Even though most people around him were. The president s trip comes as the rift between the white house and dr. Anthony fauci grows by the trump team to try to discredit the nations top Infectious Disease expert. Dr. Fauci calls the administrations campaign against him bizarre and says he just wants to do his job and plans to keep doing it. We all hope he does. The country needs him. Lets begin this hour with cnns erica hill whos joining us from new york. As we look around the country, very disturbing new numbers from dozens of states. Reporter yeah, thats true, wolf. Were just getting some new numbers in from california. The state posting its single highest singleday case. And this comes on the heels from some new comments from dr. Anthony fauci. He talked about the reopening across the country and noted that pictures of people in bars were crowded and not wearing masks. This country is now averaging more than 60,000 new cases being added every day. Dr. Fauci saying that is untenable. This needs to be turned around. And that is the reality that many states are facing today. Confirmed cases in florida have now topped 300,000. In Miamidade County where the Positivity Rate just hit 31 , the number of covid19 patients in one Hospital System has jumped 226 in the past month. Were preparing for even more patients. Reporter florida is one of 14 states reporting record hospitalizations. 11 of those states are also seeing a rise in new cases over the past week. Weve got to almost reset this and say, okay, lets stop this nonsense and figure out how can we get control over this now. If we are going to open, weve got to get everybody on the same team. Reporter california, one of the states hitting a reset button, is also setting new records. These Alarming Trends reflect behaviors from three weeks ago. It will take several weeks to see if our behavior now including the rollback of previously opened sectors slows the spread of the virus. Reporter oklahoma reporting a new daily high wednesday. Among those testing positive, governor kevin stitt, who attended President Trumps Tulsa Campaign rally last month. I dont think there was any way it was at the president s rally. Its too long ago. Reporter the governor says he has no plan for a mask mandate in his state. Though 36 states do have a requirement. The latest to add one, alabama. Walmart customers nationwide cant shop without one starting monday. In charlestown, bars and restaurants can now refuse service to anyone without a face covering. Weve got to take this seriously. It matters to all of our citizens and it matters to our economy going forward. Reporter new cases in Washington State are holding steady. But the governor is bracing, pausing reopening for at least another two weeks. You can drown with the tide coming in if you dont move, even though its really slow, just as much as you can as a big instant wave. Thats the situation were looking at is an increasing tide. Reporter increasing concern about Summer Travel fueling the spread. Its not just the northeast requiring visitors to quarantine. Chicago has a 14day quarantine in place for travelers from 17 states. Canada will keep the border closed through late august. We do not have a handle on this outbreak. Reporter a new school year is just one week away. One School District is using misters to disinfect classrooms. South carolinas governor encouraging inperson learning. In texas, its up to the district. I thought we were going as fast as we could but as slow as we must. Reporter spikes not just in texas, but in 38 states as the virus continues to spread. And a little more news out of california this afternoon. The tournament of roses parade on new years day, it will not happen in 2021. Citing a desire to prevent the spread of covid19, the parade has been canceled as for the rose bowl game, well, they are hopeful that they will be able to hold that. Of course, there is still a lot up in the air when it comes to the College Football season, wolf. So, only time will tell. Sadly, a lot is not going to happen in the coming months. All right, erica hill reporting from new york, thank you. From new york lets head over to the white house, our chief White House Correspondent jim acosta is with us. President trump and his team have been attacking dr. Anthony fauci for days now. He is speaking out about it. Whats the latest . Thats right, wolf. After days of attacks, dr. Anthony fauci has had enough and he is firing back. He is describing the attacks on him as a, quote, major mistake on the part of the white house, and white house officials are jumping into damage control mode insisting that aides across the west wing are not happy with trade adviser Peter Navarro saying he violated instruction from chief of staff mark meadows who had warned staffers to stop going after fauci. After waging a campaign to discredit one of the nations most trusted experts on the coronavirus, dr. Anthony fauci, the white house appears to be waving the white flag, at least for now. I have a very Good Relationship. Well, thats Peter Navarro, but i have a very Good Relationship with dr. Fauci. Reporter President Trump and his top aides are now backing off on their attacks of fauci, but only after Peter Navarro blasted fauci in a usa today oped. Asked about that, the president all but accused of going rogue. He made a statement representing himself. He shouldnt be doing that. I have a very Good Relationship with anthony. Reporter after biting his tongue for weeks, fauci is now defending himself. I cannot figure out in my wildest dreams why they would want to do that. But i think they realize now that that was not a prudent thing to do because its only reflecting negatively on them. I cant explain Peter Navarro. Hes in a world by himself. So i dont even want to go there. Reporter navarros oped came after anonymous white house officials said things about fauci to reporters. They realize that was a major mistake on their part because it doesnt do anything but reflect poorly on them. Reporter now, white house officials are trying to distance themselves from navarro with one top aid saying in a tweet, the Peter Navarro oped is the opinion of peter alone. The president values the expertise of the medical professionals advising his administration. One white house official went further, saying navarro had been told by chief of staff mark meadows to deescalate the situation with fauci but that he violated those instructions by writing the oped anyway. Top republican lawmakers appear to be on team fauci from Senate Majority leader mitch mcconnell. Whats your level in confidence of dr. Fauci at this point . Total. Reporter to senator lindsey graham. Both are battling for reelection. We dont have a dr. Fauci problem. We need to be focusing on doing things that get us to where we need to go. So i have all the respect in the world for dr. Fauci. I think any effort to undermine him is not going to be productive, quite frankly. Reporter but the white house is still showing some hostility to Public Health officials, calling on hospitals around the u. S. To send their data on the virus directly to the administration in washington, bypassing the centers for Disease Control. One Top Administration official said the cdc will simply no longer control the data. On the issue of using masks, former white house dr. Ronny jackson whos running for congress with the president s support, downplayed the importance of wearing one. I think wearing a mask is a personal choice and i dont want my government telling me that i have to wear a mask. So i think thats a choice that i can make. I dont wear a mask all that often, to be honest with you. Reporter and as for dr. Fauci, the nations top Infectious Diseases expert, says he does not want to step down telling the atlantic earlier today that he just wants to do his job. And after attacking fauci for days, the president and his team seem seem to be following the doctors at advice, at least for now. Fauci was at a meeting earlier this morning, and check this out, wolf. Vice president mike pence just a couple of hours ago tweeted out this picture of himself with, yes, dr. Anthony fauci. Pence told reporters later on that fauci is a valuable member of the White House Team on the virus. A lot of sudden love for dr. Fauci, wolf. Very interesting, jim acosta, at the white house, thanks. I should point out that Peter Navarro was booked to join me this afternoon, but early this morning all of a sudden the white house told us he was no longer available. Lets get some more on all of this. Thanks so much for joining us. As you know, the United States hit a Record Number of new cases yesterday. More than 67,000 cases in a single day. 900 americans died yesterday. Dr. Fauci says we need to hit the reset button to get all of that down. What should that look like . Thanks for having me on. And just to remind everybody that it was a couple weeks ago when we were around 40,000 that dr. Fauci said if we dont get our act together, were going to go up and were going to eventually hit 100,000. Hes been completely right so far. Were in the 60s now. And if we dont do a substantial reset, were going to be in the 70s and 80s and its going to keep going because thats how the virus works. We absolutely need mandates on mask wearing. I believe that in the Southern States where the outbreaks are bad, you cannot have any indoor gatherings of any meaningful size. No restaurants, no bars, no night clubs, none of that stuff. And then we really do need the federal government to help states because they are now hitting Testing Capacity numbers where tests are coming back seven or ten days later, essentially useless. We need those states to really get the help they need to get testing back up and running in a more efficient way. The president and some others have argued that more cases wont necessarily lead to more deaths. But the respected ihme, university of Washington Medical School model, now projects that the death toll will reach 224,000 americans by november. So, what does that tell you . Weve been talking about this. And if you remember a few weeks back, we talked about 200,000 some time in september that ihme model predicts that also other models are predicting that. Its pretty clear the way this works is people get infected. They get sick. Then they get hospitalized. Then they unfortunately some proportion of them die. And we have just been in denial about that clinical pathway in thinking that somehow were going to get a lot of people infected and no ones going to die from it. What were seeing now is deaths are going up. And i worry that that ihme model may be underestimating things, especially, if we dont get our act together and really start getting these large outbreaks under control. The increased death toll is based on the situation in some other states that might actually be going under the radar. Dr. Fauci says the priority needs to be making sure those states dont become the next florida or california. So how do they do that . Yeah. Its a great point. Ive been saying that about a third of the states are about neck deep. Those are the floridas and texass and arizona. About a third of the state are was waistdeep. They have an opportunity here. They can avoid becoming that next hot spot. Theyve got to do the same stuff weve been talking about. I think at this point weve got very good evidence that indoor gatherings are whats really killing us. And weve really got to figure out how to reduce indoor gatherings. I think all those states have to rachet back if they want to avoid becoming a hot spot in the country. Dr. Fauci also said today he was not involved in the decision to bypass the centers for Disease Control and prevention and send coronavirus data directly to washington. Theres room for improvement certainly within the cdc. But do you fear this move will lead to less transparency on this critically important data . So, i certainly agree that we need a clearinghouse for all the data. And cdc has always been that clearinghouse. And i think we all agree that the performance of the cdc has not been as good as it should be, i think partly because of political meddling. And cdcs more than capable. I would have preferred strongly that if the cdc wasnt doing what the American People need, then lets fix the cdc. Building a whole new apparatus for this data should only be used as a last resort. Its absolutely critical, wolf, that American People are paying for this data. American people need full and complete access to the data. I havent heard that assurance from the white house and hhs. When it comes to schools, the schools preparing to reopen next month, dr. Fauci says the default should be to open up. But he warns that you cant treat all schools the same when different parts of the country are experiencing Different Levels of outbreaks. Do you see enough guidance right now, enough resources to help schools novgait what is clearly a life and death decision for people out there . Yeah. I feel, to be perfectly 40s, i feel a little heartbroken about this. I desperately want kids to go back to school this fall. Especially younger children. Theres a great report out from the National Academy of medicine today about this. In places with very large outbreaks, its going to be very, very difficult for schools to open up and stay open. And schools need detailed guidance, not general advice. Detailed guidance about how to do this. This is why we usually have a cdc thats very engaged. And we need to find ways of getting kids back to school. Its going to be really important for kids. But we got to do it safely. Im worried that were missing the window here to act in a way that allows our kids to get back to school safely. All right, doctor, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you, wolf. Up next, dr. Anthony fauci firing back after the latest white house attacks on him, calling it a major mistake. Plus, brazils president who has downplayed the coronavirus, tests positive for coronavirus for the second time. Weve always put safety first. And we always will. For people. For the future. And there has never been a summer when its mattered more. Wherever you go, summer safely. Get zero percent apr financing for up to five years on select models and exclusive lease offers. vo verizon knows how to build unlimited right. Start with americas most awarded network. Give people more plans to mix and match at a price built for everyone. With 700 off our best phones when you switch. Because everyone deserves the best. This is unlimited built right. The white house scrambling right now to tamp down attacks on dr. Anthony fauci, even though those attacks are coming from Top White House officials. Dr. Fauci is calling the whole thing bizarre. Lets investigate this with our chief medical correspondent dr. Sanjay gupta and our chief political analyst gloria borger. President trump says Peter Navarro shouldnt have written the scathing oped attacking dr. Fauci. But wasnt navarro just following the example of the president Deputy White House chief of staff dan scavino and others in the white house who have been going after dr. Fauci now over the past several days and weeks . Of course, wolf. Are we supposed to believe that Peter Navarro who attaches himself at the hip to the president wrote this completely on his own without winking at the president and saying, you know what, i think im going to send something in to usa today. Are we supposed to believe that nobody knew about this, that navarro didnt tell the president he might do it . I have no doubt the president probably didnt read it. But are we supposed to believe that this white house is so disorganized and doesnt pay enough fealty to this president that navarro would do this on his own . I do not believe that navarro would have done this on his own. I believe the person who is most scathed by this inside the white house is the new white house chief of staff mark meadow whos met with tony fauci for quite some time the other day. Its clear to me in reading between the lines that perhaps what he wanted to do was call a truce and that he was the one who was blindsided by this and probably had no idea that navarro was going to do this in usa today. And hes probably fierce, not the president. Yeah. I suspect youre right. Sanjay, dr. Fauci is the expert whos guided the country through Health Crises under six president s, democrats and republicans. Hes now 79 years old. He knows this issue better than anyone. Peter navarro has no medical or scientific expertise, hes an intelligent guy, but hes not a scientist, hes not a doctor. By trying to discredit dr. Fauci, is the white house making its job even more difficult . I think absolutely. Here we are talking about this. The white house has an incredibly difficult job. Right now the whole world does trying to curb this pandemic. And we should be talking about the testing strategy, what we should do to curb these significant outbreaks. Schools are going to be opening in a few weeks. Theres no National Guidance on that. And instead were talking about these cannibalistic practices that seem to be happening within the executive branch. Its really frustrating. And dr. Fauci, you know him well, i know him well. He is a mildmannered guy. He