Itself for years to come. Weve got the georgia runoffs tomorrow which decide control of the senate and then on wednesday it is President Trumps last stand as electoral votes are counted on capitol hill. All of this is happening as the coronavirus pandemic keeps raging. 352,000 americans are dead. More than 20 million infected. And a Record Number are waking up today in hospitals. But we know that is not where President Trumps head is at. He is still trying to figure out some sort of way to turn his election loss into a win. He failed with the american voters. He failed in court. So now hes resorting to the kind of tactics you might read about in third world countries. Putting pressure on the people in charge to somehow find just enough votes to make thing goes his way. Nbc has learned President Trump tried to reach georgia secretary of state 18 times in the last two months. When the two finally spoke on saturday, here is the message President Trump wanted to send. So look, all i want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state and flipping the state is a great testament to our country. He just wants to find votes. Well, on capitol hill, new members of the house and senate were sworn in yesterday. Were still waiting to see all of this how it all might impact wednesdays certification of the Election Results. Heres what we know. Texas senator ted cruz and at least 11 other republicans plan to oppose certification calling for a commission to investigate allegations of voter fraud. Despite the fact that there is literally no evidence that any fraud took place. We also know that enough Senate Republicans have come out publicly in support of the Electoral College to ensure that joe biden will still be certified as our 46th president. Weve got reporters all across the country covering every angle of these stories for you. More on the coronavirus pandemic in a minute but weve got to start this morning with the president s extraordinary hourlong phone call that we have now heard and how it sets the stage for the week to come. I want to bring in Peter Alexander at the white house, Garrett Haake on capitol hill, blayne alexander in atlanta, georgia, Geoff Bennett with the president elect in delaware and peter baker, chief White House Correspondent for the new york times. Mr. Alexander, to you first. Lets start with a little more from the president s call on saturday. I want you to listen to this. The people of georgia are angry. And these numbers are going to be repeated on monday night, along with others that were going to have by that time, which are much more substantially, but and the people of georgia are angry. The people of the country are angry. And theres nothing wrong with saying that, you know, that youve recalculated. Well, mr. President , the challenge that you have is the data you have is wrong. The data you have is wrong. I said this before, and i want to say it again. 18 times the white house tried to get a one on one call with the secretary of state of georgia. They finally spoke on saturday. And this is what we heard. What more can you tell us . Yeah, steph, thats exactly right. We heard from the Georgia Republican secretary of state Brad Raffensberger again today saying after those repeated attempts by the white house to have a call happen, he said he didnt think it was appropriate to speak to the president but that the president s staff was pushing and pressing them. Whats striking about all of this is that the president here is doing exactly what he accused democrats of doing. Trying to fraudulently find votvote s that do not exist and get them to swing the election in their favor. He cites a series of baseless and debunked conspiracy theories saying that 5,000 dead voters voted. Raffensberger and the attorney, the general counsel for the secretarys office saying there were two. Tens of thousands of ballots were stuffed or hundreds of thousands were tampered with blaming a voting machine company, even Election Officials for turning a blind eye to it. All of that has been debunked as well. The bottom line is the president still has georgia on his mind. And at the worst possible time, ahead of his trip to georgia today, when even republicans, allies of the president worry that when he goes there for a rally this evening hes going to be focusing on his own grievances in a way that ultimately threatens to undermine what will determine the control of power, the future of congress, the senate, which is those two runoffs tomorrow. Steph . Blayne, youre in the state of georgia. I want to be clear who were talking about when we talk about the secretary of state. This man is a republican. He himself voted for President Trump. Hes faced Death Threats because time and again, he is debunking these voter fraud claims that have no truth behind them. What more can he do . Not only did he vote for him but he donated to his campaign, which is why when you hear those calls, when you hear the president try and hold his party status over his head, essentially saying that as a republican you should want a fair election, its even more stunning to hear that. To give you context about georgia, yes, weve heard that from secretary of state Brad Raffensberger. Longtime republican. Very strong republican. Heard that from other officials in his office. The state governor as well. This is a republicanled state for the most part but and many of them have said we wish the election had gone differently but the facts and numbers and votes show that it didnt. As for the election itself, weve reported over the past few weeks or so the reason that it took so long to get the final outcome here in georgia is because the votes were counted, not once, not twice but three times. The initial count, then a statewide audit, and then on top of that, we had a requested recount that was requested by the trump campaign. All three of those tallies show that joe biden is indeed the winner here in georgia. So you talked about those debunked election theories. Its something the secretary of state during that recount period was holding news conferences almost every single day. We were at most of them and he said repeatedly there is no evidence any of sort of widespread voter fraud here in the state and certainly nothing that would rise to the level of changing the results. I want to get back to peters point. He talked about the fact that republicans are desperately hoping that President Trump doesnt air his grievances when he comes here tonight but focuses on the message that republicans need which is getting people to come out to the polls. Getting people to turn out tomorrow and fight back against what weve seen as a large voting turnout in largely democratic sides. From democrats ive spoken to, theyre saying all of this is certainly nothing but helpful when it comes to hoping to win these elections tomorrow. Peter baker, i want to talk about this evidence that President Trump claims hes hearing all this stuff. Yet hes providing no evidence. And i want to share a bit of the exchange from the call between President Trump and ryan germany. Thats the general counsel for georgia secretary of state. He was on the call, too. Listen to this. They are shredding ballots, in my opinion, based on what ive heard, and they are removing machinery. And theyre moving it as fast as they can. Both of which are criminal fines, and you cant let it happen. And you are letting it happen. You know, i mean, im notifying you that youre letting it happen. What were seeing is not at all what youre describing. And these are investigators from our office, these are investigators from gbi. And theyre looking, and theyre good. And thats not what theyre seeing. Peter, the president is saying, i am hearing this, yet providing no information and the people actually working on it are saying youre wrong, mr. President. You have been covering many, many president s for years. Have you seen anything like this in American History . No. None of us has. Weve never seen anything like this in American History. Literally since john adams surrendered power to Thomas Jefferson after the 1800 election, no citizen president has lost the election and lost the Electoral College has tried to do what donald trump is doing here. Listen to what hes saying here. Hes seeming to hold out the possibility of a criminal, you know, threat against these georgia officials. Hes suggesting not only that they could be liable in to his justice department. Remember, he still controls the justice department. He is calling on raffensbergers party loyalty. Hes saying find me votes. Hes not saying i want a free and fair election. Hes saying i want an election that i win. And you need to do whatever it takes to make that happen and im going to throw out any kind of madeup charges or madeup conspiracy theories that come into my ear that, no matter how implausible, how unproven, how baseless they might be in order to justify that. Geoff, talk to us about what president elect biden is saying about this because these lies President Trump keeps pushing, we know theyre all untrue, but weve got a very divided media in the United States. And youve got millions of americans who are believing the president s lies and theyre not listening to this tape. Its a real problem, and its a real challenge which the biden team is keenly aware of. The biden team has watched closely but weighed in sparingly over the last couple of months as President Trump has increasingly tried and failed to overturn, subvert and steal the election. But yesterday, bob bauer, a senior biden advise eput out a statement where he said we now have irrefutable proof of President Trumps attempt to pressure a state Elections Official to overturn the election. Bauer said it captures the whole disgraceful story of trumps assault on our democracy. But to your point, in 16 days, joe biden will inherit not just a cratering economy, a pandemic spiraling out of control, not just a vaccination effort that needs to be fixed. Layered on top of it is this lie pushed by the president and parrotted by his republican allies and the conservative Media Establishment that joe biden is somehow not a legitimate president. That is not true, but it will potentially make it harder for him to govern and certainly make it harder for him to get buyin to this 100day plan hes pushing to combat the covid crisis. He wants everyone american to wear a mask for 100 days. He wants every american to get vaccinated. The shots are such that you dont have to get one shot. You have to get two. Imagine how much more difficult that makes it when you have potentially millions upon millions of Trump Supporters believing that biden is somehow not fully and fairly elected president , steph. Then garrett, help me with this because im dying to know. Wednesday, what is the political calculation for people like ted cruz and josh hawley who plan to object to the Electoral College vote, even after Mitch Mcconnell said dont do this . I think the only real calculation is what is in their political selfinterest, which is to be seen fighting for this president. Make no mistake. These challenges that we expect to see in the house and senate, perhaps six states on the counting day here will go nowhere. There arent the votes to overturn even one of these states. This is largely performative. And weve talked a lot about what the Republican Party will look like after President Trump leaves the scene. I think this is the first battle in a larger war for what that party will look like. On the one side, some politicians, some of these younger, more ambitious senators like ted cruz and josh hawley trying to fight to be the next bearer of President Trumps torch. On the other side you have republicans who are not exactly Close Friends of joe biden or have not exactly been liberal leaning folks like Mitch Mcconnell or Lindsey Graham saying this is not the way to go. This is not the fight to have. They are planning for a different version of the future of the Republican Party. Than are those who will challenge the electoral results knowing as full well as i do standing here today that these challenges will fail. But they want to be seen as fighting for this president and presumably for his most committed voters who might be useful to them in primaries either for their current jobs or jobs further up the chain of command. Garrett, have any of them changed their tune since the tape came out . Not that ive heard. These are republicans who, in every case of those who are raising these concerns now on the senate side, if they were in the senate at the time, were perfectly fine with a phone call to the president of ukraine so a call to the secretary of state of georgia, you know, how much further is that along the line . It was not a perfect phone call. Peter baker, where do you think this is going . There are republicans, not just Mitch Mcconnell, not just Lindsey Graham. You have significant republicans, all ten former defense secretaries, trying to warn President Trump against using the military in an election dispute saying, weve got to move on from here. Where do you think this thing is headed . Well, i think thats the unknown, right . Thats why those defense secretaries put out that letter. These defense secretaries include not just democrats but also dick cheney, no liberal there and mark esper who served this president as defense secretary. You presume they put this letter out because they themselves are concerned and might have reason to be concerned, that there might be some effort by this president to try in some way or another find, you know, a method to get the military involved. Whether to invoke the insurrection act to street violence or what have you. This is a president who has already hosted mike flynn, his former National Security adviser, retired Lieutenant General who has publicly urged him to declare plamartial law a use the military to rehold elections in states he didnt win until he gets an outcome he likes. Thats on the mind of these former defense secretaries. Its a lot of republicans out there are very concerned. Establishment republicans and conservative republicans like tom cotton. Senator from arkansas. Strong ally of the president on many ideological issues. They share a lot of views. Yet he put out a statement saying this is not the way to go. Not only would it subvert democracy. Its against our republican philosophy to impose a federal solution on state issues and so youre hearing from a lot of republicans, again, even people who are supportive or have been supportive of President Trump saying this is a dangerous game. Who else isnt helping the president s mission . The Supreme Court where President Trump has appointed three justices. Thank you all so much. It is such a busy news week ahead. Thank you all for making us smarter. When we come back, well go deeper on this call with georgias secretary of state on beyond being inappropriate. Beyond being unethical. Was it illegal . Plus, coronavirus hospitalizations hit another record. Anybody telling you its just the flu, im going to say it again. Hospitalizations hitting a new record. This country has failed the covid test. And now were looking like we are failing the vaccine rollout. What can we do to fix it . For the maestros of the creamiestever, musthave smoothies. Its irresistibly delicious. More almond breeze, please can you believe it . Its 9 19 and we havent even gotten to the latest on the coronavirus pandemic. Lets do it now. Here are the facts we know this hour. More than 125,000 americans were hospitalized with covid19 on sunday across the country. That is a new national record. Overall, more than 352,000 americans have died from the virus. And the total number of cases has surpassed 20. 7 million. The United Kingdom has become the first country to start administering the Oxford Astrazeneca vaccine for covid19. Its cheaper and easier to store since it does not require super cold storage. Here at home the cdc says only 4. 2 million americans have received the first dose of the coronavirus vaccine. That is far short of the Trump Administrations goal to have 20 Million People vaccinated as of january 1st. Weve got our team of reporters skofrg every angle of this for from coast to coast. I want to go to Kerry Sanders in florida where the second dose of the vaccine is now being rolled out. But kerry, theres a ton of confusion. There are people across that state who cant even get access to the first dose. What is going on . We are at Memorial Health care system, and clearly there is a difference between Health Care Workers in th