that if indeed he loses as it looks as if he will, he will graciously hand over the reins of power, that he would invite vice president biden to the white house, that he would do a president does when leaving the office to his successor. and that's a very strange feeling. joe biden was sure. he sounded like the presidents we used to hear. >> well, people can change and there's still some time to go. we still have to get to 270 it occurs to me. our thanks to michael steele, eugene robinson, two friends of the broadcast for hanging out with us tonight. and with that at the top of the 11:00 hour eastern time, good evening once again. day 1,387 of the trump administration. night four of our week-long presidential election. and a weary nation is still

awaiting the final definitive call as to who will be our next president on january 20th. right now former vice president joe biden is on the verge of reaching that goal. that much we can say. by our count biden still has 253 electoral votes. donald trump with 214. that means the former vice president just 17 shy of the magic number of 270. that means that the 20 electoral votes in pennsylvania to name one commonwealth would do it. and if you were watching you know a short time ago biden offered an update on this unusual situation. >> we don't have a final declaration of victory yet, but the numbers tell us it's clear. tell us a clear and convincing story. we're going to win this race. we're going to win this race with a clear majority of the

nation behind us. we've gotten over 74 million votes. let me repeat that, 74 million votes. that's more than any presidential ticket has ever gotten in the history of the united states of america. and what's becoming clear each hour is that record number of americans of all races, faiths, religions, chose change over more of the same. >> biden has extended his lead over trump in the state of pennsylvania. a win there would mean the suspense is over. former vice president also continues to lead in nevada and in georgia, a state democrats have not won as you heard him say since 1992. biden also remains ahead in the state of arizona where just today democrats officially picked up a really badly wanted senate seat. nbc news projects the democrat mark kelly has defeated the republican incumbent senator martha mcsally.

we also know as part of our coverage never to be away from steve kornacki for too long. and so in keeping with that rule back we go inside the studio to steve and the big board. first of all, steve, before we get to any new numbers that have trickled in, let me fact check joe biden. he says he's leading in nevada, georgia, pennsylvania and nevada. and when all is said and done he expects there to be north of 300 electoral votes. >> we can pull up the 270 map and see where we stand. let me reset this actually. okay, biden 253, trump 214. so obviously the most direct path for biden to the pennsylvania right now is pennsylvania. he is leading in pennsylvania. and as we've been talking about tonight with every update from these mail-in ballots still being counted around the state, he continues to increase his lead. it's now approaching 30,000. he built it up to half a point,

0.5%. so if biden does hold on in pennsylvania to build a lead here as these mail ballots come in, that would put him at 273 and make him the president-elect. we can go through these states quickly. north carolina remains outstanding. biden's trailing by a significant number there. frankly, if you look into what's behind that what the officials are waiting for, tough to see biden getting the kind of votes he needs late to overtake that, so north carolina would be a tough one for him. georgia, though you mentioned biden does have a very slight 43, 4,400 vote lead. it looks leak pretty much all the votes right now are accounted for in georgia. of course they're in the recount zone, there's the provisional ballot. there are a lot of factors here at the very least going to delay getting a final result from georgia. but if biden were to get georgia where he leads by the slightest

of margins now, it's certainly not out of the question, that would put him up at 289. then there's arizona where he's clinging to that lead over donald trump. trump continues to erode it. there's a question every time we get the zone updates from arizona, we're checking the percentage of the vote trump's getting, is he at the pace he needs to overtake biden statewide. the last couple of updates trump has been lower than, he's been short of, he's been missing the pace he needs to be at to overtake biden. so right now trump is on pace to come close but not close enough. but still other votes to come, so let's see. biden if he does hang on there, if trump doesn't get the votes he needs, that could put biden at 300. and then you've got nevada. in nevada right now biden sitting on a lead of 22,000. there are tens of thousands of mail-in ballots to be counted in clark county, las vegas area expected that biden is going to do very well with those. there are provisional ballots. trump would be banking on those but would need an enormous share

of those votes. and there's evidence there's a lot of democratic votes in there. if biden were to hang onto nevada that would be 306 electoral votes. >> steve, two drive by questions. number one, are they counting any votes that have arrived post-election day in pennsylvania? number two, do you have any questions for the arizona secretary of state? i've got guests stacked up like jets over la guardia. she's two guests from now but she's holding for us. >> my question here would just be a basic one. when do do they anticipate the process being complete out there in arizona, getting all these votes counted. that is the key question. the pennsylvania question you asked i know rehema ellis has been talking about this. when they give us the uncounted ballots in pennsylvania, there is this thing the ballots that arrived after election day, they're setting them aside. this is part of the complicated

potential illegal maneuvering for post election legal fights. she has been asking them are they including those late arriving ballots, those post-election ballots. it's a variable in pennsylvania. >> steve, thank you. and indeed we can bring in katie hobbs, the secretary of state for the state of arizona who's been patiently waiting for us. madam secretary, i thought steve was going to hit us with a complex technical question for you. no, he wants to know the same thing all of us want to know, timing. when do you think the count will be done in your fine state? >> well, we've got about 173,000 ballots left. a bulk of those 92,000 are in maricopa county, and they plan to be counting through the weekend. they're going to update us twice

tomorrow, and i think that should give us a bulk of the rest of their ballots. i want to say there's about 46,000 provisional ballots in the state. and just a caveat on those, first of all, obviously not all provisional ballots are counted. that's why they're provisional. we have to see if they're eligible voters. as they get verified, they can start to be processed, but by law counties have up to tuesday to finally verify those. but if voters have to come back and show their idea or something, they have until tuesday to do that. so some of those provisional ballots are not going to be able to be counted until after tuesday. but i can assure you that i think that's going to be a very small amount of the entire vote totals that are left in the state. >> i want to give you one last question and give you an opportunity to stickup for the folks doing the work as we try to every hour of the day.

it is exhausting and thankless, and the counting goes on. and i know there's also craziness going on outside the building that they can hear inside. >> yeah. and thank you so much for that. these folks really are -- they're working around the clock. they know the pressure is on, that arizona is under the spotlight and that everybody wants these answers. and they are working so hard to get them to us. and having to deal with these angry protesters as they walk into and out of the building. and nobody should have to do this work of really upholding our democracy and making sure election laws are carried out and then be badgered for doing their jobs. >> here here. absolutely. thank you for saying that. thank you for being patient with us. thank you for the work you're doing. katie hobbs, the secretary of state in the great state of

arizona. let's go nearby to las vegas in nevada. our correspondent jo ling kent is standing by there. and jo, same circumstance, folks in nevada are working hard to count up all the votes as increased public attention focuses in on their work. >> reporter: yeah, there's a lot of focus right now on the remaining 54,000 remaining mail-in ballots and the 64,000 provisional ballots that they say at the clark county registrar they're only going to count after they finish the mail-ins which would only be as soon as sunday. there's a lot of question marks how those are going to break. as we've said so many different times these mail-in ballots tend to break for the democrats historically, but we'll have to wait and see on that front. meanwhile a cam bane -- excuse me, a lawsuit brought by an individual voter, jill stoky out here that was seeking injunkative relief, claiming

there's improper voting, that lawsuit has been ruled now that injunction has been denied. and so it's a loss on the legal front for trump supporters and the trump campaign which initially explained what that lawsuit was at a press conference at clark county registrar yesterday. so there's a lot going on here. we expect to get another batch of votes tomorrow twice in the morning and then in the afternoon. i'll be sure to ask the registrar more questions about the pace of this vote. to be honest we haven't had a ton of access as we have in other areas of the country to go inside and see on a regular basis how the vote is being processed and secured and counted. so we're asking for more access to be able to see what's happening in clark county because as of last night 90% of all outstanding votes in nevada are from clark county, brian. >> thank you for the work you're doing there, jo. it's good to see the strip

behind you though we know business has yet to really come back to that city, that economic engine for the state of nevada. jo ling kent in las vegas, nevada, for us tonight. now let's bring in what is our lead off conversation after all for this busy hour on a friday night. alexi mccammen, political reporter over at axios, and barbara mcquade, veteran prosecutor, former u.s. attorney in fact for the eastern district of michigan. alexi, first to you. your latest reporting on the president's mind-set, the advice people are trying to give him, how much air support he will get from republicans, how many other republicans will stand up and remind the president and the people around him especially if biden goes up over 270 what's supposed to be done in this instance. >> you know, brian, i actually think if we look at joe biden's

speech tonight and president trump's absence from today and his remarks from this week we can see the real contrast in how president trump is viewing the end of this election and how he can move forward. we hear him cast doubt on the legitimacy of mail-in ballots and of the very democratic process of participating in a selection. we also hear the way in which he's also just sowing division and chaos in this entire process whereas joe biden comes forward to talk about the way forward. he's not talking about himself. he's talking about the integritiy of the process and moving forward past this moment. we know president trump is looking at the numbers and not feeling good about those things. and that's part of the reason why we're not hearing much from him but also part of the reason why when we do hear from him, we hear the way in which he talks about it, which is not wanting a legitimate process and wanting every person's volt to be counted but saying certain votes are illegal without evidence and

claiming evidence of fraud which he doesn't have proof for because he's seeing these numbers not move in his direction or in his favor. and we see joe biden kind of step up to fill this void of leadership is the the way the biden campaign views it to show the american people not just who he would be right now in the this moment in a contested election with president trump but who he would be if he were elected president and leading the american people through this moment. so i think that's the real contrast here. >> barbara mcquade, if you were running legal for the biden campaign would any of these lawsuits that you see out there worry you about getting to the count of all the votes? >> no, frankly, not a single one. until earlier today i had a little bit of concern what was happening in pennsylvania. as you've been reporting earlier, that was the place where the state supreme court had said they could count ballots that were received after election day up until friday. but there are some uncertainty

about whether those would stick in the end or possibly be discarded by the supreme court. we had an order tonight by justice aleto to say make sure those ballots are segregated so they can be look to adlater, which is exactly what the pennsylvania secretary of state had already ord them to do. and what's interesting reporting is tonight "the new york times" has said those ballots are not being counted in the public reports that are being released in pennsylvania and that those numbers of those three day worth of ballots are in the thousands but not the tens of thousands. and so with a lead by joe biden that's now approaching 30e,000 i believe steve kornacki told us most recently, it seems no matter what happens with those ballots received in those three dayerize just not going to matter and matter and put a dent in joe biden's lead in pennsylvania. >> do you conquer on this front with neil caugkatyal, combat yo

seeing to stop the vote of americans it's a bad look? >> because it shows you're not trying to franchise people. you're trying to disenfranchise people. i read a report that of the 40 lawsuits either the trump campaign or republican party were involved in across the country in exactly zero of them were they seeking to permit people to vote but in all those cases they were trying to stop people from voting. it is a bad look for a country where people died for the right to vote. >> nbc news has confirmed a story that mark meadows the president's chief of staff, few people are any closer to him in the orbit. he was up in the residence for election night is covid positive again. this is mr. meadows' health

aside and we hope for the very best, this adds to the visual of a president trying to operate independent of the greatest mass casualty event in modern times. >> that was something kind of striking about joe biden's words tonight. we don't hear president trump talking about the realities of the coronavirus pandemic even as those in his inner circle continue to test positive because our entire way of life is up ended by this pandemic. we heard joe biden talking about families who are grieving because of lost loved ones. we don't hear him even talking about it in a serious way when those close to him in his orbit test positive or even his wife

melania or his sonbeart test positive. it's further this idea republicans and president trump are not living in the same reality the rest of us are forced to because of this pandemic. and it's getting worse, brian. this week alone the u.s. had over 100,000 new coronavirus cases in a single day, the greatest number of cases in a single day in the u.s. so far. the winter is coming, things are only going to get worse, and we don't have a plan for the way forward under the current leadership being articulated, and that is reflected in the polling that shows a majority of the american people trust joe biden who is not president, who doesn't have a hand in implementing any sort of policy in dealing with this. and i think that's reflected in the way he talks about or doesn't talk about it, and also reflected in the way the folks around him contract this virus

and continue to sort of move about life in a normal way without taking it seriously. >> these two guests both friends of our broadcast have run the gamut from law to politics to the current pandemic. our thanks to alexi mccammen and barbara mcquade who's lucky we're out of time because she still has to answer for that michigan state michigan game. perhaps next time. >> too soon. >> thank you both. great to see you both. just ahead for us, as we mentioned one of the president's closest advisers confirmed to have tested positive for the coronavirus. we will ask our own dr. vin gupta about that as this special edition of "the 11th hour" is just getting started on this consequential friday night. consequential friday night ♪ ♪

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in the midst of this historic election, another grim milestone in the coronavirus

pandemic. nbc news confirming another single day record, and it's a grim one. over 122,000 cases reported just today in our country. the death toll is now north of 236,000 souls. back with us dr. vin gupta, critical care doc specializing in these types of illnesses, also an affiliate assistant professor at the university of washington institute for health metrics and evaluation. as i like to remind him to embarrass him on national television he has disagrees from princeton, cambridge, harvard and columbia med and serves our country in the u.s. air force reserves. we're losing over 1,000 souls a day. we have 122,000 of a new caseload just today only. i get our attention is elsewhere, a presidential campaign that is centered around

an uncontrolled pandemic in our country. but these numbers this week really underscore that word, uncontr uncontrolled. >> good evening, brian. good to see you. you nailed it. and i know there's the universe -- the reality we've come to expect our current elected leaders guiding our response. what here's the ultimate reality. there's a health care worker shortage especially icu providers. our respiratory nurses, our dialysis nurses, our icu nurses, they're in short supply. we talk about icu bed capacity in places like the dakota plains where they're issuing credentials for icu nurses and docs. utah, you're talking about in places like belgium and the eu where they're having massive lockdowns and military personnel get deployed and el paso military personnel are getting

deployed, we're in the middle of a disaster, we need our leaders to act like it, brian, and that's the big key here because estimates suggest 222 deaths a day by the middle of january. we're in the worst of it right now and this is where we need the public's attention most focused. >> all right, let me take you up on that if i could snap back the public's attention to just dealing in this pandemic. what could we do this week that would be a deposit on bringing these numbers down? >> as always, a demo here. if you don't have it already go to any department store. all americans should move up from a cloth mask if that's what you're wearing in public to a three ply surgical mask. you can get this at any department store. this we think is better than any cloth mask. the gold standard are n-95s.

of course we don't have enough of those. that's number one. i'd reconsider any thanksgiving plans where you're reconvening in home. i've heard antecdotal stories. i'm worried about peek getting on planes now. planes might have been a safe haven. now we're seeing even if you mask or wear eye shields you're still exposed. there's a case in ireland people were broadly exposed and came down with infection even if they were doing all the right things. so caution on holidays. three ply surgical masks, and this is a demand that every american should make of their government. i hear this time and again, how do you travel safely so you can go about your dally life? we need our fda to prioritize usability studies, do what they need to do so that on demand rapid testing at home, over-the-counter is a reality.

if not in the near term at least by end of q1, 2021 so we can start to normalize a vaccine as it gets rolled out. three ply surgeual masks and revisit holiday plans. >> our friend dr. vin gupta, thank you so much for coming on tonight. it's important to keep attention on this topic no matter what else we're covering. more of our special edition of "the 11th hour" right after this break. ion of "the 11th hour" right after this break. ♪ ♪ at visionworks, we know it's easy to forget

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we have the numbers people have been tracking almost in their sleep. the pennsylvania race, the pennsylvania vote count of so much importance and getting so much attention. because in that one state that

happens to be the state of joe biden's birth if he were to be awarded the commonwealth of pennsylvania he would go on up over 270 and be named president-elect. let's talk about it because standing by in harrisburg we go back to our senior national correspondent chris jansing. and chris, since everyone asks us and wants to know where the decision is from our decision desk i get to ask you what is taking so long with the count from pennsylvania. >> if i had a dollar for every time i got asked that question today, but let me tell you we've tried to do a deep dive into what's going on in allegheny county. and the reason why one of the many reasons it's so important, brian, is because at the start of the day today it accounted for nearly a quarter of the outstanding ballots all across the state. we've seen the votes come in, about 5,600 first and then you

saw steve update with about another 9,000. here's what's going on throughout the course of the day and what election officials want you to know what these workers are dealing with, and when our folks were there and looking there were about 80 people sitting and working diligently. so you started today with 5,000 ballots. they are a combination of the ballots that essentially were damaged and had to be re-created. that means this is the painstaking work, if there's something that's been torn, if there's something that's been sort of scrunched up, you've got to actually re-create that ballot in order for it to be counted. then after that was done they went back and started to take in the overseas ballots and military ballots. those started to come in tuesday, and that's a fairly straight process. then after that that's when they started the canvassing of these 29,000 other ballots. these are the ones, again a

completely different process where there was a precipitatiin error, so they had to send people a second ballot. these have all been seg rugrated and they have to make sure the ballots actually submitted are the correct ballots. now, we just got information that a little before 11:00 so probably while we were all watching joe biden, those folks, many of whom had been working all day worked through their lunch although a few of them we're told took a short break, have gone home, they're going to get some sleep, going to come back and start in the morning. it looks as though statewide, brian, and again these numbers aren't always easy to track, they're now less than 90,000 mail-in ballots to be counted. but is exhausting work and i think this also gives you an idea it's not like, you know, at the factory we're doing the same thing over and over. it must be really late and i

must be really tired thinking of lucille ball, but these folks are having to do different tasks. so why is it taking so long? that's one part of the reason. now, if you talk to the democrats it's also, well, if we'd been able to start before election day as we asked the republicans to be able to do we wouldn't be in this position. that's a political argument. this is where we are now with people who are going in every day to do these jobs and having to do what are essentially multiple jobs, brian. >> that's indeed why we're calling them public servants who are doing this thankless work. and we'll cling onto that number of 90,000 because when you're waiting for the big number it's better than 100,000. chris jansing, our senior national correspondent tonight finds her at the pennsylvania state capitol in harrisburg. thank you so much as always. an unexpected wait across

our country tonight in the reliably red state of georgia. we heard joe biden talk about it tonight. biden is slightly ahead at this hour. a recount is planned there. it's one of the states we're watching for you. we welcome back to our broadcast jenna arnold. she's an activist who was a national organizer for the womens march on washington. she is also the author of the repeat book "raising our hands, how white women can stop avoiding hard conversations, start accepting responsibility and find our place on the new front lines." we also welcome back baratunde thurston, he's these days the host of the podcast, how to citizen. well, good evening and welcome to you both. jenna, i'd like to begin with you with a question that may sound superficial, and that is given the news we think we're

approaching, given the season we think we're approaching how often have you had of late to think back on the fast moving events that gave birth to the womens march, an event that exploded beyond anyone's wildest imagination and took over the press coverage and helped form the narrative for the early part of this presidency? >> indeed it was the largest protest in human history. and one of the things that i have continued to think about over the past couple of days in particular when i've been taken aback by how close this race is what does this next chapter look like for all of us who are extraordinarily concerned about the direction of our country irregardless of what side it is, and i keep thinking about the

557 other marches organized by the country by people who have never organized marches before. you look at those individual organizers and you look at somebody like stacey abrams who so many people today are crediting for getting georgia over the line for the democratic party, for really not just registering another 800,000 voters but doing that at the mountain -- at the base of the mountain that was sheer voter suppression. so i'm hopeful and inneenthusia and excited to see how citizens mobilize moving forward. >> baratunde, we were all doing fine until we learned leslie jones is watching and listening to every word. so it has channeled our behavior. we share her rapture for steve kornacki. having established that, the great political philosopher and

better than average guitarest said last night think about this election. what it means is every other person you pass on the sidewalk we know numerically doesn't agree with you politically. what have you learned about your nation in the aftermath of this election? what's been reconfirmed for you about what you already knew? >> thank you, brian. it's good to be back here, and i want to remind anyone watching today is friday, which i forgot because the day has lost all meaning and it's such a confusing time. i literally tweeted out what day is it. i have learned in part to celebrate everyone in this moment. we did our jobs. we turned out across every race, across every place. we voted in record numbers, and now we're waiting patiently and calmly as a real leader has asked us to do while election

officials do their jobs. and i'm grateful to my fellow americans and public servants as you so eloquently put and people like stacey abrams and those activists for making sure the process works with integrity, with honor and in the highest version of our country. she posted a site i want people to know about, che checkmyballot.net. i've been reminded we're still the nation that we were founded on in terms of it devastating history of white supremacy, of racial division of inequality and we have a lot of work to do. and that's not to be sugarcoated. that's something to be reckoned with. and at least we have a fighting chance to get back to making this union a bit more perfect. >> let me ask you both the same question starting with you baratunde, and that is that we now know 70 million of our

fellow citizens voted for donald trump. it's been pointed out on this and other networks every day. how does that in a practical matter affect the way you approach the world, starting tomorrow affect the way you walk through your country knowing how divergent these two sides are? >> it's a project that i've taken on in the show in the podcast, brian, how to citizen. it's one i'm trying to live into more fully with an open heart and an open mind while still firmly gripped to my values. i think that we have a hard road ahead. i'm not of the opinion we just go out of our way to deny who we are as progressive, for example, and pretend we don't believe what we believe. at the same time i know all of us left and right, old and young have an opportunity to focus on what we have in common, to focus on what we all want for our society. so listen more than we pronounce

to ask more than we declare. and i want an opportunity for us to recommit to this project of citizenship as an act, not as a legal status. we can get past that, and we can try to be the nation we said we wanted to be when we wrote it down in that pretty paper a really long time ago. it's never going to be perfect, but we can make it more so. >> jenna, we've got tahand it to the guy. his podcast is called how to citizen. same question now to you. >> i appreciate being able to talk about citizenship while i'm cutting the longest math class i've ever been in with the two of you this evening. and one of the things that we have to remember about this country is that we have had such influence globally in the 21st century not because of our political leaders but because of our soldiers. and the people who run manufacturing plants to support their efforts. and the trenches aren't what we traditionally think in europe they're not in our cul-de-sacs,

they're in the elevators of our apartment buildings. they're in the aisles of costco, and there's not going to be a turn key solution for how we're going to be able to move forward. no one should be looking at that. but to dr. vin gupta's point put on that three ply mask, walk across the street, knock on that neighbor's door and say, hey, i'm here if you need anything. start there. and this idea we know how to take care of each other irregardless of the political sign-on our front lawn, and we have to lean really into that if we want to become all we're desiring to be. >> do you envy the work of joe biden and kamala harris? i mean it's one thing for the three of us to have this kfrz. yes, it gets jenna out of her online math class. it's another thing to be handed the keys to this country right now and say go lead, you have 74 million votes.

>> i do not envy them, but i do believe in their ability to work with us to bring us to a better place. joe biden has been through everything we're going through. he's lost family to health crisis. he's lost family to accidents. he's been through tough economic situations. technically he's about to work for me. and i just respect the journey he's been on and the mutanty and empathy he's brought to this. again citing dr. gupta, jen and i are on the same wavelength here. we're in a disaster moment and we need leadership to rise that. and i am 100% confident he gets it, and he understands there is no economy without covid being handled. and he said something about the votes, these are not just numbers we're looking at. they're the votes of our fellow americans, and that's the same with covid, that's the same with the economy. those are not numbers.

those are human beings that we live with, that we love with, that we depend on who depend on us. and i cannot imagine someone more emotionally maturely suited to this moment than joe biden along with soon to be vp kamala harris. >> terrific answers from the both of you tonight. and by the way, strong callbacks on the previous guests. cable news shows love that kind of thing. jenna arnold, i must return you to your math class with our apologies and thanks. baratunde thurston, thank you as always for bringing it. another break for us. final thoughts on the week we've had thus far from presidential historian and author michael beschloss right after this. micl beschloss right after this you work hard for your money. stretched days for it. juggled life for it.

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welcome back. as i mentioned we have news out of the white house tonight, and it is the kind of fuse that especially this white house does not seek and does not like. it pertain tuesday the chief of staff to the president. going on a titular basis, the guy who is designed to be close to president on the right of your screen, mark meadows, the former congressman from north carolina. i'll read this. this is from jennifer jacobs over at bloomberg. she says along with trump's chief of staff mark meadows at least four other white house aides currently have coronavirus. her sources. pains were taken to keep meadows' illness a secret, i'm told. and people around him who knew were told to keep quiet. direct quotes from the twitter feed of the white house

correspondent jennifer jacobs with bloomberg. but, again, it underscores the subject matter that is bumping up behind us every day and every night. we are waiting for results in this election. the driving issue in this election has been the out of control pandemic that we are dealing with. we're losing over 1,000 people a day. just today over 122,000 of our fellow citizens received a coronavirus diagnosis. well, as promised back with us tonight is our friend, the dean of presidential history on twitter. but the long time presidential author and biographer, michael beschloss. his latest book for your reading list is presidents of war. michael, to piggyback on the last conversation we had this afternoon, talk about the contrast between and let's for

the purposes of this -- let's go ahead and assume joe biden gets bumped up and over 270. let's think in the next 12 hours. what normally goes on in the circle around a president compared to what we know from terrific reporting is going on in the circle around this president? >> well, normally you'd have people around a president, you know, who go to a president and say, you know, you've lost the election. that's what george h.w. bush was told on the night of the election 1982, and he quickly went out and he said i congratulate billon, and he said he was going to get in the grandchildren business, and usually the two candidates unite. even richard nixon who's not really known as a paragon of civility and consilliation, the night of the 1960 election when he conceded tentatively to john kennedy in los angeles he said

one of it great features of democracy is that we have these contests, they're very hard fought. and once the decision is made we unite behind the person who's elected. >> talk about the lessons of fdr. this president is not a consumer of history. he's not a reader. would that he were he would perhaps know the leadership lessons, how fdr used bad news, didn't sugar coat it, didn't hide it but used that to martial the spirit of the american people. >> absolutely. you know, it actually helped roosevelt's credibility and he knew it. he went onto radio just after becoming president in 1933 at a time of enormous crisis at in a way as an earlier echo of what we're dealing with right now with the pandemic and the economy and a racial justice

crisis that has gone only 400 years. and roosevelt was trying to deal with the problems of the banks, and he goes on radio and says, you know, this is going to be a hard time for everyone, but after a while i'm hoping that my policies will work he said to paraphrase. the same thing in world war ii. after pearl harbor he didn't say this doesn't matter. he said we're going to have a lot of bad news, it's going to get worse before it gets better. but as he said in his address to congress after pearl harb, we'll gain the inevitable triumph so help us god. >> instead of denialism, the president could use it as a rallying point for the american people. >> absolutely. >> michael beschloss, joining us this evening in easily the most beautiful and fitting reading room since thomas jefferson. thank you so much. always a pleasure. as we like to say have a good weekend unless you have other plans. that's going to do it for

tonight and for this week as far as this broadcast is concerned. obviously continuing coverage of the 2020 presidential election without end. it continues with my colleague lawrence o'donnell at the top of the next hour after this quick break. r this quick break. that life of the party look walk it off look one more mile look reply all look own your look... ...with fewer lines. there's only one botox® cosmetic. it's the only one...

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good evening. i'm lawrence o'donnell, and this is night four of msnbc's election coverage. and at this midnight hour eastern time we are entering our fifth calendar day of counting votes in america to determine the winner of the electoral college. we already have a winner chosen by america's voters. joe biden has now won 4 million