Im Joshua Johnson. It is good to be with you tonight, despite this incredibly busy weekend of news. Congressional elect leks candidates were sworn into office and the loser of the president ial office trying to stay in office with a phone call to the secretary of state of georgia k we blunt . He asked the secretary of state to cheat his way into a second term as president. Thats what happened. What happened on that call . What happened on capitol hill today, and what happens next . From msnbcs World Headquarters in new york, welcome to the week. The president s phone call may be shocking, but its not surprising. He tweeted about it this morning. Mr. Trump wrote that he spoke yesterday with georgias secretary of state brad raffensperger. The secretary was, according to the president , unable or unwilling to answer questions about numerous conspiracy theories. An hour and a half later, mr. Raffensperger tweeted that the president s account was false and, quote, the truth will come out. Hours later, the truth did. The Washington Post broke the story of this phone call, a 4 1 2minute excerpt of this phone call. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have, because we won the state. So, tell me, brad, what are we going to do . We won the election. And its not fair to take it away from us like this. And its going to be very costly in many ways. And i think you have to say that youre going to reexamine it. You can reexamine it, but reexamine it with people who want to find answers, not people who dont want to find answers. Thats just one excerpt of the call. Well be playing more excerpts of the call, including longer excerpts at the top of the next hour. If youve been discussing this with people you know, chatting about it on social media, let them know were going to go through longer chunks of this. Theres more to this call that we think you should definitely hear. Thats at the top of the next hour. Pushback now from every living former secretary of defense. All ten of them sign ed on to a oped in the Washington Post that came out this evening. It reads in part, quote, the time for questioning the results has passed. The time for the formal counting for the formal Electoral College votes as prescribed by the constitution has arrived, end quote. The headlines make their oath even more noteworthy. Here is how the oath begins. Quote, i do solemnly swear that i will support and defend the constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. That i will bear true faith and allegiance to the same. Unquote. Contrast that oath with the plans of more than 140 gop members of the house, they say they will reject the Electoral College results in a vote this wednesday. Now the odds of this presenting joe biden from being president look incredibly slim. So whats the point of it . Well ask democratic senator gary peters of michigan in just a moment. Let us begin this busy night of news in georgia with the senate runoff. Election on tuesday will determine control of the senate. It will also make the biden administrations policy agenda easier or harder to achieve. No wonder the Vice President elect, kamala harris, was in garden city, georgia, today. She campaigned in garden city, near savannah, for both democratic challengers, reverend warnock and john osoff. That call with the States Election officials might give us an indication of what he plans to talk about. What are we going to do . We won the election, and its not fair to take it away from us like this. And its going to be very costly, in many ways. And i think you have to say that youre going to reexamine it. You can reexamine it, but reexamine it with people that want to find answers, not people that dont want to find answers. Honestly, this should go very fast. You should meet tomorrow, because you have a big election coming up, and because of what youve done to the president , you know, the people of georgia know that this was a scam. Joining us now is tia mitchell, washington correspondent for the Atlanta Journal constitution. Tia, good evening. Good evening. Whats the conversation like in georgia right now about this phone call . Well, republicans have mostly been silent. The only republican we really heard from so far is david chaffer, chairman of the Republican Party of georgia, who is faulting what he considers the secretary of state breaching confidentiality for recording the conversation itself. So, republicans have mostly been silent, but democrats, as you can imagine, are very critical of the contents of this conversation. Weve had representative hank johnson say that the president should be cen suchlt red but others saying there should be conversation about impeaching the president again. Impeaching him again . How do you characterize that conversation . I mean, hes going to be out of office in 17 days basically. Yeah. I think its, you know, very unlikely to happen, because its way too much of a bother for someone who is going to be out of office soon. But the fact that theres even a conversation about actions of a president that members think is an Impeachable Offense is always serious. Again, its mostly on the democratic side, but theyre talking about were crimes committed in this phone call . What are we expecting from the president s visit from georgia tomorrow . Thats the thing. The president has always been a concern for republicans that he is muddying the message. The runoffs are tuesday. So in this final hour right before the polls open, republicans hope that the president would focus on turning out the vote and getting Republican Voters energized to participate on tuesday. Now the question is, will he show up on monday, you know, wanting to criticize republican leaders, criticize the integrity of georgias election . And those messages dont necessarily encourage participation. They may encourage people to stay home on tuesday, who republicans need in order to win both of these senate seats. I do want to get your thoughts on the senate races on tuesday, particularly this push to overturn the Electoral College results. We have a clip of both senators, senator david perdue and kelly loeffler, the two incumbents who are running for reelection when asked about wednesdays vote to confirm the results of the Electoral College. Here is a cut of both of those senators reacting to that questio question. Im looking very, very closely at it. I have been one of the first to say everything is on the table. Im fighting for this president because he has fought for us. Hes our president and were going to keep making sure that this is a fair election. And im looking very closely at it. None of it matters if i cant win on january 5th. The only thing left for the president is for us to object. And i agree that i would do that. The technical problem is that i wont be certified until this election is certified, so a week to ten days after the election when we win on tuesday, but im encouraging my colleagues to object. This is something that the American People demand right now. So, mr. Perdue says hes encouraging his colleagues to object. Miss loeffler says shes looking at it. Not a hard yes from either of them. What howe do you think this will factor into what georgians are thinking about come tuesday . I think it factors in that the Republican Base is behind the challenge of the election outcome. For them to say they want to support President Trump, i think, is a messaging they think will help them on election day. The question is, as we know, senator loeffler will be in place to do so on wednesday. Senator perdue wont. The question will be, even after the election, when she no longer is on the line, so to speak, will she still vote fo contest the election as a way to, you know, reward President Trump for supporting her as she participates in these runoffs . Tia mitchell, washington correspondent for atlanta constitution journal. Thank you so much. Thank you. Democrat representing michigan, sworn in for his second term today. Senator peters, good evening. Good evening. Thank you for having me, joshua. Good to have you back. What do you think senate should do about this call if anything . Right now its up to the voters of georgia to assess this call and if this is the type of prn they want as president and a senate basically backing up this president. Its up to the voters. The thing we have to focus on clearly im focused on and my colleagues are focused on, we have to get through this covid crisis. We hear about a president focused on putting out misinformation, false allegations, and taking his eye off the real ball, which is getting this pandemic under control, making sure that we can get the immunization s out to people across the country, do it more efficiently. Its the only way we get through this health crisis. Its the only way we get our economy up and running. Thats what im focused on, what my colleagues are focused on. In the senate, for example, we have Mitch Mcconnell refuse to provide official relief to the families, wouldnt even bring it to the floor. Its a real problem if you have a republican majority in the senate. You cant provide 2,000 of additional help to people who are fighting to keep a roof over their head and food on the table. That is what is the issue right now. Yet we have a Republican Senate that refuses to help people. We have a president focused on misinformation as opposed to dealing with the crisis, making sure immunizations are getting into the arms of people who need it. Right. We need serious leadership right now. Once again, we have these distractions that are taking us away from dealing with problems that Everyday Americans are facing. I wonder what the mood is like in the senate right now, particularly in light of this effort that 12 republican senators have said they will mount on wednesday. There was a somewhat Testy Exchange today on meet the press between my colleague chuck todd and ron johnson, one of the senators who says he will challenge the results. Here is how part of that exchange went. You made an allegation that there was widespread fraud. You have failed to offer specific evidence of that widespread fraud but youre demanding an investigation on the grounds that there are allegations of widespread fraud. So, essentially, youre the arsonist here. This was started when the Mainstream Media stop dropped any pretense of being unbiased and chose sides during this election. This fire was started when you completely ignored, for example, our investigation of the hunter biden. What the senateer senator is saying in plain english is because of the press did not duly investigate the hunter biden investigation that all of a sudden there is fraud in the election that needs to be dealt with. That is a strip of il logic that is flat out dont think about it too hard or youll wake up unconscious in your bathtub and dont know how you got there. This doesnt make sense. What is going on in the senate right now . It feels like were going off a cliff in some ways. A lot of people, myself included, are concerned about what the next few weeks will feel like. Senator peters, whats going on in the senate right now . Its incredibly concerning, particularly when you hear those comments from senator johnson. I serve with him on the senate committee, is he the ranking chair. Hes not dealing with the security threats we face in the homeland, from the pandemic to Cyber Security threats. Weve had a major cyber hack. Were not dealing with that in the committee. Instead i have a chairperson who wants to deal with a variety of conspiracy theories. Hopefully thats not where most of the Republican Caucus is. I think its a small group of folks and im certainly very disappointed that theyre engaged in continuing to put out misinformation that the president wants to put out. In michigan they may challenge the results in michigan that have been widely litigated. Weve had 11 court cases, all of them have been thrown out, with the exception of one thats in process but has really no path forward. Its been rejected by the court system. Theres been recounts, certifications. Theres no basis for fact of what happened in michigan. Im sorry, senator. Im sorry to interrupt you. There might be a challenge of results in michigan. I think a lot of peoples hearts sank when they heard you say that. Can you elaborate on that briefly . Come january 20th, are you optimistic this will basically stop . Oh, yeah. Or do you think in states like michigan, georgia, pennsylvania and elsewhere, that there may be an effort to carry this even past the inauguration . This stops on the 20th, right . I believe it will, absolutely. Im saying the court cases havent gone anywhere. Theres one that hasnt been resolved but has no path for success whatsoever. Basically, they failed every single court case in michigan will end up being a failure. There were conspiracy theories in one county in michigan that became widespread. They did a hand count that resulted in a few votes being changed. Theres no basis of fact from what were hearing from the republicans, yet we may hear that on the senate floor, that theres something wrong with michigan votes. Lets be clear, although President Trump did win michigan by a little over 10,000 votes, he lost michigan this time by 1 150,000 votes. Thats not close. You know, its time to get past this. Enough is enough. I want to go back to how i started this conversation. We are in the middle of a pandemic. We are in the middle of a health care crisis, an economic crisis. Some of my Senate Colleagues are still putting out this nonsense and refusing to provide assistance to families who are struggling right now. Im hoping we will see a small number of republicans go along with the president s charade here, and a majority of the caucuses with us but well have to wait and see. Senator gary peters of michigan, appreciate you making time tonight. Thank you very much. Good to be with you. Now that weve had time to listen to more of the president s call over the last few hours, we have found some excerpts that we think you should hear. Those include how georgias secretary of state responded to mr. Trumps demands, and threats. Well play more excerpts, including some extended cuts throughout the program, including at the top of the next hour. So, again, if youve been chatting about this with others that you know on social media, have them tune in. We have more cuts that might add context that you should know about. We have a ton to get to in addition to that, with this call, for example, did the president break any federal laws . Well speak to one of the former house impeachment managers. Congressman crow of colorado will join us. The president is focused overturning the election at the of looking at the Covid Vaccination effort. How some Nursing Homes are suffering the consequences. About to face a big test, new yorks economy. Well tell you what new york and the Buffalo Bills are up to. A member of president elect bidens Covid Task Force will take your questions about the vaccines. 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And theres nothing wrong with saying, you know, youve recalculated. So, look, all i want to do is this. I just want to find, uh, 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have, because we won the state