captioning sponsored by wnet >> sreenivasan: on this edition for sunday, december 13, a watershed moment towards combating covid-19, as the firsn vashipments are rolled out; jeff greenfield on the electoral college te; and care-- after decades of providing aid overseas, it's now turning to need in its own backyard. next on "pbs newshour weekend." >> pbs newshoureekend is made possible by: sue and edgar wachenheim iii. the anderson family fund. bernard and denise scartz. the cheryl and philip milstein family. barbara hope zuckerberg. the jpb foundation. barbara hope zuckerberg.

the leonard and norma klorfine foundation.ch les rosenblum. we try to live in the moment, to not miss what's right in front of us. at muetual of america, w believe taking care of tomorrow can help you make the most of today. mutual of america financial group, retirement services and investments. >> for 25 years, consumer cellular has been offering no-contract wireless plans, designed to help people do more of what they like. our u.s.-based customer service team can help find a plan that fits you. to learn more, visit www.consumercellular.tv. additional support has been provided by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the american people. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> sreenivasan: good evening and thank you for joining us. the first shipments of the covid-19

use in the united states are expected to arrive a145 sites tomorrow. at the izpf manufacturing plant in michigan this morning, employees cheered as the first boxes of the super-chilled vaccine were loaded onto trucks. a c.d.c. vaccine advisory committee voted approval of the pfizer vaccine yesterday for people 16 or older. are recommending a recommendation, coo individual vaccocine. thittee it is recommended healthcare workers and long-term care residents get >> sreenivasan: the committee also recommended healthcare workers and long-term re residents get first priority to receive the vaccine. the trump administration's chi cientific adviser fo "operation warp speed," moncef slaoui, said he expects nearly a third of the u.s. population will be vaccinated by the end of march. >> we hope to have immunized 100 million people which would be the long-term care facility people, the elderly people with comorbidities, the frontline workers, the health care workers.

that's about 120 million people. we will have immunized about 100 millople by the first quarter of 2021. >> sreenivasan: the f.d.a. is acheduled to discuss approval of a secondne, developed moderna, on thursday. confirmed cases of the secoronavirus continue to o record levels in the u.s. according to "the new york times," there are now nearly six times many cases each day and three times as many deaths as thagere were three month tomorrow the electoral college leote will bring president joe biden one step closer to final congressional approl and his inauguration as president on january 20. but the current pretodent continueay he won-- without any evidence and consistent losselein court to l chagellens of the outcome. last night, some of president ytrump's supporters-- man belonging to the neo-fas bst group, prooys-- and counter- protesters, including members antifa, fought in the streets of washington, d.c. the number of protters was much smaller than at last month's demonstrations. police said there were more than 20 arrests and two police

officers and six protesters were injured. for more on the president's continued baseless claims of victory, the electoral college and the transition to a new presidential administration, ecial correspondent jeff greenfield joins us now from santa barbara. all right, jeffhere we are, the president still contends that he did not lose this eledction, that it was rig against him with no evidence. tomorrow, 538 electors are supposed to meet. that is supposed to be the ultimate decision on making joe biden our next president by january 20. any last-minute twists? >> once they cashetheir votes, 's one more step yet to go, and that is on january 6, the new congrs meets in joint session to formally accept the state-by-state returns. if one member of the house and one member of the senate objects to any state's port, the congress retreats to their respective chambers, they debate for two hours and vote. now, given a democratic house and enough republican senator

who already said "enough," the outcome is certain, although with mike pence as the presiding officer, vice president, there could beurther glitches. 6 t i do really think that it, formally, januarould end it and biden will be officially the president-elect. >> sreenivasan: at that poin do republicans say, "fine, joe biden is the next president?" >> on earth one, i would say that, that's right. but you now have, just today, a cbs news poll showed something like 82% of republicans or trump voters think biden was not legitimately elected, and a majority of trump vors wants the congress to keep fighting. so, what you have here is a situation where we had 1 members of the house, republicans, a majority, and a marity of republican state attorneys-general asked the supreme court to invalidate millions of votes and literally

turn those, those states over to gislature so that trump could be reelected. iunder those circumstance don't see any reason to think that you're going to find a, uh, "oka it's over. let's all cooperate." >> sreenivasan: so, why? why did that happen? >> you now have, dicp in the repu party, a belief that expanding the right to vote, making it easier to vote, cost trump the election-- the mail-in ballots, the way you could correct signature verification problems, more drop off ples. it was the argument in the supreme court by the texas attorney general that only the state legislatures could do that, that election officials exceeded their power. and what i think you're going to see is republicans being very, very careful that in the next election, they're going to make it harder to vote, because i think there's a belief, as i vote this time.as too easy to and the people who took advantage of that were, by and large, democratic voters. and republican state legislatures, they're just going

to change the laws as much as theyan, and their power is pretty complete to just tighten the ability to vote. >> sreenivasan: where does this put the popular vote in the grand scheme of things? o >> from 195288, republicans won the popular vote seven out of ten times. since 1988, they've only won it once. itht does see the republican party now believes it cannot win t vhe popule and it has turned to e electoral college and those close battleground states and tighter voting laws to have a chance at the presidency. again, it's quite unusual in an merilitics and, if i may say so, quite disheartening. >> sreenivasan: just th s week, we al a tension between congress and the president over defensspending reauthorization. why is this significant? >> well, it's significant because this is the one time trump veto.ngress may override it hasn't happened in four years. trump is saying, "i'm going to veto this bill unless you change the law that limits liability of

major telecommunications companies like google and facebook. and i want the bill vetoed because i don't like the idea of installations named afteritary confederates." by and large, there are solid majorities always in congress that support the troops, get this bill passed so that we're no left defenseless. and i think this would be the ontime, particularly since trump is pretty much certain to not be president for very longer, that the republicans in congress are willing to say, going along with you."ot >> sreenivasan: jeff greenfield joining us from santa barbara, than >> thank you, hari. >> sreasen: british prime minister boris johnson and european commission president ursula von der leyen pledged to continue brexit deal today as the end of the year, and britain's union, looms.european today marked the deadline set by both sides to decide whether to continue negotiations. in a ohjoint statement,on and von der leyen said it would be "responsible at this point tt extra mile." neither side expressed optimism

that a free trade agreement wod be created. johnson said the mos ilikely outcono deal, a scenario that is projected to cause major damage to the economies of britain and the 27 member countries of the european union. y created peace deal between azerbaijan and armenia could be in jpardy after ltiple skirmishes broke out this weekend. soldiers marched through the tareets of azerbaijan's ca of baku on thursday, celebrating the country's november reclamation of much of nagorno- karaba region which had been der armenian control sin 1994. russian peacekeepers reported a clash on friday involving automatic weapons. it was the first recorded incident since the peace deal was finalized on november 10 following 44 days of fighting. arthnian government also accused the azerbaijani government for an attack yesterday. but azerbaijan blamed armenia for the violen and threatened to destroy armenia if there are more clashes. for more on the covid vaccine

rollout and the latest national and international news vis pbs.org/newshour. >>an sreenivsome of the biggest covid-19 outbreaks in the u.s. are in the prisons and jails that house more than two million pple. most states agree that vulnerable populations should getopriority as new vaccines are distributed, but should the nation's incarcerated be included on that list? newshour weekend's zachary green spoke with two experts on the topic, stjamiles larteyf writer for the marshall project, and collette peters, orector of thgon department of corrections and a trustee of the council on criminal justice. >dreporter: jamiles, i wan to start with you. as of now, how many incarcerated people have contracted cod-19? and how does the rate of covid infections in jails and prisons country?th the rest of the >> so, we are rounding the corner on a quarter of million fos in state prisons and the federal prison system having contracted the coronavirus. this week there are at least 21,400 cases, an increase of

about 40% from the previous high watermark. so, the crisis is clearly getting worse in prisons, the same way that it's getting worse virtually everywhere else in this country. there have been close to 1,700 dea iths so fthis pandemic in u.s. prisons. >> rerter: director peters, you oversee all of oregon's correctional facilities. how has the coronavirus been making its way into tate's prisons? and what are the challenges that you're facing in protecting the health of incarcerated people and the staff who work there? >> ssto, ff all, prisons were not made with public health in mind. they were made to be ps efficit sible and house as many people as possible. and so, social distancing really is almost impossible inside of a prison. probably the mosimportant thing that we did in order to cocomply with thel distancing requirement is we shut our prisons down immedtely to anybody but essential personnel in ordeto prevent the flow of human beings from the community coming inside. tet being said, we still h

almost 4,000 corrections employees in oregon coming in and out our institutions every day and living in our communities. >> reporter: jamiles, can you give us a sense of what differenstatesre doing to otect their incarcerated populations and the staff working inside jails and prisons? >> thefforts have been fairly scattershot. the have been attempts in me places to let out people who were nearing the end of their sentences, people deemed not a threat to the community, older incarcerated people. there have been some efforts to try to be creative with space and find ways allow more social distancing than would otherwise be possible in prisons. but, you know, as director peters mentioned, it is not a system that was broadly designed with public health in mind, and not a system that was-- that was designed to allow for things like social distancing, for, you

know, the kind of overzealous ctwashing of hands and prog your personal air. i mean, that's just it-- the two are just a little bi incompatible. >> reporter: director peters you serve on the national commission od-19 and criminal justice. when and how does the commission strecommend buting a vaccine once it comes out to incarcerat>> populations? ur final recommendations from the commission on covid wiut be finalized and rolled this monday, but i can tell you, in addition to prioritizing the nati's over 400,000 correctional officers and rrrections professionals the vaccine, we are recommending that tlts who are in custody also are priitized in the 1b category. that recommendation really focuses on our prisons similarly to hospitals. and, as was just mentioned, we have, unfortunately, many vuerable people who are incarcerated. in oregon, we have the fourth largest elderly population incarcerated in the country.

and with that comes chronic disease. these individuals often are ten years older biologically than their chronological age because ofack of preventative care, lifestyle choices, etc. and so, these really are some of our most vulnerable people in the united states. >> reporter: jamiles, you've been writing about this. howretates prioritizing the distribution of covid-19 vaccines to jails and prisons? are there any states that are planning on getting a vaccine to incarcerated people early? >> yeah, in an analysis compiled by both the covid prison prmyojt anublication, the marshall project, we found that in at leas isix statarcerated people will be among the phase one recipients of the vaccine, and that in many more they were included in phase two of generally three phases, with phase three being kind of the "all the rest most states have looked at incarcat folks in that-- in that stage b of after healthcare

workers and before the-- the general public in that-- in that phase that includes essential workers and people with unrlying health conditions in the general population. >> reporte: director peters, incarcerated people fall in distribution plan?in oregon's >> yeah, i'm pleased to share that they are in theategory 1b. they have been approved for prioritization. and so, we will begin the planning for that vaccination, both for ouofcorrections sionals and the adults in custody. people to understand that while we have engaged in mass incarceration, these are our community members. sisters and aunts and uncles who have been incarcerated. and over 95% of them are coming back to our communities. and do you want them coming back, having felt cared for during the midst of a pandemic or not? i know what kind of neighbor i want. i want one that feels like they

were cared for, both from a puctblic safety perse and a public health perspective during their incarceration. >> research has also shown that, beyond the obvious risk to the pethople who live, prisons and jails and detention centers can and wi and, we believe, have served to incubate and seed th virus back into the general community since employees, as we discussed, moveth move between institutions and their homes. so, even if you are ctrolling the pandemic in the broader society, if you have outbreaks roiling and going unccked in these facities, that will extend t pandemic and prevent us from getting it under control in a public health sense. >> reporter: collette peters, director of oregon's department of corrections and jamiles lartey of the marshall project, thank you so much for joining us. >> thanksfor having us. >> thank you.

>> sreenivasan: the coronavirus pandemic has laid bare the shtcomings of america's publ health and anti-povert programs, creating a new need r humanitarian relief as result. a reflection of that new world ordeis the care organization, which was created after world war ii to help neeopeans. now, for the first time in its 75-year history, it providing thattance to needy americans. special correspondent mike cerre reports from san francisco. orthe sty is part of our ongoing series "chasing the dream." >> reporter: this san francisco food truck is the latest interpretation of a holiday care ckage. >> a "care package" for me was always something your parents sent you in college. >> reporter: since the start of the covid crisis, s ristian huannprofit food truck called "mobilized lov has been sealrving free, hot meto some of san francisco's most food insecure neighborhoods, like

rita dunn's. >> usually we see people all over the globe in africa starving. w we're arving right here in america. >> john, it's a pleasure to hand you this check for $1,500 for this food package for the starving in europe. >> reporter: the original care package was a box of army surplus rations americans could buy in 1945 and have shipped overseas to the millions of needy and displaced europeans after world war ii. over the past 75 years, variions on the care package theme havee part of our vernacular and evolved into a variety of humanitarian assistance programs, care has been providing to over 100 countries. for the first time in care's 75 on the receiving end.ns are now >> i think in many ways it has beenumbling for us here in te u.s.

i think, unfortunately sometimes there is a perspective that these problems exist everywhere else. >> reporter: ryan shepard heads up care's necreated u.s. initiativeand recent pivot from just providing assistance globally to acti. local as we >> the reality is that we have our own challenges. and i thinthe pandemic has revealed how many of those challenges are shared with other places that we're active. >> reporter: covid did not cause food insecurity in this untry, but it has dramatically increased the numbers of peopl requiring food assistance. it's estimated that 10% of americans were food insecure before the pandemic. now northwestern university researchers are saying that number is likely to double. >> normally the breakfast and lunch that the kids would get in school, they're not getting it now. so, yeah, it's very important that these grps come out and elp. >> reporter: rita dunn is one of hundreds of community organizers around the country care is matching up with local nonprofits like christian huang's food truck to get food

to the neighborhoods, made all the more food insecure by the covid crisis. >> what made it really special for us was that it made our work essential, and it maded s safe anerable during a timehere a lot of nonprofits had to shut doauwn b they couldn't bring people inside to the brick and mortar space. wed were well-positio be safe and outdoors and continue our services. >> reporter: care u.s.a. is veraging its domestic fundrsing and foreign aid experience to help local n francisco and several other metropolitaut areas,istre food, as well as personal hygiene supplies, and assistance to essential workers. >> the secret sauce of all of thisomes down to the local partnerships. none of this would be possible without the organizations that have been on the frontlines that understand the communities and have been doing this work for many years in many instances. >> my people, my people, my beautiful people!

free lunches for the people, for the community. >> reporter: damien posey, aca l legend here in sa francisco's bayview district, is helping care and christian huang's food truck connect with the escity's needit neighborhoods.s "us 4 us" network of teenagelu nteers extends the food hot meals to people cut off byng covid from other types of public assistance and food sources and living in the city's food de fserts, where fred has always beencarce and relatively distant. >> ere are four building covomplexes, 1,000 residents, a lot of families, a lot of elderly, a lot of shut-in residents. and then, when i try to s ink of myselffamily in this neighborhood, there's not one restaurantgrocery store. that's pretty bad. >> families, woroor, undocumented residents, are by the most that are impact compared to the rest of the

residents in san francisco. >> reporter: born anised in india, priti rane s well aware of care's humanirian work abroad, but never thought she would be involved with it since shmigrated to thu.s. now, as the director of the city of san francisco's nutrition services and food insecurity task force, she's relying on care's national agreements with doordash and other deliver services to get food to families that don't have access to ty services like they had before the covid shutdowns. >> that connection to a delivery system like that really helped us get food to people that were most in need. >> reporter: like other major food banks around the country, the san francisco-marin food bank has seen the numb families relying on its services nearly double due to covid, which has also reduced the numbers of its mostly volunteer distribution network, according to its executive director paul ashe. >> it takes the od bank to do

the larger scale distributions and other organizations have a great niche to fill in terms of hing populations that we may not be able to find. we don't have a food shortage problem. we have a problem of organizing our political system and organizing our government and organizing o nonprofit charities. we havnew organizations coming to us and saying, "we can help if you can provide the food," and we're doing that. so it really takes af hands. >> reporter: but that is likely to change next month in the absence of a new economic stimulus package to continue ramsing u.s.d.a. food pr that account for nearly half of his food bank's supplies, which is neighborhood pop-up distribution point depends on. is this food truck, this laundry thuck, these deliveries, i the new care package? >> i believe so. our opinion is that the care package really has evolved to

being more about kind of the irit and the generosity that we might share with one another. the care package doesn't have to be in a brown cardboard box anymore. it's community members getting together and providing food pararcels, providing gift for folks who may be on the frnt lines or who may be facing financial challenge. >>eporter: christian huang wasne 't surout how the first careta packageed, buhe's certain that his offerings of thai chicken curry is better, faster and hotter than the original army surplus rations that started the tradition. >> enjoy it! >> tha.nk you so mu >> sreenivasan: finally, if you stay up late and find a spot withou bright city lights, you may see a rare meteor shower sometime 4:00 a.m. tonight.and the geminids are pieces of dust and debris enterinearth's atmosphere from far-away asteroids and present no danger, just a light show from between

120-160 meteors per hour. if you want to watch from indoors, check for online feeds from nasa and other space- watching groups. that's all for this edition of" pbs newshour weekend." for the latest news updates visit pbs.org/newshour. i'm hari sreenivasan. thanks for watching. stay healthy and have a good night. captioning sponsored by wnet captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org >> pbs newshour weekend is made possible by: sue and edgar wachenheim iii. the anderson family fund. bernard and denise schwartz. the cheryl and philip milstein family. the jpb foundation. barbara hope zuckerberg. the leonard and norma klorfine

foundation. charles rosenblum. we try to live in the moment, to not miss what's right in f ront of us. at mutual oerica, we believe taking care of tomorrow can help you make the most of today. ia mutual of america fina group, retirement services and investments. additional support has been provided by: consumer cellula and by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting, a private oration funded by the american people. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. you're watching pbs.

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