How Speaker Pelosi gave an update on house Election Results today and says she plans on running at the age of 84 speaker of the next congress. Speaker pelosi good morning, everyone. I wish we werent Wearing Masks so we could see how exciting it is to come before you today with joe biden having the tremendous mandate he has in that pretty soon, the hyphen will be gone from Vice President to president elect, joe biden. It is a happy day for our country because joe biden is a unifier, because he is determined to bring people together, because he respects all points of view, and as he has said, i ran as a democrat, i will govern as president for all of the people whether they voted for me or not. I am so officially pleased with the outcome that is imminent and also personally delighted because of the quality and caliber of leadership that joe biden will provide. This morning, it is clear that the bidenharris ticket will win the white house. His election is historic propelled by the biggest vote ever in the history of our country 73. 8 million and counting americans, the most votes ever received by any president ial ticket in history. President elect biden has a strong mandate to lead and will have a strong Democratic House with him and Many Democrats in the senate. This has been a life or death fight for the fate of our democracy, as he says, the soul of our country. We did not win every battle in the house, but we did with the war. In 2018, we won 40 seats, 30 or 31 in districts where trump had won before. They were trump districts. In preparation for the 2020 election, i said to people, you have to help us. They say, oh, you have won. We won in trump districts with trump not on the ballot. In the next election, he will be on the ballot and that makes winning those districts a steeper climb. I am pleased that we have went overwhelmingly won those districts, not all of them. Not all of them, but next time, he wont be on the ballot. One of the reasons we were able to win so many seats was because of leadership of our members. Some of them won, a few did not, all of them excellent. I hope that some of them will reconsider, will consider going at it again. As you all know, the right to vote is a sacred right in our country. Having that vote counted as cast is the foundation of our democracy. We must be patient. I have said to people, be calm, be confident, be patient. The votes are tallying in the races are called. We look forward to continued victories in house races, and we look forward to progress for the people, which was our agenda and continues to be for the people, Lower Health Care cost, bigger paychecks by Building Infrastructure in america in a greenway, hr1, which will be the first on the ballot in january. While we prepare for the new Biden Administration, we must also move swiftly for a new Coronavirus Relief bill. We want the republicans to come back to the table, the white house and leadership or whatever. For two days in a row, over 100,000 cases were reported. The imperative to act could not be greater. Over 9. 5 Million People infected. Nearly a quarter of a Million Deaths and tens of millions on unemployment. Again, i call on the administration to come back to the table. Congress has committed to passing an appropriations bill. This is the core of our work in the lameduck. When we dont have a pandemic when we dont have a pandemic killing hundreds of thousands of people and infecting millions and making people food insecure, housing insecure, and the rest. Our responsibility to keep the government open, to have an omnibus bill, and we intend to do that. Not a cr. We want to be able to do so in a way that gives confidence that we will have the government open and continue to be, rather than having a cr. Sadly, instead of crushing the virus, it appears that the Trump Administration will use its final moments in office as a desperate last step to destroy every possible protection for Americans Health and wellbeing. So many people have said to me, in fact, some of you along the way, what damage do you think trump will do between losing the election and the inauguration of joe biden . Maybe you didnt phrase it quite that way but that is how i heard it. We knew he would be up to mischief. Separate and apart from trying to destroy the credibility of our elections, which we criticize other nations for doing, all enemies foreign and domestic making an assault on our elections. We have one domestic. Apart from that, on the policy side which is why we are here, people ask that question. What will he try to do that is harmful . This week, we had suspicions of it but didnt speak publicly about it until they went public. This week the trump , administration put forward a radical new rule that would make regulations from the fda and other health and Human Services agencies automatically sunset unless the agencies undertake a cumbersome, timeconsuming process to renew them. This is a time when we need full attention of the fda on the development and approval of vaccines. This is an opportunity cost, but it is a reflection of their disdain for science and governance. They have been messing with the whole process at the fda, trying to diminish the importance of the trials that are necessary to approve efficacy and safety of a vaccine. The lameduck trump rule seeks to paralyze government in generations of lifesaving protections and try to burden a new president elected by the American People. The Trump Administration was to seek this regulation rule beyond hhs to other agencies as well. People have been asking, what can he do . Clean air, clean water, food safety. You name it. This is a dream of the radical right wing. First, they started undermining the Civil Service, and now they are trying to say, unless we review all of these regulations, they will be sunsetted. We do believe that regulations should be subject to review. That is part of the process. But there is a way to do it. The way to do it is not to first zero in on the fda at a time when we are trying to achieve a vaccine for the people. This is the work of the energy and Commerce Committee and that is why i am so glad and honored by the presence of the distinguished chair of the energy and Commerce Committee. You will hear from him about this. I refer you to the National Register of november 4. The day after the election, they put this destructive rule in the congressional record. More from our distinguished chair. Thank you, mr. Colon, for coming down to be here for this conversation, which is important to the health and wellbeing of the American People. For science, governance, especially at a time of pandemic, when the fda should be focusing on a vaccine and not on a Heritage Foundation agenda. Thank you, madam speaker, and let me say, like you, like all democrats and i think most americans it is a very happy day , because we do believe it is quite clear that joe biden and Kamala Harris will be our next president and Vice President. We cannot help but be happy about that, as the speaker is and i am. I also want to commend the speaker for stressing so much that we have to crush the virus , which she has been saying for so many months. I think the last time i was here with her, we talked about the need for Robust National testing, tracing, and treatment, which is in the heroes act and which she kept insisting on as she negotiated with the white house. She realizes, as most of us do, that we are never going to get the economy back on foot, we are never going to create jobs and we are never going to make this country strong again unless we can crush the virus. She is like a laser beam, keeps insisting that that is so crucial. As she mentioned, the numbers, the virus continues to spread. Yesterday, more than 116,000 americans contracted covid19. It was a oneday record since the pandemic again. So when the speaker says that this has to be crushed, its because its getting worse. We have to address it. The sad thing, my role is to get into more specifics about what the Trump Administration is doing, what President Trump is doing in this lameduck in these last few months is exactly the opposite. In other words, rather than trying to help with the scientists, with the Health Experts, with those career servants who have been helping us try to come up with a response to this virus, he is trying to undermine it all. He is trying to make it more difficult for us to crush the virus. He is making it more difficult for the Health Experts to speak out and to be there at all. To help with this effort. That is so unfortunate. He is moving in the opposite direction of what the speaker and most people say we need in order to crush the virus. I wanted to talk a little bit about these two things that the speaker mentioned. One is an executive order threatening the Civil Service employees. A lot of the people who are helping us within hhs and other agencies are career Civil Servants. He issued this last ditch effort to fire career Civil Servants on october 21. This executive order. This includes people at the fda, the cdc, as the speaker mentioned. It basically says that over the next month or so, the president and his administration could put out a new schedule classifying career Civil Servants, someone like dr. Fauci, as nonCivil Service employees who can be fired. You remember at one of his rallies just before the election, he suggested that he might fire dr. Fauci after the election. Dr. Fauci is an example of the type of person who could be fired under this executive order and possibly be replaced by people like dr. Atlas who are not qualified. To do with this virus effectively because of their lack of background or their policies. All of this before he leaves office on january 19. Some said, is he really going to fire these people . I dont know, but the fact that this is in place is a threat. In other words, its either im going to fire them or threaten them with the fact that if speak out and do things contrary to what i want to do regard to covid19, they will know they might lose their job, and lose their Civil Service job. It is really basically the same thing. The other one is that the speaker mentioned is this rule change that was put in place , issued a proposed rule this wednesday that could be finalized by early december. What that says is Something Like 2500 regulations within health and Human Services, this is particular to health and Human Services but we may see it with other things, that says if any regulation has been around for more than 10 years, then you have a period of time to justify it, otherwise it expires and sunsets. These are all regulations that deal with food safety, approval of drugs, which has been such a controversy because he has always been trying to approve the drugs that we know the scientists think are not effective, and beyond that, it also diverts resources. In other words, if the staff who are working to crush the virus, have to be diverted to justify and spend their time dealing with these regulations they would not want to sunset, it is also a question of staff time it takes away from our ability to deal with the virus. The Comment Period of that closes december 4 and he could put in place and start this process to undermine not only the regulations that now are more than 10 years old but , others that might become 10 years old later during the joe Biden Administration. We are trying to emphasize why is this president doing these things that undermine our ability to crush the virus rather than working with the speaker and trying to put together a plan like the heroes act that would make a difference and effectively crush the virus . I want to conclude by saying this. We need the scientists and the public Health Experts. We need to scale up the testing, contact tracing, treatment. This is going to be, unfortunately, likely to be a dark winter. It doesnt make any sense for the president to use the short time he still has left to undermine the National Response. It is also an insult to the Civil Servants. One of the things we are going to do, i will go back to the committee, we are going to spend our time in energy and commerce and the other committees trying to shore up these agencies like hhs, cdc, fda that he is trying to dismantle for the last four years. Morale is very low, but i want everyone who works in these agencies to know that we as democrats, Speaker Pelosi, joe biden, our next president , we are on their side. We are committed to crushing the virus. We are going to support the public servants. We are going to work with the Biden Administration to undo the damage and ensure that Civil Service protections remain in place and we have a National Response to the virus. Thank you for all that you do, madame speaker. Speaker pelosi thank you, mr. Chairman. I want to commend you for the testing, tracing, treatment, etc. That is in the heroes act that was a product of your committee under your leadership as well as working with scientists about what is really necessary to crush the virus so we can put our children safely back in school, open up our economy, thats what we need to do. But we need to do it safely. Further to a couple of points you made, in terms of the Civil Service, Civil Service is a very important part of a democracy. It takes the politics out of the performance of Civil Servants. It is about Public Service being a noble calling. But if those Civil Servants are directed by political appointees to make certain scientific decisions or else they will lose their jobs, that undermines the purpose of safety and efficacy in terms of the fda, but also the health and wellbeing of the American People. I want to commend the head of one of the centers at the fda for an important oped he had i think about a week ago talking about how the scientists were going to stick with the plan to do this in a way that gives people confidence in the vaccines that would come forward, because a vaccine is only effective as its merit, but also how people will take it. The vaccine is a big hope for us, but it is not the only way for us to stop the spread of the virus. But it is an essential way for us to curtail the further spread. Again, i thank you for your leadership in that regard and the idea that you referenced. January 19 is the day they want this all done by. January 19. Can it be undone . Yes. But it takes a great deal of time and effort to undo which took a lot of time and effort to make matters worse in terms of approvals, etc. , at the fda. I am pleased to take questions. Reporter you opened by talking about the big win that joe biden might have in the popular vote. In that same environment, you will end up losing seats off your majority. What does that tell you about what the American People want from congress . Speaker pelosi we lost a few seats. As i said we won the seats in , trump districts. He wasnt on the ballot, he is now. What happened with the democrats with congress across the country helped contribute to the biden success. We are very proud to be part of that mandate. Very proud of that. Would i rather while i have the utmost respect for the members whose districts were almost insurmountable with trump on the ballot, i do believe that we will be with biden in the white house and a Democratic Congress and hopefully a democratic senate, we will see in january, we will be able to do great things for the American People. We lost some battles, but we have the gavel. Reporter you dont see any policy or corrective methods from the American People . Speaker pelosi i do think we should always be evaluating and respecting what the people have to say. I, myself, and i have said this over and over again, income, the disparities in income and equity in america must be addressed and everybody must be at the table. That is something that frank has worked on from the perspective of new jersey and his committee. We have to go to that place. People are concerned about the threat to their jobs from technology, from trade, from other people, newcomers to our country. We have to show them this is not a zerosum game. Somebodies somebodys success here is not taking away from your success there. I see this as a tremendous opportunity where people are respectful of peoples opinions, the diversity of opinion, and again, some members had some concerns about what happened in their district, but most of the people expressed concerns. Most of them won. We had an opportunity spreading across a wide net. I was disappointed we didnt win some seats in texas, i will be honest about that, but