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vaccinations lag like the south. we have a top public health official in the states most at risk ahead. welcome to monday. it's meet the press daily. i am kasie hunt in for chuck todd. it could be a big week when it comes to the future of the democratic voting, and leaders are not exactly on the same page. president biden is expected to focus for the next two days on an intense series of meetings with lawmakers on infrastructure. senator manchin signals the group will be showing what is in

it today. the progressives in his party are not thrilled with the talks because these talks are likely to produce a deal that is more than what progressives want. this is expected to be in the ballpark of $1 trillion or less, and compare that to what bernie sanders is working on, which carries a price tag of $6 trillion. there's a sweeping piece of legislation that will not get the 60 votes it needs to precede, and may not get 50 if manchin opposed it, which means democrats and the democrats will have to decide will they ramp up efforts to weaken the filibuster, or do they rev up pressure on progressives to compromise on major pieces of their agenda, which is something that they oppose. democrats on the hill are

divided on the way forward, and that's why so much attention is centered on the leader of the party, the president. joining me on capitol hill, leann caldwell, and mike medley. great to have both of you onboard here. let's start with the hill negotiations, because we have been waiting and waiting and waiting to get some outline of the deal that this bipartisan group is talking about, and, of course, you can't separate these negotiations from the reconciliation negotiations that are going on in the background set to potentially satisfy progressives that may not be thrilled with what is not in the bipartisan deal. where do things stand on the hill right now? is this still on track? >> yeah, kasie, those two things of absolutely linked for various reasons. let's start on the bipartisan proposal. joe manchin and other senators

of the bipartisan group indicated that the details of the proposal would come out as early as today. well, our sources are telling us that after days of waiting that they are probably not going to come out today, and the reason is they are still try to go figure out how to pay for this smaller$1 trillion-bill, and caught up in the negotiations and discussions is the gas tax indexed to inflation moving forward. this group of bipartisan members have been working for weeks on this much smaller infrastructure deal, and the fact that they can't come up and release the details of it still is pretty problematic, especially since they are trying to get the support of 60 senators in order for it to pass. now, why this is tied to a much bigger perhaps $6 trillion infrastructure bill that some democrats want to pass.

well, that's because if you want votes for the bipartisan bill, the progressives, anyway, are saying they have to have some sort of guarantee that their priorities are going to make it through both chambers of congress and are not going to be left behind. there's some worry if this small bipartisan package is moved forward first then they're going to -- republicans will wash their hands off it, and some democrats, moderates, anyway, will say they got through the elective proposal and they need to make sure that their priorities are also passed. >> so mike, where is the white house on this? what do they think about the strategy and what it should be here, and what are the president's top priorities? >> you think back to the $1.9

trillion covid bill in january and february and signed into law in march, and the white house was able to use the urgency of the moment and the freshness of a new administration to get democrats all onboard with the reconciliation package and have something to tout as far as an early win for the administration. now it's a much different situation, both the economy is showing signs of rebounding, and the coronavirus is in something of a little retreat at least in the u.s., and the white house sees two tracks here for movg an infrastructure bill, and the president wants to do something bipartisan if possible, and then they have the backup of the democrats only path. you are already hearing some republicans that want to be part of the bipartisan group say if you are only going to follow that up by pushing through an even bigger $6 trillion reconciliation measure, maybe

you don't have my support. what the white house has done is cleared the president's schedule for the next two days, and he has a meeting with financial regulators today but a lot of time and attention will get to beyond talking to the lawmakers in person and by phone to create a path forward. the bipartisan group has not been able to come forward as scheduled today with their proposal speaks to the difficulty all along has been how do you pay for it? the white house sent that clear signal on friday reminding them the gas tax was a no go, and so if you can't get republicans to find any other pay for, especially a corporate tax increase, where does that leave you? that, of course, begs the question on reconciliation, are you going to have joe manchin onboard with that, and are you going to have kyrsten sinema and how many other democrats are

resisting that proposal all along? it's a big decision for the white house, how do they find any path forward rather than just deciding between the two. >> if they had to pick one, would the white house go for reconciliation or the bipartisan deal? >> president biden wants to do something bipartisan and wants to show washington can work, but there are a lot of officials in the white house that never really had any doubts about where this was heading. there's been some sense that you have to show you're trying, be caught trying to get joe manchin to sign on for an infrastructure at the end. there's no sign that is completely ruled out, and even manchin indicated that. he, himself, he also said he wants to do things on a bipartisan basis. i think you are going to see, as one white house official put it to me, this is the week where we had multiple roots to a destination, and the gps will have to tell us which one by the end of the week because there is time particularing and

reconciliation may be the only sure bet may be the only way where republicans fall once the details are out there. >> do you think there's a chance leadership steps in and stops it afterwards? >> the bipartisan group says they have support of 11 republicans, and it's always been thought they need support of at least ten republicans to pass the senate, so that's a good sign. but as everybody up here in the senate, it all depends on where mitch mcconnell stands. is he going to put down the hammer and decide how his conference is going to vote, or is he going to let them vote how they see fit? it's really difficult to tell here. mcconnell has not shutdown the negotiations. he also knows that infrastructure is really good

for his members who have elections next year, to go home and tout the roads and bridges and transportation infrastructure back home in their states head into an election, so -- but we are always watching mcconnell extremely closely, regardless if there's a final deal on this, though, mcconnell and his people know this is taking up valuable time and cut into whatever the democrats' agenda beyond this is. >> of course, mike, part of that agenda beyond infrastructure is voting rights, which we expect to have procedural votes this week in the senate, and it obviously does not have 60 votes to pass. what is the white house thinking right now on how this is proceeding through the senate, and there are activist out there pretty frustrated they were not able to build more support of what was included in the for the people act, and joe manchin is at the center of this again and

doesn't seem willing to move on the filibuster, so what does the white house say when they start to make the argument to voters to try and think about a re-election campaign? >> i think you have to look at how they announced vice president harris and her portfolio of voting rights. when the president announced it in tulsa a couple weeks ago and when the vice president issued a statement about it, the priority and the language was about building outside political pressure on washington and not sort of the nuts and bolts negotiating on capitol hill sausage making like you might see under a priority that they think is paus be. there's some issues -- it's rare that you actually see a senate leader bringing an issue to the floor where they don't necessarily have a success in passing, but this is something that i think the white house views in a much more political lens where you have to put people on record and then make

sure that there are political consequences down the road. yes, of course they would like to see what joe manchin comes forward with, and if republicans are onboard, and voting rights have become a litmus test for republicans in a way, and like gun rights and abortion rights have been in the past, and without any indication that a republican will be onboard, it will be an election issue rather than a policy issue right now. >> makes sense. thank you very much. now, let's bring in one of the leading progressive voices in the senate, senator ed markey from massachusetts. thank you for being with us today. >> good to be with you. >> as we are talking about the infrastructure talks here, one of the obviously critical pieces for you and for many other democrats is climate, and there are a lot of questions about whether or not the bipartisan talk might close the gap you and

others have advocated for so long. with that in mind can you support this emerging bipartisan compromise as you understand it right now? >> well, i don't know all the details, but as i hear it thus far i have not heard language that talks about environmental justice, dramatic reductions in greenhouse gas emissions creating millions of new union jobs in this climate infrastructure mandate which 2021 politically has been given to us by the elections of last year. i have not heard that. i cannot support a deal that does not have a climate added center. no climate, no deal. >> would you be willing to support this bipartisan deal if you felt confident that the climate provisions would be included in a reconciliation package later on? >> there has to be an absolute

guarantee that climate is dealt with, that the votes are going to be there to deal with the climate issues that are central to our generations' response to this crisis. without wind, solar, all electric vehicles and new battery storage technologies and transmission systems, we can't deal with the crisis. from my perspective, these two bills as they are on separate tracks right now, ultimately it all has to come together in a way that ensures both are going to pass so that we are not just doing bridges and roads, as important as they are, but we are also dealing with the climate crisis simultaneously. right now i'm not hearing that in terms of the bipartisan package which is being negotiated. >> so what would you consider a guarantee? would you want joe manchin's word that he will vote yes on a reconciliation package, or how

does that look to you? >> ultimately there just has to be a procedural guarantee that they are both going to be considered and both going to have the votes. that's the only way in which either can pass, so from my perspective, i remain open to what the process is in order to accomplish that goal, but i don't think that we can leave this congress -- we can leave for the recess in august unless we have a bill that deals with the climate crisis. if we leave and we have not passed it then we are not only going to have a crisis with the climate, we are also going to have a legislative crisis because time is going to run out for us to deal with this urgent problem of the climate crisis. we see it every night, the drought in the west, and the fires in the west. we see the storms intensifying in their impact upon our country. we have to act now.

>> how many of your democratic colleagues do you feel the same way you do? we know there are 11 republicans that signed on to this framework, but for every person like you, every democrat like you who decides, hey, this is not good enough, they need to find another one, do you think there are enough democrats to think this compromise cannot go forward without support from you? >> i am not going to give you a number but i will tell you that i am not alone. we need to respond to the crisis, progressive democrats are going to ultimately stand up to ensure that we have the solutions put in place. this is the environmental economic national security and moral issue of our time, and we need to ensure that we deal with that crisis now, and even as we are dealing with the need for roads and bridges and other more traditional infrastructure, we have to do both. >> let me ask you about one

detail in the bipartisan package that stuck out to me. they are talking about user fees for electric vehicles, essentially requiring electric vehicles to pay the same tolls and fees that gas vehicles pay now, do you feel comfortable now adding those fees in? >> we need more tax breaks in any infrastructure bill which we pass, far more plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles to be on the roads in our country, and that's the way we will back out oil that we put into the vehicles, and so the quicker we electrify our vehicles the quicker it will reduce these greenhouse gases. at the same time i think we should just operate under the rule of thumb that there's no

taxes raised on those that make under $400,000, and then whatever we construct is built around that guarantee we will not tax working people in our country. >> senator, we know that president biden is taking time, and i'm sure your phone will be ringing at some point, sir. >> if i could just -- thank you. >> yes, go ahead. go ahead. >> i was just going to say, we just saw last week this incredible scandal about how billionaires in our country do not pay their fair share of the dues to live in our country, from jeff bezos all the way down. the scandal in our country is not what is illegal, it's what is legal. revenues are there. we know where the revenues are in order to pay for the infrastructure bill, and we have to overhaul the tax code to make sure we get the billions by the hundreds of billions back so we

can pay for all of this infrastructure which we need. >> sounds like if we are going to do that it's going to be in the reconciliation package. we appreciate your time. coming up, iran's new ultraconservative president says he won't meet with president biden as the white house says keeping iran from getting a nook -- nuclear weapon is a priority. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ just two pills for all day pain relief. aleve it, and see what's possible. this is dr. arnold t. petsworth, he's the owner of petsworth vetworld. business was steady, but then an influx of new four-legged friends changed everything. dr. petsworth welcomed these new patients.

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welcome back. president biden has not commented on iran's election of the country's new president in a vote that many say the vote was rigged. ebrahim raisi won despite the

lowest turnout in country history. he opposed any talks on limiting iran's ballistic program, and he insisted the u.s. lift all sanctions on iran. this comes as iranian diplomats negotiate a return to the 2015 iran nuclear deal. prime minister naftali bennett called the ebrahim raisi regime murders. it's good to see all of you. ali, let me start with you. bring us up to speed of what happened here and what comes next. >> well, he's clearly a very aus

steer man, and i asked him if sanctions need to be removed in order for the agreement to work, and he said not only do all sanctions need to be removed, but he dismissed the notion of meeting president biden even if the two sides manage to make a deal on the nuclear front. he's not interested in discussing other issues. when he was asked are you willing to meet joe biden he said no, and he moved on to the next question. in stark contrast, his predecessor who was the first iranian official to speak to a u.s. president, and he spoke to obama after the nuclear deal, so this is going to be tough but the reality is that he needs this nuclear deal. i asked him if he is keeping the same nuclear team in place that

rouhani put there, and he said he is and i think that's an indication that they would like to get this deal done in relatively short order to give a boost to their economy and ultimately enhance his standings which are a bit shaky with the very low voter turnout. there are other issues that probably will be problematic for the biden administration beyond the nuclear deal. one of the central focuses of the biden administration has been human rights, and here president ebrahim raisi has been accused of being involved in the killings of thousands of political prisoners in the '80s, and he was asked about that at the press conference, and he didn't answer that but said he was a defender of human rights. as far as the deal goes, i think these guys still want to keep it because he's taking his cues

from ayatollah. >> very interesting. so what is the view of all that from where you are in israel? >> naftali bennett held his first cabinet meeting yesterday and used that occasion to forcefully denounce the nuclear deal. he said in his words, the western powers including the united states needs to wake up, and hardliners like ebrahim raisi who has been involved in the major human rights violation represent the true face of the iranian regime, so like benjamin netanyahu before him, naftali bennett very strongly opposed to the nuclear deal, but we are expecting he will be taking a more discreet approach with the white house, and you will remember netanyahu defying

president obama trashing the nuclear deal. there was a feeling in israel that was pretty damaging to the relationship with the united states, especially the democratic party, and bennett has agreed with secretary of state, and they will not ambush them with the disagreements and will talk it out in private. probably not going to see the kind of fireworks we have seen previously. >> no surprises, and that has supplied to what the biden administration is doing. thank you both very much for joining us. ambassador, i would like to go to you on the big picture here. i mean, you have spent so much time in the region and have such a nuanced understanding of what is going on, and clearly there

are so many questions about what happened with the election itself, but now the result is that this hardliner is in power in iran. what is next in your view? what are the central challenges for the united states? >> well, certainly a brutal reminder of autocratic dictator ships have their politics and there's no shortage of politics in iran. from the point of the u.s. one of the major problems with the jcpoa, and that's the plan of action that we had with iran, is the fact we were not able to include limitations on missiles, and frankly limitations on iranian mischief in the region, especially in the sunni area, and israelis have to be concerned about this because the iranians have been helping hamas over the years and there's no indication that this kind of mischief would stop, so i could

see the biden administration looking at a clean deal for now, the idea that we could enhance our security against the iranian nuclear programs with a deal, and i think there's a lot of justification for getting the deal back, going back to the status quo. i think the biden administration and frankly many people would like to see some understanding on regional mischief and on the missile issues, and, of course, on human rights. i don't think we're going to see a lot of that right now, so i think we're looking at whether we are willing to take kind of a clean sort of nuclear deal that is getting back to where we were before, and making sure there's some kind of consensus in the u.s. congress that this is okay for now, and certainly that has not been the case in the past. certainly this election of ebrahim raisi that does suggest there are a lot of problems in

iran with only 49% of the eligible voters voting in this, but it's a problematic election, but i think we could probably get the nuclear deal and then perhaps move and see what we can do beyond that. we will have to reach out to our arab partners and friends and talk to the israelis a lot about this. >> so mr. ambassador, you mentioned congress and the sort of consensus. i guess my question is, do you think the domestic politics here in the u.s. is going to allow the biden administration to do this, or do you think that -- i mean, we're already seeing china, iran come up in political campaign messaging, and it's clearly going to be a central talking point for a lot of the republicans, and do you think that will make the biden administration more hesitant than they otherwise might be or do you think it's irrelevant? >> i think it's very relevant. the tough issue is to have a

clear-eyed understanding of what is in the interest of the american people, and i think the national security adviser tried to make clear that the iran nuclear program is a big concern for the american people. i think they can sell that. the problem is they are not going to be able to move forward with other arrangements with the iranians, at least for the time being in terms of what they have been doing in the broader middle east. i think american politics will be affected by what our allies, including israel think of this deal. in addition, there's just a certain amount of ban width, and you had a segment on this issue of the infrastructure bill, and there's just a limit to the amount of bandwidth people with use to go into the intricacies to see if we can get understanding with iran and syria and hamas and other

issues. for now we are looking for something that will be fairly straightforward and the question is whether the republicans will say, okay, we accept this for now. after all, since we pulled out of the jcpoa, we did not see a great improvement in the situation. i think the contention somehow if you sanction them to the max you will bring them to their knees is a proposition that is also in the air, and if you sanction them a lot you can get them to the table but it's hard to get them to their knees. i hope people understand there are limits to what you can do with sanctions only. >> i guess we're about to find out. ambassador, thank you very much for bringing your expert insight and expertise to us this afternoon. thank you. coming up next year, has police reform talks continue on capitol hill, we are on the ground in chicago where they are trying to put one of the key elements of police reform to work.

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across the country. chicago is one of the cities that has seen such a spike. just this weekend five people were killed and 44 injured in shootings. shaquille brewster joins me from chicago. community policing trying to address the violence. what are you seeing chicago try to do here as we all grapple with this incredibly difficult issue? >> you know, when you talk to community leaders and officials, police officials, they know and they acknowledge that pattern that you see every summer as the temperatures increase so too does crime in the city. we are hearing from the police superintendent saying he is combating that crime by doubling down on community policing. >> this is what it looks like. >> yeah, this is -- literally, you are just walking down the street and talking to folks. >> it's community policing. the deputy chief is charged with

refreshing the decades-old concept, and getting a major endorsement from chicago's top cop. >> this is a transformative moment for cpd. >> a moment that can't come soon enough that has seen shootings spike and murders rise. the solution is in the community. >> once you establish relationships with folks, and they trust you, people are more apt to speak with you. >> chicago's re-imagined neighborhood policing initiative pushes officers to break from traditional policing and engage the public, passing out foods and coaching sports and hosting events. it commits two officers or deos to every district. >> our job is to proactively engage the community. >> that's their only job?

>> they are not responsible for radio calls. that's their only job. >> and in the first year it seems to be working. >> the aim is to have the police be responsive to communities, and let the community say what it wants and expect that's what policing will look like. >> community leaders assisting the program say they have seen change. >> what did it looks like before you guys? who were you able to reach out to? >> it was just calling and just going into a dead zone. >> we're walking with some of the dcos, and four, five, six people coming up to them and knowing them by name, and that's what we want. >> but one says she's concerned the program could be expanding too quickly, emphasizing the need for change to last. >> often times what happens especially in major cities is that program after program is introduced then it's defunded or

forgotten about or something else becomes the new highlighted reel, so there's skepticism sometimes from community members that their voices will actually be heard this time. >> you have to note that this is happening inside the context of the calls for national police reform. you mentioned the negotiations happening on capitol hill but here in chicago those are calls you heard well before the murder of george floyd. it's clear when you listen to the police officials that they are underscoring it's not a choice between combating violence in the city and engaging members of the public. they said in order to have the lasting public safety you need to attack both problems at once. >> all right. thank you very much, my friend. always good to see you. we appreciate your reporting. coming up next here, the more deadly and contagious delta variant could be the most dangerous in parts of the

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welcome back. cases of the more severe and more contagious delta variant continue to rise, while at the same time vaccination rates are continuing to lag and the growing concern is the state by state disparity in vaccination numbers. here's former white house covid response team senior adviser. >> we will get close to 70%. the issue to worry about is if we are at 60 or 70, and the issue i am more concerned about is we will be at 50 in arkansas and 90 in vermont, and if you want us to be one country, those kinds of divisions are going to make things worse for some people. that's where i think we should focus our energy and concern. >> so at least 16 states and the

district of columbia vaccinated 70% of adults with at least one shot, and others are well below that including alabama, mississippi, louisiana and wyoming. they have fewer than half of adults with one shot. joining me now is dr. karen landers. thank you so much for being here today. can i just ask you why do you think it is the rate is so low in alabama? >> i really think there are a number of reasons we have to look at. as i said before, vaccine hesitancy does not mean refusing, but in spite of all of the messaging, a person still has a lot of questions about safety, and they are still listening to misinformation and i think we absolutely have to continue to combat that with daily messaging. >> so how much of this do you think is an access issue? >> i really do not think we have a significant access issue right

now in alabama. we have done a number of activities. first of all, we had our national guard in 24 of our very rural counties carrying out mass clinics, and they also refocussed on individual clinics. we have continued to work to ensure that persons have the ability to get vaccinated in every county in the state of alabama. we only have one county that does not have a county health department and that county has other access, and of course, people can come to other counties. again, a number of entities vaccinating. we have our home bound programs now, and some have vans and taking that out into the community and providing that. i don't think access is the issue right now in our state. >> so in that avent, one of the things we took notice here in washington is that one senator did a public service

announcement essentially urging people in your state to get vaccinated, and he's probably better known as cooch, and what other types of figures would you like to see people vaccinated to try and get the numbers up? >> well, we have actually looked at a number of ways to do this. coach saban of alabama did a psa for us, and charles barkley is also a well-respected basketball hero, and faith leaders and local persons in the community speaking out. one thing we have seen is that persons still wanted to receive information from their doctor, from their health care professional. one thing i continue to remind people, i am a physician and i give medical advice, and the element of department public of health considers the citizens to

be our patients. we are giving medical advice about an important vaccine that can protect peoples' health and saves lives. >> how concerned are you about this new delta variant? doctors and public health experts we speak to here, and if you look at what happened over in the uk, the primary issue is how fast it spreads, particularly in some cases among kids in ways that have, you know, had real repercussions in the uk, and are you concerned how the delta variant may affect your citizens? >> will, we absolutely have to be concerned about the delta variant. i remind people, we are really in a race with the variants, and this particular variant, we have identified 13 cases of delta in the state of alabama. we know there are more cases, and we obviously don't sequence every specimen, but the concern

is when we have a variant that escapes that vaccine and we only have a number of people that are not vaccinated, our health care system managed during that going on, and when i say they managed, they managed really in a remarkable way, we had over 3,000 people in the hospital at certain times with covid, and now we are down to less than 200. i don't think our health care system really can sustain that again in spite of the commitment of our physicians and hospitals and nurses and other health care personnel. we absolutely must have more people vaccinated so we can reduce the risk of this variant as well as other variants emerging that really are not able to be covered by the vaccine. >> doctor, you mentioned a moment ago that you consider people in your state to be your patients and that you are a

doctor. do you feel people don't trust you like they did before? >> again, i focus on being a physician, and even with the element of the public health, and my goal is to take care of patient, and certainly when i am talking to people one-on-one and receptive to what i say, and certainly people who talk to me in the media may not trust what i say, but again, my responsibility is to give sound medical advice based upon science. people may not accept my advice, but again, my obligation as a physician remains to provide the best guidance that i can on the subject. >> all right. dr. karen landers, thank you for taking time to be with us today. we a appreciate it. coming up next here we will have new details on the lgbtq

celebration that turned tragic.

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new projects means new project managers. you need to hire. i need indeed. indeed you do. the moment you sponsor a job on indeed you get a short list of quality candidates from our resume database. claim your seventy five dollar credit, when you post your first job at indeed.com/home. . welcome back. as pride celebrations take place across the country, v.a. secretary denis mcdonough made history at a pride event when he said that the v.a. is soon going to offer gender affirming surgeries for the first time. it changes a 13-year ban and starts the surgical capacity. speaking in orlando, secretary mcdonough said that the

surgeries the right thing to do, and to allow the transgender veterans to have the surgeries they have deserved for a long time. and now in the stonewall pride parade was kicking off saturday night when a pickup rammed into two pedestrians killing one and seriously injuring two others. sam brock has the story from wilton manor. >> casey, it was very upsetting, and there were two events that altered the pride parade, and the sequence of events that police say that a 77-year-old driver unexpectedly accelerated and killed one of the people, and injured two men who are members of the gay men's chorus.

he could not walk the parade route, and would not be in that position. and then in delray beach which is roughly a mile from here, you have had someone who vandalized the route. and the people of jacksonville put up lights to honor the five-year anniversary of the pulse nightclub shooting. and congresswoman debbie wassermann schultz was feet from where it happened. >> i don't know how i can get across how devastating it is to watch someone run down and lose their life in front of so many people who were there to celebrate, celebrate love and living and being able to be equal and who they are. >> reporter: and wilton manor's police described it as a tragic

accident, and the congresswoman's comment of the environment that it could have been intentional was part of the problem. back to you. >> so difficultment sam brock, thank you so much. thank you to all of you for this hour, and chuck is going to be back with more "meet the press" daily. don't go anywhere, because the msnbc coverage continues with geoff bennett after a quick break. break. just two pills for all day pain relief. aleve it, and see what's possible. this is dr. arnold t. petsworth, he's the owner of petsworth vetworld. business was steady, but then an influx of new four-legged friends changed everything. dr. petsworth welcomed these new patients. the only problem? more appointments meant he needed more space. that's when dr. petsworth turned to his american express business card, which offers spending potential that's

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it is great to be with you. i'm geoff bennett, and at this hour the democrats are staring down a make or break week in washington. the senate gavels in one hour from now, and then the senators have one week of work before the july 4th recess. in the short window, the democrats are hoping to make progress on two major priorities for the biden agenda -- infrastructure and voting