♪ welcome to monday. it's "meet the press daily." i'm kasie hunt in for chuck todd. we're following a number of major developments this hour involving the coronavirus pandemic. as our country enters an extraordinary split screen, where the future looks

increasingly hopeful but the present is more like a nightmare. first, the good news. early data from moderna suggests its vaccine could be around 95% effective. we're going to have more on that in just a moment. the announcement follows pfizer's disclosure last week that its vaccine could be highly effective as well. both dr. fauci and dr. slaoui the chief adviser to the white house's vaccine program, spoke today about the potential of having two vaccines in the pipeline. >> we project that by the end of december there will be doses of vaccine available for individuals in the higher risk category from both companies, we hope. and this is something that we're looking forward to. >> we know that we have enough vaccine doses between these two vaccines two immunize about 20 million people during the month of december, in the second half of the month, and then going

forward from there on we'll have enough vaccine to immunize every month, month on month, about 25 more million individuals each time with two vaccine doses. >> how nice to get good news on a monday. but as you heard there, it's still going to be months at least before the vaccine is widely available. and meanwhile, right now states and cities are scrambling to address a record-shattering nationwide surge in cases and hospitalizations, which is overwhelming health care systems across the country. just minutes from now the mayor of philadelphia is going to announce new restrictions amid an alarming rise in cases. we're going to bring you some of that press conference coming up. and we also heard this morning from new york city mayor bill de blasio. his warning suggests it's not a matter of if schools are going to close in the nation's largest public school system but when and for how long.

and in chicago they're now under a stay at home advisory that went into effect at 6:00 a.m. this morning. and new jersey governor phil murphy is right now holding a briefing as his state imposes new restrictions to try and slow the spread there. governors in michigan, oregon, new mexico and washington have recently announced blanket new restrictions which in some cases amount to near lockdowns. and it all continues to take a terrible toll on medical workers, both physically and psychologically. in this hour president-elect joe biden and vice president-elect kamala harris are scheduled to deliver remarks about rebuilding a covid-crushed economy as their coronavirus advisers consider new restrictions and nationwide mask mandates. and of course the president continues to lash out at the election results. he of course lost. he's not attended a coronavirus task force meeting in months.

nor has he announced any new nationwide mitigation efforts amid this surge. but as we mentioned, the philadelphia mayor is holding a news conference right now on coronavirus. we want to listen in for just a moment. let's watch. >> -- for rental assistance to more than 39 million since the start of the pandemic. our finance director and chief recovery officer are working aggressively to maximize every dollar from the original cares act and other federal and state supports. we continue to lobby harrisburg relentlessly for the general assembly to allocate the commonwealth cares act dollars so they go ought areas most impacted by the virus. and on capitol hill for additional relief, particularly urging congress to move quickly on a new stimulus package. we hope to bring you more information in the coming weeks on additional relief that may be available. please know we will have no stone unturned in the effort to help philadelphians get through this. i believe that we will get through it if we act with urgency like we did in the

spring. we flattened the curve then, and i'm confident that if we get past our covid fatigue and again take this as seriously as it is we will get through it again. so hopefully these restrictions will only be needed for six weeks. and now dr. farley, please. >> thank you very much, mayor. we've been with the coronavirus now for eight months and everyone's tired of it. unfortunately, the epidemic is approaching its worst. the future which is a little grim if we don't take strong action and what we feel we must do to reduce the consequences. first a few numbers. since yesterday we've identified 654 cases of the coronavirus infection in philadelphia residents and since friday we've identified 2,564. now, last week by the data sample collection we averaged 657 cases per day, which is the highest average case count ever. even that, the numbers are incomplete with delays in reporting. and so i'm sure that by the time we get all of our numbers in

last week we will average more than 700 cases per day. last week people tested -- 13.4% tested positive and that percentage positive is also growing rapidly. last week -- i'm sorry, since friday we've identified eight additional deaths from the coronavirus, bringing us to a total of 1,917 since the beginning of the epidemic. while we're seeing increases in cases and increases in deaths, we're also seeing increases in cases in nursing homes and other congregate facilities where vulnerable people live. i want to give you a better sense of the overall sweep of the epidemic and where we might head if we don't do these restrictions and to do that i'm going to try to show you some slides here. i'm having trouble.

>> all right. we're going to keep our ear on this press conference as they continue to try and outline possible new restrictions in philadelphia. the mayor said those restrictions are expected to last six weeks. we're just waiting on the details of that. we'll bring that to you as soon as we get to it. but we do want to go to chicago where we find our cal perry and meagan fitzgerald, who is is outside of dodger stadium in los angeles. that is the largest testing site in the nation. cal, let me start with you in chicago just because we've seen how they as a big city have grappled with this. we're waiting on what's going on in philadelphia here. the advisory that they're now under as of this morning, it's not quite as severe as what we first saw back in march. what's the thinking in terms of -- what are they hoping for from their residents and are they expecting that the results might be different if they don't mandate what's going on here?

what are you hearing and learning on the ground? >> reporter: i think it's two things on behalf of officials. i think part of it is to leave themselves room to as you said put in the mandate. we heard from governor pritzker saying he could still put a statewide stay-at-home mandate in place but they want to give people a chance to do it on their own, do the right thing as a community, which is why we have the stay-at-home advisory here in the city of chicago. the idea is pretty simple and as you laid out it's late short of what we saw six months ago where they want you to stay at home unless it's absolutely essential for you to go out. at additional thing is they want folks to stay in their very close family groups. this is clearly about thanksgiving and a plea that folks will do their thanksgivings virtually. when you look at numbers here in chicago it's the speed at which things are getting worse that has people concerned. we have doubled the hospitalizations in just one week and we're not of course just talking about beds but as you said in your open we're talking about our front line health care workers who are working these unbelievably long shifts and extra shifts, which

is again why you have officials sort of doubling down their pleas over the holidays to have people either cancel their travel, postpone it, or keep to those small family groups, kasie. >> and cal, quickly, the city's latino population has been particularly hard hit, is that right? >> reporter: absolutely. if you look at the numbers, the latino population has as many cases, in fact more cases than both the white and african-american populations here in the city of chicago and they're running at a 30% positivity rate. you heard the press conference there from philadelphia. 13% positivity has them moving into restrictions. 30% positivity rate. on top of that you have at times fear within the community to come and get tested. we've been talking to community leaders who want to us spread the word that that should not be a factory, people should not be afraid of their legal status in this country to get testing because of course as you have so often, you'll have an amnesty program in place really encouraging people to get out within the community not only to pass the word about these extra restrictions, these stay-at-home

advisories, but again, to get that testing, a new focus, a refocus here in chicago on that testing, kasie. >> all right. cal perry in chicago, thank you. stay safe, my friend. let's go out now to meagan fitzgerald. she is at the largest testing site at dodger stadium. meagan, what are the lines like there, and how are the local leaders and state leaders in not just california but the whole region out west handling this new wave? what kind of restrictions are people dealing with? >> reporter: kasie, i can tell you that local leaders are very concerned about this. and here's why. they're seeing these record number of daily cases and they know they're not going to see the impact of this on hospitals for another week or two. also what's so alarming to officials is how quickly this virus is accelerating. let's talk restriction. oregon and washington prohibit k indoor services at bars and

restaurants. businesses like gyms, for instance, having to move their operation outside or close their doors. out in colorado the governor there just pleading with the public to work from home as cases continue to surge. and here in los angeles county the mayor cutting right to the chase. take a listen. >> when we get tired, covid kills. when we let down our guard, covid kills. when it gets colder, covid kills. we know this is spreading. we know this is going from one household to another. we know it's happening in workplaces. if you can stay home, stay home. if you don't have to see someone, don't see them. cancel those vacation plans. don't invite others over for thanksgiving. and we'll have a better 2021 if you do that. >> reporter: and kasie, you mentioned the lines behind me here at dodger stadium. thousands of people continue to come daily to get tested. the capacity here is 13,000 tests a day. meanwhile, the county of los angeles is considering curfews on businesses as a way of trying

to stop the spread of this virus. kasie? >> meagan fitzgerald in los angeles. thank you very much for that. i want to go now to dr. nahid bhadelia to talk more about this vaccine news which i think has many americansly feeling like there's a little more good news. doctor, i'm happy to be able to talk to you about this on this monday. and we heard from dr. fauci this morning with savannah guthrie on the "today" show both expressing -- making sure to warn people this is not going to happen tomorrow, this is going to take a period of months, we have a lot of challenges, but also saying that we could see the first rounds of it possibly even this year. the emergency authorization could be pretty quick. do you agree with dr. fauci in terms of what you've seen from this new moderna information? and how do you think people should be thinking about it as they head into the thanksgiving and christmas holidays?

>> good morning, kasie. it would be rare i disagree with dr. fauci. but in this case -- >> fair enough. >> you posed it exactly right at the beginning of the hour. what a strange time we're in where we're walking into the darkest of our nights with this pandemic with this signal of a bright light at the end of it. so here's what the good news is. it's good news for a few different reasons as moderna results came out, 30,000 people trial, interim analysis showing that 95 infections and only 5 in people who got the vaccine. 90 in people who got the placebo. none of the severe deas was in people who got placebos -- rather got the vaccine. which is good news. which means this vaccine, they gave us the kind of detailed data about this vaccine we were looking for. and we're hoping the same comes true for the pfizer once we see sample data. other good news, they included people, 42% of the people they included were people with medical co-morbidities or because of their age, high risk. and 37% of the people were patients who were people of

color, participants who were people of color, who've been particularly hard hit. the communities have been particularly hard hit. best news, kasie, this particular moderna vaccine, the messenger rna vaccine-s a lot more stable, which means the shelf life and the freezer, much lower -- regular freezer negative 4 fahrenheit it can last for six months. you can have it in a egg medical fridge, or regular fridge for about 30 days and if you want to keep it at room temperature 12 hours. that's going to do wonders in distribution in getting it where it's needed. >> i was going to say exactly that, most of us don't think about all of these logistics that go into the normal shots we get at the doctor's office but suddenly we're all having conversations and thinking about who's going to build the refrigerators for these vaccines. it's a pretty remarkable situation. how does that apply to making sure that these vaccines get to communities that are underserved or low income for that very reason? you know, places that may not have this kind of

infrastructure. >> yeah, and this conversation has started since pfizer revealed its data. as you know, the pfizer vaccine requires a negative 80, subzero freezers, and the trouble is many rural hospitals and many, you know, just regular smaller hospitals don't have that kind of capacity. and the question was that would require the purchase of these is it & stationing of these even before the vaccines got out there. this data, the moderna data is useful because it does two things. it allows us to try to get the vaccine out to place that's don't have that capacity yet but overall it's good -- for me it's actually good news for the fact that you're doubling the doses. as you heard dr. sloui, it means we could potentially vaccinate 20 million people horks million doses, two doses each, 20 million people could get the vaccine by the end of the year. of course the same questions remain for this vaccine as they do for the pfizer one, we don't know how long the protection from the vaccine lasts and we don't know if it protects you just from disease or also

infection, could you get the vaccine and still get infected, have no symptoms and pass it on to others? that's still a pending question we don't have the answer to. >> it's a very good point. and we obviously have to proceed with caution here. the other element of course that we focus on a lot here is the transition of political power that's ongoing right now. and obviously the trump administration has been pretty straightforward about not collaborating with the biden transition team in a way that we would expect or that's customary. how do you expect that this rollout of a potential vaccine could be affected if the transition isn't done in accordance with usual norms and procedures? how much harm could be done between now and january 20th? >> i mean, the same things that apply to national security apply to health security. you know, the devil's in the details and the more ready information the biden campaign has the easier that transition,

president-elect biden now has, the easier that transition's going to be because we are in the middle of a vaccine campaign that's going transition from one administration to another. so the type of details the president-elect covid transition advisory board has been asking for is really detailed information about health care utilization at hospital levels, things that hhs has data and access to. only a few people within the hhs have access to. and they're waiting for those because that's where for example if they could figure out where the highest amount of risk is maybe the next few, 20 million packages of vaccines that come out they could make the decision of saying geographically it would be better to send the vaccines in these areas. that's the kind of planning and intricate details that are needed. and so they won't have that and they're not getting that from the trump administration. >> a nationwide plan. there have been several instances throughout this pandemic when we haven't had one and many experts like yourself have said we have sorely needed one.

dr. nahid bhadelia, thank you so much for being with us this afternoon. i really appreciate it. i want to go back now to ellison barber. she is an nbc news correspondent on the ground in philadelphia. i know we were trying to listen in to that press conference that the mayor was having with his top health officials about possible new restrictions in philadelphia. how bad are the caseloads right now in philadelphia, and what have they decided they need to do about it? >> reporter: well, they say they've seen the percent positive here jump 700% in just two months. they say that they need to act and they need to act now. we are actually still listening to this press conference that is on zoom in a parking lot here. let me walk you through the restrictions that we know of as of right now. again, this is still ongoing, so this list is probably not complete just yet. they say that they are hoping these restrictions are only needed for about six weeks, but they plan to prohibit indoor graerthz in any location, public

or private. they also say that outdoor gatherings are now going to be limited to 10 people per 1,000 square feet. they are prohibiting indoor dining at restaurants, outdoor dining is going to be limited to members of the same household. they did acknowledge that that's not something they can really enforce but they say they are asking people in philadelphia and restaurants to abide by that rule, that guidance. hospitalizations are up in philadelphia and we've seen those rates increasing in the last week or so. the positivity rate in philadelphia is around 14%. the health commissioner is said that the increase is not just because they are testing more people, they are testing more people, but they say there is no question that the cases -- up here -- and this line actually goes all the way around the building -- >> there she is. apology. >> reporter: are we back?

>> i think you're back, ellison, apologies. >> reporter: no worried. they say they test 340 people at this site alone every single day. they say within this testing site their numbers are not necessarily as high as we're hearing around the rest of philadelphia. they're up but they say it's not as bad for this site as it was back in april and may. that being said, though, the testing keeps going over here. the director of this site, he tells me they're actually considering shutting this down three weeks ago and then they started seeing lines, bigger lines and bigger lines, and now the demand has skyrocketed here and they tested more people last week than they have tested since this site opened back in may. kasie? >> all right. ellison barber in philadelphia, thank you very much for that. apologies for our technical difficulties. coming up next here, we've got one of the country's premier medical institutions trying to protect its staff, not just in the hospital but outside of it

as well as community spread continues out of control. and coming up later on, biden pushes forward. the president-elect working on a covid response despite the white house's lack of cooperation. we expect to hear from biden and harris later on this hour coming up live. and a quick programming note. please be sure to join ayman mohyeldin at 3:00. he's going to talk live with moderna's chief medical officer about today's promising vaccine news. that's coming up at 3:00 p.m. eastern right here on msnbc. don't go anywhere. we'll be right back. we'll be ri. pick up more on every pass with no hair wrap. shark vertex with duoclean power fins. try optum perks. it's a new way to save up to 80%. and everyone can do it. it's from optum, a health care company that's trusted by millions of people. you don't have to sign up for anything. just go to optumperks.com. and get a coupon to use at your pharmacy.

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you can plan and you can make the space available. you can plan and imagine what it could be. i think the hard thing to plan is the emotional stress. and that mental anguish it takes on the staff. >> no matter what anyone wants to say, we didn't sign up for this. we didn't sign up for an unknown pandemic with limited resources. and it's a very selfish to make

that decision when there are people working really really, really hard to keep you safe. >> doing everything you can to try to prevent the spread and keep your population safe and keep yourself safe. we're all in this together. it's not doctors, it's not nurses, it's not respiratory therapists. it's everybody. >> welcome back. those are health care workers on the front lines. and they are tired, exhausted, and frankly burning out as we struggle with another surge in this virus. the u.s. has added more than a million cases just in the last seven days. u.s. hospitalizations have increased close to 90% in the last month. hospitals across the country are stretched to the breaking point as the community spread of this virus is so significant that it's infecting patients and the staff that's needed to treat them. last week about 1,000 mayo clinic staffers were sidelined because they were infected or exposed to the virus or because

they're caring for a sick family member. and now that number has jumped closer to 1500 staffers sidelined as the need for hospital staffers keeps growing. dr. amy williams is the executive dean of practice at the mayo clinic, and she has also treated coronavirus patients. dr. williams, thank you so much for being with us here this afternoon. i'm hoping you can walk us through this challenge. we obviously since march have been watching our heroes frankly fighting this virus on the front lines, but we also had some different circumstances then. it wasn't necessarily nationwide. so that we could have health care workers move from place to place. and also in many places we were focused on doctors and nurses who needed protective equipment in their workplace. it sounds like what's affecting you is more that it's spreading so rapidly in the community that it's affecting the hospitals. walk us through what the challenge is that you're facing right now. >> thank you, kasie.

thank you very much for including me in this conversation. well, to just say it right out, there are three things you need to care for patients in medicine. one is staff. the other is supplies. and the other is space. and what is critically a concern right now is the staffing part of this. and it's because of the high positivity rates in our community. in the midwest we've had high positivity rates as high as over 30% when our goal is less than 5%, less than 2%, actually. we're seeing this across the board. and some relief over the weekend it seems, but often the testing is less over the weekend. to give an idea, we still have 1,500 of our staff that are out due covid issues. 1,500. that's amazing. that's about 5% of our staff

that's out because of this virus. and that means -- i'm talking about bedside health care workers that we need to care for patients with covid and those without covid that continue to get sick. so it is a dilemma and the bottom line is we have to stay safe, we have to keep our community safe, we have to make them safer. this is absolutely paramount, which means what you've heard throughout this entire broadcast. masking, social distancing, and robust hand hygiene. >> i think one of the things that may alarm viewers, certainly alarmed me, is one would presume that your medical workers know everything they're supposed to be doing, they're taking the pandemic seriously, they go about their daily lives in a way where they're doing all of those things you just outlined. if they're still getting sick or

being sidelined by this, i think that suggests to people that even if you do all those things you can't really protect yourself. and i imagine that that's pretty scary. can you talk us through what people can do to pekt themselves even if they're following all of those guidelines? >> absolutely. one of the biggest areas of exposure is household exposures. and that's where we see individuals who you're not wearing your mask in your home and we're not asking people to do that. but what we are asking -- we should be asking every member of our family to stay safe, to wear masks and social distance. and it's very difficult. we're seeing the numbers of pediatric patients, the positivity rate for pediatric patients, mirroring that of adult patients, or those that are exposed to covid. we're seeing our hospitals. we're seeing younger individuals in our hospitals. so it's really understanding

what is a safe environment and staying away from those risky circumstances where you can't be safe. that is absolutely key. we're all exhausted. we have been trying as hard as we can, and this is hard. there's no question about that. but to really turn the tide here we just need to be safe. what we have done is we have a communication blitz that has been going on to communicate to our staff how they can stay safe, including when they're at work. we're not seeing the exposures or the infection going from patient to staff. we do see it staff to staff. and that's in the work areas and taking off your mask to eat your lunch or to have a break. if you're doing that, you need to have social distancing. so we have opened up areas throughout our facilities where

people can go and be safer than in a small break room. it is communication and education. that's going to be key as we move forward. so people really understand when they are at risk. >> very quickly, doctor, what concerns do you have about schools? do you see that as an area that is particularly problematic for community spread? or are you encouraged by perhaps an environment that's a little better than expected? >> that's a very difficult question. i think the school can be safe if there is social distancing and masking and appropriate hand hygiene. i do worry about students going home and infecting those at home. i do worry about people being exposed when they're out of school and bringing it to the school because we know that individuals can be shedding

virus even if they are not symptomatic. so we need to be incredibly careful and incredibly diligent about listening to our symptoms and listening to our bodies. if you don't feel well, don't go to work, don't go to school. very important. >> of course. all right, dr. amy williams, thank you very much. we are thinking of all of the people that you work with on the front lines as we try and navigate more months of this in a tough winter. so thank you very much. we're going to take a live look now at wall street, where the dow has been flirting with 30,000 on today's positive covid vaccine developments. but even so our economy's still facing serious problems as so many of you i'm sure are experiencing in your own lives. we're going to have the latest on president-elect biden's plan to help struggling americans coming up next. ns coming up next on't. use 'em before you lose 'em, backed by our 100-day guarantee!! visionworks. see the difference.

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- i'm szasz. [norm] and we live in columbia, missouri. we do consulting, but we also write. [szasz] we take care of ourselves constantly; it's important. we walk three to five times a week, a couple miles at a time.

- we've both been taking prevagen for a little more than 11 years now. after about 30 days of taking it, we noticed clarity that we didn't notice before. - it's still helping me. i still notice a difference. prevagen. healthier brain. better life. welcome back. joe biden is pushing ahead with his transition despite president trump's refusal to concede. the president-elect will outline his plan for an economic recovery later on this hour. and we will bring you those remarks from wilmington as they happen. meanwhile, president trump's own national security adviser says it appears biden won the election. in comments made last week at a global security forum but just made public today, robert o'brien said the national security council is preparing for a, quote, very professional

transition. >> if the biden-harris ticket is determined to be the winner, and obviously things look that way now, we'll have a very professional transition from the national security council. there's no question about it. >> with me now is john podesta, who was white house chief of staff in the clinton administration. he was also co-chair of barack obama's transition team in 2008 and is also the founder and director of the center for american progress. mr. podesta, always great to see you. thank you so much for spending some time with us today. it's quite something the way that robert o'brien frames whether joe biden won the election or not is news at this point, but that's where we are because this president has refused to concede and even that comment is -- represents a break from the president for a member of his core team. but i'm hoping you can take us behind the scenes of what you did in 2008 as you were trying

to transition from george w. bush to barack obama and particularly i think let's start with the health care piece of this just because we're dealing with this vaccine news and a massive potential challenge in distributing millions of doses of this vaccine. what is likely not being done right now on that front that you think needs to be? >> well, the most important thing that is not being done is they don't have access to the federal agencies and the resources that they need to plan an effective distribution strategy. and you know, it's high time that they move on. i think mr. o'brien pointed to what should be going on now, a professional transition and hand-off of power. but in order to do that effectively they need to be in the department of defense, which has responsibility for distribution, in the decht heal department of health and human services, which knows exactly what the moving parts are, planning with the state and

local government. and until -- and as long as they're denied access to that, to the budget numbers at omb, to the access to the experts, the cdc and fda, they're hobbled. and that's almost criminal at this stage because clearly vice president-elect biden has won the election and should be granted the rights that he has under the transition statute. we got tremendous cooperation from the bush administration in the middle of a national crisis, for example, in sharp contrast to what's going on now. >> you mentioned the cdc and the fda. and we were talking earlier on the network to governor andrew cuomo who has suggested and gotten into a fight with president trump over whether new york would get the vaccine because he's raised doubts about whether the fda and the cdc under trump would approve a vaccine in the appropriate manner. do you agree with governors who

want to layer a state process on top of the federal one because they have these political concerns, or do you worry that it undermines trust in the institutions that frankly already people are really struggling to trust? >> well, look, this goes back to the president trying to interfere with cdc and fda decision-making earlier in the crisis, when he wished that it would all go away. and so i think the concerns are legitimate but i think the answer to that is to make sure that everything is completely transparent, again, that the biden team -- he's assembled this outstanding group of public health professionals and experts. let them interface with the people who are doing this work to reassure the american public this is all aboveboard, that it's completely transparent, that the criteria are being met, and these results from pfizer moderna are giving people a lot of hope.

but it's still going to take a while to go through the data, to get it in production, to get the distribution channels open, to get the money to state and local government to be able to do the kind of public health distribution that's necessary. and these viruses by -- these vaccines, by the way, could be somewhat more difficult to handle. they have to be handled at very, very low temperatures, particularly the pfizer virus has -- has to be handled at 100 degrees below zero fahrenheit. and the public health institutions need to prepare for that, get ready for that, so that they can do their job at the community level to get particularly first responders and people in high-risk categories vaccinated first. >> again, if the government doesn't exist for this kind of a project, it's hard to see what exactly it should be doing all day long. let's talk for a second, you mentioned the economic crisis that you dealt with back in 2008 during the transition period.

and obviously so many americans are hurting so badly and were heading into while we've got this good vaccine on the horizon, a pretty dark winter with spiking cases and a potential new restrictions in various localities across the country. people need help. congress hasn't been able to deliver it. what do you think is going to be the dynamic between the former vice president, president-elect joe biden, and republicans in the senate? because we know at least until the inauguration -- until the inauguration the -- depending what happens with the runoffs in georgia i should say, biden is likely to have to work with a republican senate and likely with mitch mcconnell. what do you know about their relationship? you've been around a long time. there are? people who have said oh, those two guys could cut deals together to help. are you in that camp or are you skeptical? >> well, kasie, you know senator mcconnell. he doesn't have a lot of affect.

he's all about power. but they have a professional relationship. president obama called on vice president biden back in -- earlier during the obama administration to try to break logjams with mcconnell. he was successful in certain instances. i don't expect a lot of cooperation from mcconnell. he's already sort of indicated that he wouldn't give a lot of cooperation. but i think there are some areas where they can agree. certainly on covid relief, on relief to small businesses which are hurting, relief for the unemployed in which we really need to get another relief bill passed. but then i think going forward you can imagine them trying at least to find common ground on a green infrastructure bill and maybe some other areas as well. the first challenge in getting the economy going is getting the -- this pandemic under

control and getting people to be in safe environments. and a lot can be done, even through the course of this winter, as president-elect biden and vice president-elect harris are trying to message to the american people wear your mask, wash your hands, comply with social distancing. that can help a lot before the vaccine is widely available for distribution. so that i think -- if you're thinking about the economy, that's job number one. but then the economy does need more support. it needs more stimulus. and they've laid out strong plans to make the right kind of investments in things like child care, which are so necessary right now, clean energy which has been a major focus of the campaign. hopefully, they'll get some cooperation, although i'm a little skeptical about how much. >> i guess we may be about to find out.

john podesta, thank you very much. really appreciate your time and your insights today. in just a short time president-elect biden is going to talk about his plans to try and jumpstart the pandemic-ravaged economy. we'll have a little bit of a preview coming up right after this. [ding] never settle with power e*trade. it has easy-to-use tools and some of the lowest prices. don't get mad. get e*trade and start trading today. good morning, mr. sun. good morning, blair. [ chuckles ] whoo. i'm gonna grow big and strong. yes, you are. i'm gonna get this place all clean. i'll give you a hand. and i'm gonna put lisa on crutches! wait, what? said she's gonna need crutches. she fell pretty hard. you might want to o clean that , girl. excuse us. when owning a small business gets real, progressive helps protect what you built with customizable coverage. -and i'm gonna -- -eh, eh, eh. -donny, no. -oh. we started by making the cloud easier to manage. but we didn't stop there.

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welcome back. as we've been saying, president-elect joe biden and vice president-elect kamala harris are set to deliver remarks on the country's economic recovery any minute now. the former vice president will of course be coming into office at a time when millions of americans are still out of work with potentially more to come if virus cases continue to climb and we face more shutdowns. we're going to have the latest from the biden transition and what it's going to mean for the economy coming up right after this. if you're 65 or older, get the superior flu protection of fluzone high-dose quadrivalent.

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wow! wow! wow! this year, turn black friday into buick friday all month long. now during buick friday, pay no interest for 84 months on most 20-20 buick suv models. we're hoping that congress, sooner or later, will go about providing a bailout package for the american to deal with this issue. we cannot simply as a city handle this ourselves. >> welcome back. that was philadelphia's mayor moments ago pleading for help from congress as the city announces sweeping new restrictions aimed at slowing the spread of the virus. of course the package is not looking very good right now.

both today when we hear from joe biden shortly and i'm joined now by my nbc news colleague stephanie ruhl. i want to understand what the philadelphia mayor just said there, asking for help from congress and while we know the stock market is spiking on the moderna news, the stock market is not the economy. what do you know about what the president elect will say today and what should we focus on here? >> the president-elect, always good to see you, is going to lay out the challenges we face. the longer we wait doing nothing basically. that's what we're doing. the worst situation that the country and the president-elect will be come january 1st when he is in office. you can point back to 2009.

but we're in a very different situation. most likely democrats are, as it stands, not going to control congress. the cares act put forward $2 trillion. the longer that we wait to do nothing the worse it is. you mentioned the stock market, yes, the president can put blinders on. but you have over ten million people without jobs and every day that passes that we don't get a bill think about small businesses. we have more restrictions being put in place and while the president is staying silent that makes covid all the more political. where you are in dc, and where i am in new york and new jersey, you have restaurants and small businesses that don't want to get shut down. they're not fighting this because they was covid to spread in their businesses. they're fighting because as each day passes they're about to get shut down for good.

>> you i know have been talking to some biden economic advisors. and will they do something between now and the inauguration or will they wait. what are they pushing nancy pelosi to do? >> they are in a really tough spot. joe biden spoke to nancy pelosi, to chuck schumer, but you know better than me that heros act passed months ago. it doesn't mean anything unless you get mitch mcconnell on board. he said it is their first order of business to do something but we have yet to figure out what that is. so for biden, he said he could have a good working relationship with mitch mcconnell, he has before. he will have to prove that. he spoke to other democrats and he will need to speak to republicans and show that something can get done. and mitch mcconnell snows that

even in kentucky some people are doing okay, others are not. by the time we get to the coronavirus pandemic, they are still months away. your local bar and restaurant is going to shut down. does anyone want that? >> my favorite is supposed to close on november 25th. something that obviously we're all grappling with and i guess we're going to have to wait and see if they're going to get it together and do something. stephanie, thank you as always, always great to see. thank you to all of you for being with us this hour. check will be back tomorrow and i will see you every morning on "way too early" at 5:00 a.m. eastern. we will, of course, bring the president-elect's remarkets to you as soon as they happen. u as,

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cities and states are considering strict new measures to control the spread of the virus. vice president biden is about to give