i'm lindsey reiser in for ayman mohyeldin. it's the final day of 2020, a grueling year that's been defined by the coronavirus crisis. even as we say good-bye and frankly good riddance to 2020, the pandemic is showing no signs of slowing down. a record-breaking 125,000 americans are in the hospital with coronavirus. a dire scenario for health care workers around the country. just in the last hour, president trump returned to washington, skipping his annual new year's eve party in palm beach. it does not appear to be related to this ongoing health kriecris. the white house offered no explanation as to why the president cut his vacation short. senator josh holly said he would disrupt the certification of president-elect joe biden's victory. on that very same day thousands of the president's supporters are ex president elected to

flood the streets of washington. just after the house voted to override the president's veto on a national defense bill, senator majority leader mitch mcconnell has all but closed the door on the president's plan to increase covid relief checks. joining me now is jake sherman, monica alba and sam stein, all nbc news contributors. three people who don't know the meaning of the words holiday or vacation. jake, we'll start with you. tell us what's happening on capitol hill. the $2,000 checks seemed to be gaining traction among some republican senators, but now there seems to be no path forward. >> there's no path forward. mitch mcconnell has decided he's not going to engage in this topic. he's put together the $2,000

checks with repealing a part of the law that shields tech companies from certain lawsuits and an election fraud commission. those issues when put together stand no chance or very little chance of getting through the senate and no chance of being put into law because the house is done for the year. mitch mcconnell had a choice. he either put the checks into law or not. he chose not to. frankly two things, donald trump has no more political capital left on hardly any issue. he didn't work this issue. he thought people would fall in line for him and no one fell in line for him. republicans in the house voted against it and now most republican senators are against it. he's been an absent figure in legislating for sometime. >> on that point you mention the president has lost a lot of political capital. in senator mitch mcconnell's

statement he was praising the president for staving off disaster for americans, even though he was sitting on that bill, delaying the delivering of those $600 checks. is mcconnell playing the long game knowing president trump's days are numbered? >> i think that's right. they already passed a bill with checks in it. the checks were $600. at the end of the day if the president wanted the $2,000 checks he should have made that known during the negotiations. lindsey, legislating is difficult, but the president says he's good at negotiating it. you state your demands during the negotiation, not after the bill was passed and there's a crisis and a government shutdown and pandemic. i don't understand what the president was doing here. neither do most republicans who

say -- john cornyn said why isn't the president focusing on what he has done which is good, the vaccine. instead he's talking about things he didn't get done, which is bizarre. it's bizarre behavior. >> i've never been a good negotiator. the next time i have to i'll call you. monica, where is the president's mood today? he seems to be losing control over some republican colleagues. this appears to be marking a new future for the president. >> unexpected in that he left his florida vacation earlier than planned, returning to washington this afternoon. the white house not giving any reason for the shift in schedule, but implying that president trump wants to have new year's eve festivities in

the white house. they didn't take questions from reporters, but the white house didn't call a lid. there could still be on-camera availability with the president. that would be significant because we haven't heard from him apart from his tweets about what his insight has been, both these major questions on legislation and the raging coronavirus pandemic, which apart from touting the vaccine part of "operation warp speed," the president hasn't talked about the slow roll-out, all the issues plaguing the distribution and the mounting cases and deaths. instead when he was in florida, he spent a good amount of his time on the golf course. we knew from his tweets he wasn't pleased with certain republican senators because he wanted more of their support on various bills. now we have questions about his plans and his role on january 6th when the joint session of

congress that the vice president is expected to preside over will formalize joe biden's victory. we know from senator josh holly this may be a prolonged process where some senators might object. we don't expect the outcome to be altered. perhaps the president wanted to come back to washington to work on those plans. he told his supporters to come to d.c. on that date for another perhaps political event. we don't know if he'll be part of that or not. >> sam, the guests are there at mar-a-lago. the champagne glasses being polished as we speak. hopefully masks will be plentiful. do you know why the president decided to skip the party? >> no. he didn't answer questions when he arrived. a ton is happening in the nation's capital. we have the stop the steal rally on the 6th. unclear what trump's

participation will be in that. there is of course the matter of the $2,000 checks. as jake noted, unclear if trump is involved at all. why is he back in d.c.? he's still president. there's that fact. there is a push among his most ardent supporters and internally as well for him to make another dramatic stand here over the election results. we have reporting coming up on the daily beast that if congress certifies the election results on the 6th he and his aides aren't going to quick fighting. they're still argue that the election was rigged and he won. he's given off numerous hints that he's going to hold some sort of event that would preview or formalize the 2024 run. the politics aren't ending and

perhaps it's that brew of politics, policy that got him back to d.c. to start scheming and planning again for the future. >> sam, we have a big day january 5th, the georgia run-offs. the president and his allies seem more focussed on the day after. senator holly has raised his hand to do the president's bidding. do we expect anymore republican senators to follow his lead? >> unclear on the senate side. i could imagine a few likely suspects. i think on the house side you'll see -- this has been rumored -- is dozens, potentially hundreds of house republicans who will vote against certification. that's a remarkable number. we're talking about nearly half the caucus saying that the election results are potentially illegitimate. we'll have a number of dramatic

moments on the 6th, frankly for a process that shouldn't have that much drama. the preponderance of evidence, virtually every single court decision, has certified this election was won by joe biden. on the 6th we'll see a good chunk of the house republican caucus at least, perhaps more than one republican senator object to the result. >> an important distinction regarding the court battles. monica, we have reporting that the trump white house has enacted dozens of new rules that would be cumbersome for president-elect joe biden to undo. what are we talking about here? >> it's common for incoming administrations to be nervous about this and for outgoing ones to make it as difficult as possible for the next team to undo this. we know that trump -- white house officials are working on

certain immigration rules when it comes to people seeking asylum in this country. there may be some environmental regulations that if they're finalized in the next 20 or so days they would be a mess to undo. we heard from jen sake who said that anything that wasn't buttoned up or frozen they would make sure on the first day to halt that. again, this is something we've seen from administration to administration. it's something that donald trump after he was sworn in did because of his predecessor and many regulations he wanted to do that former president obama had put into place. what's notable here is we're seeing officials work on more regulations in the time since the november election than we have in any other period of the trump presidency, which is, i believe, another acknowledgment

and signal that this administration is coming to an end, despite what the president says. they're very much preparing to be going out the door on january 20th. >> monica, jake and sam, thank you. jake sherman, the "politico" playbook for you and sam joining jake over there at "politico." happy new year. "operation warp speed" planned to have 20 million americans vaccinated by the end of the day. just under 2.8 million have got their initial dose. with the demand to get vaccinated out pacing the supply, many americans have been reaching out to local health officials. in ft. lauderdale, they got 100 phone calls and 30,000 emails from residents looking to get the shot.

joining me now is kerry sanders. kerry, obviously the demand is high. what are you hearing from officials about what needs to be done? >> reporter: it comes down to communication. florida is a big state. we have 21 million people. they've opened it up to people 65 and older. that's one in five people in the state. when you talk about 100,000 phone calls and 30,000 emails that went to broward health that only had space for 5,000 people to get appointments to get the vaccinations. it's now filled through to the end of february. at another hospital, cleveland clinic which is also in broward county, they announced they've reached their appointment level of 2,200. they can't take anymore appointments because they don't have guarantees of more vaccine coming. they don't want to see more people lining up without the vaccine in place. at holy cross hospital they have

coming up next week on wednesday, the need to give that second pfizer vaccination, they don't have that supply in. they believe it's coming in. at this time they don't have it. they were told don't hold back on your initial supply. get it out. the person running that at holy cross wants to have it now, because they don't want to have to wait outside the days intended by the manufacturer. this is not unique to florida. this is going on across the country where they're concerned about supply and demand. in new jersey we spoke to the former commission of health there about how there's this domino effect. listen to what he had to say. >> if we're not able to get through the first phase as fras as possible, that pushes the

whole chain. every day means lives, thousands of lives unfortunately. if we can't get these vaccines administered soon enough, the delays are troublesome. >> reporter: in florida we have two di ver intelligevergent sysu get the vaccin vaccine. some people have been waiting overnight. if you take appointments, people can miss appointments. there's a lot more demand than there is supply. that's in 2021 what we're hoping to see get resolved, lindsey. >> that video you were showing of people lined up in the dark in these camp chairs, not for concert tickets, not for a new play station, but for a covid-19 vaccine. if that's not the most 2020

thing you'll see, i don't know what is. joining me now is dr. patel. i want to play for you what dr. fauci said to craig melvin. let's listen. >> there has to be a lot more effort in the sense of resources for the locals, namely the states, cities, counties, places where the vaccine is actually going into the arms of individuals. we have to support the local groups, the states and cities, to help them get this task done. >> doctor, let's talk about what that means. the newly signed covid-19 relief bill includes about $9 billion to cities and states for distribution. is that enough? what else do states need? >> unfortunately, lindsey, it's not enough. it's off by a ten-fold magnitude.

there have been estimates of what it would take to successfully give 300 million people vaccines. let's put the goal at what it is. we need the majority of americans vaccinated as quickly as possible. that could be 100 to $200 billion. i think anybody would take any resources they can get. it's logistics, information systems. lindsey, you heard kerry's reporting. phone calls are the chief obstacle. we need humans. i know so many people out of work. can we think of a way to transition personnel on a temporary basis to help with phones, triage, allocation, vaccine programs in parking garages, stadiums. we should be at the stage where we have a narrow window and let everything, all ideas, come to fruition. it takes energy, time, resources and coordination. >> ohio governor mike dewine

said 60% of the workers at nursing home who were offered to be vaccinated refused. this number is pretty striking. how concerning is it having unvaccinated people coming into contact with people at a higher risk? >> it's very concerning. just so i can echo something we're seeing these trends around the country. nursing homes, clinics, people who are in community health centers like the one i work in, we're seeing a troubling percentage that's not necessarily at 60%, but you want all health care workers being vaccinated. they're in high contact with people. there are two things that und underly it. i've had health care workers saying i'm thinking of get pregnant. i think this will cause problems. is that true? the second thing is people in

nursing homes feel like they're not necessarily as confident as people in hospitals are because they see so much death. it's hard for them to believe this can be a solution. i think they need to have somebody explain what we've learned from the data, how this can help them and how we'll continue to support nursing homes. i can't help but say, we would feel better if we had easy testing so we could continue to test every day. >> dr. patel, before we let you go, colorado and california both have confirmed the presence of the highly transmissible variant. i can't help but think about people tonight who might have people over for new year's eve ringing in the celebrations and living room spread with this new variant. >> yeah, that's absolutely on point. look, just for some ground setting, september, in the uk,

we saw the beginning of this. in december we had community transmission. the united states is on track to be faster than that. reconsider your plans tonight and think about the fact you have hospitals in california putting people on the street and in gift shops. we need to give the health system and people a break. here's to 2021, lindsey. >> dr. patel, cheers to 2021. good to see you. happy new year. back in march dr. chris pernell was speaking out about covid's impact on communities of color. she lost her own father to the virus. first we go live to georgia with five days left in the run-off races. could the president's attack on the republican governor hurt the gop candidates? the gop candidates t® high protein... -with 20 grams of protein for muscle health- -versus only 16 grams in ensure® high protein.

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we learned that david perdue has

come into contact with someone on the campaign trail who has tested positive for covid-19. the senator has tested negative as of now, but will be guaranteeing. today is the final day of early voting in georgia for the two crucial senate run-off races there. people are waiting in those long lines to cast their ballot. more than 2.8 million georgians have voted. that's 70% of the total early vote in the general election two months ago. priscilla thompson is outside an early voting center in georgia. what's it like there on the ground right now? >> reporter: first off, certainly not the place that david perdue would want to find himself with five days to go until election day. he was right now supposed to be at a concert alongside senator

kelly leffler and lindsey graham and doug collins. that's not happening. the campaigning is continuing with democrats on the trail and early voting taking place just behind me. see the line there. the polls closed 20 minutes ago. there's still a long line of folks waiting to get inside to cast their ballots. folks were here before the clock struck 3:00 p.m. i spoke to at lot of voters today. many waiting for upwards of two hours waiting to cast their ballot. they said they were determined to make their voices heard in this alec shelection. take a listen. >> i felt like this is a little bit of inconvenience for something that really matters. you know, i'm not going to die by being cold and i felt like my ancestors sacrificed a lot for me. it's not going to hurt me to

stand in line in the cold. i've done it for something a lot more trivial. >> reporter: these are voters in cobb county. one of those diversifying suburbs that help put joe biden over the top in november and could be key to a democratic win in the senate races. the candidates for the most part, aside from david perdue who is quarantining, will be on the trail this weekend. of course vice president elect kamala harris will be in savannah, georgia sunday. president-elect joe biden and president trump will be rallying supporters here in georgia on monday before polls open on tuesday. lindsey? >> busy few days ahead. priscilla thompson, thank you. let's bring in emma hurt, she's a political reporter in atlanta. before we talk about the lines

behind pre siiscilla, let's tal about senator perdue quarantining. we don't think senator perdue's absence will have a huge impact on the veto of the president. talk about the ramifications of senator perdue not being able to be on the ground campaigning. >> it's not great news. every vote in this election matters. joe biden won by just 12,000 votes. everything that the candidates can do in this moment is what they're trying to do and know they need to do. senator perdue hit his 100th campaign stop yesterday. that was the pace he was planning on keeping up, concluding with that massive rally in dalton, georgia with president trump. this is not what republicans needed right now. >> let's talk about the early

voter turnout. run-offs see fewer people come out and vote. are you surprised by the numbers so far? who do you think they stand to benefit? >> the numbers we're seeing are far and above surpassing our statewide runoff in 2018. it's clear this is not normal by any definition of that word. it's close to presidential turnout, less than we were seeing at this moment in early voting in november. we're seeing democratic turnout outpacing republican turnout. there's still time. that doesn't mean that democrats are going to win. as we know, republicans, many vote on election day. that's the hope that many republicans have and why president trump is coming on monday to try to urge them to do so. right now these numbers are looking better for democrats. >> the president will be visiting there. he's railed against the results

in the georgia presidential election. for weeks he's falsely claimed there's widespread voter fraud. he called on the governor brian kemp to resign, all the while encouraging people to vote. do you think his mixed messages will affect the race? >> it's the twilight zone here. a couple months ago governor kemp was loeffler and perdue's surrogate and now president trump is asking him to resign. it's confusing and creating division among republican voters who are turning against governor kemp and the secretary of state because the president told them to do so. it put republicans in georgia and across the country where they're having to choose between the president and everything else, whether that's the election system or the laws of georgia which don't allow the governor to intervene. will that dampen turn out for

republicans? can they get past that and vote in this election? that is what we won't know until after tuesday. >> emma, thank you for joining us. appreciate it. minneapolis police say they'll release body cam footage today in the first fatal police shooting since the death of george floyd in play. the incident happened last night and, according to the police chief, witnesses say the man fired his weapon first. after exchanging fire with police, he died at the scene. in the hours after protesters gathered. you see them right there in the cold and the dark. may mayor jacob frey said the investigation into the shooting will be transparent. new information in the nashville bombing and the bizarre conspiracy theory that may have served as a motive.

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today the death toll in the coronavirus pandemic passed more than 343,000 in the u.s. here are the facts as we know them at this hour. maria salazar announced she has tested positive for covid-19. she will miss her

swearing-ceremony. the chief science adviser on "operation warp speed" said the covid-19 vaccine developed by assist astrazeneca is unlikely to be given emergency use until april. there are new restrictions in europe including a ban on household visits. a new jersey doctor is sharing her personal story. after losing her own father to covid dr. chris pernell took action and volunteered to be part of the moderna covid-19 vaccine trial. she joins me now. doctor, thank you for joining us. my condolences to you. i know how hard the holidays can be when you're missing loved ones. talk to me about how the loss of your father shaped your decision to participate in the trial.

>> my father was a heroic man, lindsey. he was a man who defied the jim crow south, ultimately became a research scientist at bell labs and prevailed against multiple health conditions and unfortunately this pandemic ended his life. that was fuel to my belly, that and seeing how disproportionately affected black and brown communities have been. all that impressed upon me the need to be part of the solution. this was one direct way, one very specific way i could be part of that solution by volunteering for this trial. >> let's talk about minority communities being disproportionately affected and resistance to the vaccine. those numbers are still lower than the rest of the population

and understandably so. what kind of out reach would you like to see in these communities? >> i want to see us amplify the voices of trusted messengers in the communities. cultural competency is mandatory. i like to take it a step forward. social and culture fluency, to be able to have those conversations in communities in an authentic and transparent way by saying i hear your concerns, i hear your concerns you have historically, whether we're talking about to what happened to enslaved black women during slavery or what we're talking about happening today to dr. suess and more, a black physician in indiana. we have to be ready to center the conversation there and be able to explain the science and the data. explain why we've done this quicker than for any other vaccine trial and explain how

we're able to maintain and make vaccines available to the bulk of the american population. >> you don't know whether you got the placebo or the actual moderna vaccine. did you experience any side effects and when will you be unblinded to know if you got the vaccine? >> i was unblinded. i was unblinded a few days ago. i found out that i am in the vaccine arm. >> okay. >> immediately, when i discovered that news, i said to myself, daddy, i have become the data. i'm the data. it was a very proud moment. it was a proud moment to know myself and 30,000 others in this moderna trial who stood forward and said i would like to be part of the process. what my experiences were during the trial, i got my first injection at the end of august. i have got my second injection

the first week of october. the first injection was pretty routine. was consistent with my flu vaccines. i got some soreness in my arm. i also got some headaches. ing in nothing out of the ordinary. the second injection, i was severely fatigued. no fever, no chills, cough or anything else. i couldn't be happier that i par ti participated. >> dr. chris pernell, thank you for your service and your work as well as part of the trial. your father's smile brightened up the screen. thank you. >> thank you. 2020 will finally be over. normally we're used to seeing these images. thousands of people celebrating in times square to watch the ball drop. this year everything will be different.

it's completely a ghost town. gabe guttierez is in times square now. hi, gabe. >> reporter: a short time ago it stopped raining and the sun peeked out for a brief moment. it made sense on the final day of 2020 we would wake up to a dreary rainy morning. it's now moved on. as you mentioned, this will look very different this year than it has for generations. as you can see behind me, there are police barricades. the entire area is blocked off. it's closed to the public. although the ball drop will happen. the only ones allowed here -- it's by invite only.

frontline workers and their families, including some health care workers from elmhurst hospital in new york which was the epicenter of the pandemic early on. muted celebrations across the country. fireworks in chicago will not happen this year. los angeles and boston, the mayors there are stressing to people they should not gather, even for small gatherings indoors. certainly across the country it will be a new year's eve like none other. in times square we're preparing for this event. there will be some musical performances here. again, nothing like what we've seen before. hundreds of thousands of people, that won't happen this year. for many of those watching on television, 2021 can't come soon enough. >> amen to that. gabe, our health care workers and frontline workers -- so are

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federal investigators are continuing to search for a motive behind the christmas day bombing in nashville, tennessee. their investigation led them to statements the bomber made about a reptilian conspiracy theory. >> reporter: even though authorities are released anthony quinn warner's name and said he's the sole perpetrator in this bombing, they're stressing it's an active investigation and a frustrating moment for the people who live here in nashville. they've looked to 2021 with a lot of hope, only to be impacted

by this explosion. a lot of business owners here and residents waiting to see if they have homes and businesses to return to. authorities say they're actively pursuing leads in this case. they're interviewing former associates of warner trying to get an idea of what his motive could have been. federal authorities say they're exploring several unfounded conspiracy theories as potential causes for warner building this bomb. among those, what's known as the reptilian theory which states there are individuals on earth that are lizards sent here to do harm. they're looking at theories involving 5g internet, specifically at&t. that's important to note because the at&t data facility was in close proximity to where the bomb went off. it suffered damage that caused power outages here in tennessee and multiple states that took

days to recover from. federal investigators say they're exploring all of warner's digital devices, going through online writes and videos and hoping to get a better picture of this man's motive. his mother is still cooperating in the investigation. as of right now, the fbi has cleared the scene in nashville. they've given it back over to the city. their job is a tough one. engineers have to go in and figure out which buildings need to be condemned or not. they face an incredibly long process of rebuilding. up next from recruiting medical volunteers to serve the navajo nation to delivering meals and aid. inside the efforts of a veteran relief team responding to the pandemic. eam responding to the pandemic want to sell the best burger in every zip code?

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the coronavirus pandemic is ravaging vulnerable americans disproportionately affecting several communities. team rubicon is organizing to help. they've sent for military

medics, physicians and nurses to serve in the navajo community. joining me now is the co-founder jake ward. he's also the author of "once a warrior." jake, so good to talk to you about this. this is the second time this year that team rubicon has deployed to assist the navajo nation. what are your team members seeing there? >> unfortunately we're seeing everything we saw earlier in the year, except we're seeing it on a larger scale. the reality is we sent over 100 medical providers into the navajo nation early in the pandemic, we treated over 3,000 patients. we've been back only a month and already treated 1,200 patients. as we heard dr. fauci say, we're seeing a surge on top of a surge. >> i saw your video about this.

some of your health care workers are working eight shifts in a row. the next focus for the whole nation is the vaccine rollout. how are you stepping in to help with that sfch? >> well, this vaccine rollout will be one of the largest logistical challenges in mankind. we have 135,000 volunteers, most military veteraveterans. these are people who understand low gi logisti logistics. how can we decompress these health care systems like taking patient flow, patient monitoring and freeing up capacity so nurses can treat patients and

help to smooth out this process in counties all across the countries? >> you also went to louisiana after hurricane laura which struck in august. you have had a busy year. how can you give help while ensuring everyone stays healthy? >> that's a great question. this pandemic, we knew early it wasn't going to take it easy on frontline providers. we knew that mother nature wasn't going to care about covid-19. very early in the pandemic we began preparing ourselves to operate in this pandemic environment. we had nearly 20,000 deployments among our volunteers. to our knowledge we've only had seven positive covid transmissions. that's an incredible track record. i think it's due to that military background. it's the diligence to stay alert, follow protocols and really understand complacency

kills. that's what we're seeing around the country now. >> truly remarkable. jake wood, thank you for your service to this country as a marine and your continued service with team rubicon. happy new year. >> thank you for having me on. that wraps up the hour for me. a very happy new year to you and yours. i'll see you back here tomorrow morning from 7:00 to 9:00. more msnbc after this quick break. when you're through with powering through, it's time for theraflu hot liquid medicine.

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ari melber. as we close out 2020, we have a special show for you tonight. from impeachments to protests to the pandemic, we want to go through some of the big moments this year. from the guests, to the dad jokes and some awkward moments. we'll have the comics who helped us laugh, plus their cultural insights on what was a tragic co co come comedy. we have michael phelps.