the way we were in the obama administration later on we could be putting ourselves back into another conundrum. >> do you accept a certain but small level of risk now, or are you creating a situation where there's much more risk, and actually there are more lives at stake. to that point, general hertling, i wonder, is this the trump administration put ago potential disaster right into the lapse of an incoming administration, and playing with the lives of troops? >> it is my assessment that it is, brianna. it's not only playing with the lives of u.s. troops, but it's undercutting the early stage of a formation of an afghan government. they are not going to be able to hold against the taliban. we have seen taliban actions

pushing against the government. yes, it's not only putting troops in harm's way, but also putting nations in harm's way. i think that's something he's laying on the lap of president-elect biden. >> so what happens, vivian, if the afghan government is destabilized, is destabilized by this in the coming months? >> the afghan government has been struggling all along, and u.s. and other allies have been trying to prop it up and get it on its feel so it could return to some level of normalcy, but when you have companies like the u.s. withdrawing, a lot of other allying will question their own roles in afghanistan, and then they're left to their own devices. they may not be able to solely control the taliban levels. you have pockets of isis around the country that are starting to grow and become out of control. you basically reverse so much of the hard work and effort that's

been put into the past couple of years, the peace process and everything else at this point when nobody is holding the taliban and isis accountable, and the afghan government, for that matter. they're left to their own devices and may backtrack so much of the effort that's been made over the past almost two decades that we've been there. >> brianna, if i may, too, bianna brings up a good point, about a third -- and has the coordination taken place, or to this just a unilateral issues with u.s. forces to put several nations in europe that are contributing a great many forces to afghanistan at risk themselves and further damage the transatlantic relationship as part of this entire action. >> general, vivian, thank you so much. we appreciate your analysis here of this breaking news.

>> announcer: this is cnn bre s breaking news. president-elect joe biden set to speak in moments, after cnn is learning that the u.s. military has been told to prepare for a drawdown. keep in mind president trump has yet to conasset the election, yet to acknowledge he lost and refusing to start the normal transition of power with the biden team. i want to go to kaitlan collins at the white house. >> reporter: you're right we are still many days with the president refusing to concede and formally acknowledge that joe biden has won the election. this comes as we are learning that u.s. military demanders are preparing to get a formal order from president trump wanting this drawdown of troops in afghanistan and iraq. what they have done is sent this warning to their subordinates, to stay start preparing for this

drawdown, it's about 1,000 troops in both afghanistan and iraq, and prepare for it to happen before january, by january 15th is what my colleague barbara starr is reporting. this is long something we have known that the president wanted to do. he's been frustrated it hasn't happened yet. he has been president all of this time, and now, of course, that he's got two months left on the job, this is when we are starting to see this. we are expecting this order to come as soon as this week. my colleague barbara starr notes it could come within the next 48 hours. you have to look at what's happening here. it's not just that joe biden is about to take office. it's also there's been a total clearing of the deck in the pentagon, where the president fired his defense secretary last monday, and we saw several other top officials leave their post because they were fired or resigned from those jobs. it's essential a new leadership

at the pentagon that the president is dealing with, with of course chris miller now as the acting defense secretary. so the question is not only how quickly does this happen and why is the president doing it now with only two months left in office? but what effect does it have on the biden administration once they come into office and what they're going to do, because this is something that will have a lasting effect. we know the president has been wanting to make several other major moves in his time in office, essential fire the cia director is one of those, but this would have a lasting impact as soon as they start in january. >> it certainly would. i want to bring in our chief political analyst gloria borgeers and or correspondent abby fiphillip to talk about th. to kaitlan's point, who does this? who drops this into a lap of an incoming president? >> no one.

i think president trump is trying to go through thinks bucket list, saying he promised to get out of these wars -- >> but gloria, he's not getting out of these wars. >> that's right. >> he's just handicapping the next guy who has to deal with it. >> that's part of his calculation, if there is a calculation behind it. other than saying, this is what i said i was going to do, we weren't going to fight, quote, endless wars, and he believes this is doing that, and handing joe biden a problem, and as jake tapper was reporting last week, there was a lot of talk that that was wihy esper and the former team was being pushed out, because they disagreed what the president is doing. this is a president who is desperate and who understands that he's going to have to

leave, and wants to do what he can to, quote, cement, unquote, his legacy, whatever that might be, and he wants this to be a part of it. i think it's as simple as that. >> abby, what do you think? >> i do think there's probably as element of this that is about weakening joe biden as much as possibly, for purely political reasons, because this is a president who is going to be leaving the white house while also seeding the ground for a potential second run for office. he's also trying to build a foundation upon which republicans can continue to succeed with trumpism. in order to do that, he has to be able to say i promised to get us out of these foreign wars, and the democrats want to keep us in these foreign wars. a lot of this is about having a rhetorical platform for the president, but as you point out,

there is obvious real-life consequences. the important part that sticks out, the president just spent the last two weeks purging the civilian leadership of the pentagon. we have to ask real questions about why that happened and what was the end game? why would the president try to do that is the question we had all along. maybe we're seeing one of the main reasons why. that should be an alarming thing for a lot of people in washington. >> gloria, if he's doing this to weaken joe biden, he's doing this at the expense of the safety of american troops. >> absolutely. absolutely. >> not that we shouldn't be particularly surprised. he doesn't seem to give a damn that americans are dying of coronavirus. he hasn't changed his tune. he just pretends it doesn't exist, and here he is doing something that could put at risk american troops. >> right. absolutely.

i think what he -- you know, what he wants to do, as abby is saying, drop a problem in joe biden's lap. if you know the history of joe biden, he's not been one for robust military intervention in any way, shape or form. he can drop this problem on biden. if biden believes he needs to put these troops back, he would do it, because if he believes and his pentagon brass believe that it is in the safety of american troops and in the national security interests of this country. but that is not what this president is talking about or thinking. i think what we need to hear right now are from some of the military brass who may be out, who did perhaps talk about what this means for the safety of our troops in the region. >> brianna, i just want to be clear, you know, presidents can

make decisions about troop levels. that's their job. they're responsible for deciding for where we are and how many american troops are in harm's way. the problem is how it's being done and whether there is a strategy de hind it or whether it's all political. i think that's the big question here. not so much does the president have the authority to do this? he absolutely does. the question is, if the pentagon did push back, what was the reason behind that? could it be because they believe that is not, from a strategic perspective, in the best interests of -- >> and troops put themselves at risk for strategic -- that's something they do. that's why they sign up. if there's a strategic reason to do something, they accept that. they follow orders. they do what people above them say, even if maybe it doesn't make sense to them, but in this case, abby, you bring up a good

point. is this strategic? it appears to be political, and does it put troops at risk? very possibly. i'm going -- gloria, a quick final word, please. >> i just want to say, again, this is his bucket list. this is stuff he's checking out of. there's rayly no grand strategy here. >> gloria, abby, if you can stand by, the president 'reese fusal to accept the results of the election, not only does it delay any healing for the nation, it also could delay action on the economy, and more importantly delay action against the deadly coronavirus. yesterday, there's the president tweeting this -- i won the election. like if he tweets it in all caps, it will make it true. it doesn't. that seems to be sinking in some places. here's national security adviser robert o'brien from earlier today. >> if the biden/harris ticket is

determined to be the winner and obviously things look that way now, we'll have a very professional transition from the national security council, no question about it. >> here a what he heard from maryland's governor hogan. >> the president is tweeting all day and night about beating joe biden instead of let's have a successful next couple months, focusing on these problems. >> you're saying focus on transition, and when is the right time to accept this outcome? >> tomorrow would be two weeks, and the time has come. he's just not listening to the advice. >> regardless of the president's complaining and spinning of unfounded conspiracy theories, it's simple. joe biden got 5.5 million more votes and exceeded the number of electoral votes needed to be president. gloria, i want to bring you back in to talk about this. what is trump up to with these

denia denials? what is his end game? >> look, at this point the answer to his end game, his end game is the way that he can leave thinking that he has convinced the american public that he didn't lose, the election was rigged, and somehow somewhere he has a way back to american political life if he wants it. i don't think it's anything more complicated than trying to figure out a way to deal with his own ego. don't forget, brianna, this is the way that donald trump has dealt with everything in his life. when he ran casinos in atlantic city, he never paid his bills, he litigated and litigated and litigated until people just kind of gave up. i think that's what he's doing now. he's kind of litigating, if you will, until people shrug and it becomes january 20th and that's

h it, and he goes. >> with every day it becomes a bigger issue. the issue of, does the president set in place the machinery that allows a transition to come out of z up and get off to a good start for the best of the country, he's not doing that. how does this get compounded with each day that passes where the president is just in denial? >> look, the delay in and of itself is a real problem. i do suspect that at a certain point the law is going to step in here. these election results will be certified, and this process is going to move forward whether the president is backing it up or not. i suspect that even after the biden transition maybe gets the funding that they're looking for, maybe gets some of the more kind of mechanical parts of the transition that they need, like cooperation on classified

information, or issues like how to secure facilities to conduct their work, there will be political appointees within the administration that will not try to really hand over the core knowledge of these agency. taz going to be a problem, and yeah, it does -- tweefb discussing there's the coronavirus pandemic, the economy, and there are obviously urgent national security issues. it would be, i think, unprecedented for this administration to wait until january 20th to have full and complete cooperation at all levels of government with the transition, but that will be part of president trump's legacy if that is the road that they decide to go down. >> can i point out, though, it is a crime not to hand over the work of government to the next administration, or to destroy, for example, the work of government and not hand it over to the next administration. people ought to keep that in mind. >> yeah, we'll be watching.

gloria, thank you so much. abby, thank you so much to you. tanned stand by, we are loo what will be this live event. joe biden and kamala harris will speak on the economy as we get news of troop drawdowns in iraq and afghanistan. we are watching this pandemic worsen. we're going to bring that to you live. es makes a pizza, he doesn't just make a pizza. he uses fresh, clean ingredients to make a masterpiece. taste our delicious new flatbread pizzas today. panera. $$9.95? no way.? $9.95? that's impossible. hi, i'm jonathan, a manager here at colonial penn life insurance company, to tell you it is possible. if you're age 50 to 85, you can get life insurance with options starting at just $9.95 a month. okay, jonathan, i'm listening.

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why?! ahhhh! incoming! ahhhahh! i'm saved! water tastes like, water. so we fixed it. mio. the cavalry is coming, that is the quote from top health officials responding to news of much needed hope during the pandemic. moderna's vaccine candidate is

nearly 95% effective, according to initial trial data. we're still awaiting much more information. these results come just days after pfizer released highly promising information about its vaccines. they still need to dismiss the detailed reports to the fda in the coming week. that will give us a lot of information that we don't have, but these early trial results exceed the expectations of government scientists and health officials like the head of the national institutes of health. >> this really is a significant milestone. two monday mornings in a row with remarkable results to report of interim analyses of vaccine trials, in a circumstance that outstrips the expectation that most of us had.

we do not expect to see them widely available until the spring and on from there. right now it's spreading. you can see it is not good, and it's actually going to get worse before it gets better. for the 13th day in a row the u.s. has reported more than 100,000 infections in a day, since it hit of u.s., it's infected more than a million children. tests lines are once again hours long. this is a scene of cars queueing up in illinois for drive-thru testing there. the nation's surgeon general is describing it this way -- we are truly at war with virus. the enemy has us surrounded. joining me no is bless cohis. this is the exciting news.

we should stress these are initial results, but we're listening to scientific voices, and they seem downright elated. how did this work? >> this vaccine was 94.5% effect keeping people sick from the coronavirus. both vaccines use the same technology. nobody got very, very sick. people had head aches or body aches, but nothing severe. not only did the moderna vaccine prevent most people, almost everybody, from getting covid-19, but when they got the vaccine, none of them got severely ill. many people they got a placebo, a shot of saline that does absolutely nothing, and some of those people did become severely

ill with covid-19. i spoke with dr. tal zaks yesterday. let 'see what he had to say. >> we unfortunately had 11 participants in this trial that came down with severe disease, either with low oxygen levels in their blood or need to do go to the hospital. all of these cases occurred only on the placebo arm, not a single case of severe disease vaccinated with our vaccination. >> people were giving the vaccine or placebo, and they just went out and lived their lives. nobody intentionally infected them, they just got it. the thinking is this is not a

vaccine for a lifetime, you may have to get it every year. >> one of the interesting things you can tell us, you compare pfizer's to the moderna vaccine. there are some differences here. will you also tell us that would mean one would necessarily be distributed over the other? i would expect as there's a great demand for vaccines, any vaccine is going to be desired and bought and purchased and used. >> they both seem to be identical in terms of how well they work, how they protect people and how safe they are. they didn't make anybody sick. there's one huge difference, so let's look at that. pfizer has to be kept at minus 103 degrees faron height. it's hard to xla contemplate how cold that is, so doctors and pharmacies adoy ies don't have

that low, and once taken out, the vaccine can only stay in the refrigerator five days. with moderna, doctors and pharmacies do have freezers to accommodate, and then it can stay in the refrigerator for 30 days. moderna's is definitely easier to use, but we don't have enough of either, so at this point we need both. >> get those super-duper freezers ready. elizabeth, cohen, thank you so much. president trump likes to claim we're rounding the turn, but we will roll the tape. cnn learning the u.s. military has been told to plan for a troupe drawdown in afghanistan

and iraq.

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the message. it seems like all anyone is talking about what the thanksgiving day plans are and they're trying to work it out. first, can you tell us, how are you doing? how is your wife and son doing? >> sure. we're very, very fortunate. we're headed the right direction. we're getting better. as we know, that often is not the case for families. this has been zero fun. i wouldn't wish this on anybody, but we are fortunate. i absolutely appreciate that. >> you say it was mild, but it flattened you guys. >> yeah, the best way to describe it, honestly, is like being hit by a truck. we are all athletic, work out, in good shape, and it does flatten you. it humbles you. working through it will be a process. it's not something you bounce back the next day on. >> so, look, we're at this point in time where thanksgiving is

upon us, very soon christmas, hanukkah to follow, and people are missing their families as we're in the middle of this huge surge. you want to tell people something. >> yeah. it's not my goal it life to become scrooge. it terrifies me. the truth is it doesn't matter who got it first, but the truth is one of us brought it home and we were all pretty sick within a day. so i strongly urge folks, again -- they may disagree, i understand that -- but really urging people to stay home. if you care about families and friends, this is not the time to be mixing. i hate to say that. i know how much -- i'm missing my 85-year-old mother with

alzheimer's, i haven't been able to be with her for about six months. it gives a hard message. i feel compelled to try and challenge people to stay home christmas and just to try to keep the loved ones and broader community safe. right now it's winning, and we're not. >> you talk a bit about, you know, you were being pretty careful, but you still contracted it. you were doing the things that the cdc says you should do -- wearing masks, washing your hands, socially distancing. do you have any idea how your family got this? >> we really don't. we were checked very quickly on the contact tracing. thank goodness nobody we were in contact with seems to have been positive, but six months we were extraordinarily disciplined.

we don't have people in the house or go to other people's houses. we maintain social distancing. i just think that the rate of infection now is so high that even if you think you're doing everything right, you may not be doing enough. so we truly don't know which one of us contracted it or how. we were trying to be as good as we could not just recently, but for a long time. it honestly wasn't quite good enough. >> you know, i wonder what you think. i know this is adeck dotal, but what i've heard from people i know, is a lot of times it is sometimes elderly parents who wants to get together for the holidays. they're obviously lonely. they want to have the family gathering like they've always had. what do you say to people who are -- they're being pressured by family members to get together? >> yeah. it's the right question. i just think if you love people, you have to do the right thing.

the right thing may not be the easy thing that's very, very real. that's not something that you'll ever forget or ever fully recover from. so it's sort of an act of love sometimes to do something more difficult, things that you may not want to do, if you truly care about people you'll do the right thing. unfortunately right now, in our country because this has not been dealt with, because there's been absence of leadership, we have to do some things out of love that are a bit harder, but they are absolutely acts of love and compassion. i can't overstate that. >> secretary duncan, thank you so much. we're glad you're feeling better. our best to your family as you recover as well.

>> thank you. moments from now president-elect joe biden and vice president-elect harris will speak. plus former president obama ways in on president trump's refusal to concede and what he says worries him the most about america's democracy.

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when your time is up, then it is your job to put the country first and think beyond your own ego and your own interests and your own disappointments. my advice to president trump is, if you want at this late stage in the game to be remembered as somebody who put country first, it's time for you to do the same thing. all right. i want to bring in gloria borger

and abby phillip to talk about this. hearing the former president say that, i think that's something any former president would say. it's not a partisan thing, right? it's sort of a personal thing that most presidents seem to share, especially when they get to this point and think about their legacy. i wonder if this will fall on deaf ears. >> do you? >> i think it will fall on deaf ears. donald trump is not thinking about his legacy. i don't think that's the way he thinking. i think he's thinking next steps -- does he run for office again? does he run for the presidency again in 2024? how does he monetize this presidency after he leaves? how can he -- should he have a tv show? should he go around giving speeches for money? hold rallies for money? i don't think he's thinking about his place in history right

now. he's already told us how he thinking about himself historically. he's the greatest president for african-americans since abraham lincoln, for example. we know that, of course, not to be true. i think his mindset is different from most presidents we're used to hearing. >> abby, president trump must be thinking about his legacy, it just seems that it's so different from the way anyone else thinking about the legacy of a president. >> honestly, the way that i think about this, and the way that i believe president trump thinking about this is the odd adage that history is written by the victors. i think president trump is thinking about, what is the scenario in which his allies can have the most political power, even though he is not in office, and how will that frame how he

is viewed in sort of a retrospective way by history. now, he could be wrong about that, but i think that's how he sees it, that, you know, if he sort of giving into this idea that he has to step off the stage, he will certainly be reflected on in history in a negative way, but the fight you are seeing here put up is about the president not wanting to cede power, and wanting to make sure that everything that comes after this moment, the republican party relies on him, his supporters. by any measure, he's had a great amount of success in that. look at ted cruz. you just went through the tape on ted cruz and how he was the subject of president trump's lies about elections, and now he's backing the president up in something that's completely made up. so, look, president trump is playing a hardball game hoping at the end of the day his

supporters will be the ones framing history. we'll just have to see how that turns out, but that is the framing by which he looks at this whole situation. >> so if he can't be the king, he wants to be the king maker. i agree with abby on that 100%, but i also think there's something else there in donald trump's psyche, which is that he still wants to command attention. he needs the adulation, and the stage. >> yeah. >> he's just trying to figure out what that stage should be if he is not president of the united states. i think that is what we are seeing now, because he will never give up his insatiable need to be adored and be the center of attention. >> that's right. >> energized by the chaos as well. so where does that take him? gloria, abby, thank you so much. >> you know, we told you about the military being told to

prepare for a drawdown in iraq and afghanistan. the trump administration is making moves behind the scenes in other ways before the biden administration can block them. we'll have new reporting next. look, this isn't my first rodeo

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that sets off a 30-day clock before a sale date is actually announced. so environmental groups are saying this is an attempt to rush this process through and l me read you a statement from one of those environmental groups against this. this is from deputy managing attorney eric rafe. this is an attempt to sell off land in the refuge before a new day dawns. we are already challenging the

position for the program. he authorized the drilling on this land back in 2017 as part of the trump administration's tax bill, but this is something that's been controversial for many years and something that republicans and oil companies are trying to get done for years now, and they've only been able to get it under the trump administration. and so the question is, if they are able to get this, it seems like this is a clock that's going to be much more difficult to unwind if, indeed, those leasing rights are granted. democrats, of course, including president-elect biden, have long opposed drilling on these lands, so we'll just have to see whether or not they can get it done in time and how the biden administration is going to react. brianna? >> jeremy, thank you for bringing that report to us from the white house. cnn has learned that president trump also plans to step up his hard line policies toward china in the last few weeks of office. they feel like they could put the biden administration into a

corner. we have kylie atwood with more. >> reporter: i'm kylie atwood. the trump administration plans to carry out its hard line policies over the last few months of its administration. the new acting secretary of defense has been told to focus on cyber and warfare particularly with china. china hawks in the trump administration believe this might be a way to box in the biden team on china. because if they roll back these policies, they may be viewed as being easy on china or appeasing china. president-elect biden has said he will work on competing with china, but he also said in places where necessary, they will work with china, issues such as north korea and climate change. >> kylie atwood, thank you so much. as we await word for president-elect joe biden and

vice president-elect kamala harris, i want to talk to julie on what we're hearing today. julie chatterley, we expect to hear from biden today. what are you hearing? >> that is the hard way of recovering economic support and the millions of jobs we've lost. what's important is the number of people he's surrounded himself with today he's getting advice from. he's really focusing on labor, the heads of the biggest labor unions in the country, the ceo of general motors, for example, the ceo of gap. he understands this is a consumer-driven economy and we need to focus on jobs. beyond that, of course, you've got the healing for the bigger economy and what we can do to achieve that, and that comes down to far bigger issues.

the inequality gaps brought around by the epidemic, and what can we do for education? it comes down to the politics of what's possible. will he look toward divided government here potentially because that's going to tie the hands of some really big changes. at least in the short term it's about tackling the virus and trying to reach some kind of deal in congress to get cash to desperate people, and that's long overdue. >> part of this is going to be -- there was a way to do something more economically than president trump has been able to do, and that would have required doing best practices when it came to health, right? we've seen other countries have better success with this. these are two things that go hand in hand. so part of this for biden is going to be, you know, how do you link these two things together and convince americans, many of whom, julia, really are resisting just scientific stuff,

scientific fact on what they need to do in order to get the economy back on the right track. >> reporter: there are so many pieces to this. the first thing, and you're absolutely right, brianna, dump the science skepticism. get on board with basic things like mask wearing. don't deny this virus is a problem. don't downplay the impact of this virus that it's having. that will make a material difference and it's all connected. then we can start the criticism with congress over not providing support. but you're absolutely right. on the basic level, the economy can be managed. people's health can be improved and the risk of them catching this virus can be improved by not denying that the virus exists or isn't as bad as perhaps one assumes. so these are immediate changes that can take place, and already joe biden is making these noises and all he's got to do is emphasize. you know, brianna, we can talk about all the optimism we're seeing out there about a vaccine. one of the other big challenges

that joe biden is going to inherit is while he's building a bridge to get us to the point where we can take a vaccine, is tackling some of the skepticism about this, too, and the people that are fearful of taking a vaccine in this country, because that's an additional challenge we're not talking about amid the broader enthusiasm about the future vaccine and the light at the end of the tunnel that we're seeing. dump the skepticism, two, hope to get congress on board, and then we can work on the vaccine coming in the not too distant future. he's got a lot to do. >> and they have been stymied into coming to the rescue of americans who really need them. >> reporter: they have. and you can look at the response and approach by both sides here and criticize the democrats perhaps delaying in the runup to the election. the republicans are not providing the sheer quantity of support. unfortunately, what we've seen is a lack of ability to control

this virus, and, of course, that in the last few weeks just got worse and worse and worse. it means in the absence of a concerted plan, you have to buy the recovery. and even if the republicans continue to have control of the senate, they need to get with the program here and recognize that $500 billion is not going to be enough in the absence of a broader plan to control the virus. we have 10 million people in america that lost jobs as a result of the pandemic and still not recovered them. 21 million americans claiming some form of jobless benefit. many millions of those have those specific pandemic benefits running out at the end of january. we've got an estimated 11 to 13 million people who face eviction beyond the beginning of next year. brianna, i am throwing facts and statistics at you, but we are in economic crisis and there is no time to lose, and congress needs to step up, and that's been due for months. >> julia, thank you so much for putting all of that into

perspective for us. we are standing by right now to hear from president-elect joe biden and vice president-elect kamala harris on the economy. these are live pictures from delaware. we are back in a moment.

you are watching cnn on this monday afternoon. i'm brooke baldwin. thank you so much for being here. let's jump right in on the breaking news, and here it is, that the u.s. military commanders are telling cnn that they anticipate president trump will issue an order as soon as this week to withdraw troops both from afghanistan and iraq before he leaves office on january 20th. the plan is this. to draw down troops from 4500 to 2500 in afghanistan, and from 3,000 troops in iraq to 2,500. just keep in mind, this move goes against the recommendation of military commanders who be