good evening. reality, versus unreality, again, dominates the program tonight. first, though, reality. we are now weeks, or even days, away from vaccinating people against coronavirus, depending how quickly the approval process moves. yet, we are, also, now entering the darkest moment of the pandemic. in fact, we are not even fully in it. things will get worse, according to the director of the cdc. the numbers aren't, yet, showing impact of holiday travel and gatherings. already, the death toll is stunning. right now, the count stands at 2,642 and that number, as you know, won't be final, until the overnight hours. last night's total was a record, 3,157. cases, today, topped the 14-million mark.

yet, another, record day for people hospitalized for covid. more than 100,000. and with icu beds running short in this -- in his state, california's governor, today, announced stay-at-home orders for hard-hit areas, when icu capacity drops to 15%. >> the bottom line is if we don't act now, our hospital system will be overwhelmed. we don't act now, we'll continue to see a death rate climb, more lives lost. today, we are now introducing a regional, stay-at-home order in the state of california. >> it's not just california. delaware, announced, today, stay-at-home orders running through january 11th. in other words, the holidays. arkansas recorded its highest case count of the pandemic. in michigan, cases are running five times what they were at the start of october. more than 10,000 new cases today, in florida. again, vaccines are coming but the surge is already here.

that is reality. it's what democrat and republic republican governors are now, all, dealing with. speaking with cnn's jake tapper for a conversation that is going to air at the top of the next hour, 9:00 p.m. eastern time, president-elect biden spoke to the reality we are all facing right now, and said he offered a way out. >> it is important that we, in fact, the president and the vice president, we set the -- you know, the -- the -- the pattern by wearing masks. but beyond that, where the federal government has authority, i am going to issue a standing order that, in federal buildings, you have to be masked. and transportation, interstate transportation, you must be masked. buses, et cetera. i think my inclination is, in the first day i'm inaugurated to say, i'm going to ask the public for 100 days to mask. just 100 days to mask. not forever.

100 days. >> the president-elect, also, said he will be asking dr. anthony fauci to be a chief-medical adviser and part of his coronavirus team. meanwhile, in the unreality show he is taking into his final act, the current president spoke, briefly, in favor of a compromised-economic relief package, but mainly confined to remarks of the fantasy world he's built for himself. take a look. this is the president of the united states, today, sounding like an old-time, flim-flam man. every point he i am about to sh you is made up. >> mr. president, can i ask you, why is now not the time to concede? >> well, he hasn't done anything. so, he hasn't looked. when he looks, he will see the kind of evidence that, right now, you are seeing in the georgia senate. you know, they're going through hearings right now, in georgia. and they are finding tremendous volume. so, they haven't looked very hard, which is a disappointment,

to be honest with you. because it's massive fraud. whether you go to wisconsin, where we just filed a case, or michigan. or if you look at what's happening in georgia, as an example, or pennsylvania. if you look at nevada, which is moving along very rapidly. or arizona. you saw those numbers come out, yesterday. we found massive fraud, and in other states, also. this is a -- probably, the most fraudulent election that anyone's ever seen. >> i was going to say it would be funny, if it wasn't so sad. but, that's not true. it would still be sad, even if it wasn't so sad. see, how the president, there, made it sound like there was some kind of a snowball of momentum moving in his favor? things are moving quickly? basically, his game is say a state, make something up, say another state, make something else up. hey, look at nevada. arizona. thosene those numbers come out

yesterday. look at georgia. the reality is there is no momentum, in his favor. just the opposite, in fact. we got the tape of what the president said at 12:39, eastern time. at 1:13, 36 minutes later, news hit the local papers in wisconsin. its conservative-majority supreme court declined to hear that case just filed that the president was crowing about. here's what the republican secretary state of georgia said just yesterday. >> looks like vice president biden will be carrying georgia and he is our president-elect. we have seen no substantial changes to the results from any counties, so far. and that's what we expected. >> as for michigan, pennsylvania, nevada, and arizona, all those states, along with wisconsin and georgia, have certified their results. and again, as attorney general barr said this week, the justice department has seen no sign of systemic fraud and, yes, they have been looking. we learned, as well, today, the president recently sampled another flavor of dangerous

unreality. speaking, within the last several days, at a meeting with senate majority leader mcconnell and other aides, he brought up congresswoman-elect marjorie taylor green for the qanon conspiracy cult. qanon, in case you haven't been following, is the -- the folks who believe there is a global cabal of democrats and celebrities who operate child-sex rings out of a pizza parlor and worship satan and drink the blood of children which , a source familiar with the matter telling cnn qanon consists of people who, quote, basically believe in good government. which, then, reportedly led to silence in the room. white house chief of staff mark meadows then reported to have said he had not heard the group described as such. yeah. 48 days until the president is

out of office. and yet, there is another corner of this unreal world to report on tonight. one, in which the liaison to the justice department is barred from the justice department, told not to even enter the building. kaitlan collins did the reporting on this. joins us now. so what's happened with this white house liaison? >> well, this is not a well-known rule but it's critical because you act as the intermediary between the west wing and federal agencies. so when you are not allowed in the building, it hinders your ability to be able to do that job. but, that's what we told happened to this white house liaison because we were told by sources that she was trying to get access to sensitive information, that she is not privy to access about potential voter-fraud cases that the justice department was looking at. and we're told, the belief was that she wanted to share that with the white house. it's not clear because she hasn't commented, and neither has the white house or the doj on this. but it did lead to ban her from coming to the building. and so, the white house has not

commented on this but they do seem to be responding to this. because, today, they announced they are putting her in another position as this advisory board. and you can see, there, that's where this ended up. the the white house is no longer saying she is going to be in this role. but you've got to remember, in september, white house chief of staff, mark meadows, e-mailed all the heads of these federal agencies and said they were replacing all of the liaisons. people who were doing their jobs. not because of performance issues but because what it was seen inside the white house was they wanted to put loyalists inside those positions because you really can act as the white house's eyes and ears for what is going on given this is a president who has this distrust that the deep state is constantly working against him. so, it's not clear who is fulfilling that role, at this moment. >> and president trump today said -- or wouldn't say if he had confidence in attorney general barr. you have some reporting there -- their white house meeting this

week. what have you learned? >> yeah. the president chooses his words carefully. he's been asked that question a inn number of times throughout his time in office. and you can always tell when he is actually upset with someone. the last i remember him doing it with was defense secretary, mark esper. today, the president had that long pause. i'm told tuesday the president and barr had a pretty c contentious meeting after barr's comments to the press, completely undercutting the president's argument you were showing earlier, his claims of fraud. after he say that just wasn't true. that the doj had not uncovered any evidence of that. and so, they had this contentious exchange. of course, that has raised the question by the president's closest advisers about whether or not he is going to fire the attorney general, with just seven weeks left to go. and they say the president is really hesitant to fire someone ever since the blow-back he got from firing james comey. so, it's not clear if he will but he certainly has talked about doing so.

>> at the top of the program, we played for you that sound where you heard president trump say about arizona, quote, you saw those numbers come out, yesterday. we found massive fraud. we spent the day trying to figure out what he was talking about and we couldn't. so, we are happy to be joined now by arizona secretary of state, katy hobbs. do you know what the president was talking about there? >> no, we have not found any evidence of fraud here, in our state. there continue to be challenges in court, that have been free from evidence of fraud. and d-- and those challenges continue to be dismissed. so, no, i do not know what he is talking about. >> so the court cases that have been brought forward. they have been dismissed? >> there are two pending court cases, right now, that are challenging the certification of the election that happened on monday. and we expect these to end up, the same way that the previous challenges have ended up. >> and basically, you know, in

the -- the court challenge. i mean, i think you said they were evidence-free. they're not very detailed with any specific, actually credible, allegations of fraud, is that correct? >> right. and so, there was some investigation of ballots that were duplicated, which is done by humans. and so, there were some mistakes found, which is not equivalent to fraud. this is a human process. error is sometimes inherent there. and the level that we found is not concerning, at all, and nothing that would come near to changing the result of -- of any election. >> it's so, i mean, strange because, you know, yesterday, vice president pence swore in arizona's newest senator, mark kelly. by virtue of doing that, i assume the vice president is acknowledging that the arizona results are valid? >> well, yes. and, you know, we had our republican governor and republican attorney general participate in the certification of the results on monday. the republican governor's office

prepared that certificate of election that allowed senator kelly to be sworn in. and so, you know, things are happening the way that they're supposed to be happening. and we still have republican-elected officials, here, continuing to cry foul and claim there is all this fraud that there isn't. >> did you ever expect to see a situation like -- obviously, you know, i'm not talking about just the run-up to this election because obviously there was concern about, given what the president was saying, what might happen afterward. but just, you know, in our previous lives, did you ever consider this kind of scenario? >> well, i think, in america, we have free and fair elections. they're a cornerstone of our democracy. and in that system, there's winners and losers. normally, the losers accept the result and move on. and i think, we sort of predicted, leading into this election, with all the misinformation that was coming out of the white house about how

the election would be rigged, that this was a potential outcome. certainly, i think this is damaging and has far-reaching consequences, beyond just this election. >> in what way? what are the far-reaching consequences? >> well, i mean, you have republicans, across the country, that are refusing to accept the outcome. and continue to delegitimize the integrity of our elections, which there -- the officials and the experts are saying there has been no evidence, at all, of widespread fraud. and there are -- will systems in place that check at every place, accuracy and testing of machines, postelection audits that test for those things and those things have happened. and -- and -- and we have elected leaders, who are fueling these conspiracy theories, and refusing to accept the results. and continue to say that the election was stolen. and that -- that is, frankly, dangerous to our democracy. >> yeah. arizona secretary of state,

katie hobbs, i appreciate your time and work. thank you. >> just ahead, tonight, bob woodward and carl bernstein and what these final days and weeks of the trump administration may be like. and they, of course, covered the final days in the run-up to that of the nixon administration. first, more perspective from gloria borger and david gergen. so, gloria, i mean, the president really is operating in this alternate reality. amplifying baseless claims about the election. lying to the american people. whichever way he wants it, which people think they are giving to him, you know, to allegedly fight voter fraud. seems like there is no backing down for him. >> no, there isn't any backing down. he doesn't feel the need to, and he doesn't want to. i spoke to somebody who speaks to the president, he said he is not listening to anyone anymore and he is not going to. so, this notion that, somehow, the president's going to come out of this and be gracious and concede and that's not going to happen because he has to have

his supporters. whether it's because of who he is, or because of what he wants to do in the future. he has to have his own supporters believed -- believe that he didn't lose. that he's never going to be called a loser. and maybe, he wants to monetize this. as you point out, he's already raised -- his pac has already raised over $200 million. 70% of that, he can use for himself, if he -- if he wants to. or whether he is planning for another run. who knows if that would ever happen, in 2024? but he's not going to leave the stage saying i lost. it's just not going to happen. >> david, does setting up, like, a grievance -- a grievance movement. is that a -- is there evidence that that actually works to catapu catapult somebody for a re-election attempt, to run again? i mean, is that enough of a motivation? we talked to ben ginsburg, i remember, a while ago. and one of the things he was

saying, you know, was that people who run again based on past grievance saying that they were wronged, it rarely has worked out. i'm wondering if you've seen evidence to the contrary? >> i think david's computer's frozen. the joys of what we are living through. but, you know, gloria, with coronavirus numbers, i mean, the numbers are staggering. people are dying at record numbers, right now. the president is focused on conspiracy theories. >> right. >> qanon, you know, anti-semitic-based conspiracy theory. president biden is making plans to combat the virus. it is stunning, just the disconnect here. >> it is stunning, as you pointed out at the beginning, the president praises qanon. that people don't stand up in that meeting and say, are you kidding me? what are you talking about? you know, not only is he not focusing on the virus because, of course, he -- maybe, he believes that was a hoax as

well. but he is spending all his time or his aides are spending an awful lot of time talking about pardons. and, you know, these pardons in advance of any potential crime for his family, for his lawyer, rudy giuliani. and, you know, pam brown and i heard, today, in our reporting that -- that -- that there is, also, talk of, perhaps, pardoning jared kushner's father. now, kushner, we're told, is not involved in these discussions, and hasn't talked to the president about it because he really doesn't need to. but his father, as you'll recall, went to prison for tax evasion, among other things. and so, that could be on the president's list of pardons. so, this is what's keeping him busy. >> yeah. wasn't just tax evasion. it was tax evasion and some other, also, shady things. >> absolutely. >> i want to play something president-elect biden told jake tapper, today, when he was asked if all these possible, preemptive pardons by president trump concern him. let's play that.

>> well, it's -- it concerns me, in terms of what kind of precedent it sets, and how the rest of the world looks at us as a nation of laws and justice. but, look. our justice department is going to operate independently, on those issues that -- how to respond to any of that. i'm not going to be telling them what they have to do and don't have to do. i'm not going to be saying, go prosecute a, b, or c. i'm not going to be telling them. that's not the role -- it's not my justice department. it's the people's justice department. >> and david gergen is also -- i think we figured out the problem. hey, david, thanks for being here. sorry about the problem. i am just wondering what you make about, you know, what we are hearing from this -- this -- this disconnect, this unreal world that the president is, you know, ginning up.

obviously, there's financial motives. there is political-power motives. and -- and, you know, motives for what his future may be. >> listen. we haven't seen anything like this before, in our history. you could argue that andrew jackson was denied the presidency and he came back and won the next one. and showed, yes, you can correct these things. but this president is so much off the spectrum, anderson, it's just out of sight. i think, basically, this is about power. i think he wants to cripple joe biden, before he ever gets started. he's been -- you know, things he's been doing on the stimulus program, the stalling on the stimulus program, the long lines for food. the hurt that's going on in this country. with iran. there's so many things you can point to that he is really laying ground mines for joe biden to step into, and blow up his presidency and i think it's disgraceful. the republicans need to stand up, and be accountable in this. they would be held accountable

by history. >> but i mean, there's no sign, gloria, that -- >> no. >> -- you know, they've not stood up, at all, since. and they remain fearful, obviously, of the base that trump has, that he is continuing to cultivate, who is donating money to him, that he can use however he wants, for the most part. >> yeah. they're cowards. you hear some republicans speaking out. actually, today, wolf did an interview with mitt romney, where he was very straightforward about the election. but, he's not running for president, i don't think. but, there are lots of folks now. the irony here is they have been paying homage to -- to this president. and now, he threatens to freeze the race that they want to run in. so, you know, there are -- there are senators, like marco rubio, ted cruz, josh hawley, probably like to be president one day, been real supporters of his. he doesn't care what they do now. he cares about keeping that support for himself, in one way or another. i mean, the republican party is

of no interest to him. >> yeah. i mean, david, it is -- it just -- it's so clear. i don't -- there's no -- there's no way any republican on capitol hill believes that donald trump really cares about the republican party. >> no, their problem is, anderson, he's got more support in their districts and their states than they do. and that gives him -- it gives him enormous leverage against them. that's what political power is all about. that's why, you know, how much people win by matters. it's not just victory, it's how big the margin is. and trump did very, very well in the general election. but he's got a lot more power, state by state, than any other republican, by some distance. >> yeah. david gergen. gloria borger. thank you. coming up next. coming vaccines and the president-elect's call for a hundred days of masks -- mask wearing and the incredibly difficult holiday season we are now facing. later, woodward and bernstein and their thoughts about this president's final days and weeks in office.

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maybe, do it for her. >> what we do today, what we do tomorrow, what we do this holiday season, will determine who, exactly, gets to the other side. what i see are patients with breathing tubes lining the hallways. i see patients, who are gasping for air. i see family members on ipads crying, because they just want to be able to see their mom, their dad, their brother, one, last time. that's what i see. >> joining us now, cnn chief medical correspondent, dr. sanjay gupta. also, dr. leana wen, emergency room physician, educator, and former health commissioner for the city of baltimore. sanjay, i want to ask you about the president-elect's plan for masks but what do you make of president-elect biden telling jake tapper that he's asked dr. fauci to stay on? >> yeah, i mean, it's -- it's heartening to hear. i mean, dr. fauci's obviously

been around for a long time. has served six presidents. will serve in sort of a chief-medical adviser role. sort of, a role that he has done for quite some time. so, you know, it's very reassuring. he's, obviously, been talking about this pandemic since the beginning, has -- has worked with ron klain, before, on the ebola outbreak, here in the united states. so, you know, i think -- i think he's -- he's the infectious-disease guy we all turn to. it's great to know he is going to be able to still do that kind of work. >> obviously, sanjay, won't be able to mandate mask usage, nationwide. but says he plans to in federal buildings. his plea to voluntarily mamask days, could make? >> well, this has become a politicized issue. so i think there are some people who are not going to wear a mask, just as a straatement, frankly. last week, to interview birx and

it was amazing to me, maybe 40 to 50% of people were wear masks. maybe that's not surprising to other people but it's the white house buildings. middle of a pandemic. and 40 to 50% of people wearing masks. i think most were not. and i think the things president-elect biden is talking about will make a difference because, even within federal buildings, other institutions may take those cues. hospitals do it all the time but other places of large unemployment may start to do that as well and i think it will make a difference. >> dr. wen, i know you recently wrote an op-ed in "the washington post," which was fascinating and i urge people to read it. in it, you write it's clear what lies ahead. we must cancel our christmas and holiday celebrations, now. i think it's certainly hard. it's been a tough year for many and people bawant to see their loved ones. what do you tell them? >> so, anderson, i would say that it is really hard. that, pandemic fatigue is real,

and we all cannot wait until this is over, and the end is not that far away. but we have to get through this winter, because what lies ahead for the next few months is actually our worst-case scenario in terms of overwhelmed hospitals. in he remembterms of the death t is occurring. you know, there's just so much virus in our communities right now. if you host a dinner of ten people, in many parts of the country, you have a one in four chance that someone at that dinner has coronavirus and doesn't know it, and will spread it to others. and i am certain none of us want to be the person who is the inadvertent superspreader or hosting an inadvertent superspreader event but that is probably what happened over thanksgiving. probably, what will happen over christmas. and so, let's not have those gatherings and not travel for nonessential purposes, right now. >> sanjay, pfizer ceo told nbc tonight it's unclear whether a person who receives the vaccine can still transmit the virus. which is a pretty big unknown. could you just explain how that would happen? and what people would need to do

to prevent it? >> yeah. i think this is a really fundamental point. the way this trial worked. you had about 20,000 people or so receive the vaccine. 20,000 or so people receive the placebo. over a period of time, there were close to 100 people who developed symptoms, and sort of raised their hands and came forward. and what they found was the vast majority of people who got symptoms, who developed the disease, were in the placebo group. that's where that 90% efficacy, sort of, number comes from. what -- but what we don't know, and i think this is the point albert was making, is that we don't even actually know, for certain, that this vaccine prevents infection. and we don't know that it -- whether or not if prevents someone that's infected from transmitting. what we can definitively say is it really, greatly is effective at preventing disease, which is really important, right? people may, still, get it. they may even still transmit it but if it can dramatically reduce disease, that's really important. now, it may turn out it does

actually work well preventing infection and transmission. we just don't know that, yet. those are going to be longer-term studies. >> i hadn't realized that. in all the reporting we've been doing. i guess, shows my lack -- i should have studied more in science when i was younger. i just assumed it meant you could not get infected. >> right. yeah. no. look, i think a lot of people think that. and -- and it's not -- it's -- it's one of those things where you have to look at what was the -- what we call the primary endpoint of the study? and really, with this primary endpoint they were looking for in these trials was to determine does it actually reduce the likelihood of getting covid-19? now, again, it may do those other things. we just haven't seen the data to be able to say that, at this point. >> and dr. wen, if everything goes to plan, how do you educate people on how the vaccine works? any expected side effects? you hear people all the time refusing to get flu shots every year because they are worried they're actually getting injected with the flu.

>> right. and i think it is important to debunk that myth. if you get the flu vaccine, you are not going to get the flu from the vaccine. but somebody may have had a side effect in the past and they say, well, that gave me the flu. when, actually, that was an expected side effect. and i think that's what we need to do the same thing with covid-19. not minimize side effects but be really transparent about them. you could get a local side effect, local reaction of pain, redness, swelling, where the injection goes in. you could also develop fever, fatigue, body aches. that's normal. that's expected. that's certainly a lot better than being intubated, put on a ventilator, and maybe die. so, it's important for us to educate about this. i, also, think having trust in messengers is important. i was talking to a local preacher in baltimore, he wants to have an immunization drive at his church. and he wants to be the first to roll up his sleeves and get the vaccination to help to counter

distrust in our community. and i think there will be many efforts like that, locally, that are really critical. >> sanjay, researchers for new england journal of medicine say moderna vaccine -- they say was eliminate an immune response -- or, excuse me -- elicit an immune response, that's after the first vaccination. 119 days doesn't seem very long. they do say, at least. what does that -- can you explain what this means? >> yeah. they're trying to figure out this unanswered question, at this point. and this paper dwhich i looked t doesn't answer it. the question is how long does the protection from these vaccines last? and what you got to keep in mind is when they looked at these, again, these endpoints, they are measuring about a three-month time period. so, they can say, during those three months, there was a little bit of waning, you know, decreasing of the antibodies. but there was still strong immune response. it is also one of these things,

anderson, at the end of the day, the real question is someone likely to -- to, you know, become sick with this disease. you may have protection in forms other than the antibodies, themselves. so, how long does the immunity last after a shot? we still don't know the answer to that but what they are saying is at least three months. >> sanjay, thank you. dr. wen as well. appreciate your time. there does seem to be some movement, at long last, towards a congressional stimulus package that would help mitigate the economic damage done by the virus. talks are intensifying between republicans and democrats for a deal, after months of arguments. joining me now is democratic representative sheila jackson lee. congresswoman, thank you for joining us. deaths reaching grim, new milestones virtually every day, now. obviously, the economy continues to suffer. what do you say to many americans who wonder why congress still hasn't passed a second relief package? >> well, what i will tell them

is that, democrats, as you well know, anderson, passed a $3 trillion bill months ago. one that would not have americans in the dire conditions that they are in. we understand that we were blocked continuously and we understand now, having come back to washington, that we just cannot leave. we have to continue try and reach some solution. we know that there is one american dying, every 30 seconds, from covid-19. there are no options. and the bill that is now before us, or will be before us, still being negotiated, is not what we would have wanted. meaning, democrats, who worked so hard to make sure that cities and counties wouldn't be bleeding. that families wouldn't be evicted or having mortgage foreclosures. but, we're at this point now. and so, this bill has enough money for about a four-month period, that includes $160 billion for our counties and cities and states that are bleeding revenue. $288 billion for the paycheck

protection. maybe, we can keep a few more small businesses from closing. and, of course, money for education and money for vaccine affirmation, continued testing. so, we put in the necessities. and, of course, something that we were fighting over is liability protection, using taxpayer dollars, that senator mcconnell seemed to have wanted for his -- for businesses that might be engaged in covid-19 lawsuits. we had to deal with what we could deal with. but the main issue is americans are dying, americans need testing, and they need the vaccination, and they need the distribution process or protocols in place, so that we can try and save lives. >> how far do you think you are from some sort of compromise and -- and agreement on this? >> well, the good news is that leadership has begin to -- begun to pore over the bill.

speaker pelosi and schumer have indicated we cannot leave, without a reasonable response to these lives being lost. i think we're in a good place. we all have responsibilities to our district. but we have responsibilities to the nation. i can't go home without a bill that will help our schools and help our children normalize, or to provide some guidance on how we will distribute the vaccines. and, as well, to save small businesses and, finally, every day that i've been in the district, our local governments have said we have no revenue. we have police and fire. we have municipal workers. we have got to be able to have revenue to continue working, and i think this four-month window, till after president-elect biden and vice president-elect harris are the president and vice president of the united states, where we can have a reasoned negotiator. someone, who is focusing on dying americans, and not focusing on dead elections, i think we'll be able to move forward. >> i've heard you talk about the issue of hunger in america and, certainly, what we have been seeing during this pandemic is just -- it's heartbreaking.

you know, folks. i mean, huge lines, in cities around the world. cities around the country, certainly. and people who normally have not, you know, had to go to food banks before. now -- now, relying on them. we reported, last week, some 50 million people may go hungry, this year, because of the impact of covid-19. what can be done to stem that? >> first of all, i see it every day. we have been in the mix of food distribution, almost every week. i'll go home, this weekend, for just a short period of time and do another food distribution. the cars are long, not just in houston, in harris county. but it's all over the nation. and, of course, people have said that it is people who have been food insecure, and i think we should not ignore them. they've been going to bed hungry, for a long time. but it's,le also, people who ha lost their jobs, it's families. it's people who lost two parents, if you will, and have the children remaining. so, we have to focus on that. i believe what will happen is

that, if we can pass this crunch bill, this covid-19 emergency bill, if you will, we'll immediately get to work, starting at the very beginning of january, to focus largely on food insecurity. we'll continue to give -- if we can give cities and counties dollars, they can continue to help our food banks. people who have means or continue to donate to our food banks. i, frankly, have just joined some college students who are going to do a texas-sized christmas. they are going to collect goods and money, until december 22nd and, by the way, they want to challenge colleges across america to be part of that because we know food insecurity is real. people are going to bed hungry. children are going waking up hungry and going to bed hungry. anderson, i think we will be really working on it when we return to get as much money as possible. >> congresswoman sheila jackson lee, thank you very much. quick programming note. with covid vaccine delivery close to becoming a reality. please, join dr. sanjay gupta and me, tomorrow night,

9:00 p.m., eastern, for a new edition of coronavirus town hall. the vaccines. there is no question, the president's entering his final days and weeks as an occupant of the white house. up next, a special conversation with two journalists who wrote a best-seller about another president's final days. bob woodward and carl bernstein join me. that president, of course, is richard nixon. what's the same and what's different, when we continue. align's quality probiotic strain, adds more good bacteria to your gut, to help strengthen your immunity. try align today.

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visit tdameritrade.com/learn ♪ visit tdameritrade.com/learn [what's this?] oh, are we kicking karly out? we live with at&t. it was a lapse in judgment. at&t, we called this house meeting because you advertise gig-speed internet, but we can't sign up for that here. yeah, but i'm just like warming up to those speeds. you've lived here two years. the personal attacks aren't helping, karly. don't you have like a hot pilates class to get to or something?

[ muffled scream ] stop living with at&t. xfinity can deliver gig to the most homes. just a reminder. coming up at the top of the hour, president-elect biden and vice president-elect harris, in their first, joint interview since the election, with jake tapper. as they get ready to take office, president trump is in the throes of his final week

there. here to talk about it, two legendary journalists who wrote a best-seller about richard nixon. bob woodward, author of the new, best-seller, "rage." longtime reporter for "the washington post," carl bernstein. bob, when you look at how republicans now continue to entertain president trump's lies and conspiracies, and baseless claims of voter fraud and election fraud. what does it tell you about the grip this president will have on the republican party, for the next four years? >> well, we -- at least, for the next 50 days, it's going to be rather absolute. i think it's shameful, quite frankly, the way the republicans have just kowtowed to this. now, trump, clearly, is a political force. those 74 million people who voted for him. it -- it's amazing. but this, i think, after january

20th, will start to crack. and i know, as carl knows, privately, lots of these senators will just say they want to get trump out of there. they want to move on, and they're keeping their fingers crossed. >> carl, can they move on? i mean, if he is threatening to run again and holding that over the head of all these republicans, who -- many of whom, themselves, want to run? >> they could show some courage, instead of continuing to enable a shameful president of the united states, who continues to attempt a coup. he continues to attempt a coup, and not a serious leader of the republican party has come out and said this must stop, mr. president. he continues to undermine the electoral system, for the future. so that, this election is called into doubt because of his lies by so many people.

look. richard nixon was a criminal president, who was held to account because people in his own party said, mr. president, you cannot do these criminal acts. what donald trump is, is a subversive, american president, such as we've never seen, who has subverted the national interest at every turn. we have hundreds of thousands of americans, dead and dying, because of his homicidal negligence. and he continues to abdicate his responsibilities, while more and more people die. and he focuses on his own, narrow, selfish interests. we've never seen anything like this, and it is an episode in our history that is going to resonate for a long time, especially for the republican party. >> bob, you know, obviously, look. politicians, you know, have lied before. but the -- the scale of it, the brazenness of it, the complete disregard for what is true and

not. and the acceptance by the president's supporters of his lies is extraordinary. can things ever go back? i mean, or, now, are -- does everybody have free reign to just live in their own reality? and i'm talking about every politician, have free reign to live in their own relaality, an just say whatever they want, free of concern about what is actually true? >> well, i don't think people are going to try to pull trump's stunts, in the exact same way. they may do it differently. but -- but i -- you know, we were talking about the final days here. and i think it is the final days of trump. the interesting question is does it mirror and resemble what happened to nixon, in 1974? and as you may recall, the nixon final days had some real weird

episodes. like, nixon and his secretary of state, henry kissinger, getting down on their knees and praying together, as the president pounded the carpet. asking the question, what has happened? what have i done? also, nixon's son-in-law, eddie cox, called senator griffin, who was a senator from michigan, at the time. very close to richard nixon. and eddie cox said, we're really worried about the president. he was up talking to the pictures of former presidents, giving speeches. we're worried that he might take his own life. i don't think it has reached that point with trump. but that speech, last night, was one of the most bizarre performances i have ever seen. not only detached from reality.

but he actually got somebody to write it because he had a teleprompter there saying all these things, that make no sense. and as carl points out, we -- the number one calamity for this nation, now, is the pandemic. and for ten months, trump has ignored -- when i did one of these interviews with trump, i said, what's the job of the president? and trump said, to protect the people. and he has failed in a way that truly is unimaginable to protect the people that he's supposed to lead. >> and, carl, i mean the comparisons to the final days of nixons, those details bob was just talking about are extraordinary. i had forgotten about the paintings and him speaking to the paintings and the concerns about him taking his own life. do you see parallels?

>> i see something far worse because what donald trump has done is from the beginning of his presidency but in the final days, in the final months more than at any other time, he has undermined the interests of the united states, the health and welfare of its people. we have bread lines. we haven't seen bread lines in this country since -- since the depression. that's really what these food lines are about. we haven't heard a peep out of this president of the united states nor about the coronavirus, which is killing our people by the hundreds of thousands. but let's talk about son-in-laws as bob just did. eddie cox was not a co-conspirator in the presidency of his father-in-law. let's look at jared kushner. let's look at the pardons that we know the president is now considering for his grifter children, for his daughter, for his son-in-law. what is that all about? what does that tell us about the

values of this president of the united states? where is the national interest, and what are these pardons about and what have they been about? continuing the cover-ups that have started early in this presidency and are going through the final days of this presidency so that people can't be prosecuted and information cannot be obtained. look at paul manafort. the president's campaign manager who was in contact with russian agents, and we know is the point of contact with the russians. we don't know about his discussions with donald trump, with roger stone. the cover-ups continue, including the financial interests that were pursued by the president while he was in office and his children. so these final days are unique in our history in terms of the venality.

>> 48 days to go. a lot can happen in 48 days. i want to play part of your interview with trump back from july 21st. >> the question is going to be we're going to look back, and we're going to say, the end of july, august, september, october, what happened with the virus? did people -- people want -- you know, we've talked about this. people want their president to succeed. now, you're right. there's some people who don't. >> no, no, no. i this inc. you're wrong. people don't want me to succeed. >> but if you succeed, they succeed. >> even the rinos don't want me to succeed. they'll end up with a supreme court and lots of things that they're not going to be too happy with. >> is there any lesson you take, because i think this is so important -- you know, i keep -- because i'm in the business of trying to understand other people, i keep learning about how do you really understand

people? how do i understand you? i mean you and i have -- >> you don't -- you don't understand me. you don't understand me, but that's okay. you'll understand me after the election. but you don't understand me now. >> you don't think so? >> no, i don't think so. i don't think -- i don't think you get it, and that's okay. >> what are the questions i've not asked that have not been answered? >> um, i think you've asked me a lot of very good questions, a lot of personal questions. i think you've asked me a lot of good stuff. >> you'll know me after the election. i mean you'll see who i am after the election. >> that's the remark that really counts. >> yeah. i mean, bob, we are seeing who this president is right now. i mean the display you talked about in that rambling 46 minutes when he was talking yesterday, which we didn't even air because it was so full of lies. >> yeah, rightly so. i mean when he says i don't

understand him, we do understand trump now, and the difficulty is larger than anybody could have expected. i don't think he knows the difference between the truth and untruth. and when something comes up, if he decides it is to his advantage to speak untruth, he will do it easily, happily. and if the truth, on rare occasions, serves him, he will do that. i just want to read -- there was one other thing we played in this. now that the pandemic has struck, and this has -- carl was asking about jared kushner and so forth. and here's one of the things. seven months ago, jared kushner said, oh, we're now in the comeback phase of dealing with the pandemic. >> right.

>> and, quote, trump's now back in charge. it's not the doctors. now, think about that, that somehow it is a great thing that trump has sidelined the doctors, and look at what the result is. i mean that is something you don't want on your tombstone. >> you know, carl, cnn is -- >> let me say one other thing you don't -- go ahead. >> no, no no. go ahead. >> one other thing you don't want on your tombstone is mitch mcconnell not talking about this, not coming on this broadcast. the republican leaders not addressing this. this is on their tombstones, not just donald trump's. that's what's so extraordinary about what we're going through, not saying to the president of the united states, put -- we are going to put down this coup that you have attempted, mr. president. we are going to speak the truth, unlike you. we have not had that in four

years. >> bob, obviously the pardons -- you know, there's been reporting on the president looking into, you know, a variety of pardons for, as carl keeps saying, his kids. i believe it was grifter kids, carl said, and others, possibly kushner's father even. president nixon, of course, was pardoned by president ford. the only way i assume president trump would likely be pardoned is if he did it himself, which i'm not even sure -- i've talked to some legal analysts, and it's not clear exactly who would have to determine if that's even constitutionally allowed. but ford wrote in his autobiography that nixon's pardon wasn't motivated by concern over the state of his health. it was the state of the country's health at home and around the world that worried me. it was criticized a lot at the time. i'm wondering how history views that now. >> well, in a very interesting

way, i think it was 1998, well 25 years after watergate. ford had been out of office for two decades. i went to interview him at his home in rancho mirage, california, and asked, why didn't you get an admission from president -- former president nixon that he had committed crimes? so ford opens his wallet and pulls out a little newspaper clipping, and it's a clipping from a supreme court decision, 1915, the burdick decision, in which it said that the acceptance of a pardon is a confession of it. >> hmm. >> and ford held that out and said, so i got him to say uncle. i got him to say at least legally that he had confessed to the crimes of watergate. >> that's really interesting.

do you think he carried that -- put it in his wallet to show you, or do you think he carried that with him like all the time? >> no, no. it was yellowed and folded. >> wow. >> i suspect he showed it to lots of people. >> that's really interesting. wow. >> he wanted to -- go ahead, bob. >> no. he wanted to make it clear, and of course the most important thing that ford did here, he really took the road -- took the nation on the road of healing. >> yeah. >> and as he said, the long national nightmare is over. and he took a lot of heat for pardoning nixon, and carl and i now think it was the right thing to do. >> we got to leave it there. bob woodward, carl bernstein, thank you. >> great act of courage. >> carl, thanks. even as we've been talking, the covid death toll has been climbing. in the hour we've been on the air, it has risen to more than

2,700. that's the second highest single day death toll. still three hours until the day ends. at least 276,148 people have now died in this country from this virus. i want to hand it over to jake for president-elect joe biden and vice president-elect kamala harris' first joint interview since winning the white house. welcome to this cnn special event, the first joint interview with president-elect joe biden and vice president-elect kamala harris. i'm jake tapper live in washington, d.c. in 48 days, this building behind me will be under new management. after taking the oath of office, president biden and vice president harris will take charge of a nation truly in crisis. there has never been a worse time in the coronavirus pandemic in the u.s. than right now, and it is only expected to get worse. the nation just recorded the atghest number of coronavirus