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and we do have breaking news. for a second-straight night, the christmas message is it doesn't matter how naughty, nasty, or even last night, murderous, you are. being nice to the president changes everything. 24 hours after pardoning corrupt congressman, medicaid scammers, and more criminals, the president is at it, again. this time, the big three are his disgraced campaign chair, paul manafort. his campaign operative and self-described dirty trickster, roger stone. and real estate tycoon, charles kushner. charles kushner is jared kushner's father. paul manafort, the president once tweeted, quote, unlike michael cohen, he refused to break, make up stories in order to get a deal. family values, if the family's last name is cor leone.

evan, again, these pardons were close to the president. what can you tell us? >> list of 26 pardons and three commutations are the president's campaign associates. these are people, who were sentenced to prison for essentially trying to protect the president. that's according to special counsel robert mueller's prosecutors. in the case of paul manafort, he was sentenced to seven and a half years for bank and tax fraud and witness tampering. he's been in home confinement, since earlier this year, because of the coronavirus pandemic. and the president has now kbrantkbran granted a pardon to him saying, essentially, he was mistreated by special counsel robert mueller as part of the hoax, as what the president calls the investigation. in the case of roger stone, he lied to congress, to the republican congressional

committee that was investigating the russia -- the russia -- the russia involvement with the 2016 election. and one of the things that the judge says -- said in his sentencing was that he tried to protect the president. and now, he's gotten a pardon, as a result of that -- what he did for the president. in the case of charles kushner, he was convicted in 2005 -- rather, pleaded guilty. chris christie was the u.s. attorney, at the time, in new jersey. and he has been out since 2006. obviously, he is the father of jared kushner. we have been told, by white house officials, that jared kushner did not play a role in this -- in this pardon. but, obviously, this is something that has been on everyone's mind, for some time to come. another name that stood out, tonight, john, is that of margaret hunter, who is the wife of duncan hunter, the former congressman who was pardoned last night. she is, also -- she's the

estranged wife of duncan hunter. she, also, is getting a pardon. they were both involved, allegedly, in misusing campaign funds. the underlying thing here, john, is obviously, the president is using his pardon power, which he has been very obsessed with since he first got into office. and realized that, essentially, there is no curb on it. and he is using it, in the last days in office, to try to reward people, friends, and those associated with his campaign, that he believes were wrongly -- wrongfully pursued or prosecuted. >> so, evan, is there any reason to think that these highest-profile pardons went through the traditional process involving the justice department? >> no, we don't think that they -- they have, so far. in the case of the 20, last night, that were announced, only three of them had existing petitions here, at the justice department, with the office of pardon attorney. one of the unusual things about this presidency is the fact that you have an entire bureaucracy

here, in the justice department, that is supposed to go through these pardon -- these requests for clemencies. they review them. they make sure people even are sorry, have some remorse for what they've done. and that they qualify. the president has kind of bypassed that process. he's relied on friends and donors, fox-news hosts, even the kardashians. >> evan perez, thank you so much for your reporting. we will let you get back to work, as more develops here. so, as robert mueller's lead prosecutor, andrew weissman, played a key role in the manafort case, perhaps the key role. his new book is titled where law ends, inside the mueller investigation. we are pleased to have him with us tonight. also, carrie cordero, and john dean, former nixon white house counsel. andrew, i want to start with you. i mean, the manafort case was your life. this was your work, for years. and now, with one stroke of the pen, it's up in smoke. your reaction?

>> well, it's not entirely up in smoke. i mean, it -- there's no question that -- that his pardon and the others that we've seen, in the course of this presidency, have really flouted the rule of law. but it's important to remember that paul manafort will still have spent two years in jail. and because we anticipated this, the forfeiture of tens of millions of dollars was taken both criminally and civilly because we were concerned that, if the president were to pardon paul manafort, that the criminal forfeiture would be eradicated by the pardon. but a civil forfeiture is not. so, there still -- there still are consequences to paul manafort. they're just not commensurate with the extensive criminality that he was convicted of and pled guilty to. >> and, andrew, i was just re-reading an operative section in your book, which i have right here. and the pardons were not some

abstraction during your investigation and dealings with paul manafort. they played a central role and, in fact, during the whole process, even after he was convicted and was supposed to be cooperating with you, you felt that he was angling for a pardon. behaving in a way, to get a pardon. lying to you, in some cases, you felt, to get a pardon. >> absolutely. and i think evan got it exactly right. which is, the president used his pardon power during the investigation, in order to thwart cooperation. in other words, for people who are thinking they should cooperate with us because, otherwise, they might spend a long time in jail. this president was saying, not so fast because if you hold fast and you don't do what michael cohen did, you will get a pardon. and he's made good on that promise. and if you think about this from a big-picture perspective, what he's really doing is setting incredibly bad example for the

presidency because it basically means, how do you go about holding any president to account if the pardon power is going to be used to basically be a get-out-of-jail-free card for anyone who would cooperate with an investigation into the president? >> and just one, last question on this point. you had never really witnessed or experienced anything like this before, in the process of prosecuting and working with paul manafort, this was a huge obstacle for you. >> absolutely. you know, many of us have -- i have prosecuted mobsters. i've prosecuted enron executives. and those people, as heinous as they can be, don't have two powers that president trump had. he had the power to pardon and to dangle pardons. and i would ask people to think what's -- what's the legitimate reason to dangle a pardon? there is none. it's only to thwart cooperation. and he also had the power to pull the plug. in other words, to fire the prosecutor. something that no mob boss or -- or enron executive had the power to do, and he wielded both of

those to try and get out from under this investigation. >> so, john, i -- i quoted that tweet from president trump about paul manafort, back in 2018, which read, unlike michael cohen, manafort refused to break. so, to andrew's point, to that tweet, what message does that send about the rule of law in america? >> it's not a very good message. it certainly indicates that he was very effective in his dangling of the pardons. we think the same thing happened with roger stone, who was pardoned today. we think happened with michael flynn, earlier. and it was always that potential. back in my history, during watergate, nixon tried the same thing. he quietly sent messages to people that, if they didn't acro cross the line, he would be able to pardon them, possibly. well, i didn't buy into that and a lot of people didn't buy into it. so, historically, it hasn't always worked as it worked here. >> carrie, i want to play you

some sound from chris christie. chris christie was the prosecutor who put charles kushner in jail. and i want you to listen to how governor chris christie, who was a u.s. attorney, describes the crimes committed by charlie kushner. listen. >> i want to talk about jared kushner. you talk about him in the book because, frankly, it comes down -- he's the one who fired you. right? >> that's what steve bannon told me, yes. >> and you believe that? >> sure. >> right. you believe that because there is history between the two of you. >> between me and his father, not between me and him. >> you can understand why he takes it personally. >> yes. >> would you separate your experience if your father had been put in jail, from the prosecutor who put him in jail? >> if my father was guilty. listen, if i thought my father had not done something and that he had been wrongly accused and wrongly convicted, that would be one thing. in this instance, mr. kushner pled guilty. >> legal-campaign contributions.

>> tax evasion and witness tampering. significant crimes. >> it was surprising you didn't give yourself more of a defense for prosecuting charles kushner in t in the book. >> i mean, if a guy hires a prostitute to seduce his brother-in-law and videotapes it. and then, sends the videotape to his sister to attempt to intimidate here from testifying before a grand jury, do i really need any more justification than that? i mean, it's one of the most disgusting crimes that i prosecuted when i was u.s. attorney. and i was u.s. attorney in new jersey, so we had some disgusting crime going on there. but i just laid out the facts and confronted with those facts, i had a moral and an ethical obligation to bring that prosecution. >> so, one of the most loathsome crimes that he prosecuted, carrie. charles kushner, who did serve time, now receiving a full pardon. the connection, it is safe to assume, is that he is jared

kushner's father. your reaction? >> of course. he's part of the friends-and-family category of individuals, that the president is pardoning. and governors christie's description of mr. kushner's crimes and his prosecution of them really speak for themselves. with the other pardons, the president is clearly unraveling the mueller investigation. and so, that's the -- the stone in the manafort pardons are part of that. but i think, if we look at the bigger picture of what's going on. when we look at last night's pardons, and we look at the new pardons, tonight. what it shows is what this president is doing in his last days of office. and what he's not doing is he's not actually doing the work of president. instead, he is doing what he's always done, is catering to his own, political interests. rewarding individuals, who had his back and didn't cooperate with investigations, in order to save his own, political interests. and he is rewarding friends and family and close, political

allies. what is he not doing? he's not leading a government response to the coronavirus. he is not leading a government response to the major, cyberintrusion by the russian government. he's not even signing the national defense authorization act. he is not doing what we need to give our military a pay raise. and -- and pass additional, cybersecurity legislation. instead, he is rewarding friends, family, cronies, criminals. >> and, of course, he does have that power, andrew weissman. the president does have the unencumbered power to pardon. but, i know adam schiff feels, and i believe you feel this way, also, based on some of the writings that you have -- you've put out. that, if the president uses the power to pardon to obstruct justice, that isn't completely unencumbered. and perhaps, you think donald trump should be prosecuted after he leaves office. why? >> well, with respect to the pardon power, while it is very broad, there are a lot of limits. it doesn't cover state crimes. it doesn't cover civil matters.

it doesn't cover future crimes. so, for instance, i fully expect that the president is going to try to pardon himself. and that, itself, is an open question. but even if that were to be the case, if he commits a crime in the future, for instance, he is going to have to file tax returns, going forward. and that's going to be quite a conundrum for him. so, there are still a variety of things that can -- can play out, as well as roger stone can be put in the grand jury to find out why he lied and obstructed justice for the president. in other words, what -- what would the truthful answers have been? and if roger stone lies, then there are going to be consequences to that. with respect to the president's prior, federal crimes, that is going to be a really big issue, depending on, you know, what the attorney general, the new attorney general, wants to do. and whether the president tries to pardon himself away, you

know, and out of that -- out of that legal conundrum. but i think it's -- that's something where we have to really wait and see what's going to happen. >> so, john dean, you know, look. you lived through the nixon presidency. and still, have the scars to show for it. how does this compare, as we are looking at the final days of the trump presidency and the actions he is taking and the situation that i think carrie describes quite well, how does what you are seeing now compare to those years? >> well, it's ironic that nixon actually looks good. as i knew, at the time, and learned almost contemporaneously, that at the end, as he was leaving, his former-top aides, chief of staff, top-domestic adviser, and also his former attorney general, john mitchell, all wanted pardons. they got word right to the president. he spoke with haldeman about it.

he said, bob, i can't do it. it will only make things look worse and be worse. he thought the country had had too much of watergate, and that he didn't want to add any more agony to it. so, he turned them down for pardons. now, that isn't a measuring rod that we, anymore, see with this president. so, nixon is actually -- did the right thing, in that instance. and he didn't know he was going to get a pardon, for sure, from ford, at that point. so, we have a very different picture, today. >> and, carrie, we have 28 days left. 28 days left, at this point. so, what more do you expect to see? >> i think we, potentially, will see -- well, we saw the veto of a major, national security legislation, today. he has wreaked havoc in other legislation regarding covid relief. so, he's going to continue to create chaos, i think, is a major thing that he is going to do. he's not assisting. he is actively obstructing the transition to the next administration. and -- and other senior leaders,

for example, at the defense department have, also, obstructed the transition. so, he's actually affirmatively making it harder for the next administration to be as prepared as they possibly can be to do their job, when they come in on january 20th. and then, we'll see what other pardons. we'll see what lobbying other individuals close to him have done, and if there's additional pardons, he has some political allies and advisers who are under indictment or, reportedly, under investigation. and we'll see if his next wave of pardons includes pardons for individuals who have not, yet, been convicted of crimes. >> rudy giuliani, stay near your phone, in other words. andrew weissman, cara cordero, john dean, i have to say, terrific discussion. i can't think of three people with more perfect perspective so thank you. >> thanks, john. >> we have more now from congresswoman sheila jackson lee, democrat from texas, and member of the house judiciary

committee. congresswoman, thank you so much for being with us. your reaction to this latest round of pardons? >> well, john, let me just say this. as we are here tonight, there are families whose loved one is dead because of covid-19. and there are families, who will not see their loved ones this holiday season because of covid-19. and the president of the united states has taken what is constitutionally granted from a nation that has been grounded in the adherence to the constitution. the executive has consistently, meaning the president, taken those powers and used them effectively for the american people. and we have seen this president, very sadly, turn them into a destructive torpedo. he's really imploded the -- the collegiate relationship between the branches of government, the congress, the executive, and the judiciary. and so, what he's done with the pardon powers, which really, presidents do have absolute-pardon powers.

we acknowledge that, as members of the judiciary committee. but not to abuse those powers. 15 pardons, yesterday. no one knowing whether these individuals have been particularly processed or vetted, as was carefully done under the obama administration. 26, tonight. all of them, or many of them -- many of them -- tied to, in essence, undermining and tearing apart the hard work of the mueller investigation. and as we know, in his report, mr. mueller said if he could have held the president, he would have done so and he did not. what does that mean? the president, one by one, wants to eliminate those who would provide testimony in other settings to get to the truth of what happened with the russia investigation. it's sad that a commander in chief has taken his powers, and used them in this manner. >> so, when you take these pardons over the last two nights. you take the veto of the defense-authorization act. if you take his veiled threat to veto or to not sign the huge

relief package. what do you think he is trying to do, in his last 28 days in office? >> you know, i'm on the budget committee. i deal in numbers. 54 million americans are food insecure. i have been home for two days, and i've been in more than one food giveaway. be going to one tomorrow. and people are lined up. they are hungry. as well, there are people facing eviction. they need either the extra unemployment or they need some cash dispersement. so, what i see is a president who is now leaving washington. where he is not engaging with how do you solve this problem? democrats laid out a $3 trillion project, almost eight months ago, that really would have, in essence, saved america. but it could have been part of negotiation. we'll be on the floor, tomorrow, with unanimous-consent plea of which we could have unanimous consent, if the president left a message for the republican leadership to say join with the democrats to get this 2,000 cash

dispersement per individual. he's on a plane. so, i guess, what we see and what the american people have to see is that this is a president who's left his job. this is a president, who will use the next 28 days, to my sadness, because, frankly, i agree with 2,000. we wanted more, in may. most democrats do agree with it. and i imagine, a few republicans because i have co-sponsored a bipartisan bill that was republicans and democrats for increased amount of cash dispersement. but in this instance, you have to play the game. you have to be part of the operations on the field to get our job done. on the ndaa, tragically, does he realize that, as commander in chief, a million-plus young men and women in the united states military with families who are wearing the uniform, unselfishly, in faraway places defending this nation.

and he would take that bill that they depend upon and actually veto it. what consciousness is there in terms of leadership? my fear is that the 28 days, going forward, will be a continuous effort to interject, to interfere, and to undermine the branch of government that is trying to really serve the american people. right now, that's the united states congress. and that's what we have to be careful of. coming in next week -- excuse me, the week after next, we will have our swearing in. what will he do? we'll have january 6th. so, i think we have to be diligent and vigilant. and we have to be, very much, having the american people number one, number one priority. >> congresswoman sheila jackson lee, thanks so much for being with us tonight. i do appreciate it. have a merry christmas. >> merry christmas and thank you for having me. >> more on this all, next, and throughout the hour. including, a look at what might be going on inside the president's head from the man who co-wrote the art of the deal. and later, with holiday

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and cleaner than ordinary soaps. safeguard against germs. so now, we know the warmth of mar-a-lago does nothing to stop a blizzard of pardons. roger stone, paul manafort, the father of the president's son-in-law. that's on top of a defense bill veto today, and the threat of one on the covid relief registration. quite a big night for cnn's jeremy diamond, who joins us not far from mar-a-lago. so, jeremy, is there whether the president has other announcements in store for christmas, whether it's pardons or anything else, for that matter? >> what is clear, john, is that the president will be doing more pardons, in these next 28 days, before inauguration day. this is a president, who is only getting started, as it relates to these pardons. and that is stunning, when you think about the pace and breadth

of the amount of pardons we have seen in just the last two days. four people prosecuted by robert mueller, pardoned. three corrupt, former republican congressmen, pardoned. one father of the president's son-in-law, also, pardoned today. and so, it's clear the president is going to continue this. in particular, john, because what we are seeing from the president right now are efforts to exert what power he has left. he is a lame-duck president, he knows that, and he is fighting it any way he can. vetoes are one way he can do that. pardons are certainly another. >> jeremy, who is going to around him over the next few days? who is going to be whispering in his ear? >> well, i can tell you that advisers to the president are nervous anytime he comes to mar-a-lago. and that is because this is the place where so many of the president's allies, including those on the fringe of his political orbit, get the most unfettered access to him. they don't have to go through the normal white house process to be able to see the president or speak with him if they call

into the white house switchboard. they can just go up to him when he is schmoozing with guests at the mar-a-lago courtyard. and this is where we have seen some of the president's most erratic behavior. it's where he tweeted that baseless claim about president obama having wiretapped trump tower during the 2016 campaign. it's where he mused about firing special counsel robert mueller. where he considered and ultimately followed through, afterwards, in terms of firing director of national intelligence, dan coats. so, this is a place where the president tends to engage in that kind of behavior. and given where the president's head is already at. the fact that he is considering a range of these delusional attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election. watch this space. watch what happens, during the next week, as the president spends his holiday here at mar-a-lago. >> just to be clear, jeremy. you're suggesting aides are concerned, given how erratic he's been the last few days, he could be even more erratic at mar-a-lago? >> that -- that is what i would say, john. yep. >> jeremy diamond.

get some sleep tonight. you are going to need it. perspective now from cnn senior political analyst, kirsten powers. cnn senior political commentator and former pennsylvania republican senator, rick santorum. and john harwood. john, let me start with you. all these persistent questions over the past four days about donald trump's feelings about national security and the rule of law. what do these pardons say to you? >> i think the pardons he did tonight represent open corruption. this is a president, whose goal for much of the last four years, has been to try to absolve himself, politically and legally, from the connections with russia that prompted the mueller investigation. and these do not dispense with those questions, they affirm those questions. let's just recap, briefly. donald trump.

russia was a financial benefactor of donald trump, before he ran for president. russia helped donald trump become president by interfering in the election. donald trump lied about what he knew about that, fired the fbi director who was investigating that. and as president, has taken actions that no other, post-world war ii president has done to advance russia's objectives. that is to say, to weaken nato, to question nato's -- america's commitment to enforcing article v of nato. weakening the western alliance. his administration is now ending with a massive, russian hack of the u.s. government and u.s. business. and when he -- when his own secretary of state side secretary of state said it was russia at fault, he spoke to absolve russia and point to china. the -- it is true that robert mueller did not show or demonstrate or have enough evidence to demonstrate

collusion or conspiracy, between the trump campaign in 2016 and russia. however, he laid out -- he -- he said that russia helped him, that trump welcomed the help, and that trump had taken a series of actions that amounted to efforts to obstruct his probe. now, the president has pardoned a series of figures who declined to cooperate with robert mueller, who know things about him. he shielded michael flynn. he shielded roger stone. he shielded paul manafort. these are all efforts to shield himself. and i think that those efforts will culminate in his attempting to pardon himself, before leaving office on january 20th. >> senator santorum, how good do you feel act these pardons, tonight? >> well, first off, i completely reject everything that john harwood just said. i don't think anything that this -- the whole russian, collusion conspiracy, frankly,

fell flat and the american public saw that. and the reality is that what donald trump is doing right now is affirming -- is affirming one thing. and that is, that he believes he's not going to be president january 20th because, if he did believe he was going to be president on january 20th, he wouldn't be doing these things. so, i think if there is anything that shows inside the mind of donald trump right now is that -- that he has lost, and that he now, you know, wants to do some things that -- that -- that he believes are just, before -- before he leaves office. so, that's the insight i see from these pardons, and really nothing more in this wild conspiracy that everyone's been trying to allege against him for the last four years. >> well, aside from your -- >> you have got to be kidding. >> i am not kidding, john. not at all. not a cent. >> john? >> i -- i -- i -- i -- i think everything that senator santorum just said -- >> because the attorney general doesn't believe -- >> -- defies logic. >> no, it doesn't defy it.

what defies is if we spend four years talking about something that is unproven, and is more of a hoax than what we -- what we -- what we ever could have anticipated. >> well, let me just ask you this, rick. paul manafort was convicted. roger stone was convicted. >> absolutely. nothing to do with the election. had to do with his dealings prior to the election. >> do you feel good about those pardons, tonight? >> look. i -- i don't -- i don't -- i'm not big fans of those guys, and i think what paul manafort did prior to being involved with the trump administration was something that was wrong, and he should suffer the consequences for it. so, no, i don't agree with the manafort. roger stone, you know, again, don't like the way he handled himself in this situation. i don't think -- i think he was -- he was cavalier and -- and -- and undermined the rule of law. and, no, i don't think he should be pardoned. but to suggest that those pardons somehow -- they've already been through the trial,

john. >> right. >> they have already been convicted. you can't leverage them, any more. this had nothing to do with unshackling people who are leveraged. that's not the reality. >> i will say, andrew weissman who was on, before, said paul manafort did not cooperate with the investigation, and lied to them because he was trying to get a pardon. so, pardons, absolutely, did play a role in the investigation. kirsten, tonight, we have 28 days left in the trump administration. rick santorum says that donald trump knows we have 28 days left in the trump administration, now, which is a development, in and of itself. but what do you think will happen in that time period? >> i have no idea. but i don't believe that if -- that -- that he oowouldn't have been doing this if he thought he was going to be in the white house because i really haven't seen anything, in the last four years, to suggest that he has felt hemmed in, in any way, by these guardrails that are supposed to exist for presidents to not do things that, maybe,

aren't illegal but have typically not been done. so, this falls into that category, right? what he is doing isn't actually illegal, but it's completely unethical and inappropriate. he has demonstrated, over the last four years, that he's always more than willing to do things like that. so, i think he has to have known, for quite some time, that he did not win the election. and i don't think that he's in denial. i think that he is running a grift, and he is raising money off of it. and he is trying to gain more power, and to drag -- you know, to basically mislead people, take their money, maintain his power. that's what he's been doing, and that's what he will continue to do, all the way out of the white house. as he drags everybody down with him, and causes harm to people through, you know, trying to mess with relief for covid and -- and things like that. i mean, it's just -- it's just what he does, and it's what he's going to continue to do. >> i will say, kirsten, that if you are unemployed looking for

an enhanced $300 benefit to your check. if you are a service member looking for your paycheck to come, over the next few months, with the national defense authorization act. and you see what the president's actually focused on, which is pardoning charlie kushner and -- and paul manafort. how does that make you feel, tonight? >> i mean, i can't speak for other people. but it's repulsive, to me. you know, i -- the -- the -- the way that he is absolutely unconcerned with what is going on with people in this country. and there's just no way around it. if you look at his behavior. that he would be throwing a wrench into these -- in -- in -- into providing relief. now, he is right. he is, substantively, right that the checks should be $2,000. i agree with him on that, but where has he been? he hasn't been helping people, and that's the point. it's, he is completely consumed with himself. he's always been consumed with himself. and he will be consumed with himself, all the way out the door. and if people choose to follow

this, that's their right. but he is causing a lot of real harm to people. i mean, he always is causing harm to people. but right now, there are people that desperately need this money. and the military, also, needs to have, you know, have approval of this. so, i think that this is -- these are just really immediate needs. >> we got about a minute left. so, 30 seconds to each you, rick and john, on the question of what position does this all put republicans in for the next few days? rick, first, you. >> yeah. i think this puts republicans, particularly two senators in georgia, in a very tough bind to -- to have a president. you know, having voted for the national defense authorization act. now, having to decide whether they are going to buck the president, and what the impact of that is, on the base -- on their base in georgia. and number two, you know, the covid-relief package. same thing. you know, having the president put that number out there is -- is a tough thing for these members because i think most republicans don't feel that's an appropriate amount. so, it's -- it -- the president's not doing anybody

any favors, on either side of the aisle. and particularly, himself, when it comes to helping to win those senate seats. >> john harwood, last word? >> i think it all depends on whether the president is actually serious about trying to take down the covid-relief bill and the omnibus. don't know if he is, yet. if he does, that puts him in a real problem but i got to go back to one thing on the russia probe. if there was nothing to this, why did mike flynn lie? why did george papadopoulos lie? why did paul manafort and roger stone lie? why did he try to get don mcgahn to lie? why did those things happen? why did he take all those actions? and why did he, in helsinki, say that he believed vladimir putin over his own, united states intelligence services? those are pretty big questions i think cannot be dismissed by saying it was all a hoax. >> thanks to you. we are going to delve more into the mindset of the president tonight, with someone who knows better than most, how and why donald trump operates

the way he does. the co-author of "the art of the deal," when we return. want to sell the best burger in every zip code? add an employee. or ten... then easily and automatically pay your team and file payroll taxes. that means... world domination! or just the west side. run payroll in less than five minutes with intuit quickbooks. ♪

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so, one, big, unanswered question, tonight. what could the president possibly be thinking? and is there an endgame here? off on his christmas trip to florida, leaving behind a veto defense spending bill. also, two days of controversial pardons leaving the rest of washington, especially his own party, holding the bag. i just heard rick santorum say that donald trump is not doing anybody any favors. perspective, now, from someone who knows how the president operates. tony schwartz, who co-wrote

donald trump's "the art of the deal." he also wrote "dealing the devil, my mother, trump, and me." tony, what do you make of this? what's your takeaway from these pardons of the president's friends, his associates, family? what do you think? >> well, i think he's determined the trump modus operandi is, particularly, under these circumstances, is maintain dominance, in any way i possibly can. and make other people suffer more than even i am suffering. so, all this is consistent with it. i think this is exactly the scenario that i foresaw, in the fall of 2016, just before his election. at that time, i thought he was going to lose. but even then, my assumption was that he would never, never acknowledge it. that he would do everything possible to mobilize opinion against it.

and that he would do whatever he could to cause a destruction. i don't believe donald trump has a moment's interest in $2,000 for every american. donald trump doesn't care about any american. so, the idea that he would, suddenly, care about giving them $2,000, when he's allowed hundreds of thousands of americans to die, on his watch, is preposterous. he is doing it because he wants to show he's powerful. he wants to show he can still step in, and blow it all up. >> is there a plan? what is the plan, do you think, if such a thing exists? >> well, donald trump's long-term plans are, you know, i would say, five to ten minutes ahead of the present moment. so, no, i don't think that he has -- first of all, he doesn't think clearly. he doesn't think in a rational or logical way. so, no, i don't believe he has a plan. i do believe he has a bunch of ideas, and they're swirling in his head. but mostly, john, what he's

doi feeling right now is rage. white-hot rage because he feels obliterated by this. everywhere he looks, even sometimes on his own -- among his previous allies, he's hearing failure, failure, loser, loser. i think -- i think he's beside himself. he's like, you know, he's furious to the point of madness. >> is there any part of him that accepts responsibility for being a loser? and by that, i mean, someone who lost the election. by that, i mean, a one-term president. >> no. there is no part of him that accepts that. there is a part of him, now, that recognizes that short of, you know, blasting with guns to try to save himself, he is going to have to leave the white house on january 20th. but, there is no part of him, no part of him, that believes it is fair. he has told himself this story,

and anyone who disagrees with this story, including his closest allies. i mean, we're talking people like bill barr, who were there for him in every moment. now, he sees bill barr as an enemy. and so, anybody is an enemy who will not support the fantasy that he's bought himself into. and the reason is because to acknowledge that he has -- that he has lost is to acknowledge that he is a loser, and that is obliterating. that really makes him feel as if he doesn't exist. he's almost dead, when he calls himself a loser. >> if anyone surrounding him wanted to do anything to make the situation better, to stop him from doing some of these things, could they? i mean, what could someone do, if they wanted to quote/unquote save the country, and i'm not necessarily suggesting that's what is at stake here. but if they wanted to steer this in a different direction, could they stand up to him? >> invoke the 25th amendment. i mean, what was the 25th

amendment made for, but to deal with a situation in which a president is completely incapacitated? there are -- there's so much evidence that he is incapacitated. he is mentally incapacitated. he's not functioning as president. he's taking criminals and giving them pardons. and he will continue. i don't agree with one of your previous guests, who said, no, i don't think he'll -- you know, i -- i don't think he'll do anything. maybe, that person didn't say exactly this but i don't think he'll do something terrible, beyond this. yes, he will. he will. we're not done. anything he can think of to do, that will allow him to continue to feel dominant, he will continue to do. so, the 25th amendment would be one. it's problematic this close to the end of the election. but i don't think, short of a straightjacket, there is anything that even the people closest to him could do. jared kushner's thousands and thousands of miles away because

he doesn't want to be in his line of fire. so, if kushner doesn't want to be there and ivanka doesn't want to be there, who does? >> tony schwartz, i appreciate you being with us tonight. thank you very much. >> thank you. >> we aren't finished with the breaking news as a million holiday passengers were reported screened yesterday at american airports. another, sobering milestone is reached by americans hospitalized with coronavirus. that's next. ♪ may your holidays glow bright and all your dreams take flight. visit your local mercedes-benz dealer today for exceptional lease and financing offers at the mercedes-benz winter event.

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more breaking news tonight, the u.s. has reached another milestone in the pandemic. more than 119,000 people are hospitalized with the disease. along with that, more than 179,000 new cases and more than 2,700 deaths reported tonight, numbers that are certain to climb as the night goes on. these alarming figures come as more than 1 million pre-christmas passengers were screened yesterday alone at u.s. airports. also at 1 million tonight, the number of inoculations government officials say have already been administered across the nation. the latter is good news but officials say they do not expect to reach their previous estimate

of 20 million vaccines allocated to americans by the end of december. now they're saying early january. add to that nume raus state officials tell cnn the white house coronavirus task force -- states will have to request reports each week. they're still worry about those new strains of the virus, one from britain and the other from south africa. joining me now, dr. chris murray, the director of the institute of health metrics and evaluation, who's models track the impact of the pandemic. and dr. leana wen, a cnn medical analyst. dr. murray, for the second week in a row, your model projects an increase in u.s. deaths by april 1st. the most likely scenario you say now has 567,000 people dying. the worst-case scenario, 731,000 people. what's driving these numbers, and do you think this upward trend is going to continue? >> well, we think the upward trend will continue and probably continue well into january depending on how people react

and how governments react, it could even continue in that worst-case scenario going right up into february. what's driving the increase is the big epidemics, particularly in california, that are larger than, i think, any of us expected. and so it's the same thing for the last six months. it's people's behavior. it's mask wearing. it's how much social interaction is, you know, driving transmission. >> so, dr. wen, a lot of confusion over these new variants. experts in england said the two different strains are, quote, more transmissible. here in the u.s., the head of operation warp speed said there's no evidence the new variants have a different impact on people. so clarify exactly what that means. >> so both of these variants in the uk and in south africa appear to have mutations that make them more easily to enter

cells, to bind to cells and to enter them. that means they are probably more transmissible, a huge issue because already we know that this coronavirus is extremely contagious, that just by breathing and speaking, we can exhale these droplets. so if something is even more transmissible, that's definitely a worry. now, it's good that so far it doesn't appear that these variants are more deadly although if you have more infections, by definition you're also going to get a higher level of hospitalizations, which is something that when we have hospitals that are so overwhelmed right now, that's hardly something that we can take at the moment. and so i think this is a warning to all of us to really double down on the precautions that we know will work like masking and social distancing and also the sooner we can control the impact of the spread, the better it is for controlling future mutations that may occur. >> dr. wen, i know there are also questions about whether or not children might get this more often. what do we know about that? >> so it's not so much that the virus is somehow specifically

attacking children. but what we've seen in the uk and in south africa is some preliminary data showing that the increase in the rate of infection in children for this variant is greater than the increase in adults. we don't know if that's because of behavior of children or because of some specific characteristic of the virus. but, again, that's cause for concern and for us to keep a close eye on that in the u.s. >> since last monday, more than 1 million americans have received their first dose of vaccine. how many people do your models project will be vaccinated by april 1st and what does that mean in terms of lives saved? >> well, in terms of vaccination, we're now predicting with all the data that's available on supply, you know, how quickly things are rolling out, about just over 70 million people vaccinated on april 1st. and that's going to make a modest difference to the number of people whose lives -- you know, how many lives we can save. but because the vaccination doesn't come soon enough in this

winter surge to make a really large dent on the death toll. >> and just put numbers on that because i think it is interesting. you're talking about 30,000-plus lives saved because of vaccinations? >> yeah, and we're expecting 250,000 deaths between now and april 1st, and you can save 30,000 with the scale-up of the vaccination. if you were to scale up vaccination super fast, like twice as fast as we think currently is the possibility, you could save, you know, quite a few more lives than that. >> the mask wearing, universal mask wearing would save how many lives? >> well, we're already at -- you know, we've made progress in the country. i think it's really important to recognize that people have been listening. we've got mask use up to about 73%, 74%. but going up to 95%, you can save a further 50,000 lives between now and april. >> that's what i was going for. it still is so interesting. your models suggest mask wearing could save more lives in the short term than vaccines. so, dr. wen, more than 1 million

people have been vaccinated. more than 9 million doses have been distributed. as baltimore's former health commissioner, can you talk about the challenges public health departments have ahead of them to get the doses from the freezers to people's arms? there's this difference between allocated and administered that people are just coming to understand. >> that's right. as we say, it's not the vaccine that's going to save lives. it's the vaccination. local health departments have been substantially underfunded and underresourced and understaffed over the years. since 2008, local health departments have actually lost about a quarter of their staff, and these are individuals who at the start of the pandemic had to be pulled off of whatever they were working on, maternal and child health, working on the opioid epidemic, sdis and hiv, issues that did not go away with the pandemic by the way. but they were pulled off to work on these other things, testing, contact tracing, and now we're asking them to also set up the most ambitious vaccination program our country has ever

undertaken. so we desperately need to get resources to these individuals. local and state health departments know what to do. they can stand up vaccination programs, but if they don't have the resources to do so, i'm afraid operation warp speed is not going to translate anything close to warp speed for distribution. that's so tragic when we have thousands of people dying every single day. >> dr. murray, this new set of data, you looked at how many people are willing to receive the vaccine. what did you find? >> well, just under half say, yes, they'll take the vaccine. and about another quarter say they're unsure. and the last quarter says they don't want the vaccine. so as we go from, you know, the supply of the vaccine being the limiting factor to when there's more vaccine available, those unsures and the noes will really become absolutely critical for us getting to that point where we can put covid behind us. >> thank you so much for your time