good evening and welcome to "politicsnation." tonight's lead, still thankful, as we bow our heads thursday, distanced in every way, our minds are collectively heavier that only a year before, tables

will be emptier, in some cases made so in the span of only a few days as covid cases spike in state after state, day after day. nearly 13 million americans infected going into the thanksgiving holiday. more than a quarter of a million families missing someone this week. and for millions of us fortunate enough to still draw breath, chests have been tightened not by covid but by the ensuing economic catastrophe. but our president, donald trump, the main person tasked with overseeing our full recovery from the pandemic, he's more concerned than ever with the title of president and denying it to president-elect joe biden, than actually doing the job in an uncommonly dangerous time for our nation.

more on that in a minute. of course the pain of the nation is hurtling towards what could be tamped down in part by additional pandemic relief. but the same gop senators who insist all the president's fraudulent claims of fraud be borne out and taken seriously, they are telling the american people that waving the president's bloody shirt of entitlement to prep for a georgia senate fight in january is more important than whether americans can afford a turkey this week or a roof overhead next year. but a minister's job, among many, is to comfort.

that's something i don't tell you i don't get a chance to often do. i'm still thankful for the record nearly 80 million americans that have at this time been confirmed to have voted for president-elect joe biden. i'm still thank you that i live in a country where historically, institutions have been valued, even if their benefits have been historically denied to most of its residents. and i'm still thankful that i get to fight every day on my grandson and your grandson and children's behalf to close those gaps. as we saw three weeks ago, sometimes it works, thankfully. joining me now is congressman bennie thompson, democrat of mississippi and a member of the homeland security committee. thank you for being with us, mr.

chairman. thank you, reverend al, for having me, glad to be here. >> now, congressman, you joined this week a bipartisan group of critics slamming the president for his firing of security head christopher krebs who refused to corroborate president trump's claim of election fraud. please explain how these action in general, his refusal to concede, is directly threatening our national security. and have you heard any of those frustrations from republicans even if it's off the record? have you heard any of those frustrations from any of them at this point? >> well, as you know, the republicans in washington for the most part, they've been bullied. president trump has his bully

stick on them. let me say, in terms of chris krebs' firing, this was someone that president trump put into office and said do your job. he did his job by saying we've looked at the elections, and as far as we can tell, the elections were fine. well, the president said no, i don't think they were, i think they were fraudulent. but he said, we have spent millions of dollars building an intelligence system to look at what foreign actors are doing, rogue nations, all that. and reverend al, he came with the report that was joined by other people and got fired for telling the truth. now, what that does for us, it puts us in the crosshairs between russia, china, and iran,

because they now know that we have some vulnerabilities that can be basically taken advantage of simply because this president is acting irresponsibly by firing the people who are maintaining our cybersecurity system. so -- >> and when you say the crosshairs, that's an extremely dangerous position for us as a nation to be in. >> no question. every day, russia is trying to penetrate our cyber systems. that's documented. iran is our enemy. north korea, china. but this is part of that intelligence apparatus that we put together in homeland security along with cia and others to try to protect us so that their agency, who is tasked with the responsibility of

protecting america from foreign actors, is now at risk because the president is in disagreement with the person he put there. >> wow. you know, i had your congressional black caucus colleague congresswoman val demings here on the show yesterday. this week the cbc criticized mitch mcconnell for allowing relief to languish. the cbc says it needs to happen by christmas. i would like to hear your own words, congressman, what kind of pain you're anticipating in your district, on the mississippi delta, which is overwhelmingly black, and one of the if not the poorest region in the nation, what kind of pain is this going to be on your citizens when it

is just languishing in the senate, when this act has been passed by the congress months ago and this is what the cbc has been raising? >> honestly, the h.e.r.o.e.s. act would be substantial in my district. it would prevent landlords from evicting tenants. it would prevent utility companies from cutting off utilities. it would extend unemployment insurance to those individuals who have been unfortunate in trying to find a job. so there are a lot of basic bread and butter type issues that we address in this. this is not enough of a piece of legislation. this gets down to the nitty-gritty of survival. this is what we're trying to do. we're in the midst of a pandemic. unemployment, as you know, is on the way up again. so at the worst moment, here we

are headed into the holiday season, and our republican colleagues are acting like the grinch who stole christmas, simply by denying opportunities for people who need help. >> now, let me go to some political stuff for a minute. we're anticipating the first biden cabinet picks this week. his incoming chief of staff ron klain saying this morning that we'll have those names on tuesday. we already know the biden transition team is on pace to be the most diverse ever, nearly half of them of color, more than half are women, and that includes top staffers. and he's attacking systemic racism in our economy with several key advisers. given all that cbc talent recently tapped to help mr. biden, kamala harris, cedric richmond, please tell us what

job have you been offered, mr. chairman, if any. will you be part of this new administration or will you stay the roaring lion of the congress? >> well, i will be right here as chair of the homeland security committee. i am comfortable making sure that i help keep people and hold them accountable. we call ourselves in the congressional black caucus, reverend al, the conscience of congress. but also we are the congress of everything. we do things and say things that other people can't. that's why we get elected. here is a good example. here is a seahorse district in houston, texas. you can see it goes all around. and this is a republican district that was drawn by a republican legislature to make sure that this republican keeps

staying in congress. we have to fix this. this is a seahorse district. it has no continuity at all. so we have to do that. we have men and women who are in the criminal justice system. when a person serves their time, they should be made whole. >> right. >> but in this country, if you are convicted of certain crimes, you lose your right to vote. well, if i do my time, then i should be made whole again. but worse than that, reverend, if i am fortunate to pick up a skill in prison and come out, then the law will prevent me from having a license, because i'm a convicted felon. there are so many things that are against us in this country. and that's why i along with others think we have to be

there. the biden administration is purporting to be as diverse. i'm convinced they will be. but, you know, we have to look at them. i'm told that the civil rights community is looking forward to having its opportunity to sit down and talk with president biden and vice president harris, to talk about their concerns. sometimes people get sidetracked. they'll meet with education, they'll meet with health care, they'll meet with financial services. but sometimes civil rights gets overlooked. and i think you and others understand that we have to keep civil rights on the front burner. >> oh, yeah. >> one of the other things the congressional black caucus will be talking about, in this country there is a comfort level that our white brothers sometimes look for.

so they want to pick black people who they are comfortable with. but sometimes those black people are not the individuals that the black community support. >> that's right. >> so we need to have that kind of conversation with our friends to say, look, if you recognize that if it were not for the black community, if it were not for the divine nine, if it was not for the religious community, if it was not for the hit forically blafor ical historically black colleges, we would not have defeated donald trump. >> that's right. >> then bring us to the table and let's talk about how we make this happen. >> and i might add, as we're out of time, you're absolutely right, and we asked for those commitments in advance, that was committed to, and we will have that conversation, because that was the basis of our going

forward, telling people to come out and vote, and we turned out the vote. promises made is promises kept and we intend to hold people accountable even and especially our friends. you are right on as you always are. congressman bennie thompson, thank you for being with us. >> thank you, reverend al. as the pandemic continues to ravage communities across the united states, the news of two possible vaccines on the horizon represents a rare bright spot. but new york governor andrew cuomo is sounding the alarm, pointing out that the federal plan for vaccine distribution will leave behind communities of color who have been hardest hit by covid-19. joining me now is steve benjamin, mayor of columbia, south carolina. thank you for being with us this evening, mr. mayor. >> thank you, good to see you, brother. >> let me go right to the point. cases in south carolina are spiking along with the rest of the country. how concerned are you about the

most marginalized folks in columbia in the lead-up to a vaccine being made available? >> we've been very clear that we're following data, and the data has shown us across this country that african-americans followed closely by native americans are two times as likely as white americans and asian-americans to die from covid-19. so we've been very intentional, obviously, hopefully, we can build confidence in people possibly taking the vaccine. but the vaccine should be made available first to first responders who can provide medical care to the rest of us who need it, those who are at highest risk of exposure and those who are at the highest risk of complication if they get ill. we would nant to make sure when made broadly available, that it's broadly available in our

vulnerable communities and rural communities who are hit doubly hard. >> the president and his legal team keep alleging widespread fraud in democratic cities with large black populations while accepting results in mostly white areas. for example just now "the washington post" is reporting that president trump's campaign is trying to invalidate tens of thousands of votes in the state of wisconsin, specifically in the state's two democratic leaning counties. how do these accusations by the president's campaign affect black voters in your city and in your state? >> rev, you've known me for a long time. i'm a refined southern gentleman now, my parents raised a fighter. we know have to fight every single day. this american republic, the one

that was almost an apartheid state from 1865 to 1965, we have to fight every day to recognize the blood, sweat, and tears of those who got us here. we have to make sure we preserve that for your grandchildren and my children. we have to fight every single day. the reality is that the american people made a choice. we've got to make sure every single vote is counted. people have to stand up and make sure that regardless of where you are in the country, you've got to be involved in this fight to continue to create this more perfect union that we all aspire to. we're not there yet, but we have to fight on through this trumpism and this attempt to devalue our voices and our votes. we can't let this happen in georgia in this runoff. >> we also have to make sure that as we go, we hold people accountable, as we just talked with congressman thompson, chairman thompson, and i know

you, i've known boltith of you long time. it's not to help our friends' careers, it's to help our communities and all communities get treated fairly and we are just as hard on accountability with our friends as we are with adversaries. >> we've got to be, boss. 2020 is a heck of a year. the greatest pandemic since 1918. the greatest economic destruction in an election year since 1932 or 1876, depending on which historian you talk to. and the greatest social unrest around systemic racism and police violence since 1968, all wrapped into one. this is a time to stand up and figure out how our friends, who will now assume power, and i'm so thankful for joe biden and kamala harris, but how do we turn this pain and passion into real progress that helps us move forward. >> that's right. thank you so much for being with us, mayor steve benjamin.

coming up, inside another donald trump con job. this time he's milking the wallets of his most devout supporters with the claim they could help overturn the election. but first, my colleague richard lui with today's other top stories. >> good afternoon, rev. stories we're watching for you this hour, the u.s. now hitting over 12 million confirmed coronavirus cases this week. this has pressed lawmakers to roll out new restrictions in cities from new york to chicago. the cdc releasing guidelines thanksgiving travel this past thursday. they're saying stay home, resist traveling long distances for large family feasts. hundreds of protesters broke into and set fire to the congressional building in guatemala. they're against the president and lawmakers who approved a budget cut that slashed health and educational spending. spain's famous flea market

has reopened, making it one of the handful of flea markets across europe to be allowed to reopen during the pandemic. it's limited to 50% customer capacity, 50% of sellers opened on alternating weekends. police are using drones to monitor crowd control. it comes after spain was hit hard bit virus with more than 1.5 million cases. more "politicsnation" with reverend al sharpton after the break. #1 for diabetic dry skin* #1 for psoriasis symptom relief* and #1 for eczema symptom relief* gold bond champion your skin

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for today's gotcha, i want to speak to the issue of loyalty. with trump, loyalty only goes one way. you should think long and hard before you give him your hard-earned money. donald trump has been perfecting the art of the steal for

decades. he had to pay a $25 million settlement for cheating people with his fake university. allegations of money laundering at his atlantic city casinos. and years of unpaid bills for construction, upkeep, service at his hotels, golf courses and other properties. and the grift certainly didn't stop when he moved into the white house. this man talks a big game about donating his presidential salary. but that money pales in comparison to the literal millions of dollars in taxpayer money he has been funneling into trump properties over the last four years. his latest gambit is a desperate attempt to convince you, his most ardent supporters, that your donations to his legal fund can somehow overturn an election that he lost by over 6 million votes. aside from being blatant, and

being a blatant attack as well on democracy, the fundraising effort is just another scam. fine print on the donation form reveals that donors would have to give over $8,000 for any money to make it into the recount fund. anything less than that gets funneled into a dark money super pac with no accountability, or towards paying off campaign debt. but say you love trump that much, you give more than $8,000. so your money actually goes into supporting some of these doomed legal actions. $20,000 a day of that cash is going straight to the pocket of rudy giuliani, a man so inept that he didn't know the difference between the four seasons hotel and a philadelphia

landscaping company, who can't even use hair dye without a literal meltdown. rudy's a terrible investment, sure. but there was no widespread voter fraud, because the corruption is coming from inside the house, the white house, that is. donald trump is scamming his supporters out of thousands of dollars and they still stand by him. like this man who said, quote, if i'm being manipulated by trump, then he's the greatest con man that ever lived in america. finally trump supporters and i can agree on something. and to the trump fans out there who are determined to keep standing by their man, well, it's a free country. you can waste your money on anything you please. but keep in mind, this time he's gotcha. i wanted to help protect myself. my doctor recommended eliquis.

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this summer, in the midst of

a global pandemic, the united states had yet another reckoning with its original sickness, racism. hundreds of thousands of us rallied across the country and even traveled to washington for the commitment march martin luther king iii and i called, demanding to end systemic racism. and while there is a long way to go, our collective voices seem to have made an impact, most recently with the announcement that the american medical association will recognize racism as a public health threat and that the promise that the organization will take steps to mitigate racial inequality in the health care system. joining me now is a board member of the american medical association. thank you for being with us tonight. >> thank you, reverend. >> let me go right to this, you

said that this move is, quote, a step in the right direction toward advancing equity in public health. what would that equity look like and what steps will the ama take to get there? >> right now what we have said is that racism is indeed a public health threat, racism of any type, whether we're talking about systemic, cultural, or interpersonal. we're looking at how it's impacting health equity and also creating a barrier to appropriate medical care. our policy is to acknowledge that racism and unconscious bias leads to more c-sections in minority mothers. we have less pain medicine going to our black and brown kids relative to others. and we want to encourage more

educational curriculums to show our medical students and our practicing doctors how to promote a greater understanding of how the public health threat of racism is influencing our medical decisions via unconscious bias. >> in the midst of this pandemic, the ama has had to spend time correcting misinformation from the president himself. how has this impacted the organization's ability to combat covid-19? >> it is a constant everyday issue for us to make sure we get the right information out to the public. we recognize with all they have going on, we know that covid has ripped a band-aid off of health care and revealed the fact that we have a lot of underlying health disparities and it shows there is a disproportionate impact on black and brown people.

they're suffering from covid as well as many other chronic diseases and we need to make sure that when we start focusing on providing quality care, that we then focus on these communities that have been marginalized. >> and the significance of that is, yes, we're disproportionately impacted by covid and that is clearly disproportionately leading to deaths and illness in our communi communities. if you look at health infirmi infirmities across the board, we're overindexed in many areas, and not because we're careless or reckless, but because of systemic racism. and final aca is addressing that. >> yes. one of the things that we're doing, that needs to be done across the country, in chicago, the west side united is an effort by the ama along with other organizations to put $2 million into this community to try to narrow the 17-year

lifespan gap between people in low income areas versus their downtown neighbors in downtown chicago. we're trying to provide programs that will provide financing for business projects that will provide job creation and educational programs. it needs more than us focusing just on the health, because all of these things, these social determinants of health impact people's health and racism is at the bottom of that as well. >> and ama will be pushing for concrete ways to deal with how we alleviate these problems, not just issuing statements and putting out press releases or tweets, but concrete ways to really deal with equal health services which will save lives that are disproportionately impacted. >> absolutely. we're declaring racism a public

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when white america gets a cold, black america catches pneumonia. these way my fellow clergy members have framed just how devastating coronavirus, this pandemic, has been to black americans. racial health disparities have been ingrained in america's medical system for a long time. but consequences of it have created deadly outcomes for black communities across the country. the disproportionate impact of the virus has had on black americans, both physically and financially, has been staggering. now fellow black clergy leaders, myself included, have wrestled with this and have come together in many ways to create an action plan. i remember reverend dr. w. franklin richardson on this show talked about we've got to deal with this. and one lady has come together and brought us together with

something called choose healthy life, which we hope will instill trust inside the black community to get tested, get help, and find resources so we can help fight this pandemic together. joining me now is the founder of choose healthy life and founder of the national black leadership commission on aids and the reverend dr. calvin butts, senior pastor of the abyssinian baptist church of new york city and co-chairman of the black clergy health leadership council. let me go to you first, deborah. in the midst of -- as i stated, dr. richardson and i talking, one of our churches in harlem near house of justice, had a lot of deaths. you called me and we talked about what you have seen as a way to really deal with testing,

which was not happening equally. what are the goals and objectives for choose healthy life? how did this project come into being for those listening who are just hearing about it because it will be officially launched tomorrow? >> yes. well, rev, we wanted to make testing more accessible to the community because we have testing deserts in our community. our community doesn't have the widest range of testing available. we had to make that happen. we needed to deal with contact tracing and allow for some cultural competency to be a part of us doing outreach to people who are infected who may have infected others in our community so that we can get to them and help them and help them isolate and services dealing with isolation. but the story here, reverend, is that the ministers are coming together. i came to you initially and i came to reverend butts because

the two of you together represent some of the best that our community has to offer. you in the mold of a civil rights icon like a martin luther king, a minister with all of that that you have to offer, and reverend butts, the icon in the mold as pastor of an historic black church and educated himself in the mold of a benjamin mays. together there's a power there that's going to save our community and bring us forward. we also brought in ministers from new york city, from atlanta, from detroit, newark, washington, d.c. all of which will be a part of being in the leadership of this initiative, because we have decided that it is time to save ourselves, because no one else will save us. >> reverend butts, let me go to you on that point, save

ourselves. you as a leading faith leader in this country and as deborah said, a pastor of an historic church, and we've seen members of the clergy in new york who had covid-19 and struggled with it. members of the clergy themselves have to deal with it. but explain to the nation, why is the black church and black clergy mobilize ongoing this front? >> first of all, thank you for allowing us to be on the show to present choose healthy life and thank you for joining us as a co-chair of this very important project. the black church has always been and remains, remains, the first line of defense almost again st any attack on our community and especially in this arena of covid-19. many years ago now, more than

two decades, i joined with deborah fraser-house in the fight against hiv/aids and we formed the black leadership commission on aids. we traveled the nation, speak to go ministers, congregations, and communities. we partnered with churches and religious leaders to address this along with our political and health leaders, members of the congress as well as the national medical association. and so the church once again, because we are the most trusted organization still in our communities, has to come to the forefront and fight this dreaded disease. if we don't, no one will. it has always been that way. we've had historically to bury our own dead. we had to build our own churches. we had to advocate for civil and human rights. you yourself know, reverend sharpton, if we had not been at

the vanguard of the civil rights struggle, none of the others in this nation would have been able to move forward. martin luther king jr. and his nonviolent marching brought down the walls. when the walls came down, it wasn't just us who ran across the road. it was women, it was jewish americans, it was latinos, everybody ran across. but it was martin luther king jr., medgar evers, it was those types who lost their lives. john lewis beaten down into the ground, but alongside of him marched abraham joshua heshua and others. the church has to take the lead and are doing so once again. >> deborah, dr. butts mentioned abraham joshua heshua, i

remember jesse jackson took me to meet him to hear what he was talking about. black americans carry distrust in the medical system due to deeply ingrained racism seen throughout our nation's history. what are you doing to instill trust back into the black community to go see covid-19 testing when it's needed? >> well, ergo the two of you, and the five ministers that you have both brought together to move things forward. this is the way that this has to be done. our leadership host take their rightful place in this fight against this insidious disease. we're dealing with warfare here and the enemy is covid-19. so we need the warriors of our community to do this. and one of the things that we're going to do is deal with some advocacy issues. we need the leadership to speak to the people in power, the

people that have our lives in their hands, instead of speaking at us. >> right. >> speak to us and give us a seat at the table so that we can make some decisions about the way that we're going to -- we cannot continue this way. we've got over 12 million cases, 256 deaths in the last ten months. and in some cases 60% of those are african-americans. this has to stop now. >> dr. butts, i want to give you the last word. i think that with 256,000 deaths and these millions of people infected, and our community disproportionate, if we cannot as faith leaders come across denominational lines and whatever petty political differences and egos and whatever and stand up now, then none of us are faithful to our calling. as pastor mike waron says to me, if now is not the time, i don't

know if we'll ever see the time. i think that's what you said to the clergy as we did the zoom call the other day. we've got to stand up to define what our ministries are really about or whether we really believe what we proclaim. >> no question about it, claim. >> no question about it, reverend sharpton. and more so, i want to say that we've done it before. again, the church has been in the forefront. we've done it before and we can do it again. we did it with hiv/aids. we did with voting rights. we've done it with so many other things. and the lord has been on our side. and the lord is still on our side in this fight. now it's going to take some practical things. we have partners, we have dr. tom frieden, who is resolved to save lives, supported by bill and melinda gaetes and and so we're going to be responsible,

but that's how we know that the lord is on our side. and we're going to win this. and we have some dynamic preachers like yourself working with us to make this happen. and if god did it before, the lord will do it again. and i can close on this, won't he do it? of course he will. >> all right. doing a little preaching today. all right, thank you both for bringing this out, this is your first appearance announcing it and doing it on the show. i appreciate that. dr. debra fraser-howze and dr. butz, thank you both for being with us. up next, my final thoughts, stay with us. up next, my final thoughts, stay with us. our adversaries aren't waiting.

the coronavirus isn't waiting. the economy isn't waiting. america shouldn't have to wait, either. the american people have spoken. the result is clear. it's time to move forward. and get to work. ♪ oh, oh, (announcer)®! ♪ once-weekly ozempic® is helping many people with type 2 diabetes like emily lower their blood sugar. a majority of adults who took ozempic® reached an a1c under 7 and maintained it. here's your a1c. oh! my a1c is under 7!

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helping me reach my blood sugar goal. ♪ oh, oh, oh, ozempic®! ♪ you may pay as little as $25 for a 1-month or 3-month prescription. ask your health care provider today about once-weekly ozempic®. ♪ you can count on me ♪ i'll be home for christmas ♪ if only in my dreams ♪ that's why we've merged with sprint.get more. ♪ if only in my dreams now it's about to get even better. and as we work to integrate sprint's network, our nationwide 5g keeps getting stronger. with the capacity and coverage to reach more people

and places across the country. who says you can't have it all. now is the time for 5g. now is the time to join t-mobile. thursday is thanksgiving day and cdc has advised people not to travel. as we give thanks another year, we do it amidst a deadly pandemic and i beg of you to follow those health advisories that have been put out. if you love your family, keep them safe. for the last 28 years, national action network and i have given out and had free meals and dinners at our headquarters in holland, we would not do indoor dining. we will do hot meals, but we will distance people and only have up to ten serve at a time

and have people keep going out. because even if you have to do good and you should, you must do it safely. reckless is not giving thanks. happy thanksgiving. be safe and keep others safe. i'll be right back. thers safe i'll be right back this holiday season,

it's all about the bedroom. and with caspers black friday sale, you can save up to 30% and make yours a winter slumberland. the fluffiest down duvet you'll ever feel, soft and light percale sheets, a cool, supportive mattress and plush pillows, even our glow light for better sleep.

and that does it for me. thanks for watching. i'll see you back here next weekend at 5:00 p.m. eastern. up next, my colleague, alicia

menendez picks up our news coverage. >> thanks, reverend sharpton. hello, everyone. i'm alicia menendez. tonight, closing in on a cabinet. we are just hours from learning who joe biden wants in his inner circle when he takes the reins in less than 60 days. tonight, the names being talked about and the power they bring to the table. plus, the race to georgia's runoffs. jon ossoff is here tonight. how he and democrats plan to take down their unified republican opponents in a race that will ultimately decide control of the senate. and in turn, how much of joe biden's campaign platform can become policy. also tonight, the super spreader threat. covid is raging coast-to-coast, and now, just days to thanksgiving, new warnings tonight about the risk you face if you plan to feast with the family. this is "american voices."