voiceover: 'cause she's a biker... please don't follow me in. if it's wednesday with his agenda on the line, president biden holds a critical infrastructure meeting with a republican. he calls out members of his own party. plus, russia strikes again. the white house says it is engaging with the kremlin after yet another cyber attack, this one targeting the world's largest meat supply. biden goes face-to-face with putin two weeks from today. and democrats just won by a big margin in a new mexico special election. what those results could signal about the upcoming 2022 midterms. steve kornacki is here at the big board, up ahead.

♪♪ welcome to wednesday, it is meet the press daily, and i'm chuck todd on a busy afternoon as always here in washington. we're going to begin today with an urgent and immediate threat facing this country, it's the economy and it's national security. i'm of course talking about russian cyber attacks. the white house says it is engaging directly with the russian government after a cyberattack on the world's largest meat supplier shut down nine meat plants in the united states. jen psaki told reporters she expects president biden to address the issue when he meets with putin in two weeks. the company which was targeted jbs told white house that a ransom demand likely came from cyber criminals based in russia, raising the question of just how much involvement the russian government has had in these things. the company's plants are starting to come back online but the disruption has raised

potential concerns of shortages and price hikes. it would send uncomfortable signals to the united states ahead of the biden/putin meeting. bottom line here, the united states has been under attack. the jbs hack is the latest major cyberattack on u.s. businesses and infrastructure, and yes, lots of fingerprints belonging to the russians. we all remember the panic last month after a russian criminal gang shut down a vital pipeline. government officials are still coming to grips with the full extent of the massive russian solarwinds hack as well. they're not sure they got the hackers out of the government systems that they've been infiltrating. before that in 2018, it was revealed that russian government cyber actors had infiltrated critical u.s. infrastructure including our power grid with the ability to make mayhem if they chose to. and then of course the original russian hag of them all and the disinformation campaign of 2016, which of course compromised the

presidential election and they compromise an american political party. these are some of the purported russian hacks that we actually know about publicly. they certainly appear to be escalating in frequency and severity. as then vice president joe biden told me in 2016 amid the russian attack on our election, we may never know what our government is doing to protect us. >> just, you know, sort of like in baseball you throw a high hard one to send a message. why haven't we sent a message yet to putin? >> we're sending a message. we have the capacity to do it, and he'll know it. it will be at the time of our choosing and under circumstances that have the greatest impact. >> so a message is going to be sent? >> will the public know? i hope not. >> a message may have been sent but was it received? after this most recent hack on

jbs there are going to be plenty of folks looking at our government's efforts to protect us from cyber attacks and wondering whether this government is doing enough. just this morning, news of another cyber attack as officials in massachusetts said that a ransomware disruption ended up making mayhem on some of the state's ferry services. so i'm joined by two of my msnbc colleagues, monica alba outside the white house, jake ward at a cattle ranch in esper ra doe, california. and a senior adviser at the center for strategic and international studies. she is now tasked with defending u.s. infrastructure from the cyberattacks. monica, let me start with the initial response here that the biden administration is making to this latest hit on this meat supply company, jbs. jbs said it was the russians and a russian gang. the united states says it is

engaging with the kremlin to get to the bottom of it. has the united states independently confirmed that it was the russians that hacked jbs? >> reporter: not yet, chuck. that's what's notable here. we have to read between the lines a little bit because we know that when the press secretary says this is something she expects president biden to raise with president putin in just two weeks' time, that clearly this topic of discussion means they believe there is reason to assign blame there. just like what happened in the last week or so with microsoft pointing the finger at the russian hacking group, that was the same that was linked to the solar wind hack from last year, but the white house didn't want to go there and draw that direct line, instead saying they want the fbi to continue investigating. so that's what's happening today with jbs as well. but in terms of how they may retaliate, we are seeing here the white house say they're not going to take any options off the table. so something like economic sanctions could happen again. the last time they issued those were back in april in response

to the solar winds hack. they haven't yet said how or if they are already responding to some of these other vulnerabilities and cyber security issues. we know, for instance, the white house has tried to bolster that with federal agencies because of course they're nervous about what that could mean but they haven't discuss instead detail what they would like to see private companies do like jbs that we're talking about. and our colleague peter alexander did just ask jen psaki about that steamship authority incident and whether the white house was tracking that. she said they were aware of it, but that they didn't have any other details yet. but all of this juggling behind the scenes before we know that meeting in geneva. it's already a very crowded agenda, chuck, as you know so well, and now add this to the list. it's probably going to be pretty close to the top of it from what we understand. >> monica, who in that west wing is pulling on this? you know, are they treating this as a homeland security crisis or a national security crisis? >> after the colonial pipeline

ransomware attack last month, they did designate a new commission out of the department of homeland security that's supposed to be investigating these cyber attacks and then is supposed to issue a report after each one, but that just happened. it's quite new. so we haven't actually seen the fruit of their labor. this is something they are trying to detail through the department of homeland security. we knew in terms of the response, the department of justice, fbi, they're waiting for those agencies to take a little bit more of the lead. as we see these pile up, chuck, they're going to maybe have to put some more weight behind this. this is happening almost every week now. >> it happens every day depending on the size of your business. look, and a lot of it has to do with the fact that too many people pay the ransoms because in some ways it makes, sadly, more financial sense sometimes to do that. monica alba with the latest from the white house. thank you. let me go to jake ward. you're at one of these cattle ranches. what more are we learning from

jbs and why are they so sure it's the russians? >> well, chuck, at this hour, jbs has been pretty quiet. they've issued a couple of official statements, you know, including one that blames it. specifically mention ransomware but certainly talked about getting back online today. the thing is, however, chuck, listening to you and monica talk about sort of the broad national security picture, hearing what the president had to say to you about, you know, the behind the scenes efforts they'll be making. it's amazing to be in a place like this where you really see the ripple effects of ransomware, right? it touches down in one company, and then boons on to places like this, yolo land and cattle company. i mean, this place runs 700 head of cattle on about 15,000 acres, and the owner here tells us, you know, even a couple of days interruption to the pipeline of meat processing means that they have to hold cattle here that they intended for market. that has a backup effect.

not just on them. it just goes on and on and on, and to see how all of this, you know, has become so fragile, especially in a market where four companies control about 80% of the meat processing industry in the united states, you know, it see those effects and the ripples that go on for each one of us, whether it's the ferry service, whether it's colonial pipeline, whether it's this cattle ranch, it goes on and on in this new era of ransomware, chuck. >> jacob, explain, how long will it take jbs to get back to its normal supply chain functionality. >> you know, it's been very vague. it's issued a couple of official statements but it's not talking directly to report, about what steps are being taken. you know, this is one of these things. they don't want to be telling you what specific system was hit, right, was it the bar code system that keeps track of the sizes of meat we buy on the shelf. was it some other kind of invoicing system? we don't know. and it's not all clear how they got it back. did they pay ransom, did

something else happen. we don't know any of that yet. all we do know is it definitely shut down not just one facility, it shut down at least five states worth of facilities, based on social media posts that those posted to its workers. a couple of those facilities offer meats of different species. this wasn't just beef production. this was also chicken production. so how -- how deeply this went into that company, and then what steps they took to defend themselves is not clear, which makes it, of course, hard to learn from this and pass on those learnings to other industries. >> you brought up another issue, which we learned, of course, during our covid shutdowns. the industry consolidation means we are -- we could have one company can have a massive disruption because of so much consolidation and different industries in the world of meat packing. jacob ward on the beat for us, jacob in california at a cattle ranch, thank you. all right, so let me bring in suzanne. what i loved about your

pre-interview today is you brought up an issue, i want to put up our list of russian hacks that basically we know about going back to 2015, 2016, and what it seems -- what was an attack on the government institutions, our election system, emails of the political parties, infiltrating their way into our power grids, these last couple of ones have impacted everyday people, and so in a weird way, you seem to think that this might actually finally create urgency on capitol hill that did not exist before, explain. >> i think that's right, jeff, you know, long lines at the gas station, paying higher prices for gas, potentially paying higher prices for meat, these hit americans where they can really feel it directly. and these are the kinds of issues that then get brought up meetings when members of congress are back in their districts and their

states, and so that will make them sit up and notice and may give them the political will that's needed to wrestle with some of these really hard issues and do some things to strengthen our posture here. >> look, it's pretty clear that there's a whole of government approach that's necessary. obviously the russians are trying to take advantage -- are bad actors here, either as a government or as a government over, you know, deciding not to deal with these gangs. on the other hand, the government has a duty that protects its citizens from this day-to-day ransomware. it's like we're allowing -- it's like bank robbery is happening every day, and we don't have the tools to stop these small-time bank robbers because we can't, you know, we can't track the money they steal, right? we can't put -- it's not like ink's going to blow up on them when they get their bitcoin. you know, i understand coming up

with a russia strategy, but that only solves part of the problem. what do we need to do to stop these ransom attacks? >> so let's stick with your robbery analogy, chuck. the government certainly has an important role to play in trying -- in doing what it can to deter, to detect, investigate and deter this malicious activity, and you talked about the messaging that's going on with respect to russia and other bad actors but just with robbery and, you know, the police and law enforcement have a role, so do individuals and individual companies, businesses, and the same is true here. there is more that the government can be doing, but there's also a lot more that businesses and companies need to be doing to protect their own networks to begin with, and then assume that they're going to be hacked and then how are they going to reduce the -- what planning are they doing to be ready for this?

>> well, let's talk about paying ransoms. chris krebs, who i know you're familiar with, he thinks that's a mistake. but yet, i understand why a small county government decides, you know, at 25, you know, thousand dollars out of our budget is a lot easier than dealing with the consequences of x, y, and z leaking out, how do we -- how do we fix that penalty problem? >> well, one of the most important ways is by building up your resilience. again, planning for how are we going to reduce the impacts of a ransomware attack, for example. and you know, if it's colonial pipeline, do you have contingency contacts for trucks and truck drivers so that you can get fuel delivered. if it's a meat packing plant, you know, department of agriculture is currently going and talking to other meat packing facilities around the

country to say can you help, you know, fill the gap here. the more we can do to reduce the impact that a bad actor can have, the leverage that they have over us with this ransomware, the more we can resist paying that ransom. so having your servers backed up in a completely separate way such that you can bring them back online, for example, those are really important steps to take in advance so that you can at least buy yourself more time to figure out can we bring ourselves back online without paying this ransom? >> without an unregulated financial structure, awe la bitcoin or other cryptocurrency, would this be the crisis it is right now? >> well, it's not as though other kinds of payment systems are that much easier to trace. i do think that some of the regulations we have in place for other payment systems like know

your customer need to be -- we need to make sure that those apply to cryptocurrency. but we also need to figure out how can we use the traceability that does exist, transaction by transaction in cryptocurrency to turn this to our advantage rather than being victims of the anonymization of cryptocurrency, it's providing a level of anonymity is not helping. >> your supporters of crypto should want illegal activity to be barred from those participating in these digital currencies you would think. we shall see. suzanne spaulding, really appreciate you coming on and sharing your expertise with us. thank you. >> thanks for having me, chuck. and we are awaiting president biden's remarks on covid to begin, and when they do, we will bring those remarks to you live. first stop me if you've heard this one, there's a critical

bipartisan meeting today on the way forward in infrastructure. is there any real chance for a deal? infrastructure weak, 70,000 is next. plus, the latest on the voting rights fight, as president biden tasks vice president harris with leading the efforts. i'll talk to the co-chair of the congressional rights conference. congressional rights conference. and get every month for $5. which is why i brought them. two $5-a-months right here. hey. hey. plus the players of my squad. hey. what's up? then finally my whole livestream. boom! 12 months of $5 wireless. visible, as little as $25 a month or $5 a month when you bring a friend. powered by verizon. wireless that gets better with friends. i've got moderate to severe plaque psoriasis. now, there's skyrizi. ♪ things are getting clearer. ♪ ♪ i feel free to bare my skin yeah, that's all me. ♪ ♪ nothing and me go hand in hand nothing on my skin, ♪ ♪ that's my new plan. ♪ ♪ nothing is everything. ♪ achieve clearer skin with skyrizi.

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welcome back. we are expecting remarks from president biden shortly on the administration's ongoing vaccination campaign. a little bit hitting a wall if you will. we'll bring you those remarks when they happen. as the president touts success on the coronavirus fight, obviously other parts of his agenda are hitting obstacles. infrastructure, excuse the pun, are stalled. president biden is meeting this afternoon, the white house and senate republicans are still very far apart, which has many democrats ready to abandon negotiations and go it alone. voting rights, president biden

is promising to fight like heck against efforts to restrict voting. in those remarks president biden took a pretty, i don't know if i'd call it thinly veiled shot, he didn't say him by name, that's about it. he took a shot at moderate democratic senators manchin and sinema for being roadblocks to action on some issues. >> i hear all the folks on tv saying why doesn't biden get this done? well, because biden only has the majority of effectively four votes in the house and a tie in the senate with two members of the senate who vote more with my republican friends. >> joining me now from capitol hill, my msnbc colleague sahil ka pure. i want to get to the infrastructure stuff in a minute. let me start with since i used the high hard one analogy with joe biden in 2016 with the russian this in baseball terms

is a bit of a brush back pitch with manchin and sinema. how is capitol hill taking it and how are manchin and sinema taking it? >> reporter: i think what we're hearing from president biden is frustration, with just what every president has to deal with. they don't have the power to will their agenda into existence. they have to deal with congress. voters don't want to hear that. they don't want to hear about margins in the house and senate, they don't want to hear about bipartisanship, they just want you to do it, and president biden can't really do it because he has to convince these figures. the second 100 days of the biden white house have been so far a little bit less smooth than the first 100 days, which were all about getting covid-19 under control. congress was willing to give him much more rope then, and at this point the next task is infrastructure, which is something that democrats agree on. the path to getting there has turned out to be very complicated. democrats are in different places. some of them want to cut the rope and say go it alone, use

reconciliation. others say give more time for bipartisanship, and that's where the white house is struggling a little bit to figure out how exactly to proceed. >> well, look, i was given the impression sahil that joe biden wants to get to yes. while it's not clear that there are ten senate republicans that want to get to yes, he definitely wants to get to yes, and the point is this, though, that he views it as a way to make sure he's got manchin and sinema on everything else. i mean, is this one of those things that there's a little bit of -- and i hate these metaphors, three dimensional chess, whatever bad chess metaphor you want to use, meaning if he wants manchin and sinema on board, he's got to get caught trying and letting the republicans kill a bipartisan deal before getting them on board. do congressional democrats see that strategy or not? >> reporter: yes, absolutely, chuck. the two things are very much interrelated.

he has to negotiate with republicans, he believes, democrats believe in order to convince the centrist holdouts in the senate. and also the house, which doesn't get quite as much attention, they want to pursue bipartisanship as well. they want to go home and say they did everything they could. the key thing to know is when president biden is negotiating with senator kapato, he's really negotiating with mitch mcconnell. there are not ten republican votes unless you get mitch mcconnell's signoff for anything major. he can potentially come to an agreement on a number or something like that, but translating that to actual legislation to get ten republican votes is a much more complicated task. the white house's challenge here is to figure out whether to cut a deal with republicans. at best he can probably get a small deal that falls far short of his target and try to do something separately with democrats or maybe do the whole thing alone if he thinks that could undercut the big package.

>> let me ask you from mitch mcconnell's perspective. it's not like he doesn't see what's going on. does he want to hand biden a small bipartisan win knowing full well that biden's going to go it alone anyway down the road. now maybe he thwarts it, maybe he doesn't. does he see any benefit in doing a bipartisan deal with biden for him? >> reporter: i think only mitch mcconnell really knows the answer to that question, but if you ask democrats, almost to a person they would say no, mcconnell does not want to get -- that their belief is that he should not be relied on as a partner in this negotiation, who's ultimately going to agree to anything close to the scope that president biden and democratic leaders want to do. and frankly, chuck, the january 6th commission vote has empowered those voices and has been a knock against the argument from senator manchin and others who want to go on a bipartisan route, manchin in particular was very disappointed, publicly critical of mcconnell for exercising what

he called raw politics. his attitude there is he can't get a bipartisan deal on a commission to investigate an act that put their lives in danger, what hope is there? >> joe manchin, some democrats want to call him naive. i think he thought, hey, i'm holding the line here, mitch. you got to have my back on at least the january 6th thing and so you do wonder will that erode joe manchin's patience, something only joe manchin knows at this point. anyway, sahil kapur coming out of capitol hill, as always, sir, thank you. joining me now is texas democratic congressman mark bee see, the cochair of the executive voting rights caucus. congressman, this seems to be this battle over voting rights, i feel like it's an asymmetrical political warfare. the democrats are focused on how to fix it from a federal level and republicans are basically

fixated with changing all the laws on a state level. democrats lack the power to stop it in the states. republicans have just enough power to prevent action on the federal level. what is the best path forward for your party to fight on voting rights here? >> absolutely, chuck. you got it right. i mean, we're not going to get any sort of relief from the state of texas. you have to remember how ruthless greg abbott is. he said that sickle cell stamps on vote by mail applications and vote by mail ballots were proved voter fraud in the black community. he said that a while ago when he was attorney general, and so you can imagine trying to work with an individual like that. >> can i pause you there? what is the logic -- >> yes. >> congressman, i just want to understand, can you explain his logic as how a stamp about

sickle cell, the disease, is somehow proof of voter fraud? i'm sort of -- i don't mean to make you match this logic train, but how is that proof? >> it's not proof at all. that's just the sort of thing that black people have to go through on a daily basis. we're assumed to be guilty and assumed to be committing some sort of criminal act. i doubt that people in rural texas, if they were to mail their ballots back with john wayne stamps that they would all be considered criminals. but if we mail ours back with sickle cell, we are. that's the basis they're using to oppress the vote, to try to pass these sort of laws in texas that make it to where in this bill that democrats rightfully walked out on would have allowed courts to overturn elections had democrats won by small margins. and so what's going on here is real, and we're not going to get any sort of help from the state at all, and so we have to pass

h.r. 1 and hr 4. we have redistricting coming up here, and the way that republicans in the past have tried to split and divide and attack black and hispanic communities here, and you look at what they're doing with these voting laws, this is going to be the worst redistricting that communities of color have seen since before the voting rights act was passed if we do not pass h.r. 1 and h.r. 4 immediately, particularly h.r. 4 because it helps restore the voting rights act and have to get free clearance. >> and in fact, let's talk about the strategy here, right? there is -- it sounds to me there's sometimes a divide. you go all in for h.r. 1 or do you go h.r. 4 first where there is at least the illusion of bipartisan support or potentially, although lisa murkowski said i think she's alone on this. there's certainly chatter among some senate republicans and even some house republicans at wanting to restore a form of the

voting rights act. what is the best strategy at making progress in your mind? >> you know, obviously i think that both of them are hugely important, but i do think with redistricting, you know, really looming, the census is going to release numbers to states, final numbers to states in september, and my guess is that if we don't have h.r. 4 in place that you're going to see republican legislatures basically try to push through maps that they've already drawn, by the way, guys, so let's not make any mistake about that. they're not consulting with black elected officials or hispanic elected officials. they already have these maps drawn, and they're going to try to push them through as quickly as possible so they can get these maps in place, and hold elections before we're able to act on h.r. 4. i would say passing h.r. 4 right now is hugely important and that time is actually of the essence!

>> what's the role of the vice president, she's being tasked with this as her focus. i know it's something she wanted this on her portfolio. how can she be best used here in advancing either h.r. 1 or 4? >> obviously the vice president knows her way around the senate where she was a member, and i think that she can be very helpful in going and talking to senators and just reminding them about the importance of this -- of h.r. 4 from a bipartisan standpoint. i think when she's speaking to democrats that she should remind democrats that it is the black community that is the heart and soul of the democratic party, that with the exception of maybe a few states like new hampshire and maine that if you look at all of those senate democrats that are in their seats because of the black community, it's essential and important we not

let the black community down and we get this passed. >> congressman mark vee sooe, the founder of the voting rights caucus. i'm weirdly optimistic on the map making this year because so many average citizens have the tools to make their own maps. i do think voters will be able to see how easy it is to gerrymander in a more public way this time than ever before, maybe that has an impact. i said maybe. i hope a lot of citizen activists make your own map. show people how it can be done the right way. democrat from texas, thanks for coming on and sharing your perspective with us. and coming up, democrats won big in the latest special election. steve kornacki is here, he's going to fire up the big board, how they compare to 2017, the first year of the trump presidency. that's next. first year of the t presidency that's next. to relieve occasional nerve aches, weakness and discomfort.

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unchanged. >> yeah, chuck, one thing we could say, one example we have, it's the only one. we just haven't had a lot of special elections in the early days of the biden presidency. the special elections that have taken place ended up being these jungle primaries, this was the first clean republican versus democrat race. this is the only one before november. take a good long look at it right here. democrats hope it's a preview of attractions. you see the 24 point margin here for stansbury, the democrat. the number to compare that to is 23, 23 was joe biden's margin in this district. so republicans were hoping, yeah, if not to win the seat, they were hoping to get this to 10, 12 points somewhere around there to be able to say, hey, we've made progress in the democratic area. imagine what that's going to translate into in a swing district. democrats come in a point better in this special election than biden did. if you want to have a point of

reference, let's think back to 2017, 2018, the special elections that preceded the 2018 midterm way for democrats. here they are, and again, there were just a lot more of them back then. and a pattern emerged. there was a pattern in '17, '18, that really did predict what was going to happen in that midterm. you see there were eight of them here, some of these were in 2018, most of these 2017. six of these, look at this, kansas four, mississippi the at large, south carolina's fifth district, six of the eight that you see here featured democrats doing ten or more points better in a special election than they had against trump in the 2016 election. not all of them but six of the eight. so you are consistently seeing this pattern. trump won montana by 20 in twibs. 2016. trump won the kansas fourth district by 27, republicans held it by only by seven. you are seeing that pattern very consistently in '17 and '18, and

then election night 2018, democrats pick up 40 seats in the house. >> look, more importantly, there was message testing here on the right. they try to run basically on the crime message that they thought won them some swing districts, whether it's the charleston district in south carolina, the two south florida districts which now many believe the defund the police argument worked. look, i think a lot of us thought it could make some inroads in a place like albuquerque and that fell flat it looks like on the republican side of things. >> yeah, no, absolutely. i think that was -- republicans hoped it would look something like this, you know, where it would come down to six, seven points, something like that, and they could say exactly that. look, we pressed the prime message. the democrats have been giving us this issue, and there's traction, but this is the one thing, again, this is 2017, 2018. look how much evidence we had. we're not getting any more special -- we're going to have two in ohio that are going to take place this november on the

regular off year election date. this is the only one we're getting, though, between the biden inauguration in november. so we just don't have a lot of tests of this yet. >> no, we won't the next big test really is the state of virginia. the whole enchilada, we'll glean and over analyze that i promise everybody there. steve, good to see you at the big board, brother. >> thanks, chuck. let me bring -- we're still awaiting president biden but in tv parlance terms they took down the bars, which means we're about to see him. an infectious disease physician, an msnbc medical contributor. we hit a vaccine -- we're plateauing here if not even regressing, you know, i think it's -- is this more let's try this, let's try this. it does feel as if where would

you like to see the efforts concentrated when it comes to our sort of vaccine plateau issue? >> yeah, chuck, we always knew that it was going to turn to a ground game, and then really trying to focus in now to smaller groups that we need to remove structural barriers to get them vaccinated. we need to provide more one on one education, you know, to remove hesitancy, to understand what's driving some of that but really my eyes are on the global scene. you're seeing cases increase through most parts of the world. that's what i'm hoping president biden will speak a little bit about. >> glad you're watching your tv just like me. thank you. >> successful fight against the pandemic as we approach the july 4th date. in just four months, thanks to the american people, we've made incredible progress in getting people vaccinated quickly. efficiently, and equitably. nearly 170 million americans of

every party, every background, every walk of life have stepped up, rolled up their sleeve and gotten the shot. 52% of adults are now fully vaccinated including 75% of all seniors, 28 states and the district of columbia have a achieved 50% of adults being fully vaccinated in those jurisdictions, and it's clearer than ever, the more people who get vaccinated, the more success we're going to have in our fight against this virus. since january 20 -- and we're talking now about 15 months ago, the average daily cases are down from 184,000 to 19,000. below 20,000 for the first time since march of 2020. average hospitalizations are down from 117,000 to 21,000. death rates are down over 85%,

and this didn't just happen by chance. we got to this moment because we took aggressive action from day one with a whole of government response. we used every lever at our disposal to get this done. we experienced the production and expanded it in a significant way in life saving vaccines available for every single american. they're available and we knew that was the case months ago. we work with cities and state to create over 80,000 vaccination sites. we deployed over 9,000 federal staff including 5,100 active duty troops to get shots in arms. as a result, we've built a world class vaccination program. i promised you we'd marshal a wartime effort to defeat this virus, and that's just what we're doing. and now, tens of millions of

americans have been vaccinated. they're able to return to closer to a normal life. fully vaccinated people are safely shredding their masks and greeting one another with a smile. grandparents are hugging their grandkids again. small business owners are reopening storefronts and restaurants because of the vaccination strategy. our economic strategy, we're experiencing the strongest economic recovery this country has seen in decades. there's a group called the organization of economic cooperation and development, oecd, which includes most of the world's largest economies in this membership. they've been one of those leading bodies analyzing economic growth around the world for 60 years. just this week they increased their projection for the u.s. economic growth this year to 6.9%, 6.9%. that's the fastest pace in

nearly four decades, and that's because our vaccination program and our economic response which alone are adding three to four percentage points to our growth, driving stronger growth not just this year but in years to come. in fact, america is the only major country where global forecasters have actually increased their five-year forecast for economic growth since january of 2020. and because of that, americans headed into the summer dramatically different from last year's summer. a summer of freedom, a summer of joy, a summer of get-togethers and celebrations, an all-american summer that this country deserves after a long, long dark winter that we've all endured. what happens after the summer? the data could not be clearer. for all the progress we're making as a country, if you're unvaccinated you are still at

risk of getting seriously ill or dying or spreading disease to others, especially when americans spend more time indoors again closely gathered in the fall. and as we face the potential threat of a new, more dangerous variants. even now, if you look at the areas of country where vaccination rates are the highest, the death rates are dramatically falling. the vaccines are effective. they're effective against the variants currently circulating in the united states. on the other hand, covid deaths are unchanged in many parts of our country that are lagging behind in vaccinations. and for young people who may think this doesn't affect you, listen up, please. this virus, even a mild case can be with you for months. it will impact on your social life. it could have long-term implications for your health that we don't even know about

yet or fully understand yet. it's true, young people are much less likely to die from covid. but if you do not get vaccinated, you can get covid sooner or later, but you get covid still. a substantial percentage of people with covid, even young people will suffer illnesses and some will have long-term health impacts as a consequence. if you're thinking that the side effects from the shot are worse than the covid or that you can't just take a chance, you're just dead wrong. do it for yourself. do it to protect those more vulnerable than you, your friends, your family, your community. you know, some people have questions about how quickly the vaccines were developed. they say they've developed so quickly they can't be that good. here's what you need to know. vaccines are developed over a decade of research in similar viruss and have gone through strict fda clinical trials.

the bottom line is this, i promise you, they are safe. they are safe. and even more importantly they're extremely effective. if you're vaccinated, you are protected. if you are not vaccinated, you are not protected. places with high vaccination rates will also see fewer cases of covid moving forward. places with lower vaccination rates are going to see more. you know, we were elected to be president and vice president for all americans, and i don't want to see the country that is already too divided become divided in a new way, between places where people live free from fear of covid and places where when the fall arrives and death and severe illnesses return. the vaccine is free. it's safe. and it's effective. getting the vaccine is not a partisan act. the science was done under democratic and republican

administrations. as a matter of fact, the first vaccines are authorized under a republican president and widely developed by a democratic president, deployed by a democratic president. all over the world people are desperate to get a shot. that every american can get it at their neighborhood drugstore hat no cost with no wait. every american over 12 years of age no matter where you live, what you believe, who you voted for, has the right to get vaccinated. it's your choice. so please exercise your freedom. live without fear. we need to be one american, united, free from fear this fall. now, how we keep beating this virus as we enter the fall after summer. on may 4 i asked americans to come together to get 70% of adults with one shot by july

4th. 70% at least with one shot. to date, 12 states have already reached this important milestone. we expect more to make this milestone this week. nationally, we're at still have. with 73% of americans over the age of 40, with one shot, and especially people under 40 we need them to step up. over 40 is doing much better. that's why today we're announcing a month-long effort to pull all the stops, all the stops to free ourselves from this virus and get to 70% of adult americans vaccinated. i'm going to take -- it's going to take everyone, everyone, the federal government, the state governments, local, tribal and territorial governments, the private sector, most importantly, the american people, to get to the 70% mark. so we can declare our independence from covid-19.

and free ourselves from the grip it has held over our lives for better part of a year. each of you has the power to help us gain this freedom as a nation. if you get a shot this week, you can be fully vaccinated by july fourth, by the week of july the fourth. and you can celebrate independence day free from fear or worry. this effort has five key parts. first, we're making it easier than ever to get vaccinated. 90% of you live within five miles of a vaccination site. the vaccinations are free, and most places allow walk-up vaccinations. no appointment needed. you can go to vaccines.gov or text your zip code to 438829 to get a text back with the places you can get a shot that are close by. and now we're going to make it

even easier. in response to our call to action, businesses and organizations across the country have stepped up to help everyone get vaccinated. starting next week, many vaccination sites will be offering extended hours during the month of june, including pharmacies that will be open 24 hours every friday night, for 24 hours they'll be open, this month. and if you're too busy at work or school, you can get vaccinated around the clock on any friday, any friday. for parents, who haven't been able to get the shot because they didn't have the child care, starting today, kinder care, learning care group, the bright horizons with hundreds of ymca locations are going to offer free drop-in child care while the parents are getting vaccinated. in addition, uber and lyft are both offering free rides to and

from vaccination sites, vaccination centers. it's easier than ever to get vaccinated. so, again, text 438829 to find out what the nearest places you can get vaccinated are, from where your zip code is, and visit pharmacies within extended hour and walk-upshots that are available. free child care, free rides, free shots. second, we're going to reduce our outreach and public education efforts. we're going to relaunch them in effect. we're going to launch a national vaccination tour to encourage people to take the shot. the vice president is going to lead that tour across the south and the midwes where we still have millions to vaccinate. she will be joined by the first lady and second gentleman and cabinet secretaries along the way. in the spirit of meeting people

where they are, we'll be working with black coalition against covid and other organizations to launch a new initiative called shots at the shop. barbershops, beauty shops, our hubs of activity information on black and brown communities in particular, many communities across the nation. local barbers, stylists, they become key advocates for vaccinations in their communities. offering information to customers, booking appointments for them, even using their own businesses as vaccination sites. we're going to work with shops across the country to make a bigger impact over the next month. we'll also kick things off this weekend with a national canvassing weekend, where thousands of volunteers will be out knocking on doors and encourage their communities to get vaccinated. and mayors will be stepping up even more over the next month and partnering with us on the

city vaccination challenge to see which city can grow its vaccination rate the fastest, the most, by july fourth. we need you to join these efforts. this is the kind of on the ground work that's going to get the job done. third, we will be increasing our work with employers. a lot of working people are holding back because they're concerned about losing pay if they take time off to get a shot. or if they don't feel well the next day. i said before, for small and medium size employers, if you give people paid time off to get a shot, you'll get a tax credit to cover that cost. already millions of workers across the country are eligible for paid time off and incentives from their employers. i'm asking all employers, do the

right thing. we're making it easy for employers to set up on-the-job vaccination clinics to make it more convenient for employers to get a shot. fourth, we're going to continue encouraging people to get vaccinated with incentives and fun rewards. the state of ohio had a heck of a fun reward, a new millionaire last week, thanks to the creative ideas of the governor for holding a vaccination lottery. the grocery store kroger announced they will give away $1 million each week to someone who gets vaccinated at one of their pharmacies. the nba, the nhl, nascar, nascar tracks, they're offering vaccines outside playoff games and in races. major league baseball will be offering free tickets to people to get vaccinated at the ballpark. and to top it off, anheuser-busch announced beer is on them jowl fourth.

free beer for everyone 21 years or over to celebrate the independence from the virus. fifth, and finally, we're asking the american people to help. we need you, we need you to get your friends, family, neighbors and co-workers vaccinated. help them find an appointment, drive them to the site, talk to them about why you made the choice for yourself. so many americans have already stepped up to help get their communities vaccinated. over the next month, we're going to need you more than ever. we need every american to commit to the five actions that i mentioned this month. go to wecandothis.hhs.gov to sign up to volunteer and learn more about how you can

help. take at least five actions to help in june and you might even be invited to visit us at the white house in july to celebrate independence together. i'll close with this -- we need everyone across the country to pull together, to get us over the finish line. i promise you, we can do this, just look what we've already done. we have already accomplished together in only four months. we know it for a fact, americans can do anything when we do it together. so, please, do your part. give it your all through july the fourth. let's reach our 70% goal. let's go into the summer freer and safer. let's celebrate a truly historic independence day. thank you for listening. please get engaged. may god bless you all and may god protect our troops. thank you. [ inaudible question ]

>> we're looking closely at that issue. >> do you think they're testing you? >> no. >> sorry, we had to see what kind of -- one thing we have learned about joe biden is he will answer the shouted question if he would like to give that shouted question a little bit. the shouted question was on the cyber attack, on russia, and whether this is a test from putin. the theme of this is, this is an administration that's basically going local. it's a ground game, it is almost a -- not quite house-to-house when it comes to vaccinating, they're not doing door-to-door. but it's pretty close. the vice president, along with cabinet secretaries will be traveling the country, going to -- trying to get whether it's barbershops, beauty salons, you name it, but we are now in the ground game portion of going where the vaccine hesitant

perhaps are, and going to them, making it as easy as possible so that's all i have for today. with that, let me hand it off to my friend, yasmin vossoughian, who is sitting in for katy tur. >> thank you, chuck. welcome, everybody. i'm yasmin vossoughian in for katy tur as you were just listening to joe biden, the president, basically talking about what was happening with the covid response in this country. he mentioned that the goal come july is reaching 70% of those vaccinated, getting one shot by july. at this moment, as we speak, 63% of americans have one shot of the covid vaccine. this is a ground game, as chuck mentioned. and the president engaging in that ground game, sending the vice president on tour, trying to get folks involved and vaccinated as much as possible.