Transcripts For KNTV Meet The Press 20240711

Thinks. Well talk to congressman cedrick rich b monday of louisiana and republican senator kevin cramer. A covid explosion. More sick than i have ever seen in my life. They just drop so fast. Daily case records being set. Were in an utter emergency here. A quarter million americans now dead. The Trump Administration refusing to confer with the biden team. Were in a very serious situation. We can do something about it. Vaccine help is on the way. We had enough vaccine doses between these two vaccines of about 20 million during the month of december. This morning youll hear my conversation with dr. Fauci and ill talk to the head of operation warp speed. Join iing me for inside and analysis are hallie jackson, eddie glaude jr. And anna palmer and john podhoretz. Welcome to sunday. Its meet the press. Is from nbc news in washington, the longest running show in television history, this is meet the press with chuck todd. Good sunday morning. In the days immediately following joe bidens victory, it was easy to dismisPresident Trumps reality of denial as working his base, or just a tantrum or some sort of strategy for his post presidency. But now his antics are looking less like a fit of peek, than an assault on our democracy. In recent days we have seen President Trump allies pressure legislators to overturn the election. Trump lawyers spin basically conspiracy theories about voting machines, dead dictators in venz way la and a National Conspiracy to rig the election that somehow members of both parties participated in. President trump fired the Cyber Security head, and he tweeted falsehoods about nonexistent photo fraud including the call to state legislators to overturn the election results. At the same time, the president is denying bidens Transition Team access to information that would allow the new president s deal with the covid crisis on day one. Simply put, that decision could be costing lives in a country where a quarter million have already been lost. Trumps efforts to turn a defeat into a fraudulent victory appear headed for failure, but he may succeed in undermining confidence in u. S. Elections and in kneecapping the Incoming Administration and perhaps thats the motive. But ask yourself. Is this the 1950s or 1850s . The 1950s when we overcame our crisis and pulled fogt as a country or the 1850s when the nation broke apart. Im confident he knows he hasnt won. Its just outrageous what hes doing. President elect joe biden stepping up criticism of President Trumps effort to overturn the election results. Big pharma ran millions of dollars of negative advertisements against me during the campaign, which i won by the way. Youll find that out. Trumps attempts to make his legal efforts appear anything more than a pr campaign aimed at delegitimizing bidens presidency and building his post presidency brand are failing inspe. On friday the secretary of state certify another bidens win after a recount. Numbers dont lie. As secretary of state, i believe that the numbers that we have presented today are correct. Though the president summoned michigan lawmakers to the white house on friday, after the meeting they sads in a statement that that they would follow the normal process in certifying the vote results. While the president and his allies are ripping at the fabric of the democracy in any way they can, the fabric is not tearing. Its holding firm. Also this week trump fired Homeland Security official chris krebs, who challenged his false claims of voter fraud. Theres like a loyalty purge going on in the last month in the white house. I disagree vehemently with his firing. Of the 36 election lawsuits the Trump Campaign and republicans have filed, 24 have been denied, dismissed, settled or withdrawn and none has found a single instance of actual fraud. Most of the republicans i have spoken to including some of the governors think this is debilitating. Its not it sends a horrible message about who we are as a country. The Republican Party response has been to largely accept and encourage the president s attempts to overturn the election results. Just three republican senators have publicly criticized the president. Senator mitt romney, its difficult to imagine a worse, more undemocratic act by a sitting american president. Senator ben sass wrote, the president s lawyers have repeatedly refused to actually allege grand fraud because there are legal consequences for lying to judges. And Susan Collins condemn ed th attempt to pressure state officials. But overwhelmingly, the nations Top Republicans have been silent or encouraged the president s unparalleled effort to steal an election he lost by more than 6 million votes and an electoral margin equal to his 2016 win. Stacey abrams challenged the results. She was a hero. When donald trump is going to court, hes a dictator. Im tired of this crap. Were going to fight back in georgia. Were going to fight back eve everywhere. Its an assault on our democracy. Its outrageous. Its bad for donald trump. Its bad for the Republican Party. Its bad for the country. And our standing in the world. Join iing me is the incoming director of the White House Office of Public Engagement is congressman Cedrick Richmond of louisiana. Welcome back to meet the press. Tomorrow is certification day in pennsylvania. We got the lawsuit thrown out last night, which basically was the last legal path that he had in pa pennsylvania. If you follow the president s plan to try to get to 20, it doesnt work without pennsylvania. If tomorrow is not the day, what does the biden Transition Team do, congressman . Looks like we have an audio issue thewith congressman richm. Well get that fixed. So we are now going to swap orders here and hopefully my next guest republican senator kevin cramer is ready. Senator, as you can tee there, a little bit of issue. Hope you can hear me. I can hear you just fine. Let me start with sort of a form of the same issue here. But im going to use senator pat toomey, your colleague from pennsylvania. Heres what he said last night after the decision to essentially throw out the lawsuits. With todays dispute, fair and unbiassed jurist to President Trump has exhausted all plausible Legal Options to challenge the result of the president ial race in pennsylvania. I congratulate president elect biden and Kamala Harris on their victory. Do you conquer its now over . Chuck, thank you for the opportunity to be with you. I do not. I think its very likely. That said, i dont know why were so easily offended by a president thats carrying out all of his Legal Options in course, not enhancing or encouraging any riots or burnings of buildings or beating up of democrats coming out of the democratic means or events. Its just a simple Legal Process and really theres not been a lot of evidentiary hearings that have evolved the trump case. There have been other hearings, i noticed you used a number that was rather large of cases dismissed. But when you look at actual evidence, there have not been many, if any. Maybe pennsylvania was the first one. I think everybody ought to calm down. I dont think this is an attack on our democracy. We spent four years listening to new shows and liberals trying to discredit the Trump Administration to the point of spying on him by the last administration, 40 million spent on a independent council started with no evidence and ended with no evidence and then the crazy impeachment. So everyone just relax and let it play out in a legal way. Well be just fine. Youve implied theres no damage being done just now in those comments. Oh, there was a lot of damage done in the last four years. I want to ask you, the spectacle of Rudy Giuliani on thursday, using the headquarters of the Republican Party, i mean, at one point one of the lawyers accused a dead dictator of somehow being a part of this. Are you really saying that the president is youre out there saying the president is not encouraging somehow any way of sort of being disorderly about this, how is that not encouraging disruption and disorderly hes accusing the entire system of being corrupt. Is that not undermining the democracy . First of all, what theyre claiming is theres a lot of evidence and theyre presenting that evidence in cases. Now, its up to them to present that evidence, chuck, obviously. We have yet to see a real hearing where evidence is presented and theyre not obligated to present it yesterday or tomorrow, although the sooner the better from my perspective. Im speaking strictly from this attack on democracy, as you call it. These are legal systems. These are processes in our constitution, in our laws and theyre not just appropriate but theyre really an obligation, frankly, to the millions of americans that President Trump is a reflection of. I know a lot of people like to think were the reflection of him. Hes the reflection of millions of people that want to see him fight this to the end. Now there has to be an end, chuck, i agree. There has to be an end. I frankly do think its time well, it was past time to start a transition to cooperate with the transition. I would rather have a president that has more than one day to prepare should joe biden end up winning this. But in the meantime, again, hes just exercising his Legal Options. It i just want to confirm, you believe the head of gsa tomorrow morning at this point ought to say the transition needs to begin, it looks like joe biden will be the apparent winner. Yes, theres more to go through. This is what the head of gsa said. Yes, theres still more to go through but it looks like joe biden is the apparent winner. Lets allow the transition process to begin. Should that be what happens tomorrow morning . Yeah, it should happen tomorrow morning because it didnt happen last monday morning. I think you have to begin that process, give the Incoming Administration all the time you need. I will also say this, i think Vice President biden has been a bit overdramatic as it relates to operation warped speed and distribution of the vaccines and things. None of those things are a secret. The military is in charge of operation warped speed. The military still will be there after the election. But there are a lot of other things. And i informed my staff well over a week ago they had to cooperate with any transition outreach because we want to be prepared. We have a government to run, regardless of who the president is. Does it concern you that so many and im curious what happens when you have your own constituents that say to you, i know this was stolen. I just dont believe it. What is it gonna take to tell those folks, your constituents in north dakota, look, i know you dont like the results but it was fair and square . Thats a great point. Thats where leadership does really have to stp step in and be attentive to them and use your circle of influence. I think what its going to take, chuck, is for all of the legal avenues to be exhausted. At some point we start preparing for another election. Your monologue illustrated a couple of times in our history where there have been challenges. The good news is our republic is very resilient. You do realize that in this century, there have been four closer president ial elections. 2000, 2004, 2012, 2016. Believe it or not, popular vote win here by biden is even larger than barack obama was over mitt romney. At one point does this undermine you heard governor larry hogan. This is not a member of the media. This is a republican. Who thinks this is undermining the look of america to the world. Yes, i know a lot of people would like a nice, tidy, historically traditional sort of election but we dont have a traditional president. He didnt get there in a traditional way. I never seized being amazed at people like you who you surprised when he doesnt behave the way previous president s behaved. But i go back just last year, Hillary Clinton referred to him as an i illegitimate president. We went through four years trying to delegitimize him. Having this process is fine. Who knows, we also never in this history or any other century, had a massive votebymail balloting where there were things like ballot harvesting, ballot curing, things we never heard of taking place. And frankly, much, much lower rejection rate of ballots than just four years ago. So its okay to go through this process. Make sure its being done right. Make sure it never happens again if there are irregularities. We cant ignore hundreds of signed affidavits. Thats way more evidence than Robert Mueller had. So far its not the case because the evidence, they have not presented it in court because they dont have it, it appears. Well see. As you said, if they have the evidence, they should present it. They have yet to present it in a courtroom because you cant lie to a judge. I dont know if thats the reason, chuck. We dont know but they havent done it yet. I appreciate you coming on, many of your colleagues. My best to you and cedric richmond. Thank you very much. Joining us now, congressman cedric richmond. Hes back with us. I hope you can hear some of that interview. I know we had audio issues. On one hand senator cramer said its time for the transition to begin, on the other hand wasnt ready to elect president elect biden biden. Is that hopeful or harmful to the cause right now . Its harmful to the cause. One, it undermines the confidence of american government. This was a fair election. Joe biden won by over 6 million votes in the popular vote. 306 electoral votes, which is exact same number that donald trump had that he called a land slide. Joe biden won with a mandate and land slide. Now its time to transition. Look, the senator just said he didnt see much harm being done. Thats just not true. The one thing thats important about joe biden is he understands the pain of losing loved ones. So when we think about covid19 thats cost us over 250,000 americans and were going to have a vaccine, then we need to be meeting, we have to distribute the vaccine to over 300 million people. And that will save lives. So we want to get in there right now, now talk to former officials but talk to the people that are in there right now doing the job so we can be ready to finish or start distribution of vaccines on day one. And then the last point ill make is one of the reports of the findings of the 9 11 commission was that because the transition was short and failed, it left us more vulnerable for a 9 11type attack. We should be getting the National Security briefings. We should have access to everything in the federal government that were supposed to, and we hope that the gsa administrators going to do that soon. I was just going to say, given all of the things that happened over the last 24 hours, and whats going to happen tomorrow, tomorrow is certification day in pennsylvania. The lawsuit, the one big leaf of a lawsuit tossed out in pennsylvania. If you dont if it doesnt start tomorrow, and it certainly seems like theres plenty of reasons why it should, what is your recourse . What does president elect biden do next . Look, we will explore every avenue. We expect it to start. The certification in pennsylvania is a very big step. Were doing everything we can. Weve named white house chief of staff, 13 white house senior officials. This coming week, we will start to name the cabinet, people in the cabinet, and we expect the fbi and need the fbi to start background checks into other things that go with transition. We will continue to push it with the Trump Administration. But we wont take any avenues off the table. Your friendship with steve scalise, republican from louisiana is known. Both of you talk about it because its so rare to have bipartisan friendships in this town these days. Have you talked to him and reached out to him . If relationships matter, his voice would be a big one if it uttered the phrase president elect biden. What does he say to you . I think he knows that this election is over, and that joe biden will be the 46th president of the united states. Its just amazing to me the grab this president has on the Republican Party and the reluctance that members have to come out and tell him the hard truth. And thats just not with congressman scalise but it starts with the minority leader mccarthy, goes over to the senate with leader mcconnell. This is the future of our democracy on the line. It was a fairandsquare election. Donald trump lost. At this point we have to move on. But this republican has been very reluctant to stand up and tell the emperor that he wears no clothes. Steny hoyer, the number two leader on the democratic side, said i think it boarders on treason. Hes undermining the democracy that you go to the vote and the people decide. Theres no doubt the people decided. Those are strong words. Do you concur with him . Look, its certainly unamerican. But remember, we have to all remember who were dealing with. Were dealing with donald trump, a president that was impeached for withholding foreign aid to ukraine unless they gave him dirt on joe bidens son. Theres one thing i do agree with senator cramer on, theres nothing donald trump will do that would surprise me because hes shown exactly who he is, a person who will break the law, ignore the law, to get what he wants. At some point i just hope that the American People understand that this is about them. This is not about an elected official. This is about saving lives. This is about protecting our country. All of these people who are waking up in an economic and financial instability and ruins because of our failed coronavirus response, we need to be doing something for them right now. Before i let you go, you have a unique perch. Youre the national cochair for joe bidens campaign. Youre a pretty active and highlevel democrat in the house. Answer me this question, joe biden won the white house but democrats lost a seat in the house. Why . Look, it was a roughandtough election. I will go back and look at different things. Donald trump increasing a turnout was a big deal. But theres a whole post election audit we should do and analysis to see where we ran didnt run strong. The fact joe biden won georgia and we still have two senate seats in runoff could be a telling tale for whats happening. I do believe as democrats, though, we need to make sure im a saints fan, we need to make sure we have a good general manager, good offensive coordinator, good defensive coordinator and we all run the same plays. It doesnt have to be the exact same route but we should have the exact same goals in mind. I believe thats the case. We should continue to push and let the voters decide. Senator richmond, for a few more days or weeks youll be a democratic congressman from louisiana but soon you will be a major player in that west wing with president elect joe biden. Thank you for coming on. Apologies for the audio issues at the start. Thanks for having me, chuck. When we come back, dr. Anthony fauci and officials overseeing the efforts to distribute a safe and effective vaccine. When i was in high school, this was the theater i came to quite often. The support weve had over the last few months has been amazing. Its not just a work environment. Everyone here is family. If you are ready to open your heart and your home, check us out. We thought for sure that we were done. And this town said not today. This is the feeling of total protection now that we protect your identity, and mobile phone, as well as auto home and life youve never been in better hands allstate click or call for a quote today but i got a Second Chance to be there for the people i love. 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Ask your doctor if brilinta is right for you. If you cant afford your medication, astrazeneca may be able to help. Welcome back. When it comes to the covid pandemic, were now setting records on a daily basis. On friday more than 196,000 new cases were recorded in the united states, breaking the record that was set the day before. And over the past seven days, there have been nearly 1. 2 million cases, also a record. In a week over a million new cases, folks. As bleak as all of this sounds, there is good news on the horizon, assuming we can get to that horizon. On friday pfizer applied for emergency authorization for its vaccine, kicking off a process in which the fda will determine whether its safe and effective. And moderna is not far behind. Earlier i spoke with dr. Anthony fauci, who said yes, help is on the way, but first we also have an obligation to help ourselves. We really got to Pay Attention to the Public Health measures that we are not uniform uniformly implementing throughout the country. Its dispritt. Some are doing it, some are not. Theyre very simple, wearing of masks, physical distancing, avoiding congregate and crowd session activities, particularly indoors. Trying where possible to do things outdoors as opposed to indoors and the frequent washing of hands. They sound so simple, chuck, but they do make a difference. The point i was making is that were in a very serious situation of we can do something about it. Point number one. Point number two is that help is on the way. Traditionally and historically, highly efficacious and effective vaccines have crushed epidemics like smallpox and polio and measles. We can do that with the vaccines that will be coming online. Im trying to figure out when were going to plateau before march. Theres no mitigating event and theres no evidence were mitigating a thing. Where does this case count escalation stop . When does the hospitalization escalation stop . Are we really staring at until the vaccine . It doesnt necessarily have to be that way. Were not going to completely eliminate it and turn it around rapidly and dramatically. But you look at the curve, chuck, its almost exponential when you compare the curves in the spring and the curves in the summer with the inflection of the curve where we are right now. We should not accept we cant do anything about that. Putting vaccines aside for a moment, which will be extraordinarily helpful, if we implement a simple public help measures that i was mentioning to you, we can blunt that inflection. It doesnt have to be as high up. When you think of the Holiday Season and congregating indoors, what our innocent lovely functions like meals with family and friends, youve got to at least think in terms of evaluating, do you have people in your family that are elderly that might have underlying conditions, like someone on chemotherapy, or other things that weaken their immune system. Do you really want to get a crowd of 10, 15, 20 people, many of whom are coming in from places where theyve gone from crowded airports to planes, getting into the house . Those are things that have been such joy us things in the past. Let me ask you about testing. Believe it or not and i hear the anecdotes, it is still not easy to get a test and its not easy to get a test quickly. And youve said yourself earlier, you regret, thats one of your early regrets, our testing strategy. Explain. Yes, chuck, what i would have liked to have seen one and i articulated this and it didnt go very far is the idea about testing to determine if a particular individual is infected so you can identify, isolate and contact trace. Im all for that. Thats fine. But im also for what i said months and months ago, that we should be flooding the system with tests to determine the penetrance of the asymptomatic spread. We dont have that availability of tests. We should have now, we should have tests that are point of chair, sensitive, specific. You can do at home. You can get the results yourself, so that you can know when you wake up in the morning when you want to go to work whether or not you are infected, or whether the people you might want to invite over your home for a holiday are infected. We dont have that. We should have that. I hope we do get that. That has been something thats not been within our grasp. I know technically its not the easiest thing to do, but i wish we had done that. Joining me now is moncef slaoui, the head of operation warped speed, the u. S. Governments effort to produce a safe and effective vaccine for use as soon as possible. Dr. Slaoui, welcome to meet the press. Let me start with, look, theres been great news both from moderna and frank figliuzzi. We kn pfizer. We know pfizer applied for this emergency use. So walk me through how warped speed suddenly gets implemented, who gets the first vaccination . The second the emergency authorization is proved, the acip and cdc will issue their recommendations for who will get the vaccine on a priority basis. Thats very likely to be maybe health care workers, maybe first line workers, maybe individuals that are very high risk, elderly, people with como comorbidities. We will identify with each States Department of health where they want the vaccines to be located. We cannot move the vaccine doses prior to the emergency use authorization. Within 24 hours from approval, the vaccine will be moving and located in the areas where each state will have told us where they want the vaccine doses. And each state will decide specifically, based on the guidance from the ncih and cdc, where they distribute the vaccine. Is there a point where the government may deploy and say, state x, youre not inoculating enough front line workers. Hospitalizations are rising too fast. You need to focus more vaccines there. If you see a state not doing that, is that something you would intervene and tell a state, look, we left this up to you, but youre not inoculating nearly enough health care workers. Right, fist of all, the vaccine doses will be distributed on a proportionate basis to the population. And, frankly, i dont see the federal government will intervene on the same decision. Now, i assume each state will be acting responsibly based on the guidance from the cdc and also with the label from the vaccine, the fda issued the emergency use authorization on. Normally, this is not our intent to intervene at the micro level, if we are acting. I have to ask you, how hard will it be to hand off this process that youre overseeing to a new president ial administration . And do you hope to be kept on to continue to oversee this process . So, frankly, the operation is has been isolated from the administration, from the political environment and political context. We will work very hard to make sure thats the case. And, therefore, all decisions are made, the train is running, whether one administration or the other, it doesnt frankly make a difference. I hope theres no disruption in any way. My personal role, as you know, i have volunteered for this on a limited basis. My personal agenda is when we have two vaccines approved and two methods improved and the rest of the portfolio we have really well, you know, in good hands, ill probably move on back to my private life. As you know, im highly supportive of the program, which means i work with the new administration, i would be very happy to. Would you like to start briefing the new Administration Next week . I understand that all of the information that i make public, of course, i will make public to the new administration. I have been informed i should not be saying anything thats confidential to anybody, including, you know, anybody thats not part of the administration and, therefore, ill act according to what the legal requirements are. Dr. Moncef slaoui, the good news this week are those vaccines. All we got to do is hope we can get there and start doing mitigation and start doing all of the other things to prevent this from being as bad as it looks right now. Dr. Slaoui, thank you very much for coming on and sharing your perspective with us. Thank you for having me. When we come back, President Trump is lobbing baseless charges about election fraud. Hes not goingto oh, oh, oh, ozempic® announcer onceweekly ozempic® is helping many people with type 2 diabetes like emily lower their blood sugar. A majority of adults who took ozempic® reached an a1c under 7 and maintained it. Heres your a1c. Oh my a1c is under 7 announcer and you may lose weight. Adults who took ozempic® lost on average up to 12 pounds. I lost almost 12 pounds oh announcer for those also with known heart disease, ozempic® lowers the risk of major cardiovascular events such as heart attack, stroke, or death. It lowers the risk. Oh and i only have to take it once a week. Oh oh, oh, oh, ozempic® announcer ozempic® is not for people with type 1 diabetes or diabetic ketoacidosis. Do not share needles or pens. Dont reuse needles. 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Its nbc News White House chief correspondent hallie jackson, anna palmer, the senior washington correspondent for politico, and john horse, editor of commentary. So i want to start off with a little bit of numbers. Hey, thats what i love to do, right . Check out what were seeing now in the 2020 president ial election. I noted there are four closer races just since 2000 then 2020. Check this out, its 2020 versus 2012, obama romney, 51. 01 and popular vote to 57. 2. Look where the vote is now, 51. 0 and 47. 2 . Those numbers will grow and continue to grow so bidens lead will be larger when all is said and done. Let me show you the popular vote split, by the way. Obama won by just over 5 million in the raw vote. Joe biden is over 6 million in this raw vote. Hallie jackson, its sort of a reminder, this is the fifth close election we had since 2000, which means it wasnt really that historically close. I heard senator cramer use the impeachment as one of the rationales, Lindsey Graham say stacey abrams. Is this the white house strategy theyre basically saying hey, we did it to us, so were going to do it to them that reminds us there is a strategy, chuck and its a sort of broader work in progress. Listen, this is about the president. This is about what he wants and he feels and he is feeling angry, obviously, as we know based on this. I have talked to sources over the last 24 hours that know, chuck, the president understands theres an uphill climb ahead. He sees the writing on the wall. The point now is to continue to keep up the fight. I thought it was interesting senator cramer work to thread the needle, yes, we should start the transition process but, no, its not president obapresident. I have talked to both sides and they say potentially after tomorrow when the certification process happens, you will see more republicans come out and put the president on an isolated island by saying, yes, we should move forward, joe biden is the president elect. Heres where they disagree, that its going to matter for President Trump. Folks on the democratic side thinks that will put pressure on the president. I spoke to someone from the Trump Administration who said that will probably make very little difference to him. Arnold palmer, the difference is striking, if theres any chance whatsoever that joe biden will be the next president , continue looks like he has a very good chance, the Trump Administration should provide him with all necessary materials and meetings to provide he has a smooth transition day one. Hes retiring, leaving january 2, i believe, his term expires technically and he still couldnt write the phrase president elect joe biden. I think it has a lot to do with where the Republican Party is and a lot of these lawmakers dont want to get proselytized with trump supporters. He doesnt want to now, even if hes leaving the administration, theres already talk of a 2024 run. You have a lot of republicans not wanting to inflame the president , whether or not they are seeking elected office again. Eddie, at what point do you think democrats have to fight harder about this . In some ways i think president elect biden preached public patience. I know behind the scenes theyre getting impatient. At what point should they be acting more impatient . It seems to me particularly after pennsylvania is certified, if we still see this going on, they need to put their foot to the pedal, it seems to me, chuck. Its not so much the success of Donald Trumps efforts with regards to challenging the election, its sowing the doubt, its delegitimizing the upcoming administration. And transforming that doubt into outright hostility. I think this is the challenge that we face and senator cramer honestly didnt want to admit, the more donald trump delegitimizes this process, the more he undermines our democratic process and unleashes, in some ways, these forces. I think after pennsylvania certifies, if we see this still happening, we have to press harder, chuck. But we will still have millions of people who believe one thing and this newsmax phenomenon were watching where clearly pople dontlike what with theyre hearing on fox and say no, no, i dont want to hear an occasional fact or two. I want to go where life is different than election day. Let me play a little excerpt from newsmax. Were like one of the only Major Networks not to call the election, and our view, of course, is were waiting for the states to certify and see what the final result is. And were also encouraging the president to begin the possibility of a transition even if thats not been certified yet. Before you respond, john, a little History Lesson on christopher ruddy, the founder of newsmax was best known before this cable channel for the chief reporter on a crazy conspiracy that somehow ron brown was murdered seconds before a plane crash, which did kill ron brown. The point is that this is sort of newsmax had its founding by a thr theorist. What is happening to the messaging of the right side of the aisle in this country . Its very hard to fathom. Look, im a conservative. I got into this fight 40 years ago about Smaller Government and lower taxes and traditionalist values and a strong military. And 40 years later, i, and people like me, are being put in the position of disloyalty because we do not buy into the notion from his grave seven years ago hugo chavez paid off the governor of georgia of the republican governor of georgia in a payorplay scheme to fix voting machines, whose results were just verified by a hand recount that we are somehow being put in the position of having to say, its okay that this go on this way, because the president has every legal right to contest and we dont really have certification. This is where you get off the train. When you were asked to take the train to crazy town and then move to crazy town and then send Nuclear Missiles to strike normal town. John, when do we get back to normal town, and what happens on your side of the aisle if this splintering doesnt end . You know, people think, as hallie said, trump had a strategy. What sft if the strategy is stupid . Ill give you an example. In 2018 when the midterm elections were coming, if trump instead of pushing a strong economy, went with the message of evil caravans coming from Central America and how this would turn the tides and win the democratic house. This slaughtered him. What if hes dumb and he doesnt know how to win and he only really knows how to lose . Right, hes yet to win the popular vote, lost the popular vote more this time than four years ago. When we come back, turns out the counties who play a no one likes to choose between safe or sporty. Modern or reliable. We want both we want a hybrid. So do banks. Thats why theyre going hybrid with ibm. A hybrid cloud approach helps them personalize experiences with watson ai while helping keep data secure. From banking to manufacturing, businesses are going with a smarter hybrid cloud, using the tools, platform and expertise of ibm. Did you know that 70 of the on your clothes are invisible . Try new tide pods hygienic clean heavy duty. See the difference, after being washed with tide hygienic clean. For a deep clean, try tide hygienic clean if its got to be clean, its got to be tide. Hey yeah . I switched to geico and got more more savings on Car Insurance . They helped with homeowners, too ok plus motorcycle, boat and rv insurance geicos got you covered like a blanket houston . You seeing this . Geico. Expect great savings and a whole lot more. Wake up in a winter slumberland with a cozy casper mattress and pillows, soft percale sheets, even glow, our magical light for better sleep shop the black friday sale and save up to 30 today at casper. Com than Rheumatoid Arthritis. When considering another treatment, ask about xeljanz. A pill for adults with moderate to severe Rheumatoid Arthritis when methotrexate has not helped enough. Xeljanz can help relieve joint pain and swelling, stiffness, and helps stop further joint damage, even without methotrexate. Xeljanz can lower your ability to fight infections. Before and during treatment, your doctor should check for infections, like tb and do blood tests. Tell your doctor if youve had hepatitis b or c, have flulike symptoms, or are prone to infections. Serious, sometimes fatal infections, cancers including lymphoma, and blood clots have happened. Taking a higher than recommended dose of xeljanz for ra may increase risk of death. Tears in the stomach or intestines and serious allergic reactions have happened. Dont let another morning go by without asking your doctor about the pill first prescribed for ra more than seven years ago. Xeljanz. Welcome back. Data download time and a final look at our county project. Each piece told a different story of the trend that would help determine the 2020 election. I think we learned a lot. First up, Beaver County near pittsburgh, representing trumps base. He won it big in 2016. Won it big again but did lose a point from four years ago and it was the narrow margins that did matter in pennsylvania. Lets go to milwaukee county. Could mr. Biden increase black voter turnout to flip the stage back to blue . The answer, yes. He improved on Hillary Clinton and more importantly won the state. He netted his 20,000 votes just out of milwaukee. Kent county, michigan, home to gerald ford and wealthy republicans, supported mr. Trump barely in 2016 but not 2020, biden flipped the county and state. Grand rapids goes blue. Maricopa county, home to latino, seniors, 60 of arizonas population. Mr. Trump barely carried it in 2016. This year biden flipped the county and the state, First Time Since harry truman, a democrat carried that county. The finally miamidade in florida. We knew it wouldnt be a swing count but would the charge of the president embracing socialism do it . 2016 it did. This time, 20 points. Donald trump got out of florida and cut into the Hillary Clinton lead is basically how he carried the entire state. These five counties turned out to be crucial in the 2020 election. Watch these and others for signals to 2022 and beyond. When we come back, the changing faces of congressional smooth driving pays off with allstate, the safer you drive the more you save you never been in better hands allstate click or call for a quote today find a stock basedtech. On your interests you never been in better hands allstate or whats trending. Get realtime insights in your customized view of the market. Its smarter Trading Technology for smarter trading decisions. Fidelity. Iwith vicks sinex saline nasal cmist. Tion for drug free relief that works fast. Vicks sinex. Instantly clear everday congestion. To high quality Computer Science and stem education. I joined amazon because i wanted to change education and i am impatient. Amazon gives me the resources to change the world at a pace that i want to change it. We provide students stem scholarships and teachers with support. Im a fighter and im fighting for all students. Welcome back. The panel is back. Anna palmer, it was election week for congressional leaders this week. And both the house and the senate are being run by the same folks essentially that weve had for quite some time. In fact, take a look what we put together here. Nancy pelosis been leader of the democrats since 03. Mitch mcconnell leader since 07. The entire democratic leadership has been there since 03. Eight congresses, four president s, three changes control of the house, two changes of control of the senate, prerunoffs, we could have three, same as it ever was to quote david palmer in a quote. Why is it if congress is so unpopular, everybody is so upsit, pelosi and mcconnell have such strangleholds over their caucuses . Listen, the capitol is all about power, who has it, who wields it. And they are both very good at what they do. They have basically complete control of their caucus and conference. There are a lot of people wondering, particularly on pelosi, is this her last term . Shes been asked about it repeatedly. He will stay as long as she wants. She basically flay played a flawless hand for trumps term, where she was able to have impeachment get done, they did a trade deal and all kinds of things as well as hold the president s feet to the fire. While theres frustration certainly about the fact shes 80 and her Leadership Team is 80, 81, no one is willing to challenge her. You cant win with nobody. Thats what she always says. Thats a good thing to remember. You know, andy, take it from the youre the least washington of our group here, although john horace will take a little bit of a issue with me on that, how does this look . The congressional leadership really doesnt change in this country. Well, yeah, in some ways its a reflection of the problem in some ways. Look, chuck, i think its important for us to know last year millennials outnumbered baby boomers and baby boomers continued to define the kind of broad framework of the country. What we do know clearly is the kind of ideological stream, spectrum, how we think of american politics is much more muddled out in the world than it is d. C. Part of what we need to do to get beyond some of the gridlock, get beyond some of the sorts of traditional blockages as it were is to shake up leadership and have that leadership reflect the experiences of the majority of the country. Lets see what happens. We have folks on the bench, hakeem jeffries, some folks coming up, the quad, katie moore. There are young folks in the country who can actually come in and do some really interesting things in terms of pushing the needle forward in what the country needs, chuck. John, both pelosi and mcconnell, the reason why i think their colleagues trust them so much is they understand the process and they know how to manipulate the process, but neither of them get praised for passing legislation, if you will. Right. Well, i think one of the things thats going on here is that people dont actually want to do the hard work of being in congressional leadership, which is a grinding, tough, timeconsuming, fundraising, backscratching job, and because of the nature of the modern media, particularly in the Republican Party, you can become a celebrity or a star by being on Television Much more than you can by being the chairman of a committee or being in house leadership, hoping to rise through the ranks. You can become a alexandria oscasiocortez without ever having to lift a finger on the house floor, and thats a new thing. And these people are willing to stay until midnight every night to get things through whatever they have to get through. And they dont have to go on tv five times a week. Excellent point. Final question, hallie, is the white house aware Mitch Mcconnell may hold his perceived fate in their hands if he just utters the words president elect biden . Well, he hasnt done it yet, chuck. I think theres certainly an acknowledgment of that, if senator mcconnell does that, watch the dam breaking, right. I think theres a question of when that could happen. Our reporting here, sources we talked to, the legal fight and president s insistence on acknowledging will likely go into september, september 14th, the deadline that day. But keep in mind hes hinting at a run in 2024. Hell never stop running. Thats my feeling. Thank you all for watching. Have a safe and socially distanced thanksgiving. Well be back next week, because if its sunday, its meet the press. This week on press here, we take you inside a Virtual Reality Training System designed to help teacher and employers better handle conflict. Meet a entrepreneur who built atms for bitcoin. How they work and is bitcoin ever going to work as a currency . Plus, new science helps doctors find the recurrence of cancer, years before a ct scan spots it. Thats this week on press here. Good morning, everyone. Im scott mcgrew. 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