral votes for President-Elect Biden, what they want to do is hold a 10-day emergency review of votes in some U.S. states.
Objections like this have been made before. In 2005, dozens of Congressional Democrats challenged Ohio`s results in the 2004 election.
They said widespread voting problems were to blame and that`s what President Trump and some of his Republican allies say was the problem this
time around.
But 15 years ago, Congress still moved ahead on certifying President George W. Bush as the winner of the 2004 election and analysts say that`s all but
certain to happen this Wednesday for President-Elect Joe Biden. President Trump`s challenges to the 2020 results have not succeeded in changing the
outcome in any state.
Certified results from Georgia showed Biden winning there with 11,779 more votes than Trump. In a phone call on Saturday with Georgia`s secretary of
state, President Trump said he wanted to quote, "find 11,780 votes" one more than his opponent won by because President Trump says he actually won
the state. But Georgia`s Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said the president`s data was wrong and that the truth would come out. As far as
Georgia`s Senate races go, we`ll keep you update on what happens this week.
10 Second Trivia. Where would you find the most populated city in the world? Japan, Brazil, India or China. (inaudible) Tokyo, the capital of
Japan has a population of about 38 million people.
Friday, July 23rd is the planned kick off date for the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics. They`re still being called that even though it`s 2021 and the
same pandemic that postponed the games in the first place is threatening to cancel them altogether. To be clear, that hasn`t happened yet.
The show is scheduled to go on this summer in Japan but there are new strains of coronavirus that have cropped up around the world and they`re
causing new headaches in the efforts to fight the disease. It`s common for viruses to mutate or change.
At least one of the new COVID strains or variants is believed to spread faster than the original one but it`s not believed to be more deadly. The
survival rate for the new and older strains is estimated to be more than 99 percent.
Health officials don`t know yet if the newly approved emergency vaccines work against the new strains. But as they race to find answers and
treatments for all variants of coronavirus, concerns about the disease in Japan are bringing some Olympic sized questions.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SELINA WANG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It`s just 200 days now until the postponed Tokyo Olympics are set to kick off and that mammoth tasks of planning the
games in the middle of the pandemic is only getting harder. Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga said that he`s considering declaring a state of emergency as
the country grapples with soaring COVID-19 cases.
The governors of Tokyo and three neighboring (inaudible) have already urged the prime minister to do so. The country`s reporting thousands of new COVID
cases a day bringing the national total to nearly a quarter million. The country has also detected several cases of a new potentially more
contagious variant of COVID-19 prompting the government to ban entry for travelers through the end of the month.
But even though this state of emergency wouldn`t have any legal enforcement, Japanese officials have been reluctant to take any steps that
would harm the economy. Olympic organizers have already said that the games will be simplified with paired back opening and closing ceremonies.
Officials said that they`ll decide in the Spring how many foreign fans, if any, can attend. Despite high confidence from the President of the IOC that
fans will be able to come, the success of the Olympics really hinges on how fast the world can get vaccinated. In Japan, vaccination is not set to
begin until February far behind some countries.
But the stakes are very high this year for the games to go forward as planned. Olympic organizers have said that if the games do not go as
planned this summer the games will simply be cancelled not postponed again. Japan has sunk an impressive amount of money into these games.
These games were already set to be the most expensive summer games on record. And now because of the postponement and because of COVID-19
prevention measures, that cost has only increased by billions more to now $15.4 billion. Selina Wang, CNN, Tokyo.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AZUZ: For 10 out of 10, this method of Christmas tree recycling is sure to get your goat. At a farm in Massachusetts, it`s like Christmas morning for
the animals who love to eat the old trees. It`s not just the Nigerian Dwarf goats on the property who enjoy the special treat.
It`s the chickens too who apparently pick off the needles for a snack. This all started when the family who owns the farm tried giving their tree to
the goats. And after that, well they didn`t need to "needle" their friends and neighbors to "goat" them into a recycling program that people weren`t
"chicken" to join.
It`s like a barnyard "eat-a-long" that`s tough to "bleat" and no one thinks it`s a "baaaaad" idea. It`s just terrible. Before we go today, we want to
give a shout out to our friends in Medford, Massachusetts. All those students watching at Medford High School, you guys are awesome.
We pick these schools from the comments of our most recent show at YouTube.com/CNN10. I`m Carl Azuz. Have an amazing rest of your day.
END
