his covid medical team after a rousing speech to fired-up supporters in georgia where biden is trying to expand the battleground. >> folks, it's go time. there's one week left. there aren't a lot of pundits who would have guessed four years ago that a democratic president in 2020 would be campaigning in georgia on the final week of the election. [ cheers and applause ] >> president trump continuing his battleground blitz, today in arizona continuing to deny the covid surge around the country while making a confounding new pitch to suburban women in michigan. >> you know what else, i'm also getting your husbands -- they want to get back to work, right? we're getting your husbands back to work. >> and new "washington post"/abc news polls showing joe biden

leading trump. biden in wisconsin leading the president by 17 points in this poll, 57-40. and joining me now, nbc news white house correspondent peter alexander will be here in a moment, but first, steve kornacki joining me. steve corn aackee -- kornacki, let's take a look at the big board and what you think of the poll in wisconsin. >> that's the biggest margin by far we've seen out of wisconsin. we've seen joe biden consistently ahead in wisconsin. the states in gray, every one of them was a trump state in 2016. every one of them, to some degree, the president is in trouble in the polling right now. but the two states, and this has been a consistent story this fall, that stand out, where trump's polling has been the

weakest against joe biden, are michigan and wisconsin. and that abc/"washington post" poll today, whether that's an outlier, a little farther out there than reality, it's consistent with biden being ahead in that state and ahead in those two states more than the others. look at this, if biden gets the states that clinton won in 2016, that's what you're seeing there with the 232, if he added michigan to that, and if he added wisconsin to that, he would be sitting at 258. and the other place on this map, it's a little tough to see, and this looks obscure, but it's important, the other place that stands out, where the polling for biden has been very strong, it's the second congressional district of nebraska. it's where trump was last night. it's omaha. trump barely won that in 2016. democrats are feeling very optimistic they're going to flip that and they get one vote. remember, nebraska does the electoral vote by congressional district. if you just take those three places where the democrats are feeling very strong right now,

259. one more, arizona, would put biden at 270. we haven't talked about florida. we haven't talked about pennsylvania. any of these other states in this snocenario. but for biden, that's one of the pathways when you look at this polling that could open up here. this could put trump in a position where he could sweep everything else and it wouldn't be enough. he would have to start finding clinton states in 2016 to flip. his campaign will talk about nevada. but those two, just michigan and wisconsin, they are not enough, and the second district of nebraska, they're not by themselves enough to put biden on 270, but they could put him on the cusp of it. then you see all the possibilities that open up. kamala harris is in arizona today, you add arizona, that would be 270. >> the polls have been narrowing in arizona. we'll be talking to vaughn hillyard there in just a second. wouldn't it be sort of amazing

if this ends up, 269-269, and omaha, that one district? >> it does feel like if there's going to be a year that ends with a 269-269 tie, it would have to be 2020. and yes, if there's a scenario, hey, trump was there last night. if it changed things and put him in a better position, not impossible to get to that scenario, andrea. >> not impossible. steve kornacki. nothing is impossible in 2020, that's the bottom line. joining us now, nbc white house correspondent and "weekend today" co-host peter alexander and nbc political reporter in goodyear, arizona ahead of the president's rallies today. first to you, peter, wouldn't it be amazing, just so 2020, if it all boiled down to omaha and to the lack of a bus and ta plan t get people out of a blizzard and

suffering from subfreezing temperatures? tell us what happened after the rally in omaha. >> reporter: andrea, we hope this is not a 269 tie at the end of the night for the sake of our sanity. in nebraska, a frigid, snowy evening, hundreds of trump's supporters had waited for hours and were unable to get to their cars and vehicles that were miles away because some of the buses that were to pick them up simply couldn't get to that location because it was blocked by foot traffic and other cars there at the time. ultimately, according to some of the dispatch reports from the omaha area, at least 30 individuals needed medical attention given the circumstances there. the good news is at this point, to the best of our understanding, everybody is okay. but you can imagine the concern right there, for so many of those folks in that situation, trying to get help, to say nothing of this all happening against the backdrop of the pandemic. those who ultimately did get on

buses and were in the rally had no social distancing. there were few masks available at the time. the white house says the president's priority and the white house's priority is always the health and safety of those who attend his rallies or attend any of his events. >> and peter as well, the coronavirus such a drag on the president's campaign despite his denials. that "washington post"/abc news polling find 59% of registered voters in wisconsin disapprove of his handling of the virus. >> reporter: we've heard just today in that crucial battleground of wisconsin, the beloved badgers canceled the weekend game against the cornhuskers because of the pandemic, because players and staff members, including the head coach of the badgers, have now tested positive.

the president is trying to say we've got to get life back to normal, we've got to sort of live through this virus but in fact it's the virus itself that's made it difficult for life to get back to normal because of the president's failure to crack down on it, that's certainly what the democrats are saying right now and it's what you hear the president trying to push back on when he says this is all going to disappear in our coverage of it on november 4. we know that's not true. his own testing czar said it's not true as well. the president insists we're rounding the turn despite all the fact to the contrary. >> and vaughn hillyard, you're in arizona where nbc sees this as a toss-up state. there had been a bigger lead, we had seen a bigger lead in the senate race there. what's going on? >> reporter: good afternoon, andrea. what you're looking at in arizona is the president making two stops today, one here in the suburb of maricopa county, and a

second stop in mohave county, a place he won by 52 percentage points in bullhead city. the reason the president is going there is frankly because he is continuing to bleed support here in the greater maricopa county area. that's the greater phoenix area here. this is a president who since his 2016 win in the state, you only won it by 3.5 percentage points but he's done little to ingratiate himself here in the greater phoenix suburbs. maricopa county makes up 60% of the electorate. back in 2018, martha mcsally, the republican senate candidate at the time, lost her senate race. there has been only one candidate who won statewide in the last decade while losing maricopa county. it's worth noting that the president going up to the rural part of the state where there's a much larger population base is worth noting. i stopped up there yesterday into a couple towns like havasu,

kingman, bullhead city, i went to one early voting location and only one person out of 50 said they were both for joe biden. but the trump campaign is looking to turn out more people to vote and make up for deficits here in maricopa county. >> thanks you to, vaughn, and of course to peter, and steve kornacki. vice presidential nominee kamala harris will be taking the fight to the president in arizona today, the second leg of a western campaign swing that began in nevada on tuesday. >> we're going to have to make the special effort to not let the circumstances of this moment disempower anybody. let's let this moment be the moment that we rise to remind people of the strength of ourselves and each other. >> karine jean-pierre is chief of staff to kamala harris on the

campaign trail and joins me now. karine, great to see you again. the message that kamala harris is bringing to arizona today, we'll see two raucous rallies from the president, how does she counteract that? >> well, i think first of all, you're going to see a campaign, our campaign, who is going to be talking to the american people and earning the vote in a safe way. we're going to be wearing our masks, we're going to be social distancing, and we're going to do it so that we're not just protecting the senator and our staff but also the people we're talking to, the voters we're talking to. that alone is a major contrast. you were just talking about omaha and president trump's trip there last night and how he left the city and what he did, basically putting people's lives at risk. here is the thing, andrea. we have many paths to 270, our campaign does. and we're going to run through the tape in each and every state. yes, we like how it looks in arizona. yes, we like how it looks in georgia.

we're also going to focus on pennsylvania, michigan, and wisconsin, because the name of the deal here, the real thing here is, our strategy for the next six days, andrea, is really making sure people go out and vote. we win if people go out and vote. and if you have already voted, please get your friends to vote, get your family to vote. and that is the key, because get out the vote, this is the moment now, and people are voting every day. that's what we're out there doing. we're going to make that contrast between biden and donald trump and we're also going to be earning everyone's vote. >> how concerned are you about some of the legal challenges we're seeing in texas, losing a number of issues over ballot access, in wisconsin, notably the supreme court decision not permitting vote counting on late-arriving ballots, especially with what our nbc survey has shown with nbc elects and our affiliates, we've done a

real study of postal service delivery of letters, first class mail, and it's shown that really there is a marked delay in october. and notably, in big cities with large minority populations. >> that's exactly right, that is voter suppression for you, andrea. first of all, if you have your ballot and you have not dropped them off or mailed them in yet, go to iwillvote.com and find a dropbox location to drop them off. if you have not voted by mail yet, go to iwillvote.com and find out where you can early vote in person and on election day. those are the two messages i want to make sure people hear from me today. we as a campaign have built out one of the most impressive, largest voter suppression operations. we have thousands of lawyers, we have thousands of volunteers focusing on that particular thing, making sure that we are helping voters navigate through the process, not just what

donald trump has done, the barriers his allies have put up to make it difficult for americans to vote, but covid is a reality for folks. we have 17 phone lines in these 17 key states and also a national phone line. people should call that if they feel like they're not quite sure what's going on and they need to get more information of what's happening in their voting, in their polling site or anything that they're hearing. and so we are out there trying to make sure that we're helping folks navigate through this process, because yes, voter suppression is very real and so we have to deal with that as well. >> i know you've got the not so secret weapon, president obama. we've got the first clip from lebron james, he interviewed president obama in florida about voter outreach. lebron talked about the importance of his mother voting

for the first time. let's watch. >> i don't know if this is her first time voting but this is the first time she's ever talked about it. i believe it was her first time voting. i'm so proud of her. >> you tell her barack and michelle give her much love and respect for that. >> absolutely. she sent me a video today, she voted, she had her sticker on her chest, she was so damn proud of herself and i was so proud of her too, it was a beautiful thing. absolutely, there is some change happening, man. >> that's a pretty important message. pet pow pretty powerful message there. >> so powerful. we are all proud of lebron's mom as well. it's so important to go out and vote. when we vote, we win. that is the message there. and you were asking me about obama. obama is one of the most popular politicians on the face of this earth. there is no one better that understands what it means to be president.

there is no one better that can speak to why joe biden should be president. and there is no one better that can speak to the failures of donald trump and his administration, especially in this current crisis that we're in with covid-19 and how badly donald trump has mismanaged this and failed as a president. >> karine jean-pierre, it's great to hear from you today, thanks for being with us. >> thanks for having me, andrea, i appreciate the time. >> you bet. and we should point out the trump campaign of course has an open invitation to have people on our show as well, always does, always will. covid crisis. how one border city has become paralyzed by the rapid spread of coronavirus. a report from el paso, texas, next on "andrea mitchell reports" on msnbc.

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the u.s. averaging more than 72,000 new cases daily. the virus has pushed the border city of el paso, texas to the brink. nearly 1,400 new cases were reported there tuesday with hospitalizations up by 300%. nbc news correspondent gabe gutierrez joins us from el paso. gabe, what's being done to handle the surge? >> reporter: hi there, andrea. yes, as you mentioned, hospitalizations are up dramatically in el paso. behind me, you can see one of the mobile medical tents, several of them, actually, set up here at the university medical center of el paso. 12 or 15 patients per tent. right now at this hospital there are nearly 200 covid patients, some of them critically ill and airlifted to other parts of the state. they're also dealing with staffing issues here, and in many other hospitals, not just in texas but across the country, they're bringing in travel nurses from across the state. here in el paso local officials have imposed a nightly curfew to

try and stop the spread of the virus. take a listen to the chief medical officer from another medical center here in the region. take a listen. >> just two weeks ago, we were having public discourse around 500 cases a day, 700 cases a day, 800. last week we broke the record three times, a thousand, 1,200, 1,400. the mortality rate is better, but the more people come in, it goes on unabated, there will be a lot of dark days into the fall, and that's unfortunate. >> reporter: andrea, yes, dark days is the fear of public health authorities here as well. they're warning what will happen not just as winter takes over but also flu season. if there is this surge in cases, andrea, what's different here in texas, we keep hearing hospitals around the country are fearful their hospitals could be full. guess what, here in el paso they are full, they're at 100% capacity. behind me are scenes reminiscent

of what we saw more than six months ago in the northeast, in new york city, where these outside tests and refrigerated trucks had to be brought in. they're really preparing for the worst here, andrea. >> and a really vulnerable community as well. thanks so much, gabe gutierrez. dr. zeke emanuel, former health adviser to president obama, dr. zeke, thanks for being with us. i want to ask you about the contrast between what the president was saying this week on the trail and what dr. fauci said about what we're going to get back to normal. >> covid, covid, covid. that's all they talk about. we're rounding the turn. they hate it when i say it. normal life. that's what we want, normal life. >> i think it will be easily by the end of 2021 and perhaps even into the next year before woe

start having some semblances of normality. >> so obviously, dr. fauci is giving us a more realistic prognosis. the fact is, dr. emanuel, we keep hearing the president denying the surge, denying the reality, and the strange thing is, politically it is affecting him. look at the polls in wisconsin today. people are feeling it in their daily lives and just aren't believing what they're seeing on the campaign trail. >> so the president's right, we all want a return to normalcy. but that requires, as public health people like myself have been saying since march, getting a handle on the virus and driving it down to undetectable, which they've done in other countries. so we know it's possible to do. they've done it in china, south korea, japan, taiwan. we're rounding the corner? i don't know what corner he's talking about. we're rounding the corner back to march and april when we had

the big outbreaks. they happened to be in new york. but as you can see, they can migrate, and they've migrated to texas, they've migrated to arizona before, they're up in wisconsin and other places. i have been saying literally since the start, that november 2021 is about the point when we're going to have enough vaccine out there that we're going to be able to really begin to return to normal. and we should make it clear, this is not like flipping a light switch. we're going to go from, you know, wearing masks, socially distancing, small groups, businesses being mostly outside, to suddenly everything's going to be normal. it's going to be a phased-in approach. that's the way people have to look at it. the president has never been once right in his prognostications. he is constantly acting like a doctor and an epidemiologist. hydroxychloroquine, it's going to go away with the summer and the heat. none of those predictions have worked out.

and i think it's much more accurate that people understand, we're in a third wave because we're going inside. it's going to get bad. and probably begin to return to normal november or so, the fall of 2021. but it may take a while to get back to what we all experienced in december 2019. >> and we saw admiral brett giroir on the white house task force with savannah guthrie today saying that it's not true that cases are up because testing is up. in part that's the case, that there is more testing now than there was last spring, but you're also seeing now hospitalization rates going up. >> yeah, look, we're at still under a million tests a day in the united states, where most experts think we should be at 5 or 10 million tests a day. we have never been able to solve the testing problem despite the president's promises. and it's not because we're testing more that we're having outbreaks in north dakota or all

over wisconsin. people on the ground know that there's real disease there. people are really getting covid. and by the way, let's just emphasize for the audience, we also know pretty definitively now, masks make a huge difference. and consistently wearing masks, consistently staying six feet apart, consistently having small groups, under 20, under 10, those are the keys to beating this. other countries have used those same techniques with testing and contact tracing. and we could too. but it does require leadership. it requires management. it requires money. and we have yet to consistently, you know, devote those things to solving this problem. >> i do want to ask you about the dodgers, the world series, the big victory for them after more than three decades. but justin turner, pulled from the game, between the seventh and eighth inning, then it turns out he's tested positive, and

then he shows up on the field celebrating. you know, kissing the trophy, grabbing the trophy, grabbing other people. he's tested positive for covid. what does that say, you know, about the -- >> look, andrea, i think you're -- >> -- baseball? >> your inability to fully express your outrage says everything. we have to consistently implement these measures. even when you win something as substantial as the world series, it doesn't mean you throw off all those public health measures. that is a perfect example of what could have been a super spreading event. a guy positive, shedding -- maybe shedding virus, infecting other people. fortunately, many of those other people, you know, were protecting themselves or staying away, but people were touching the trophy. and you've got to worry that this is exactly the kind of

circumstance that allows a lot of spread of this virus. and we know it's the super spreading events which has spread most of the cases, 80 to 90% of the cases are a result of super spreading events. we need our celebrities, our sports figures, our business leaders, all to walk the walk and to behave and to follow those rules consciously and model them for the public. >> indeed, whether it's the world series or the rose garden. a super spreader is a super spreader. >> yep. >> thank you very much, good to see you, zeke emanuel. and the climate crisis. despite wildfires out west and hurricane zeta off the gulf coast, the trump administration is taking more action to undercut those fighting global warming. washington governor and climate advocate jay inslee joins me next. stay with us. you're watching "andrea mitchell

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millions of people are under fire warnings as catastrophic winds are fueling the flames. this as the president has called climate change a hoax and in the administration's latest move to undercut science, they've recently removed the chief scientist of noaa and put in new political staff who question climate change. joining me now is washington governor and former democratic presidential candidate jay inslee, a climate activist. governor, if joe biden wins and even if the democrats win the senate, who chance does their plan have, will it be too piece meal to accomplish anything soon enough? because he's talking about 2050, that's a long way off. >> i could not be more delighted by joe biden's ambitious plan. it's appropriately ambitious. and it's real. it's not just some pipe dream.

he has put forgth a plan that i robust and practical, meaning we could actually do it. the fundamental difference between joe biden and donald trump is when trump thinks of climate change, he thinks "hoax." when joe biden thinks climate change, he thinks "jobs." his plan, i am so pleased, because i've beaten this drum for a decade and a half, and joe biden has put his ideas to paper and it is going to grow jobs in steel for wind turbines, for electricians who are wiring electric charging stations for our cars, for sheet metal workers and carpenters who are rebuilding our homes so that they can be more energy-efficient. there is no greater jobs program than fighting climate change. and to do that you have to understand science to begin with. and look, the situation we face today is a president who ignores science and debases it, refuses to accept science on covid because he cares more about

hurting his election than hurting americans. and science in climate change where we have a candidate who embraces it, joe biden, and will turn it into a massive jobs program. i could not be more thrilled about the arrival of a candidate who will lead us in hopes of economic recovery rather than one who will try to ignore science every chance he gets, and that's the situation with donald trump. >> how did you feel after the debate when people were immediately saying, okay, there goes pennsylvania with fracking, there goes texas when he said he was going to end the oil industry. he later clarified to say he was going to end the subsidies. but do you think that it is still, you know, really political high wire to even talk in those terms about climate in the debate? >> this is a winning issue for joe biden, because the people get it. they're not following this hogwash from donald trump. look, i saw an ad for an electric hummer the other day, okay? every major car company

understands the power of electric cars. and every major auto company is now making electric cars. they understand this is the future. it's actually the present. so does joe biden. so does a huge majority of the american people. and they understand that we can make electric cars here. and we want to make them here and not surrender that future manufacturing base to china or germany or anywhere else. this is fundamentally a struggle to have an advanced manufacturing economy in the united states. and that's why joe biden is doing so well in pennsylvania in many places. look, he's not going to eliminate fossil fuels tomorrow. he does think, as i do, that we should no longer use taxpayer money to subsidize these fossil fuel companies. there will be a transition over decades to cleaner sources of energy. americans get that. and the reason we get it is we understand what donald trump does not understand. we are an optimistic, technologically literate,

scientific ical scientifically knowledgeable people who understand an economic opportunity when we see it, and it's an economic opportunity as much as it is an environmental and health challenge. joe biden gets that. donald trump does not. we'll start this progress next wednesday morning. >> i want to ask you also about the president's rhetoric on the trail. last night in lansing, michigan, he was focusing on senator kamala harris and -- well, let me play it for you and see what your reaction is. >> if he gets elected, three weeks into his presidency, they'll say, kamala, you're ready, let's go. that's why they're talking about the -- that's why they talk about the 25th amendment, right? three weeks, three weeks in, joe's shot, let's go, kamala, you ready? >> so, you know, i guess he's trying to demean biden and also talk about kamala harris as vice president. but just the way he talks about

both of them on the campaign trail, i guess the rhetoric is getting heated on both sides six days out, but still. >> well, trump seems mystified why suburban women are voting against him two to one. he seems mystified by that. whereas he has an entire career demeaning and demoting the opportunities of women in our community in businesses and their home life and everywhere else, then he's mystified and has to go begging. i heard the other day him sort of saying, you have to vote for me, you women of suburbia. they're rejecting that very kind suggestion by donald trump, because he's found every single way possible to demean the possibilities of strong women in our community. and senator harris is one of those strong women who represent a tremendous future and present in our american political leadership. i could not be more pleased with her candidacy and i could not be more understanding of the clarity of the difference of joe

biden, who recognizes that strong leadership, and donald trump, who is a very insecure man, who is threatened by strong women. i don't know how to put it more bluntly than that. and i'm looking forward to women voting against him in droves. >> well, okay. there you've got it. governor, thank you very much for being with us. >> thank you. and meanwhile, over in texas, texas now a toss-up. nbc has reclassified the presidential race in the state. what does that mean for the state's closely-contested senate race? speaking of strong women. democrat mj heger joins me, next. heger joins me, next worry follows you everywhere. over 100,000 people have left blood thinners behind with watchman. it's a one-time,

minimally invasive procedure that reduces stroke risk-- and bleeding worry--for life. watchman. it's one time. for a lifetime. and welcome back. we're interrupting this break to bring you joe biden speaking now in wilmington after a meeting with his health care advisers.

>> anything we experienced to date. we talked about what actions will be needed to turn this around and how we're made worse by this administration's declaration of surrender to the virus. and we discussed again the vital importance of wearing masks, protecting yourself, protecting your neighbor, and so save around 100,000 lives in the months ahead, between now and the first of the year. this is not political. it's patriotic. wearing a mask. wear one, period. we focused on the way this virus is hitting communities of color much harder, particularly black, latino, and native american communities. we're seeing race-based disparities across the aspects of this virus. higher infection rates but lower access to testing and harder time quarantining safely because of their financial circumstances.

lower access to quality treatment when they are infected, and tragically, higher mortality rates. one in 1,000 black americans have died from this virus. this is a staggering statistic. and 57% of black adults, 46% of latino adults, know someone who has died or been hospitalized from this disease. folks, we've lost more than 220,000 lives to this virus already. but this administration has just given up. over the weekend, the white house chief of staff mark meadows went on television and admitted that they've waved the white flag and declared surrender. he said, quote, we're not going to control the pandemic, end of quote. the american people deserve so much better than this. just look at what happened last night in omaha, after the trump rally ended. hundreds of people including older americans and children were stranded in subzero

freezing temperatures for hours. several folks ended up in the hospital. it's an image that captures president trump's whole approach to this crisis. he takes a lot of big pronouncements, he makes a lot of big pronouncements, but they don't hold up. he gets his photo op then he gets out. he leaves everyone else to suffer the consequences of his failure to make a responsible plan. it seems like he just doesn't care much about it. and the longer he's in charge, the more reckless he gets. it's enough. it's time to change. meanwhile, yesterday the white house science office, and this stunned me, put out a statement listing ending the covid-19 pandemic as a top accomplishment of president trump's first term. top accomplishment of trump's first term. at the very moment when infection rates are going up in almost every state in our union,

the refusal of the trump administration to recognize the reality we're living through at a time when almost a thousand americans a day are dying, every single day, is an insult to every single person suffering from covid-19 and every family who has lost a loved one. there's nothing, nothing more personal to an american family than their health care and the health care of their loved ones. i know all too well what it feels like to have your heart ripped out, losing loved ones too soon, to sit at a hospital bedside and feel like there's a black hole in the middle of your chest, knowing there's not much you can do. i and many of you know what it feels like to watch a beloved person die, lie there dying of cancer or some other disease without wondering, having to wonder about whether you can pay for the medical bills, or what would happen if god forbid, the insurance companies were able to say, we're not going to honor

the treatment. yet today the president is on a single-minded crew said crusade americans of their health care, creating another crisis in the american health care system. in two short weeks, the trump administration will make its case asking the supreme court to strike down the affordable care act, quote, in its entirety. in its entirety. let me say that again. they're arguing the entire law must fall, which would strip 20 million americans of their health insurance overnight, rip away protections for preexisting conditions, for more than 100 million people, in the middle of an upswing in a pandemic, the upswing. look, just this week, on "60 minutes," we heard what trump told lesley stahl about the upcoming supreme court case on the affordable care act. and i quote, i hope that they end it, it would be so good if

they end it, end of quote. there's no question. there's no question that's why president trump nominated justice barrett to the court. that's why the republicans jammed her through, her confirmation, in the middle of an election. the republicans have tried and tried and tried since the affordable care act was passed to overturn it. and every single time they've failed. president trump has tried everything he can on his own to sabotage the law. so now, through what i have characterized as a craven abuse of political power, they've added to the court a justice who criticized chief justice roberts' previous decision to uphold the affordable care act in hopes that they can destroy the affordable care act once and for all through the courts no matter how many americans they hurt in the process. so let's remember exactly what's at stake in this election.

if you have diabetes, asthma, cancer, or even complications from covid-19, you're going to lose the protection this law provides. insurers will once more be able to jack up your premiums or deny you coverage. women could again be charged more for their health care just because they're women. and children will no longer be able to stay on their parents' insurance policies until age 26. on top of all that, overturning the aca could mean the people have to pay to get covid-19 vaccine once it's available. that's right. that's right. the law that says insurers are required to cover vaccines for free is the affordable care act. and he's striking that down, or attempting to. unlike donald trump, i believe health care isn't a privilege. it's a right that everyone should have access to.

this country can't afford four more years of a president who thinks he's only responsible for the well being of people who voted for him. we can't afford a president who attacks doctors instead of attacking the virus. he attacked doctors, claiming they're overreporting covid cases because they want to make more money. doctors are overreporting cases because they want to make money. you know, our doctors and nurses and our front line health care workers are putting themselves at enormous risk every day. more than a thousand of them have already died in an attempt to beat back this pandemic and save lives. they deserve to be treated with respect by their president. we can't afford four more years of a president who would rather spend his time desperately trying to strip people of their health care than even once bother to put forward a health care plan on his own. we can't afford four more years of donald trump.

the good news is, we have a chance to turn this around by voting. we have six more days left in this election. the american people have it in their hands to put this country in a vastly different path. this is my commitment to you. i will protect and build on the affordable care act so that you can keep your private insurance or choose a medicare-like option. you can make it stronger. i'm going to make it stronger with your help. to lower premiums, and deductibles, and out of pocket expenses. we'll bring down drug prices by almost two-thirds by taking steps such as allowing medicare to negotiate with the pharmaceutical companies or making billions of dollars, making the price lower, when they negotiate, medicare says we'll only pay you "x" amount for the following medicines, that will lower prices

drastically, making it available to everyone. we're going to make sure every american has access to free covid-19 vaccine. this isn't beyond our capacity. now, if we come together, we can stand together. if wetogether. if we stand together as the united states, the united states. democrats, republicans, and independents. we can transcend old divisions and show what's possible. there's nothing beyond our capacity. there's no limit to america's future. and if i'm elected president, as i said yesterday in warm springs, georgia, i'll be a president hospital not in it for himself but for others. a president who doesn't divide us but unites us. a president who appeals not to the worst in us but to the best in us. and a president who looks not to settle scores but to find solutions. a president guided not by wishful thinking but by science,

reason, and facts. even if i win, it's going to take a lot of hard work to end this pandemic. i'm not uning on a false promise of being able to end this pandemic by flipping a switch. but what i can promise you is this. we will start on day one doing the right things. we'll let science drive our decisions. we will deal honestly with the american people. and we'll never, ever, ever quit. that's how we'll shut down this virus, so we can get back to our lives a lot more quickly than the pace we're going at now. you know, i'm going to fight to protect your health care. i promise you. just like i fight for my own family. we can do this. i promise you. and i'm going to go do what i hope all of you do. i'm going to walk out of this building and i'm going to go vote. i'm going to go vote.

there's a lot of people on that ballot. not just me but the down ballot as well. that are going to change things for us, make it better. may god bless you all, and may god protect our troops. thank you. >> joe biden with another appeal on covid, saying an alarming statistic, that 1 in 1,000 black americans have now died from the virus and saying that that is going to be his top priority and now that he's going to vote. speaking of voting, one of pennsylvania's board of elections, a key state next to delaware, is asking newly sworn in supreme court justice amy coney barrett to recuse herself from a case over the deadline for receiving mail-in ballots in the battleground state. the recusal motion comes after the supreme court before barrett ascended to the bench ruled that wisconsin could not count the arriving ballots. nbc news justice correspondent pete williams joins me now. pete, as i understand it from

talking to you over many months and years, recusals are completely up to the justices. they don't have to announce them. so a motion to recuse is not likely to be acted upon per se. >> right. they do generally recuse if they have some actual conflict, they have a family member involved, they have financial conflicts or so forth. what the recusal motion says is given the statements that the president has said about hoping the supreme court can resolve any election problems, given the closeness of her confirmation to the election she should recuse. now, a couple of things about this, andrea. number one, they have lodged this motion in front of the court and sort of given them notice. it's not formally filed yet. so it's in kind of a strange legal posture. and local media are reporting that last night the county board of elections on whose behalf this recusal motion was filed said we didn't know anything about this and voted to have it withdrawn. it hasn't been withdrawn yet. we haven't heard from the

lawyers involved in the case. so the poft qusture of the whol thing is very strange, andrea. >> and just very, very briefly. the other cases now pending, there are cases from texas, more cases from pennsylvania. there are a lot of election cases pending. >> right. in the supreme court just two right now. pennsylvania seeking to have this -- the republicans seeking to have the extension for counting mail ballots rolled back. and a similar claim from north carolina. and then of course andrea one of the non-election cases the president's effort to stop cy vance, the new york district attorney, from getting a hold of his tax returns. that's up on an emergency appeal as well. >> pete williams, thank you. nbc news now is rating texas a tossup in the presidential race. a significant change could affect the big senate race of the lone star state. m.j. heger, an air force veteran and purple heart recipient, is running to unseat republican incumbent john cornyn, hoping to become the first democrat to win

statewide in 30 years. and joining me now is m.j. heger, the democratic candidate for senate in texas. a lot of eyes are on the voting in texas. first of all, a lot of mail-in ballots already have been cast in early voting. what are you looking at right now? >> i'm just so excited, andrea. you know, i grew up here in texas and i've driven tens of thousands of miles around this state. and frankly just the increase in civic engagement. you know, hopefully gone are the days that we're 49th or 50th in voter turnout. a very small number of us have been choosing our elected officials. and we have an hunt now to actually send people to represent us both in austin and in d.c. the state house is really important here in texas. so we have an opportunity to elect people that are more reflective of our values. and the voter turnout is through the roof. that tells you texans are really tired of the dlingsz are going in. i just got off a call with press that had a group of former republicans for m.j. and we with just talking about the current

direction of the country and the things happening in our state are not reflective of who we are as texans. we value giving people access to health care and not putting kids in cages and putting science forefront in the discussion about how to handle the pandemic, creating jobs, protecting our kids, protecting public education, and these are not things that our current representation is doing. >> what about the women in texas? many women who live in the suburbs. yesterday the president tried to appeal to those voters in michigan by saying he was going to get their husbands back to work. what's your reaction to that? >> probably the same as my reaction has been to a lot of statements from this administration. john cornyn actually just recently compared his relationship to trump to -- he said he was like a lot of women who try to change their husbands. it makes me feel like some of these guys haven't met a texas woman or maybe not in the last couple decades. i don't know. we kick butt and we are standing up for our kids. we're standing up for their

future. we're going to vote out these, you know, dinosaurs that try to put women in little categories and they don't see us as equals and they don't see us, they don't value our voices in the conversation. the answer to that is to get more of us elected. >> you've seen kamala harris campaigning there. what about joe biden? should he come to texas? >> you know, i think texas loves joe biden. texas is a very military state. we have a lot of bases, a lot of veterans. and we know he is going to respect our troops. we know he understands the cost of serving because he lost his son. and you know, texas wants to prioritize our national security. both in our immigration and foreign policy. i think texas is going to turn out big for joe biden. >> what about the oil patch issue? >> well, texas wants to lead in the energy industry. we understand that we are --

that oil companies here are energy companies. and if we don't jump on the train of transitioning to renewable energy in the next several decades, we're going to get left behind. we've lost half of the energy sector jobs in texas since 2014, not just because of covid. and we are in danger of losing more jobs if we don't jump on this train. >> we're going to have to leave it there. thank you so much, m.j. hegar. and of course we've always asked senator cornyn to come as well. and that's it for today's show. "mtp daily," chuck todd coming up next. eteran made of doing what's right, not what's easy. so when a hailstorm hit, usaa reached out before he could even inspect the damage. that's how you do it right. usaa insurance is made just the way martin's family needs it with hassle-free claims, he got paid before his neighbor even got started. because doing right by our members, that's what's right. usaa. what you're made of, we're made for. ♪ usaa

if it is wednesday, going for broke. or going broke. the trump campaign is facing a major cash crunch with time running out as biden stays close to home in delaware to draw attention to the virus. plus a nightmare scenario in wisconsin. new restrictions in illinois. field hospitals in texas. record levels of infections are raging across the country right now.