the constant whirlwind that will have impacts for many, many years, perhaps a generation. i think we're only starting to grapple with what that's going to mean for all of us. so i think it's important that that doesn't get lost amid everything else. thank you all for getting up "way too early" on this tuesday morning. stick around, because "morning joe" starts right now. before the plague came in, i had it made. i wasn't coming to erie. i have to be honest, there was no way i was coming. i didn't have to. i would have called you and say, hey, erie, get out and vote. we had it won. i think i have the truckers' vote. nice. by the way, nice trucks. you think i could hop into one of them and drive it away? just drive the hell out of here. just get the hell out of this. i had such a good life. my life was great. and then i said, let's do this, darling. this will be a lot of fun. but you know what?

i'm so happy with it because nobody has ever done so much in the first 3 1/2 years. >> nobody has ever done so much to kill so many people. that's correct. >> that's true. >> nobody. >> literally, nobody. >> nobody in the white house. it just has -- you've got to hand that to him. >> yes, you do. >> that he has made history. >> if it wasn't so sad i'd laugh harder. interesting closing arguments from the president. really interesting. there's no way i was coming to erie, pennsylvania. in erie, pennsylvania. >> yeah. >> and yesterday, i'd love to drive the hell out of here. speaking in allentown, pennsylvania. willie, that's sort of what you do when you visit family, right? >> exactly. the minute i sit down at the thanksgiving table i say i'd like to drive the hell out of here. nobody loves a truck more than donald trump but maybe my nephew frank. he wants to get behind the bill wheel and honk the horn.

i think that's an instinct a lot of us have. >> i guess so. but he understands that things aren't going quite the way he expected them to go a long time ago and you get the -- a sense of frustration. he's talked about wanting to leave the country if he loses. if he doesn't win iowa, never going back to iowa. it's -- it's an interesting closing argument, but we're going to look at a lot of polls today. >> yeah. >> and just go through the state of the race. we're one week away. can you believe we're one week away from this election. >> i can't, i can't. i know some health officials in allentown, pennsylvania, that wished he would have gotten the hell out of there before he arrived yesterday. good morning and welcome to "morning joe." tuesday, october 27th along with joe, willie and me, we have white house reporter for the associated press, jonathan lemire. and nbc news and msnbc contributor shawna thomas is with us. today as joe said, exactly one

week until election day. the president will be out on the virus spreading campaign trail set to hold rallies in lansing, michigan, west salem, wisconsin, as well as omaha, nebraska before heading out to spend the night in las vegas ahead of a rally in nevada on wednesday. his opponent, joe biden -- >> by the way, by the way, can we look at that picture right there? >> this is nuts. >> look at the picture of the crowds. i was talking last night to a top democratic operative who has probably taken more polls than anybody and -- over the past year, and a year and a half, and probably knows voters better than anybody. he said, you know, whenever you guys show pictures of these huge crowds you wouldn't believe how much it helps joe biden.

whenever seniors see pictures of those huge crowds, donald trump, he thinks it's 2016. he thinks he's running as a reality tv host that can go up there and do whatever he wants to do. he said, our polls show repeatedly that everything he thinks that is helping him especially these big rallies are causing him grave political harm. so please, keep those rally pictures up as long as you can because everybody every rally reinforces our message that donald trump is not responsible enough to be president during a pandemic that's killed over 225,000 americans. >> well, the dissonance is that the country is taking this seriously. the people who live in the country taking this seriously because they understand how dire it is. they have seen their -- they lost their jobs, somebody in their family has died or the kids are home from school, learning on computers.

the country gets it because we have been at it since february. the president clearly does not get or just does not want to get it. they're still mocking masks. mark meadows did that again yesterday. mocked joe biden for wearing a mask. they're still holding the huge rallies and mitigation is kind of gone, so let's ahead to vaccines and treatments and therapeutics. so they're totally out of line. by the way, they have been for how long now, seven months with how seriously the country takes it. and how unserious the white house either is or is pretending to be for political purposes. joe biden -- go ahead. >> no, did mark meadows really mock somebody wearing a mask yesterday? >> he was asked yesterday about whether he was waving the white flag because of his comments to jake tapper about not being able to control the virus. and he said the only person waving a white flag is joe biden or maybe he's wearing that white mask he wears all of the time.

so going out of his way to mock joe biden for wearing a mask which anthony fauci, dr. redfield, anybody you can listen to even inside the white house tells you is the key to getting our arms around this. >> i mean, the stupidity -- i mean, what exactly does he think happens after donald trump leaves office? who wants to hire somebody that's defiled themselves as much as he has, that's shamed himself i -- >> even before trump. >> making -- making a mockery of -- just making a joke out of himself. time and time again. you look funny in the mask, jake. then yesterday, still, after the white house super spreader event which of course they had another one last night. you have to wonder, amy coney barrett, really? you're going to go back to the scene of the crime where the united states government was

actually put at risk by your first event? could you not just say thank you, but no thank you, mr. president. i'm going to be quietly sworn in by chief justice roberts, it will be safer that way. really? i don't -- not only do i not understand that, most americans look at that picture and say, what the hell is going on? and willie, again, these are people who are running around acting as if 225,000 dead americans is a joke. >> almost 227. >> it's a punch line, that wearing masks which one doctor after another, one scientist after one, epidemiologists after another says, hey, if you want to save your lives, if you want to save the lives of people around you, and if you want to get back to work, if you want to get your businesses opened back up, wear a mask. seems pretty simple but for some

reason, donald trump and all of his stooges who are trying to emulate him, they're making it so much harder than it needs to be. and who are the people who suffer of course we have said it before, the seniors who die, the seniors who get very sick and people with underlying conditions who get very sick and yes, small business owners who continue to suffer because donald trump has mishandled this so badly over the past seven, eight months. >> and he's still saying at his rallies he'll probably say again today, we have turned the corner. we are turning the corner when my gosh, we're setting records every day for cases. joe biden, meanwhile, one week out from election day will be in the state of georgia, the first time as the democratic nominee that he'll be there first to warm springs as you know served as franklin delano roosevelt's retreat through his 12 years of president before making his way to atlanta for a drive-in rally. georgia remains neck in neck in

the latest polling. we told you yesterday about the poll that has biden up one, plus or minus four points. in wisconsin, the latest reuters/ipsos poll shows joe biden ahead by nine points. 53% to 44%. in pennsylvania, that same poll finds biden leading by seven points. 51% to 44%. in texas, the latest "new york times"/siena college poll puts president trump ahead by four points. 47% to 43%. let's bring in national political correspondent for nbc news and msnbc, steve kornacki. steve, let's start in the state of georgia if we could. it's pretty extraordinary that the democratic nominee for president is in georgia of all places. what do you make of the numbers in the state, how have they moved lately? >> that's roughly consistent with the polling average. here's the road to 270. every state that you see in gray here that includes georgia,

these are states that trump carried in 2016 that look like they are parts of the battleground in 2020. there's varying degrees of trouble for trump. wisconsin, michigan, pennsylvania, the three states in the grouping where his numbers are the weakest right now. you know, a state like texas is looking competitive, but donald trump's poll numbers are better there than they are in the midwest. but basically, the way to look at this map at least the way i do, there are a couple of states you see as blue, new hampshire, minnesota and nevada, these are states that they talked about flipping. blue states that clinton won in 2016. you're not seeing it in the poll right now, so barring that, barring trump's ability to flip one of the states i just circled, it is all about trump playing defense in these states right here. we took you through it the last time i was on a few days ago f he just loses -- trump does, wisconsin, michigan, pennsylvania, that would put biden over 270.

a loss in the state like georgia, for instance, if that ever to turn blue, you see biden would be sitting at 248. then if you went through the midwest here, there's wisconsin. there's michigan. even without touching pennsylvania, a state like georgia plus two in midwest would put biden over 270. there are scenarios for donald trump but he's playing defense with a week to go. >> a lot of people are saying hey, we won't know the outcome of this race for, you know, a month, maybe two months. but on election night, we're going to learn fairly early, maybe even by the end of the evening what's happening, what's happening in arizona. what's happening in north carolina and of course what's happening in florida. i mean, we'll know most likely by 9:00 p.m. with all of the early votes counted in florida. we'll know the shape of that race by 9:00 p.m. see how fascinating that's

going. if joe biden wins any one of those three states and if we assume what the two campaigns have assumed that biden has wisconsin and michigan locked down, is that enough for joe biden? >> yeah, take a look at a couple of different scenarios here. you mentioned florida and how it will work outside the panhandle basically 7:00 p.m. eastern in the first half hour we'll get the early vote and the mail-in vote and then the same day vote not that long after if past is prologue here. come in for florida at 7:30, you'll get north carolina. i'll another add another state here that you'll get substantial results from. that's ohio. the polls close in ohio at 7:30 and unlike a lot of the other states we're talking about in the midwest they do allow the processing of ballots ahead of time. so there's the potential to get a readout from ohio. texas might be producing numbers

too. look, if you start with michigan and wisconsin going blue, i know the trump folks will contest that at the point, but for the sake of plague out the scenarios if you start with wisconsin and michigan going blue, a florida would put biden over the top. a georgia would put biden over the top. a north carolina would put biden over the top. if you get out to arizona, by itself that would not put biden over the top. that would put him at 269 at the cusp of things. that's when you need to start talking about this, nebraska, they do the electoral votes by congressional district. notice that one of these is gray here. second congressional district of nebraska it's basically omaha. trump barely hung on there in 2016. he won it by about three points. the polling that's available there suggests donald trump's probably an underdog there if anything. if you gave that to biden, again, that would get him to 270. we didn't touch florida. we didn't touch arizona in this

scenario. that's what we mean about a -- when you're ahead eight nationally there's a lot of potential paths. >> yeah. jonathan lemire, it's one of the reasons why donald trump is going to nebraska to campaign there today. we have been talking about that congressional district for some time and right now, there's no doubt donald trump is an underdog in the nebraska congressional district in omaha. >> no question. he's going there because he is scrambling to find any combination of states and therefore electoral college votes to get him to 270. he'll be there tonight after two stops in the midwest before heading out indeed to nevada and then arizona where he has events tomorrow. he's got a robust travel schedule certainly for the next week including pretty remarkable 11 rallies scheduled for the last two days which is impressive but also shows a sense of desperation, joe. they haven't made strategic choices here where they're just going to focus on, hey, we'll

keep the three states in the upper midwest pause they're down -- they're down everywhere. there's a real scatter shot approach and they're at a financial disadvantage combined to the biden campaign. they're short on cash quite frankly and there's news that mike bloomberg who is helping fund joe biden's efforts in florida is putting in some last minute money to back up biden in ohio and texas too. two states that trump won fairly comfortably in 2016, but is now having to play defense. and with trump not being able to police the airways with ads what does he have? he has himself and the rallies. that's the one strategic advantage is his advisers concede he can be out there. of course, it's a double-edged sword as we have been discussing for weeks and months the large-scale rallies of course some have been traced to surges in coronavirus and of course we're seeing the covid-19

pandemic explode in states across the country. but there's a sense talking to both campaigns, i have talked to people both inside and outside the campaigns in the last 24 hours. publicly the trump people are still bullish and the democrats are quietly confident. that's why we're seeing biden in georgia today. kamala harris in texas later this week and biden going to iowa. another state that donald trump won pretty handily last time around. their numbers they feel good about their chances not just in the great lakes states where they can put a stranglehold on this race, but he can have an early knockout blow. not in florida, they think it's tight, but if they can get north carolina or arizona a state they feel good about, they want to declare victory that night to prevent donald trump from trying to mess with this and sow seeds of doubt in the election results. >> it's interesting, you're right, the one thing that donald trump can do, the democrats

actually want him to do because when he holds the super spreader events and you have everybody -- those pictures of everybody put together, it actually again it reinforces the narrative that donald trump is reckless. that he's oblivious to the pain, to the suffering, to the death of senior citizens and it hurts him in arizona. it hurts him in florida. it hurts him across the nation and yet, you're right. they feel like that's the only thing they can do. let me ask you about this this scatter shot approach though. i have talked to people on both sides. i know you have. we discuss this a good bit. i haven't found anybody -- i have and found anybody, the trump campaign or the biden campaign that thinks that donald trump can win in michigan or wisconsin anymore. nobody. i haven't talked to anybody in a month that -- you know, that is

not playing for the press when you get them off the record and they start going through the numbers. so i'm curious, he has a pathway to 270 without going back to wisconsin or michigan. but why isn't he taking a more focused approach? why isn't -- i know pennsylvania is a stretch but he can't give pennsylvania up. so why isn't he hammering in pennsylvania and then going to arizona, florida, north carolina? why is he going all over the map with really looks like no plan at all? >> it's a great question, joe. one that i have posed to a lot of trump senior campaign aides and those in the white house. now, publicly, they are saying they're in play. and bill stepian the campaign manager they held a conference call for reporters yesterday and they're seeing encouraging signs in michigan. they feel like -- >> no, they're not, no, they're not. >> which of course -- >> it's just not. >> that's what they're saying publicly, they're not saying that privately.

and that's just -- that's why they're surprised here because it did look like and we talked about this last week, they looked like they north carolina, florida, arizona, and then everything else in pennsylvania. that gets you. there that gets trump to 270. >> yeah. >> that's what it looked like they were going to do. and yes, still a focus, but that's why it's surprising they're going to wisconsin and michigan and why he went to new hampshire. that doesn't make sense. >> by the way, pennsylvania makes no sense. again, you look at the private polling, forget the public polling. the private polling has donald trump down double digits in new hampshire. why is he going to new hampshire? if you -- and by the way -- >> maybe he thinks his presence is so alluring he will pull people over to his side. >> if you're a republican, if

you see any donald trump in any state other than pennsylvania, arizona, florida or north carolina, it's a scatter shot approach. he's not -- he's not giving himself a chance to get to 270. arizona, florida, north carolina, pennsylvania, that gets him to 270. when the trump people behind the scenes are admitting that these states are gone where he's still campaigning, new hampshire being one of them, why is he still going there? >> so yesterday in pennsylvania, along with saying he'd like to get the hell out of town, president trump attacked the state's governor as well. and other democrats and claimed that quote, law enforcement is watching them. >> we're watching you, governor, very closely, in philadelphia. we're watching you. a lot of bad things -- a lot of bad things happened there with

the counting of the votes. we're watching you, governor wolf, very closely. all we can say is law enforcement is watching nevada and we're watching you, philadelphia. and we're watching it at the highest level. and we're watching the democrat governor what's got his state shut down, a great state, north carolina. he's got it shut down. we're watching north carolina. we're watching michigan. >> you know, this is good because i hate when a relationship just goes one way. >> what the heck? >> because for the past year, we have had a lot of state attorneys general watching donald trump. >> closely. >> closely. really closely, especially in new york. the state of new york, donald, hey. donald -- >> they're looking. >> the state of new york, the attorney general there, they're watching you closely. attorney general -- >> bigly. >> and other states, they're

watching you closely. so i'm sure they're glad that you're looking bad. i'm sure it's good, it's more reciprocal and that's fine, you watch all you want to watch. here's the great news. even after the election, they'll be watching you. we need to really go out on every breath you take. shawna, donald trump is trying to intimidate the governors of these states. i don't know how or why, but the man just -- at this point he just looks desperate. >> yeah. i also don't know at the highest levels is watching them. like what -- what does that even mean? but it is -- it does play in to -- it does play in to things that the president has said for a long time that are -- that seem to be aimed at undermining

confidence in the vote and if, you know, he's saying watch philadelphia clearly a democratic strong hold in the state of pennsylvania, watch these other places, then what he's signaling to people or what he seems to be signaling to people don't necessarily trust the outcome of this vote. and that is the most dangerous part of this, because i don't really think the fbi is watching governor wolf. but -- but this plays in to that idea that maybe this election won't be fair and that is the scarier part about this. especially no matter who wins on tuesday night or we know no one is going to win on tuesday night because we won't know what the results are on tuesday night. >> we might. >> you're right, mika, maybe it will be a landslide and it will be obvious but i don't think any of us are counting on that. but no matter what wins, is the responsibility of everybody including this president though i do not know if he'll take that

responsibility to try to everybody sure confidence in how the vote wins so we have some continuity in the government and not civil unrest over it and what he's pointing to now is don't trust the system at all. that is dangerous. >> so steve, i know you hear the same panic and paranoia from democrats that everyone is hearing about the polls. you have been pretty clear, you have showed us the polling averages. you have gone state by state, you have shown us the national numbers so they're burned by 2016 when they thought hillary clinton was a sure thing against donald trump. how different is joe biden's lead in the polls right now than was hillary clinton's at this .4 years ago? >> take a look here. two ways of looking at it. here's the national polling average right now. this morning 7.8 points that's the lead that biden has over donald trump in the presidential horse race. same distance from the election

in 2016. clinton's lead over trump was 2.2. remember at this point that comey letter reopening the clinton email investigation had just hit. so one thing to keep in mind, remember, hillary clinton did win the popular vote by two points in 2016 and when you got to the election day in 2016 this national polling average lead for hillary clinton was three points and that put trump in range in 2016 for the electoral college. so this probably has to come down. we have talked about in the last four years for a variety of reasons, it may be possible that donald trump could lose the popular vote by more than he did in 2016 and still get the electoral college based on a number of factors. possible. at least. so i would look over to last week, does that drop two or three points and put him in a place where the electoral college might open up? that's the other thing when you compare state to state,

michigan, wisconsin, pennsylvania, this is the easiest path for joe biden. just flip the states. michigan, look at michigan, the republicans are the most pessimistic about it because of numbers like that, but those are biden's best leads in swing states. the one thing for trump, when you go a layer beyond that, florida, arizona and north carolina, for instance, these are biden leads but they're much closer biden leads. when you go one layer further, still you get to some very narrow but you get to trump advantages there. to me, it's narrow that national poll show you can win one of the three if you're trump. michigan, wisconsin, pennsylvania and really pennsylvania. show you can win that, and then something could start to emerge in the other states. because those are not as -- the gaps there you see for trump in the poll are not as extreme as you see in the first couple states. >> jonathan lemire, what is the goal? what is the closing argument for the last seven days? i know the staff wants it to be

economy, economy, economy. but he's all over the map. he can't focus. so, you know, listen, say what you will and we have talked about this too. the last seven, eight days in 2016, he actually controlled himself a bit. >> yes. >> he modified his twitter output. he was still crazy by traditional political standards but you can see he was trying to do no harm. but now, with the staff begging him to just talk about the economy. it seems to be something he just cannot do. i guess it's harder to do when the markets are collapsing all around you. >> and that's certainly a warning sign for the donald trump campaign. you're right, joe. this is worth spending a minute on. compared to any other politician, donald trump looked remarkably undisciplined in the

final ten days of 2016, but he really wasn't. certainly for him, and he largely cut out twitter. he stayed on message with that. but more than that, his closing message at the rallies and at a series of interviews he did was consistent. night after night at the rally stages he would hammer home a few key themes on immigration, on trade, on accusations of corruption against the clintons and, you know, on america first foreign policy. four or five things and it was night after night and he'd hammer them home. that's not happening this time around. yes, he's delivering the closing messages that the aides want him him to, a vote for shim a vote for the economic recovery and if you vote for joe biden you're voting for socialist policies and a depression. we can take issue with whether that's factual or not, but that's their case. and he does deliver that. but it's drowned out by the nonsense. he dispatches it in a paragraph and he does. spend time on it. really driving home that message and instead the takeaways are

something else. one example, i was there sunday in new hampshire when he had a rally in manchester and he spent nearly 15 minutes talking about the contract negotiations for the new air force one. and it was to some in the crowd somewhat amusing. he had a few lines but it was 15 minutes about the new presidential aircraft. instead of the messages his aides want him to hammer home. >> who's the guy he fired in the justice department that nobody knows who he was talking about. >> bruce ohr, that was, he was the lead of the story last night. a small, relatively forgotten justice official who was a minor player in the russian probe. outside of the fox news silo it's not resonating with general public and it speaks to how the

president is directing his message to the smaller sliver of the electorate. >> also yesterday on twitter, going after the crucial swing states of new york, california and illinois trying to rally voters in those states. i mean, if you look at the numbers that steve kornacki just put up in michigan for example, where he's down by an average of nine in the polls, what did he do after the governor who he's talked for months and months and months was in the middle of this kidnapping plot, he attacked her afterward. well, she's popular in the state, she's got a high approval handling of the coronavirus. she's got a good approval rating on that. you look at the decisions and the rhetoric he's made in the places that he has to absolutely win get another term and it boggles the mind. it makes you wonder if he wants to be president for four more years. >> you know, when he was talking bruce ohr, willie you know what that reminded me of.

we love jon stewart and we always loved jon stewart. he's a really talented guy, i loved his movie. but jon stewart hasn't always loved me, that's hard to believe. >> no, he does. >> he would do his opening skits attacking us or attacking me, actually. it was very personal. i remember he'd come out and he'd do some pretty funny things, attacking me and the crowd just sat there. and they're like -- who's joe scarborough? by the third day he's -- >> a papier-mache napoleon horse. >> yeah. by the third night he looks around and nobody is laughing. nobody knows who this guy is. >> this is early "morning joe" too. i think some people on the staff said, hey, jon, nobody knows who those guys are and then he

backed off. >> get off the horse. they don't know who joe scarborough is. jon stewart, one of the great comedians of our time and you have to say dave chappelle, let's go back to richard pryor. carson, letterman. lenny bruce. and of course jerry clouer. you know who he is? >> going back. >> there's a deep south thing. jerry clouer. jerry would go around -- this is how i feel about this election. i just want it to be over. jerry clouer was this southern comedian that would go around to state fairs and he'd tell a story at the end every night and you're talking about he and his friends would go out raccoon hunting. they'd go coon hunting and one night they're deep in the woods in mississippi and one of his friends chased one of the

raccoons up a tree and was poking at it with a stick. >> he climbed up in there. >> climbed up in the tree. the dogs are barking. he goes up there. and he can't get it down. suddenly there's a huge fight. and good old jerry, god rest his soul, told the audience, he found out once he got up there that it wasn't a coon. that it was what people in mississippi call a souped up bobcat, it was a lynx. so they were fighting up there for about five minutes and the guys down below didn't know what it was. they were screaming and scratching and he started to scream, shoot up here. we can't shoot up there we might hit you. shoot up here he said because one of us needs relief. that's when everybody at the mississippi state fair would start laughing real loud. that's how i feel right now about this election. just shoot us up here, one of us

needs relief. >> just end it. >> seven days. >> i bet you jerry clouer told that story at the tennessee state fair as well. >> i bet he told it every state fair he went to. yep. >> okay. still ahead on "morning joe" -- >> he told the joke much better. >> you did good but just i wanted it to end. we all want it to just be over. so here's the question -- >> the joke or the election? >> which is which? i mean, this guy. are the president's campaign rallies helping spread the virus in battle ground states. yes. >> yeah, they are. >> we'll have the new analysis when we come back. e. ar >> we'll have the new analysis when we come back. you power through chronic migraine - 15 or more headache days a month, ...each lasting 4 hours or more. botox® prevents headaches in adults with chronic migraine. so, if you haven't tried botox® for your chronic migraine, ...check with your doctor if botox® is right for you, and if samples are available. effects of botox® may spread hours to weeks after injection ...causing serious symptoms. alert your doctor right away,

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covid, covid, covid. that's all they talk about the fake news. covid, covid, covid. that's all they talk about, what progress we have made it on too. we understand it. we have the best testing in the world that's why we show so many cases because we do more testing than anybody else.

but we're doing great and, oh, excuse me, here i am. right? i'm here too. ground breaking therapies and safe vaccines that quickly end the pandemic. it's ending anyway. we're rounding the turn. it's ending anyway. >> as president trump campaigns across the country, the coronavirus has surged in counties in minnesota, pennsylvania and wisconsin where the president has held massive rallies. according to a "usa today" analysis, conducted from mid august to mid october. in the two weeks following trump campaign rallies, five counties in three rust belt states saw about 1,500 more new cases compared to two weeks prior. in minnesota's blue earth county, the coronavirus growth rate was 15% before a trump rally in the county but later grew to 25%. in pennsylvania's lackawanna

county the growth rate shot up from less than 3% before his visit to more than 7% after. "usa today's" analysis states that while there is no way to definitively link the rallies to the outbreaks public health experts say they ignore recommendations to curb the spread of the virus. last month, minnesota's department of health traced nearly two dozen cases to three trump campaign events in the state. let's bring in "morning joe" chief medical correspondent dr. dave campbell. dr. dave, first of all, there's been an uptick in numbers overall. there have been more daily covid cases in the past week than ever before. what does this mean? >> mika, i would say rather that an upticket it's an onslaught.

we're over 68,000, seven day average. besides that, we have just had two of the record-record days in the number of new cases, over 83,000 per day two days last week. so we should expect to shatter this seven day average. so really thinking of the pandemic in -- as some kind of a skeptical person may think that it's just due to increased testing has also been disproven. we see 23% increasing new cases, we have only seen a 2% increase in testing. so there's nothing to this whole testing theory of why we're seeing more cases. it is simply that there is a surge all across the country and we can talk about regions and states. but it is covering 50 states right now, mika. >> well, the cases spiked,

several pharmaceutical companies are resuming vaccine trials after pausing due to safety concerns. johnson & johnson's trial was paused after a participant suffered a stroke, however, investigators said it was not linked to the vaccine and the trial is set to reopen. astrazeneca was put on hold in september for the united states after a british participant contracted a neurological problem. the fda subsequently deemed on friday that the trial can resume after reviewing data from trials around the rest of the world. meanwhile, pfizer is expanding its testing base adding miners to the study. a move met with some criticism. and eli lilly said its antibody treatment is not effective. trials will continue for those with less severe bouts of the virus. let's bring in president and ceo of biotechnology, dr. michelle

mcmurray heath. doctor, good to see you again this morning. so let's start there with the vaccines. you are optimistic, you have been optimistic about the sort of break neck pace of this effort to find a vaccine. where do you think we are in the process, how soon might we see one? >> we're going incredibly fast and it's going incredibly well. this is not unexpected to see adverse events in any clinical trial. this is the ups and downs of normal medical research. the good news we're seeing incredible transparency and amazing amounts of communication so that each and every time there's a hiccup you hear about it. and we know first hand what's happening. so i think the public should be reassured by how the companies are reaching out to make sure they're aware of everything that happens. just this week, we reached 8 hundred drug development programs targeted at fighting covid that have been started since the beginning of this year.

that's an unprecedented amount of research aimed at this target. and the research is going well. so i think we can expect to see vaccines early in 2021 and you'll see them in wide distribution probably by the spring of next year. >> that is good news. as you say, extraordinary work by all of the scientists and doctors who have been working around the clock to get there. so just lay out that time line a little more, if you could, doctor, because i think people are confused. president trump has said many times it's a matter of weeks we'll have one, implying a couple of different times it will be here by election day. it's not going to happen, we're a week out. when you say it's available early next year, how much will be produce and who gets the first round? >> well, the companies are preparing to produce hundreds of millions of doses but of course it will take time to ramp up that amount of production. but the good news is they started to fine-tune their production lines and started to manufacture doses before they

know if their vaccines will be approved, just on a hope and a prayer that they have what it will take to help the country and the world recover. it will not be unexpected to see one or two or perhaps three vaccine candidates get emergency use authorization before the end of this year. the fda had a very new and unprecedented vaccine and advisory panel meeting which was a public meeting on the 22nd of october where they reviewed all of the standards they'll put forward for this authorization. that being said, an emergency use authorization is not a full approval. it's saying that we have some really promising early steps and we'll make it available to the highest risk patients. that's why i think it's safer to assume that you'll see it in your local doctor's office probably by quarter one or quarter two of 2021. >> dr. dave, just looking at, for example, the president's

rally in pennsylvania last night, allentown, with thousands, it was a big rally, he had a big crowd and thousands of people were squished together. i want to ask you about the alarming reports out of utah that utah hospitals could start rationing health care at facilities that are overwhelmed, using potentially a patient's age to decide whether or not to take them in. greg belle, president of utah hospital association at the end of the day, some senior person versus a healthy young person probably would not get the nod. is this an outlier or could this be a reality in other places across the country? >> oh, no, it's not an outlier, mika. el paso has similar problems and there are other intensive care units across the country and the hottest of the outbreaks where the icus fill to capacity.

the demoralization of the staff kicks in. the availability of equipment kicks in so we have personnel people and equipment to worry about. but what do you do when you are at capacity and you have two people vying for the same bed. that is what utah is grappling with now and that is what other states may grapple with if this surge that is an onslaught of new cases. experts are worrying most about hospitals, the number of hospitalizations and then the intensive care unit, that's where things get tight, mika. we haven't seen the end of this. the next few weeks or a month or two has most public health experts particularly worried. >> well, that's in your -- dr. dave campbell, thank you. in your notes you also talk about pandemic fatigue where hospital staff is overwhelmed as

we reported. family members find it hard to resist getting together. pandemic fatigue erodes public cooperation to control the infection, creating a vicious cycle which we could be in right now. drs. dave campbell and michelle mcmurray heath. coming up, president trump's son-in-law, jared kushner, is facing backlash after comments he made about black americans. we'll play them for you ahead. "morning joe" is coming right back. m for you ahead. "morning joe" is coming right back counts......because of covid-19 ......polling locations ......confusion is high.. (fisherman vo) how do i register to vote? (working mom vo) i think i'm already registered. ...hmm!...hmm!...hmm! (woman on porch vo) can we vote by mail here? (man on porch vo) lemme check.

(woman vo) thank you! (man vo) thank you! (grandma vo) you'll be safe, right? (daughter vo) yes! (four girls vo) the polls! voted! (grandma vo) go out and vote! it's so important! (man at poll vo) woo! (grandma vo) it's the most important thing you can do!

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in a fox news interview yesterday morning, seen year white house adviser jared kushner criticized protests who mobilized after the killing of george floyd. and also said this. >> there's been a lot of discussion about the issues needed in the black community for the last years, but

particularly it intensified after the george floyd situation and, you know, you saw a lot of people who were just virtue signaling. they'd go on instagram or cry or write something on a basketball court and that was doing more to polarize the country than to bring people forward. the one thing we have seen in the black community which is mostly democrat is that president trump's policies are the policies that can help people break out of the problems that they're complaining about, but he can't want them to be successful more than they want to be successful. what you're seeing throughout the country is a ground swell of support in the black community because they're realizing that the different bad things that the media have said about president trump are not true. >> shawna thomas? >> so i guess that's why they don't let him talk in front of cameras much? that's shocking on so many levels, shawna. why don't you just take us through all of the shocking things that jared kushner -- by the way, a kid who inherited

millions and millions of dollars, who was born as a multimillionaire and his daddy paid his way to harvard, talking about black people not wanting to help themselves. >> yeah. the level of condescension is off the charts. i was on earlier with kasie on "way too early" and i said that jared kushner maybe doesn't understand his words, so i was condescending jared kushner the way that jared kushner was condescending black americans and then i thought about that, i realized he needs to take responsibility for his words and hopefully he'll talk to understand and try to understand that what he -- that how what he said came off. but two, like hopefully he can learn from this. i'm not holding my breath on that, but hopefully he can learn. he can learn that the george floyd situation wasn't a situation, it was the death of a

man caught on camera as someone, you know, held him down for minutes and minutes and minutes that we all saw. but one thing that happened over the summer along with the protests and the conversation with police brutality, people put up the black boxes on instagram and it was about listening to the black community about the problems, about systemic racism, about their lives and how they feel every single day in this country. it is clear that even though jared kushner apparently is having conversations with ice cube and maybe something will come of that, he is not listening to what people are saying in the streets and maybe he is distracted by -- i mean, i wish he was distracted by covid because if they were doing something on covid that was actually concrete and made sense

that would help the black community that's one thing they could do. but he doesn't appear to have heard any of what people very saying and screaming out in the -- out in the country for the last four or five months or years and years and years. this is not a new problem, but the new light on it i think has caused a lot of white people to actually listen and think about this. it would be nice if jared kushner could take that into his heart ever so slightly. >> and stop and think. he talks about virtue signaling. sometimes people just stop for a moment after they watch a man choke to death for nine minutes and they sit and they start looking at all the things that have happened through the years. and start asking whether we can do better as a country and maybe -- maybe jared doesn't understand it, but you know, there's the old saying out of

"to kill a mockingbird" where you need to try to walk another mile in a man's shoes to understand what he's going through. well, it's not even what was asked of any people this year. just asked that they stop and think about what's happening in this country and how we can make this country a better place. and jared kushner -- i mean, what he said was nothing short of outrageous and i wonder if ice cube -- i guess ice cube associates himself with all those remarks and with the charlottesville remarks and with the hole country remarks or calling hispanics breeders and i guess ice cube associates himself with jared kushner saying that donald trump can't help black people if black people doesn't want to help himself. nice career move. nice career move, ice cube. that's really something at this stage when you have seen such

racial animus coming out of the white house being stirred up. somebody like ice cube or kanye west are deciding, yeah, hey, this seems like a good move to back donald trump and jared kushner. let that one sink in. >> look, he is very young and inexperienced and it's not like he knows how to wrap his words to cloak them in some way. that was out and out who he is. that's who jared kushner is. the white house responded to the comments. >> it's an ugly look. it's a really ugly look. >> the white house -- >> donald trump can't help black people if they don't want to help themselves, jared kushner says. >> if they don't stop complaining. wow. so the white house responded in a statement that read in part, quote it is disgusting to see internet trolls taking senior adviser jared kushner -- >> actually, no no no. >> -- as they try to --

>> the trolling -- put it down. he said a bigoted, racist, insensitive comment and guess what, you could be scrawling that on the side of your apartments in crayons a couple of months from now. >> kayleigh mcenany can do it a couple of months from now. >> gene robinson, i just say i cannot imagine not walking a mile in your shoes. i cannot imagine the indignities you have had to put up with growing up in orange burg, south carolina, and growing up and putting up with what -- that you love, that i love, that has blessed both of us, but my god, you have done such an extraordinary job throughout your life. but even then you have to give your sons warnings about when they go out and drive in cars.

you live -- you live in a different world than i live in. it's just the way it's been over the past 400 years in this country. we have made great progress, but we still have a long way to go. >> yeah. >> then jared kushner says that donald trump, a guy who inherited $400 million, can't help black people if black people don't want to help themselves. just please -- >> amazing. >> the floor is yours, gene. >> no -- well, no, i mean, mika said it, that's who he is. that is who he is. he is this spoiled -- i mean, if you look up white privilege in the dictionary, you'll see a picture of jared kushner who inherited millions of dollars, whose daddy, you know, never went to harvard but gave it $2.5 million so jared could get in. he got mediocre grades, who has

been kos setted and helped along all of his life. lecturing black people about not complaining about -- lecturing white people about virtue signaling that they actually might understand, some of what african-americans have gone through in this country. and saying that i -- gee, i guess i just don't want to succeed -- you know? donald trump can't do it for me. it's astonishing. such a retrograde world view. one that thankfully a whole lot of the country has gotten past. but jared kushner never has because i guess he's had no reason to. he has -- he's not capable of reflection or self-examination or critical thought. he knows no history. and it is -- it is amazing that

a man like this is a senior counselor to the president of the united states. he works in the white house every day. he helps to make policy. that's shocking. that's -- that's a sign of american decadence that -- just vote, everybody. just vote. just vote. get rid of these clowns and let's move on and let's move forward together as a country. and just get rid of this nonsense. it's disgusting. disgusting what he said yesterday. >> let's start with a fact check that there is a ground swell of support among black voters for donald trump. the latest nbc news/"wall street journal" poll shows it's 91-4 for joe biden. let's start there. but as mika -- >> quite a ground swell. >> this is the mask comes off sometimes. this isn't an aberration.

this is who he is. he grew up privileged and he can't conceive of the fact that some people are sincerely concerned about what they have seen in the country for many, many years and particularly this year and it must be virtue signaling. but they must be hopping on a bandwagon. the other point i heard from friends of mine is using the word complaining, they're whining and complaining about what happened for generations and hundreds of years since their ancestors were sent here on boats and they're complaining about the systemic racism. complaining about the way they're treated by our culture, complaining about the way some of them are treated by police. that it's a complaint that they're whining and again it couldn't be sincere. it must be political. that's his analysis. >> this the son-in-law of the whiner in chief who thinks that the coronavirus happened to him and that he's been through so much with it. all right. we're a couple minutes off the

top of the hour here. also with us we have msnbc contributor mike barnicle. national affairs analyst co-host of show times the circus, john heilemann. and host of "way too early," kasie hunt is with us. so guess what, everybody? one week exactly one week until election day. the president will be out on the campaign trail set to hold rallies in lansing, michigan, west salem, wisconsin, omaha, nebraska and then he heads out to spend the night in las vegas ahead of a rally in nevada on wednesday. >> hey, girls, bring your ventilators. >> yeah. super spreaders across the country. joe biden heads to georgia as the democratic nominee and he'll hold a drive-in rally in atlanta. that is socially distanced. georgia remains neck and neck in the latest polling. we told you yesterday about the

"atlanta journal constitution" poll which has biden up by one, 47% to 46%. with a margin of error of plus or minus 4 points. in wisconsin the latest reuters/ipsos poll shows joe biden ahead by nine. 53% to 44%. in pennsylvania, the same poll finds biden leading by seven, 51% to 44%. in texas the latest "new york times"/siena college poll puts president trump ahead by four, 47% to 43%. >> so john heilemann, you know, these polls count off and if they are off let's just shut the whole thing down because polls have never been this wrong before. if you're looking at the polls though that donald trump's team is looking at and the joe biden's team's looking at, they will tell you, tell anybody that asks, off the record, if you know them well enough, michigan is gone.

and wisconsin's gone. i don't know that donald has figured that out yet, but they're gone. pennsylvania is slipping away quickly. but they still have the sunbelt strategy where they win those sunbelt states and they somehow figure out a way to win pennsylvania and yet we talked about it last hour with jonathan lemire, this president has a scatter shot approach. he's going everywhere which means he's going nowhere. he's not focusing on any areas. what your hearing right now about the president's strategy and why he's using such a scatter shot approach and what's the map look like to you? >> good morning, guys. i think the president's in a state of panic. i think that's the only real answer and i think you see things like -- you guys pointed to in the last hour when you talk about trump being up in new hampshire a good example of that kind of panic. there's places he's going where he makes -- it makes no sense.

i mean, you could look at wisconsin and michigan and i guess, you know, there's still, you know, if you're donald trump and you believe in the magic of 2016 and you have convinced that you did something that the polls -- you have convinced of the false conventional wisdom that the polls in 2016 were wildly wrong and you had some political magic somehow you'll pull it all back together in some of the states, you know, you get -- you convince yourself to go to the places but you go to new hampshire where there's not been a poll this year -- this year that's had donald trump within double digits of joe biden. so i think there's a degree of you're starting to see the walls closing in. that's what i see on the map. there's a path for donald trump to win the presidency but it's the best analogy, he pulled an inside straight in 2016 and he has to pull an inside straight this time around. there's no bright spot on the

map right now. that's the best way to simplify this. donald trump is on defense everywhere and joe biden now is increasingly on offense, feeling incredibly competent about their standing in the core six battleground states, confident enough they're starting to press into states that they spent all of the last eight months saying they would not go to until they knew that they had a clear path to 270. there's donald trump -- joe biden going to georgia. we have kamala harris going to texas. we have joe biden going to iowa. these are states that they have resisted the siren call of all year. and now, i think it's a sign not that they have become foolish, but that the discipline that the biden campaign has shown over the last eight months in staying out of the places they now are confident enough in the rest of the map that they feel like with their financial advantage and the polling advantage they can start to stretch the map out and keep donald trump on the run and that's what -- that's what the last week of this campaign looks like to me. donald trump in desperation and

on defense and biden incredibly confident on offense. >> mike barnicle, 62 million americans -- 62 million already have cast their ballots. 12 million more than the total early vote in 2016. some estimates have it going up to 90 to 100 million people voting early. those will be in the bank by the time we get to election night. i won't read the full tweet but if you want to see a picture of desperation, donald trump is suggesting on twitter that people who already voted find out a way to change their mind, if they voted for joe biden to vote for him. i'll leave that alone. where do you see this race a week out? >> you know, willie, what's really interesting and john just spoke to it and joe has spoken to it, everybody has spoken to it, why is donald trump going where he's going? and you have to figure at this stage, he's operating in a state of near complete disbelief. he's still operating with what

he thought he had going a year ago. he thought he was going to have a strong economy. he thought he was going to have a lot of campaign cash. he thought he'd be running against a guy he nicknamed sleepy joe who is going to mumble and fumble his way through the presidential campaign and donald trump would emerge victorious. none of that happened because he never planned on the pandemic. he never planned on how to combat the virus. and what we're left with now today is people like jared kushner who we just saw in that appalling video that we showed, incidentally, we want to drive up the vote for joe biden, keep showing the jared kushner video on tv. the smugness that comes across. the isolation that comes across. the idea that this -- you know, little know it all, thanks dad, millionaire kid is going to tell the president of the united states what to think and thus tell the country what to think. he referred to the george floyd

killing as the george floyd incident, 8 minutes and 46 seconds long incident. the compendium of all of the things when you put it together and you do talk to people, and you bump into people on an everyday basis, you find out one thing underlines all of this with regard to donald trump. the virus is certainly a huge issue, but donald trump is a bigger issue and the exhaustion factor. people are tired of this. they want their lives back and they want their country back. >> well, president trump is breaking with his chief of staff, mark meadows, who said on sunday that the united states would not control the coronavirus pandemic. while speaking to reporters in pennsylvania yesterday, the president insisted that the trump administration hasn't given up on managing the virus. here's what meadows said on sunday followed by the president's new comments. >> here's what we have to do.

we're not going to control the pandemic, we are going to control the fact that we get vaccines, therapeutics and other mitigation -- >> why aren't we going to get control of the virus? >> because it's contagious flu. >> are you not in control of the virus? >> no exactly the opposite. take a look at what's happening in europe. what's happening to europe is -- nobody has seen anything like it. you used to tell me all about europe. now we're doing a great job. we are absolutely rounding the corner. other than the fake news wants to scare everybody, we are absolutely rounding the corner. >> i have been saying for months as you well know that he waved the white flag all the way back then. he wasn't doing much at all. some people said i was being harsh. that i was being unfair, the white house is coming right out now and admitting what i said months ago was absolutely true.

>> mr. president, joe biden said you're waving the white flag. >> no, he's waved the white flag on his life. he doesn't leave his basement. he's -- he's a pathetic candidate. i will tell you that. >> the only person waving a white flag along with the white mask is joe biden. when we look at this, we are going to defeat the virus. we're not going to control it. we will try to contain it as best we can and if you look at full context of what i was talking about is is we need to make sure that we have therapeutics and vaccines. >> yeah, we need to make sure we have -- we need to do this. we need to do that. gene, first of all, this is a white house that never deployed the defense production act to mobilize masks and ppe to everyone and when certain health experts are making comments

about masks, there was actually not enough masks to go around, okay? so the whole thing is a sham operation where they pretend to care about this coronavirus and pretend to be managing it but they want some big company to come in and save everything, but their like of knowledge about how science works and how pandemic responses should be carrying out, they didn't follow the playbook. they didn't even think it was serious publicly. so mark meadows' comments right then even walking back his comments from sunday but again going after masks. >> yeah, i know, it's astonishing, but this has been the trump administration's responsibility from the beginning that's why we are where we are and we have done worse than any other wealthy country in the world in terms of cases and deaths. it's why we have 20% of the

cases and 20% of the deaths in the whole world, over 4% of the population. it's because they never took this virus seriously. they never took the basic steps they should have taken. they always denied it. they always did -- at first they looked for a reason to believe that it was no worse than the flu. even though they knew it was much worse than the flu. they look for reasons that it would only kill some stanford -- new york university academic wrote -- not a doctor, who said there would be at most 500,000 deaths so that circulated in the white house. this is all going to blow over, it's not a big deal. only 500,000 and it quickly surpassed 5,000 deaths and then it surpassed that and now here we are, 225,000 deaths and

counting. they never took it seriously. so no, they didn't deploy the defense production act. no, they never told americans to wear masks to socially distance, to do the things that the coronavirus task force, the experts told them we have to do and here we are. we are going into the election with cases at an all-time high. and skyrocketing and it's going to be vertical soon. and that's all on the trump administration. they did this. they're responsible. >> let's bring in the dean of the brown university school of public health, dr. ashish ja. great to see you this morning. we can detail as we do every morning the fault in what president trump and the white house is saying, the way he's addressing this, covid, co

individu individual, covid, you've dedicated your life to public health. so what do you think as a doctor and as a public health expert when you hear the white house chief of staff again mocking joe biden for wearing a mask and what is the truth about where we are in this? >> good morning and thank you for having me on. i have a few thoughts when i hear the president say it. first it's deja vu. we have been hearing it will go away, it will be a miracle. and the problem with that kind of talk is it confuses the american people. it suggests to them we are days or weeks away from life going back to normal so people can't prepare adequately and then the government doesn't make the investments necessary. we're not making any of the investments because the

government, our federal leaders keep saying it's about to be over but it's not. where we are right now is a difficult moment. we all expected a wave in the fall. i thought it would be later and i thought it wouldn't be as big as it already is. we have more than 70,000 cases being identified every day and we have a very hard six to 12 weeks ahead of us unless we get our act together. and i don't really believe at this moment we'll get much federal leadership. so we have to see states step up and we have to see congress fund states to step up. but it will be a difficult few months. >> when you look, dr. jha, at the events that the president is holding specifically to those communities without socially distancing but as an example, a projection and you see crowded spaces of people, some not wearing masks what does that say to the american public and how does that hurt the effort state

by state by state to get people to take this seriously and impress upon them as we're entering a tough three months here. >> yeah, so just it's more of that confusion, willie. more of that disinformation that makes it hard for people to know what to believe and what not to. it's one thing to hear the public health experts say wear a mask, socially distance and then the president brings the people together they're not wearing a mask and they're not socially distancing. i mean, the rallies they have set off a whole lot of infections so they themselves are dangerous. but the symbol they send to the american people, that's even more dangerous. because what it says especially to his followers is this is not a big deal. and i think that's contributing to a lot of the infections, hospitalizations and deaths that we're seeing. >> so there's hope. there's hope that president trump might do a bigger thing on masks. >> really? >> yeah. >> what's that? >> well, russian president

vladimir putin this morning has ordered a mask mandate -- >> oh, that'll do it. >> -- in russia in an attempt to stem the second wave of the coronavirus. the country hit 16,000 cases a day for the last five days. the coronavirus has surged in counties in minnesota where he was, pennsylvania where he was, and wisconsin where the president has held massive rallies. according to a "usa today" analysis conducted from mid august to mid october, in the two weeks following trump campaign rallies, five counties in three rust belt states saw about 1,500 more new cases compared to two weeks prior. big surprise. in minnesota's blue earth county, the coronavirus growth rate was 15% before a trump rally in the county but later grew to 25%. in pennsylvania's lackawanna county, the growth rate shot up

from less than 3% before donald trump's visit to more than 7% after. "usa today's" analysis states that while there's no way to definitively link the rallies to the outbreaks, public health experts say the campaign events ignore recommendations to curb the spread of the virus and last month, minnesota's department of health traced nearly two dozen cases to three donald trump campaign events in the state and contact tracing helped them to link the rallies to coronavirus cases. these are super spreaders. >> i mean, look at that image. john heilemann, as we look at the people packed i'll say this hour what i said last hour. one of the top democratic operatives in america said any time we see images of donald trump on stage in these super spreader rallies pushing people

together, that is great news for joe biden politically because what it shows is how irresponsible donald trump is, even with his own supporters. they have seen in their polling that these rallies absolutely moves more undecided voters to joe biden. which of course seems obvious us to. i'm sure it would be written in the history books by historian as a fact that had to be obvious to those who are watching the 2020 campaign as it unfolded. but of course, it is far from obvious to donald trump. >> apparently. i mean, look, joe, i go back to things we have discussed over the course of the pandemic in the political context. if the campaign is about the novel coronavirus, about covid-19 and it's a referendum on donald trump's leadership on this it's a race that donald

trump loses that referendum is not a race he can win. so, you know, when is it -- what is his job, it's to make it about joe biden and try to disqualify joe biden. i've said it a thousand times. every time he does one of the events it just reinforces the narrative frame that biden campaign wants the race to be about. look at -- look at this man in the middle of this pandemic. we're now talking about the pandemic. we're talking about donald trump's behavior in the pandemic. about his irresponsibility about this behavior. all of these events in addition to -- at this moment particularly, right, when as willie pointed out before, when we think of the overall political context the 60 million votes banked, in the remaining days as the virus bears down on the states, you have a scenario where the thing that donald trump most wants to avoid is

becoming amplified and his behavior within that context is only calling attention to himself. it's like exactly the opposite thing you want to do if you understood the basic political logic of the race. so again, it points to why donald trump is in so much trouble and even in the battleground states it's still close. it's not like joe biden has had double digit leads but he's had the high single digit leads enough to get him to 270 and everything that donald trump is doing right now against the back drop of the pandemic is making it almost impossible for him to do what he needs to do as the days get shorter and the votes that are banked just pile up and gives joe biden what looks increasingly like an insurmountable kind of locked in advantage. even if donald trump performs well on election day which he clearly will. >> yeah, donald trump can still win this election.

donald trump could win instead of a rust belt strategy, with a sunbelt strategy, arizona, north carolina, still pennsylvania that's a pathway to 270. but every day he holds the rallies is a day that he offends more senior citizens and as we look at the numbers out of the states with the early voters, people are trying to project assumptions from 2016 on to the numbers in 2020. but what they're missing, kasie hunt, is the act in that donald trump is bleeding support among seniors who are watching these rallies and yes, they're going to have a bunch of older white guys go out and vote in florida election day. vote in wisconsin, vote in michigan. vote in pennsylvania election day. but they're not going to be breaking for donald trump the way they broke for him in 2016

if any of the polls that we have seen that are focused on senior citizens are accurate. he's losing support specifically because he continues to conduct these super spreader events. >> yeah. it's quite stunning, joe. if you had told me, you know, four years ago we would be looking at the kind of numbers with seniors for donald trump, i would have told you you were crazy. i mean, this is so outside of what we normally see in the typical patterns, but you know, a couple additional points on the rallies. obviously, john heilemann is right and i hear the same thing from the democrats about thenaritive frame that this cites but think of what's happening in the communities as well. where donald trump is going. he's going to swing states and as mika just outlined he is causing spikes in coronavirus cases. what is that doing? it is putting coronavirus front and center on people's local

newscasts. it is making them more worried about going to the grocery store. it is affecting their day to day lives and it is in front of them on their screens in their conversations for days after the president is leaving these areas. it's almost, you know, hard to wrap your head around the extent to which that could be the case and the second piece of this is think about election day. the president is ramping up all of this activity right before election day and we expect most republicans or many republicans, certainly more republicans than democrats, to count on actually putting their vote in on election day instead of voting early. so what happens to people who need to show up in large groups, in person, to vote on election day if in your community you have a spike of the coronavirus? it makes that activity a lot more potentially dangerous and you have to wonder does that make more people stay home and

is the president just depressing his own turnout by doing things in these communities? so, you know, on the national scale we talked about the national polls, clearly this is a problem for president trump. but it's also in these battleground states, in these communities that are going to decide the electoral college that it also matters in potentially significant ways. >> all right. eugene robinson, thank you. we'll be reading your latest column in "the washington post." judge amy coney barrett and president trump celebrate her supreme court confirmation at a white house ceremony. we'll get the latest on that, kasie is reporting on that. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. ♪ limu emu & doug you know limu, after all these years it's the ones that got away that haunt me the most. [ squawks ] 'cause you're not like everybody else. that's why liberty mutual customizes your car insurance,

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entirely within the rules of the senate and the constitution of the united states. >> and i want to be very clear with my republican colleagues. you may win this vote and amy coney barrett may become the next associate justice of the supreme court. but you will never, never get your credibility back. and the next time the american people give democrats a majority in this chamber, you will have forfeited the right to tell us how to run that majority. >> you know, i love -- i love watching stuff like this. this is like -- >> okay. >> do i need some popcorn?

>> no. >> no, i'll tell you why. every word that mitch mcconnell -- every single word and if democrats have half a brain, and if they're not wimps, they will actually lift that speech word for word and use it when they expand the court to 11 or 12 justices. >> yeah. >> because what mitch mcconnell said, you know, he's right. they have the constitutional right to do this. >> sure. >> democrats shouldn't whine. they should have won the last election. hey, mitch mcconnell, he has a constitutional right to lie through his teeth. lindsey graham is maddening, but he has a constitutional right to lie through his teeth to the people of south carolina as he's just done repeatedly, time and time again. but here's the deal.

what is true for republicans is true for democrats. as mitch mcconnell said, this doesn't violate the rules of the senate, but of course he makes the rules of the senate and it doesn't violate the constitution of the united states. neither does expanding the supreme court to 11 or 12 justices that doesn't violate the constitution and again, everything mitch said will apply to that next year in the judiciary reform act of 2021. and it's so radical. it is so radical, nobody in american history has done this except for wait for it, george washington, john adams, thomas jefferson, andrew jackson, abraham lincoln. >> oh, my goodness. >> republicans after lincoln

died, ulysses grant. you know why they did that? because the constitution allowed them to do that. so you already have some anti-anti-trumpers whining right now, this is the worst thing i ever heard, starting their whining. just listen to what mitch said because you're going to hear it given in 2021 and the democrats are going to expand the court unless -- unless they just want to be run over the way they were run over with mitch mcconnell changing the rules of the senate time and time again. so that's up to the democrats. i don't know. i don't know if they're strong enough to do it or not but i'll tell you what. republicans would do it. >> yeah. they have. >> if harry reid had done this to them, to shove two liberals down their throats and to lie

through their teeth both times -- you know, i'm a former republican but i know how republicans would think. we would do it in a second and we would use mitch mcconnell's words against them and there wouldn't be a thing they could do it about because the american people have seen disgusting mitch mcconnell and lindsey graham have been over the past several years. how they have lied to the american people, how they have made up new rules, how they have broken the rules, how they have done everything possible to get the 6-3 advantage and guess what? guess what, democrats? that's their constitutional right. they have the constitutional right to do that and democrats, you have the constitutional right to add a couple more justices next year. >> all right. >> we'll see how that goes. but kasie hunt, what is the atmosphere on capitol hill with

amy coney barrett now going on the supreme court despite all of the guarantees that lindsey graham and mitch mcconnell gave several years ago. >> it's pretty poisonous. people are pretty angry. pretty demoralized and, you know there's a fight looming i think among democrats next year if they win the way that some of them are starting to expect that they're going to and it's about this very question and, you know, ocasio-cortez used stark terms, republicans do this because they don't believe democrats have the stones to play hardball like they do. and for a long time they have been correct. and that's going to be the pressure and the difference -- the divide as much as it's between progressives and centrist democrats again if they win is going to be between people that want to play by the rules and the norms and people who think that republicans have thrown all of that out the

window and that they need to basically use the same strategy that republicans have been using as they have governed washington over the course of the last four years. so they have to win first and i think that -- >> yeah, you talk about playing by the rules though. i mean, playing by the rules as mitch mcconnell said it's the constitution. the constitution sets the boundaries of the rules. and when mitch mcconnell declared the garland rule and then got rid of the filibuster for supreme court nominees and then broke the garland rule, he proved that the only boundaries -- only guardrails are the constitution of the united states. so why wouldn't democrats live by the mcconnell rule, that we can do whatever we want to do. we can do what george washington and john adams and thomas jefferson and andrew jackson and

abraham lincoln and ulysses grant, we can do the same thing that those presidents did. why wouldn't they do that? i guarantee you if republicans were run over this way for four years they would do in in a new york second. >> they might, joe. i think there's going to be some pressure to try to restore -- go back to what, you know, people would argue is -- at least some democrats i talk to talk privately when there were norms or rules outlined in the constitution that governed the way that people acted towards each other. i think your point is well taken. i was talking to one democratic senator the other day who i would have said is most vested in making the institution work. i was taken aback by how demoralized he was about the state of play in the senate and i think that your set of point there is something that really is going to resonate right now.

and if in fact they do win. and, i think it's also reporting out that harry reid broke through the filibuster on circuit court judges so i think there's some will among the democrats to do things this way. >> i mean, reid did that. of course we can go back to bork in '87 and then talk about what happened to estrada. just disgusting, in 2003, 20 202000 drouin 4 with harry reid. first not giving merrick garland a hearing and then getting rid of the filibuster for a supreme court pick and now of course this. and so, again, democrats can do whatever democrats want to do. but mitch mcconnell has opened the door. >> yeah. >> i guess, if republicans are really interested in pushing back on that, they want to come together and figure out a way to

do this without the nuclear option, a couple of republican appointed justices can retire from the court and that will still give democrats -- will still give republicans a 5-4 majority of appointed justices. but they could have it that way or have democrats add three and then it's tied, 6-6. it's like the guy from midas, pay me now or pay me later. coming up, they're planning to continue as a media business after the election. two cofounders of the lincoln project join us next on "morning joe." ncoln project join us ne oxtn "morning joe.

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i think we'll do very well with suburban women. we have a lot of suburban women right here. this savannah guthrie who's just -- you know, she was -- she was coming out of her chair.

she was asking -- she was -- she was crazed. savannah, take it easy, just relax. just relax. don't let the hatred show. nancy pelosi -- crazy nancy. crazy. she's crazy as a bedbug. biden's running mate kamala harris, did you see her last night on television with the laugh? i said is there something wrong with her too? she will not be the first woman president. you can't let that happen. she says, are you ready for tough questions? and i said, let's see what you have. and this was just question, question, kill -- always going for the kill. she's -- she's a zippo, but always going for the kill. suburban women, will you please like me. please.

please. i saved your damn neighborhood, okay? >> what, what, what did he do to the neighborhood? >> he saved it. >> oh, that guy is crazy. >> he's -- >> he's just out of his mind crazy. >> he got all that stuff out. >> he saved -- oh, government by gesture. this guy, he's almost as funny as jerry clower. >> joining us now is reed galen and jennifer horne. >> jennifer, jennifer -- >> they're both cofounders of the lincoln project and, yeah. >> jennifer, what a long, strange trip it has been. >> where the hell are we now? >> we go way back. i mean, i still -- you know, for people that don't know, jennifer ran the new hampshire republican party.

she was as the apostle paul was a jew's jew, jennifer was a republican's republican before the version, before donald trump. >> yeah. >> unfortunately, the negative. so jennifer, talk about it. how disorienting it still is to be somebody who dedicated your entire life to growing the republican party in new hampshire and looking at a lot of the people like me that you grew up with that are completely fine with a guy one week before an election, call for his attorney general to arrest his political opponent. like he's in belarus instead of america. >> you know, joe, i remember standing at fisher cat stadium in manchester, new hampshire, with you not having this

conversation about donald trump and you tried to convince me that he was positioned to win and not wanting to believe what you were telling me. you know, it is unbelievable to me to see the republican nominee for president standing on the stage conducting is, standing uo asking republican women, suburban women, please like me, you know, a president who assaults the dignity of women on daily basis, assaults the dignity of immigrants and their children on a daily basis, assaults the dignity of our military. you can go through the list. suburban women are not -- do not need donald trump to protect our neighborhoods. that is not an issue that is going to save this campaign. and we see it quite clearly in the movement in the polling in a lot of these swing states where it's not just suburban women who are rejecting donald trump now, but it is republican suburban women who are saying anywhere from 5% to 10% of them in recent

polling are choosing joe biden over this disgrace of a so-called republican president. >> but, jennifer, how did the party melt down so quickly? how did it go from you and me being in crowds talking about balanced budgets, talking about small government, talking about pushing back on russia, talking about a strong nato, talking about a strong israel, how did it go from that to where we are today? the biggest deficits ever, the biggest debts ever, and a pro-russian president? >> it is a total corruption of conservativism and the republican party to the core. there is not a single elected republican left in washington, d.c. who stands for the principles that you and i used to fight for, joe, or who, in any way stands for integrity or character. they have completely sold out to this president. why is beyond me.

there is no good explanation why. but what we know is that what they have done is dangerous, that is poses a direct threat to the future of our country, and that what good republicans across the country need to do is stand together in this election and completely reject what this president stands for. you know, from the lincoln project's perspective, obviously we believe the right thing to do is to choose a man who is at his heart a good person, who will put the safety and well being of the nation and our families above themselves, and it should be an easy choice for those people on election day. there is no future for a republican party that continues to embrace donald trump as their leader. >> so president trump's closing argument here appears to be suburban women, please like me, because i'm saving your neighborhoods from black and brown people. that's the subtext of what he is saying. this morning he is saying, hey, if you already voted early, go change your vote if you think

you changed your mind. again he is writing in all caps it's all the media, fake news media wants to talk about covid-19. we are rounding the turn, he says. doctor after doctor has told us we are not. for you at the lincoln project who clearly has gotten under his skin these last several months, what is your closing argument? >> as usual, the president has logged right into the scenario we set for him, whether or not it was billboards we put up against jared and ivanka in times square that they immediately reacted in way we couldn't have been more pleased with. it did what we knew it would do, which is it put covid, his family and his failures in the middle of this campaign with seven days to go. we have 220,000 some people dead in the country. another 7 milicic. where i live here in utah, we are going to start thinking about rationing care. we saw this in northern italy at

the beginning of the pandemic last spring. from our perspective, it is about covid. covid has changed everything in american life. it's affected the way we work. millions of people out of work. kids going to school, coming out of school, parents not knowing what to do. i haven't seen my parents since last thanksgiving. i won't see them this thanksgiving. tens of millions across the country will be the same way. yes, it should be about covid. it will be about covid and it won't stop being about covid until joe biden is elected, takes the oath of office and starts to get this country back on the path. >> john heilemann is here with a question for you. john. >> hey, reed, good to see you, man. we talked about this a little bit when i visited you guys a couple of weeks ago, but i think it's good to talk about as we look kind of -- the election is pretty close now, right, and people are setting their sights on what happens after. particularly what happens after with you guys. you came together with a singular focus, which was to try to get rid of donald trump.

but it seems on the basis of what we are reading in axios this morning and other places that you have a longer-term ambition that goes beyond just beating donald trump. it goes to some larger ideological aims and also commercially has some greater aims for what your future at lincoln is. why don't you talk about both of those things. what is life after trump like for the lincoln project? >> sure. first and foremost, like the rest of us who are dedicating to beating him, we have seven more days to election day, right. every last minute of those seven days is going to be focused on that. i think when it comes to what we want to do as an organization past election day when donald trump is defeated, remember that last december we said that it's defeating donald trump and trumpism. trumpism isn't going away. it's a virus within the american body politic, within the republican party and there are a lot of add hereents to it.

a lot of folks will start on the republican side who will use its ugliness and the heat and what i would call depth of the people on the republican side to try to get that inside straight on the republican primary. donald trump is going to have his own media company. i think from our perspective it's going to be about serving as a coalition partner to joe biden as he tries to get this country back on its feet. it's going to serve as a convener of organizations. i feel like we have had a real opportunity to bring different groups together, whether or not it's conservatives, progressives, liberals. we need to start the conversation in this country. and from our perspective we have to get back to the fundamentals of democracy, voting rights act, election security. if we do that and push back against what i call the trump, bannon, facebook, fox news doom loop, that's what we are going to do in the next two, four, six, eight years. this fight is not going to be

owe over soon. >> we have been talking about joe biden to expand the map now. he will be in the state of georgia today with a couple of stops. dr. biden has been there several times. it's clear they think they have a good shot there. today's visit will not be without some historical significance for his visit to warm springs, georgia. >> yeah, willie, that's so true. i think it might be nice to pay attenti attention to what joe biden might have to say because it is rooted in fdr, a man in the early 1930s when he assumed the presidency could not walk. could not walk. he urged the country to stand up, move forward, get going and combat things like the virus. and, jennifer, if you could tell me, along with people like tom rath in new hampshire, was there a pivotal moment when you decided, oh, enough, i'm out of here? >> well, for me it's been, you know, a very long time ago. i have been publicly speaking

against donald trump since he dipped his toes in the water in the 2012 cycle. if you remember when he came to new hampshire for a visit then, and i was very vocal. long before he even got into the race in 2016. but i think for a lot of republicans like myself who are now finally coming to the position that they could not possibly support this president, it has to do with the coronavirus and the tragic 223,000, i think, lives that have been lost not to his mismanagement, to be clear, but lost to his informed strategic choices that he made eight months ago when he knew what he was doing, he knew what the danger this virus presented, and he made choices that would advance his political ambitions and put the lives of hundreds of thousands of americans at risk. i think for so many americans they look at the loss that this president has inflicted upon our

nation and they realize that they cannot move forward with him. >> and i remember a phone call that jennifer and i had the day after the election. jennifer said, everything that i have fought for my entire life i have lost. it's good to know that through this, through this lincoln project, mika, she has found it. she is still fighting. and what an inspiring way forward. >> nothing is ever lost. >> jennifer horn and reed galen, thank you for being on this morning. up next, election day is exactly one week away. a look at the latest battleground polling and what the candidates' schedules tell us about the state of the race. we'll be right back. ce we'll be right back.

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before the plague came in i had it made. i wasn't coming to erie. i have to be honest. there was no way i was coming. i didn't have to. i would have called you and said, hey, erie,if you have a

chance get out. >> i think i have the truckers' vote. by the way, nice trucks. you think i could hop into one of them and drive away? just drive the hell out of here. just get the hell out of this. i had such a good life. my life was great. then i said let's do this, darling, this will be a lot of fun. but you know what? i'm so happy with it because nobody has ever done so much in the first three and a half years. >> some interesting closing arguments from the president, really interesting. there is no way i was coming to erie, pennsylvania, in erie, pennsylvania, and yesterday i'd love to just drive the hell out of here, speaking in allentown, pennsylvania. willie, that's sort of what you do when you visit family, right? >> exactly. the minute i sit down at the thanksgiving table i say i'd like to drive out the hell out of here.

nobody loves a truck more than donald trump. he wants to get behind the wheel and honk the horn. i think that's an instinct a lot of us have. >> i think so, yeah. but he understands things aren't going quite the way he expected them to go. you get the sense of frustration. he talked about wanting to leave the country if he loses. if he doesn't win iowa, never going back to iowa. it's an interesting closing argument. but we are getting a look at a lot of polls today. and just go through the state of the race. we are one week away. >> so -- >> can you believe we are one week away from this election? >> i can't, and i know some health officials in allentown, pennsylvania, that wished he would have gotten the hell out of there before he arrived yesterday. good morning and welcome to "morning joe." it is tuesday, october 27th. along with joe, willie and me, we have white house reporter for "the associated press" jonathan lamire and nbc news and msnbc

contributor sean a thomas is with us. today, as joe said, exactly one week until election day. the president will be out on the virus-spreading campaign trail set to hold rallies in lancing, michigan, west salem, wisconsin, as well as omaha, nebraska before heading out to spend the night in las vegas ahead of a rally in nevada on wednesday. his opponent, joe biden -- >> wait, wait, could we look at that picture right there. >> this is nuts. >> look at the picture of the crowd together. willie, i becauwas talking lastt to a top democratic operative who has probably taken more polls than anybody over the past year, year and a half, and probably knows voters better than anybody. and he said, you know, whenever you guys show pictures of these huge crowds, you wouldn't

believe how much it helps joe biden. whenever seniors see pictures of those huge crowds, donald trump, he thinks it's 2016. he thinks he is running as a reality tv host that can just go up there and do whatever he wants to do. he said, our polls show repeatedly that everything he thinks that is helping him, especially these big rallies, are causing him grave political harm. so, please, keep those rally pictures up as long as you can because every rally reinforces our message that donald trump is not responsible enough to be president during a pandemic that's killed over 225,000 americans. >> well, the dissonance is that the country is taking this seriously. the people who live in the country are taking this seriously because they understand how dire it is. they've seen their, lost their

jobs, somebody in their family has died or their kids are home from school learning on computers. the country gets it because we have been at it since february. the president clearly does not get it or does not want to get it. they are still mocking mask. mark meadows did that yesterday again. they are still holding huge rallies. they are still saying, well, mitigation is kind of gone. we can't control this thing, so let's just look ahead to vaccines and treatments and therapeutics. they are totally out of line and have been for how long now? seven months with our seriously the country takes it and how unserious the white house either is or pretending to be for political purposes. >> did mark meadows really mock somebody wearing a mask yesterday? >> he was asked yesterday about whether he was waving the white flag because of his comments to jake tapper about not being able to control the virus-and he said the only person waving a white

flag is joe biden or maybe he is wearing that white mask he wears all the time. taking a hard left turn to mock joe biden for wearing mask, which anthony fauci, dr. redfield, anybody you can listen to even inside the white house tells you is the key to getting our arms around this. >> the stupidity. i mean, what does mark meadows -- what exactly does he think happens after donald trump leaves office? who wants to hire somebody that's defiled themselves as much as he has, that shamed hiv self as much as he has? >> even before trump. >> that making a mockery of -- just making a joke out of himself. time and time again, that mask, jake, and then yesterday still after the white house super-spreader event, which of course they had another one last night. you have to wonder. amy coney barrett, really? you're going to go back to the

scene of the crime where the united states government was actually put at risk by your first event? could you not just say, thank you, but no thank you, mr. president. i am going to be quietly sworn in by chief justice roberts. it will be safer that way. i mean, really? not only do i not understand that. most americans look that picture and say, what the hell is going on? and, willie, again, these are people who are running around acting as if 225,000 dead americans is a joke. >> almost 227. >> it's a punch line, that wearing masks, which one doctor after another, one scientist after another, one epidemiologist after another says, hey, if you want to save your lives, if you want to save the lives of people around you, and if you want to get back to work, if you want to get your businesses back up and open,

wear a mask. seems pretty simple. but for some reason donald trump and all of his stooges who are trying to emulate him, they are making it so much harder than it needs to be. and who are the people that suffer? we have said it before. the seniors who die. the seniors who get very sick. people with underlying conditions get very sick. and, yes, small business owners who continue to suffer because donald trump has mishandled this so badly over the past seven, eight months. >> and he is still saying at his rallies and he will probably say it again today, he said it yesterday, we are turning the corner when, my gosh, we are setting records every day for cases. joe biden, meanwhile, one week out from election day will be in the state a of georgia. the first time the democratic nominal

nominee will be there. first to warm springs. then atlanta for a drive-in rally. georgia remakes neck and neck. the ajg poll has biden up unwithin the margin of error plus or mineers four points. in wisconsin joe biden ahead by nine points, 53-44. in pennsylvania, that same poll finds biden leading by seven points, 51-44. and in texas the latest new york sometimes siena college poll puts president trump ahead by four points, 47-43%. let's bring in national political correspondent steve kornacki. let's start in georgia. it's extraordinary that the knick nominee for president one week out is in georgia of all places. what do you make of the numbers that that state? how have they moved lately? >> that's roughly consistent with the polling average. one way of looking at this, here is the road to 270.

every state that you see in gry here, that includes georgia, these are states that trump carried in 2016 that look like they are parts of the battleground in 2020. there is varying degrees of trouble. wisconsin, michigan, even pennsylvania. those are the three states in this grouping where his numbers are the weakest right now. a state like texas looking competitive, but trump's poll numbers are better there than they are in the midwest. but basically the way to look at this map, at least the way i do, a couple blue states, new hampshire, minnesota and nevada, these are states the trump campaign talked about flipping. you are not seeing it in the polls right now. so barring that, barring trump'sable to flip one of those states, it's all about trump playing defense in these states right here. we took you through it the last time i was on a few days ago. if he just loses, trump dauz,

wisconsin, michigan, pennsylvania, that would put biden over 270. a loss in a state like georgia, for instance, if that were to turn blue, you see biden sitting at 248. if you went through the midwest here, there is wisconsin. there is michigan. even without touching pennsylvania, a state like georgia plus two in the midwest would put biden over 270. there are scenarios here for trump we can get into, but the bottom line is playing defense in an awful lot of place was a week to go. >> steve, stay with us. we want you to run through more election night scenarios. and what happens when you take florida out of the mix for joe biden? you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. right backe so you only pay for what you need? really? i didn't-- aah! ok. i'm on vibrate. aaah! only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪

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with internet essentials from comcast. when you're connected, you're ready for anything. ♪ steve kornacki, let's talk about election night. people are talking about we won't know the you can of this race for for a month, maybe two

months. but on election night we are going to learn fairly early, maybe the end of the evening, what's happening in arizona, what's happening in north carolina, and of course what's happening in florida. i mean, we are going to know most likely by 9:00 p.m. with the early votes counted in florida. we are going to know the shape of that race by 9:00 p.m., see how fascinating that's going. if joe biden wins any one of those three states, and if we assume what the two campaigns have assumed, that biden has wisconsin and michigan locked down, is that enough for joe biden? >> yeah, take a look at a couple of different scenarios here. you mentioned florida and how it works outside the panhandle, 7:00 eastern in that first half hour, we think we are largely going to get the early vote in the mail-in vote and same-day vote not that long after if past is prologue. florida at 7:30. you will get north carolina.

i'll add another state here that i think you are going to get a substantial results from, ohio. the polls close in ohio at 7:30 in ohio. up like a lot of these other states we are talking about in the midwest, they do allow the processing of ballots ahead of time. that's a process that's underway in ohio. there is the potential to get a read-out from ohio. late at night maybe something were arizona. texas might be producing numbers, too. again, look, if you start with michigan and wisconsin going blue, i know the trump folks will contest that at this point, for the sake of playing out these scenarios, if you start with michigan and wisconsin going blue, a florida would certainly put biden over the top. we said a georgia would put biden over the top. a north carolina would put biden over the top. if you get out west in arizona, by itself that would not put biden over the top. you see that would put him at 269 on the cusp of things. when you see that, that's what you need to start talking about this. nebraska, they do the electoral

votes by congressional district. notice one of these is gray here. second congressional district of nebraska, it's basically omaha. trump barely hung on there in 2016. he won it by about three points. the polling that's available there suggests trump's probably an underdog there right now, if anything. so if you gave that to biden, again that would get him to 270. we didn't touch florida, didn't touch arizona in this scenario. that's what we mean. when you are ahead eight nationally, there are a lot of potential paths. >> yeah. jonathan lamire, that's one of the reasons that donald trump is going to nebraska to campaign there today. we have been talking about that congressional district for some time. right now there is no doubt, donald trump is an underdog in that nebraska congressional district in hoomaha. >> no question. he is going there because he is scrambling to find any combination of states and, therefore, electoral college votes to get him to 270. he will be there tonight after

two stops in the midwest before heading out indeed to nevada and then arizona where he has events tomorrow. and he has a robust travel schedule certainly for the next week, including a pretty remarkable 11 rallies scheduled the last two days, which is impressive, but also shows a sense of desperation, joe. they haven't made strategic choices here where they are focusing on, hey, we will keep these three states in the up eve upper midwest. they are down everywhere. there is a scattershot approach here. they also have, it should be noted, a relack of resources. they are in a disadvantage compared to the biden campaign. they are short on cash. there is news that mike bloomberg, the billionaire, former new york city mayor, helping fund joe biden's efforts in florida, is putting in last-minute money to back up biden in ohio and texas, too, two states that trump won fairly comfortably in 2016 but is now having to play defense.

and with trump not able to blitz the airwaves with ads, what does he. >> he simply has himself and these rallies. that's their one strategic advantage his advisors concede is he can be out there. of course, that's a double edge sword as we have been discussing on this show for weeks and months. these large-scale rallies some have been traced to surges in coronavirus. we are seeing the covid-19 pandemic explode in states across the country. but there is a sense here, talking to both campaigns, i talked to a lot of people inside and outside of the campaigns in the last 24 hours, yes, publicly, the trump people are bullish. but democrats are quietly confident. that's why we are seeing biden in georgia today. kamala harris in texas later this week. biden now going to iowa. another state that trump won handily last time around. their numbers, they feel good. they feel good about theirnechat just this the great lakes states, but they like the idea to have a early knockout blow, perhaps not in florida.

it's tight. they think they can win. it's fight. if they can get north carolina or arizona, a state they feel really good about, they want to be able to declare victory that night to prevent donald trump from trying to mess with this and sow seeds of doubt and chaos in the election results. >> coming up, earlier this month president trump says he has federal law enforcement watching the democratic governors of nevada and new mexico. now he is adding pennsylvania, north carolina, and michigan to his list. those ominous new threats are next on "morning joe." orning jo" ♪ it's still warm. ♪ thanks, alice says hi.

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jonathan, it's interesting, and you are right. what donald trump can do, the one thing donald trump can do, the democrats actually want him to do because when he holds the super-spreader events and you have everybody, those pictures of everybody put together, it actually, again, it reinforces the narrative that donald trump is reckless, that he oblivious to the pain, to the suffering, to the death of senior citizens, and it hurts him in arizona. it hurts him in florida. it hurts him across the nation. yet, you're right. they feel like that's the only thing they can do. let me ask you about the scattershot approach though.

i have talked to people on both sides. i know you have. we discuss this a good bit. i haven't found anybody, i haven't found anybody, the trump campaign or the biden campaign, that is talking seriously to me that thinks donald trump can win in michigan or wisconsin anymore. nobody. i haven't talked to anybody in a month that's like, you know, that is not playing for the press. when you get them off the record and they start going through the numbers. so i'm curious, he has a pathway to 270 without going back to wisconsin or michigan. why isn't he taking a more focused approach? why isn't he -- i know pennsylvania is a stretch, but he can't give pennsylvania up. why isn't he hammering in pennsylvania and then going to arizona, florida, north carolina? why is he going all over the map

with, really, looks like no plan at all. >> it's a great question, joe, and one i posed to a lot of trump senior campaign aides and those in the white house. publicly, the ka campaign manager, they held a conference call for reporters yesterday and they said they are seeing encouraging signs in michigan. >> no, they are not. >> which they did, of course, did have in 2016, but that's what they are saying publicly, that's what they are saying publicly, they are not saying that privately. and that's just -- that's why there is surprise. we talked about this last week. it looked like they were focusing on a path, the sun belt path. put their energies north carolina, georgia, florida, arizona, and then everything else in pennsylvania. that gets you there. that gets trump to 270. that's what it looked like they were going to do, and that certainly, yes, still a focus. but that's why it's surprising that they are also spending trips, time in wisconsin, michigan, why he went to new hampshire on sunday. that's the part that it still

has not made sense with the scattershot approach. >> by the way, pennsylvania makes no sense. you look at the private polling. forget the public polling. the private polling has donald trump down double digits in new hampshire. why is he going to new hampshire? if you -- by the way -- >> maybe he thinks his presence is so 'luring, he will pull people over to the side. >> if you're a republican, if you see donald trump in any state other than pennsylvania, arizona, florida, or north carolina, it's a scattershot approach. he's not giving himself a chance to get to 270. arizona, florida, north carolina, pennsylvania, that gets him to 270. when the trump people behind the scenes are admitting to you that these states are gone where he is still campaigning, new

hampshire being one of them, why is he still going there? >> so yesterday in pennsylvania along with saying he'd like to get the hell out of town, president trump attacked the state's governor as well. and other democrats and claimed that, quote, law enforcement is watching them. >> we are watching you, governor, very closely in philadelphia. we're watching you. a lot of bad things. a lot of bad things happened there with the counting of the votes. we are watching you, governor wolf, very closely. all we can say is law enforcement is watching nevada. and we're watching you, philadelphia, and we are watching at the highest level. and we're watching the democrat governor who has got his state shut down, a great state, north carolina. he's got it shut down. we are watching north carolina. we're watching michigan. >> you know, this is good because i hate when a

relationship just goes one way. >> what the heck? >> because for the past year, you have had a lot of state attorney generals watching donald trump. >> closely. >> closely, really closely, especially in new york. the state of new york, donald, hey, donald -- >> they are looking. >> donald, the state of new york, the attorney general there, they're watching you closely. attorney generals in other states, they're watching you closely. so i am sure they are glad that you are looking back. it's good. it's more reciprocal, and that's fine. yeah, you watch all you want to watch, and they are just going to keep watching. here is the -- >> peekaboo. >> here is the great news. even after the election they'll be watching you. we need to really go out on "every breath you take," by the way. so donald trump obviously trying

to intimidate the governors of these states. i don't know how or why, but the man just -- at this point, he just looks desperate. >> yeah, i also don't know who at the highest levels is watching them. like what does that even mean? but it is -- it does play into things that the president has said for a long time, that seem to be aimed at undermining confidence in the vote. and if, you know, he is saying watch philadelphia, clearly a democratic stronghold in the state of pennsylvania, watch these other places, then what he is signaling to people or seems to be signaling to people is, you know, don't necessarily trust the outcome of this vote. and that is the most dangerous part of this because i don't really think the fbi is watching governor wolf, but this plays

into that idea that maybe this election won't be fair, and that is the scarier part about this, especially no matter who wins on tuesday night, we know no one is going to win on tuesday night because we won't know what the results are on tuesday night. but over the course of days or weeks or however long it takes to count ballots. you're right, mika, maybe it will be a landslide and be obvious. we are not counting on that. no matter who wins, it's the responsibili responsibility of everybody, including the president, to ensure confidence in how the vote went so we have some amount of continuity of government and not civil unrest over it. and what he is pointing to now is don't trust the system at all, and that is dangerous. >> coming up, the life, the run, and what matters now. author evan osfos with his new book on joe biden. that conversation is next on "morning joe." ion is next on

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who's supkamala harris.5? harris says, "a corporate tax loophole has allowed billions to be drained from our public schools and local communities. no more. i'm proud to support prop 15." vote yes. schools and communities first is responsible for the content of this ad. week's debate, knowing that america going forward will be tougher on china, challenging mercantilism, lack of democracy. that isn't the question for china on voters next week. the question is what is the right approach. is it trump's trade wars or is it biden's proposal to lean in to the post-war forward alliances with countries like japan and south korea?

for voters to make that kind of decision, you really need to understand what china has done and what it's doing. when america looks at china, it often sees a billion people all marching. but not unlibel america, powerful forces have been gaining ground inside chinese politics. extremists, nationalists, even some of its diplomats called wolf warriors. named after a pair of chinese nationalists film blockbusters for aggressively criticizing america. at the height of the turmoil following the killing of george floyd it this summer, the state department criticized china's human rights record in hong kong. a chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman responded in a tweet, i can't breathe. those who criticized china are targeted. ucla china expert professor michael beret has been woman

barred with online abuse because he translated wuhan diary about the early days of coronavirus in wuhan. >> i bprobably got close to a thousand private messages of hate and threats. >> what do they say? >> i am going to f-ing kill you. i am going to f-ing kill your son. i am going to kill your mother. almost a kind of psychological terrorism. >> reporter: in washington opinions are hardened on china on both sides of the aisle. >> this is not a republican/democrat issue. this is an american issue. >> i really do believe that one of the most defining questions of the next 20, 30 years will be what is the united states' relationship with china. >> reporter: for years the british ambassador karen pierce has watched chinese diplomacy. for decades it focused on

economic growth, pulling millions out of poverty. now she says -- >> you see a rather different china. a china that's determined to have a place on the world stage, a china that wants to reset the rules of international affairs to its own advantage, that says that they collaborate with the multinational system, they contribute to peacekeeping, they are now major donor. it's very much a mixed picture over what it was, say, 15 years ago. >> reporter: president trump has played good cop/bad cop with china, railing against china on the season campaign trail. >> we are going to have a very, very great relationship. >> reporter: making friends with president x ovi over chocolate e at mar-a-lago. now they haven't spoken for mounts. huawei, particultiktok, hong kon rights, currency devaluation. now the controversy surrounding coronavirus has poured gasoline on the fire.

>> look what happened with the china virus. look what they did by not keeping that within the confines of china. look what they have done to 188 countries all over the world. >> reporter: trump now entertaining the idea of the world's two largest economies decoupling. nobody truly knows what's next. >> we are likely to be in a prolonged global recession. how china escapes from that, therefore, that will impact china's foreign and economic policy. >> reporter: but we do know china has been flexing its muscles, fusing civil and military decision-making, modernizing its massive navy, air force and army. a total of 2.8 million troops. senator jean shaheen sits on the senate's foreign relations and defense committees. >> they have continued to do a build-up in the south china sea in ways that increase the chinese sphere of influence in that area. as you point out, there are

rumblings that continue to threaten taiwan. they have gone back on their agreement not to interfere in hong kong in a way that has protected human rights and democracy there. that has been totally undercut. >> reporter: china's human rights record continues to undermine its standing on the world stage. i it's been repeatedly accused of detaining a million uighur muslims in concentration camps. they call them vocational retraining centers designed to combat extremism. china this year elected to the united nations human rights council, but with the lowest votes ever. while a second term president trump will likely continue his anti-china america first rhetoric, a potential biden administration says it will rally america's regional allies. >> biden will have a very different approach to managing china. he understands the value of working with other countries.

china is too big and too powerful for any country to try to manage on its own. >> reporter: but both approaches likely mean relations with china will remain or get more tense in the years ahead. this month taiwan's foreign minister called china hostile country. american and chinese confrontation has led to hostilities before on the korean peninsula and in vietnam. >> a lot of people talking about is this going to lead to a new cold war. that is absolutely not the case if we don't want it to be. it is not inevitable that we end up having a new cold war or competition to that level with china. >> reporter: the two economies are intertwined to the tune of more than $700 billion, meaning millions of american and chinese jobs depend on each other. that may be the best deterrent to confrontation. the stakes for america's next president couldn't be higher.

and willie, the producer who helped me put together these pieces said to me a great point today. he said, i feel like china understands america way better than america understands china. willie, right now the chinese leadership are meeting, looking at plans through to 2035. america really needs to be clear-eyed about what china is planning and needs to have a unity of purpose because this is a long-term challenge. >> yeah, that was a great comprehensive look at the relationship here. and, keir, if donald trump a week from tonight is re-elected to a second term, you laid out very well all of the rhetoric that's gone on back and forth, including in the middle of the coronavirus crisis, for lack of a commitment by his administration to taking it on. he said, well, it's china's fault. this never should have happened. so how does the dynamic change if it is donald trump for another four years? >> reporter: yeah, that's a good question. we know, look, that president trump does have the capacity to pivot. i would say one other thing, is

that secretary of state pompeo has actually been on a global tour meeting with allies in the region. so actually despite some of the rhetoric, you are seeing some effort there by the secretary of state at least to do a bit of work, kind of the vice president biden is saying that he might do. but the question, i think, is, one question is the personality question between president xi and president trump. you know, how do you resolve that? and another big question here, it doesn't necessarily come down to two men, if you like. there is so much involved, so much wrapped into this in terms of the economic links between the two countries. how do you choose where to confront china and where to cooperate. >> fascinating. nbc's keir simmons. a great series. we look forward to more. thanks so much, keir. mika. >> up next, "the new yorker's"

evan osnos has spent nearly ten years writing about joe biden, and now he is out with a timely new book that offers a portrait of the former vice president. plus, with recent polls suggesting texas may be a battleground this year, jonathan swan, of axios, sits down with senator ted cruz. we will show you his comments on the debt and deficit, which had jonathan swan saying, quote, isn't that the most cynical, phony thing? we'll be right back. one day we'll look back and remember the moment that things, for one strange time in our lives, got very quiet. we worried over loved ones, over money, over our planet,

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axios national political correspondent jonathan swan roontly sat down with senator ted cruz of texas to discuss a wide range of issues including how his party has seemingly forgotten its concerns over the national debt. >> one issue i haven't heard discussed at all this election, let alone this debate is the debt and deficit. >> yeah. >> mick mulvaney had a great quote. he said when there's a democrat in the white house, my party, boy, do we care about the deficit is the worst thing in the world when barack obama is present. but president trump came in and we're not so worried about it. he's right, isn't he? >> i'm worried about the debt and i'm worried about it under trump. now to be fair, trump didn't campaign on cutting the debt. >> he did. he said he's going to eliminate the national debt in eight years. >> he also said something, what

is it, i'm the king of debt in 2016. >> right. >> trump has said from day one -- look. he gets to decide his priorities. and they're not necessarily all my priorities. so the fact that eye. >> i don't doubt your sincer isity. this is not directed at you. but stepping back, you belong to a party that has green lit a historic expansion of deficits and debt. and it's just a plain fact. >> do i wish that it was a higher priority for the president to rein in spending and the debt? yes. he didn't run principally on reining in spending and deficit and debt. we have real differences between it. and you know what the -- >> i will remind you he did promise to eliminate the national debt. he literally promised that. >> let me give another element. this is in terms of how you eliminate the deficit and move towards reducing the debt -- >> you're going to say growth.

>> the most important factor, trump's policies have been profoundly pro growth. >> yeah. >> the tax cuts -- >> also profoundly pro deficit. do you think your colleagues, the republican party, will rediscover its concern about debt and deficits? >> sure. >> isn't that the most cynical, phony -- >> there's an element of it -- >> doesn't it make you want to puke? >> you are touching into something that as you know i have raged against. and i have raged against my own party not genuinely fighting to rein in spending and deficits and debt. >> you have? okay. if you say so. i just haven't seen that. senator cruz also gave his take on last week's presidential debate. and commented on the trump campaign's attacks on hunter biden. >> if you look at the contrast between the policies between the record -- by the way, one of biden's best points was when he

said all of these attacks back and forth about my family and his family. they don't matter. what matters is your family. that may have been biden's best moment actually. and i -- >> you don't believe voters are moved by the hunter biden stuff? >> i don't think it moves a single voter. and i'm glad -- look. i think that -- what was it, about 10, 15 minutes where they were slamming each other's families and going back and forth. i think that was kind of -- >> you think that was a wash basically? >> that, i don't see as moving votes. >> joining us now, staff writer at the new yorker, evan osnos, the author of "joe biden: the life, the run and what matters now." which is based on interviews with dozens of people who know joe biden and years of new yorker interview with the man

himself. evan, congratulations on the book. great timing. >> thank you. >> what does -- what does a voter still on the fence or thinking about joe biden or a voter who has been following joe biden because a lot of people know his life story. it's amazing. learn in this book about the man. >> well, i mean, that's, frankly, i had a similar view which is do people really need to know more about this man, and that was what interested me because what you discover is, look, we trade the same stories back and forth all the time in the headlines. and what you find is if you actually go back into his life and you really begin to look into the byways, into the corners, you find some fascinating moments that tell you more about his mind, how it works, how his character works. i'll give you an example. if you go back to his very first senate run in 1972, he was running against kale boggs, this giant of delaware politics. here was joe biden. 29 years old. they're on the debate stage.

there was a very revealing moment. kale boggs botched a detail about foreign policy. he didn't know it. the moderator turns to biden, the young guy and gives him a chance to basically run his sword through his opponent here. biden knew the answer, and he didn't give it. he dodged it. what he said later was that, look, i could have pounced on that, but nobody wanted to see kale boggs humiliated on that stage. nobody wanted to see him clubbed in front of the public. and there's something -- there's a deeper truth to that in the idea of the way that joe biden has gone about politics throughout this long career, which is to say that he doesn't regard it as blood sport. it doesn't have to be that way. and that's something that's easy to forget these days. >> yeah. two major moments in joe biden's life where he's faced death in one way or another. first was, of course, the car crash that killed his wife and

baby. the other was when he had, i think, one of two -- he had a brain aneurysm and had to have surgery. i want to know the story about how he spoke to his sons. but the interesting thing today is that the trump campaign, you know, always says that joe biden is hiding his health record and he's hiding his brain surgeries or whatever and i even think maria bartiromo asked him a question about it. >> yeah. >> when it's on the biden website, his entire health history. but tell us about that surgery and that -- the time that he spent with his sons before he went under and what he said to them because i think it's especially moving but also telling about who he is. >> you know, it's -- one of those moments in his life that in anybody else's biography it may be the centerpiece because it's so simply remarkable, sort of dramatic. but in his case, there's so much else on there that catches people's eye. as we know, after he left the

presidential race, after he bombed out of the presidential race in 1987, he had two aneurysms. he's written about it. he's talked about it. there's no secret there. they were so grave. this is a ballooning of an artery in the brain so serious that the surgeons summoned the priest to deliver last rites even before his wife jill could be there because they thought he wasn't going to make it. he goes in and sees his sons before going under the knife, and he says to them look, if i don't come out of this, you will be okay. you will have a life ahead of you of decency and of honor. and the truth is, he said, i could go into that surgery with peace knowing that i had given my sons that. i think, honestly, look, we are, as we know, we are a nation right now that is vulnerable. we are literally grieving. and we know what it feels like to feel vulnerable and frail. and i think having a president who has been through that, who has literally climbed out of the worst possible moment, clawed

his way back. out of the senate for seven months before he could get back to work. it's not an incidentally important fact. it actually begins to rebuild some of those connections between our leadership and our public that feel to us so lacking right now. >> evan, it's willie. we have a minute left for a long question, but the nut of it is bringing it up to this year that when we sat with joe biden in a restaurant in new hampshire on the day of that primary, there was a funerial feel to things about his political career. it was over. he finished fifth that night. fourth in iowa before that. what was the state of that campaign and, obviously, moving to south carolina, which rescued his campaign. did they feel like it was over in that moment in new hampshire? >> they sure did. it was as close as you could come to the end of the campaign. they were having questions about, how much money do we need to hold in our hands to pay people for severance if we have to lay them off at the end. there was this amazing turn around. and the briefest, interesting

fact is we sometimes look at it and say it feels as if this turned around overnight. it didn't. it was the product of years of relationship building of the kind he wants to do in washington with people as broad a spectrum as bernie sanders and amy klobuchar who, when the moment came, they coalesced around him because they had, in years of experience of seeing what he was and how he operated, and it paid off. >> all right. the new book is "joe biden: the life, the run and what matters now." evan osnos, thank you so much. that does it for us this morning. stephanie ruhle picks up the coverage right now. hi there. i'm stephanie ruhle. it's tuesday, october 27th. let's get smarter. we are just one week away from election day, and it is on. today, president trump hits three states starting in michigan, then heading to wisconsin and nebraska. the first two he won narrowly last time, but now he trails in the polls. in the state of nebraska, he is