was 99, a world war ii veteran and a retired ladder driver for the fire department. joce of wisconsin was 94. her daughter patty describes her as a beautiful soul whose dedication to family was the main focus of her life. may they rest in peace. i'm jim acosta. have a happy and haelealthy new year and a healthier 2021. "erin burnett outfront" starts right now. outfront next. breaking news. 140 house republicans and a handful of gop senators are planning to object to the electoral college vote tally next week. this as president trump cuts short his vacation hoping this stunt can help him cling to the presidency. plus, just days before the high stakes georgia senate runoffs, republican david perdue is sidelined and quarantined. could this plus the early voting number spell big trouble for the gop? new year's eve like you've

never seen it before. we're live in times square counting down to 2021. let's go outfront. good evening everyone. i'm in for erin burnett. welcome to a special edition of outfront. 140 republicans, that is the number of house republicans at a minimum who are planning to answer trump's call to try to overturn the election. that according to two house republicans who tell jake tapper that more than half plan to vote against counting the electoral votes on wednesday when congress certifies joe biden's victory. unprecedented effort to undo america's fair and free election. cnn is also learning a handful of senators are planning to join senator josh holly in contesting the vote certification. the president now back in the white house after cutting his mar-a-lago holiday vacation short, getting more help on his last ditch effort to overturn the will of the people.

a source tells cnn the president who appeared, quote, unsettled while in florida still believes next week's challenge will somehow hand him a second term. but this stunt is not going over well with some republicans. senator ben sass is slamming the effort, saying they're playing with fire. if you make big claims, better have the evidence and the president doesn't and neither do the constitutional arson members of congress who object to the vote. live covering capitol hill, worried the fact he lost this election no matter the damage he's doing by pressuring republicans to try to overturn the will of the people. >> reporter: yeah, he's not the only one ignoring it. he wants to bring republicans into this fold with him and he's paying attention closely to who is coming and who is not. and so that's why i think we're hearing from so many republicans that you are going to see so

many house members expected to join on to this effort and more than one republican senator who's come forward, of course, josh holly and now they are expecting others to come forward as well in this effort. because basically, they think it's a little bit safer to move forward once someone else has already made that first move. but we are told that as the president has come back early, it's incredibly unusual for him to do something like this and miss his new year's eve party. while he was supposed to go back tomorrow, he cut it back, back at the white house and spent most of the afternoon in the west wing and biana, this is basically after he spent his time in florida almost completely consumed by this election loss, and talking about what's going to happen next week when congress does meet to certify biden's win and so while he's plotting along with his republican allies to cause a disruption, have this spectacle go forward, it's not actually going to change what the outcome is. they could affirm biden's win at the end of the day. the question some white house aides ask themselves is what the

president is going to do after that and it remains uncertain. we are told the president has still been asking people if he should attend biden's inauguration at the end of january. though, it does not appear clear cut in any way, shape or form he's made a final decision on that. >> what we're not hearing from the president is the coronavirus and the thousands of people who died just today. kaitlan collins, nauthank you s much. and now phil mattingly. 140 republicans is a stunning number and quite frankly, 140 too many but how many of them truly believe these challenges will go anywhere? >> reporter: yeah, and don't even take my reporting. take the words of senator ben sass who you quoted but in a lengthy facebook post why he had serious concerns about what's going to happen and in the post, he said explicitly, he's not spoken to a single congressional republican who does not know joe biden is the president-elect of the united states. i can't speak for all, what, 230, 240 republicans on capitol

hill in the house and the senate in terms of what they actually think but the vast majority i've spoken to acknowledge the reality, at least privately and that is what's caused so many problems right now inside the senate republican conference. biana, this morning, there was a conference call, senator majority leader mitch mcconnell held a call with senate republicans where he asked josh holly to lay out his rationale why he was planning to object. and what was he going to put forth. one problem, josh was not on the phone call and had several members i've spoken to, republicans who are very frustrated with what josh holly decided to move forward and join in objecting to this. one, because they know joe biden is the president-elect of the united states. the other, it puts a lot of josh holly's colleagues in a very difficult position of having to vote against either president trump who is still widely supported inside the republican party and amongst the base which could create problems for republicans who have to have reelections in 2022 or 2024 but

just the reality of the moment. do you want to vote against somebody that everybody knows, one, whether or not you're willing to admit it publicly or not? one interesting element, biana, from the call, one source told me when josh holly did not respond, one of the people who did speak up, pat toomey, a pennsylvania republican i'm told did a walk-through as to why the republican concerns from the president to josh holly and several others about the results from pennsylvania were unfounded. saying he disagreed with where they were. that's the senator from pennsylvania, the republican senator from pennsylvania taking out one of the core arguments that are being made at this point in time. biana, you've got all of this playing out. january 6th is going to be a huge day, a bit of a circus, kind of a mess even though we know how it's going to end. the bigger question right now seems to be, how is the republican party going to make its way through this over the course of the next couple of days, so many people get on board with what the president wants. >> sure is an embarrassment for the republican party and a dangerous one at that. phil mattingly, thank you.

outfront now, republican congressman denver riggleman from virginia. two house republicans saying 140 gop representatives plan to vote against the electoral college results next week. what do you say to them? >> it's not much of a surprise as far as that number and actually, it might be a little higher. i'ms a goi s also going to tell delegations, the pennsylvania senator about senator toomey, he's going to be in direct conflict with the congressional delegation that looks like put out a statement where all of them are going to vote against the electors. it's going to be interesting, biana, to see this. i say stop. enough of this. i think, i understand why they're doing it and they have to appeal to their base and fundraising is a big issue, i understand that 2022, they could get primaried but i think there is a time to pick facts over fantasy and i don't know what they're going to do on january 6th.

are there going to be kraken balloons and the merch store, i think it's unprecedented to have this type of votes on things that aren't true. >> you understand why they're doing it. do you really? are they not concerned about democracy and what they're doing to our electoral system here in this country? by the way, the entire world is going to be watching and is currently watching what's taking place? >> right. and like i said, i understand politically from my point of view and maybe it's because i wasn't brought up politically. i came as an insider into this and left as an insider. i don't understand why facts are not your guiding principle in defending the constitution and a lot of these people were my friends and i talked to many of them and i have, biana. get the phone calls and talk to them and i'm sort of flummoxed why we can't say, listen, we've done this transition many times in the united states. this is nothing new. and we look at what ben sass is saying, look what i'm saying,

paul mitchell, so many people saying enough of this. let's move on. let's run on reality and facts. let's make sure we protect the integrity of our republic and being able to have dialogue not based in fantasy and conspiracy theories. again, maybe it's my intelligence background. i can't for the life of me, looking at some of what they're saying, think that anybody can think this is reality at this point. >> it's crazy at this point and it's dangerous. you look at speaker mcconnell and today telling his caucus to vote their conscience. clearly he wanted to avoid this scenario but by telling them to vote their conscience, you think about the last time a republican senator said that publicly and that was ted cruz at the 2016 republican convention. he said vote your conscience. fast forward now. he's one of those enablers alongside senator holly. what damage has this done to the party itself and to the country? >> i think long-term, it does tremendous damage. i think in the short-term, people think they might win an election, but long-term, it does

this. here's the thing, biana. why aren't we going to every election, why isn't it contested based on some fan that's cal theo fantastical theory, and other tweeting nonsense and rubbish and attack other people if they don't believe that rubbish, and that's what i'm worried about is that we just have a decline of dialogue and inability to keep this republic going because we're just sort of tracing through these meadows of just theories that make no sense. and i got to tell you, i talked to a few and again, ben sass was correct. i want to tell you this right now. most of the people, they know it's not going to win. they're not going to win and they're doing this because they're worried about getting primaried. >> short-term gain. last question quickly, do you think vice president pence will do the right thing and certify the votes next week? >> i think he will. i think he'll verify the vote. i think he's going to do his

duty. i can't imagine he wouldn't. that would be the one thing that would surprise me. it hasn't surprised me to see maybe 140 or more and i'll make a prediction right now, i think it will be more that are going to do this but i do believe that vice president pence will certify this vote and i believe we'll have a new president, president-elect biden sworn in on january 20th. >> vice president clearly under a lot of pressure from his own party and the president itself. congressman, thank you so much for joining us. happy new year to you. >> thank you, ma'am. happy new year to you. outfront now, vice dean of u usc's law school and senior editor of the atlantic, ron brownstein, welcome both of you. what a busy night. you just heard what the congressman said. let's talk about josh holly. he isn't just vowing to make one objection but challenging the election of multiple states. each challenge means a two-hour debate. how much of a hail mary is this? >> to call it a hail mary is very generous, i think.

they need to just stop because honestly, he's just prolonging the process. let's say he objects to four states, right, michigan, georgia, arizona, nevada, and so on. so the contested states. pennsylvania. if he objects to those, he can add ten hours to this process but at the end of the day, by even late that night or early the next morning, joe biden will still be president. all he's doing is prolonging the process where the outcome is inevitable. >> and doing damage to the country while they're at it. >> doing damage. >> mitch mcconnell had a call with his caucus and asked senator holly to lay out his plan. holly did not respond to multiple questions from mcconnell because he apparently wasn't even on the call but he did have time to launch a small dollar fundraiser putting out his plan. what does this tell you? >> it tells you he sees this kind of fantastical claim as a way to establish himself as an inheriter of president trump's

base in 2024. i think you really have to look at the big picture here though. this is one step in a continuum. another escalation of a long pattern and i think the big picture is that we are seeing fear of demographic eclipse is eroding the commitment to small d democracy in the republican party. both among voters and among leaders. there are long roots of this going back to all of the voters suppression measures passed in republican states since 2010. shelby county decision. 2013. eviscerating the voting rights act but certainly under trump, just an enormous escalation. i mean, one republican in both chambers thought it was worthy of sanction when he tried to extort the government of ukraine to manufacture his opponent, essentially no complaints about his efforts to tilt the census bureau or the pardons he's delivered since the election to confederates who withheld information relevant to an investigation on him. and of course, the fact that two-thirds of republicans in the

house already have endorsed that lawsuit attempting to disenfranchise 20 million voters as well as two-thirds of the republican attorneys general. there's a pattern here, the party moving toward the position where they're arguing the consequences of democratic victory are so apocalyptic that any means necessary is justified to resist that and i think there's a direct connection between the kinds of things you're seeing from holly and the house republicans and these closing arguments from purdue and loeffler in georgia that basically says if democrats win, the america we know will cease to exist. if that's the states in every election dispensing with democracy is a small price. >> we see the break-ups of checks from this president on his own party. vice president of the senate will preside over this joint session of congress next week. harry, former deputy and assistant attorney general and now constitutional law professor. pence's constitutional role to open the certificates. not it. not to certify or technically to

count. no way to even purport to change the count. it would be like saying the oscar presenters get to decide who wins best picture. there was a mishap at the oscars a few years ago. but that aside, is he right? >> i agree with that completely. what happens next is a matter of politics or a power play or like it has normally played out? the vice president and his role as president supposed to be a rubber stach mp sorts, of open certificates. allows him to feel objections to the certificates but a far cry from being able to substantively determine. but for example, i know one nightmare scenario, those that were developed in states where biden clearly won, that pence might open those slates and

under the electoral count, certificates purporting to be elector slates. if that happens, pence does not have the power to determine the validity of the slates and definitely be an objection to those slates and congress would still get to decide the validity. so largely one of oversight and not supposed to make substantive determinations. >> never a dull moment. thank you so much for joining us tonight. >> happy new year. >> happy new year to you. >> wisconsin hospital employee is fired and arrested after allegedly intentionally spoiling 500 doses of the covid-19 vaccine. is trump standing in the way of biden preparing a budget? a war of words between two administrations. less than five hours until midnight on the east coast. good riddance 2020. we'll take you live to times square where anderson cooper and andy cohen are standing by for the new year and celebrating in

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united states hitting a record for coronavirus hospitalizations. 125,000 people in the hospital tonight fighting for their lives. also the 30th day in a row that number has been over 100,000. this as dr. fauci admits he's not pleased that about 2.8 million americans have gotten the first dose of the vaccine so far. that's far short of what the trump administration had promised. >> would have liked to have seen it run smoothly and have 20 million doses into people today by the end of the 2020, which was the projection. obviously, it didn't happen. and that's disappointing. >> outfront now, dr. jonathan reiner, former medical adviser and dr. daniela, a critical care doctor in boston. welcome to both of you. dr. reiner, the goal was 20 million vaccinations by the end of this year. that's by today. the results with less than five hours left in 2020 about 2.8

million, as you heard, dr. fauci said he's disappointed. how disappoint ready you by the these numbers? >> really disappointed. this is not a small, we didn't just shoot for 20 million and actually injected 17 million. we injected maybe 3 million folks with this vaccine and 17 million haven't gotten it. it's really frustrating because every one of those citizens, residents of this country who have been vaccinated, every single one of those people is protected from dying. that's what this vaccine does, it protects you from dying. it's excellent at preventing you from acquiring the virus but almost completely effective at preventing you from dying from it. i feel an urgency to get into everyone's arm and completely rethink what we're doing because

it's not going to work early enough to put an end to the pandemic in the next year. we really need to rethink what we're doing. >> overshoot of some 18 million is quite a disappointment. we know both vaccines approved for use here in the united states require that second dose. and today, dr. fauci was asked about calls to spread those out so that more americans could at least get the first dose. here's what he said. >> i mean, that's under consideration. i still think if done properly, you could do a single dose. reserve doses for the second dose and still get the job done, but there's a lot of discussion about whether or not you want to spread out the initial vaccination by getting more people vaccinated on the first round. you could debate either way on that. >> in your opinion, is that a good or bad idea? we know the efficacy of a vaccine obviously improves when you have two of those doses.

>> so i think this is an interesting hypothesis but the truth of the matter is i think it's a red herring and the bottleneck here is not getting the second dosage to people but the first dose into somebody's arm. it's not a lack of doses. it's a lack of infrastructure to give people the vaccine. throughout this pandemic, we have not had very good science and here, we actually have excellent science. we had six months getting a vaccine with fantastic science behind it and to sort of go off the science, to extrapolate data to say maybe this is good enough, that's not what we need to do now. what we need to say is exactly as reiner said, this vaccine in two doses, we know based on data, it can prevent people from dying. people need to get both those vaccine shots, just as the data say that they should. and we need to ramp up the infrastructure to get that into people's arms with urgency and haste. rather than trying to go around

the edges. >> neethat means working with t states, saying it's not on me anymore. given the scarcity, there's some disturbing news tonight. we learned that police have arrested a hospital pharmacist in wisconsin. they say he intentionally removed more than 500 vaccine doses from a refrigerator to make them ineffective and there were 57 vaccinations given that are now believed to be less effective or completely ineffective. how disturbing and troubling is that and are you worried there would be more cases like that throughout the country? >> well, there are crazy people everywhere and this is, i'm sure, a one-off event. what's worse than simply wasting the vaccine, which is like wasting donated blood is that it was administered to people who believe that the vaccine was affected. so basically, it placed them at greater risk because at some point, the behavior will change based on the assumption that they are largely protected.

so it is really a heinous crime, but i'm not worried about that on any kind of wide scale in the united states. >> there are crazy people everywhere. dr. lamas, you wrote an op-ed about the first dose of the vaccine which made you reflect on the patience you cared for. you write in part, the family took false comfort in a negative test. a father who welcomed a dozen people in his home for the holidays. each casualty is made more poignant by the celebratory vaccine selfies on my phone and the knowledge that had they waited, my patients might have lived. we sometimes forget that you too are human and you do god's work every day, especially throughout this pandemic. what was that moment like for you and what were you trying to convey to those people who were going to read what you wrote? >> i think that moment was intensely powerful, knowing that just a couple of floors away in

the hospital, there were people who i cared for, whose faces and families i knew who were suffering, who might not make it, who might make it and who might face long-term complications from coronavirus, and an infinite number of people i will never meet who will get sick while waiting for the vaccine. i wrote the piece and still believe that these photos, that the very existence of the vaccine, the miraculous science that brought this to us so quickly is cause for hope and i think now, our administration, our federal government needs to make sure that this hope i'm asking people to have, this reason to not have a new year's celebration tonight, that that's not in vain. there's promise they will get the vaccine and people will work to get it to them as fast as humanly possible to keep them from dying, that's not a false promise and that this hope is real. so that's sort of what i'm thinking as we go into 2021 and as i think about the vaccine.

>> should be thinking about the americans in the hospital tonight and ring in the new year as they struggle with this virus as well. thank you both for everything you've done and thank you dr. la mrk lamas and david preiner. there's a quote, indefensible lack of cooperation from the trump administration. the war of words that's erupting between team biden and team trump. get ready - our most popular battery is now even more powerful. the stronger, lasts-longer energizer max.

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breaking news. just five days before georgia's critical senate runoff elections that will determine the balance of power in washington. the republican candidate senator david purdue forced to quarantine after coming in close contact with someone who tested positive for coronavirus. it comes as republicans grow increasingly concerned that democrats are outperforming in early voting. kyung lah is outfront in georgia there. purdue sidelined at a critical time, yet we saw a largely

maskless crowd at what was to be a joint event just this afternoon with purdue and senator loeffler. what more do we know about this new development? >> reporter: well, it was supposed to be a joint event and it was supposed to be here. they're breaking down the stage but there was no david purdue. we learned about what was happening with the senator right as he was about to take stage. right as he was supposed to take stage and he just didn't show up. the campaign released that statement saying he came into contact with someone who was covid-positive and so he was going to follow doctor's order, follow cdc guidelines, he and his wife were going to quarantine. they did get tested and currently negative but depending on on the timing of when they had contact with the person, it's likely they're going to have to be tested again. what happened here, biana, this rally was a little surreal. he simply didn't show up. everything rolled forward as if he was never supposed to be here

in the first place. senator loeffler spoke to the crowd and as people were leaving, they were never informed. they were actually asking us. as if people wouldn't notice. and i hope those people are okay. but we also know that nearly 3 million ballots have already been cast, and we're seeing people waiting in long lines to vote early. is that giving democrats a lot of hope right now? >> reporter: well, i'll tell you what my colleague ryan nobles found out in talking to his republican sources. he spoke with two of them looking at gop data of turnout and this is what they are telling ryan. what they are saying is that democrats are currently outperforming where they were in the 2020 general election. and that has republicans concerned here in georgia. what it means is essentially the there's more democrats already

voting, they have to figure out how to get more republicans to the booth on election day. it is something they are confident they can do, biana, but certainly it gets tougher as those democratic numbers climb in early vote. >> we have the president and the president-elect both coming down there next week as well ahead of that big crucial vote tuesday. kyung lah, thank you so much. for more on these races, harry, we had so much fun earlier this week, we decided to do it all over again. >> sure, why not? >> you make statistics so fun. so let's get to it. senator purdue off the campaign trail in the final days of a close race. how much could this hurt him? >> it can't help him. if you think about the coronavirus, look at this general election exit poll. i think it gives you a good understanding, which is that if you believe that the efforts to contain the coronavirus were going well, won by 75 points. if you thought the efforts to contain the coronavirus were

going badly, you voted for john by 71 points. so the more the coronavirus gets in the news the final few days, the more i have to think it hel hel helps osof. >> it makes it more obvious to his supporters this is something impacting him in his state but this comes as republicans likely need a heavy election day vote, given the early voting data, right? >> that's exactly right. as ryan nobles was reporting, you can look at the hard data itself. it's publicly available and you see that in the early and the areas in which the democrats did well back in november, you see the ones that biden won by 30 points more, the congressional district, right now, the relative turnout in the november election. 66% in those areas versus the areas trump won by 30 percentage points or more. 51%. so what you do see in the final few days and especially on election day is need to see

heavy republican turnout and obviously, if purdue is sidelined, that could hurt the efforts. >> and we're also seeing unusually high turnout already for a runoff election. haven't you seen anything like this? >> i have not. and you know all i do is spend every day just looking at the data. the last time that we had a senate runoff which was extraordinarily high turnout back in 2008, what we saw was, i believe, only about 2.1 million voters. that was the previous over all records and look at this, through this point, through wednesday, 2.8 million ballots. and we know that number will climb ever higher. this is truly an unusual election. voters in georgia are pumped up. they're going out and voting. a lot of ballots already cast. >> could it be possible that democrats are benefitting more from two candidates running at once than republicans are? >> i think it's very quite possible because what democrats do are two things. they want to persuade voters to go to their side and you can see it well in the sixth congressional district, where

joe biden won by 11 percentage points in the presidential level but the senate democratic candidate struggled there. but guess who ran in the special house election back in 2017? john, and perhaps he can change the minds of some of the republican down ballot voters anti-trump and bring them over to the democrats but here's the other thing democrats want to do, right, they want to try to build up their turnout. and specifically, they want to go after african-americans, make sure they turn out. the black share of the georgia electorate, 31%, only 28%. it seems to be working out for democrats so far. >> stacy abrams deserves a lot of credit for that. har harry, all you said is look at charts. i give you a reprieve. it's new year's eve. >> i'll try. happy new year. >> you too. tonight, a 25-year-old incoming republican house member, the youngest person elected to congress in modern history is trying to boost the

youth vote in the all important georgia runoffs. diane gallagher out front with a compelling and at times controversial figure. >> do you wish you could take it back? >> absolutely. >> meet north carolina republican madison, the youngest person elected to congress in modern history. celebrated on twitter with three words. which some thought was a dig at his democratic opponent. >> you tweeted. >> not the most congressional thing i've ever done. >> it was not targeted at my opponent who ran a tough campaign. this cancel culture and really the extremes on both ends. >> the first member of congress born in the 1990s, taken his party by storm. >> i represent young republicans, this new phase of the republican party. >> the conservative platform

wrapped in a message of youth, and overcoming adversity. the now 25-year-old has used a wheelchair since the car accident in 2014 left him partially paralyzed. >> i've known what it is to feel significant amounts of pain and feel left behind by society and i think that's an interesting perspective to come into as a conservative. and more empathetic message with the conservative values. >> cawthorn credits a democrat with inspiring him to run for office. >> although i disagree with her on a lot of policy positions, she did set an example that you can get involved as a young person in your 20s to make a difference in your country. >> after his shocking win over a trump-backed candidate in the crowded 11th district republican primary, the party and the president quickly started showcasing the western north carolina native. >> where's madison? is he here? madison, a real star. you're going to be a star of the party. >> a prime speaking spot at the convention. >> be a radical for our

republic. for which i stand. >> stumping for gop senate candidates in georgia. but it was a series of scandals that helped propel the relatively unknown candidate to the national stage. >> i'm definitely not a nazi. i'm not a white supremacist. >> this 2017 instagram post from a visit to adolf hitler's vacation home in germany. the eagles nest where he refers to hitler as the fuhrer. >> i was unaware as using a certain term describing an evil man was offensive to people in the jewish community. >> he went there for the history pointing out he called hitler a supreme evil in the post. >> i hate racism. my fiance is a biracial young woman. i'm going to have biracial children. >> he said term limits are a top priority in his conservative agenda. but he does see potential for compromise with democrats on broadband expansion, opioids and

even the environment. >> i believe as a republican, you can love god, guns and hate greenhouse gases. >> in our interview just before, he suspected fraud in the presidential election but did acknowledge trump's legal team had yet to prove it. >> if joe biden is our president and if i was a betting man, i'd say he will be. >> but just two days later at a gathering of young conservatives -- >> i will be contesting the election. >> not ready to completely accept reality, but open to what's next. >> i look forward to working with him and i think that we can modernize our country together. >> reporter: none of that scratches the surface on the controversies that surround cawthorn, accused of making misleading statements all of which he's denied or explained away but none of which hurt his popularity in the republican party. he feels a great weight on his

shoulders for representing aggez republicans knowing his success and scandals could impact a generation. >> clearly caught the president's eye calling him a star. dianne gallagher, thank you so much. outfront next, the trump administration responding to team biden's claim that officials are not giving them enough information about the nation's finances. plus, we'll take you live to times square where as you're about to see, tonight's new year's eve festivities will be unlike any in the past. it's an important time to save.

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breaking news. the biden transition alleging a, quote, indefensible lack of cooperation from president trump's budget chief who himself is accusing the biden team of, quote, false statements. it's just the latest feud in this turbulent transition. mj lee is live for us outfront. what more do you know about this? >> reporter: biana, we are seeing a serious disconnect between what the biden transition world is seeing happening versus what the trump administration is happening during this transition process. you recall that biden himself earlier this week said that

there has been obstruction and road blocks coming from particularly, the dod and the omb and the latest iteration, the latest back and forth in this whole saga is that the omb director has written a letter to the biden transition team and what he said was that he basically insisted we have been fully cooperative in offering the information that we should be giving but the one thing that we are not going to do is help the biden transition with their legislative priorities. we don't want to help them dismantle this administration's work. those are his words. and then that prompted the biden team to strike back with the statement of their own saying that all of this basically amounts to partisanship and all of this is hurting their ability to do important work like try to get a plan for a budget set up for next week. now, you'll recall that earlier this week, we did a lot of reporting on the drama between the dod and the biden transition. essentially, a lot of concerns being raised from the biden world about information that

they're not getting that could have national security implications and now i should note just this evening, the pentagon said there are some 30 interviews that are set to take place next week between the biden agents review teams and the dod. we'll see what comes of those meetings. but i will say, obviously, the biden transition work is continuing including on inauguration day. they just announced that they will put out a memo to halt or freeze all trump administration regulations that have not yet gone into effect. so busy work for the biden transition team continuing, biana. >> bears repeating though how not normal these transition road blocks are. mj lee, thank you so much. i want to bring in doug brinkley, cnn presidential historian and professor of the history at rice university. doug, good to see you again. have you ever seen a transition unfold like this one? >> >> no, nothing like this one. this is donald trump trying to sabotage the american democratic system. it was times like andrew johnson

didn't go to ulysses s. grant's inaugural or eisenhower and truman were very frosty with each other but this is a form of sabotage that the trump team is doing, keeping biden folks blinded by the intelligence information they need to get prepared for january 20th and beyond. >> and potentially dangerous. this is why we have this period for the transition teams to be helping each other as they move into another administration. you've written about many presidents and one is jimmy carter. cnn is premiering a new film sunday night at 9:00 p.m. eastern called "jimmy carter: rock 'n' roll president." >> when willie nelson wrote his autobiography he confessed that he smoked pot in the white house one night when he was spending the night with me. he says his companion that shared the pot with him was one of the servants at the white house.

that is not exactly true. it was actualwin of my sons which he didn't want to, you know, categorize as a pot smoker like him. there were some people who didn't like my being deeply involved with willie nelson and bob dylan and disreputable rock 'n rollers but i didn't care about that because i was doing what i really believed. >> incredible video there. carter's connection with the biggest rock 'n roll musicians of his day was really instrumental in helping him get elected, wasn't it? >> there is no question about it. when the journalist hunter s. thompson did the cover endorsement on "rolling stone" of jimmy carter it was a big deal because carter was a born-again christian who didn't drink, didn't smoke, and so the fact that the rock 'n roll community rallied behind carter was huge. it was mainly the allman brothers band. their record label capricorn was out of macon, georgia. greg ullman and decky betts

would go to barbecues and the like with jimmy carter, play softball with him. they really developed an incredible, close friendship. and jimmy carter just loved the music of bob dylan. he put dylan quotes in his autobiography, why not the best, and in fact at the inauguration in 1977 jimmy carter quoted bob dylan he not busy being born is busy dying. >> look, willie nelson can do nobody wrong. from jimmy carter and he was campaigning for beto o'rourke the past couple years ago. this is fascinating. always great to have you on. thank you. >> happy new year to you. >> you, too. don't miss "jimmy carter: rock 'n roll president" sunday night at 9:00 p.m. eastern. outfront next we'll take you live to times square for a new year's celebration unlike any the city has ever seen. ♪ sanctuary music

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you are looking at live pictures of times square in new york city right now where the famous ball is dropping tonight. that's where the tradition ends. tonight no lines, no massive crowds, no cheering fans. richard quest is in times square now and, richard, you're usually there when there are a million people in times square. you've covered the celebration for more than 22 years. tonight a very different scene. what are you expecting? >> reporter: you know, it really is extraordinary. it is quite upsetting for somebody like myself who has been here every year doing this with a million people but let me show you. this is times square 2020 style. you have nobody from here really till the end of the square.

there is the ball. that will still drop at midnight. these are going to be filled in with a variety of honorees so if you come back up here we have the honorees from the military. we have honorees who have raised money for charity. it's very different. it is extraordinarily different. but it is still times square and it's still new year's eve. we're still going to get on with it. >> those front line workers who deserve to be there to celebrate are there as are you my friend. strong jacket. strong mask. i am loving it. tell me why this has been such an important moment for you as well. it's been a hard year. you suffered covid and had a very difficult recovery. tell me about the emotions you're feeling now. >> reporter: i am feeling huge emotions because a year ago i

stood in this square and i looked up and i thought, go 2020. come on, 2020. i was getting married in 2020. by the way, this is the man i got married to. >> congratulations. >> we failed to get married when we were expecting to. we did it later on. i've been in this square every year for 25 years or so. midnight. i did millennium midnight in this square. the mood is still a bit of festivity. i mean, you know, you do the one thing we've learned by the way anyone who wears glasses and spectacles will know why i've taken these off. it is very difficult to speak and do that. >> richard. >> they fog up. >> listen, you survived. you're thriving. 2021 will be a better year for you. wishing you all of the best. >> yes, yes. >> with the love of your life there have a wonderful new

year's. be safe. >> thank you. >> thank you so much for covering this for us. happy new year's to everybody at home. >> thank you. >> thank you so much for watching. >> happy new year! >> thank you for watching our special new year's eve show live with anderson cooper and andy cohen starts right now. yes, everybody, ringo here. ringo and cnn want to wish you all a happy new year. and peace and love of course. and remember, here's to those nights we won't remember, and here's to the friends we won't forget. peace and love. ♪ welcome to cnn's new year's eve live. tonight we celebrate the end to the worst year ever and the stt