[Berman:] This morning, a long-time associate and alleged accomplice of Jeffrey Epstein is in custody. Ghislaine Maxwell was arrested Thursday. She faces six criminal counts for her alleged role in recruiting and abusing young girls as part of Epstein's sex trafficking ring. CNN's Kara Scannell joins us now live with the latest. This is a major development to say the least.
[Kara Scannell, Cnn Reporter:] Good morning, John. It is a huge development in this investigation. One that many of the victims of Jeffrey Epstein thought would end with his death last year in prison. But yesterday, prosecutors announced a six-count indictment against Ghislaine Maxwell, accusing her of working with Jeffrey Epstein, helping to recruit, groom and ultimately abuse girls, some as young as 14 years olds old. And prosecutors say that this conduct began in 1994. That's even earlier than had previously been alleged. Now Maxwell has not addressed these charges, but she did have her first initial court appearance in New Hampshire yesterday. She's in the custody of U.S. Marshal Service where she will be transported back here to New York to face these charges. There will be a detention hearing in the future, and prosecutors intend to ask that she'd be detained, saying she's an extreme flight risk. Now, Maxwell again has not entered a plea yet. That will come again in one of these future hearings. Prosecutors though say that they are asking for any witnesses or other victims to come forward. They say they also want to speak with Prince Andrew. One of the victims has accused him of abusing her and Prince Andrew has been a long-time friend of Ghislaine Maxwell, so prosecutors have various reasons why they might want to speak with him. Now, he's not been accused of any wrongdoing by authorities. And Prince Andrew's team says that they're bewildered about why prosecutors would want to speak with him. Prosecutors refuse to say how they consider him in this investigation, but he is someone that they do want to speak with. John?
[Berman:] There are so many strands to this, Kara. So many new interesting new angles. What does she know? What will she say? The royal family. Thank you so much. We know you're all over this story. We appreciate you being with us. NEW DAY continues right now.
[Anthony Fauci, Director, National Institute Of Allergy & Infectious Diseases:] They're setting records practically every day of new cases. Clearly it's not the right direction.
[Unidentified Female:] This country is seeing its highest single day of new coronavirus cases.
[Unidentified Male:] Florida hit a record high, 10,000 new positive cases. Now people understand this thing doesn't just go away.
[Jim Sciutto, Anchor, Newsroom:] The CDC projects nearly 148,000 fatalities by the 25th of this month.
[Unidentified Male:] If this epidemic doesn't get under control, we're talking about a million deaths over the next year. This is deadly serious. This weekend, I hope we don't have a reprise of what happened on Memorial Day.
[Berman:] Good morning, everyone. Welcome to our viewers in the United States and all around the world. This is NEW DAY, Alisyn is off, Erica Hill joins me this morning. This is the beginning of a holiday weekend, Erica, for a lot of people.
[Hill:] It is. Happy Friday.
[Berman:] You too. So, in the words of Dr. Anthony Fauci, the United States is heading in the wrong direction. Overnight, a record number of new coronavirus cases in the United States, beating the previous record, a record that lasted a whopping one day. New case records in six states, Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Montana and South Carolina. Record hospitalizations, which is a really important statistic in six states, including Texas and California, Democratic and Republican governors are taking actions they never have before to fight this. The president's reaction overnight was to lie. He says the rise in cases is because of testing. That is just a lie, and this is what the admiral who was in charge of testing for the Trump administration says about that.
[Brett Giroir, Assistant Secretary For Health:] There is no question that the more testing you get, the more you will uncover. But we do believe this is a real increase in cases because of the percent positivity are going up.
[Berman:] The percent positivity are going up. There is an increase in people. END