Here, its over. The president has failed in his attempt to overturn an election result. Joe biden will as planned take over as the 46th president at noon, january 20th in keeping with the results of the election. Another way of putting it is trumps defeat became official when the woman who runs the General Services administration faced with a boss who will not concede just tonight grudgingly agreed to officially begin the transition to the biden administration. In a letter to biden that avoids calling him president elect, emily murphy, signed off on his transition and noted she was under no political pressure writing, quote, please know that i came to my decision independently based on the law and available facts. I was never directly or indirectly pressured by any executive branch official including those who work at the white house or gsa with regard to the substance or timing of my decision. I did not receive any direction to delay my determination. Her decision came just hours after Election Officials in michigan certified joe bidens victory. Trump posted his reaction to the news about the transition with a message that did not sound like a concession. Quote, i want to thank emily murphy at gsa for her steadfast dedication and loyalty to our country. Our case strongly continues, and we will keep up the good fight, and i believe we will prevail. Nevertheless, in the best interest of our country i am recommending that emily and her team do what needs to be done and have told my team to do the same. Tonight the New York Times reports it this way. Quote, mr. Trump had been resisting any move toward a transition, but in conversations in recent days that intensified monday morning top aides including mark meadows, the white house chief of staff, pat cipollone, the white house chief council and jay sekulow told the president the transition needed to begin. Trump continued to solicit opinions from associates including Rudy Giuliani who told him there were still legal avenues to pursue. This all comes after a string of losses for trump in his effort to overturn the election results. Now trumps legal team is putting all their efforts in pennsylvania even though as several counties begun to certify the victory. Earlier on this network one of Trumps Campaign lawyers explained the strategy here. The legal strategy is to make sure every legal vote counts and is counted fairly and accurate. And we have until december 14th where those electors for the Electoral College will vote. And so our strategy is to make sure we continue to challenge all these false and fraudulent results. The election was stolen and President Trump won by a landslide. Okay, so none of the election lawsuits has uncovered any fraud. Meanwhile, president elect biden stepped up his effort to build his administration. Today he met virtually with a Bipartisan Group of mayors and also announced choices for key cabinet positions. To begin with hes nominated former Federal Reserve chair janet yellen for treasury secretary. She served in the Obama Administration. If confirmed she would be the first woman to head up treasury in our 231year history. Biden also put forward his National Security team which included tony blinken for secretary of state and former secretary of state john kerry as climate czar. These nominees will have to be confirmed by the senate which like all of bidens appointments may be a dicy business resulting in drama and close votes. Biden was asked about that earlier this afternoon. Do you expect republicans to put up any significant to your nominations . Are you kidding me . The New York Times notes biden appointees will also have to deal with decisions being made by the Trump Administration on their way out. Quote, mr. Trumps political appointees are going to extraordinary lengths to try to prevent mr. Biden from rolling back the president s legacy. Some of mr. Trumps advisers make no attempt to hide the fact their actions are aimed at deliberately hamstringing mr. Bidens policy options even before he begins. President obama was optimistic about how bidens team would handle the aftermath of a trump white house. Theres been some damage done that is going to take some time to dig ourselves out of, but theres no doubt that joes got the right people to do it. And i have every confidence theyll be able to do it. It just may not happen instantaneously. So now with the transition stalemate at an end, the biden team will have access to information they need to try to contain the out of control coronavirus outbreak as well as the plans for Vaccine Distribution lets not forget. Today a third drugmaker, astrazeneca, announced it had positive results from late stage trials of a coronavirus vaccine. Its candidate developed by Oxford University is up to 90 effective. Its expected to be less expensive than other vaccines, does not to be stored at subzero temperatures. Meanwhile the u. S. Has lost nearly 260,000 souls, almost 12. 5 million have become infected that we know of. Despite the cdc warning about avoiding thanksgiving travel, the tsa says over 3 Million People were on the move this past weekend, the most for any weekend since the pandemic began in earnest in march. Earlier today dr. Fauci expressed his concerns about the eventual impact of all this holiday travel. If, in fact, youre in a situation when you do the things that are increasing the risk the travel, the congregate setting, not Wearing Masks the chances are you will see a surge super imposed upon a surge. What were doing now is going to be reflected two, three weeks from now. With that, lets bring in our lead off guests on a monday night of thanksgiving week. Phil rucker, pulitzer prizewinning White House Bureau chief for the Washington Post. Coauthor of the long time bestseller a very stable genius yates. Susan page, veteran journalist, best selling author of usa today, Washington Bureau chief. She was of course moderator of the vp debate this cycle. She is the biographer of barbara bush. Her next work will profile speaker pelosi. And jeremy bash, former staff at the cia and pentagon, former chief council to the house intel committee. Mr. Rucker, im going to begin with you and your beat. You share a fourway byline. I note tonight in the Washington Post with some real detail from behind the scenes. Trump was described as angry about the situation. He called political advisers monday to say he had doubts about the gsa initiating the transition to inquire about whether he could block certification of the michigan result and to express reluctance to travel to georgia to campaign for the two republican senators facing runoff elections, according to officials and advisers. What is going on behind the scenes, fiphil rucker . Well, brian, whats happening according to my colleagues and i reporting today is that the president has been very reluctant to agree to this procedural move which is quite significant, which is the General Services administration allowing the biden transition to take place. That is effectively a surrender on the part of the president after 16 days of delaying the transition and trying to subvert the vote. He, of course, is continuing his fight publicly. He believes he has some legal avenues ahead, but the reality here is that its over and tonight brought some end to it. But the president took a while to get to that place psychologically. He had conversations over the last few days with a number of advisers who were telling him, look, the avenues are running short here. You need to let the transition begin. And then in the last 24 to 48 hours weve seen this chorus of calls from some republican senators who are influential, from a number, more than a hundred National Security veterans in this country who wrote a public letter today calling on the Trump Administration to begin this transition. And importantly from the ceo of blackstone, steve schwarzman, whos perhaps President Trumps closest ally in the business community, he went public today with comments saying effectively that biden had won this election and the country needed to move on. All of this has wounded the president that got into an emotional place, but his advisers were able to convince him to go ahead with the beginning of this transition so long as he doesnt concede. And my colleague josh dossy is reporting theres actually an effort in the white house right now to deliver a formal speech to the nation. He would not concede in the speech, but he would use the moment to tout his accomplishments in office and to commit publicly on camera from the lectern to a peaceful transfer of power. Thats the conversation under way tonight. Susan, im told at least one fox anchor tonight used television to speak to an audience of one as one does, kind of letting the president know its over, urging the president to campaign for both candidates in georgia. And lets project a little bit. Thats not going to be the same for him. As a losing candidate now he can say all he wants, it was rigged, it was fixed, we won this election. Its still not going to be the same for him. Im wondering what to you has been the cumulative effect of this rolling blunder and b. S. Two plus weeks. Well, one conclusion i think we can draw is that the system has worked. Its not been up to President Trump whether he won the election or not. Its ben up to the election process. Its been up to judges in these states who have kicked out lawsuits that allege fraud without showing fraud. But this has been i think at some cost we have not previously seen in modern times. An example of the loser refusing to recognize results for a couple of weeks to blocking the peaceful transfer of power with the transition process. And that leaves, i think, some americans including a lot of President Trumps supporters questioning the legitimacy of joe bidens election and that will be a big task for the president elect to have to address once he does take office. Jeremy bash, lets talk about the biden selections thus far. I dont know if he even considered an oil company ceo as secretary of state. But be that as it may the reaction to the names put out today, the names we mentioned at the top of the broadcast, but also homeland security, dni, ambassador to the u. N. , these are career people. These are competent experts. And i think the reaction because of the competence was kind of gentle crickets across washington, am i wrong . Youre right, brian. This is a return to normalcy. After four years of chaos, after four years of alliance, dissing and dictator coddling president elect biden has announced tonight a set of National Security professionals to take over, and these are individuals all of whom have relevant experience, all of whom have served in government, all of whom are recognized experts. And they all are loyal to joe biden and Kamala Harris and their agenda. And when they speak they will speak authoritatively for the president. And the other thing i think thats interesting is all of these people know each other. Theyve worked together, and i know them personally and theyre unfailingly nice. Theyre not just diplomatic in a professional sense. Theyre actually good people who care about our country and principled u. S. Leadership. So joe biden selecting people like tony blinken and admiral haines and Jake Sullivan and alejandro mayorkas, hes got the ateam. Hes got the celtics on the floor to cleanup the damage but i think theyll do very well. Might be a shock to the u. N. When a career diplomat takes the chair as an ambassador to that world body. Phil rucker, do we know anything more about the postpresidency plans of this particular president . Well, its interesting, brian. President trump for the last several weeks has been wanting the world to think hes planning his second term. He keeps saying he won this election and hell get it all sorted out in court. But in reality our reporting shows that the president has been privately plotting his next act. Hes been planning for how he could make a lot of money without doing very much work, which i think is something all americans would probably strive for. But hes thinking about maybe writing a book. Hes thinking about a television gig of some kind. And most importantly i think hes thinking about a rematch, another run in 2024 and has told advisers he may want to declare a new campaign as early as december before the end of this year because he wants to keep the political operation going. And no matter what he does he has told his friends and allies that hes committed to trying to remain an omny present force in american life, in media and republican politics and effectively freeze out that field of 2024 republican president ial hopefuls which we all know includes Vice President pence but also nikki haley and mike pompeo, people who served this administration. Its going to be a rude awakening for them if they suddenly have to compete with their boss for the nomimation. Lets try a viewers guide to the folks watching tonight trying to predict the future, the early part of the biden administration. And for the sake of this conversation lets assume the democrats dont take the majority in the senate. Days ago Mitch Mcconnell just gaveled through a vote on a young woman eight years out of law school whos now a federal judge, a federal judge for life. I reckon biden if he wanted to wouldnt get that same chance to put up someone who the other side considers outlandish. Bidens probably going to be limited to very moderate federal judicial nominations. Hes probably going to be limited to only those cabinet secretaries he feels can safely pass, and wont that also be a limit on his governance . Well, hes going to take office at a time of just huge challenges. Hes going to have a democratic controlled house with the narrowest majority of any speaker in two decades. He is as you say may well end up with a republican controlled senate. Well see that after the special elections in georgia. And theres a lot of talk people have talked about the working relationship he may have with Mitch Mcconnell. The two of course know each other well from his days in the senate and from his days as Vice President. But if you look at Mitch Mcconnells record as majority leader, it is not an encouraging one for a Democratic White House taking over. Hes not shown a willingness in the past during the Obama Administration to be that kind of constructive bipartisan lets find Common Ground figure. Hes instead been someone whos focused on winning the election the next time around. And that creates big problems for a president who will want to get some big things done. I was reminded, susan, just tonight that Mitch Mcconnell was the only republican senator who attended beau bidens funeral. But to your point hes also a real fighter and a transactional Senate Majority leader. Jeremy, jim mattis cowrote a piece that im going to read you a part of it. It says in practice America First has meant america alone. In january when President Joe Biden and his National Security team begin to reevaluate u. S. Foreign policy, we hope they will quickly revise the National Security strategy to eliminate America First from its contents restoring in its place the commitment to cooperative security. Jeremy, this is not my area of expertise. Im still looking to find mine. But im not trying to diminish the mattis message either. It seems to me as an observer that its really not going to take much. Weve already heard some politicians in europe say things like americas back, that for all peoples fears over the last four years, the strained relationships, the alliances appearing in ruins now. This could come back quickly. Heres the reality about International Relations which is that all the big challenges we face covid or climate or even curbing iran or north Koreas Nuclear ambitions or checking chinas rise, we cannot do it alone. We have to work with our allies and partners with our countries who share our values, share our interests, thats the way we get things done on the world stage. And thats in stark contrast to what President Trump pursued which is neo isolationism and frankly dissing our allies. I think the Team Joe Biden has put on the field tonight and has announced will lead our Foreign Policy for the coming years is a team that are committed internationalists. They know in a cleareyed way how to protect americas National Security interests. Well use military power if thats whats required, but our first move is going to be diplomatic, using all elements of American Power and working with our friends and allies to get things done internationally. Im imagining nato members have never paid this close attention to the american gsa as they have in the past few days. To our friends phil rucker, susan page, jeremy bash, our thanks for starting us off on this monday night of thanksgiving week. We greatly appreciate it. And coming up,