tv MSNBC Live MSNBC December 25, 2020 8:00am-9:00am PST
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physically inside it. are you asking me was there another explosion this morning? >> reporter: do you believe there may be another vehicle where there may have been another explosion or just that one vehicle at this time? >> we're not aware of any other attempted explosion, no. >> reporter: do you know where this vehicle -- >> that's all part of our investigation. as you all know, there are cameras throughout the downtown area. we're trying to look at footage and see exactly what the cameras might tell us. [ inaudible question ] >> i don't know that. if there could have been something and maybe some windows breaking, shattering. i don't know of any other explosions. [ inaudible question ] >> there are several buildings that have experienced damage on second avenue north.
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>> reporter: shots fired call, we don't have it confirmed yet that shots were fired. >> you are correct. you are correct. we'll see you back here at noon. >> all right, everybody. that was just an update from the metro police in nashville. i'm going to tell you a little bit about what was said before we bring in our team here. to catch everybody up to speed, there was a suspicious vehicle in the downtown nashville area early this morning. a first responder looked inside this rv, decided to call it in as a potential bomb. the rv then exploded at 6:30 in the morning while first responders were on their way. the second avenue area, it's a tourist area in downtown nashville, it has suffered significant damage as you can see there. many buildings and businesses are damaged. the atf and the fbi are on the
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ground, on the scene. they have sealed off the downtown area. police dogs are searching the area. these are explosion detection dogs. they're looking for -- if there might be another device. they don't think there is. but they're looking, nonetheless. they're searching buildings in that area and looking at camera footage that might tell a little bit more about who did this. the interesting thing here -- and maybe this can allude to why any injury is significant by why there are so few here, three people were taken to the hospital. people were able to evacuate out of this area. there was enough time to get people out. one person was walking their dog, but some of the people who live in the apartments in that area were able to be escorted out, evacuated prior to the explosion. there was an officer who was knocked to the ground as a result of the explosion. that officer has suffered what they hope to be temporary hearing loss. i want to bring in gadi schwartz as well as clinton watts.
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i'm joined on the phone by jim kavanaugh, a retired atf special agent and terrorism contributor. gadi, we'll start with you. what more do we know about what happened? what blanks can we fill in at this point? >> reporter: at some point it seems like they had a shots fired call that may have been unrelated to this. it almost was a circumstance that prevented things from getting a lot worse. that shots fired call in the area led to police responding to that area around second street and that's when they were looking for people to interview or to question about those shots fired, that's when they stumbled above this rv. for some reason, we're hoping to get details a little bit later. for some reason, what was inside that rv or what was on the outside of that rv gave them enough pause to call in the bomb
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squad. we understand that there were several police that were there on scene blocking off the area, waiting for the bomb squad to arrive near that rv when the rv actually exploded. we keep hearing that police believe this was an intentional act. there was something in that rv that made them suspicious enough to call the bomb squad. as you mentioned, they may have saved somebody's life. there was a man walking his dog down the sidewalk as authorities there tell it and an officer stopped him from walking near the rv before that rv exploded. that rv explosion knocked back one officer. so far, those three injuries are the only injuries we know of and there are about 20 buildings in the area that the mayor is saying was damaged. so it's an interesting circumstance that led up to police being at the right place at the right time and cordoning off that area before that explosion happened. but it's going to be up to
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investigators who are now on scene to figure out exactly why that rv exploded and how it exploded at that moment when officers were all around it. again, this happened at around 6:30 in the morning in downtown nashville. and we understand that the fbi and atf are already on scene. >> frank, let's bring you into this. this obviously is a tragedy and three families aren't going to be able to have christmas dinner at home unless they get released early. how was such a disaster averted here? but these quick actions of first responders prevented this from becoming even more disastrous. >> as has been said, the shots fired call brought law enforcement into the area. as they're doing their normal routine work, they come upon this vehicle. what i'm fascinated by is the
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speed with which we've heard an official statement that this looks like it was intentional. we've heard the use of the word "bomb." this is extremely significant. you don't usually hear this kind of conclusion this early in the investigation. so as has been said, was it something on the outside of the recreational vehicle? was it something in plain view, once they peered in the window? was there a note on the window? was the license plate run and it came back from a known or suspicious actor. what was it that caused them to start evacuation and call for the bomb squad? all of this quick action with a very smart, adept police department is all to be praised. now the investigation in ernest begins and it's going to happen on the immediate investigation to find out who did this and whether they are still outstanding and there are other
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conspirators and then on the intelligence level in the background they're going to be doing everything from where did this vehicle come from? what's the license plate? was it rented? was it owned? where is the security cameras in the area? what do we know about this person that belongs to this vehicle? and all of those gaps are going to be filled in. the joint terrorism task force, the multiagency partnership, they have their christmas canceled. they're going to be working this. and they'll get to this fairly quickly is my guess. >> clint, i want to bring you into the conversation right now. the nashville mayor was asked in a briefing whether it appeared intentional, the timing of the detonation. the fact that it was 6:30 in the morning on christmas morning. nobody was outside. and the mayor said, i don't know, that's what the investigation is for and we'll learn that from the courts as well. >> yeah, i think what's really interesting is that law enforcement was already there, right? they were moving there based on
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what could be an unrelated call. we don't know regarding the shots fired. this is the tourism area which is also strange. i think it speaks to a motive that they'll run down here within the day. it's curious that the detonation occurred right when the law enforcement officers were there, right? when they were around it. so this is a better question for jim kavanaugh, probably, when you get a chance to talk to him, how did they detonate this device? we talked in the previous segment about was someone inside this vehicle that did a detonation inside of it, or was it a command and control kind of detonation based on who was around it or it being discovered? so i think that's very curious and will be something we got to look at and it makes me wonder if that's why they've gone to this intentional act language saying they think it was very much premeditated or preplanned. that makes you wonder, was there an event coming up later in the
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day in this area? was there a specific reason they wanted to be down here on christmas morning? or is it just a personal motive of someone having a grievance where they want to conduct an act to draw attention to themselves on christmas morning? it is an interesting scenario that's sort of playing out and i'm thrilled that law enforcement was there and did everything exactly right in terms of clearing the area and probably protecting and saving a lot of lives here on christmas morning. >> certainly so. jim kavanaugh, we'll throw it to you since your name was evoked by clint there. i want you to react to some of the things that clint brought up and i want to ask you about police dogs searching the area. and they're explosion detection dogs. talk to us about what they're trained to detect and why they're doing such a thorough search and whether that's indicative of whether there could be more devices. >> when we go to these scenes,
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we always sweep for secondaries. that's on the top of the mind of all of us. is the device just meant to lure others in? we have to sweep for secondary devices. i like to say you have to -- when you hear an explosion, don't run toward it. take cover, there could be another. and we always prepare for that. we've had entrapment devices. i've had them over many years, eric rudolph is a famous one who planted a device to kill others, whether law enforcement or -- >> explain what you mean there, an entrapment device. >> well, one device goes off, emergency, fire, police, ambulance, investigators respond. and then the killers wait. the bombers wait. when there's a lot of police on the scene, then they detonate a second device. it's common in the war theaters of the mideast. we've seen some entrapment devices here.
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the ira used it as a tactic for years. and we have to always be alert -- >> by the way -- >> we don't know that that's what's happening here. it's something that's almost always done. atf maintains an explosion detection k-9 training center in virginia. thanks to all of the members of congress who have supported that over the years. it takes a lot of money, manpower and k-9s to train these dogs extensively and the atf k-9s, we think, the best in the world. once they're trained, they never eat again in their life unless they find explosive. they're very motivated to find explosions. those dogs will be there. they'll use them to sweep for secondaries. and they can find residue of explosives from far-plflung pies
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of shrapnel or check on other suspicious items. it's part of the team of investigators. what happens here is the leverage and expertise of every department is put together. fbi and atf put bomb scene investigators in there, but they also put white-collar investigators out there and intelligence analysts out there. they do the same things together and that's what makes it so powerful. and i don't want to leave out the metropolitan police. they put their bomb squad, intelligence unit, white-collar detectives, and that's what makes it all come together quickly. the question here is, you asked it, if i was commanding it, i would be asking those questions, where's the operator of the vehicle? why did he stop at this location? is there other devices? was there a different target?
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was this the place he wanted to detonate it or was he going somewhere else? i've had many cases where the bomber's vehicle just breaks. he can make a bomb, but he doesn't maintain his vehicle very well. all of a sudden, he's out of money and his car doesn't start on a cold morning. was he going somewhere else? and then the police come and then he's forced to activate his plan. and, you know, there's many cases like that. eric rudolph in birmingham when he killed a birmingham police officer, he detonated it when the police arrived because they were going to find and uproot his bomb. that could be the motive for the instant of the detonation when the police arrived too. or was it remotely detonated? it's possible?
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was the bomber inside the vehicle? possible. there's a lot of unanswered questions here. and, you know, hopefully they're going to get a lot of those by the end of christmas day. the bomb scene investigation is going to take a number of days. it's not going to be finished today. it's probably going to take the better part of the vehicle just to get the scene completed while the white col-collar side of th investigation is going to see just what they have. it's going to come into focus as the days tick. >> we're still looking at a live shot right now of downtown nashville. we can see first responders there still on the scene. thank you all very much. we'll keep a close eye on this story as we get further developments. coming up, it has been a busy holiday. it's still a holiday. and it has been a busy one in american politics. and if the threatens to veto
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welcome back. we are keeping our eye on the breaking news out of nashville and we'll bring you any update on the explosion that police say was intentional as soon as we have it. let's turn to what's ahead for the final week of the year, which may be the most trying in recent memory on capitol hill. congress is facing a potential presidential veto of its covid relief bill which could delay financial aid to struggling workers and shut down the government on monday. another potentially devastating blow for americans hit hard by the pandemic. nancy pelosi says the house will vote on a bill to increase the size of direct payments to millions of americans from $600 to $2,000. democrats say they're doing what president trump is demanding. here's house majority leader. as for the president, he's
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spending christmas at mar-a-lago. the covid relief/government funding bill has been sent to the president. he could sign it or veto it at any time. joining us now is our own josh lederman. josh, first off, before we get to all of that, has the president been briefed on what's going on in nashville? >> reporter: he has. we just got word via the white house spokesman that the president has been briefed on this explosion in nashville and will also continue to get regular updates throughout the day. white house spokesman telling me that the president is grateful for the incredible first responders and praying for those who are injured. the president is currently on his golf course here in the west palm beach area. he was spotted along with senator lindsay graham of south carolina, one of his golf partners for today. but the president can get
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regular updates from his team wherever he's at. the white house saying they will be keeping him abreast of this developing situation in tennessee. >> let's go to the covid relief negotiations. the president had no part in those negotiations. he blew up to the deal when it was reached and left town. are republicans as frustrated with him as democrats are? >> reporter: republicans are even more frustrated with democrats, if that's possible for a couple of reasons. first of all, democrats have long wanted direct payments to americans that would be higher than the $600 that they essentially agreed to because they thought that was what president trump would support. and so that's why you saw democrats try yesterday to quickly move through legislation to approve those $2,000 that the president wanted calling his bluff. the other thing is, nobody wants the government to shut down. nobody wants americans to lose covid relief. i think there's a sense of bemusement from contracts seeing
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so many of their colleagues twisting in the wind because of their own president trump who -- to whom they have been so loyal for the last four years now putting them in a difficult position after so many of them just voted for this piece of legislation. >> so the president has the bill on his desk right now. do you have any idea of whether he's going to sign it or veto it? >> well, you're absolutely right. the president now has in hand the final version of this covid relief measure. it was flown here to south florida on an airplane last night after finishing the enrollment process in congress. but the fact that it's in the president's hands doesn't mean we have any better sense of what he's going to do. the white house continues not to say whether the president will actually veto it, whether he might sign it. but the hope from both democrats and republicans at this point is that the president will back down from that threat and sign this legislation clearing the path for all of that relief to go to americans in the next couple of days. >> josh lederman, thank you.
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with me now is kim shryer. she's the only female doctor in congress right now. thank you for spending part of your christmas morning with us. i want to take a look at some of the programs, protections that are set to expire without this new covid relief deal, expanded unemployment benefits, eviction protections, federal student loan deferral. what does the country look like a month from now if nothing gets done by a week from now? >> merry christmas and thank you for having me. this is terrible. this is terrible for my constituents and for americans across the country. i'll tell you, this is devastating. we've negotiated for months to get a package that would appease republicans and democrats that we could get through. we had secretary mnuchin
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representing the president and this monkey wrench has thrown in so much uncertainty and panic about what's going to happen, whether people will be able to stay in their apartment past the end of this month. >> democrats and the president both want larger stimulus checks. what's more of a priority at this point, getting money to your constituents quickly, those $600 checks, or making sure your constituents get more money, potentially those $2,000 checks when we don't really know if there's support for it in the senate? >> obviously, more is better. but anything will help. and so getting a check for $600 per family member for eligible families plus getting that unemployment support, which frankly is probably even more important because it targets those who are most in need. i would love to get through the bill that we passed earlier this week and i think if the
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president wants to seal his legacy as a generous man who helps the people who voted for him, he could give this christmas present today to the people in this country and change his perception. and perhaps he will decide to do that. >> sounds like you're almost talking to him as if you might think he's watching. maybe appealing to his good nature. as a physician you're stressing the importance right now of covid testing. while the vaccine is being distributed and administered, do you worry right now that americans have taken their focus off of testing because of all of this good news of the vaccine? >> i hope not. it's going to be a long time until we're all vaccinated. many, many months. we're seeing disasters. look at california right now. everywhere in this country, the pandemic is exploding. we don't even know how much of this is due to the new variant
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that we have seen in the uk and that may well be here already. and so it has just made masking, distancing, not gathering indoors all the more important. and i have to tell you that, you know, a lot of us who have been talking for quite a while now about how important it would be to have a home, in expensive coronavirus test that you could take everyday or every other day. think about children going to school. we want them back in in-person school. if you could check your child every day, imagine how safe our schools would be. and that -- that's really key to opening restaurants, opening the economy and it is doable. we are seeing these tests get approved and the price points come down. >> that would provide a lot of peace of mind. before we let you go, we had a guest on earlier in the show and he was an er doctor in california and he said many of the hospitals he's talking to,
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specifically the children's hospitals, are being converted into covid wards. you are a pediatrician and we know that those kids who need treatment will be going to other facilities. how worrisome is that to you? >> this is incredibly worrisome. we're not only hearing that children's hospitals are being repurposed, we're hearing about patients who are in hallways, in operating rooms, even i think in a gift shop trying to get care. this is a disaster. it puts doctors, you know, already in a position of going to work every day exposing themselves, putting their families at risk, now in a position to really have to choose who lives and who dies which really means choosing who dies when you have to decide who gets a ventilator. i want to just remind everybody out there about this, fundamentally in many ways, this is still a preventable illness if you do all the right things.
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the vast majority of the time. this is not meant to make people feel, you know, bad or talking down to. there are things we can do to protect ourselves, our loved ones, and the medical community. and so staying home for the holidays, however difficult it is, it is the right thing to do. >> congresswoman, merry christmas. >> merry christmas. >> thank you. more on the breaking news out of nashville, we've got new video showing how powerful that explosion was. keep it here. is now a good timere for a flare-up? enough, crohn's. for adults with moderate to severe crohn's or ulcerative colitis, stelara® can provide relief, and is the only approved medication to reduce inflammation on and below the surface of the intestine in uc.
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welcome back. more now on that breaking news on that early morning explosion in downtown nashville. here's what we know. there was reports of a shooting, first responders were already on the scene. they found a suspicious-looking rv. one of the first responders approached the vehicle, noticed something suspicious, called it in. people in the area were evacuated and moments after at 6:30 in the morning local time there was an explosion at that rv. three people were injured. we expect another update from police in about 90 minutes from
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now. but we have video of the explosion just in captured bay security camera. it's in a business called the nash collection. it's about a five-minute block from the address police gave us. let's go ahead and watch that. >> you can hear the blast. you can see the flash in the upper right hand of the corner. we're replaying it now. joining me on the phone is former director of the national counterterrorism center. nick, thank you so much for joining us on christmas morning, no less, talk to us about what you're seeing and hearing from that video from a business that's a good five-minute walk from where we believe that explosive device was detonated.
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>> thanks for having me on. obviously, it's an explosion of pretty significant magnitude. it's a bit of a blessing that there weren't further casualties or more loss of -- loss of life or more injuries to people involved. perhaps because it was so early in the morning. you don't have the street traffic that might have led to more injuries. but there's more questions than answers. and i'm sure law enforcement, the fbi, nashville police, atf are all working as quickly as they can to learn more about what might have led to this explosion. >> i realize this is going to be a tricky question. what is it that you think that first responders saw or maybe even heard approaching that rv to call it? >> it could be any number of any things. something as simple as a door being ajar on a vehicle or the classic idea that you might have of someone maybe seeing
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unexplained wire or a device that doesn't look normal attached to a vehicle. what it does tell us, you had some first responders that were very attentive and did a great job of identifying something -- identifying a threat and responding to it even without a tremendous, tremendous amount of information. that could well have saved some lives. >> absolutely likely saving lives. right now we're watching footage that we have from the scene. you can see the smoke billowing into the sky. this is downtown nashville here. second avenue is a tourist strip with restaurants and businesses. a lot of those businesses now sustaining damage to their buildings in the middle of a pandemic and economic calamity, no less. nick, talk to me about the quick actions of law enforcement here. we have potentially another event happening right before shots fired. but first responders were in the area. they quickly move and evacuate
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people out of the area before that explosion even ignites. >> that's exactly right. and, you know, it's way too early to know whether this was some kind of critical act or some kind of act of terrorism. we just don't know at this point. one of the things you worry about when you see first responders rush to a scene is that they could be in a sense targets themselves. terrorists in the past, in other countries have been known to create incidents that cause first responders to respond, to show up on the scene, and they themselves can become targets. so, again, we have nothing right now to suggest that that's what's happening here. as first responders do come into contact with people or vehicles or whatever at a potential crime scene, they always have to be careful and on guard to make sure they're not entering a zone of personal danger or taking whatever steps they need to keep themselves safe. that's one of those things our first responder community lives
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with every day. >> atf and fbi are on the scene. they're sweeping businesses there with explosion detection dogs. they have said there's no indication there is another device. you mentioned it's too early to indicate whether this is criminal or terrorist-related. police are saying they believe it's an intentional act. but talk to me right now about what investigates will look for to rule out an act of terror or point to that as a cause? >> well, investigators will be doing everything you would expect them to do forensically, running traces on who might have owned or driven that vehicle, you already mentioned access to closed circuit tv footage from one of the businesses. i suspect there's dozens of potential sources of cctv footage in that area and it will take sometime for fbi and law enforcement to work their way through all of that footage. all of that will help them build
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a picture, frame by frame, piece by piece. at the same time, fbi and nashville police will be going through their ongoing investigations to look and see is there anybody that they had concern about in the local nashville area from a critical perspective or a potential terrorism subject perspective. at any one time, a major field office like the national field office might have quite a number of active ongoing investigations into potential terrorism subjects. and so they'll certainly be reviewing all of that information and see if anybody leaps out at them as being a concern and they will run the ground any information they have that suggests it might be a terrorism-related event. >> that scene is so mangled. we don't know exactly what we're looking at there in the aftermath of the explosion. a lot of smoke, a lot of charred damage. nick, thank you so much for joining us on this developing
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welcome back. we learned last night that the cdc will require all air travelers from the united kingdom to test negative nor coronavirus before they can fly to the u.s. the new restrictions are set to go into effect monday. they're aimed at stopping the spread of a faster-spreading version of the virus in the uk. the testing requirement is less stringent than the ban that many other countries instituted this week. joining me now, an infectious disease epidemiologist and a professor at ucla. hello. merry christmas. thank you for joining us. >> merry christmas. >> let's go to a serious topic
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here. covid deaths, they're rising in 32 states. the death toll in l.a. county hit it its highest yesterday at 148. what happens when we already have hospitals that are on the brink and icus are already at capacity? what happens if there's a post christmas surge? >> we're in a situation where we already have, as you just said, a surge in cases and so we're going to have this surge upon a surge and then what happens, these hospitals are already overstretched. there are not enough beds. there are not enough beds in the icus. it's not just about beds, it's about the number of staff that are available to be able to provide care. what's starting to happen here is that these hospitals are starting to have plans for how they're going to ration care. one of the things that we already know here is there have been communications going out that have suggested to doctors if you have patients that have chronic problems, you can advise them unless it's absolutely
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necessary. please don't go to the emergency room. we're doing everything we can here in california to be able to reduce the burden on emergency rooms, to be able to make sure that there is enough space and enough people to care for patients that are going to be coming in. we know, just as we saw with thanksgiving that, cases are going to increase over time. people are getting together. we -- this virus is so ubiquitous in the community right now, it's not surprising. we've seen estimates that 1 between 60 and 80 people in l.a. county are walking around infected with koecovid-19 and capable of spreading it. the odds of coming in contact with someone who has covid-19 is quite high. >> talk to us about the new strain overseas and how concerning that is for you. a lot of health experts believe it's here spreading in the u.s. >> what we learned in this pandemic is an infection anywhere is an infection
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everywhere. i would bet that this variant is probably in the united states. it's not just this variant in the uk. we have a new variant that we've detected in south africa, there are other variants that have been detected in other places. and what this does, it highlights the importance of viral surveillance. we need to be doing this kind of genomic sequencing to identify cases. we haven't been looking here in the united states. so it's very likely that we have this variant and other variants that could potentially be doing the same thing right here in the u.s. already. so, you know, it's not surprising that we're finding these variants. this is an rna virus. it mutates rapidly. we know that. it highlights and underscores the importance of doing much more surveillance. >> talk to me about the physical and mental stress that doctors and nurses are under right now. so many health care workers are spending today, christmas, away from their families because they're working on the front lines of this pandemic and yet
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we see images like this, packed airports, people disregarding cdc calls to stay home. >> you know, these health care workers that are out there on the front lines are human. they're tired. they've been working at full speed for months now. and with no break. and really, you know, i think that people need to understand that the hospital system is only going to be able to sustain this for so long. we're already feeling these effects right here in california. but this is a problem not just here in california. it's a problem across the united states and globally. what everybody can do right now is to stay home, cancel any plans that you have, there's too much virus circulating in the community. it's likely that there is a variant here in the united states that is spreading -- that's more contagious which means we have to double down on our efforts, this variant in the uk, variant in south africa, there are probably other variants that are very similar.
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we haven't been looking. so we don't know. what we can do right now, wear a mask, social distance, hand hygiene. i know this is a mantra that people are glazing over when we say it. but that's what we can do to stop the spread, to keep people safe around you. we are going to see increasing numbers over time. the doctors and nurses, all of the first responders staff are tired here and so the care that you're going to get may be compromised because people can only do as much as they can do. it's not surprising. >> doctor, thank you for the work that you do and thank you for the message on christmas. we appreciate it. up next, the effort to help feed families ravaged by this pandemic. we'll speak with someone on the front lines of that fight. helping to prevent gum disease and bad breath. never settle for 25%. always go for 100. bring out the bold™
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honey? new nyquil severe honey is maximum strength cold and flu medicine with soothing honey-licious taste. nyquil honey. the nighttime, sniffling, sneezing, coughing, aching, stuffy head, fever best sleep with a cold medicine. as we wait for word on whether president trump will sign or veto the massive covid relief package, help can't come soon enough for millions of americans across the country, many now forced to turn to food banks for the first time this holiday season. by one estimate, 50 million americans including 17 million children are suffering from food insecurity this year. that's one in six people and one in four children. with me now, david kisselbach
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from the ymca in new jersey. they've already distributed 100,000 meals since the pandemic started. david, we obviously don't have quite as much time as we had planned for for this segment because of the breaking news, but we're happy to have you. i want to talk to you about the need here, you guys have been doing food drive events every tuesday since covid hit. about a month ago local outlets reported the lines were more than a mile long, some people waiting in line for seven hours. has demand increased in that time just in the last month? >> lindsey, thank you for having me and merry christmas. the scary part is since we started this, we were averaging 100 cars, 20 to 50,000 meals a week. and now every the last eight weeks we're averaging more than 500,000 meals since then. we're well over 200,000 meals a month. the lines are up to two miles long. and people are waiting four, five, six hours and also driving an hour to two hours to get to
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our place to get the food. >> my goodness. what are you hearing from some of these families who you're serving, what are they telling you? >> i think the hard part of this is what the pandemic showed is so many people were close to being on the verge of help but didn't know it until the pandemic came. we're seeing people living in their cars, families living in their cars. we're seeing people who are so grateful. at first when they came you could see some embarrassment. now they know we're not judging them, think ask for i.d., we don't ask for proof of residency, we just want to get as much food out as possible. i would have never thought, sitting here on christmas day, that i would say we have provided over 900,000 meals to over 50,000 families. and there is no end in sight. and that is why we need help from the federal government. without not-for-profits like us, these meals go away, these services we're providing, not just locally in the meadowlands
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ymca but across the country, will be devastated. >> i understand you guys are losing funding at the end of the month. what does that mean for this and other programs that the community is relying on? >> we've lost over $5 million this year so far. without additional funding, we're going to have to make a choice whether we'll be able to keep going and doing these food distributions. we have great partners that provide food. but there are additional costs. and any stimulus bill that you look at, anything that you hear about in washington, they're not including not-for-profits like ourselves. and it is becoming devastating. thousands of employees have been laid off. the money that has been lost, some donations have been down, but thankfully we've had good neighbors who stepped up with funding so we can at least get through the new year's with this food distribution. >> just because it's christmas, doesn't mean the need ends tomorrow when christmas is over. do you fear at all that the
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public maybe won't step up as much as you need them to because thanksgiving is in the rearview and christmas is in the rearview and typically those are such high need times? >> absolutely. and remember, we were never a food bank until march 24 of this year. and now we've become one. and food banks across the nation see this every year. they get a surge of food at thanksgiving and christmas and people forget about it once the new year comes around. and that's understandable. but this is not going away. we're really worried about what's going to happen to the people that are waiting in lines, looking for food, that are coming every week. and the lines are getting longer. >> david kisselback, such an important topic, thank you for spending some of which your christmas day with us. we are continuing to monitor breaking news out of nashville. we're expecting officials to hold a news conference. when that happens, we'll bring that to you live. coming up, a special holiday marathon of "dateline extra" starting with inside the hunt for "el chapo."
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