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with kasie hunt next. >> it's wednesday, january 8th. right now on cnn this morning devastating wildfires. a state of emergency in los angeles as a life threatening windstorm fuels the flames engulfing southern california. >> and the panama canal is vital. we need greenland for national security purposes. canada and the united states, that would really be something. >> redrawing the map donald trump lays out a plan to expand the u.s., refusing to rule out using troops to seize territory. and it's an ambitious agenda. we're starting today with the laken riley first order of business. >> the republican led house passes their first major immigration legislation of the new congress. but it does face shaky ground in the senate.

all right. it is 5 a.m. here on the east coast. here is a live look out west where fierce, fierce wildfires are currently racing through the los angeles area. we have been tracking this overnight with major wind gusts expected through the early morning hours there. this is a live look at los angeles at this hour. it is 2:01 a.m. pacific time. we had heard as we were going to bed on the east coast last night, that some of the most dangerous hours in california, we're going to be playing out right now as those fierce santa ana winds have made it all but impossible for firefighters out there to try to battle these blazes. instead simply focusing on getting people out and to safety. we saw really striking images of cars lining sunset boulevard in los angeles, people abandoning them as they tried to flee these fires. they engulfed many multimillion

dollar mansions in the pacific palisades neighborhood. many celebrities among those who have homes in that area. so this is going to be something we are going to be tracking throughout the morning. good morning everyone. i'm kasie hunt, it is wonderful to have you with us. and again, these terrifying, devastating wildfires are burning across los angeles. there is a state of emergency. thousands of people being threatened. let's watch. oh my god, these evacuation orders are widening overnight. the flames being whipped by those fierce winds. there are more than 30,000 people at least forced from their homes. >> this is the worst fire i've ever encountered. >> i've been within three within a mile, and i've never had to get evacuated. >> so i was really surprised that the fire moved so quickly. >> this time we were running down. you could see palm trees just like random palm trees on fire, so i'm sure leaves are burning and falling down. and it's it's

literally apocalyptic. >> apocalyptic. thousands of acres already burned, countless homes, businesses, cars torched. we know that at least one firefighter was seriously injured. the flames burning the equivalent of five football fields per minute at one point. >> people understand how bad a hurricane is or how bad a tornado is. you know you can't stop those. the wind is so strong, there's nothing you can do. you wait till it passes through and then you fix what's left, right? well, add fire on top of that. and that's what we're up against. >> and this just in a third fire, it's called the hurst fire. it erupted overnight in the sylmar neighborhood that is just northwest of san fernando. and that fire has burned through 100 acres. an immediate evacuation order has been issued for the area. cnn meteorologist derek van dam has been tracking the weather conditions this morning. derek, what do we know? what are firefighters facing as this blaze races across these enormously densely populated areas in and around l.a. yeah.

>> casey, you know, i want our viewers to understand just how quickly these fires can spread. it is at a moment's notice that an ember can travel across a road, across the expanse of a highway, start additional spot fires, and then erupt into a raging inferno. that's what we're experiencing right now, over western l.a. and into ventura counties. the palisades fire in particular. this is a dangerous situation, and we have this video coming out of the l.a. county fire department of extreme fire behavior. that's how they labeled this video. and you can see it just with the rapid swirls in the fire itself, actually kind of creating its own weather patterns here in and around these fires. so this high potential for rapid fire spread, that is what they are experiencing. changes in wind direction, long range spotting, meaning the embers are traveling several hundred yards because of the intense winds. obviously a life threatening situation. so currently tracking three large, active,

out of control wildfires that are all three at 0% containment. i highlight this palisades fire because this is the one that we saw overnight and late last evening when cars were abandoned on palisades avenue. they're just trying to get out of harm's way. here's a perspective that's very interesting. i believe this is from the cal fire side. so what you're looking at is santa monica right here. so into western l.a., this is the palisades fire. and if we zoom in a little bit closer, all of those areas in red are the regions that have already burned. but notice the population. this is all areas of homes. this is where people live or are attempting to evacuate. and you can see the topography here making it just extraordinarily difficult to fight this fire, because it doesn't take much for one of the embers from this canyon to jump over that road and start a new spot. fire, start an additional fire past that. that's how it flames out. you can see the wind gusts here, just as we warned yesterday, nearing 100mph, the peak of the winds

through this morning and our critical fire weather continues for western l.a. and into ventura counties through the course of the morning. this really, truly a nightmare situation here in southern california. casey. >> derrick, what do you know at this point about when those winds may subside? i mean, when may people get at least a little bit of relief and firefighters, perhaps an opening to try to do more here? >> okay. so through the next six hours is the most critical point of this firefighting venture. the ongoing wildfires, the potential for new fires to erupt. certainly there we call that an extremely critical, particularly dangerous situation. but that level starts to get lowered as we go through the course of the day today, because the winds are anticipated to relax, conditions will change. but that doesn't mean that the dangerous situation doesn't continue. so as we go forward in time, it is just a matter of how the weather and the wind directions unfold. we'll have

to keep a very close eye on that actually happening and what actually occurs. but regardless, the next six hours is the most important time frame to try to attempt to get some sort of handle on the ground with the firefighting operations here in western los angeles county. >> and we were looking just a second ago at live pictures of these flames burnirrick, i know. there they are again. that's this is again live in los angeles right now at this hour. it's it is really, really difficult to look at. and again, if anyone are anywhere near these evacuation areas who happens to have have turned us on, be worried about this. of course, we know that authorities are urging people to heed those warnings immediately, as all of this is so incredibly unpredictable. derrick, you're going to stick with us throughout the next couple of hours as we continue to cover this breaking story. we also so thank you very much for that. we also want to show you a cnn crew had to make a quick escape last night when they saw flames on both sides of the pacific coast highway. they had, of course, been covering those wildfires in l.a. let's watch cnn's natasha

chen explaining how they got to safety. >> we were there from about noon until about just after 6 p.m. local time, when we had finished our last live shot. and i guess what, we hadn't quite surmised was exactly how bad it had gotten south of us on pacific coast highway. and that's the way we came in to get to our spot to cover the fire. and we knew that we had heard reports that the flames jumped the highway. but i guess we had not seen with our own eyes just exactly what that meant and what that looked like for us getting out of there. so at the end of the night, you know, we're i, we pulled up to a fire truck and kind of waved at a firefighter and said, hey, where do you think is the best way for us to leave to get out of here? he kind of shook his head at us and said, well, i guess you go south. and so that's what we did. um, pretty quickly realizing that there were flames on both sides of the highway. they were embers

flying over the lanes of the highway. i spotted an emergency vehicle and decided our best bet is to just follow that car to follow right behind him as closely as possible. if he's driving, then he's probably knowing the best way out. so as we're driving behind this emergency vehicle, i'm hearing an explosion on my right. there are houses on fire right up against the road on the left. and as i mentioned, embers flying. and so at this point, i'm just holding my breath, um, and i can feel the heat from inside the car and just watching the embers fly across the windshield. so, um, not ideal in that kind of, um, you know, we get put on a lot of, kind of risky assignments. and in this situation, we had to make a calculated risk for the best way to leave. and i think, um, you know, thankfully, we got out of there and we got a real look at

just the level of destruction and, um, really the fear that a lot of those residents might be feeling if they're looking at those images on the news, if they've evacuated, i can't imagine they're there wondering if their house is is the next one on fire, if they have anything to go home to just so difficult there. >> from our natasha chen, who thankfully is safe. all right. we're going to continue, of course, to cover these fires throughout the morning. it is overnight in l.a. some of the most dangerous hours happening there right now. straight ahead here on cnn this morning, we'll also talk about how the laken riley act passed the house with bipartisan support. but there are narrow margins in the senate that could complicate its future. and meta's sweeping change, of course, their decision to show fact checkers the door and ease rules that combat hate speech. >> i'm a little concerned. i mean, this is like chipotle announcing that it's ending health inspections. do you know what i'm saying? but it's an

exciting time at meta. i mean, facebook is turning into twitter and apparently mark zuckerberg is turning into jack harlow. >> kobe believed in himself at the youngest possible age. >> it's one of the most remarkable stories in sports history. >> i don't want to be remembered as just a basketball player. >> kobe premieres january 25th on cnn. >> now's the time to go back in time and shine a light on the family journey that led to you. learn when they said, i do. when they became heroes, how they ruled the school. curious about what you might find with billions of records, photos, and more, you're bound to find some gems. ancestry can help you piece together the past. memberships are on sale now, so start your journey today. >> greatness hurts, but

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no. >> you're talking about panama and greenland? no. i can assure you on either of those two, but i can say this. we need them for economic security. the panama canal was built for our military. i'm not going to commit to that now. >> well, trump senior was talking about greenland and florida. trump jr. was traveling to the territory. he included a bobblehead of his father and a message from the president elect. >> he says hello. >> okay. >> we were talking to him yesterday, so he says hello to everyone in greenland. >> all right. back in florida. on the topic of annexing canada, trump ruled out military force, but seemed to think that there might be another way. >> economic force, because canada and the united states, that would really be something you get rid of that artificially drawn line, and you take a look at what that looks like. and it would also

be much better for national security. don't forget, we basically protect canada. >> all right. joining us now to discuss margaret talev, senior contributor at axios. margaret good morning. good morning. i have to say, when i was watching this unfold yesterday, i was not quite expecting it to be. well, we're not going to rule out military force for the panama canal and greenland, but here we are. what do you think we saw yesterday from the president elect? and how much of this is real and how much of it is just bluster? >> i mean, i think you've asked the big question is like, what is the intent of all this? is he actually going to pursue expansionist moves that could involve the u.s. military and, you know, reorder the world and be some, like, weird throwback to a couple hundred years ag or is this about, you know, negotiations? he take the use of military force off the table when it comes to annexing canada. so it sounds like that's not goin happen. 51st state talk notwithstanding, and it has been said and i think smartly so, that if if canada were to become a state and just to be

clear, it's not going to become a state. >> i think the quote from justin trudeau was not a snowball's chance in hell. yeah, but it would also make california seem like moderate. >> so it's about 41 million people. it's larger than california and the nation of canada, the sovereign nation of canada, far more liberal than the united states. so that would be sort of undermining republican electoral math. so i think maybe move canada off to the side. but if you are if you're donald trump and you're looking at russia's moves in recent years, china's threats in recent years, you're looking at brexit and what happened there. you do see that there are some powerful nations in the world where voters get sick of their own governance situation, or where large powers like china and russia just do whatever they want or threaten to do whatever they want and see if they can get people to move. and it feels like he's trying to take a page, or the idea of a page

from some of those countries and, and try to use it tactically or strategically. but the truth is, nobody really knows right now. like what? where is this all leading? and what is going to happen as a result of it? and we've also seen such a blurring already before he takes office of his family's investments in business interests all over the world, including in the middle east, with the appointments that he's making to office and the policies that he is floating, that it is also possible that we're going to see some trump family business alignments around these strategies completely separate from governance and u.s. policy. so i think it's too early to say we don't know. this isn't normal compared to the last, i don't know, dozen or so presidents that we've seen. um, but it's i think we don't really understand yet where the strategy is going. >> margaret, i also want to talk about another breaking

story out this morning, which is president biden did a sit down exit interview with the usa today's susan page. there. usa today has said this is the only print interview he has planned, but i want to really point out one question that she had for him, and she said, she asked, do you believe that you, president biden, could have won in november? here's what biden said, quote, it's presumptuous to say that, but i think, yes, based on the polling that and then she followed up and she asked, do you think you would have had the vigor to serve another four years in office? biden says, i don't know who the hell knows. so far, so good, but who knows what i'm going to be when i'm 86 years old? i mean, striking honesty, but also, he was telling the american people that he could do it by saying, i'm going to run for reelection. >> yes. and i think so. i think

that bit. encapsulates kind of the emotional drama, trauma, torture, to some extent that that president biden is experiencing in these final weeks in office is that there's clearly still this part of him that thought i could have won if my party hadn't forced me off the ticket. there's no polling that suggests that that's, you know, the prevailing likelihood. but but he obviously feels that way. and that's that must be very difficult for him. i think the excerpt that you just talked about is going to be what gets a lot of attention, a lot of attention in the next 24 hours. but what's really, really interesting is when he was asked two things basically like, what are you worried about with donald trump and beyond the democracy stuff? he said he's worried that trump's going to undo some of the climate stuff, and that he's worried that he's going to do some of the drug. price prescription drug protections that he put in place for americans with chronic illness and for older americans. so i

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night at eight on hgtv. >> all right. we are looking live now at southern california. right there. three out of control. wildfires are burning thousands of acres in and around los angeles. fire crews on the ground say there is no possibility of containing the fires at this hour. as winds near 100 miles an hour in some places, as people have been fleeing their homes overnight, they got stuck in traffic. they were forced to abandon their cars. what you're seeing now are bulldozers coming in to clear them so that emergency vehicles can get through. some of these homes are owned by celebrities, and the actor steve guttenberg lives in the pacific palisades. he left his home to help people fleeing the flames. >> i got out of my car and i started to try to help people because people were just coming down the road. i was helping

people in wheelchairs, and there were people that didn't have their feet were dragging on the floor. there were mothers who were hysterical. >> steve guttenberg there. the winds were so fierce that at times the palisades fire is blazing through five football fields a minute. we're going to have live updates for you on this throughout the morning, as some of the most dangerous hours out there in southern california are transpiring right now through early this morning. as those winds again have made it impossible for fire crews to focus on anything but simply trying to save lives they're having. it's almost impossible to battle these flames in a meaningful way right now. all right, but let's check in on some other stories. it is 28 minutes past the hour. here's your morning roundup. no more fact checkers at meta. instead, you'll see on facebook, instagram and threads a community notes system that lets other users call out what they think may be false or misleading. president

elect donald trump believes he played a role in this change meta. >> facebook. i think they've come a long way. i watched it, the man was very impressive. >> you think he's directly responding to the threats that you have made to him in the past with these issues? >> yeah, probably. >> meta. also quietly relaxed some rules around hate speech. among those changes, women can now be referred to as property. district judge aileen cannon blocking the public release of special counsel jack smith's final report on his investigations into president elect donald trump that prevents the justice department from publishing the report until a court of appeals reviews an emergency motion filed by trump's former co-defendants. they want to block its release. a republican led bipartisan bill called the laken riley act, is headed to the senate. the bill would require undocumented migrants to be detained if they are charged with certain crimes. it is named after georgia student laken riley, who was killed

last year while out running by an undocumented migrant from venezuela. he was sentenced to life without parole. all right. still coming up here after the break, those extremely dangerous wildfires that are rapidly spreading across southern california overnight. >> the fires were this close to the cars. people left their cars on the palisades drive. yeah, burning up the hillside, the palm trees. everything's going. and the wind and the firemen are great, but you can only do so much i lay on my back, frozen, thinking the darkest thoughts, and then everything changed. >> dana said, you're still you. >> and i love you, super man. the christopher reeve story february 2nd on cnn. >> speak now or forever. hold your only took for our cough liquid. >> unlike robitussin dm, delsym

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protein, one gram of sugar and a protein blend to feed muscles up to seven hours. kobe. >> the making of a legend premieres january 25th on cnn. >> all right, it is 5:35 a.m. on the east coast. it is 2:35 a.m. pacific time. you are looking live at los angeles county, california. that fire is burning as we speak and looks like we're even losing that shot, which. oh, there it's come back. it's obviously been very difficult and dangerous out there to cover these fires, as so many thousands of people are now fleeing their homes. good morning everyone. i'm kasie hunt, it is wonderful to have you with us. and we are going to continue to track that extremely dangerous and life threatening fire that is sweeping across southern california. there are a number of them, the fires exploding in size. they are fueled by winds that are gusting up to 100 miles an hour overnight, forcing more than 30,000 people to flee from their homes. among the evacuees, 95

senior center residents, as you can see, many of them wheelchair bound. >> it's tough. it's tough. they can't get up. they're stuck on the wheelchairs. we got to lift them up, put them in the vans and then take the wheelchairs at the same time. so we got to get everybody out of here. >> all right. let's bring in cnn correspondent maribel gonzalez. she is in pacific palisades, california, tracking the very latest for us. maribel, what have we learned overnight? what are you seeing, hearing smelling what's in front of you right now yeah. >> good morning casey. it's definitely a dire situation here in the palisades. and it's kind of a surreal one as well. we are just steps away from the ocean. in fact, it is dark right now. but i can hear the waves crashing. all of this happening as we are just steps away on the other side of these raging fires. as you see behind me now, here on the scene, we've seen dozens of fire trucks just on standby, hoping to contain some of this fire. but at this point it is zero

containment, as you mentioned, it's only growing in the hour that we have been here. we've actually seen some of it contained, but you can see how rapidly the situation is evolving, because as soon as some parts get contained, other flames are flaring up, as you can see on camera right now. and as you mentioned, those winds, those dangerous, life threatening winds, as officials have called them, only fueling this fire. now, as we know right now, this palisades fire has been burning at five football fields a minute, nearly 3000 acres burned, and firefighters are not only dealing with this fire, but also two other ones that have popped up overnight. one in hurt the hurt fire north of san fernando in the eaton fire in altadena. that one has grown to 1000 acres in the matter of hours. as you mentioned, those wind speeds reaching nearly 100mph overnight with isolated gusts across the highest

elevations approaching triple digits. now, los angeles has declared a state of emergency. governor gavin newsom securing federal funding to help firefighters on the ground try to protect those homes, try to protect people's lives. more importantly, we know that this has been ongoing since yesterday morning. those those rescue efforts have been ongoing as people have been fleeing their homes, thousands, tens of thousands of people leaving their homes evacuating, some as a precaution, others under those evacuation orders. we also saw some of those cars being left on the side of the road and along the road, as people are trying to leave frantically, a bulldozer even being used in some of those situations to remove those vehicles. now what you don't see right now is what's happening on the other side of this. this mountain, along the roads, as we were coming here, downed power lines, downed trees, difficult to drive through. there's power outages, thousands of people right now

are without power, not only here, but stretching across a large area of los angeles county. and as we mentioned, you know, more than 1400 firefighters are on the scene right now trying to combat those fires. 0% contained right now, the effort and the focus is on helping people get out and make it to safety and try to protect those lives. casey. >> yeah. maribel. we're also learning at this hour that officials have declared the iconic rose bowl, the stadium where they play the rose bowl as an evacuation shelter for people who are leaving. what can you tell us about how this threat is playing out through the night there in los angeles? because our understanding is some of these winds, the peak time for danger may be between 10 a.m. local time and 5 a.m. or so. what? what should

residents there be expecting be on the lookout for in these coming hours? >> yeah, we're definitely not in the clear. the worst is definitely not yet here. and of course we will get a better understanding once the sun comes up. but as you mentioned, those winds are expected to continue gusting at high speeds through the early morning. we know that right now the governor is asking people to please heed those evacuation orders. several shelters are open now for animals and also for the people that need somewhere to go. there's also the school, schools, at least five schools in the los angeles county area have now closed. um, but definitely heeding those evacuation orders. we also know that hundreds of thousands of people are without power. so that is just another thing that people are battling here in this area. >> all right. maribel gonzalez is going to be with us throughout the morning. maribel, stay safe. thank you very much for your reporting. we'll be back with you soon. but let's go now to cnn's meteorologist, derek van dam,

who has been tracking those weather conditions this morning. derek, what can you tell us about how the weather is going to affect whether or not firefighters have any chance of getting these blazes under control anytime soon? >> yeah. well, when you have hurricane force wind gusts fueling the flames. excuse me. obviously this is going to have rapid spread on any kind of additional fires that form within southern california as we speak. we heard maribel talk about wind gusts in excess of 60, 70mph. look at this. this is some of the highest wind gusts that we have experienced so far. of course, these are mountain top ridges. but remember, when that wind goes up and over these mountain ridges, it compresses, it dries out, and it actually speeds up as it reaches the valley floors as it warms up. so you can just imagine the incredible extreme fire behavior that firefighters are contending with with these types of winds. so we've kind of put in a localized view here. so this is los angeles county, ventura county just to

the west. and i want you to see the direction of the wind more of a northerly component coming right over the santa susana mountains, right down towards the coastline near santa monica, where the palisades fire is. of course, we have three out of control fires at the moment. and then i want you to see as we take you through time. this is wednesday morning, local time. that's the current gusts. they expect those winds to pick up and speed through the course of the morning. that is typical with santa ana wind events. we get that peak wind gusts as we edge towards dawn hours. right. so that's typically what happens right now. we have this particularly dangerous situation. we're all well aware of this, but it's the combined factors of low humidity values. the extreme winds and the intense, ferocious winds that are just driving these incredible, incredible flames right now. casey. and this is amazing. only 10% of average rainfall for southern california so far this water year. that's led to these scenes we're seeing on our tv screens this morning. and i'll leave you with this. this is what it looked like outside of a passenger window of a flight approaching los

angeles last night. >> wow. that's just an unbelievable. derek van dam for us. wow. that's really hard. really, really hard to to look at. derek. thank you. i know we'll be back with you a number of times throughout the next hour as we continue. these are, again some of the most dangerous hours out there in l.a. happening right now. still ahead here on cnn this morning as donald trump returns for a second term, is another left wing resistance also making a comeback. former congresswoman susan wild joins us to talk about how democrats are preparing, and we'll continue to bring you our latest coverage of the destructive wind and those wildfires rampaging southern california. >> the fire was basically encircling us. you could hear explosions all around us, and the fire was kind of rapidly moving down bienvenida and towards our house. so i kind of i'm kind of glad i got out when i did. >> the whole story with anderson cooper is a five time emmy winner for long

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captioning is brought to you by purple. >> greatest sleep ever invented. >> we've been out of a job. that's because purple mattresses are made with patented gel flex grid technology. >> do not go to purple.com. >> do not visit a purple store. >> welcome back to cnn. this morning, life threatening wildfires sweeping across southern california overnight into this morning, los angeles officials declaring a state of emergency as tens of thousands of people have been told to evacuate across l.a. and its environs. cnn's nick watt has been on the ground for us. >> this is palisades village, the heart of pacific palisades. this used to be a restaurant. i don't know what that was, because there's nothing left. i can't tell what that used to be, but you can feel what the problem is. it's this wind. and the wind is only going to get worse. it's the wind. flick. look at these embers, chris. look at these embers. any one of these embers could go and

cause a fire somewhere else. look, we've got this. we've got another fire spot. fire up here just around the corner. an entire apartment building was gone. it's dry vegetation. it's wind. it's a terrible combination. 30 000 plus people evacuated. we have no idea yet how many structures have been lost. but we have been up in the hills. million dollar homes. we've seen destroyed. we're down here in the village. apartment buildings, restaurants destroyed. the question is, just how far is this fire going to go before the wind finally dies down? nick watt, pacific palisades, california wow, just a stunning scene there from our nick watt, who filmed that at about 1 a.m. >> overnight for us, clearly very close to many of those flames. and we are, of course, going to continue to cover that

breaking news story throughout the morning. but let's take a minute now to turn to politics. democrats preparing for trump's return to office. it's looking a little bit different this time than it did back in 2017. >> we're appalled. we're appalled at the new. president. um, i don't think any of us even want to say his name. i mean, we're we're appalled. >> so eight years ago, in january 2017, those pink hats emerged as a symbol of the anti-trump resistance with hundreds of thousands of protesters flooding the streets across the country after his inauguration. this time around, though, activists seem to be embracing a more muted response to donald trump's second presidential term. one organizer telling cnn, quote, the 2025 playbook cannot be the 2017 playbook, as democrats in congress look ahead to the republican trifecta in washington, some are also reconsidering the approach to trump 2.0.

>> there was a lot more of the resistance movement back then, and resistance is appropriate. i resisted him trying to get rid of the affordable care act. i resisted him trying to deport dreamers. we can do resistance, but it can't be all resistance. >> i've been warning people like you got to chill out. you know, like the constant, you know, freak out. it's not helpful. so, you know, pack a lunch, pace yourself because he hasn't even taken office yet. i'm not rooting against him. if you're rooting against the president, you are rooting against the nation. >> pack a lunch and pace yourself, he says. joining us now for her first tv interview since leaving office, former democratic congresswoman of pennsylvania susan wild. she was the top democrat on the powerful house ethics committee. congresswoman, thank you so much for joining us this morning. thank you so much. so do you agree with senator fetterman? there? should democrats, you know, pack a lunch and, and and approach this differently than you did in 2017? >> well, i do think that it's

important not to freak out at every distraction, because i think there's going to be a lot of distractions. and i think people in my party really need to focus on what the issues are that really matter to the american people. and quite frankly, i think it's going to be one distraction after another. so maybe, yes, pack a lunch. >> why do you think you lost your race? >> what was it? because trump was on the ticket. i lost by one point. and in pennsylvania, um, was the center of the universe. as you know, last election and all resources from both parties poured into that state. and, um, i think what democrats underestimated was just how many republicans were getting registered. and by that, i mean trump supporting republicans. >> really fascinating. so this morning, we also have a little bit of breaking news, because the usa today did an exit interview with president biden. and the headline is this biden

says yes, he could have won reelection. and here is the here's the headline. as you can see it, here's the full quote. this was susan page, who you may know, a longtime washington very well respected washington journalist. she says, do you believe you could have won in november? biden says, quote, it's presumptuous to say that, but i think, yes, based on the polling that and then she jumps in and she says, do you think you would have had the vigor to serve another four years in office? biden says, i don't know who the hell knows. so far, so good, but who knows what i'm going to be when i'm 86 years old? would that honesty have helped democrats in, you know, years ago that line would not have helped democrats. >> and i think that who knows whether he could have won. but i we have we can't underestimate the fact that having a woman, a woman of color at the top of the ticket,

may or may not have, um, not helped democrats win the presidency. so i'm not sure. but the age issue, the competence issue that debate performance, those were all huge mitigating factors against joe biden. so hard to say. >> what do you say to voters who feel like democrats weren't honest with them about what they may have known about the president's cognitive state? i mean, do you feel like you were confident in his mental acuity before that that debate? >> i was confident in his mental acuity. i did have great concerns about his ability to project and to speak. um, he's had a lifelong speech impediment, as we know, but this was something different. and i saw it firsthand. i could be as close as we are now and have difficulty at times understanding what he was saying. and that caused me a lot of concern because as president of the united states, it's not a

it's not that you're speaking professionally, but it's an important thing to be able to communicate well. and that really concerned me. but i didn't have concerns specifically about his cognitive abilities. no. >> um, do you think kamala harris could have won the presidency? was it a winnable race for her, or was it unwinnable? >> i think it was unwinnable. i think having i think there was we underestimated the trump effect and his ability to rebound. >> all right. congresswoman susan wild, thank you very much. you're going to be joining our panel throughout the coming hour. i appreciate it. thank you. all right. coming up on cnn this morning, a lengthy, wide ranging press conference, president-elect donald trump making clear his hopes of reshaping the entire western hemisphere, plus tens of thousands evacuated as a state of emergency in california as ferocious winds fanned the flames of devastating wildfires. so i just started packing up all of our stuff, and we got in the car to go, um, and then all the

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