the first covid vaccine for teenagers. for kids 12 to 16. now the snot out of the blue. pfizer had recently reported clinical trial results that show really good results among young people young people sa aged 12 to 16. that trial showed that the pfizer vaccine was as effective if not more effective in that age group when it comes to preventing serious illness compared to what adults experience with that vaccine. that clinical trial also showed that the temporary side effects that people get sometimes from taking the vaccine, those were basically the same in that age group, that 12 to 16 age group as they are in adults. and that is very good news. and that very promising result now means that the fda's advisory group will soon make its recommendations and the fda will be expected to move quickly on approving the pfizer vaccine

for 12 to 16-year-olds. 12 to 15-year-olds, since the current vaccines are approved for kids 16 and up. now, this could happen by next week, it could potentially even happen by the end of this week. but this, of course, will be a huge relief to families around the country who have 12, 13, 14, 15-year-old kids who have been thinking about how to mitigate covid risk for kids doing summer activities and kids going back to school in the fall. the other two-shot vaccine that is similar to pfizer's, the moderna vaccine, that is also in the midst of its own clinical trial in young people. if that trial produces similar results, there are good reasons to expect that moderna could follow pfizer pretty quickly in becoming a second vaccine approved for kids ages 12 and up. there are also promising trials underway right now for kids younger than age 12. so that part of the vaccination

effort is all happening now. it feels like it's sort of happening all at once, but we have been able to see this clinical trial in development and it laid the predicate for what's about to happen now. but in terms of fda acting on this stuff, it looks like it could happen in the next few days. and that's really important. it comes amid these twin concerns that we have right now, about how we're ever going to get ahead of the pandemic if the rest of the world can't get vaccinated. global access to vaccines is the only way to beat a global pandemic. right now, it's only a very handful of well off coverage that are approaching saturation coverage. we are one of those small handful of countries. that's among the best in the world when it comes to how much of our population is already vaccinated and how much vaccine supply that we have. but lots of experts are now concluding that even our vaccinations are too slow to beat this thing systemically.

and we've been talking about this for a while, but we're starting to get a sense of how the race is going. one side of the race is the number of unvaccinated people that you've still got, the amount of vaccine that's -- excuse me. the amount of virus that is circulating in the population, so the number of people getting newly infected, which means the ongoing replication and spread of the virus into new hosts and new people, which gives the virus more and more opportunity to mutate into more and more contagious and more and more dangerous variants. that's one side of the race. what the virus is doing and how much of a toehold it can get in our population. and on the other side of the race is the vaccination effort. how fast can we vaccinate the most people so the virus can't find another host. another person to infect. another opportunity to replicate and mutate and get more dangerous. that is the race. and more and more public health experts are saying that our

vaccination effort, as good as it is, is so far not able to outpace the virus. so we're going to be talking tonight with apova amandaavili from "the new york times" about the widespread consensus that we're not going to win that race, but the idea of herd immunity is not something we're going to attain. there is reason to believe that that is not terrible news. the future in that kind of a covid world is potentially a pretty livable and understandable future, but it is worth understanding if that's where we're heading. that's big news there in terms of kids potentially being vaccinated. it raises really big questions in terms of how much of our population we are vaccinating and how quickly, particularly while the rest of the world is way far behind us in terms of vaccination saturation into the population. so i'm really looking forward to that interview. also big political news today in

terms of what's coming next from president biden and the democrats in congress. these last few days have been really bang-up news for the administration and for the country in economic terms. we got the economic numbers in for the first quarter of this year. the u.s. economy in the first quarter of 2021 grew at an annualized rate of 6.4%. 6.4% gdp growth. that's nuts. that's an insanely high number. but look at this in terms of individual american households. household income in march in the united states, we just got these numbers, jumped by a record 21.1% in the month of march. the government has been tracking monthly -- that monthly household income number since 1959. since they started tracking that number in 1959, it has never had a higher jump than it did in march of this year.

and, of course, both of those numbers, the huge 6.4% overall economic growth rate for the country and the record jump, more than 20% jump in average income for individual american households, both of these figures are fueled by the same thing, right? both of those figures are feudal by the biden administration and the democrats in congress doing stuff. legislation has made a huge economic difference, both in the macro sense and at the individual household level. you can see the impact that it's having on the economy, already. it's huge. and that covid relief package they passed, you know, with the stimulus checks in it and relief for small business owners and financial help to restaurants and funding for vaccines and funding to safely reopen schools and all the rest of it, lesser-noticed economic feature of the covid relief bill is that it has tons of tax cuts in it for people making under $100,000 a year, as politico as reported,

quote. look at your headline. not rich, good news. you're probably getting a tax cut. quote, everybody knows that democrats want to raise taxes on the rich, but what hasn't gotten nearly as much notice is how much democrats have cut taxes for everyone else. they have cut taxes for everyone else substantially more than republicans did in the first year of their 2017 tax overhaul. quote, new estimates by congress' official forecasters show that the democrats' tax cuts included in their march covid relief package will drive down tax rates on low and middle-income people so much this year that americans earning less than $75,000 a year on average will owe nothing this year in federal income taxes. quote, it's a flip side to democrats' campaign to raise taxes on the wealthy, but it's a flip side that is often overlooked. one senior fellow at the tax policy center saying, quote, it plays against type, but this was a big honking tax cut for low

and moderate-income people. yeah, a sometimes-overlooked fact? try completely overlooked, at least in most of the beltway press. thanks to the tax changes in the biden and democrats' covid relief bill, people making 75 grand this year will owe zero in federal income taxes. people making between 75 and $100,000 grand this year, they'll pay in federal income taxes, 1.8%. that will be on average if you make between $75,000 and $100,000 a year. big, big tax cuts from the democrats for everyone making less than $100,000 grand a year. they have passed. they are already in effect. and we've got these macro numbers that household income is making the biggest jump since we started keep records of it. yes, undercovered in the beltway press? yes! i would say. i mean, so far, zero republicans

have voted for the legislation that has made this possible. what are republicans doing to try to turn people against what biden and the democrats are doing? well, this weekend, the republican leader in the house, kevin mccarthy, posted this on facebook, touting the benefits of the covid relief bill to folks at home in his california district, as if this was something he had anything to do with. democratic house speaker nancy pelosi was agog saying in response, saying, minority leader kevin mccarthy called the american rescue plan socialist, claiming it would turn the united states into venezuela and he convinced every member of his caucus to vote against it. he even warned the american people, help is not only way. now he is touting the benefits of the american rescue plan to brag about bringing home the bacon. "help is not on the way." except for this help that is on the way that i would really like everybody in my home district to know about and credit me for.

and we covered this phenomenon a few days ago, all of these republican members of congress touting the benefits of the covid relief bill back home to their districts, as if they had something to do with it, but now it's top guy, the republican leader in the house, kevin mccarthy, the guy who put himself in charge of trying to stop the covid relief bill. now he, too, is bragging about it back home. help is here. talking about all the good that it's going to do back home in his district, because he didn't succeed in his efforts to stop it, so now he wants credit for it, right? that's one way to do it. pretend you were for it. try to take credit for it, although you not only voted against it, you did everything you could to try to stop it. but as the biden administration and the democrats try to reap the political benefits from the popularity and the positive effect of the stuff they have

done already, they are also making plans to move on to the next big stuff they are going to do through congress. namely the big infrastructure bill and the american families plan, that biden talked about in his state of the union last week. on that front, there were two big, important developments over the last few days on that, that i think will sort of set the course for how this is going to go. and that should, i think, hearten and speed up democrats' approach to both of those pieces of legislation. and again, both of those pieces of legislation are as big as the covid relief bill. they could be as expected to have as big an effect on the economy and they would both be a huge, huge deal. but a couple of things have happened that have set the course for how this is going to go. first of all, you know we have had this amazing two-party split screen recently? on the one hand, on the left, we've had democrats passing a $2 trillion covid relief bill that got widespread support from the

american people and that we thousand know strapped a rocket engine to the u.s. economy. on the other side of the screen, on the right, the republicans seem to have no idea what to say about that or what to do about that, as proven by the fact that they all voted "no" against it and now they're all taking credit. but what they did spend their time on these last few months is careening through this bizarre series of made-up cartoon outrages. cartoon literally in some senses. mr. potato head, dr. seuss, a ban on meat. all of these made-up scandals. all of these things that either had nothing to do with the biden administration and democrats or were completely made up and had nothing to do with anything in reality. well, that dynamic is underway already for the next legislation of the democrats and the biden administration are pursuing, including the infrastructure bill and the american families bill, right? the bill that will make child

care way more affordable and preschool and community college. those things are very, very popular with the american public. and so we've now had our first glimpse of what republicans are going to do about that this time around. turns out they're going to try this. >> two years of college, whether you like it or not. these are the things that take away choices from the american people. >> two years of college, whether you like it or not. wait a minute, huh? this is the republican argument now. joe biden, that jerk, is going to force, force everybody to go to college whether they want to or not! it's going to be mandatory. what?! no, president biden isn't going to make you go to college, he isn't going to make anyone go to college, let alone make everyone go to college.

can you imagine how that would work. like you would be drafted or something. and you, you in the corner, you've been designated to get a master's degree. mwah-ha-ha. you have no choice! i mean what is -- how would that even work, senator? president biden is not banning meat and he is not going to force everyone to go to two years of college. senator blackburn's office later said that she misspoke on that, but, come on! but this is the character of the opposition thus far, to the next -- to the infrastructure bill that they're going to roll out, which the republicans say is socialism and is going to turn us into venezuela and the american families plan, which is going to be forced college for everyone, even if you don't want it. that's the character of the opposition. okay, that's instructive. we'll stick with that kind of thing. okay. dr. seuss, got it. but also instructive, i think,

was this from senator mitch mcconnell, who is once again flat-out promising in advance that zero republican senators will vote for biden and the democrats next legislation, on infrastructure, on the american families plan. there will be legislation. the american family plan, there will be zero republicans voting for it. think about the implications of this. this ought to be the cause of wall-to-wall political coverage for days on end. but it is just something mcconnell said and we heard it in the beltway. and biden needing republican votes and he needs a big bipartisan show of hands and meeting with republicans. news flash, there's not going to be republican votes. he doesn't have to do any of those things.

put that up again. the republicans are promising, saying out loud and ahead of time, no matter what is in the bill or how anyone talks to them or with them or about them, there will be zero republican votes promised in advance for infrastructure, for american families plan. zero, none, no matter what talks are had. ifs that guaranteed, there is no reason for democrats to waste time talking with republicans how they feel. they are pledged as a group to vote no no matter what the legislation is. that is a convenient piece of warning that it is not worth talking with them about it. they have already pledged zero votes. good to know. now we can stop wasting time. we don't need to spend time trying to persuade you.

this is a blessing for the democrats. you will recall this also happened with the relief plan remember, before that passed, senator mcconnell said no republicans would vote for the act. democrats got that message. they didn't bother letting republicans waste time they took them at his word they were all going to be no votes no matter what. now that mcconnell has made the seam promise, democrats are free to do the same. if there are no votes, then, okay. negotiations will be among democrats themselves, only. which can frankly we harry

enough to move quickly. >> so we'll see how this translates in days ahead. the lack of reality-based critique from republicans on this forth bit of legislation as well. the promise that they won't support anything. those are freeing for the democrats in terms how they they proceed here any republicans that will slow down and weaken and move ahead on their own terms with just their own votes with clarity. meanwhile tonight, president biden announced he is dropping the trump administration on

considering refugee status and for the first time since taking office just over 100 days ago, today, the administration is facilitating the reuniting of families that were forced apart at the border by the trump administration. as we and others have covered, there were thousands of families this was done to. kids taken away from their moms and dads forcibly at the south border. before he took over office, president biden set up a high-level task force. the force says there are over 1,000 families that remain separated. the kids have been taken away from the parents by force by the u.s. government. that's a huge task ahead to get them reunited. nbc reporter has been on this from the beginning.

he has begun an interview of one of the four families being reunited. his name is brian. he's now 18 years old. he's from mexico. when he was 15 years old, three years ago, he was separated from his mother. they will be reunited for the first time this week. three years later. joining us now from riverside, california is msnbc correspondent. the authority of "separated." thank you for being with us tonight. i know this has been tough with your schedule and getting ahead of this policy change. >> racial, thanks for having me and highlighting these stories tonight. i would say it is a bittersweet day. it's undeniably an extraordinarily announcement

that the first four families of over 1,000 are going to be reunited. the biden administration has facilitated this. so many children that have yet to go through what he is going through. he was gracious enough to meet with me to share what he's been going through in this moment that has been three years in the making. in october, it will be four years. i want to share a little about what brian told me a couple of minutes ago. take a look. >> so many people have learned about what now people have learned was the trump separation policy in the news and so few people have got to hear firsthand what it was like from a now 18-year-old man who experienced it for himself. what do you want people to know? >> it is just a really cruel

experience that i hope no one has to go through. there is a lot of kids are going through now but something you don't wish a kid or minor would have to go through. >> there is a thousand people just like you. >> yes. >> when you think about that, what goes through your head? >> it is unbelievable that they let this happen to multiple kids to be separated from each other. it shouldn't happen. it is something unbelievable. it sounds cruel. >> i have to tell you about what i learned about bryan from bryan this evening. once he was separated, he went into high school here in the united states. he graduated early because he wanted to get into the workforce

and become an rn. with his life and career, he's decided to go work for a pro bono legal service provider that works with migrant children. this is his first week on the job doing that. he's a remarkable young man. i'm very grateful of him sharing his story with us. >> you are kidding me? >> he was 15 years old, taken away from his mom, separated as a 15-year-old kid, sent into this country alone. in three years, he's graduating early and now working at a legal services organization? this is insane? that's right. he just started. his new colleagues love him very much. some of the same people he worked with in his own immigration proceedings.

there's a smile on my face just getting to meet him and knowing through all of this, the way we talk about it, the politics of it. the public perception of it. this is so real and this is what he wanted to do with his life after going through an experience i don't think anybody could comprehend outside of the people that went through it themselves. >> you've been able to report including around these four reunifications that are happening this week, that the administration was able to facilitate this essentially by granting humanitarian parole so they could come into the country and meet each other. but these were facilitated by nonprofit groups and advocacy groups and aol that have made

this happen with their own resources. they needed help from the administration to get it done in the end. they have done extraordinary work. not just them but all of the members of the steering committee, parents of children not yet able to be located. there are over 300, where they don't know the location of children. bryan family is not in that category. aclu, justice in motion. they literally tracked down and reunite. he's one of 30 lawyers have been trying to put in front of the government since the beginning of the biden administration. bryan's case is one of the first four. these legal service providers have identified over 1,000 in si

similar position as he is. it is so important to stress there is so much work yet to be done here to right the wrong of the separation policy. not just the unifications themselves. the wrap around services, mental health, even accountability and members of the administration that will help this out. i know they are working very hard on. running the task force but bryan is fortunate enough to be one of the first four during this administration to get back with his mother and family just this week. >> msnbc correspondent. what a remarkable turn. thank you for joining us. i'm looking forward to seeing the rest of this with bryan.

thank you. >> our lead story tonight with that feature. the biden administration saying the firsthandful of four families where the child was separated. first families who went through the separation policy under the trump administration, those first four families being reunited this week. expected to be the first four that need to go through this. it is a slow start but finally a start. much more to get to tonight. stay with us.

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learn more at factsonhand.com today. the latest republican anti-rights bill is on its way to the governor's desk in florida. even more draconian than the

voting rights law than in georgia. it cuts early voting and cuts drop boxes and makes it harder to vote by mail. republicans in florida are realizing they might be in a little bit of an oops situation. these restrictions aren't only going to hit democratically leaning voters. they are also going to accidentally hit their own. one of the things they'll make harder to do is mail-in voting. that is very popular with republican voting. they are committed to getting votes by mail. they've again and again passed legislation to make it easier to vote by mail. that's kind of the republican way of voting in florida and pushing republican voters to vote. you may have noticed they've done really well including the one last november that was

supposedly so a wash but apparently as they were rushing this through, florida lawmakers realized they might be suppressing the wrong votes. amy gardener has a remarkable post in washington today that as the bill was being debated, some republicans privately worried that they could encourage voting in the country who overwhelmingly use voting to cast their ballots. some republicans briefly discussed whether lawmakers could exempt those two groups

from the new mail voting rules. key lawmakers said you can't do that. it would raise equal protection. now the damage is done. now you'll have military personnel who might request the ballot. we have senior concerns who might not know the law has changed. republicans have accidentally punched a whole new list of voting that include the ways that republican voters most like to vote in florida and the republican party have vested millions trying to encourage among those own voters. on the way toward passing this thing, they reportedly tried to exclude from the new law just the slivers the voters using

this new law. the technical term for this is ops. we've got more of what this might mean ahead. stay with us. stay with us

problem, republicans in the great state of florida have passed a new bill radically restricting voting rights in the great state of florida. in their haste, republicans didn't notice some of the means of voting they put restrictions on are the very means their supporters use most frequency and the means the republican party have been actively promoting for decades. in a remarkable new post, amy gardener said republicans along the way tried to exclude elderly and military from these new

restrictions they want to apply to everyone else. joining us now, reporter amy gardener. thank you for being here. >> glad to be here, thanks, rachel. >> what is the extent of regret among them? >> it is extensive. republicans had their first absentee ballot victory when everyone went to sleep on election night and a republican won two days later. that's happened over and over again to teach elderly how easy it is to vote by mail the man

who ran obama's campaign, every time they tweeted last year how crooked absentee balloting is, he'd get a text with an eye roll emoji or swear words because he was so upset to what president trump was doing that was so danching to the republican party. we had this extraordinary year where trump was on the ballot and we had a pandemic, which was extraordinary.

if they snap back, these new provisions could curtail that party more do they have options? trying to start over again to amend the bill do they have any options? or 124 baked? >> it is definitely baked. governor desantis went on and said, of course i'm going to pass this law. >> the passage of the bill defines the state a lot are in right now, which is that they are under tremendous pressure to show support to president trump even though many privately believe joe biden won the election fairly. there is a huge pressure to pass these laws that in a lot of cases both republicans and

democrats describe as solutions without a problem. in states like florida where desantis widely hailed the 2020 election as the gold standard for elections in america. i don't think there is any regret to what they felt they had to do bypassing. they felt constituents would please the audience of one, president trump, going forward, there will be new strategies to make sure that they will go forward and navigate these. i do think those voting services that work by mail will be making a lot of money. >> there will be ways this will be turned into at least a money-making opportunity for the

consultant class. thank you for great reporting on this and thanks for helping us understand it tonight. >> thank you. >> we have more ahead tonight, stay with us. stay with us both? visibly diminish wrinkled skin in... crepe corrector lotion... only from gold bond. ♪ the light. ♪ it comes from within. it drives you. and it guides you. to shine your brightest. ♪ as you charge ahead. illuminating the way forward. a light maker. recognizing that the impact you make comes from the energy you create. introducing the all-electric lyriq. lighting the way. ♪

when do you think the u.s. will return? >> i think by the end of summer, we'll be in a very different position. there is a debate of what constitutes herd immunity? the point is, right now, every single person, 16 years or older. doesn't have to wait in line. can show up and get a vaccination now. my plead to everyone, get vaccinated now, please. >> president biden in port

smith. herd immunity is when enough of the population has immunity that the virus can't make end roads. the virus has nowhere to go and it stops spreading. the way you get to that safely is vaccines. the vaccination campaign launched in december, officials have been asking how fast we need to vaccinate americans to reach herd immunity here? will we reach herd immunity. right now, 145 million americans have had one dose. that's 56%. vaccines for kids 12 and up may be approved this next week. the rate of vaccinating adults is slowing. we had a daily average of more than 3 million doses a day.

now the daily average is just over 2 million doses a day. now the "new york times" put up this nightmare of a headline, reaching herd immunity is now unlikely in the u.s. experts now believe. the ideas behind it are more interesting. quote, daily vaccinate rates are slipping. wide-spread consensus that herd immunity threshold is not attainable and perhaps not ever, instead, they are coming to a conclusion that rather than making a long-promised exit, the virus will most likely become a manageable threat that will still cause hospitalization. it depends in part how much of the nation and world become vaccinated and how much the skrie russ evolves. joining us now is the author who

wrote that author. "new york times" science reporter. thank you for being here. >> thank you for having me. >> i know that reporters don't always write the headlines that appear on their stories. when you saw your story appear with that headline, that you were going to ruin a lot of people's days? >> i was really hoping people would read beyond the headline to be honest. i had a conversation with my editor about that headline. we decided, it is true, there is a lot more subtle ty. what my editor felt writely is that what's new here, is that we are hearing for the first time that we might not reach herd immunity and that's a big deal.

>> in some ways, it is degrees of difference. right now, we may be at 60% of the population that is immune one way or another either because they were effected or vaccinated. we may need to get to 80, 85%. the more people we vaccinate, the viewer hospitalizations and deaths we'll see. that's what we are trying to get to hear. saying even when we were hoping for herd immunity, it is not that we get there and raise the flag and it is over. it was always going to be something public health officials had to keep an eye on and is it was apparent to kill

populations wholesale and our ability to fight it off will always depend on some sort of race of the virus's attempt to mutate. it was always going to be a push me, pull me contest. >> it was always going to be that and because we would never have 100% protection. thinking about something like measles, we do have herd outbreaks. as you know, in new york, we had in the orthodox community outbreaks. so those outbreaks will be bigger and still lead to hospitalizations and death as long the way. >> i know you were part of the reporting team that reported that pfizer is likely -- the fda

is likely to approve the vaccine for kids 12 to 15. it is already approved for kids 16 and up. that prospect of being able to vaccinate younger teenagers in kids and presumably with the clinical trials, kids even younger than that. does that affect the math at all in terms of how much of the country will be immune and how many communities will be susceptible? >> i think we definitely need as many kids as we can to get vaccinated. kids under 18 are about 20% of the population. if we don't vaccinate kids, there is no chance in hell of getting to herd immunity. but even with vaccinating the kids, we won't get there. we expect the fda to approve for 12 to 15 this week. then we'll start to hear results

for the younger kids. we need all of those children to get vaccinated and closer to herd immunity. >> "new york times" science and health reporter. thank you for your time and clarity. the headline is a scarey thing. the ideas behind it are more nuanced, the more americans vaccinated, the quicker it will be. thank you for having me here tonight. >> thanks for having me. >> we'll be right back. ll be rik e cash payment. call coventry direct to learn more. we thought we had planned carefully for our retirement. but we quickly realized that we needed a way to supplement our income. our friends sold their policy to help pay for their medical bills and that got me thinking. maybe selling our policy could help with our retirement. i'm skeptical, so i did some research and called coventry direct. they explained life insurance is a valuable asset that can be sold. we learned that we can sell all of our policy or keep part of it with no future payments, who knew? we

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one thing to watch for in tomorrow's news, there is news we led with that we are likely to have fda approval this week for kids 12 and up to get the vaccine. tomorrow, the travel ban goes into effect between the u.s. and india. this is in the midst of the terrible covid crisis right now. that is a travel ban that will

go into effect tomorrow. a lot of news. we know president biden is due to speak on covid specifically at 2:30 eastern. that's tomorrow. we'll see you again tomorrow night. "way too early" with kasie hunt is up next. several developments in the fight against covid, the u.s. rethinking and possibly expanding its u.s. strategy to soon include adolescences. the question is, what will the president say. the more lies president trump spreads about the election, the more congresswoman liz cheney fights back. after 27 years of marriage, the gates are separating. the question is, what happens to the