back from mars. watch this. it's the first time we've seen video. this is the landing. see it blow out sand. a harrowing descent to the martian surface last week. astro scientists believe was a river delta on mars hunting for signs of life. "ac 360" starts now. so this is not the kind of monday to ease you into the week. it's the other kind. john berman here for anderson. flags are flying at half staff for the white house and capitol. they were lowered late today when deaths from covid crossed the 500,000 mark. the president, vice president and spouses held a candle light ceremony and moment of silence at the white house tonight to honor the fallen. >> we often hear people described as ordinary americans. there is no such thing. there is not anything ordinary about them. the people we lost were

extraordinary. they spanned generations. born in america, immigrated to america, but just like that, so many of them took their final breath alone in america. i know all too well, i know what it's like to not be there when it happens. i know what it's like when you are there holding their hands. there is a look in their eye and they slip away. >> the president tonight and to put it in perspective, he took office with fatalities having just crossed 400,000. nearly 100,000 lives have been lost since then. a quarter million in the last three months, 500,000 plus in about a year. no, there are a number of ways of expressing the awful figures, whether so many football stadiums, this many towns, this city or that ocho , these wars

combined. it boils down to this, we all know someone who grieves or worse, someone who is gone. whatever scale the loss may be, whether close enough to touch or too large to grasp, it's clear by now we've seen too much. more on this tonight along with confirmation hearings for the first attorney general in four years who was not expected to serve as the president's personal lawyer and captain sullenberger on the dramatic engine failure on a 777 over the weekend. the professionalism the drew demonstrated and the concerns about the engines in question and because it's one of those mondays, there is more which it's actually where we begin with the supreme court clearing the way for the former president's accounting firm to turnover his taxes to a manhattan grand jury. in other words, with apologies to gerald ford, the long national farce is over. and make no mistake, it's been going on longer than you might imagine, shy of a decade than

the once impeached private citizen said this. >> maybe i'll do the tax returns when obama does the birth certificate. >> president obama did do his birth dcertificate but the faild casino operator did not do the tax returns. this is what he said about it three years later. >> you questioned his citizen ship during his campaign and you said afterwards, if he produced that long form, you would produce your tax returns but you didn't do it, did you? >> did he do it? if i decide to run for office, i'll produce my tax returns, absolutely. i'd love to do that. >> love to. mean it. but no. it's kind of like that new yorker cartoon where the guy says to someone on the phone, no thursdays, how about never is never good for you? >> at some point prior to the election, i'm going to be giving out a financial report. i don't mind releasing. i'm under a routine audit and it

will be released. >> donald trump has every intention of releasing his tax returns once a routine audit is completed. >> i will release my tax returns against my lawyer's wishes. when she releases her 33,000 emails that have been deleted. i would love to give them, but i'm not going to do it while i'm under audit. very simple. >> those tax returns will be coming when the routine audit is done. >> any closer to releasing the tax returns? >> i'm thinking about it. maybe when we find out the true story on hillary's emails. >> that's where they left it. it is not, however, where it stands now. more on that from our randi kaye. >> yeah, he's a nice looking man. >> reporter: that's former playboy model karen mcdougal sharing details about her alleged affair in 2006 with donald trump. adult film actress stormy daniels claims she had an affair with trump around the same time. >> you had sex with him in.

>> yes. >> reporter: donald trump denied having a relationship with either woman or knowing anything about alleged attempts to silence them in the final months of his 2016 campaign but so-called hush money payments made to these two women are at the heart of new york prosecutor cyrus vance's investigation and with the supreme court's latest ruling, vance will have access to tax returns dating back to 2011. in 2018 trump was asked about so-called hush money payments made by his former attorney and fixer michael cohen. >> do you know about the $130,000 payment to stormy daniels? >> no, no. you have to ask michael cohen. michael is my attorney and you'll have to ask michael cohen. >> do you know where he got the money to make that payment? >> i don't know. >> reporter: during michael cohen's congressional testimony, he suggested trump is very much

in the know as he wired $130,000 to stormy daniels lawyer. >> in addition to the personal check for $35,000 in july 2017 is there additional core operating evidence that mr. trump while a sitting president of the united states directly reimburse you hush money as part of a scheme to finance laws. >> there are 11 checks that i received for the year. >> reporter: the new york prosecutor will be looking to these documents for possible violations of campaign finance law by trump and his family. also, whether the trump organization disguised hush money payments as legal expenses. beyond that, prosecutors in new york are hoping to figure out the source of trump's wealth, who his business partners are, who has loaned him money and whether the trump organization profited during his presidency. no doubt investigators will want to know how in 2016 and 2017 trump paid just $750 in federal

income taxes according today "new york times" and took bizarre deductions including $70,000 to take care of his hair and writing off hundreds of thousands of dollars paid to his daughter ivanka as a consultant for the trump organization. all of it perhaps part of the alleged aggressive tax avoiding tactics that michael cohen eluded to during testimony? >> mr. trump inflated total assets such as trying to be listed amongst the wealthiest people in forbes and deflated his assets to reduce his real estate taxes. everything was done with the knowledge and direction of mr. trump. >> reporter: as a sitting president, donald trump count be indicted but now, citizen trump can no longer protected by the walls of the oval office. >> randi kaye joins me from palm beach. i can't imagine the former president is sitting at home

tonight happy about this. >> reporter: no, in fact, he's just here at mar-a-lago across the water behind me, john. he's probably very unhappy about this. as you know, he's been fighting the release of his financial records for years and his tax returns. in fact, after the supreme court issued a decision today, he issued a statement lashing out at the court and the investigation calling it a continuation of the greatest political witch hunt in the history of our country. there is a bright spot for the former president. john, the fact is his tax records and financial documents will not be released to the public. they will not be given to congress unless that new york prosecutor cyrus vance files charges. in that case, those records would be part of the court record, part of the public record and we would all be able to see them. but for now, they will be kept only for the eyes for that grand jury and for those investigators but i can tell you, john, that the horse is really out of the barn. i mean, the former president has exhausted all efforts here to keep those records private.

his accounting firm issuing a statement, as well, saying they are committed to fulfilling all of their professional and legal obligations. so again, all efforts exhausted here for the former president, john. >> all right. interesting. randi kaye, thank you very much. joining us now, "the new york times" suzanne craig who shared the 2019 politzer prize and cnn legal analyst and white house norm. i want to start with you he's a private citizen in the u.s. what do you think would be most significant that prosecutors will now have access to? >> it's interesting because the news today and the headline is that the tax returns will be turned over but what is actually i think really significant about today's decision is the tax returns are one piece of it, and also to be turned over are going to be the records from the accounting firm, which will include notes and communications between the accounting firm and

donald trump and the trump organization and i think with all of this information that's coming in, they're going to start to be able to piece together what they are looking for. for example, just on the payment to stormy daniels that is much discussed, we didn't see that in the tax return information that we have. it's not there. it's not a line item. they potentially would be able to get a lot of detailed information about what is in the legal fee category and that could be there. it may not be. they will start to be able to see a picture that will come together. >> talk a little more about that. that's interesting, suzanne. obviously, in the tax returns you're not going to see a line item that says hush money to porn star. it doesn't work like that -- >> or there could have been a payment that we would have seen in the tax returns to stormy daniels. it's not there. but it could have been put in another category like legal fees where we don't have transparency into it with the tax return information that we saw, but cy

vance will be able to get that detailed stuff and that will come together when you see the pieces being put together through these different pieces of information. >> that's an important distinction. it's the notes and information that could be the decoder ring to understanding the tax returns and the tax data. some of which you've seen. >> the accounting firm has to go through it so it will be interesting to see what is in there. >> ambassador, you say the accountability era against donald trump now begins. what do you mean? >> john, thanks for having me back on the program. ex president trump managed to successfully forstall criminal, civil, two impeachments, regulatory and a variety of legal remedies but he could only delay them, john, because in our rule of law system as the supreme court wrote when it

first decided the manhattan d.a.'s right to subpoena these materials, nobody including a president is above the law. so now he's going to face very serious jeopardy. when i worked on the first in impea impeachment, we looked at the records for the hush money payments and prosecutors have said that they were not accurately booked. now, these papers may shed light on them. there is a lot of other records of that. there is tax issues. there is insurance issues. there is bank loan issues and that's just one case, john. he's also looking at serious potential criminal liability in georgia for his shameful call to brad to find 11,780 votes. civil cases and on and on. so accountability is coming for donald trump. >> in terms of taxes and financial information, how much jeopardy do you think he's in or

could be in, norm, and put it in perspective. we know that a sitting president can't be criminally charged or hasn't been criminally charged but it's pretty unprecedented for a former president to face criminal charges, too, isn't it? >> it is but we've never had a president like donald trump before, john. i think it's healthy that this is unfolding at the state level including in new york because you don't like to see that spector of donald trump saying well, the guy who beat me is now retaliating. there is no question about that, and i think that the jeopardy is substantial. just look at the hush money payments. we know we already have some evidence in the public record that those were reflected as legal fees. john, they were not legal fees, and in new york state when you create false books and records to cover up for another issue and we know michael cohen pled

guilty to campaign finance crimes in connection with these hush money payments, that's a close e felony. that is a serious felony and that's just the hush money payments as suzanne says, there is so much more in new york and that's before you get to the other criminal and civil cases so donald trump has got to be feeling very, very uneasy tonight. >> suzanne, we heard in randi kaye's piece from michael cohen who was talking about some of the things the former president is alleged to have done from inflating the value of his properties for better loan deals to under valuing them for tax purposes. based on what you know and what you've seen, what would be the holy grail here for prosecutors? que what questions do you have that are unanswered? >> well, i mean, i think going deeper into the documents and matching up, you know, some of the things that aren't in the tax returns that could be deeper in the other documents they

have. you know, you mentioned the valu valuations, that's one thing talked about a lot on that. valuations can be tricky because normally evaluation comes from a professional advisor and you can say i relied on professional advice but then you have to go deeper and say well did they seek two or three valuations? did they go valuation shopping? and you start to build a case. these are the things i think will be potentially embedded in other information that cy vance the prosecutor involved will be getting. >> one last question, suzanne. consulting fees for ivanka trump is something you exposed in your reporting. what more information might there be on that? >> i think that you're going to be looking for specifics about where the money went, not only to ivanka but whether consulting to his other children. what did they do to earn them? was it a no show thing or attempt to avoid the gift tax.

>> suzanne -- >> so those are the things they will be looking for. >> thank you both so much for helping us understand this. it is a new era as norm points out. that is for sure. next, our medical team on today's covid milestone but what could be the road to recovery and later, the long haul airliner you're most likely to fly and questions about safety in the wake of a fiery engine failure over the rockies this weekend. my conversation with captain sully sullenberger ahead on "360." ♪ jackson hewitt knows times have changed... ...both how and where you work. and your taxes could have changed too. let our tax pros work for you and fight for every dollar you deserve. priceline works with top hotels, to save you up to 60%.

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the president tonight spoke in the sadness of the moment and in tonight's covid milestone. he reminded americans to take heart how far we've climbed back up as a nation. half a million lives have been lost but as of tonight, more than 64 million vaccination doses have been given. perspective on the moment from cnn chief medical correspondent dr. sanjay gupta and farmer baltimore health commissioner. sanjay, you know, it's interesting. president biden expressed sadness and shared a moment of grief with the american people and that's important emotionally and psychologically but it also might be important in terms of battling this pandemic because one of the most significant things that you note as we sit here 500 tho,000 deaths later ie possibility of something you call empathy fade. the idea that we're -- we've lost the ability to care enough

anymore. why is that so important? >> well, you know, john, first of all, this is -- it's a sad moment, you know. obviously, what is happening as you've said and it makes you angry, as well, i think because you do realize so many of these deaths were preventable, and there are still lessons to be learned right now. i mean, you know, no one should be looking at this in the rearview mirror. there are lessons that can be applied now and lives can be saved. one of the things, john, as reporting on this. tell you the story of one person who died from covid and you will listen to that story and maybe have a lot of empathy. if i tell you that story 500 thousand times what happens is that people's compassion starts to fade or their empathy starts to fatigue and, you know, my point was earlier is that we can't let that happen. we cannot let that happen because that would be essentially missing the biggest lesson of all that this becomes

normal, these numbers wash over us and we sort of suffer from the psychic numbness. this is not normal. i think about this with my kids all the time. they should not think what happened this past year is normal. this should never happen again and we should learn the lessons now. >> such an important point. dr. nguyen, our viewers in the country looked to you for guidance, in fact, so much the past year. what is going through your mind tonight? >> well, i think, too, what sanjay just mentioned about this really unthinkable milestone that we've just hit. i also think about all the lives that we could have saved but didn't because of a variety of things that happened, lack of a national response and i also think about what still needs to be done. my biggest fear now is complacency. we do see the numbers trending in the right direction, thankfully. cases falling, hospitalizations falling, deaths falling at last but we are not out the woods yet.

we don't have nearly enough immunity in the u.s. from vaccines, from people recovering and we still have the vast majority of the country that's still potentially susceptible to coronavirus. there are projections we could lose upwards of 150,000 people in the u.s. by the summer, and all those deaths and suffering that's to come just as we've been saying for the entire pandemic, this is not preordained. there are things we can do now that will continue to be on our guard for one another. the vaccines are coming and fantastic and there is so much hope but things each of us can still do right now to protect ourselves and one another. >> what happens depends on what we do and what has happened is very much a result of the decisions we made and sanjay, as you have noted before, this is uniquely american failure what's happened here over the last year over these 500,000 deaths. what do you think the major lessons that have been learned are? >> this is the thing i've been thinking about the most, john,

over the last several months now. you know, some of them are very tangible lessons. we didn't invest in our public health system, and this is sort of a sort of larger problem. we tend not to invest in things that are preventive that we don't have an immediate benefit, thingsless visible we pay less attention to. this idea we could have essentially became pandemic proof as some described it to me with investments of 10, $15 billion and those suggests were made and yet, we didn't do it so our public health system -- but a lot of it, john, has to do with how we evaluate risk in our society. i was having this conversation with someone the other day. if it was primarily young children affected by this, would our response have been different? do we value the elderliless in this country? there are so many tangible things, testing, masks,

communications, outsourcing of materials, supplies. who are we? our humanity. what did we really show? that is something that really harmed us here because so many of these deaths again were preventable. no family likes to hear their loved one's death is preventable and i apologize for saying that but so many were and we still can apply the lessons that we're learning right now to the future. >> dr. nguyen, in terms of new information and where we are tonight, dr. walensky talked about a study that showed teachers were a probable source of several covid-19 outbreaks but didn't say the teachers need to get more priority for vaccines. how do you reconcile that? >> it's a major mistake. the c didc and biden administran needs to step up now and say teacher vaccinations are essential. they say it's up to state

governments and federal governments. vaccines and deploying the national guard to get vaccinations to educators, to school staff. if getting our children back in school in person is really a priority, we need to be vaccinating our teachers and as sanjay mentioned, this is about societals priorities and time for the biden administration to show us what their priorities are and if it's about children and our future, we should be protecting teachers and school staff, too. >> sanjay, dr. nguyen, thank you both for what you've done tonight and throughout the whole year. appreciate it. reminder, krcnn present as special memorial to the 500,000 lives lost so far tonight at 11:00 eastern time. five years in the making, judge merritt garland gets a confirmation hearing. questions and a moment that silence theed room. the details when we return. she wished there was a way to make it last longer.

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president obama nominated him for the supreme court merit garland got a hearing. this time as the nation's top law enforcement official. attorney general. more now on a tense hearing from congressional correspondent ryan nob nobles. >> reporter: merrick garland making it clear the justice department he runs will be different from the one he would inherit. >> i am not the president's lawyer. i am the united states lawyer. >> reporter: garland pledged an independent doj. one that would follow the rule of law and pursue prosecutions in confronting america's biggest problem. >> if confirmed, i will super vice the prosecution of white supremacists and others that stormed the capitol on january 6th. heinous attack that sought to disrupt a corner stone of our democracy. the peaceful transfer of power to a newly-elected government.

>> reporter: garland a federal judge said the investigation into the january 6th insurrection will be a massive job and his top priority. >> i think this was the most heinous attack on the democratic process that i've ever seen and one that i never expected to see in my lifetime. one of the very first things i will do is get a briefing on the progress of this investigation. i intend to give the career prosecutors who are working on this matter 24/7 all the resources they could possibly require to do this. >> reporter: garland took tough questions from republican senators on a wide range of controversial topics like his support of the death penalty for oklahoma city bomber timothy mcveigh. something he says he doesn't regret and garland says he is now come to question capital punishment in general. >> because of how seldom it's

applied and desperate impact on black americans and members of other communities of color. those are the things that give me pause. >> reporter: he also pushed back on the idea of defunding the police. >> president biden has said he does not support defunding the police and neither do i. >> reporter: arguing that while reform of policing is necessary, a whole sale reduction in funding is not the answer. br ryan nobles joins us. democrats supportive of the nomination. what are you hearing from republicans? >> reporter: john, it looks like this nomination will sail through the united states senate. joe biden obviously going with a more moderate pick in merrick and particularly impressed with his performance. chuck grassley of iowa, john cornen of texas left saying they believe garland should be confirmed. there are other nominees the biden administration is nervous

about, merrick garland is no th to be confirmed. the most poignant moment of the day, judge garland's response to the question how his painful family history informed his career and prosecuting and justice intolerance. >> i come from a family where my grandparents fled anti-semitism and persecution the country tack us in and protected us. and i feel an obligation to the country to pay back and this is the highest best use of my own set of skills to pay back so i want very much to be the kind of

attorney general that you're saying i could become. i'll do my best to try to be that attorney general. >> what a moment. perspective from cnn chief national correspondent john king and cnn chief political analyst gloria borger. gloria, the emotion in that moment was palpable. the world stood still not just what he was saying but his history, prosecuting oklahoma city and the attack on the u.s. capitol. history going forward. the fact judge garland pledged to prosecute white sup prelimi -- supremacy. it was remarkable. >> it was a remarkable moment. you could hear in his voice somebody that spent his entire career devoted to public service and when he talks about pay back, he's not talking about pay

back like we've heard over the last four years as in revenge, he's talking about paying back to this country that he is so devoted to. when you look at his resume, it is a resume of public service and i don't think anybody sitting in that room whether they agree with the biden agaena or disagree with the biden agenda could not help but feel for him because they, too, in their own ways, some more than others consider themselves public servants and there is, you know, you can only admire what he was saying there. >> john, the messaging wasn't subtle overall with judge garland. >> never is. >> it never is. particularly this time with judge garland saying i'm not going to be the president's attorney, i'llm going to be the attorney of the united states. what a time to take over as the attorney of the united states. there is so much to do. >> look, across his desk in the months ahead, he's going to be

confirmed easily and get overwhelming republican support as well as democrats. the u.s. attorney looking into hunter biden's taxes, if there is something there, that's difficult for the attorney general. if there is nothing, it's difficult. he has to convince republican skeptics they scrubbed it. rudy giuliani investigations, trump's investigations.presiden. he wants to remove the president's relationship with the attorney general. a lot of politics will come across his desk plus the insurrection investigation and race relations, plus voting rights. this is an incredibly difficult job and incredibly consequential moment. >> gloria, he did face direct questions what are you going to do about the hunter biden investigations? are you going to do about andrew cuomo in new york? what are you going to do about the russia investigation? how do you think he answered

those questions? >> he said i don't know yet. i don't know enough about it yet. what he did say, what he did make clear he did not talk to the president of the united states about hunter biden and that he is not yet picked up the phone and called john durham who is doing the investigation into the fbi's role in the trump russia matter, that he is someone who like a good judge hasn't heard the case yet. and so he showed that he had an open mind that he wasn't likely to sweep anything under the rug, and don't forget, there is a context here for merri ck garland. people respect him as a judge. people know what happened five years ago when he couldn't get a hearing as a supreme court nominee but comes into that role with a lot of respect on both sides of the aisle. so when he says i got to figure it out, i think i have to take

him at his word. >> gloria, john, don't go far. when we return, he's back or he will be. this weekend, the former president will give his first public speech since leaving office and by the sound of it, the far right already got the talking points. we'll explain when "360" returns. emulsions for 100% whiter teeth. its highly active peroxide droplets swipe on in seconds. better. faster. 100% whiter teeth. crestwhitesmile.com

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on the president's tax documents comes as he's about to make the first public appearance since leaving the white house. he's scheduled to speak at the annual conservative political action conference known as cpac. the speech will be about the quote future of the republican party and the conservative movement, neither of which it seems can quit the former president. for instance, just this weekend the number two republican in the house congressman steve scalise was repeatedly asked a simple question who won the election

and he couldn't answer it. >> the election was not stolen, correct? >> look, joe biden is the president. there were a few states that did not follow their state laws. that's really the dispute that you've seen continue on. >> i asked you is he the legitimate president of the united states and do you concede that this election was not sto stolen? very simple question, please answer it. >> once the electors are counted, yes, he's the legitimate question. if you ignore the fact there were states that did not follow their own state legislatively set laws, that's the issue at heart. >> so those replies as squirrely as they are aren't as bad as what's on the agenda at cpac. for starters, this is a seven-part series protecting elections. seven parts spans the entirety of the conference and just to give you a taste of what is in store, here are session titles. protecting elections part two, other culprits, why judges and

media refuse to look at evidence and protecting elections part three. the left pulled the strings, covered it up and admits it and there is also this panel did your vote count ask the experts. back with us, john king and gloria borger. john, the title of the sessions gets to the world the former president is living in. you saw it's almost a parallel universe, what do you mean? it is a parallel universe, look what happened today. america marked this horrific, horrific milestone. 500 thousand of our friends and neighbors and relatives dead from covid. most of that is on president trump who walked away from science and common sense, ignored a pandemic on his watch. what happened on january 6th? an insurrection that came after a rally led by the former president. he is stained by history. he's stained by his actions. he's stained by his record but he has what used to be an organization born of william f

buckley about conservative ideas and rebels and challenging the establishment. that's what it is, john, pure and simple. i covered cpac for years. that organization doesn't exist anymore. in the is the trump parallel universe. let's promote the big lie, attack on the truth, attack on the fact, attack on decency and democracy, go forit. >> gloria, one person that won't be at cpac is the former vice president mike pence and you got new reporting tonight on the relationship between the former president and former vice president and what has been going on there. what have you learned? >> i was told by a knowledgeable source that pence and trump have spoken a couple of times since the inauguration. pence called trump once, and it went the other way around the other time, and i was told that the relationship is amicable. that's it. my source would go no further and would not describe the contents of the phone calls, but as you mentioned, pence has decided to hang back and stay quiet for six months and my

source said to me look, this is the tradition. remember that of the out going president and vice president? give the president the new president some room, obviously, donald trump has decided not to do that and mike pence has decided yeah, i'm going to hang back a it willittle bit and that be him trying to see the lay of the land than anything else. >> all right. that's interesting. trying to figure out where mike pence fits on the republican spectrum. john, where does he fit on the republican spectrum going forward? >> that's tough. the old mike pence was christian conservative and lower taxes, less washington. when he was in the house of representatives and indiana governor, he was traditional. if you're a democrat you might disagree and liberal you might disagree but a principled consc conservative out of the christian faith. he's a trump republican. he's trump's vice president.

he's smart right now. lay low. lay low because you don't want to be part of the promoting the big lie again. lay low because you want to respect the new administration as it tries to deal with the pandemic. lay low because you never know what donald trump will do and if you're mike pence you've been caught up in enough of it already. we have a lot more to go and we don't know what donald trump's role will be. so the smart -- pence is doing the smart thing right now to stay out of it. >> right. don't forget, he's got different friends than the president. i mean, for example, arizona governor doug ducey is a very close friend of mike pence's. he runs the republican governor's association. has he broken up that relationship? absolutely not. >> we should add, john, who would have happened to mike pence had he walked on stage at cpac given the fact he presided on january 6th when they verified the electoral collage count? >> the program you went through answers the question. they will continue to promote the big lie.

mike pence honored the constitution and his duty on that day and all the praise he got from democrats from the first three years and 11 months of the trump administration did stand up and do the right thing. there are a lot of trump supposupport supp supporters on the floor of cpsc but you're right, the anger for those who want to promote the big lie and help the former president win in fantasy land he won the election have issues with mike pence. he's smart to stay away from that. >> what will donald trump say about mike pence? there. >> it's a great question. what will he say in general when he goes on to that stage and who will help him prepare for it, if anyone? what will his message be if anything cohaerent? we don't have answers. there is a great deal of concern what he will do. >> i hope daniel dale is resting. >> he's at a spot for every minute up until sunday so he can

be ready. gloria, lindsey graham spent time golfing with the former president and apparently, sharing his former phone with the president so he could call u.s. senators and basically tell them you had my back, i'm going to have yours now. >> lindsey graham wants to portray this as donald trump wants to help us win back control of the senate and he's working day and night to make sure it happens. what this is really about for donald trump is vengeance, revenge, call it what you will. he wants to get back at those folks and primary those people or help primary those people who weren't with him on the big lie. that's what this is about for donald trump. watch out if you were on the other side of this, in the house or in the senate or whether you're deciding to run for office, for donald trump there's one litmus test. that is you have to buy into the rigged election. and as john was pointing out, is

that what the republican party has become? >> john, i have to imagine people he didn't call might be more interested than those who did. >> donald trump selfless team player said no one ever. thank you both for being with us. appreciate it. up next, more of the airborne drama over the weekend. an engine on fire, debris falling from the sky. i'll talk with a pilot who knows a thing or two about an aircraft in distress.

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new developments in the united airlines flight over the weekend where the engine of a 777 -- where it took off. here's what the right engine looked like. that's not what passengers or crew wanted to see when they look out the window. the engine cover was torn off and debris fell to the ground. korean air grounded all 777s

with that same type of engine and boeing suggests the same for all using the engine. with us, captain sully who famously landed his damaged u.s. air flight on the hudson river in 2009. captain, thank you for joining us. i want to play some of the may day call from the aircraft and get your thoughts so let's listen. >> 228. heavy engine failure. need to turn. may day. may day. united air 28. 328 heavy. we experienced engine failure. denver departure united 328 heavy aircraft. just experienced an engine failure. need to turn around immediately. >> what did you hear of that and how the captain and crew handled the situation? >> well, they were doing what aviation professionals do. they're doing their job and doing it professionally. let me tell you from personal

experience, it's very rare to hear someone say may day on the radio. years ago i happened to hear an airport fire chief talk about an aircraft accident he had worked. he said his advice to everybody in the profession is manage the situation or the situation will manage you. and clearly this crew is managing the situation. >> so the investigation obviously ongoing, but from some of the video you have seen the pictures of the debris, and the fact that now we are hearing about the ideas of fractures in the fan blades. what do you think happened? >> well, it's too urgent to tell. that's part of what the investigation will find out over many months. but from the photographs i've seen, at least one piece, probably from an engine, entered the right side of the airplane below the right wing. it seems to be an uncontained engine failure. as you probably know. engine failures in airliners are rare. and uncontained failures are

even more rare. in fact, on our famous flight that landed in the hudson a number of years ago, i had been flying at that point for 42 years, 20,000 hours in the air. even though we practiced for engine out procedures, i had never experienced that. our technology is very reliable, but the fact that this happened and we've had some similar accidents in the last several months and last several years, it's red flags that perhaps we don't have as good an understanding of these particular engines as we thought. and i'm sure they'll be reviewing the design, the inspection protocols, the technology that's used to look for microscopic defects. and the maintenance procedures and trading done. they'll find the answers and correct whatever flaws they find in the entire system. >> so you know better than most what it's like to experience this kind of emergency.

how much does this safe outcome depend on the training? how much depends on the type of person, the type of mind set and experience about the people in the cockpit? >> experience matters. it often makes the difference between success and failure, life and death. but we all train intensely. so over many decades, we have to attain the skill, the knowledge, the experience and the judgment to handle whatever happens even if it's a novel event we'd never trained for. one of the other things we have to develop over many years is to be able to calm ourselves when a sudden extreme crisis hits. there's a huge startle effect, and we'll be aware of it as it happens when your blood pressure and blood pressure spike and sometimes our perception narrows and tunnel vision. but we have to summon up the focusing on the task at hand in spite of the task. that's something pilots are able to do and in a moment's notice

solving problems like this. we have trained as crews to help and support and cross check each other. and we also have protocols to follow that will help us solve these problems one at a time until we solve them all. >> captain, an honor to get your perspective. thank you so much for taking the time. >> thank you. good to be with you. let's hand it over to chris for cuomo prime time. >> thank you. welcome to prime time. question. what do we have more of than anywhere else? we have more of this in number than the populations of miami, kansas city, new orleans, tampa, and it's not a secret. it is something most of you have dealt with directly or close to it. the answer is we have more of people who have died from covid than anywhere else. anywhere else. you likely