His sometime friend and longtime associate roger stone. Roger stone, the convicted felon convicted by a jury of lying to congress apparently on the president s behalf. Cnns sara murray has the details. President trump called roger stone earlier. What are you learning about the conversation . Reporter thats right. Roger stone had been waiting for and hoping for this phone call. He said hed been praying for it and essentially going to prison would be a death sentence for him. And finally as the president was leaving tonight he finally called roger stone, and here is how stone described that conversation. He said you understand i have the option, i have the authority to either grant a pardon or commute your sentence. He says you should understand that a pardon would be final, and that in accepting a pardon you are accepting guilt, and i would rather see you fight this out, which is why im commuting your sentence. Reporter now, both roger stone of course and donald trump believe that this was politically motivated, that thats the only reason he faced charges, but even attorney general bill barr has said this was a righteous prosecution. What is the white house saying about the commutation . Reporter the white house put out a lengthy statement. Well just read you a portion of it. This is from the press secretary saying at this time in light of the egregious facts and circumstances surrounding his unfair prosecution, arrest, and trial the president has determined to commute his sentence. Roger stone has already suffered greatly. He was treated very unfairly, as were many others in this case. Roger stone is now a free man. And anderson, i think what youre seeing here is what weve continued to see from this white house and this administration to sort of rewrite the narrative around the russia investigation and sort of make it seem like no one in the president s orbit actually did anything wrong and they were just targeted unfairly. And stone is still challenging his conviction in appeals court, right . Reporter he is. Hes gone after the judge that was overseeing his case. Hes gone after the jury, saying they were not unbiased towards him. And hes trying to essentially get that conviction overturned. The important thing to remember about the commutation, it means hes not going to be going to prison right now but hes still a convicted felon. I think thats what played out in this call with him and the president , the indication that stone is going to continue to fight to clear his name. Sara, thank you very much. Back to the pandemic racing across the country. During the president s visit to florida today he made mow reference to it. But cases topping 60,000 a day this week and hospitals in big states and small filling up. More now on all of it from cnns erica hill, who joins us now. Georgia was one of the first states to reopen but now theres some major changes happening there. Reporter the mayor of atlanta, Keisha Lance Bottoms putting in a new order. She says her city is going back to phase one. She says no gathering of any size is allowed on atlanta property. People need to wear masks in public. She had already mandated that but shes bringing the city back to phase one. They were in phase two because she says georgia reopened in a reckless manner and the city is now suffering the consequences. The governor pushing back, calling this plan back calling it confusing. And this is one of the states posting a new record today. A daily high for new cases in georgia, nearly 4,500. And this is one of the states, again, that opened early back in late april. Long lines for testing in florida as the numbers there continue to move in the wrong direction. The situation is truly concerning here in south florida. Reporter florida is now averaging more than 9,000 new cases a day. A staggering jump of more than 1,200 since the state began reopening two months ago. The president in hard hit Miamidade County today though not because the Positivity Rate there is nearly 30 . There seems to be this lack of understanding or awareness that we are in one of the most extraordinary Public Health crises that our nation has ever faced. Reporter the u. S. Is shattering new case records almost daily. West virginia now has the highest transmission rate in the country. The only bullet in the gun right now is this right here. This little mask. Reporter ten states seeing an increase in covid related deaths over the past week. Half of those posting their highest average for new cases since the pandemic began. I think the numbers are going to look worse as we go into next week. And we need to make sure that theres going to be plenty of hospital beds available in the houston area. Reporter its not just Hospital Capacity and icu beds. Personal protective equipment is once again in short supply in some areas. Weve had plenty of time to plan and take action, and it has yet to happen. Reporter as some states pause or roll back their reopening plans, many jobs are also on hold. The 600 weekly unemployment boost will run out at the end of july. But the needs of struggling families will not. Back to school looming, with some states just weeks away. I dont think theres anybody who can make an argument that this is especially risky for kids. We have to accept that and then figure out, you know, how you fashion policy around it. The viral loads in children are equivalent to that in adults. What does that mean . That means they can transmit the virus equally well to other people, whether or not they show symptoms. Reporter as districts work to find the right balance, the one constant in every decision, a virus that is here to stay. In our Current Situation it is very unlikely that we can eradicate or eliminate this virus. Youre also learning more about disparities in new york city. Reporter yes, thats right. So theres this fascinating information that came out of city md. These are some some of the urgent care offices people see around the city. Maybe in their cities as well. So they looked at Antibody Testing at a couple of the different offices, specifically one in corona, queens, a hard hit area in new york city. 68 of people coming in tested positive for antibodies, and you look at that number and this is mainly a working class neighborhood. A lot of people there had to continue working while people who could work from home did so. They put out other information from a city md office in a wealthier white section of brooklyn, just 13 of those people had antibodies. So what does it tell us . They say, listen, we cant tell you exactly what it means. It doesnt mean everybody who came into that clinic lives in that neighborhood, but it does give some insight into perhaps how certain neighborhoods may be better able to deal with another surge of the virus as it comes along. Fascinating. Erica hill, thanks so much. Just this moment another milestone, 6,390 new cases nationwide. The highest total yet. Joining us now is the mayor of miami, francis suarez. The mayor of atlanta has just reinstated a stay at home order going back to phase one for her city. You havent ruled out doing that in miami. Given the fact Miamidade County which is obviously the county your city is located in is now seeing a positive test rate of more than 25 . Is it time to shutdown, or whats the calculus that will go into that decision . Were definitely approaching that point. Obviously our icu capacity is down to 11 . Many of our hospitals dont have any more icu capacity. Our ventilators are at pretty much the alltime high, close to 197 which was our alltime high. We are having a little bit of good news, which is that it appears that the rate of growth has slowed a little bit. It was growing at a rate of 125 new cases per day. That number is down to about 60 new cases per day, which is about half the rate of growth which indicates some level of flattening. And that could be because we did order a mask in public rule about ten days ago. And thats when we started to see, you know, the slowing of the growth rate. Like i said and like you said, i will not rule out the possibility of a stay at home order. And thats something that were looking at depending on the data as we see it over the next few days. And the virus growth in florida, the surge in florida its sometimes topping more than 10,000 new cases in a single day. I mean, is there any other way to put it than this is out of control . I mean, is this something you think we have our hands around in florida . Theres no doubt that the growth is exponential. When you look at back in, you know, early april, late march, when we implemented the stay at home order, our Highwater Mark was 533 cases. For the state it was 1,300. When youre talking about 11,000 cases for the state, its almost a ten times multiplier. For Miamidade County its like a six times multiplier. Its no doubt theres an exponential growth, which is why one of the things i urged is for us to have a statewide mask in public rule, and we should probably have a National Mask in public rule as well. Do you know what percentage of people in miami i dont know if you have these figures but actually do wear the mask . We dont have those figures. What we do have is data that shows from the moment we implemented the mask in public rule to now. We have seen about a 50 reduction in the growth rate of the virus, which is good. And i think one of the things all the epidemiologists and all the experts from john hopkins also tells us is there needs to be a very Clear Communication strategy. You know, the clearer we are in terms of our communication, the more in sync we are in terms of our communication, that is the closest thing we have to a vaccine right now, which obviously we dont have a vaccine. So clearly communicating what the rules are, being on the same page is the best we can do for our residents right now. The mayor of the county made the call to shut down Indoor Dining and i think you said that decision was without justification. Why isnt it appropriate to err on the side of being cautious . Well, some of the Restaurant Owners felt the decision he made wasnt data driven. We have contact tracers right now that are in the process of getting us what we hope to be the information that we need to make very surgical decisions to decide whether to close certain segments of our economy or not. And understanding all these decisions that we make have a dramatic impact on thousands if not hundreds of thousands of people in our community. So, you know, when we make a decision we have to be able to justify it. We have to be able to explain it so that people will follow it. How many contact tracers do you have, are you able to utilize . We dont have anywhere near enough. I asked the governor this week for 500 more. We have about 300 that are working right now. And just to give you a sense on a given day, we have 2,000 new cases, were getting about 70 survey responses out of 2,000. About 450 that are being contacted. So thats a contact rate of about 17 . And its a survey answer rate of about 3. 5 , which is nowhere near adequate to have an adequate Contact Tracing program. I know cnn did an investigation into Contact Tracing in florida. They found that Health Authorities really just often fail to do it. Yeah, its not being done at the percentage that it should be done. In midjune they were telling us it was being done in the 90 and now were being told its being done in sort of 17 . The second part is its not just about Contact Tracing and making sure people isolate. Thats 50 of it. The other 50 is getting us that actionable data so when we do make a big decision like shutting down an industry or implementing a stay at home order, we can clearly justify it to our residents so that they comply. We dont want is mass noncompliance from our residents because we havent articulated clearly the reasons why were doing things. Mayor, i appreciate your time. Thank you, anderson. I want to get perspective now from an expert in the field that happens to be right in the thick of it. An epidemiologist and associate professor at the university of florida. Thanks for being with us. What do you make about what is going on in miami about the reopenings . Yeah, well, i think that mayor suarez is spoton as far as miami needed to take a step back in where they were. You know, they paused in their reopening, and they really have been strong in saying we need masks and we need to think about what people are doing. We need data on risks so that we know going forward, you know, if we need to shut things down, we have a reason for doing it, we can justify it. And also, can we identify places that are causing risks and making these cases circulate more. I dont understand, Governor Desantis had said there wasnt justification to not move forward in may and early june when restrictions in florida were lifted. It seemed to me, i mean, if you look at the White House Coronavirus task force guidelines, many states i dont think hardly any states had met those guidelines before moving forward into the next stages. Yeah, thats true. I mean, we moved quickly. I think there could have still been a possibility of opening up. But the thing was, that had to be very minor, very slow. And thats not what we did. I mean, open up one thing at a time and then give it the time to find out whether or not your cases are going to increase. Youre not going to see that in a week or two weeks. It can take probably a month or even a month and a half to see the effect of what youre doing in each stage. And so this should have been a monthslong or maybe even six months of opening up rather than what we did, which was really rapid. What i dont understand from a Public Health standpoint, and i guess this really comes from the white house down, but, you know, it seems like we were given a false choice. Which is, everything either reopens or its stay at home in complete lockdown, as opposed to as you said gradual reopening with real emphasis on social distancing, mask wearing, hand washing, all the things that science tells us actually works in slowing this virus. And because it was either either or, we didnt take the middle road, which seemed to be the one that would allow us to open, yes, more slowly but also keep social distancing. Yeah, i agree with that. I think one problem im seeing is i feel like we have science, we have data, we have things that we know, and thats what should be driving the policy as you indicate. But i think what were seeing is the reverse. Weve got people who just want to put policy in place and think that you can somehow mold science and data to do what you want, and thats just not the case. And we really have to think about where are we right now, how do we get ahead of this virus, because right now were well behind it. Were not leading, were trailing. Weve got to really think of the measures we need to do and do them early. We cant delay like we have been. We cant react. We have to be proactive. The idea the mayor is saying Contact Tracing, 17 of people are being contact i mean, thats ridiculous. Its really low. I think the problem is if you think about the level of cases in florida right now and then think about the fact these people may have, you know, on average three or so contacts and all of those have to be contacted as well, plus the time it takes, and unfortunately what were also seeing in some cases is just refusals to give information, to talk to department of health. And, you know, this is such a critical step in controlling this outbreak and for people to refuse, it really is discouraging to me that they would do that. I mean, they can just refuse and nothing happens . Well, at this point, you know, were we have not enough Contact Tracing. We dont have enough people to be able to do it, so, you know, when theyre calling, if theyre not getting a response or if they are, you know, meeting someone who is being resistant at this point you move on to the next person, right . Where is your value . Youve got to go talk to someone whos going to give you the information you need. I appreciate your expertise. Thanks for being with us. Thank you, anderson. Ahead, the first major american hot spot for coronavirus is still desperate for help from the Trump Administration as cases climb. Up next, my conversation with washington governor jay inslee. With the nation just reaching a new single day record for cases. And later, President Trump calls himself a very stable genius. Now he says he aced a test of his mental acuity, but you may just have to take his word for it. Yes until i realized something was missing. Me. You ok, sis . My symptoms kept me from being there for my sisters. Flight boarding for flight 2007 to chicago. 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If you cant afford your medicine, over time, you go noseblind to the odors in your home. background music but others smell this. upbeat music thats why febreze plug has two alternating scents and eliminate odors for 1200 hours. Breathe happy febreze. La la la la la. Our breaking news in the coronavirus. Moments ago we learned the u. S. Today set a new single day record for cases at more than 63,000. The state that saw americas first coronavirus cluster is tonight dealing with cases that isnt slowing down. Washington state is nearing 40,000 cases. More than 1,400 people have died there. And the governor overseeing the emergency is asking for federal help. He too is demanding to know when a National R