Transcripts For MSNBCW MSNBC Live With Stephanie Ruhle 20210

MSNBCW MSNBC Live With Stephanie Ruhle January 5, 2021

Country. And i want to start with blayne alexander. She is with voters in atlanta. Blayne, what are people telling you . Well, steph, good morning. People are telling me two things. One, the voting process is going smoothly and, two, that theres no way they were going to miss today. Theyve talked about the fact theyre enthusiastic, theyre excited and made it a priority to get here today. Right now im at a polling location in south atlanta. I want to bring you along and show you. This location opened at 7 0 7 00 a. M. We saw some people lined up before the doors even opened who were ready to go inside who were waiting out here in the cold in the dark to cast their ballots. You look around inside now, you see some people who are still waiting to cast their votes but i will say, steph, that the low numbers that you see here are because a lot of the people came out early. A lot of people came out during early voting, early voting turnout. You saw more than 3 Million People already cast their ballots. At this particular location, i talked to a number of people who came in. Some told me they were in and out in as quickly as five minutes. One of woman described her experience as, quote, perfect. This is one location. We talked to some of our colleagues around the state and look at people planning on coming out, not just yesterday but today. We talked to democrats and republicans and it seems among those that weve talked to, theres not any sort of diminished enthusiasm. Even as they look at the president s claims about issues with the election. We talked to a number of republicans who say doubts or not theyre coming out anyway. Are we going to get these Election Results tonight . Thats a good question. Ive got to say, probably not likely. Remember what we saw during the president ial election. There were not once, twice but three times those results were touted. That was due in part to the fact there was a legally mandated audit. Thats not happening this time around. What could happen is we could see a candidate requested recount. Georgia state law says the margin is within 0. 5 the candidate can request a recount. There are a number of absentee ballots to be counted. That counting cant start until polls close at 7 00 tonight, steph. Why is everyone in washington paying attention to this . Because control of the senate is important to every Single Person in d. C. And its this flrace in georgia thats going to decide it. Theres one exception. The president of the United States, you would think hed be focusing on it, but heres how he started his speech in georgia last night. I want to thank you very much. Hello, georgia. By the way, there is no way we lost georgia. Theres no way. A rigged that was a rigged election. Remember, this speech was supposed to help rally voters on behalf of those republican candidates. Earlier in the day president elect joe biden came out to rally for the democrats in atlanta, and he took a shot at the president for focusing on the election he lost instead of the pandemic that is still going on and raging in this country. The president spends more time whining and complaining than doing something about the problem. I dont know why he still wants the job. He doesnt want to do the work. All right. Lets dig into this. Peter alexander at the white house. Phil rucker, pulitzer prizewin ing bureau chief for the Washington Post and Garrett Haake on capitol hill. How much does the president care about what happens in georgia today . He cares about what happens in georgia in as much as it reflects on him and his presidency. What was stunning about those remarks, though not surprising, is the moment the president walked on stage in front of thousands of his supporters where he was ostensibly at a rally that was supposed to focus attention on Kelly Loeffler and david perdue. He was more focused on november 3rd than january 5th. He said, i dont do rallies for other people. I do them for me. The president focused heavily on his own grievances, his frustrations about the election that took place two months ago. Again, falsely claiming victory. And he did it just hours after a republican Georgia Election official, you know, dismantled his claims. One by one, ticking off all the reasons the conspiracy theories the president has touted are not through and throughout the course of it. And one of the things that creates a conflict and a real contrast in all of this is that the president who is claiming the last election was the result of a rigged system, that its corrupt, now has to sort of reinforce that people should believe in the system to vote again today. And thats one of the real challenges here. It will be entertaining to witness the way the president tries to cast this if republicans do win these two seats in georgia. What does he say . Well, it worked this time but didnt work last time . In some ways thats a nail in his own argument. Steph . Phil, i want to turn to your latest reporting because you say that President Trump is effectively sabotaging the Republican Party on his way out of office. Pretty much every Business Partner hes ever had has said, yep, been there, done that. I know what thats like. But is he doing this consciously or unconsciously . Well, steph, hes being driven entirely by his personal grievances and by his desire to undo the results of the election and stay in power. He doesnt much care about the future of the Republican Party or the gop. He is fixated on his own future, his own legacy and trying to perpetuate his power. So what hes doing is hes forcing the very uncomfortable vote for these senators and house members. Republicans. They have to choose between whether to honor the votes of their own constituents to elect joe biden president or to try to subvert the vote and crusade on trumps behalf which is all but certain to fail in congress. But they risk primary challenges and what weve seen from President Trump the last few days is hes been attacking republicans left and right. He has been recruiting publicly a primary challenger, the number two ranked Senate Republican john thune. Hes been calling on the georgia governor, also a republican, to resign at that rally last night. He even said hed be returning to georgia in 18 months to campaign against Governor Kemp as well as against the republican secretary of state. So theres a gop civil war here, and its being brought on by donald trump, President Trump because he refuses to concede. Phil, 18 months from now when he says hes going to come back to hurt brian kemp, hes just going to be a private citizen. What power is the president really going to have . Well, its actually were not sure how much power hes going to have as a private citizen, but if he continues to have the public support he has now, he will be, by far, the most potent and powerful and popular figure in the Republican Party. And so the risk for these republican elected officials is that trump can come in with 80 of republicans supporting him and say, i choose somebody else in that primary and all of those trump voters are going to go another direction. So even though hes out of office, he could have political sway. Is he the most power snful . Last i checked, he just lost an election. Kelly loeffler in georgia wants to be in Good Standing with the president so shes added her name to the list of republicans who are going to oppose the Election Results tomorrow. Take us behind closed doors on the hill. Whats actually happening . Well, look. Theres a couple of things you need to understand. Everyone involved in this and those who arent know that it will fail. This effort to block the electoral count cannot succeed on the merits. The votes arent there in either the house or the senate. So this is purely performative. Its designed to get the attention of the president and of the president s voters. Just as phil was saying, the president does still have enormous sway with these folks. He lost his election but got the second most votes of anybody ever running for president. His only problem was the guy who beat him got the most. But he still has the sway of all of those voters and thats why you see this effort. Theres some frustration in private and in public among republican elected officials that they are being forced to take this vote. Not just by people who are trump skeptics within the Republican Party. But really committed Trump Supporters like kevin cramer, senator from north dakota, who is publicly upset this becomes the litmus test. This, you know, Suicide Mission to vote for something that is destined to fail becomes the test of loyalty to a president that all of these folks on the senate side, on the republican side, have remained loyal to but now are going to be asked to do something both impossible and antidemocratic in the final weeks of his administration. Significant frustration among Senate Republicans for this effort that is destined to fail and will be part of now their legacy as well as the outgoing president s. Can we add an element that makes no sense. Phil, Kelly Loeffler will not accept the president ial Election Results, but she will accept the results of her own race. Its the same election. Steph, i dont even know how to make sense of that. Its the same election. Its also been counted and recounted twice in georgia. Those results are certified by the state, by the state republican officials there. The fraud claims that the president and his Senate Allies have been repeating are simply not true. They have been debunked. This is conspiratorial talk and clearly senator loeffler, i think, is just trying to get on the good side of President Trump ahead of todays Runoff Election to try to win that seat. All right. Peter alexander, youre getting the question i want to know the answer most. I want to share what President Trump said last night about the certification and specifically mike pence suggesting his Vice President can change the game. Watch this. I hope mike pence comes through for us. I have to tell you. I hope that our great Vice President , our great Vice President comes through for us. Hes a great guy. Of course, if he doesnt come through, i wont like him quite as much. I get it. The president is pretty powerful. You know who else is pretty pow powerful . Mitch mcconnell. And he does not support this. So who is mike pence listening to to. Its be issue of the constitution and mike pence does not have the power unilaterally to change the outcome. The New York Times this morning described it well. Effectively, his role tomorrow on wednesday is basically to open up the inenvelopes like at the academy awords, read the name which declares the winner. He cant just flip a switch and all of a sudden joe biden doesnt win, President Trump does win here. The president knows better and is doing this to fuel disinformation among his supporters or he just doesnt get the way that it works. But the times is also reporting that the president has directly pressed pence, pressed him to try to find alternatives to certifying bidens win. Basically finding a way that biden wouldnt get to the 270 electoral votes that he won. That ultimately throw this to the house. Again, to be clear, pence cant do any of this. And it puts him in this awful, untenable position where he has to decide between his boss and the constitution. His advisers have said, though not on the record, on background as they describe it, that he will follow the constitution here, but hes also trying to have it a little bit both ways by saying theyll have a chance to air their grievances and present the evidence on january 6th. Steph . Mike pence in an awkward situation. Not new news. Gentlemen, thank you. Phil, i like that new art you have. Thanks. Coming up it is not just gad georgia. The gop senators who plan to object to certifying the biden win are also targeting Election Results in pennsylvania. John fetterman joins us to talk about how he plans to carve out their baseless lies. Ambulances in los angeles are being told not to transport Covid Patients with little chance of survival as hospitals there are overrun. And on your screen right now, we are watching long, long lines, drone video. That is daytona, florida. People have been lined up for hours. 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County are so overwhelmed that ambulance crews are being told not to transport patients who have little chance of survival. In new york, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced the states first case of the more contagious uk variant making it the fourth state with confirmed cases of this strain. Nationwide, the total number of coronavirus cases has surpassed 20. 9 million. 354,000 americans have lost their lives. Including more than 1800 just yesterday. And as of this morning, 4. 5 million initial doses of the two covid19 vaccines have been administered in the United States, far below the 20 million target which President Trump had for january 1st. I want to go live to dasha burns in san antonio, texas, where the vaccine roll dloout has been turbulent at best. Help us understand this. The governor there says vaccines are sitting on shelves waiting, waiting to be distributed. But hospitals there say they cant get enough doses for even their frontline workers. Yeah, stephanie. There seems to be a disconnect between the conversation at the higher level and the reality on the ground for providers and folks looking to get vaccinated. The Texas Hospital Association has pushed back on those claims that there are vaccines sitting on shelves. They say thats absolutely not the case. That hospitals are working as quickly as possible to get shots in arms even as they are dealing with record numbers of hospitalizations gh t s in the right now. Where im at right now is an example of how every dose is getting used. This is the public District Hospital here. Their vaccination site, you can take a peek in here. There are folks in line ready to get their vaccine. These are individuals in the 1b group. University health just opened up vaccinations to this group and, stephanie, get this. When they opened up registration last week, within five hours, 17,000 people filled up those slots. They have to shut down the registration portal asking folks to be patient until they get more supply. And heres where it gets complicated. At the same time this is happening here, there are other providers in this area that say they do not have enough supply to vaccinate those 1a frontline workers. And the Texas Hospital Association tells me there are 68 hospitals in the state right now, mostly rural hospitals, that have not yet given out a single dose. Not even to their frontline staff. So thats creating a lot of confusion because of this wide range of circumstances in the state, this decentralized system. So the Texas Hospital Association has come up with a few dos and donts for the public because right now a lot of people are looking to get vaccinated. And its creating some bottlenecks for hospitals. Here are a few tips. First, do your research. Talk to your hospital, look at social media, the websites and see if there is availability. Be patient and understand that there is a limited supply. Check your eligibility. See if you are actually eligible to get a vaccine if youre in one of those groups the vaccine is available to. And understand that there is a lot of variablity. Some regions may have more play than ot

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