captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc >> woodruff: good evening, i'm judy woodruff. on the newshour tonight, a troubling surge-- the u.s. breaks 11 million covicases and approaches 250,000 deaths hospits brace for a hard winter. then, the biden agenda-- the president-elect looks to the economy as the white house spreads disinformation and denial of defeat. and, the hunt for a vaccine-- we talk to a foundeof moderna as the company announces promising results, but many obstacles remain.

people are usee'to saying whthe cure, where's the therapy? we've had vaci we know how to make vaccines for a lot of things but we've never tried to do it with the clock ticking like this. >> woodruff: all that and more on tonight's p newshour. >> major funding for the pbs h newshouras been provided by: >> when the world gets complicated, a lot goes through your mind. with fidelity wealth managemendv a dedicatedor can tailor advice and recommendations to your life. that's fidelity wealth management.

>> the william and fra hewlett foundation. for more than 50 years, advancing eas and supporting institutions to promote a better world. at www.hewlett.org. with the ongoing suppor and individuals.tions: >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you.

>>oodruff: the covid-19 pandemic in the u.s. is generating both despair, and hope tonight. total infections have soared over the 11 million mark nationwide, but there is also progress in the effort to stop the virus. william brangham begins our coverage. >> brangham: a new week and another new experimental vaccine showing signs of real progress against this novel coronavirus. drugmaker moderna said today inearly trials show its vais nearly 95% effective. dr. stephen hoge is moderna's president: >> it's really just a milestone. thou we have a lot of work ahead of us. knowing the ccine is going to be effective is great news, but we still need complete the regulatory process. >> brangham: the announcement comes just a week after another leading candidate from pfizer had similar results. neither company has released the complete data behind their

claims. still, ameri's top infectious disease expert, dr. anthony fauci, hailed the news.no >> swe have two vaccines that are really quite effective. so i think this is a really strong step forward to where we want to be about getting control of this outbreak >> brangham: it's a bit of hope whthe the country faces a he crisis that's now growing exponentially. a staggering one million cases wereeported nationwide in ju the past six days. and, the u.s. ssed the 11 million mark over the weekend. when it comes to deaths, the average is up 33% from two weeks ago, at 820 a day. fearing that hospitals are reaching their breaking points,l officinationwide are putting back into place a series of restrictions many hoped were in the past. california rolled back reopening plans, ordering non-essential businesses in 41 counties to close. in new jersey today, governor phil murphy tightened limits on

indoor andutdoor gatherings ahead of the holidays. >> the smaller the gathering is ss likely it is someone is infected and puts their loved it is that simple. >> brangham: the city of philadelphia introduced similar restrictions. and er the weekend, washington state announced a month-long freeze on indoor sert restaurants and gyms. >> this is where the virus gets 'r. inside, where weheading duri the winter. brangham: michigan did the same, while also canceling in- person classes for high school and collegstudents over the next three weeks. but, president trump's coronavirus adviser, radiologiss dr. scott atlagested on twitter people shod "rise up" against those restrictions. he later tweeted he never meant to incite violence. that drew a rebuke today from president-elect biden. >> what the hell is the matter with these guys? what is the matter with the resist? >> brangham: in wilmington, delaware, mr. biden also warned alat president trump's ref

to concede defeat in the election, and authorize a transition, is delaying critical planning on a coordinated pandemic response. >> more people may die if we don't coordinate. if we have to wait until january 20 to start that planning, it puts us behind, over a month and a half. and so it's important that there be coordination now. >> brangham: and, dr. fauci has said a smooth handoff was key to beating the pandemic. for the pbs newshouri'm wiliam brangham. >> woodruff: as william reported, thpromising news from moderna raised hopes about it's important to er theear. data have not been published in a peer-revied medical journal yet. and the company has received signicant funding from the federal government and taxpayers: neay $2.5 billion for research, development and potential supply. ot's hear more about this news fr of the leading

executives involved. a noubyan is a co-founder and chairman of moderna. pioneering, a venture capital firm that helped launch moderna. yubar afeyan, thank you v much for joining us. this promising news today, how confident are yout t thats could help put an end to all the seeingsuffering we're now? >> well, judy, thanks for having me today. you know, in the science and inr clinical rech, confidence is a relative term. certainly, the data we have today encourages us to go forward -- the gforward rapidly to begin to make approval to have the vaccine get out. the challenge tht we face broadly around the world is so gravthat we needt to go through these tests, but also to

be rea to start making a difference. and i certainly believe that we have the basis to do that. today, again, subject to regulary review. >> woodruff: can you in layperson's terms why it is you think you were so -- you were able to achieve thihigh level of what's called efficacy, what is it, 94.5% success in helping make people immune from -- from thvirus? how were you able to do it? >> well, gulle the underlying technology which is, in fact, quite new and unprecedented, is uleled messenger rna, a molec that exists in every one of our cells and is the intermiary between dna which we know to be where the informationst isored about every aspect of life and proteins, which are the actors element which are the that do the things that make us and, so, the intermediary

molecule has never been tried as a form of a drug or a vaccine that could actually providefo ation to cells that they could then convert into a protein to have a resulting function. in this case, the intermediaryha moleculewe used coded for the protein, the spi protein, now famous for this virus, that actually is its vulnerability in ction.of the immune rea so what we did is we took the sequence, the dna sequence of this spike protein, qlyick encoded it into rna, molecule that we've had a decade-long program convert inta substance that could be used as drugs or vaccines, and that information was then provided into the volunteers that we had, that we tested it on, so that their own cells make this protein. when their immune system sees

edis protein, it thinks that it's been fend starts fighting back. now, of course, in our case, there's no infection, so the immune system gets activated, learns to ow what to to defend for and waitson guard until the virus shows up and, when the virus shows up, unle an immune system that has now lost and can't recognize thatthrethe immune system rapidly activates and knows exactly what to do to neutralize the threat and, based on allof that, we believe we had a pretty good chance, though would result, that anumbers preponderance of the cases of infection in our trial would be in people who did not get the vaccine and that's, in fact, what we saw. >> woodruff: complicated, but i'm sure for peopan who to try to understand it, they will be able to understand it. and what about the refrigeration, the freezing that's needed?

how much difference will that make in what your vaccine will require? >>hat we announced as well today based on data is not on could we keep our vaccine at minus 20 degrees stably for a very long time, but also take it out of that condition, keep it refrigerated fw up to 30 days without any loss of the vaccine'efficacy and, further yet, you can take it out of the fridge, because in order to use it, u're not going to take ouople into a fridge, you're going to take iof the fridge, put it on a bench, on at table, ands stable there for another 12 hours. so from a logistics standpoint, if we were only going to give this vaccine to a dozen or 100 people, this would not be a bigl but if we're talking hundreds of millions of people, then indeedo have to figure out where is it stored for long periods, whe is it stored at the point of administration, and how long can you work with it on any given day.

and we're very pleased it looks behave the way many otherould vaccines do in this regard. >> woodruff: as we reported earlier, it's estimated the federal government is putting something like $2.5 biion into moderna's work. is that accurate?ve could you done this without federal money, and how mu private money went into it? there has been substantialeed, government effort, not only just the efforts that avancedall of received government money of one sort or another, and this was largely to make sure that everybody went as fast as safely as possible, which required extra expenditures than wouldo have made mic sense to do. we also hador, fnately, a set of partnerships with the government that precede pandemic, particularly barta, with whom we worked on zika

ccines and the like. so based on that history, very quickly, our government colleagues basically said, look, don't slouw down be of lack of capital. they put some capital up fro,nt and sa look, we'll go try to get more. so what we did as a company is reach out to our shareholders and, through a series of equity raises, added yet another billion dollars at risk to be able to accelerate this proengrm s the year's gone on, we've struck agreements with tht u.s. govern through a was, operation warp speed, to supplement our resources andsu madee the capital is put to work to develop one of the best vaccines and potent solutions to this pandemic. >> woodruff: because to have the federal money there's a

progressive nonprofit consumer arkdzy group called mick citizei hethe u.s. that is saying, because of that, what moerna should be doing is providing access bas on who needs the vaccine rather than on countries with the ability to pay, and they are saying because of u.n. protocols, this is something that moderna needs to do. >> well, judy, the distribution of the vaccine will be done through governments. we have worked not only with the u.s. government but many other governments to enter into contracts to supply them the vaccine, and we also are in active discussionswith covac which is the entity charged with securing vaccine supplies to low and middle-income cotries as are many of te intention and hope is ourand our vaccine will be part of that suite of solutions offered to all countries through their government.

so the good news is we're not the ones allocating our vaccine within a country and then to get to that untry we have had standard agreements made with ltiple countries that i've already signed up and some yet that were ively discussing so we can have the biggest impact we c i. >> woodrufs a question we want to depose and we thank you for the answer, we thank you for talking with us, noubar afeyan, we appc iateit. >> thank you so much. >> woodruff: now to a personalth take ovaccine hunt. our own john yang has been a part of these clinical trials. and he joins me now. ulso, john, not everybody want to take part in one of these. what made you want to do it and why do you think they wanted thu othe the fact that you're an amazing, wonderful human being?

>> well, jui wish i could say it was something altruistic like wanting to contribute to the solutiol wanting to hep the cause of science, but, quite frankly, it was the opportunitnc the chthat i could get the real vaccine, you know, in these trials, half get the real vaccine, half get the placebo. so the 50/50 chance is what attracted me. i gh risk group, my age, i have asthma, i have gh blood pressure, things that put me at a high risk group, and according to the doctors in the study that's what alsdeo mae attractive is they wanted to find out if the vaccine was safe for eople in those groups. i'm also a person of color, which is something they wanted to test. and my desire to geta the l vaccine was so great that, after the first day after i got the vaccine, i was actually a little disappointed that i hadn't had a reaction to it, to the shot, that maybe i got the placebo.y, paradoxicahe next morning,

when i started to feel some of the side effects, it actually boo idea me little bit. i felt good about feeling bad. >> woodruff: so you thought ybe you did get the real thing. so we heard about the side effects,ot to debilitating, and assuming you did get the real thing, tell us, what did you go through? how did it affect you? >> well, there were two shots.t the fine, as i say, the first day i was fine, the second day i started to get a ttle achy, a little muscle pain, muscle soreness, joint soreness. i got a fever, not too high, about 99.9 was the highest it went. i got it on sda tue -- got the shot on a tuesday, and those ymptom really did persist, until aboutturday is when i felt fine. the second shot, the onset as much faster. by that night, i was in bed by

7:00, achy, verrish, fatigue, but as the onset was faster that second time, it resolved faster, o. i got it on a tuesday, by wednesday, i was fine. >> woodruff: so, john, in a tuation like this where you don't know going in whether it is the real thing or a placebo, what kinds of questions -- as this has gone on, what kinds of questions has this raised for you about the vaccine? >> well, they asked me to continue my usual routine. vstayed, obiously, working from home, when i went out wearing a mask when i'm going shopping. i think what i'm fighting against is we still don't know how long the immsune at t lasts or even if i personally have immune at this. so i am being reery ful not to change my patterns, not to cautio any of the pr that i am taking, still being anry careful wearing that mask. >> woodruff:at some point, you will find out for sure whether you've had the real vaccine or not?

>> well, this mornin when they announced their preliminary results, they sad they were so happy with what they were offer the real vaccine to the people in the play vw seibo grou i'm going for my two-month check-in tomorrow, so i'm going to athem if they're going to tell me ich group i'm in and if i am in the placebo, whether they will offer me the real vaccine. >> woodruff: so helpful to hear your story. i think everybody has to say enu're making a sacrifice for everybody else wyou offer to do something like this, and we john yang.r that. >> thank you. >> >> woodruff: the re to develop a vaccine, or more accurately, a number of vaccines, is a sprint we have not tried on this ale ever before. president trump, his team and longtime public health leaders who were not political hires say the latest news about modernaws and pfizer shis approach

is working. but there are questions about ramping up an effort like this. miles o'brien has been reporting on the larger prograthose concerns. >> reporter: in a factory built to fight pandemics, they are going faster and working harder than ever to build the vats and turn on the spigots for coronavirus vaccines. >> there's a big onrush of materials, a big onrush of activity happening in this facility and we're currently normalizing our operations around that to ensure that we get as much vaccine produced and the door as possible. >> reporter: sean kirk is executive vice-president of manufacturing operations at emergent biosolutions, a company with a long history manufacturing drugs aimed at big threats to human health; ebola, zika, anthrax and sm among them. >> we have a lot of experience with some potentially scaryu organism if ll, when we're bringing that expertise to that capability and confidence to bear in the fight against covid-19.

reporter: funded with 6 million federal tax dollars, emergent is already producing covid-19 vaccines here in baltimore. the team hopes to crank out tens, to hundreds of millions of lises for their big ph customers ke astrazeneca and johnson and johnson, before thef haished clinical trials, and before approval from the food and drug administration. >> it does create the possibility that if th do not navigate the clinical pathway successfully and they're not approved that the material may not be usable. >> reporter: meaning it will be incinerated. but there is growing evidence science is not racing down a dead end. of the six leading vaccine contenders the u.s. government is shepherding, four are in the third and final stage of clinical trials, whe efficacy is tested among tens of thousands of volunteers. last week pfizer issued a pres release claiming its vaccine is at least ninety per cent effective. >> from knowing that it is

positive, all the way to knowing that it is positive, and 90%, which i never thought would be, describe. me a joy that i cannot reporter: albert bourla is pfizer's c.e.o.an his compis now completings itapplication for emergency use authorization from the f.d.a. >> i think we know if it protects against the disease. we don't know yet, because we ahaven't seen this data, how many of these cases were seve cases or light cases. >> reporter: today's announceme moderna is nearly identical. all of this, onlten months after chinese scientists first published the genetic fingerprint of the novel coronavirus, officially called sars-cov-2. the news brought president trump into the white house rose garden to bask in a scientific victory on the heels of his potical defeat. d >> this far exceeds any l expectations. nobody thought they'd get to

that level. and we have others coming, which we think will be an equal level, maybe more, ifhat's possible. >> reporter: the friday the 13th victory lap was more than good luck. in the spring, the trump administration began funneling 0 billion in federal funding to the private sector mostly to hasten the hunt for a vaccine.'s alled operation warp speed. it also has aimed to reduce regulatory burdens and encourage collaboration between private enterprise and federal agencies. derek lowe is a veteran drug discovery researcher and author of the influential blog "in the pipeline." people are scared and looking for a silver bullet. a >> they su and i don't blame them for a minute. we haven't had a situaike this. people are used to saying," okay, i've got this di where's the drug? where's the cure? where's the therapy?" weornow how to make vaccines a lot of things but we've never tried to d ticking like this.

>> reporter: johnson and deep in its phase work onr, is its vaccine. paul stoffels is the chief scientific officer. this is a scientific moonshot. >> reporter: how are you moving so quickly? >> yeah, it is a moonshot feel people, for an organization. everyone is volunteering their time. everyone sees the challenge in society, but also the disease is in the family and several people lost family members due to covid. so, we don't have to ask people to work weekends and nights. they just show up and do it. >> reporter: dr. stoffels says his team is doing many tasks d normale consecutively, in parallel. that's why, among other things, they're already manufacturing the unapproved vaccine at emergent. is likely no vaccine will be ready for widespread inoculations before the springat arliest. still, science at this pace has

raised concerns a vaccine coulde be released bet is proven safe. >> we have to be clear-eyed about thisnd that we aren't taking on extra risk. you cannot have it all. cannot have the vaccine the world record for speed and work perfectly and be perfectly hefe not all by the end of year. >> reporter: stoffels and his pharmaceutical industry bristle at the notion that politics has set their timetables. haveersonally or your company felt political pressure to deliver faster? and if so, what have you done about it? >> we want to say we work fast, but it's not under political pressure and we do what we need to do in order to get to the results to show the safety and the efficacy. i've never had any prefrom anybody, and i won't take it either. will be there when it is there. >> reporter: and in fact, astrazeneca have hbriefly pause their vaccine trials because of unexplained illsses

among their volunteers. in a world where science is moving at break-neck speed to solve a global crisis, tapping the brakes may be the most reassuring news of all. for the pbs newshour, i'm miles >> woodruff: this leaves us with a number of questions about when the others miles just mentioned, could be available more widely to the public next year and the challenges that exist. doctor francis collins is the o directthe national institutes of health. he has been involved with all oe this and thedent's dr. collins, thank you so much for joining us. again, to pick up on milre' rting, how great a risk still is it with these vaccine. >> we're feeling extremely encouraged by the extraordinary results as far as the efficacy, and the safety has turned out for pfizer and moderna, the two

that reporteficacy data, that look pretty gooled. peike john yang have had side effects in terms ofso ness or low-grade fever, butt nothing severe. so we're on the populistic. that means that's good enough to be submitted to the f.d.a. for that would include a public session of their advisory committee soverybody will get a chance to look at the data and on then will f.d.acide whether to issue this e.u.a. at that point, that will be the trigger to start distributingth roughly 40 million doses that will be potentially available in december from a combination of pfizer and moderna. but keep in mind this is a two-do vaccine, 40 million doses, 20 million people may potentially get immunized in december if all of the things go as well as we hoped. >> woodruff: and the f.d.a.

part of this, y see that moving pretty smoothly? >> absolutely. the f.d.a. screentists are extremely experienced and hard working.in they are 24-7 through all of the steps to make sure that what we have is just as safe and effectivthe public expects. i know we're working against a hits built of public concern because of the speed with which this has been conducted and even the n warp speed has caused atme people to worry th corners are going to be cut, they are not. and to have done these trials with morehan 30,000 participants and to have the data analyzed by an independent group, which is what happens here with th a safety monitoring board, and then to go to f.d.a., this is as rigorous as it gets anywhere in the worl and if this does come through with that kind of emergency use authorization, itb wibecause the data is really good. >> woffodmeanwhile, dr. collins, as you know very well, we are seeing such a across the united states right

now. what is is it, we're up a million cases the last week. we're at almost 250,000 deaths. give us your read on where we are right now as a country dealing with covl,. >> w judy, it's such a moment of traumatic contrasts to have these encouraging results from vaccine trials but to know that those are still months away for most of us, a to se at the same time this explosion of the pandemic across thoe cuntry, not just in cities on the coast but across the country and rural areas, thiswhat we alll as feared might happen when cold weather came in. if there was ever time for americans to say we can do something here to get through to the light at the end of the tunnel those vaccines present, skt they're not here yet. so wearing the is not an invasion of your personal

freedom, this is actually a life-saving medical instrument. we have the data forthat, with thanksgiving coming and other holiday gatherings, i thinkre we're allly concerned that this could get even worse if we don't follow those guidelines, those three ws, you know what watch your distance and wash your hands, we've got to that. i can be thankful at thanksgiving and i know we will bwillbe that we have the vaccind e volunteers, but also we can push the reset button on all the public health decisio that haven't gone well and make a decision to takesu mees to save lives. >> woodruff: it's clear you're concerned the message hasn't gotten across to enough people. that's coming across. i uld like to ask you about a comment from

president-elect biden. tr called on president trump to begin thsition process quickly. i'm quoting him, he said, more people may die if we don't coordinateou if he right that? >> well, goodness knows we need to have a clear plan going forward for testing, for putting forward more public health messages that peop can completely adapt to. it is not a good time to bea losing eveay in terms of organizing that effort. so i understand where the president-elect is coming from. i hope we can soon pull all of this together. as a member of the current white house task force, we woulall look forward to doing whatever it takes to get the public health messages properly convened and communicated. this is a moment where we haveos no time to >> woodruff: if there's one message today for the american people, what would it be?

>> the cavalry is coming. the research has pai off in a dramatic fashion like we've never seen anything like it before. usually takes eig years to get to this point. we did it 11 months and no rners were cut. so be enthusiastic, excited, encouraged about that, but still we are alrko in a period with this pandemic. it is up to all of us to further increase our attention to what we can do day by day just likeg wearseat belt, put on your mask, it's a way to save lives, how we can all doa better job of this if we just hang in for a few more months. >> woodruff: coming through, loud and cle. francis collins, director of national institutes of u alth. thank ry much. >> thanks, judy. glad to be with you.

>> woodruff: witabout nine weeks until his inauguration, president-elect joe den's focus today waon rebuilding the economy after coronavirus. lisa desjardins was at the esident-elect's speech and joins us from wilmington, delaware. , so lisa, let's start with discussing, the promising word on a vaccine, a second vaccine. what is president-elect biden saying about this d the potential for mass distribution of it?re >> as you discussing with francis collins tre, the president-elect is saying that there are real concerns and he inks aeal threat to human beings in this country if he and his team is not able to get inrmation about the vaccie plan, specifically, and other things. but what doest that mean exactly? of president-elect biden'srs

coronavirus task force, a professor at harvard among other qualifications he has, and he said, as you have been talking has ever been attempted, not in scope, not in speed, and that in eight weeks a new administration will taha over thling of this monumental task, and they need to know at least as much as they can if there is a plan about that plan. second, the doctor also told me something else interesting, it's not st about theccine that biden has a concern, but alsoge aboural supplies. the doctor says he's hearing from nursing homes and others b there cou shortages of supplies of things like gloves, masks, things people need tope care for thple who get the disease as well as for people who want to administer thein va so there is a critical supply team would like t morehe biden answers to. >> woodruff: now, lisa, weow the president-elect also talking today focusing on the economy connected to pandemic. of course, he met with leaders

of both organized mayb -- organd labor and business. any signs early oof common ground for a path forward there? >> you know, judy, how many times do weear abothese meetings and we hear there was common ground, it was producti productive? and sometimes we're skeptical, right? well, i spoke to people in tha meeting and who said, actually, it was productive, including the leader of the service employees international union, she has in nurses and front lio line worken her union and everyone agreed there's a need to focus more on p.p.e. now and there's a need they said they agreed on forn more attentght now on communities of color which are suffering economically and in health, and one more thing there is an interesting conversation between the uaw and also gm about electric cars. is that a way they can help with jobs in the future if they get federal help from a future biden

ministration?>> woodruff: so, ls only been president-el mt for a litte than a week since the race was called. is it known what if anything he can do now befe -- well before he takes office to doin someabout the need for economic recovery? >> yeah, my porting gave us some ideas. you know, president-elect biden said today there's onlyne president at a time. what he's doing in this call is mrshalshalling resources to hean the future and now. one thing he asked c.e.o.s d union leaders to do is put pressure on congress now to pass more coronavirus relief before he takes us a.eh said we might get credit for it but we can't wait till january. >> woodruff: lisa desjardins, reporting from wilmington, thank you very much. >> you're welcome.

>> woodruff: meanwhile, president trump has still refused to concede the election, more than one weekfter the associated press called the vote for president-elect joe biden. yamiche alcindor has our report. >> alcindor: defiant and divorced from reality, president trump spent the weekend on the golf course and twitter. he repeated familiar, unsubstantiated claims of fraud. and he continued to refuse, o admit defestead spreading disinformation. "i concede nothing," he wrote sunday. dashing hopes that he was slowly realizing he'd lost. earlier, he wrote of president- elect joe biden saying, "he won because the election was that seemed to at least acknowledge the results of the election. meanwhile, g.o.p. leaders, including house minority leadery kevin mccaare still supporting the president's refusal to concede. >> regardless of how this outcome is, you want to be able trust the election. if there was something that was wrong in this election, we do not nt to repeat it for the

future either. >> alcindor: former president barack obama hit back on republicans on cbs news sunday, in his first remarks since. november >> the president doesn't like to lose and never admits loss. i'm more troubled by the fact that other republican officials who clearly know better are going along with this, ang humoim in this fashion. it is one more step in delegitimizing not just the incoming biden administration, but democracy generally. and that's a dangerous >> alcindor: with the country divided on trusting the election results, thousands of supporters of predent trump took to the streets of washington, d.c. there, they enjoyed a visit from the president, who waved from insi his motorcade. the event drew thousands of people, but did not live up to its name, the "million maga march." it also didn't live up to the trump campaign's estimates, including white house press secretary kayleigh mceneny's false claim that the crowdat

tallied"more than one million." by day's end, the initially peaceful gathering turned, in clashes between prump and anti-trump protestors resulted in 21 arrests. four police officers were sinjured, and one person stabbed. e rlier today, in a press conference, strict's police chief, peter newshom, praised his officer's handling of the event but deche circumstances. > to see our country having p those kinds sical disputes over an election, that's something we attributeo other countries across the world. we don't see that in the united states so that's the worst oit for me. >> alcindor: though a peaceful transition of power remains in question, president-elect biden expressed confidence that hisep team would be ed come january. >> i am hopeful that t president will mildly more enlightened before we get to january 20. but i find this more embarrassing for the country than debilitating for my ability

to get started. >> alcindor: and outhe capitol, the work to put on the inauguration two months from now continues as workers construct the stage where the winner will ear his oath. this evening, president trump is continuing to doublee own on his fasertion that he is the rightful winner of the 2020 election, refusing to acknowledge joe biden is in fact thelpresident. critics say his behavior and rhetoric is dangerous a can imperil american democracy t president-elect biden says he's moving ahead full speed even though he doesn't have the resources needed and the transition has not startly offici the biden campaign is hiring and expected to announce senior staff positions as early as tomorrow. while the biden campaign is letting people go.campaign is sunday a majority of the trump campaign staff endoy their emnt. while the president is continuing his legal battles, he's doing it with a m smaller staff. for tbshe "ewshour," i'm yamiche alcindor at the white

house. >> woodruff: in the day's otherc news, hue "iota" blew up into a category 5 storm, with winds of 160 miles an hour, threatening catastrophe in central america. the storm closed in on the same parts nicaragua and honduras already battered by hurricane "eta". the nicaraguan army has evacuated hundreds of people from low-lying areas. the storm could dump 30 inches of rain, and trigger floods and landslides. the u.s. military is set to cut troop numbers in afghanistan by half, to 2,500, by mid-january. pentagon officials confirmed today that president trump is issuing an executive order. it would also reduce troops in

iraq by 500, to 2,500. the plan goes against vice of top american commanders. fighting in ethiopia has escalated again.po various s say the ethiopian military bombed theig capital of they region today, after tigray fired rockets into neighbo eritrea, an ally of ethiopia. in two weeks ofighting, hundreds of people have died, and some 25,000 refugees hdae fled into >> ( translated ): a bomb came, om the eritrean direction, and an attack from the direction of the ethiopian federal a lot of people dire.ty. i was afraid of the bombs and the strikes. up.ot of buildings were blown >> woodruff: the ethiopian government has risted international calls to start peace talks. is, an islamic state suspect went on trial today, accused of attacking a high-speed train in 2015.

the heavily armed moroccan man allegedly opened fire before he was overpowered by three americans. their story was later made into a movie. if convicted, the accused attacker could face life i prison. ree americans and one japanese astronaut are due to dock at the international space station tonight on a history-making space-x flight. they blasted off sunday from cape canoraveral, a. it's the first time a private spacecraft has carried out a full-scale human ferry flight for nasa. the deadline passed today for filing sexual abuse claiy against the outs of america. forward, saying thehave come assaulted by scout leaders. the claimants are seeking damages in federal bankruptcy for chapter 11 protection.led the trump admistration is moving to sell oil and gas drilling rights in the arctic national wildlife rege, before

leaving office. the federal bureme of land mana served notice today on opening 1.5 million acres of the alaskan wilderness. president-elect biden could block any leases after taking office. and, on wall street, stockss rallied on newof a second possible covid vaccine. the dow jones industrial average gained 470 points to close at a record 29,950. it has now erased all of its pandemic losses. the nasdaq rose nearly 95 points, and, the s&p 500 added 41, also a new high. >> woodruff: as we remain in

this contentiousodransition peetween two administrations, amna nawaz has o.day's analysis with our politics monday >> nawaz: thanks, judy. they are: amy walter of the cook political report and host of amy walter."'s "politics with and tamara keith of npr. she also co-hosts the "npr politics podcast." welcome to you both. it's good to see you. amy, i don't think you need reminding, but tomorrow marks two weeks since election day. itee been more than ak since the election was called for joe biden, and as we have been reporting, president trump is still refusing to let the transition begin. i know you have been looking into this, so lay tout for us. the shorter the runway gets, how does that complicate how and if the biden team can hit the grou running? >> that's right, amna. i mean, you know, we're hittings oint where it's not just about whether donald trump concedes and whether he's magnanimous. hethe issue really is that t

neral service administration allows these funds to e disbursed and althousands the actual bodies of government which are i the trump administration to talk to the incoming biden administration. we know this is happening at hea timewe're in the middle of a pandemic, so you could argue there are some things right nw that itt such a big deal if folks get that within a week or two weeks from now or closer to january, but the fact that president-elect biden is going to have toe tackis pandemic, the possibility of trying to distribute hopefully a vaccine within weeks of taking office, getting dl of this prepa in time is really, really, really and when i was talking to some scholars last week about this transition process, what they reminded me was that the 9/11 report, after, obviously, the

attacks on september 11, what it pointed out was the fact that, in 2000, the very short ansition time between the then clinton administration going in the bush administration was certainly a weak point, and while they didn't blame that for not being prepared for the attacks, they did say having that shorned window of time was a real security threat, and i think we have to take that very seriously rightow. >> and we're even seeing some republican lawmakers stepping forward saying there could be national security implications and they don't think there is president-elect biouldn't have intelligence briefings now. president and ou're about the hearing from your inside white house sources. he does continue to perpetuate the lie that he won the election.

his legal challenges are dissolving, the math really isn't there. is there anyone inside his orbit close to the president who is delivering that message to >> he talks to a lot of people, so he is getting a lot of, messages a course, he pics the messages he wants to receive at any given moment. i will note that, in is twitter feed, there have been moments, there have been glimmers of him acknowledging that he may not be president much longer. there was a tweet today about the vaccines where he said, remember, this happened on my watch. but in talking to people who are in the president's orbit a who aret at the white house, what you hears i that they really just have to let this play out, they have to let all of these lawsuits get to the end of the road and states certify a eventually while maybe they don't know what will happen or what the president may do and there may never be a speech or hashake or anything that

resembles what is traditional for a transition, with you that eventually joe biden will get the keys. the qution, though, is, as amy this lag?ut, how problemat is biden today essentially said lives are on the line. represents govern who saidho that having this sort of question of who -- you know,t there cabe two presidents and one of them could get really upt if governors start working with the future president, and, so, they'r this really challenging position right now, kindlking on egg shells, not wanting to go public or weblicly say, mae, biden's going to be president,need to work on vaccine rollout plans. >> reporter: when i mean ghile, as we have been notin throughout the program, the pandemic in the u.s. continues to get rse. amy i want to ask you ant the analysis as more and more election results, people e

taking a close look at them, one thing that caught my ye is in states where the virus has been surging republicans, many of whom argued against steps torb irus spread, many of those lawmakers con won their races, they won big in a lot of those areas, what do you make of that? >> as did the president, right? we saw the surges in the upper midwest right near election time, places like iowa, south dakota, even wisconsin, the president won two of those handily, came close to winning in wisconsin. i think this goes back to talking about so ad nauseamen for the last fouryes with you preceded trump, too, is everything n is politicized. en i was asked before, in the old days, in the before time, i ess, you know, what would it take to break the gridlock in washington? i would say, unfortunately, i think it's going to take something really dramatic, really horble that will unite

us together as one during a crisis. wellwe're in the middle of a crisis but at this point we still have two very diffent cotries when it comes to taking the seriousness of it,ng thinit's serious, and, two, how to deal with it. and that's not some ingthat president-elect biden is going to be able to fix overnight, and, so, that's a challenge tt is still very much in front of us. the other thing, amna, is we all really hoped that maybe the election would give us guidance. we're always looking fovoters' say in these things, what mandate, what kind of message are they sending, but they sent, as you pointed out, a very mixed message, which is, in some places, where the pandemic theoretically could have been the most important issue working against the president, it actually -he actually won rather handily. >> reporter: so, tam, pick up where amy left off. often talking to leaders at the state evel, right, when it comes to the fact they're in the middle of a crisis, votexe are

sending messages. what are they saying about how they could or will be working with an ioming biden administration? something interesting emerging, as aimia talks about, the politicization of the coronavirus. you have democratic governors saying things like, i want my opponents to live long enough to vote against me, or, sure, say that your governor is a dummy on the mask, i don't care, just wear the mask. and ybe some of those governors are finding a way to attempt to get the results that they want without without conceding to the politics. you know, i think that the real challenge that biden facrs and ots that when we're talking about coronavirus and we're talking about politics, there's not a lot of nuance, and, so, it's either shut town or open up but, in reality, it's not a switch, it's a dial, and politics, as we've said many times on thisrogram, itics does not live well in the realm

of nuance. >> particularly during campaigns. >> reporter: tam, in just a few seconds we have left nirks chance in this next coming session, congress is back in session now, is tre any chance of any covid relief funding >> well, never a bet on a lame duck pause you never know what will happen in tse weird times, but there doesn't seem to be a lot of momentum and energy and, certainly, yodon't have the president, at this point, focused on it or seeing it as part of his legacy to push elthrough a covidf package, and you need someone like the president to push for that to make it happen. >> reporter: mean while, we're out of time, where millions of americans could use that help more than ever. that is tamera keith and amy walter, our "potetics monday" , always good to start the week with you two. thank you so much. you're welcome. >> woodruff: i always learn so much from "politics monday," thank you all three. online right now, schools are

acying all kinds of strategies to keep kids on and engaged, but parents and teachers say it sometimes feel like nothing is working. in the latest episodof our podcast, america interrupted, amna nawaz talks with a michigan family and their teacher about the challenges they're facing. find it on oureb site, pbs.org/newshour, or wherever you get your podcasts. and that's theewshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. join us online and again here tomorrow evening. for all of us at the pbs newshour, thank you, please stay safe, and see you soon. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been proved by:

>> the kendeda fund. committed to advancing restorative justice and meaningful work through investments in transformative leaders and ideas. mo at kendedafund.org. >> the alfred p. sloan driven by the prom great ideas. >> supported by the john d. and catherine t. macarthur foundation. just, verdant and peaceful world. more information at macfound.org >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. urand by contributions to bs station from viewers like you. thank you.

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♪ hello and welcome to "amanpour & company." here's what's coming up. >> i want to congratulate you an congratulate kamala harris for this election. >> france welcomes joeid ben's victory. what next for country shaken by coronavirus and terror attacks? answers from the french finance minister bruno le maire. then writer chimamanda ngozi adichie with her review of obama' new memoir, her fresh fiction and ria's current crisis. plus -- >> haso you have a divided couny that doesn't he a common sense at this point. >> how to break up online echob ch. the stanford internet observatory's renee diresta joins us.