but it doesn't always have to be when in extremist circumstances we can get it done over the phone very, very quickly. >> but from what i understand it's normally an elaborate process done in advance. and, in fact, the information came to you on january 1st. you got back a response on january 5th. so this was before january 6th. but it had this provision that this restriction that i think you've testified to was unusual that required reconsultation on january 6th in a fashion that deeply inhibited the ability to move quickly. >> that's right, senator. >> okay. thank you. i wanted to turn to under secretary smislova. and you've been with the department for how long? >> 17 years, sir. >> for 17 years. and i think you were the deputy under secretary on january 6th. is that correct? >> yes, sir. >> well, i was struck by

different reports that came from officials saying that there was a mood within the department. and i'll just quote one formal official report. quote, nobody wanted to write a formal intelligence report about this in part of the fear that such a report would be very poorly received by the maga folks within dhs. and to follow this up, brian murphy, former head of dhs, and i don't know, were you also the deputy to him as well? >> i was one of his deputies, yes, sir. >> he noted that dhs officials had ordered him to stay away from the threat of white nationalism, that chad and ken cuccinelli also asked him to modify intel assessments to ensure that they matched up with public comments by president trump to downplay the threat posed by white supremacists.

in your time at dhs, it's very important that intelligence is unaffected by politics. it's like the root information. did you get a sense that there was kind of a troubling cloud as reported in various sources including from the former head of dhs that there was this troubling cloud of political influence over the quality or the kind of determination of how intelligence was presented to officials? >> um, i can say that ina's report did not change. we did not change our assessments based on any political pressure or interference. we did publish the homeland threat assessment. it's a publicly available document that does state that white supremacists are the most persistent and lethal threat to the homeland. >> so, did you ever feel any pressure or receive any

encouragement, even kind of in a less informal way, i'm not talking about a written document, that you needed to be very careful about kind of refine the threat posed by white supremacists? >> i did not personally receive that. >> and do you consider brian murphy's report that that type of pressure was applied to be accurate or inaccurate? >> he has -- his is the whistle-blower complaint, and it is still being adjudicated. >> i understand. but i'm asking, you were right there in the leadership. you never got a sense that there was any type of political influence like he reported regarding an encouragement -- >> i did not personally have that influence pushed upon me, sir. >> thank you. someone suggested that the reason there were formal intelligence assessments regarding earlier events including the protests in portland but not such a detailed presentation related to january 6th was because of this pressure

to downplay to some degree the threat posed by white supremacists. >> i would like to point out, sir, that the two incidences are very different. our support during some of the civil unrest and the protests specifically in portland were the direct request of our own dhs federal law enforcement partners. and in that capacity, we were reacting to a pattern of violence that had shown itself for several weeks. our open source team did an excellent job in many instances of providing specific information that kept those officers safe. they were reporting things like bricks may be used today as a weapon. another day it might be bug spray combined with leaf blowers or lasers. our work by contrast leading up to the election on january 6th is quite different. it's a different kind of environment.

there's not that pattern of violence. it is a different kind of assessment. so i do suggest, sir, that it's impossible to compare the two. >> thank you for your testimony. >> thank you. >> thank you, madam chair -- or mr. chair. welcome, everybody. i'm john king in washington. and welcome to "inside politics." you've been watching a very, very important hearing in the united states senate, part of the continuing effort to find out just what happened on january 6th, the day of the insurrection and what went wrong, why security was not in place beforehand and why once the rioters breached the perimeter, got into the capitol, had the vice president and vice president-elect, 35 members of congress at risk, why there was not a greater response including from the national guard. let's discuss the important things we just heard with our group. cnn's lauren fox is with us. our formland security official. barbara, i want to start with you at the pentagon. because one of the big questions here was the perimeter was

breached. the capitol police chief called the d.c. commander desperately saying, i need help. general walker said he understood the urgency, he wanted to deploy his troops, but. >> at 1:49 p.m., i received a frantic call from then chief of united states capitol police steven sund where he informed me that the security perimeter of the united states capitol had been breached by hostile rioters. chief sund his voice cracking with emotion indicated that there was a dire emergency at the capitol. the approval for chief sund's request would eventually come from the acting secretary of defense and be relayed to me by army senior leaders at 5:08 p.m., about three hours and 19 minutes later. >> barbara starr, that is just incredible and just incredible to make you stop and think what the hell was going on at the

pentagon that they couldn't say, yes, absolutely immediately, now? >> well, you know, i think -- let's start with a conclusion in the year 2021 washington, d.c. clearly not capable of being defended on the ground quickly multiple legal jurisdictions, multiple law enforcement agencies, the d.c. national guard, the fbi, which was in the lead that day, and an inability not legal for the pentagon obviously to go to capitol hill without all the approvals being done. it's a totally separate branch of government. what the army has said to the news media repeatedly, as soon as they got the request, they began working it, and that they did get very rapid approval from then acting defense secretary chris miller to go ahead and do it. that approval had to come from the defense secretary, the secretary of the army had to

begin enacting everything that it would take to make it happen. their explanation of why it has taken so long to get those troops right up to the capitol ground, it's the national guard, they are not a rapid response force. general walker would be well aware of that. the troops were not already mobilized because everybody said they weren't needed. the intelligence didn't show in advance to plan a day or two ahead. that they got them mobilized, got them the equipment they needed, which they did not have, and got them there as fast as they could. that's the pentagon's point of view. but i will tell you that the army secretary at the time ryan mccarthy has been adamant from the very beginning that the system is broken, that there are too many players, decisionmaking is very diffuse, it's very distracted. general walker has been very clear repeatedly that he feels there were delays, the

pentagon's been very clear. they believed they moved as fast as they could and that what they needed to have is direct word from the capitol police on the ground at the capitol grounds, not just from watching television reports but very direct word from the capitol police, what the situation was on the ground, where those national guard troops needed to go, how they would have a plan essentially to begin and try and take back control of the situation on the ground. all of that took time, and by any measure, obviously it took too much time. the real question right now today is what happened, but the way ahead, how to make sure all of these problems are fixed and it doesn't happen again, john. >> i think there's no question they need a new command and control structure, they need a new system in which they declare in advance this is going to be a big deal, therefore throw out the current bureaucracy and have a streamlined system in place. to this point where the pentagon

says and the people in charge in the trump administration in those days say they did, you match it up. you could hear general walker's frustration because he said during the summer he placed a few urgent phone calls when you had black lives matters protest in d.c. he said every time he placed the call he got approval. he placed the call, he got approval. he placed the call, he got approval. this is a pro-trump mob going into the united states capitol. he says he placed the call and he got this -- [ silence ] >> john? >> here i'm going to read it for you here. the army senior leaders did not think it looked good. it would be a good optic. they further stated it could incite the crowd. it would not be their best move or their advice to have uniformed guards on the capitol. i was frustrated. i was just as stunned as everybody else on the call. it's certainly general walker's perspective, and again we need to listen to every voice involved here and get through to

the end. but it's certainly his perspective that this event was treated very differently by the civilian leadership at the pentagon. and he disdn't say it, but it's hard to come away that because this was a pro-trump crowd, they were going more slowly. >> it doesn't just begin on january 6th. what walker described today was actually a greater understanding by the national guard and the pentagon of the intelligence that was telling them this is likely to be a violent crowd. it did not take rocket science, it does not take an fbi report to tell us that. everyone who was following donald trump during that period and was following the right-wing websites knew that there was a planned fight. you can describe it however you want, but that was the language that they were using. by early january, there begins to be a discussion about what's important here, the predeployment of the national guard so that they're there on the 5th. imagine if the national guard was there. would that mob have actually

even tried to enter the capitol? no, because that's why you predeploy assets beforehand so that they are actually a deterrent from the kind of madness that we saw. the mob then sees, oh, my goodness, there is an open capitol, let's go up. so you see the predeployment challenge that's never explained by the pentagon. and then this change that's done in early january, not after lafayette but early january that says you need an additional level of approval. at the very moment that your intelligence is telling you we may have a problem on the state. most homeland security threats, you do the opposite. if you believe that there's going to be a threat, you give the operational components like the national guard greater leeway because they're seeing what's happened. and then, finally, this three-hour delay is inexcusable. i don't understand it. it's clear walker doesn't understand it. if they keep saying that the system did work, the three-hour

delay can only be described as someone is running it around somewhere. and i know conspiracies here. those are the questions that are still unanswered. but the mistakes were made well before january 6th at this stage. >> and, josh campbell, another mistake or another point of interest that's the question going forward. we need to give these people grace especially in this example. but the night before, the norfolk fbi field office received some intelligence. it was not vetted. it was raw intelligence, which can be wrong, can be right, can be somewhere in between. but they pass along the idea that they saw this online posting that people were coming to washington, they were coming on a war footing and they were talking about either trump stays in power or we fight. we know it was received on the 5th. and what everyone has said is that it was received and essentially the middle management had it but it was never passed up the line. senator magee hassan of new hampshire former governor was asking why didn't somebody at the fbi pick up the phone. listen to this. >> it is very hard for me to

understand why somebody didn't pick up the phone. and i'd like to understand, too, whether any of the following were informed. intelligence, the president, the white house chief of staff, the attorney general of the united states, the speaker of the house, or the senate majority leader. >> not to my knowledge, ma'am. i think you heard the director say this yesterday and i echo it 100%. any time an attack happens we're going back and we're going to figure out what we could have done better and differently. there's always processes that can be improved. >> there are so many different ways to come at this. you don't know if it's true or not. but you do know there are thousands of people coming to washington on a day when the vice president, the vice president-elect and everybody is going to be in that building. you know what the president has tweeted about beforehand. you know some of these people are troublemakers. why, why, why? why does it not go to the white house where somebody says, mr. president, you shouldn't speak at this rally given the

intelligence. we've had this conversation after 9/11 and other events where you have dots. what has to be done to make sure somebody pulls the alarm? >> well, something you just said there at the very end was key. this is what senator hassan was hitting on as well. and that is whereas before we heard yesterday the fbi director and today the fbi official there say that this reporting out of norfolk appeared more aspirational. it was raw, they didn't know whether these people were actually talking about doing bad things, had the capability. but, to your point and to senator hassan's point, this was the united states capitol on a day that the vote would've been certified. you had the vice president there as well. and so this isn't just your run-of-the-mill threat against some facility, some building. this was against the legislative branch of government. the point being that perhaps something targeting that area, that building should've been elevated. now, the fbi says that they did what they should have. they sent this information in three separate ways briefing it through their joint terrorism task force. but again the question gets back to the significance of that date

and the significance of that target that. raises that important question whether someone should've picked up the phone and started setting hair on fire. i think the one thing we can say is i think you can draw a line between the failures of preparation to get information to where it needed to go and the response that we saw. and the reason i say that is because there is this saying in military and law enforcement circles that you don't just sit around admiring a problem. you try to solve it and put yourself in the shoes of military officials on the day that this capitol building is being stormed. of course, the question there that juliet hit on that we've all been sitting here with just puzzlement watching, why did it take three hours to get the military to deploy. you have to wonder had this intelligence made it to where it needed to go, had they been thinking about things in realtime or prior to that that they were trying to do in realtime because we know based on what we just heard from the senior defense official, the secretary of the army between the secretary of defense actually giving the authorization and actually getting to the national guard, the secretary of the army

according to this person wanted to decide, well, let me understand the dynamic. how were these forces going to be used? what is their purpose? what is the mission? all of the questions that should've been asked prior to this incident were being deciphered in realtime. of course, the big issue here being as those three hours were passing, this is three hours that people were being fatally injured. bones were being broken, officers were being crushed in doorways, pentagon officials and those in law enforcement circles were reportedly sitting around admiring the problem rather than giving the national guard the authority to try and quickly solve it. >> and this circles back to those three hours. senator roy blunt at one point was trying to work through the time line when after the testimony was that it was at 4:32 that the pentagon finally said yes, let the national guard go in. but general walker says he didn't get the phone call for another half hour plus. listen. >> army senior leaders told me at about 17:08, 5:08 p.m., that

the secretary of defense has authorized our approval to support the capitol. >> that's when the secretary of defense made the decision at 4:32 as general walker has pointed out because i've seen all the timelines. he was not told that till 5:08. >> how is that possible, mr. salazar? do you think the decision was made at 4:32, and the person that had to be told wasn't told for more than a half an hour after the decision was made? >> senator, i think that's an issue. >> it's an issue as you watch this play out. this is a horrific event. this is a rare example where we are seeing a bipartisan proceeding here where the senators are asking fact questions. there is some criticism of some of the senators. but mostly it is fact-based questioning. the question is where does it go from here. this committee after days of hearings will have an assessment. does this make the case, all of

the questions about the convoluted bureaucracy between the d.c. police, the national guard, all the federal agencies involved, how to streamline that process. number two, do they have a commission? does this actually make the case now for a 9/11-style independent commission? >> i think on the second question, that is still open for discussion. you have a lot of republicans arguing that if a co-mission is going to be developed, it has to be evenly split. and that's the fight that democrats and republicans have been having on capitol hill. what stuck out to me as part of this hearing was the fact that you had bipartisanship in questioning why the department of defense had not deployed the national guard sooner. you had senator roy blunt in that clip you just played. you also had senator rob portman asking very specific and targeted questions about why that delay, that three-hour and 19 minute delay had actually occurred. you heard from general walker that he was ready at some point and just had people waiting on a bus ready to be deployed if that was necessary because he was so

sure, he was just about to get the okay to send guard troops into the u.s. capitol. and i will tell you that on the day of the insurrection, i was texting with republican senators who were asking me, have you heard anything about the national guard? me asking them, have you heard anything about the national guard? that was a scary moment, scary couple of hours during the day as everyone on capitol hill was waiting to see whether or not the guard was going to be sent in to save what was unfolding on capitol hill because people members specifically, they were scared. you see that reflected in the hearing today. they're trying to get answers not just because it's good for the country, not just because it's good for future events but because it's good for all of their safety as well on capitol hill. >> and as we get some of the important answers, they tend to raise even more questions. the investigation needs to continue whether it's 9/11 commission or similarly. might be good reasons but let's get them on the public record.

i appreciate you all for coming in to help. we will continue to watch the hearing. a big change to the vaccine rollout timetable. but president biden still says and he hopes governors will listen, caution, critical. ♪ limu emu & doug ♪ hey limu! [ squawks ] how great is it that we get to tell everybody how liberty mutual customizes your car insurance so you only pay for what you need? i mean it... oh, sorry... [ laughter ] woops! [ laughter ] good evening! meow! nope.

oh... what? i'm an emu! ah ha ha. no, buddy! buddy, it's a filter! only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty, liberty, liberty, liberty ♪

is skincare from around the world better than olay? olay regenerist faced 131 premium products, from 12 countries, over 10 years. olay's hydration was unbeaten every time. face anything. find out more at olay.com want to brain better? unlike ordinary memory supplements— neuriva has clinically

proven ingredients that fuel 5 indicators of brain performance. memory, focus, accuracy, learning, and concentration. try our new gummies for 30 days and see the difference. we are at what you might call another crossroads moment in the fight against coronavirus. on the one handsome very promising news. president biden says a new production deal will help cut by two months the time line to have enough vaccines out there for every adult american to be vaccinated. now the president says that will be the end of may. previously it was the end of july. but the white house has opened tension now with states that are easing restrictions saying we need more time, this is not the too imto drop things like texas just did its mask mandate. let's walk through the numbers and tee up the important moment. this is the peak of the horrific winter peak, and then down you come here, 55,000 new infections

reported yesterday. this is well done but appears to be a plateau in the mid-50s here. that's still a high benchmark if you go back and look at here and here where we had the previous surges. the white house says it appears to be flattening out here. hospitalizations again way down from the peak seems to be a plateau just under 50,000. 46,388 hospitalizations, americans hospitalized with covid yesterday. so a big improvement but still a moment of caution here. here's the saddest number of all. we're currently 516,000 plus americans have died because of covid. the ensemble forecast of the cdc says nearly 50,000 more americans will die by the end of the month. 48,000 more americans by the end of the month based on current projections. this map is getting better, if you will. this is the percent of the population partially vaccinated. in most cases the johnson & johnson new vaccine is one shot. but the previous vaccines are all two shots. alaska, 23%. 21% in south dakota.

into the teens in most other states. moving up and aggressively in recent days. why? because of this. 2 million vaccines just shy of that we're averaging now 1.9 million vaccines a day, significantly up from the 900,000 when president biden took office there was a dip here the harsh winter weather, that is back on track there. here's the challenge. the white house says we're making progress, don't ruin it. but 27 states have announced easing of their covid restrictions since january 30th. 15 of those states in the last week alone. texas yesterday said no more mask mandate. texas is completely open. i just want to show you the texas and mississippi cases. both of these states have decided it's time to move on from the severe covid restrictions. both of those states up a little bit in their recent cases. up a little bit in their recent cases. this is why you have this open tension now between the biden

team and governors. mostly republican governors but not exclusively. the biden team says we are making progress, this is not the time to drop a mask mandate. urging citizens maybe ignore your governor, stay safe. >> every individual is empowered to do the right thing here regardless of what the states decide for personal health, for public health for the health of their loved ones and communities. i would still encourage individuals to wear a mask, to socially distance or to do the right thing to protect their own health. >> we are actively being very, very clear on what we think needs to happen. and so we hope that other elected officials who have the authority in their domains will in fact listen. >> with us now to offer us insights and expertise is a professor of epidemiology at harvard.

i don't know if there's a better term for it, krcrossroads, but e white house coordinator saying, governors, please stop. if governors are doing this, citizens, please don't listen to your governor. we've talked repeatedly over the last year about the importance of consistent communication. that's not consistent. >> that's exactly right. this inconsistency is not a good thing for us. we've had enough of that over the last year, as we know. this is just not the time to completely let our guard down. i think we can -- this is the time to have hope that we're really getting into reprieve from this virus, at least for the coming months. but it is absolutely not the right time to tell people to disregard this virus just as we're getting the vaccines, just as we're nearing this major milestone of getting most of the vulnerable people in our communities protected. this is the time to just remain

vigilant. and it's just a mask. continue wearing our masks. it is a small effort but goes potentially far away. >> help someone out there who might be listening and who might be getting conflicting information. the biden team says be vigilant. your governor might say we're 100% open like in the state of texas. do what you want at a restaurant, no more mask mandate. what is safer, if you will? what can we reopen? because the case count is down. we do know a lot more about covid treatments and the like. so what is safer, and where would you draw the line like please don't do that right now? >> yeah. i think that re-opening things is quite different than just telling people not to wear a mask. i think that it's going to be dependent on what is the local environment. but starting to be able to reopen our stores, our businesses. we've talked about it. i would like to see that these things get reopened with the

assistance of having people use rapid tests on a frequent basis to ensure that they're not transmissible. but these things can start to happen. but certainly we should remain vigilant. we should continue keeping our masks on. we probably shouldn't crowd into theaters, for example. but we should start thinking seriously about how to make these locations safer as they open up rather than just throwing all caution to the wind and opening up and sort of swinging the pendulum all the way. >> well, i'll bring us to the testing point because you have been remarkably consistent that the best way to have intelligence about what the covid crisis is, what's better, what's worse, what's in the middle is to have more testing. just since january 1st, the numbers are down a little bit. you see a little ebb and a flow there. but from 2 million to 1.3 million tests on tuesday. and if you look at some of the

states, only five states are reaching the goal of having five tests for every hundred people, essentially averaging out testing enough people to give you a good snapshot there, only five. what do you see as the risk here? or the picture i just present when did i went through the cases. obviously vaccines help. is that even a complete picture? are we sure when testing drops? >> yeah. this is a very difficult piece to really interpret. how is testing and changes in how many people are getting tested on any given day, how is that impacting how we think about what this virus is doing across the community? i think that there are ways to get around that to try to understand, but certainly if we continue to keep barriers up to testing, it's going to be very, very difficult for people to continue wanting to get testing performed as cases drop. and that could turn into a negative cycle. what we would like to see is for these tests to get put into

people's homes, make it absolutely convenient for everyone to test themselves whenever they want to. this will help the public health. it will help curb transmission. and then we make one-click reporting. you open up your phone and you report if you're positive. it can be very, very simple. but we have yet to actually see these very simple home tests without a prescription get authorized and really be deployed widely. but these tools could very well help us both understand the epidemic and make sure that when we're opening up or doing it in as safe a way as possible. >> and i just want to pick up, your point is that without a prescription part that you believe that that's an extra barrier that is slowing down the more widespread availability and use of these tests. >> absolutely. requiring at this point in the pandemic requiring a prescription for these tests and having one physician, for example, write a prescription for thousands of people who they never even meet, that's not

enforcing medicine or practicing medicine. that is the fda eroding what it means to have a prescription eroding medicine. and at this point nobody should need a prescription to get one of these. it's just creating financial barriers and barriers in access overall to these very important tools. >> dr. mina, grateful as always for your insights. i wish we were having a more optimistic conversation. i think we're starting to get there. we shall see. sir, thank you. let's continue the conversation now. president biden is now promising the united states will have enough vaccine doses for every adult by the end of may. the white house has offered up various dates about when the country will really return to normal. >> i can see return to normalcy in the next year. we're still far from back to normal. i believe we'll be approaching normalcy by the end of this year, and, god willing, this

christmas will be different than last. my hope is by this time next year we're going to be back to normal and before that, my hope. >> our senior white house correspondent phil mattingly joins us. the administration does have many things to brag about at the moment, especially this new deal to ramp up vaccine production and the like, one thing where the president could maybe use a little bit more work on being consistent on when normal comes. >> i think this is to some degree a feature from all white house staff. that is, one, how do you define normalcy and be very, very cautious about predictions. if there's one thing they learned from the last administration, it's that promising things that you aren't sure you can deliver is going to be a significant problem. so what you've seen over the course of the first six weeks of president biden's time in office is the effort to overpromise and underdeliver. think just for the johnson & johnson. they knew this was in the pipeline. they knew once they saw the

efficacy numbers is that this was be something that would get an emergency use authorization. you saw them factor that in and all of a sudden the supply to v vaccinate all 300 million adults in the u.s. the time line shifted from late july to late may. and i think that is a good story. one thing we're hearing from administration officials is they recognize that this is not a straight line. there are any number of things that can happen to throw even their best laid plans completely off course. whether it was the weather a couple of weeks ago. whether it's a surge based on what you're seeing perhaps in texas, what you're seeing perhaps in mississippi, or what you're seeing with the variants. there is some expectation that is coming. so they're being very cautious in terms of what they predict and how they try and represent what's coming down the pipe. the one thing they are certain of is the supply, which obviously they changed the time line on that yesterday. and also the fact that they feel like they're making progress in

terms of the infrastructure of the distribution. when you talk to white house officials that were on the transition team, that were in those agencies when they came in, and you compare what they saw then to what they're seeing now, there's a recognition that the decision to really federalize this process move top down and put things into place has had a dramatic effect, one they hope so long as people get the shots will speed or hasten the return to normalcy despite what the president's predictions are, john. >> i think the weeks ahead, the month of march will be absolutely critical, at least on the vaccine front. there has been important progress that we will see as the infrastructure in place to get those shots in arms, phil mattingly at the white house, grateful for that report. very important statement coming from the new york governor andrew cuomo. he will speak in just a short while for the first time publicly since facing multiple sexual harassment allegations. c? my sub has bacon. choose better be better and now save when you order in the app. subway eat fresh. but not jayson's sub.

hi sabrina! >>hi jen! so this aveeno® moisturizer goes beyond just soothing sensitive skin? exactly jen! calm + restore oat gel is formulated with prebiotic oat. and strengthens skin's moisture barrier. uh! i love it! aveeno® healthy. it's our nature.™ hey shaq. oh what up fellas? remember you were talking about the general being great insurance. and we disagreed with you, and we stopped letting you sit with us at lunch? i do. well turns out you were right, we just misjudged them based on their commercials. they're actually a quality insurance company, been saving people money for nearly 60 years. that's what i've been telling you. can we sit with you? milton? ahhh. ahhh means no. for a great low rate, and nearly 60 years of quality coverage - make the right call - and go with the general.

university of phoenix is awarding and nearly 60 years of quality coverage - up to one million dollars in new scholarships through this month, because hope fuels opportunity. see what scholarship you qualify for at phoenix.edu

we're just minutes away from a briefing for the new york governor andrew cuomo, significant because the governor says he will be discussing covid and, quote, making an announcement at 1:00 p.m. eastern. we do not know what that announcement is about. but the governor has not spoken publicly in recent days, and he is facing growing calls that he should resign' mid-allegations of sexual harassment lodged by three women. our national correspondent is here. just a few minutes away. >> that's right, john. and, listen, just to give your

viewers some backup here. essentially, we always get covid briefing updates multiple times a week from the governor. one was supposed to or usually did happen on monday. we didn't get that. we got it in our inbox instead. this will be the first time that we will see the governor in front of cameras allegedly talking only about covid for now but of course questions are always asked at those briefings so i'm sure there will be plenty of reporters who will be asking for some sort of statement to these allegations that first came out just a week ago. it will be interesting to know if cuomo just sticks to the lines that he put out publicly in a statement over the weekend after the second allegation came forward or if he elaborates more. we still have not gotten any response to the third person's allegations of sort of unwanted advances from ana ruch. she was the woman who said she met governor cuomo at a wedding reception. and we have that picture that the "times" first reported of cuomo putting his hands on her cheeks and saying, can i give

you a kiss. well, cnn hasn't been able to talk to ruch about her story. but we did talk to a friend who was actually at that same wedding, and said she was there when this happened. she heard the governor actually say that question, ask that question. and this person told cnn that the moment just felt aggressive and she remembers asking ruch was she okay. so, that allegation is another serious one. there's a picture with it. and we haven't heard anything from the governor specifically for that one. so, it'll be interesting to see if he addresses that. but, again, this is a big deal because we have not seen him. we have not heard in his own words other than a statement anything toward any of the allegations all three of them as of yet. so we'll see what he addresses at 1:00 p.m. john? >> very important moment for the governor of new york. brynn gingras, thank you for the reporting. up next for us in the meantime, the price of an evenly divided congress. president biden loses a cabinet pick and now tries to get his

covid relief package through the 50/50 senate. you have luvs ready for that pro-level leak protection. luvs. parent like a pro.

the president's covid relief package faces key tests in the 50/50 senate this week. and today there's a deal to make an important change to help win key support. stimulus checks for single and joint filers will now phase out at lower income thresholds. that change addresses concerns raised by centrist democrats and reflects the reality that any one senator in a 50/50 senate can derail things. this is just one change. speaker pelosi's office now confirms two infrastructure projects in the house bill will

also be dropped. republicans were complaining some democrats complaining too they had nothing to do with covid relief. the covid package is the first of many legislative challenges for the biden agenda. still to come, an infrastructure bill, legislation providing a pathway to citizenship for the undocumented, election reforms, and much more. the evenly divided congress makes democratic unity paramount, something vice president harris raised yesterday in a conversation with house democrats. >> democrats have a majority in the house. democrats have a majority in the senate. and democrats are in the white house. and some of us have never experienced this before. but let's own it by working with republicans when we can and by driving ahead when we must. >> back with us cnn's lauren fox and phil mattingly. lauren, this change, the targeting of the stimulus checks, it's a modest change but an important change when you're trying to get to 50. >> this is something that senate democrats who are on the

moderate side of things have been fighting for for several weeks. they talked about this issue once again on monday. and i'll just explain because it's a slight change. essentially what happens now is that if you make $75,000 or less, you get the full $1,400 stimulus check. but once you get to $75,000, there's a phaseout. and instead of that phaseout going to $100,000, it's now only going to go to $80,000. so, essentially you're going to cut off the number of people who are going to be receiving any stimulus check at all. and that was important to democrats because, remember, they were wanting to make sure or the moderates were wanting to make sure that those high income earners weren't getting the 1,400 stimulus checks. the argument is someone making $100,000 in west virginia, do they really need a $1,400 stimulus check? his argument, no. of course that's a problem for some progressives for high-income earning states like new york is not the same as someone making that amount in west virginia.

>> from the white house perspective. phil mattingly, everything the president tries to do, anything sensitive is going to be difficult just because of the math. a handful of votes to spare in the house, no votes to spare in the senate. overnight neera tanden withdrew. she's the president's nominee to be budget director. she withdrew because of the math. some tweets she had sent in her prior life at a democratic thinktank had angered some democrats and republicans. just moments ago, it's a very critical job office of management and budget. moments ago the white house press secretary says we need a few days. listen. >> all right. the computer ate our homework there. this is what jen psaki said at the briefing. given neera tanden withdrew her nomination just last night, you should not expect an announcement on a future nominee this week. so they want to reboot here they have a favorite but they also have incoming from democratic interest groups who have different choices than you will.

beyond the who, how big of a setback is this? >> look, obviously the white house is willing to fight for it. the white house lost that fight. and so when you're looking at an administration that hasn't had really anything catastrophic occur over its first six weeks, this would be considered a loss. in the grand scheme of things when you're still getting your core cabinet officials confirmed with pretty wide bipartisan support, they feel good about where they are. and officials i spoke to over the course of the last week asking them the writing feels like it's on the wall here, what are you guys doing, kind of going to the mattresses on this one. was there was a sense inside the white house that they needed to show that they were willing to fight even if they were going to lose. and clearly they made the calculation that they were going to lose neera tanden made that calculation as well. and so the nominee was withdrawn. so i think they felt like they put an important mention out there that they were willing to fight for their nominees while also acknowledging reality when it kind of hit them in the face to some degree. it's going to be really interesting, lauren is dealing with the balancing act that's going on, on capitol hill between progressives and

moderates with no margarin for error. it's going to be fascinating with how the president handles this because he is willing to deal. the dynamics of just this omb selection is going to be fascinating, too. and this is a little bit inside baseball, but you know it very well, you have the three top leaders in the house in the democratic side getting behind one nominee, something that i've really never even see. shallonda young who biden nominated to be the deputy at omb. and you have officials pushing from biden world for potential nominees. you have people pitching from clinton world for particular nominees as well. and so it's almost another dynamic here where the administration has to navigate democratic politics, intraparty politics and intrawhite house politics. there are specific people who want these positions for specific people. and this is going to be interesting just in emergency room it's of the internal dynamics of the white house. while most people don't necessarily pay much attention to what the omb director does or

who he or she is, it is an extremely important position, particularly given how big and bold this administration wants to go with some of their economic policies over the course of the next several years. >> most of this lobbying is done behind closed doors. it is not subtle when they put their name on a piece of paper and release it to the public. one of the reasons he needs the votes and he knows and you heard vice president harris as well saying, look, democrats, we're going to have some family feuds, we're going to disagree hover some details. but we have to stick together in the end. former senator biden now president biden we'll see if we get surprised on the senate covid bill. but we did not on the house side. listen to the republicans who have clearly decided if biden's for it, we're against it. >> the last catalog of liberal spending was no relationship whatsoever to beating covid-19. >> this whole bill in my opinion gets an f-grade because it fails

to do what it's supposed to do. >> i'm not going to get pumped into voting for a bill that helps pelosi bail out california, that helps schumer bail out the predator governor of new york. >> pretty clear. you can't count. you might get a republican vote here and a republican vote there, but you cannot start any conversation counting on them. >> that's exactly right. they are not counting on any republican votes in the senate. that's what part of this compromise with the senate moderates was all about. i should note that that's also one of the reasons you saw those transportation projects in new york, a bridge in new york and as well as a rail system in california get taken out of the bill because that was a common refrain they heard from republicans. look at this huge relief bill, and then they pointed to these two smaller pronjects in the bil for wanting to vote against it. democrats wanted to extract that out of the bill because they wanted to make this a tougher argument for republicans when they go home and rail against what is a very popular bill when it comes to giving people direct checks when, it comes to helping

small businesses, getting kids back to school. democrats are feeling good about them. so extract what you need out of the bill so that it is popular when you're selling it back home. >> interesting to watch the vote-a-rama. coming up for us, a u.s. civilian contractor dead now after rocket attacks against an iraqi base hosting u.s. troops.

topping our political radar today. sad news, the pentagon says the u.s. civilian contractor had a heart attack and died during a rocket attack on an iraqi military base that is home to u.s.-led coalition troops. at least ten rockets hit the al-asad air base. it comes less than a week after a u.s. strike in syria targeting two iranian-backed militia groups. no group has claimed responsibility for the recent attack. that's it for us today on "inside politics."

hope to see you back here this time tomorrow. brianna keilar picks up our coverage on a busy news day right now. have a good day. ♪ ♪ hello, i'm brianna keilar. and i want to welcome our viewers here in the united states and around the world. we are beginning with breaking news coming from the capitol of new york. any moment we will hear from governor andrew cuomo who just tweeted he will speak at 1:00 eastern to, quote, make an announcement. this of course is coming as he is facing growing calls to resign after three women have come forward and accused him of sexual harassment. and amid an investigation into his handling of the counting of nursing home deaths amid the pandemic. cnn's athena jones is in albany standing by for this story. athena, what more can you tell us about this announcement? >> hi, brianna. well