good evening. just about 90 minutes from now the united states capitol will receive the ashes of capitol police officer brian sicknick. taken to the rotunda to lie in

honor, ra -- a reminder of the insurrection that caused his death on the 6th of january. the united states senators whose lives and staffers lives he died protecting is being asked to show bravery, as well. house impeachment managers and the ex president's legal team today presented their briefs in next week's impeachment trial and the insurrection at the heart of that trial is not ancient history. they will be weighing decisions with the seat of american democracy and their workplace still showing the scars from an attack unlike any we've seen in our lives. the manager's case is straightforward. they plan to use video of the president's rally leading up to this and comments by his violent supporters to show he instigated the attack and plan to rebut the notion a president cannot be tried after leaving office. as for the defense, well, their brief begins with a mistake, a pretty sloppy one at the top of page one as you see there, the lawyers misspelled united states.

those are the ex-president's lawyers. from there they argue that in ex-president cannot be convicted on constitutional grounds. in addition, though they make a claim that's easily disproved, reading from their brief quote it is admitted that after the november election, the 45th president exercised his first amendment right under the constitution to express his belief that the election results were suspect. the brief goes on to say quote insufficient evidence exists upon which a jurist could conclude that the 45th president's statements were accurate or not and thereafter denies they were false. insufficient evidence? a reasonable jurist? keep in mind more than 60 reasonable jurists decided otherwise already. they were elected judges and appointed judges and republican judges and trump appointees and they sit on the united states supreme court. the claims made by the president's motley mob of attorneys in the weeks after the election were without merit.

they all decided the election results were not suspect. the state of georgia recounted their ballot three times. is that somehow insufficient evidence? in fact, when the ex-president asked this at his rally, he already had the answer. >> by the way, does anybody believe that joe had 80 million votes? does anybody believe that? >> yeah, 80 million people at least do. every single secretary of state, also, democrat and republican believed it. every single secretary of state in every state. is that insufficient evidence? is it insufficient evidence that one even told the former president directly just a few days before the rally georgia republican and supporter of the former president, prachbz -- brad raffensperger, here is a portion of their phone call. >> we have won this election in georgia based on this and there

is nothing wrong with saying that, brad. the people in georgia are angry and the people in the country are angry and there is nothing wrong with saying, you know, that you've recalculated. >> mr. president, the challenge that you have, the data you have is wrong. >> the data you have is wrong. is that insufficient evidence? again, that's the guy who voted for the former president who wanted him to win. he just didn't want to lie and cheat for him and here is his deputy, also republican back in december warning the former president about the violent consequences of lying about election fraud. >> mr. president, you have not condemned these actions or this language. senators, you have not condemned this language or these actions. this has to stop. someone's going to get hurt. someone's going to get shot. someone's going to get killed. >> that was more than a month before the attack. four days later, armed trump supporters descended on the home

of michigan secretary of state stoked by the defeated president's false claims about election fraud there. a week later, so-called stop the steal rallies across the country turned violent. you see it there. four people are stabbed in washington. that same morning at 8:05, the president tweets quote i won the election in a landslide. house impeachment managers plan to show precisely this incite ment and effect. from what the president says to what his violent supporters do. not all his supporters are violent, far from it. but we're talking about the summary judgments. blaeb this video compiled by the organization shows the former president's remarks on the 16th of january synchronized from videos posted mainly on social media. here is a portion. >> we're going to walk town to the capitol. [ cheers ] >> we're going to walk down to the capitol. [ cheers ]

>> and we're not going to be cheering too much for some of them. they will never take back our country with weakness. you have to show strength -- >> yes. [ cheers ] >> invade the capitol building. >> -- do the right thing. >> take the capitol! >> take the capitol! >> take the capitol! >> take the capitol right now! >> so that's how the former president's words were received by a number of people who have been fed a diet month after month of lies by the former president. we've been told -- they had been told not to believe the officials, the judges, the supreme court judges, not to believe the electors. they've been told both that both day and night, day after day, that they had every right to be

angry. yet somehow his attorneys in their filing today said, quote, if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore had anything to do with the action at the capitol as it was clearly about the need to fight for election security in general. it sure doesn't seem like a lot of the folks who attacked the capitol were just doing it for election security in general. that didn't seem to be the rallying cry. some of them were overly choreography this -- overtly comparing this to a new american revolution and chanting about hanging mike pence. >> that's what we're doing, fighting back. >> what's the point? what's the end game? >> what's the point? >> yeah. >> we're losing our freedom. what do you mean what's the point? >> describe it to me. >> you not even knowing -- >> i will describe it to you. >> explain it to me -- >> what are we supposed to do? okay? >> tell me. >> the supreme court isn't helping us. no one is helping us. only us can help us. only we can do it. >> let's go! >> what are you going to do? >> whatever we have to do.

what do you think 1776 was? >> what do you think 1776 was? that guy's name is bardon shilvel. he's been charged with aiding and abetting, forcibly assaulting or interfering with a federal officer and violent entry. the president's team of attorneys will be arguing that he was just at the capitol fighting metaphorically for election security in general. looking at the capitol tonight, hard not to think of everything that happened there not even a month ago and the seven lives lost in the wake of it, lives taken, not lost. and shortly tonight, one of the fallen returns home to it. the question now is how will he be honored by the men and women he protected and the democracy he died to save. perspective from benjamin ginsburg, and pete bharara, former u.s. attorney for the southern district of new york. so ben, the filing from the former president's legal team alleging his claims of voter fraud cannot be proven false, what do you make of their filing? >> they had a simple task to

keep the 45 republican senators that voted with them on the constitutionality provision happy, and they opened up a couple of doors that are going to cause great nervousness for that secrete jury. one of them is the first amendment part that he was using protected speech, even though it led to the incitement of a riot and the notion that there was not sufficient proof to show that he was wrong in his remarks is nonsense. there were all the court cases that you referred to before, the certificates by the individual states, that their votes were correct. and what are you saying about the election has never received any evidence at all and that's going to make the republican senators quite nervous. >> pete, do you agree with that? what ben is saying, essentially, is just the argument alone of

it's unconstitutional, you cannot put a former president -- you cannot impeach a former president, you can't put him on trial for impeachment for when he was in office -- if they had just stuck to that, that would give cover to a lot of senators to say, yeah, well, i agree with that. we don't need to go to the merits of the charges because just unconstitutional. >> look, i mean, these jurors are not traditional jurors and that you see in a criminal or civil trial in federal or state jurisdictions, and they can choose to base their vote on anything they want and choose to base their vote on a constitutional argument that by the way, is not only wrong if you talk to the overwhelming majority of legal experts but also as failed with respect to a particular vote in the senate. we already have that vote. 55-45. including five republicans said it is okay and constitutional and proper and legal to proceed. you can, in fact, have a senate trial of impeachment with

respect to a former president so in some ways, that question is settled and i don't know that senators at either party have much pause when it comes to what their strong believes are and on the republican side, what they want to avoid saying or doing. >> ben, is that settled? i mean, the argument that a former president can be impeached? >> i don't think it's settled. there's not any sort of court ruling about it. the congress is a judge of their own procedures, and there's nothing to stop the 45 republican senators from voting not to convict because they're wrong about the constitutionality argument. there is no consequence against that, which is way the democrats need to present and have indicated they're going to present sort of a strong visual, emotional case to try and get the republicans nervous. and again, that brief filed

today is helpful to the democrats, actually. >> helpful to the democrats because it raises uncomfortable questions that challenge republicans? >> yes, precisely. i mean, the notion that donald trump was right about election fraud is an argument that republican senators don't have to make. remember, even when they were challenging the state certifications on january 6th, they never argued that there was fraud involved. now donald trump's lawyers have brought that subject back up in that portion of their answer that you just read. >> preet, when you look at what was filed by the president's attorneys, they misspelled the united states in their filing right off the top. >> they did. >> how does something like that just fall through the cracks? i mean, is it just -- they're rushing to get it to kinkos to print? >> look, it's not a brilliant

piece of legal writing, but to give them some credit and to forgive them somewhat, they don't have a lot to work with. i think the arguments that the president is making and the arguments they must have had to make with their client, the president, given the reporting about a raft of lawyers resigning from the case a few days ago, it's a very challenging thing apparently, both financially because he doesn't like to pay his bills apparently and substantively to represent the president -- this president, former president of the united states, so they don't have a lot to work with. they're being dictated things probably literally probably sentences being dictated by donald trump. they were in a rush because they were only retained recently and this is the product you get. by contrast, you have a very carefully thought out -- i mean, just trying to be objective about it, you have a well-written 80-page submission with democrats in favor of the

conviction of the article of impeachment that lays out i think a very clear narrative, marshalls the evidence and makes legal arguments that make sense and to my quick eye no glaring typos on page one. >> so preet, as a former prosecutor, how do you think the house managers should go about presenting their case? >> there was a reference earlier that ben made to the possibility that they're going to make an emotional case based on videos and arguments that appeal to passion. ordinarily somebody might think that doesn't make the best possible case. you argue facts and rules, but think about what is being alleged here. what's being alleged here is that the president of the united states incited on insurrection. the way you incite an insurrection is appealing to passion and causing people knowing they are able to be warning signs, including probably from his own law enforcement officials and

certainly, as you pointed out, from the election official in georgia, that if you don't tone down the rhetoric, bad things are going to happen. people will be armed and killed. that turned out to be true. so the entire nature of the proceeding, because of the nature of the crime, the high crime or misdemeanor being charged, is very saturated with emotion. and so i think it's an appropriate way for them to go about it to show the public that donald trump had every reason to foresee that violence would occur if he spoke the way he spoke and didn't calm people down. >> yeah. >> and that he wanted to overturn the election. it wasn't just that he was promoting this idea of protest. he wanted a particular action. he wanted that action from the secretary of the state of georgia. he wanted that action from his own vice president, mike pence, and when those things failed and a bunch of that i mentioned, he wanted those protesters, the context shows, to figure out a way by force to impede the counting of the votes and overturn the election. i think that's clear.

>> >> appreciate it. thank you. joining us is hakim jeffreys that served in the president's first trial. thanks for being with us. what do you make of the trump team's legal argument that the trial is unconstitutional because donald trump is no longer president and his speech is protected because there is no proof that he was wrong about election fraud? >> well, certainly a settled question that the trial can proceed even when a former executive branch, elected official or official has stepped down. the very nature of an insurrection, by definition, is it will come at the end of a president's term to halt the peaceful transfer of power. and so it would defy logic and accountability if someone could simply halt a trial because there was a failed coup attempt or failed attempt at sedition

and insurrection, and, therefore, escape accountability. and so i think that that is an argument that is not compelling at all. and with respect to the alleged truthfulness of the president's remarks, every reasonable person in america knows that joe biden won the election. he won the election by more than 80 million votes. he's governing now on behalf of people who voted for him and voted against him, working on tough challenges on behalf of the american people. and that it was donald trump who was the individual who refused to accept the results and radicalize millions of people which resulted in the violent attack on the capitol on january 6th. >> the idea the defense theme would include the false claims in the former response to congress and state insufficient evidence exists to make a determination on those claims, ben ginsburg was saying that it's just ridiculous. i mean, those claims have been rejected and some 60 court cases.

>> we have a client in the former president, the twice-impeached president and a disgraced president who is directing his legal team to do his bid and go carry out this narrative fantasy of the presidency being stolen. the big lie continues to be perpetrated by donald trump. and that's why we are where we are. and the hope is there will be enough decent and fair-minded senate republicans who are going to follow the facts, apply the law, be guided by the constitution, and let the chips fall where they may once the compelling evidence by the impeachment managers is presented and hold him accountable for the charge of inciting a violent insurrection. >> the rules of the trial are still being finalized. senator lindsey graham on fox news yesterday said if democrats hold a lengthy trial, including

calling witnesses, it could open quote a pandora's box. what do you make of that? >> well, i think lindsey graham is divorced from reality at this particular point in time because he's no longer in charge of making these decisions on his side of the aisle and suppressing the ability of witnesses to be called or threatening to call irrelevant witnesses. that was the gain that the republican senators played during the last impeachment trial when they controlled the majority but there is a in -- new sheriff in town as it relates to what's going on in the senate, and fairness is going to dictate the witnesses that i believe will be called in this trial. and that's a good thing for truth, for justice, and for the american people. >> congressman hakeem jeffries, appreciate your time. >> breaking news on what happens to the freshman republican congresswoman who questioned if the parkland shooting was a false flag operation and doubted whether a plane really hit the

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president called a future star. she's a qanon supporting among other things, facing possible disciplinary action from congress and perhaps her own party for remarks she's made in the past. here she is in some newly uncovered video before a protest two years ago advocating her followers stormed the capitol. >> if we flood the capitol building, flood all the government buildings, go inside, these are public buildings. we own them. we own these buildings. do you understand that? we own the buildings and pay all the people that work in the buildings. >> we asked the congresswoman's office for comment on the video and got no reply. she's still tweeting, including a retweet of a letter with unproven allegations of house members. republican leaders showed signs of losing patience with her but they seem more willing to discipline members such as

liz cheney. george conway, good to have you on the program again. so this new congress has been in session for almost a month. what does it say that republicans can't decide if they're the party of liz cheney and mitt romney and donald trump and marjorie taylor greene? >> i think we're watching, if it hasn't happened already, the moral collapse of the republican party. this is a product of four years of people who knew better being silent about donald trump, who himself was a conspiracy theorist who told 30,000 lies this office, who talked about ridiculous fake miracle cures like for covid who pretended like covid would go away and told the biggest lie of all that resulted in violence, the big election lie that he had actually won the election by a landslide but he was cheated out out of it. and in the last three months of his term, he tried to destroy, i mean, this is what the impeachment is about

he tried to destroy constitutional democracy in the united states of america. and through all of that republicans were largely silent they didn't call him out on this. and the problem now is this conspiracy theoryism, the qanon insanity, all of this has metastasized. and a significant portion of it devoted to not just donald trump but insanity. i don't know how you have a republican party that can survive with the likes of liz cheney being attacked for standing up for the rule of law and meanwhile, this woman marjorie taylor greene propounding bizarre theories and saying that the speaker of the house should be assassinated and talking about jewish space

lasers. i don't know how this party can survive like that. >> what do you make of the slew of republican senators criticizing marjorie taylor greene? are they trying to get on the record, al bae beit belatedly for the sake of their reputations or do you give them more credit than that? jim i think said to cameras before or said to cnn before he didn't think kevin mccarthy was going to take her off her committee assignments. >> yeah, i think they are concerned, many of these senators about her. they should be. it's destroying the republican party to have, you know, the insurrection, to have this is scaring away middle class voters in the suburbs of swing states and elsewhere. they should be terrified -- >> you have lindsey graham today saying he's giving marjorie taylor greene the benefit of the doubt because he had a quote very pleasant time traveling with her and wants to know if her social media posts were manipulated. i mean -- >> yeah, that's their problem is

they're scared of this and what this is doing to the stature of the party in these suburban enclaves, but they're terrified of the base, which has been saturated with these toxic lies. they're caught between these two elements and i don't know how it's sustainable. >> it did seem like lindsey graham had a moment like the night of the insurrection where he said i'm done. you know, i hate that it ended this way. you know, he was a president of consequence which means, you know, that's praise that doesn't mean anything. but now it seems like he gets yelled at in the airport and all of a sudden, he just won a new term. he's got six years. i don't understand what he's so scared about. >> i don't, either. i'd rather if i were in the position of a lindsey graham, i'd rather go down fighting for

truth and reasonableness and the rueful -- rule of law. he's terrified of these people and that's the problem that we have created with the republicans are created by not standing up to donald trump for four years is a monster. they can't -- they are terrified of a base that is saturated with these lies where fox news isn't even good enough for them anymore. they have to go to other outlets like one america news network to get their fill of what they want to believe even if it completely defies reality. >> so what happens? >> i don't know how you walk back from that brink. >> so what happens? i mean, where does -- what happens for the republican party? >> i don't know. i mean, i don't know how -- i think that the republican party, if it keeps going down this path, is going to start bleeding

educated, suburban voters who are reasonable, maybe conservative, but not extreme, and who are reality based. they're going to continue to bleed those people. it may well be too late if even people stand up to marjorie taylor greene because there are so many people in the house who may not be quite as outspoken or bad in the sense that they say crazy things all the time, but they say crazy things some of the time and, you know, 140 or so members of the house bought on to the president's big lie theory -- >> even after -- >> yes -- >> even after the insurrection. george, if you could stay there. we're getting news from capitol hill on this. cnn ryan nobles at the capitol now. late word on the congresswoman. ryan, what's the word? >> reporter: that's right, anderson. we're told that the republican

house leader kevin mccarthy has called members of the steering committee into a private meeting. now, this is significant because the steering committee is the body that's responsible for deciding who sits on house committees, who represents the republican party at these house committees. now, as far as we can tell, the meeting between empathy and marjorie taylor greene is ongoing. we've seen both greene and mccarthy come in and out of his office, go onto the house floor to cast votes and then go back behind closed doors to continue their conversation. but the fact that mccarthy would now take the step bringing the steering committee into the room would indicate there could be movement as it relates to her future on these committees. now, we don't know what is happening in this conversation right now. it is behind closed doors and it is ongoing, but it is a significant development that the steering committee members have been brought into the conversation. >> interesting. we'll keep checking with you.

george conway is back with us. george, you know, it's always a danger to read tea leaves but the question is does she keep her committee assignments? she's on the education committee and the budget committee as well. >> obviously we don't know what that -- what's going to result from tonight's meetings. it's possible they do the right thing and strip her of these committee assignments. the fact of the matter is, it may be for the republican party too little too late. she's still going to be a member of the house. the same forces that elected her elected people like this woman in colorado and western colorado, lauren boebert. there are other people, not quite as bad, but pretty bad, who are basically donald trump cultists or almost qanon types.

they're still part of the party going forward. that's exemplified by the fact these people are still there. i think the best thing they can do that could be done for the republican party would be for republican senators to get on the stick and realize how they got where we are today instead of focussing on just criticizing one member of congress who is a whacko from focusing on the fact that a president of the united states attempted to end constitutional democracy in the united states and there should be a punishment for that. and congress should exercise power under impeachment clauses. to mete out that punishment. >> it does seem this is the moment for them to rid themselves for trump as a future, you know, rid them shelves of the former president hanging over their heads and then having to pay fealty to him

for the next four years and living in fear he's going to run again. >> right. i mean, i think politically their best chance at survival as a party is to lance the boil. i mean, he's the problem. he's not the only problem, but he's the principle problem. he's the reason why it all got worse. you know, he went out the other day and threw his support in favor of this congresswoman. and so -- you know, if they really want to try to save the party and bring it somewhere where it can function and bring it somewhere where it has a chance of reaching out to moderately conservative reality-based voters, they need to do something about donald trump, and they need -- it's their duty to do it. >> george, if you hold on one more second. i want to bring ryan nobles back in. is this the only template we have for this recently steve king, republicans taking him out

of his committees. is this how that come about? did they bring a steering committee in? can we read anything into that? >> reporter: you're right. steve king is a good example of how this process can play itself out. king, of course, the former congressman from iowa, was very controversial and said a number of incendiary things, particularly racist comments that led to a firestorm around the republican conference. that led mccarthy to begin the process of pulling him off the committees that he was assigned to, and it was the steering committee that made this decision. it somewhat inoculates the house minority leader or majority leader depending on the case we're dealing with from having to make the decision all by himself. so the fact that the steering committee was brought into this process, we have a precedent for this. steve king is the precedent. now, we don't know what's happening behind the closed doors. you know, is greene herself perhaps talking to the steering committee and making a case for why she should stay on? that we don't know, but you're absolutely right that in the

past when he wanted to take someone off the committee, it was done through the steering committee. >> ryan nobles, appreciate it. george conway, really appreciate it. thanks for sticking around. we'll be watching this closely. thanks, george. ahead, new research on how long antibodies may protect people from the coronavirus after they were infected and a separate report involving a new strain of the virus and protection from vaccines. really important information. that when we come back. incompn makes it beautiful. state of the art technology, makes it brilliant. the visionary lexus nx. lease the 2021 nx 300 for $359 a month for thirty six months. experience amazing at your lexus dealer.

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confirmation from those british study that those infected by the coronavirus keep antibodies for at least six months. the data did not indicate if it could provide protection from new variants, however, a separate study shows the new variant circulating there has acquired a concerning mutation, which we've seen among strains in south africa and brazil that could make it resistant to vaccines or lead to reinfection. want perspective from our chief medical correspondent dr. sanjay gupta and dr. michael osterholm director of the center for infectious disease, research and policy at the university of of minnesota and medical adviser during president joe biden's transition. i want to ask you about the report. does that mean one of the variants we know could be more transmissible, could be somewhat resistant to the vaccines? >> up until now that particular

strain you're talking about b 117 or the u.k. strain has only had the ability and i say only because it's still significant to cause more infection and likely more severe disease. now for the first time british officials found it also acquired the mutation we've been talking about with the south african strain and the brazilian strain that could possibly help it avoid the immune protection that we get from vaccines or natural disease. obviously, this is not a good development as this b 117 has shown how well it is able to be transmitted around the world. >> so sanjay, i find this a little confusing because fauci said with these variants that, you know, it's not great news, obviously. it's very concerning, particularly the south africa one and the brazilian one. but that a booster shot could be developed for each of these variants because they're kind of in the same family of the virus.

is that still the case, or is this just saying that there is basically more and more variants -- that is number of variants is growing? >> some of the variants like the one in the u.k. are acquiring more mutations or mutations that we've seen in other variants, so that's part of the problem. >> so wait. it's not -- so the u.k. variant or the south african, brazilian variant, they're not just one variant? they're now mutations of those variants? >> yeah, the way to think about it is a variant is an umbrella term. a variant basically means that the virus that we have thought about, the one that's circulating, acquires certain mutations. based on those mutations, you know, we know that there's three main mutations, for example, around the spike protein in the variant that's emanating from south africa. the u.k. one had one main mutation making it the variant, and as professor

osterholm said, it now has a different mutation, one we see in the south african variant. it will get confusing. the viruses mutate all the time. a lot of the mutations that occur are, frankly, inconsequential but sometimes these viruses mutate in a way that makes them as professor osterholm said more transmissible which is the way they go. but to answer your question, you could make retool the vaccines, and that's something that's sort of special, i think, or specific to these mrna vaccines or do it something similar to today, you think of vaccines taking four to six years to make -- to retool one of these vaccines, you could do it in four to six weeks. it still needs to go through some trials but there is bridging trials that could make the process go pretty quickly. we may be getting to that point. that could be the booster. dr. fauci said it's one of two. either you're giving another booster of the same vaccine

just basically trying to increase your antibody levels, or you give a booster that's more specific to the variant. the virus that has these mutations. >> professor, for everyone listening and myself included, which i tend to get concerned about the variants and mutations, the bottom line is still, we all need to be vaccinated. we need to get the vaccines that we can get. we need to have vaccines that need two doses, we need the two doses, and that needs to happen as quickly as possible for as many people as possible. that's still the basic truth, right? >> that's absolutely the case and just remember a vaccine can prevent a virus infection from happening, if if you don't have a virus, you don't get mutations. so this, in part, is how we're going to address the issue with the mutation situation. so again, vaccine, vaccine, vaccine. we can't say that enough times or loud enough. >> right. the more people who get vaccinated and as quickly as

possible, that will limit the continued spread of new variants and more mutations? >> right. i think the other note to make here is that as much as we're concerned about these variants that may compromise the immune response, when you actually look at the studies that were done by the j & j vaccine in south africa, it looked like what happened there was, yes, people did get infected with the variant strain even though they had the vaccine but it was much less severe and that we didn't see the big increase in hospitalizations or deaths. that by itself isn't the perfect end point. we'd like to prevent disease, but if we can prevent severe disease, hospitalization or deaths, that's a big victory belen blens against the variants. >> sanjay, we mentioned a u.k. study that found people that previously had covid-19 retained antibodies for at least six months. if you had antibodies against an old variant, how helpful would they be against a new variant?

? it's a really good question. i think they would be helpful. i spent time today digging into that question. i think they would be helpful in terms of as professor osterholm you don't want the virus. don't get me wrong. i don't think people want to get infected fwlchlt what is but what is it we really are hoping for? people don't get sick and don't get hospitalized and don't die. if we can show the j & j numbers, since you brought that up, it's important when you look at the vaccine how well it works, it doesn't work for mild to moderate disease against variants, as well but if you look at the bottom line on the right. 85% protection against severe disease. in these trials, five trials, 75,000 patients, nobody that got the vaccine in the trials died, which i think is really important. >> yeah, no, that is hugely important. sanjay, thank you. i feel a little better.

professor michael osterholm, appreciate it. thank you. >> thank you. >> tonight as the capitol is to honor officer brian sicknick, you see the rotunda where he will lie in honor. the officer died as a result of juries suffered in the attack last month. we'll tell you about the supermarket heir recess that paid for much of that. all that when we continue. quit cold turkey. kidding me?! instead, start small. with nicorette. which can lead to something big. start stopping with nicorette heir reces s heiress

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as we mentioned at the top of the program, the remains of capitol police officer brian sicknick will lie in the rotunda tonight for a tribute tomorrow. the ceremony is a rare one reserved for political leaders. because of the pandemic it will be closed to the public.

later in the day officer sicknick's remains will be buried at arlington national cemetery. his loved ones wrote, knowing our -- evan perez reports investigators are struggling to build a murder case in the wake of his death. to -- sicknick, who was a 13-year veteran of the capitol police force died a day of the riot. with each passing day it seems we're learning more about those that took part in the attack. for many, the underpinning was the rally just before. who paid for it? ranke kay looks into who footed the bill. >> a donor paid for 80% of it. >> reporter: that's conspiracy theorist alex jones talking about a key donor that help fund if bulk of the rally in washington, d.c. that donor, according to "the wall street journal" is julie

jenkins fancelli, the heiress of the multi-billion dollar publix super market. $300,000. according to to the journal. she's worth nearly $9 billion. she didn't respond to cnn's request for comment but did issue a statement to "the wall street journal" saying i am a proud conservative and have real concerned associates with election integrity. and i would never support any violence, particularly the tragic and horrific events that unfolded on january 6th. florida-based publix has more than 100 store in the southeast and 800 here in florida alone. the backlash against the chain that be swift with the #boycott publix on twitter. one user tweeted, won't be shopping with this dictatorship wannabe organization.

another user tweeted called for a boycott writing profits from this supermarket chain were used to fund trump's illegal and seditious efforts. at stealing lt election. and over throwing democracy. despite that, publix's spokesperson toll us -- we she's not an employee. is neither involved in business operations or represent the company in any way. we cannot comment on her actions. they do not represent the values, work or opinion of our supermarket. cannot comment on misfancli's actions. this isn't the first time fancelli and publix have been in the spotlight because of donations. in 2019 she donated $2,000 to florida's republican governor and in december last year, publix donated $100,000 to his pact, friends of ron desantis. >> so great to be here at publix.

>> reporter: that was a month before desantis announced a partnership with publix's pharmacies to carry the vaccine in florida. >> i'm delighted to be here to make an exciting announcement regarding covid-19 vaccinations for our senior citizens. the timing of it all raised eyebrows. the governor's office denies the vaccine deal with publix was any quid pro quo, telling us those claims were baseless and ridiculous. some on social media need convincing, one twitter user write, desantis has to go. he gave publics the vaccine distribution after they gave him money. >> randy, how many pharmacies are offering vaccines in florida? >> just tonight the governor said he's increasing the amount that will be offering it now. a total of 325 publix pharmacies.

the problem is, publix isn't everywhere, is people who live there don't have access. it's not in low income communities. the state is certainly trying to help. they have these mobile units going out. they have vaccination events taking place at churches. but a lot of folks asking, why not expand it to other pharmacy chains in the state? but now for the time being, if you're going to a pharmacy it is only available at publix because of the deal with the state. >> randy, thank you very much from florida. we'll be right back. you can both adjust your comfort with your sleep number setting. can it help me fall asleep faster? yes, by gently warming your feet. but, can it help keep me asleep? absolutely, it intelligently senses your movements and automatically adjusts to keep you both effortlessly comfortable. will it help me come out swinging? you got this. so, you can really promise better sleep? not promise... prove. and now, during the ultimate sleep number event, save 50% on the sleep number 360 limited edition smart bed.

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sorry, we ran out of time with breaking news about the marjorie taylor greene meeting. breaking news continues with chris cuomo. >> we'll pick up the news about what republicans decide to do. i'll do my best impersonation. thank you very much. i'm chris cuomo. welcome to "primim