. >> evening, this is night four. we are entering the 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 more votes than donald trump. that is an insurmountable lead only going to increase. the final electoral college vote will be determined by the battleground states still

counting votes. pennsylvania, arizona, georgia, and nevada. joe biden has a lead in all those states at this hour. joe biden's lead in pennsylvania continues to increase by the hour. there is no indication that the remaining uncounted pennsylvania votes will change the biden trajectory upward in pennsylvania. winning pennsylvania at this point would make joe biden the president-elect. joe biden's lead continues to increase in georgia and nevada. earlier tonight joe biden addressed the nation. >> we're going to win this race. just look at what's happened since yesterday. 24 hours we were behind in georgia. now we're ahead and we're going to win that state.

24 hours ago we were behind in pennsylvania, and we are going to win pennsylvania. and now we're ahead but we're winning in arizona, winning in nevada. in fact, our lead just doubled in nevada. we're on track to over 300 electoral votes, electoral college votes. look at the national numbers. 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 our vote total is still growing. we're beating donald trump by over 4 million votes. and that's a margin still growing as well. >> leading off our discussion nbc's mike nenoly covering the biden campaign as he has for two years now. mike, with joe biden's summary

with where the election stands at this hour we're actually able to give steve kornacki a rest. he wanted to tell the country exactly where this is. and i noticed in the way he talked about it tonight it was much more definitive that joe biden has no doubt no question, there's no hesitation about joe biden is going to be the next president of the united states. kamala harris is going to be the next vice president of the united states. >> yeah, that's right, lawrence. first it has to be said this is not the speech he began the day thinking he was going to be delivering tonight. as the day started and as we saw joe biden take the lead in pennsylvania, biden's team turned quickly toward plans a victory celebration, one that would have happened outside, one that would have concluded with fireworks and a crowd of, well, cars in a pandemic. this is how we celebrate if you're on the democratic side of the aisle. but instead what did we see from joe biden? i think everything you see and

hear from him you have to look through the prism of governing because that's how joe biden is looking at it. i thought it was interesting what he did in his remarks tonight. one is talk about the need to unify the country, something he's been talking about in the beginning of his campaign as he looks at potentially working with a republicanb senate or at least a very closely divided senate. and secondly he talked about what he called his mandate, that he repeated the number of votes you just heard he rereceived. he talked about the fact he rebuilt the blue wall, he's won states that haven't been won in two decades. he's very clearly laying down a marker yes, he is trying to work with republicans to tackle the very serious challenges that this country faces but that he also is going to do so from a position of strength. and that's i think important window into how the biden team is looking at the challenge ahead. yes, he hasn't been able to declare himself the woman yet but clearly on a trajectory to do so, lawrence.

>> is the biden campaign surprised at the silence of trump today and that they do not have to go out there to counter something wild said by the president? >> reporter: i think so. it's interesting as we've heard from inbiden campaign what is happening in the courts, they've almost moved beyond that at this point focusing simply on his own claims at this point, and as you heard from one of biden's spokespersons this morning about concern that the president might not willingly leave the white house, andrew bates, campaign spokesperson talking about the federal government more than equipped to deal with trespassers. but the biden concern at this point is laying -- is really speaking in a way of presidential leadership that has been absent in their view. and it was all the more notable to hear him talk about the serious spikes in the coronavirus, the uncertain economy on a night that we

learned, of course, that the white house chief of staff himself has now been diagnosed with the coronavirus. the silence from the white house on this issue over the last week definitely from the perspective from the biden campaign and something biden was eager to speak about himself. >> i want to talk about a change in the campaign in joe biden's status that you might be uniquely positioned to see. when he started off this campaign he of course had the secret service delegation that a former vice president would have. added to that after he won the nomination was the secret service detail that a nominee of a democratic party gets, and this week within the last 48 hours the secret service decided that they needed to send to delaware an additional secret service detail which is the secret service detail they send in when they believe they have a president-elect. this is not a secret service detail that was ever sent for john kerry or for anyone who

ever came in second in one of these races. it only goes when the secret service believes that the next president-elect needs more protection. do you sense a change in wilmington, in the biden campaign, in joe biden when that additional secret service detail came in, which in a way inside the game creates a very different sensation of where we are? >> reporter: absolutely, lawrence. even different since what we encountered on tuesday night on election night when we came here. the ramp up in the security presence i think for all of us who had to come into this perimeter, what i've been calling the most heavily secured and closely scrutinized parking lot in america at this point. it was a bit different tonight, and we're in a part of

wilmington that actually is pretty easily secured given the geography, the way this particular part of the city is laid out. but i think what it speaks to, lawrence, is the fact that, yes, the president of the united states himself may propose significant challenge in a transition even in a transition of a defeated incumbent president from what has historically been true. but it's a sign of the fact that in the large apparatus of the federal government the transitions of power can continue in a way that i've also heard from members of the biden transition team they've had good cooperation so far from the career agency officials that they've been working with under the law that guides transition, lawrence. >> thank you very much for joining us tonight. and on behalf of the network thank you very much for two years covering this campaign for us and keeping us up to exactly what we needed tato know every day in the biden campaign.

we're joined now by ben rhodes. he's an msnbc political contributor. yamiche alcindor, an msnbc political analyst. and let me begin with you. what are we to make of donald trump's silence especially when we're watching joe biden go out day after day and make presidential addresses to the nation? >> based on my reporting the president is fuming and really he's starting to feel deflated in some ways. the mood at the white house is one of solemn indignation as well as people trying to feel like they want to fight but really understanding the math just isn't on their side. of course the president would have to run the table in order to win this election. and he can't do that because he'd have to of course win -- he couldn't possibly do it, but looks like he would do it and people around the president he spent most of the day watching tv. what you can make of that silence the president doesn't

know what to say because there's so many people in the white house trying to maybe tell the president he might lose this. another thing to notice now just tonight with the chief of staff having come up tested positive and bloomberg is reporting they're up to four other white house staff members with coronavirus, that also really means that the president is dealing with a dual crisis here, the political crisis of his presidency possibly slipping away. and then also the white house again being a hot spot for the coronavirus that has been spiking every single day this week. and the president of course has not been talking about the coronavirus at all, so that was a marked difference we saw joe biden talk about the pandemic. the president hasn't done so. >> let's listen to more of what joe biden had to say tonight including his sympathy for some people out there who might think this vote count thing is taking too long. >> i know watching these vote tallies on tv moves very slow, and as slow as it goes it could be numbing. but never forget the tallies aren't just numbers. they represent votes and voters.

men and women who exercise their fundamental right to have their voice heard. 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. they've given us a mandate for action on covid, the economy, climate change, systemic racism. they've made it clear they want the country to come together not continue to pull apart. >> ben rhodes, you worked with vice president biden during the obama administration. what did you feel when you were listening to him tonight? >> well, i think it's worth stepping back and realizing that this is an extraordinary moment for joe biden. this is someone who's been in public life for decades. this is somebody who ran for

president three times. this is somebody who saw the job up close. every morning in the obama administration for years walked into the oval office and took the presidential briefing along side him. so he has an idea how to approach this office. i think he has a unique set of skills having been through lost frankly patience how much in his own life to get us through this. in realtime he's morphing into the president. and donald trump is receding into the background. he's talking about governing. he's speaking in a language that we recognize from presidents about the suffering americans have gone through. even the frustrations americans feel in watching election returns. and frankly by adapting that kind of governing strategy it's the right political thing to do, too, because it's casting donald trump in an even more negative light. and what we're seeing before us is the receding of the trump presidency and the on set of the biden presidency.

>> yamiche, part of the challenge for donald trump if he tries to break his silence and step up to a microphone is what would he say? what could he say? >> that's right. and we saw just in the last day or so the president come to the white house briefing room and deliver what was likely by may observation his most dishonest speech yet. he said a bunch of things that just were not true including that votes were magically appearing, that democrats were finding them everywhere, that there was some sort of impropriety in georgia and throwing things at the wall and seeing what sticks. now, the president has really employed this strategy of flooding the zone with information and disinformation his entire presidency. and we're now seeing him trying to use this disinformation machine again with the help of don, jr. and other republicans

like lindsey graham and ted cruz. but the president really can't actually make a legal argument because we're already seeing the lawsuits that are being filed in places like georgia and pennsylvania thrown out by judges who are saying we don't see any evidence. and the president can say a lot of things, but he can't actually prove them in court based off of these losses that are already being thrown out. so the president is in a tough position because even when he does want to say something, even when he does say something, it's really calling into question the integrity of the election, something no president has done, and also him simply lying. >> let's listen to more of what joe biden said tonight where once again he did something that donald trump has never done not even once. joe biden spoke encouragingly to people who voted for him and to the people who did not vote for him. >> we may be opponents but we're not enemies. we're americans.

no matter who you voted for i'm certain of one thing. the vast majority of 150 million americans who voted, they want to get the vitriol out of our politics. >> ben rhodes, that can sound like something from another era, but that's the kind of standard of political speech we used to hear just five years ago before there was a donald trump nominee in the republican party. >> that's right, lawrence. and there's something else i noticed. when i worked in the obama campaign in 2008 i remember after the election it was a very marked shift in the remarks we were writing as speechwriters. and president-elect obama was delivering at the time. you begin to talk in different tones. you know, he's moving past the election. this is not just campaign

rhetoric. it's familiar from the campaign, but i heard a couple of things really important here. in his first days after the election you want to set a tone for what kind of president you're going to be. he repeated twice a list of issues he's going to focus on. covid, the economic recovery, climate change, and racial injustice. i think setting the parameters of the american people what's going to be his focus as president, but even more important tonally this is joe biden, this is who he is, this idea we can come together, he sees the people who voted against him as clearly he sees the people who voted for him. i think what you'll see him do tonight and continue to do in the days ahead he'll continue to sketch out what kind of president he's going to be. and again the contrast is going to be for him by donald trump. you notice he doesn't mention these remarks at all. he doesn't have to. he's the one moving forward and frankly trump is going to be the one in the past here. >> the transition is not just one of those things a tradition. there's actually a budget for it. it's considered a serious process, and yet this is the most incompetent and most corrupt administration in

history in departments all across the trump administration. there are things they're going to want to hide. the process is supposed to be open your doors, welcome in the people who are going to come in and take over these offices. how ugly might this transition turn out to be with the incompetence level of the trump people and the trump incentive to hide and obstruct the people who are coming in? >> the transition could get really, really ugly if president trump tries to throw a wrench in it and really wants to not embrace the reality that he might lose. and if he has lost, that he has lost the presidency. i've been talking to sources with the biden campaign, the trump campaign as well as outside people who monitor this. they say right now as mike nenoli reported things are going smoothly. let's remember it's 4,000 political appointeevise to go in. 1,250 of them are appointed. and then you have the idea the trump administration did not

show up for most of their transition. you had chris christie and then mike pence took it over, so they also didn't really have a transfer of power because they didn't want that for themselves. they didn't want to work with the obama administration, so they don't actually know how to transfer power because they didn't show up for their own, so it could get messy as we start talk about agency and high level officials. but right now things are going smoothie, but that could all change depending how unhinged the president gets. i've been talking to people close to it the president, they're very worried because they think the president is getting to a point where his rhetoric is getting more and more dangerous and he's getting not really familiar with the reality how elections work in this country. >> ben rhodes, you saw that trump transition four years ago. what do you expect this time the. >> well, i'm worried about it, and yamiche is right i think

chris christie showed up the day of the election is basically indicated he didn't think they were going to win. look, there are a couple of points to make, the transitions are incredibly important. you want to hit the ground running january 20th. you especially want to do that when there's a pandemic in an economic crisis. i'm sure the biden people want to get into those agencies, review the state of play, figure out their personnel charts and how to get people into jobs as soon as possible. some of that will happen because there is a career civil service aspect to the transition. civil servants who will do the right thing. a machinery of government who will take over. i remember feeling this acutely in 2016 in january they were constructing the infrastructure of the inauguration parade on pennsylvania avenue. you feel suddenly like a temporary employee. that's all going to kick in, but we know that at some of these agencies they're incredibly political individuals at the

top, trump loyalists, people who may be looking to with hold information from an incumbent biden administration. people who may not be cooperative, people who may be going along with donald trump's efforts to cast the biden presidency as somehow illegitimate. my hope is even as donald trump may be incensed with the results that that machinery of how the united states government handles its business and how the career people handle their business and frankly just the clock ticking away on the trump presidency moderates this to some extent. i just hope there's not obstruction that prevents the biden team that already has one of the worst inheritances that any incumbent president is going to deal with, to figure out exactly what they're walking into so they can go wright to work on those issues biden is talking about. chief among them the pandemic donald trump seems to have no interest in dealing with and the chief of staff is infected with. and the chief of staff is usually the figure for managing transition. hopefully it can go forward at the civil service level. >> ben rhodes and yamiche

alcindor, thank you both very much. and when we come back, pennsylvania, pennsylvania, pennsylvania. we'll go to chris jansing live in harrisburg. and we will be joined by the mr. rogers of pennsylvania election analysis senator bob casey who has all week been delivering the most accurate report, analysis of what wez going to happen next in pennsylvania. that's next. that's next. businesses today are looking to tomorrow. adapting. innovating.

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20 years ago the great tim russert told us to pay attention to florida, florida, where the presidential election was decided that year. this year luke russert telling us what his dad would have told us this year. pennsylvania, pennsylvania, pennsylvania. i for one haven't had a minute of doubt about pennsylvania all week long because i have been following the mr. rogers of election coverage in pennsylvania. pennsylvania senator bob casey who has been updating us every day on twitter with these videos. you've got to follow senator casey on twitter. >> hey, we just got obviously the great news that joe biden has overtaken the president in

pennsylvania. he's running ahead of him, which is what i expected. there's still more votes obviously to tabulate today that i think that lead will continue to grow over the course of the day. i don't know exactly what the lead will be by the end of today, but as i said when all the votes are counted and there's an official count and that's probably two weeks from now, joe biden will win pennsylvania somewhere around 100,000. >> i couldn't be happier to tell you that senator casey will be joining us in a moment, but first we tell to harrisburg and msnbc's senior national correspondent chris jansing. chris, what is the situation in pennsylvania's capitol tonight? >> well, the senator was right. joe biden's lead all throughout the day continued to grow 72 hours if you can believe it, more than that since the polls have closed.

he now holds the lead of 28,833 votes here. we're now working ourselves outside of recount territory. but let me tell you where we are right now. a couple big groups of votes dropped tonight in allegheny county, one of over 9,000 and another over 5,000 votes which leaves us state-wide with about 89,000 of those mail-in ballots still to be counted. about a third of those in allegheny county, that's the area around pittsburgh. folks have gone home for the night. they've been counting all day. they'll start-up again tomorrow. you know, the secretary of state raised a lot of expectation. she said we might actually know who the winner was on thursday, then she said maybe today. but a lot of this vote counting is obviously going slower than expected. they've been working in virtually every county because mail-in ballots could be counted up until 5:00 today. they could be taken in. philly says they may have a few

more days yet of work to do, which doesn't mean that that race couldn't be called before that. we're going to keep our eye on that tomorrow as those votes continue to be counted. in the meantime there's also been a lot of attention on the legal aspects of this. there was a new development today that was not what the republicans wanted when supreme court justice samuel alito said, look, we're going to ask the counties to segregate the ballots that come in after election day after 8:00 p.m., but he would not stop the vote count. now, state officials say it doesn't matter anyway. they've not been part of the numbers coming out so far, and they're not in such big numbers that would make a difference anyway, but it's clear that the republicans as they see joe biden's numbers going up are looking to see what they could do on a legal front. just one example is the rnc has sent in what they're calling these legal challenge teams to four different states including

pennsylvania allege that there's been some sort of voter fraud. a republican michigan election official was so unhappy about it she said everything ronna mcdaniel said was categorically false and she made a video, so it's kind of gone viral on twitter. we saw senator pat toomey who's of course a republican as well as the republican leader of the state senate both saying they've seen absolutely nothing to indicate there's any kind of fraud, anything wrong with it vote count. and so what we're seeing now is that as joe biden's numbers go up the legal options for the republicans were dwindling, lawrence? >> msnbc's chris jansing in harrisburg. thank you very much. really appreciate it. joining us now is democratic senator bob casey of pennsylvania. senator casey, thank you very much. i've been dying to talk to you all week, and i feel like i have been because i've been watching your video tweets explaining to us every day exactly what was

going to happen in pennsylvania, so for you from the start really there has been no suspense. tell us how we get the rest of the way in pennsylvania. >> lawrence, there's still some votes to count as chris was indicating. there's some mail-in ballots yet to be counted. i'm not quite sure the total amount of those ballots. the provisional ballots they've begun that process. we started i guess today with maybe a little less than 100,000 but i think that's been whittled down a bit. but we're obviously coming to the last -- the last bit of vote. but i think it's been clear that joe biden just continues to grow his margin, and now it's just inexorable. even today, for example, i forget which batch, maybe the second batch of votes from allegheny county in the early evening. and it might have been around 5,000, but within that 5,000 there were about 2,000 both military and overseas ballots. and it seems like no matter what

combination of ballots you have the percentage of joe biden votes is very high especially of course with the mail-in ballot. but even i think the pattern seems to be continuing maybe a little less percentage with these other ballots. so he's already overtaken the president. he's going to beat them in the unofficial count when there's a margin for that and then the official count that will be the basis for certification. >> senator, you've been standing at that map behind you all week taking us on a tour of the counties, and every day telling us where the votes were going to come from. i mean you told us that allegheny county, what they were going to produce before they produced it. based on your experience in the state you know where the democratic votes are. was there anything as theitata flowed in? it seemed as i was watching you that there was nothing as the data flowed in that really gave you any doubt about where this

was going? >> lawrence, i had a good sense joe biden would be able to not only maintain the base of the democratic party vote in our state with this philadelphia, the four suburban counties around it and allegheny county and a few other counties, but he ran ahead of where democrats have run for president in the last two elections in the philadelphia suburbs. so that proved to be true. he ran a little better north eastern pennsylvania where i am now. but i also had a little help, lawrence. i had the voter project use really good number crunchers. in allegheny county the executive there all along thought the turnout would be high as well as the margin. so it's proved to be true, but it's a remarkable i think demonstration that even in the

midst of voter suppression efforts, in the midst of the president trying to raise doubts about really this lie about mail-in ballots. people voted in record numbers. last time in the presidential election about 6 million people. this will turn out to be probably about 6.8 million which is really extraordinary. >> there was some reporting in the last month suggesting there was a possibility, for example, if it came down to pennsylvania that the republican pennsylvania legislator would seize control. i found preposterous on its face when first suggested. it seems to me from my distance is absolutely nothing from anyone in the republican

legislator that even suggests a whiff of irresponsibility on their part as this week proceeds. >> yeah, it's really fairly remarkable that you have the president of the united states, the leader of the free world day after day saying that there's fraud or some kind of malfeasance. and republicans of all stripes pat mentioned senator toomey but also in the leaders of the general assembly. so it's pretty difficult for the president to maintain that argument as people are calling upon him to produce evidence, any shred of evidence. but i think the good news is the country i think is already moving beyond him. i think mike mentioned this earlier but they saw it tonight as they've seen on a number of occasions. a president. he just happens to not be sworn

in but joe biden was showing i think a lot of empathy for what the country has been enduring. he was respectful of those who disagree with him who just gave a great unifying set of remarks tonight. so we've got to finish the process. i want to commend all the people who are spending so much time and effort going through the ballots and really supporting our democracy even as the president undermines it. >> senator bob casey, i can't thank you enough for your guidance this week as the votes are being counted in pennsylvania. and i have to tell you i was getting all sorts of very nervous texts from friends of mine 24 hours a day about pennsylvania and other places, and i would always just tell them don't worry about pennsylvania. and i never have the time to explain why, but it was all because i was listening to senator bob casey. thank you very much. really appreciate it. >> thanks, lawrence. when we come back, joe biden's presidential campaign

was sinking and i mean sinking in a crowded field of democratic candidates. and then congressman james clyburn's endorsement urged black voters in south carolina to save the biden candidacy, and they did. and then this week black voters have saved joe biden once again in the battleground states. that's next. today in "the new yorker" we're helping change the future of heart failure. understanding how to talk to your doctor about treatment options is key. today, we are redefining how we do things. we find new ways of speaking, so you're never out of touch. it's seeing someone's face that comforts us,

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the always brilliant professor cobb wrote to be black in the first week of november 2020 is to yet again have the feeling of being called off the bench and being told the whole game is riding on you. the presidency would be decided not simply by a handful of swing states but by a small grouping of districts within those states. that responsibility fell largely to milwaukee, detroit, philadelphia and atlanta.

places with disproportionately black and democratic voting populations. here's joe biden tonight in wilmington. >> one of the things i'm especially proud of is how well we've gone across america, and we're going to be the first democrat to win in arizona in 24 years. we're going to be the first democrat to win georgia in 28 years. and we've rebuilt the blue wall in the middle of the country that crumbled just four years ago. pennsylvania, michigan, wisconsin, the heartland of this nation. >> joining us now latasha brown, co-founder of black voters matter fund. latasha joining us from atlanta. latasha, how did he do it? >> you know, i think what happened i think the people did it. i think the people did it and he would certainly benefit from it.

i think there is a coalition of folks who are -- it's important to campaign but i think most importantly black voters we've worked with and i've talked to they knew what was at stake this election cycle. they knew we had to come out in record numbers and we had to send a message we were not going backwards, this was a major, major critical election for our community. >> what was your reaction to the way jelani cobb but it today in "the new yorker" if you're black and this week you get it feeling you're being called off the bench and being told the whole game is riding on you? >> you know we -- i agree totally with it 100%. those of us who do this work we know that black people have been on the vanguard of democracy. we have been pushing this nation to actually strengthen and expand democracy. from the voting rights movement to other civil rights laws. once again we were looking at the fragility of democracy in this country, on the eve of

which a fascist in office right now and has already attempted to dismantle democracy, we knew the danger in that and because of that what you saw was black turnout in record numbers because we knew what was at stake. >> and tonight in georgia as vote counting continues do you believe -- do you see a pattern that tells you joe biden is going to come out with georgia's electoral votes? >> i certainly do. i think it is -- it's been 27 years since we've had a democratic nominee to win the election. i think when you're looking at what's happened in georgia, you know, that is story around this isn't just about this particular election. this has been about years of deep community organizing. and when you put in deep community organizing you put investment and a coalition together of african-americans, of asian-americans and pacific islanders, and latinx community, when you put us together the

lgbt community, we're creating new coalitions all across the region and we're going to change and shape this nation. >> i want to listen to nikema williams actually going to join us later. she won the congressional seat that was held by john lewis. let's listen to what she had to say. >> congressman lewis loved the ferrell williams song "happy," can and i can see the happy dance in that we won georgia, the state he represented for 34 years. >> i have the feeling you and others living in atlanta are the least surprised by how this has turned out not just in atlanta but in other cities around the country. >> we have been saying this. we have been saying this. we ignored the polls and said we are going to focus. what we know is that if you have

a good strong ground game that if you ignite and if the people rise up in fact that's how you strengthen a democracy. we saw we're not surprised what is happening in philadelphia right now. we're not surprised what we're seeing in arizona, we're not surprised what we're seeing in atlanta. the people are speaking. >> latasha brown, we have to go to a break now, but the next time we talk you're going to have guide us through the senate races going to take place in georgia for the rest of the year. thank you very much for joining us. >> thank you for having me. and up next, the united states is on the cusp of history with its first woman vice president. caroline randall williams will join us next. if you have medicare, listen up. the medicare enrollment deadline is only weeks away. with so many changes, do you know if your plan is still the right fit? having the wrong plan may cost you thousands of dollars out of pocket.

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tonight the united states of america is on the verge of having our first woman vice president of the united states.

>> we will begin the work of healing and repairing and uniting our nation democrats and republicans and independents and people of all races and all backgrounds because we know that's how we've always overcome our greatest challenges. >> that was senator kamala harris in her last campaign speech on monday as she stood on the threshold of history. joining us now caroline randall williams, writer and resident at vanderbilt university. she wrote the acclaimed opinion piece "you want the confederate monument my body is confederate monument." caroline, thank you very much for joining us tonight, and i just have been wondering what is

it like, what are you thinking as you watch kamala harris step up into this position which she will soon surely be vice president-elect of the united states? >> i mean, i'm just so moved by it, and i think, you know, the first thing i think when i think about kamala is that in some ways this election for me and i hope for more than just me and the women i represent, but this election is about black women because you know what, 91% of us showed up to the polls to do what we were supposed to do. we always pick the candidates on the right side of history. i think in a lot of ways we were born on the right side of history certainly in this country. and, you know, it's always been our job to drag america along with us into the light. but usually we wind up having to do that by elevating a white

candidate, usually a white male candidate in order to bring us into the -- you know, bring america back to its senses. but in this case we're actually getting to carry one of our sisters with us while we do that work at the polls. and i don't know how to tell you how transcendent that feels. >> let's listen to more of what kamala harris had to say in her final campaign speech for vice president. >> in this battle for the very soul of our nation we have seen what can be unburdened by what has been. we have seen who we are and a willingness to fight for the country we love. >> caroline, i can remember during barack obama's campaign

so many people just envisioning what would it be like to have him every day in the presidency, and now there is this to envision. >> you know, her capacity for surcomspection, for transcending differences, she lives a binary. she's doubly a woman of color. she's doing this double work of representation. she's able to transcend the grievances that she expressed, you know, eloquently and emotionally on the stage when she was joe biden's opponent before she joined him on the ballot. i think that she models this kind of america that i want to see looking forward both in terms of being of immigrants and of this place. she's a woman of color, and she's also a woman who makes profound alliances across

colors. and you know, i even think in her role as a prosecutor, right, that she shows that you can be right on both sides -- you know, on both sides of the law in this country, and the spirit of that energy is what we need to bring to that side of the law for sure as we move forward. and i think that, you know, she's also just got this energy that it's of a star. and i think that's something -- looking to that kind of light after four years of sideshow is really refreshing. >> caroline randall williams, thank you very much for joining our discussion tonight. really appreciate it. >> thank you for having me, lawrence. >> thank you. and as the counting continues, so does our continuing live coverage. we will be back after this break.

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and a good saturday morning to you. craig melvin here. it is 4 a.m. here on the east coast. 1 a.m. out west. and a reminder, the first big group of polls closed some 81 hours ago in this country, and right now while we still do not have a declared winner in the presidential race. in fact, let's start with where things stand at this hour. former vice president joe biden leading in pennsylvania, leading in nevada, georgia, and arizona. four critical