CNN "The Situation Room" - Interview with Michelle Lujan Grisham

Interview

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Let's get back to our coverage of the coronavirus right now. I'm joined by the governor of New Mexico, Michelle Lujan Grisham.

Governor, thank you so much for joining us. I know you heard, we all heard what are described as some stunning words today from Dr. Anthony Fauci who said there was pushback early in the pandemic to take aggressive nationwide mitigation measures against the virus.

Would an earlier, earlier, more forceful warning from the president, from the federal government for that matter, have saved lives in New Mexico?

GOV. MICHELLE LUJAN GRISHAM (D-NM): I think it would have. Look, I was the former secretary of Health here in New Mexico for former governor Bill Richardson. And public health policies The earlier you engage, right, the better your outcomes including mortality rates, in particularly for states like New Mexico, while we have, you know, only -- we lost six more people today. It's tragic, I can't even imagine the pain of these families for a total of 26 which might seem so minuscule as we're dealing with a worldwide pandemic.

But given the demographics of a state like New Mexico, where, you know, we're one of the poorest states in the country. We're a minority majority state. We have populations that are older and have many more chronic care conditions including diabetes means we're more at risk. So the more that we could do to mitigate and prevent the transmission of this virus, the better we would have been. No question.

BLITZER: The president just a few moments ago tweeted something directly aimed at you, the nation's governors, and I want to read it once again. Here's what he tweeted. "Governors, get your state's testing programs and apparatus perfected. Be ready, big things are happening. No excuses. The federal government is there to help. We are testing more than any other country in the world. Also, gear up with face masks."

So, Governor Grisham, how do you interpret what the president just tweeted? What impact does it have for you when he says big things are happening, be ready?

GRISHAM: Well, you know, I look at it two different ways. I have to say that in the last couple of weeks the administration has been more responsive to specific requests. Like we have a problem in the northwestern part of the state, very concerned about our small rural communities there and tribal nations including the Navajo Nation.

[19:10:02]

And so look, we've got to have double the number of ventilators that we have requested for that area of the state. And in fact, we got them in, frankly, short order. And we're beginning to get that kind of quick attention.

But the other side of that coin is, is that we didn't started with a national strategy that included the states. So when you tell me to gear up, and I know that you've got backlogs in the private sector, that everybody is doing testing, hospitals have long had relationships, they've done point of care testing.

The CDC and the FDA, every time there is a new strategy, they have to both endorse it, right? It's got to be approved by FDA and then all this calibration has to occur before you can run a single test. And then it basically does this. It has every state competing with each other for testing.

So we don't have a strategy. We're not doing surveillance. And I am really concerned that we continue to pit one state against another state, instead of serving every American citizen and being really clear.

If we work together and we're clear about testing strategies, I think we would be a much better job for every single person. And we would be protecting them to a much higher degree. Frankly, I spend most of my time chasing personal protective equipment and-or testing supplies. And I can tell you that after this job, I would be effective at identifying any kind of laboratory equipment or testing kits you might need anywhere in the world.

BLITZER: You know, Governor, I want you to stay with me because your state has actually started a controversial practice of using some cell phone data to see whether your residents are actually following the social distancing guidelines. I want to ask you about this. But first, I want to make sure our viewers understand the technology how it's being used.

CNN's Sara Sidner has this report for us. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SARA SIDNER, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Official government orders to stay at home stare you in the face, but are you obeying them?

A tech company Unicast knows. Grading the nation state by state, even county by county, as of Friday, Nevada, Vermont and California were at the top of the list as far as residents staying put. Six states were near failing. Overall, the United States got a C-plus.

How did they do it? By tracking cell phone data. And now, some state governments are hiring companies to do it, too. They developed social distancing models that gauge how well residents are adhering to stay- at-home orders.

GRISHAM: As we dig deeper, using cell phone data --

SIDNER: The state of New Mexico is one of the first to go public about hiring a company, Descartes Labs, to get cell phone geolocation statistics.

MIKE WARREN, CO-FOUNDER, DESCARTES LABS: We came up with a way to measure statistically how far a typical person in a community was going away from where they started the day.

SIDNER (on camera): So, you actually could track cell phones to show that people were following or not following the stay-at-home order?

WARREN: Yes.

SIDNER (voice-over): Mark Warren says other states have also signed on during the pandemic. China goes even further. It's using citizen smartphones to control their movements around their cities. A QR code on their phone determines where they can go.

(On camera): Americans are really concerned about that kind of personalized tracking. Is that concern addressed by the technology? WARREN: Absolutely. I mean, I personally am concerned about that as

well. So, we've got a number of controls that prevent us from tracking individuals.

SIDNER (voice-over): He says the data sold to the U.S. government is just statistics. Anonymous information that does not reveal who the phone belongs to.

You play a role and being tracked, too. When you download certain apps and agreed to let them use your geolocation on your phone, that data is being used by third party companies and advertisers. And now some state and local governments.

There are plenty of companies buying the tracking data. For example.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Not on spring break.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No. Not really. That's not happening.

SIDNER: Remember those spring breakers who flocked to beaches even after the warnings to social distance? X-Mode collected spring breakers' phone data. Another company, Tectonix, was able to show where those spring breakers ended up. Those little points of light are cell phones pinging from the beaches.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: As we zoom further and further out, it becomes clear just how massive the potential impact just one single beach gathering can have.

SIDNER: If just a few of those spring breakers had contracted coronavirus, they could have spread it far and wide. Now, governments want this kind of data in part to see if stricter measures to distant citizens are needed.

Sara Sidner, CNN, Los Angeles.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BLITZER: Good report, Sara. Thank you.

Governor, I'm sure you can understand why some people out there would be uncomfortable with the government tracking their movement, but you feel this is not necessary. Tell us why.

GRISHAM: Well, I'm uncomfortable with the terminology about tracking people's movements. Right?

[19:15:03]

This is a data analytics company. There are many. And they can give us useful information that is intended to both measure, do the social distancing aspect to identify how well do they work, where could we do better. And quite frankly, they motivate individuals, aha, you know, I can do this better and I can get more deliveries and that means less contact if I go out to the grocery store. I think the notion that any government including this government would

be interested in any personal information or tracking an individual outside a court order, you know, quarantine that's very specific and we aren't doing that here. This is data that allows me as a policymaker to get a sense about what are the transmission risks that I have based on the way in which an entire state moves.

And that is very helpful. And I'm really grateful for that information. But it is really important for your viewers to know there is absolutely no excuse for any company who would be tracking an individual or utilizing any personal information or any government doing that as well.

BLITZER: Well, that's good to know. Governor, thank you so much for joining us from New Mexico.

Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, appreciate it very much. I know you guys are very, very busy understandably so out there. Thank you.

GRISHAM: Thank you, Wolf.

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