good evening and welcome to a special holiday edition of the last word with every vote counted in the presidential election, we know donald trump did not win a majority of the

vote. political report tells us that donald trump captured 77.3 million votes, 49.8% to kamala harris 75 million votes, 48.3%. 1.5% winning margin for donald trump. another 1.7% of the vote went to other candidates with almost 3 million people voting for other candidates for president. once again, most american voters voted against donald trump. in the end, the 2024 election was decided by 229,766 votes across michigan, pennsylvania, and wisconsin. joe biden's record high vote count in 2020 of 81 million votes for president remains the most votes ever won by a

presidential candidate in american history. of course, the number of voters constantly increases as the population increases over time. former presidents that won in huge landslide like ronald reagan, lyndon johnson, franklin delano roosevelt, could not have possibly won as many votes as even losing candidates do now because of the voting population at that time was so much smaller. postelection polls show voters in conflict with themselves. 79% of voters said that lowering prices of goods and services was their top priority, 52% of voters said that they favored new tariffs on goods imported from other countries, 59% of voters said that new tariffs on goods from other countries would generally make the prices of the things that they buy higher. congressional budget office agrees with this 59% of voters who said that new tariffs will increase prices,

congressional budget office estimates the new tariffs donald trump proposed to the cost of american families average of $1560 a year. the cbo inflation calculations did not include imported electronics and virtually all of our electronics are imported . that is a category that would face the highest price increases, as much as 60% price increases. republicans showed no consistent governing capacity during the first trump presidency with republican house members in open revolt against their own leadership. it is a habit they cannot break. in the new york times, writes this about the incoming trump administration, compared trump's picks with virtually any other republican white house or cabinet, and you will see a team with shockingly little governing experience and almost no connection to the institutional republican party outside of donations made to affiliated political action committees. trump is not picking from

within the broad universal republican party, he has no interest in most of the politicians, policy entrepreneurs, and experienced bureaucrats who make up most republican administrations. he is interested, more or less, in people he sees on tv. trump is less concerned with the house of the republican party, less concerned with building up the next generation of republican leaders than he is with serving his narrowest interests. the republican party could wither and die and donald trump would not care, provided it did not disrupt his ability to enrich himself and his family. leading off the discussion, jamelle bouie, columnist for the new york times and co-host of the podcast, unclear and present danger. -- is with us, opinion, miss from the washington post and senior fellow at the brooklyn institution and professor of government at georgetown university.

i want to begin with the point you make about here is the theoretically, you would call him, leader of the republican party, donald trump, who has absolutely no interest building the republican party. >> yes, i think that the immediate issue for the republican party, at the very least, it puts them into a bad political position. i'm sure there will quickly, time when the immediate interest of donald trump will conflict with what is best politically for the republican party. those situations, you want the president who cares about the health of his party. if you don't have one, trump is clearly willing to sacrifice the help of the republican party, immediate political interest to whatever he wants to do and i think we will see that soon. >> ej, talk about what a difference this is from the past with former republican presidents and democratic presidents and the way that they approached party building. >> i think you have had

presidents that do more building, barack obama, won great victories but was not all that interested in building his party. lbj was clearly a party sort of guy. i think there is another fundamental that underscores jamelle's point. donald trump's lame duck president, the constitution makes clear he cannot run for president again. i think he is are republicans realizing that right from the beginning when they rejected rick scott as their leader and elected john thune. it was secret ballot so they could get away with voting against the elon musk pick and what we have seen as maga world's pick in voting for someone who would protect them and not trump. i think you are going to see republicans with that in the back of their minds. and republicans who will want to run for president in 2028.

they will be thinking about their interest. in the short-term, there will be a lot of worry trump will primary them, the maga constituency is right now a majority of the republican primary vote. they know trump has -- on them, i think that will reduce his power on them more than he realizes. >> donald trump's popularity, favorability has dropped since the election. the latest shows him at 41% favorable. if you go back to 2016, at this point after he was elected and before he took the oath of office, he was 10 points higher at 51%. jamelle, that is a lame duck number he is starting with . >> that's right. i think that e.j.'s point, starts off photo weakened

position is critical, not just he is a lame duck, basically 18 months before the pressures of the election cycle bear down on the entire political landscape. he has this big ambitious agenda, narrow majorities in the house, fragile narrow majority and narrow majority in the senate with republican senators who may not be on board with every single little thing that he wants to do. even a skilled and competent and experienced president would have a hard time under these conditions. the president we have is donald trump. >> that is such a good point. e.j. , i want to go to your point about john thune as the next senate leader because it was such interesting early test of elon musk coming up and saying, this is who i want for republican leader of the senate. republican senators basically

said, we don't care. your guy will come in last in our election among senate republicans. and going forward, john thune is very much that party building kind of guy, the kind of senator very much interested maintaining a republican majority in the senate and finding the right candidates who are winner candidates, not fringe crazy candidates like the time donald trump supports. >> i think that what, i'm glad you showed those numbers at the beginning of the show, his republican politicians can count votes. when donald trump claims on the basis of a victory, it was smaller than hillary clinton's victory in the popular vote when trump won the electoral college in 2016. they know trump is speaking nonsense. donald trump, either way, mid- december said that he had the biggest mandate in 129 years.

that was really strange number for him to pick because it does not go back to an election year. i went back, it is 1895, almost no elections then, a guy called frederick, what's his name, frederick -- got elected a massachusetts. he has the -- mandate. it is nonsense. i think that thune and thom tillis, who is up next year, a lot of republican senators in 2026, well aware there is no mandate here. they will go along with trump because his success will partly benefit them, if they think it will help them. as you say, thune interested in public majority in 2026 and beyond. >> jamelle, one thing your description of the trump

cabinet coming in, one thing donald trump seems to have tried to guarantee is that no one in his cabinet would possibly agree to invoke the 25th amendment to remove him which is option open to the cabinet and they did discuss it after january 6th last time, some of them did, donald trump making sure there's not a person who would think about it. >> that's right, he is selecting primarily for loyalty. for someone worried about that kind of backstabbing that makes sense. it is important to recognize the most loyal people are not necessarily the ones with the greatest handle on running these agencies. these agencies like the department of defense, the department of justice, these are real jobs with real responsibilities and it takes time to learn how to do those jobs well. i will repeat this, experienced erik kratz -- bureaucrats have

taken these jobs and run into trouble because it is hard to work the president's will through the federal bureaucracy. one of the things trump has to watch out for, offering up advice, he may have loyal people that they will not necessarily, they may not necessarily be able to work his will in the way that he wants them to. they may have to resort to lawlessness to do the things he wants, which opens up another set of medical problems as well as practical ones for the administration. >> jamelle bouie and e.j. dionne, thank you for this last addition before the holidays. president joe biden takes his place as one of the most successful builders in the history of the presidency having passed the biggest infra structure bill of our lifetimes and created important programs leading to factory openings all over the country. my discussion with secretary of

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the most important thing to know, when you look at a ballot, is what you are voting for. that isn't easy to do because your only choice on the ballot is who you are voting for. many voters mistakenly thought when

they voted for donald trump that they were voting for someone that would get things done in their community. that is because most of us, that very much includes me, don't always know who to credit for the good things or the bad things the government has done. who did that, who built that new bridge, who rebuilt our airport to make it a state-of- the-art airport? why did that new chips factory -- who did that? the answers to those questions are critical to informed voter participation and democracy. people will automatically get refunds from airlines next year when their flights are canceled and they won't know that joe biden did that. people will be driving over bridges with their kids in the back seat not knowing that that bridge was rebuilt and made safer by joe biden. it would take much more than the full hour of this program

to describe what joe biden did as president of the united states. for most other presidents, it would take less than an hour to describe what they did in the presidency. donald trump, in four years, did tax cuts and tariffs that raised prices and built a little bit of wall at the southern border, not 2300 miles of border wall, just a tiny fraction of that. that is what he did. you have heard many times on this program that what joe biden built as president compares only to what franklin delano roosevelt did in 12 years in the presidency before there were term limits for president. president roosevelt revolutionary program that changed every way we change in america was called, the new deal. the most poverty-stricken group of americans in the 1930s were the elderly. president roosevelt rated social security and provided

financial security minimum for people over 65 that never existed before. president roosevelt enacted the first minimum wage, massive infrastructure spending all over the country that provided jobs and improved communities all over, everywhere we live in this country. donald trump kept promising an infrastructure bill when he was president and did nothing. the trump administration did not write one sentence of an infrastructure bill, never mind vote on it. there should be a name for what joe biden did. franklin roosevelt came up with the name, the new deal, when he was running for president for the first time in 1932, the middle of the worst depression in the 20th century. he promised america what he called, a new deal, for the american people. the phrase caught on right away and reporters began referring to the new deal in the first year of the roosevelt presidency. we still talk about it today as

the most important turning point in the definition of what was possible in american government. what joe biden did should have a name like that. everyone knew what you meant when you were talking about the new deal in 1934 and 1944 and 1954. our next guest has a name for what joe biden did. >> president biden understands that policy is a matter of daylight. it is about people. he doesn't just see a road or bridge, he sees somebody's commute home back to their families. he doesn't just see ships and ports and supply chains, he sees ways forget the things we count on at the grocery store. that is what all of this is actually about. taking together a belief on how to use the government to solve problems, recognition for what we are up against, and level of

ambition, i think all of that has added a into the enormous progress that we made in recent years. something collectively i like to think of as, the big deal. >> leading off the session tonight as transportation secretary pete buttigieg. the big deal, let's get it started right now, see if it can catch on. >> i hope it does. first of all, i think it is wide and as turn of phrase, the only way to capture the transformative investments in transportation, infrastructure, the part i had the honor and privilege of working on, the removal of lead pipes poisoning children for decades in this country, extension of broadband internet access to millions of households, improvements to the energy grid. unlike other moments in our infrastructure history that had a single piece of infrastructure change, interstate highway program under eisenhower, massive achievement but it was one

thing. transcontinental railroad under lincoln. this is hard to characterize because it touches so many things, the only thing all of the different kinds of investments have in common is the scale, the scope, the imagination and recognition that confronted with a crisis, in some ways, as fdr was confronted with crisis, president biden responded with a level of ambition, let's take the tools of government, use them to solve short-term and long-term problems. that is what this decade of infrastructure is all about. >> how do we get voters to understand who did that? this fundamental thing? all they get in the voting booth is a name and they don't know why things are running so much better in my town or my state, because of things people in government did. it might be a governor, your mayor. you have been a mayor, i'm sure you did that yourself.

>> we have been working with governors and mayors, one of my favorite rules of political mathematics, two willing parties share credit for something like this, each party walks over two-thirds of the credit and it can be a beautiful thing. we have seen people try to take credit for projects that they opposed. i try not to be cynical about it. again and again, we have seen often republican members of the house telling their constituents, i delivered this project. >> you've got transportation, huge piece of the infrastructure bill. i know the way that works, i was also the chief of staff of the environment of public works committee in the senate which has a lot to do with public works aspects of the infrastructure bill. i know when you pass these laws , the transportation secretary gets calls, gets letters from members of congress saying, can you please make sure this project in my district, my town

gets funding. have you been getting those request as secretary from republicans who voted against it ? >> all the time, absolutely. >> why don't you run into a microphone every day? >> it is so tempting. president biden made it clear to this administration, we are not going to punish americans, constituents, for the behavior of their representatives. >> voted against it. >> we will certainly call them out and we have. i think it is important to remind everybody this infrastructure package didn't just happen we talk about it now like it could not have been any other way, three years ago this week president biden signed it. three years and two months ago, everybody in the town was writing political obituaries for that legislation again and again. >> including me . the reason i was, i said this, when i worked in the senate, what you guys

did was impossible, it could not have been done. sorry, we don't have the votes, we can't get there, it is 50-50 senate. we used to have 57 democrats and struggled to get things done in a much more cooperative environment. i didn't know what play to run to get this done but joe biden did. once i saw that happened, i sat back not knowing what you are capable of next and you kept on . >> it turns out is decades in the senate and public service really came in handy. i'm somebody that is a big believer in what a new generation can bring in terms of leadership. i have to say, there were times i thought, it is not going to happen. he kept coming back, people kept saying, it is foolish to come back after one version collapse, he came back with another version. i sat in the oval office with republican and democratic members of the senate not giving up. sure enough, this happened.

what is really striking, the same way we had legislators trying to take credit for projects that they voted against the last few years, i think for the next four years, we are going to see an entire administration's version of that because president trump did not deliver an infrastructure package and opposed the one that president biden delivered. for the next four years, there are going to be more and more projects that we started the nature of the projects, they very rarely get done in one year or three years, more like five or seven years. trading jobs and improving lives, the next four years and beyond that. i think it will continue to be important, frankly to communicate we will have handed the new president -- >> projects 10 years away from completion. when those bridges go across the canal, which i happen to know about, got funded, people have been trying to do something about for years, unless it is named the biden

bridge, i don't think people will get it. is there a way, i tried to describe the new deal in two minutes, i may come up with versions from time to time. so many books written about it, people who know about it have a handle on it to talk about how it includes all sorts of extensions of humanity that we did not have before like child labor laws, everything from child labor laws to giant infrastructure projects. is there a way of describing the big deal that you can get across to people in a clear way ? remember, lbj brought electricity to rural texas, that one thing while he was in congress. i brought electricity to rural texas. that was easy to remember, every time you turn on your light, you knew it was lbj. this is 68,000 projects around the country, how do you explain it? >> there is no way to characterize one project at a time. i did the math, if i were to

visit three projects a day for the rest of my life, i still would not live long enough to see all of them. a better way to think about is what they have in common, not just these projects but the other steps that have taken place under the president trump is leadership. aviation, consumer protection, making it easier to be airline passenger, made every day life easier from getting hearing aids over-the-counter to the ftc rule that says if you sign up for something like gin mentorship or newspaper subscription, it should be just as easy to cancel. what do these have in common? here's how i think of it, three things. one, recognizing the scale of the problems that face the country. two, recognizing that government, not always big government, but the right kind of government can be a solution if used in the right way. three, not being afraid to actually bring the tools to bury in a big way, that is what happened with the

infrastructure space. when we got here, the president confronted with some of the most enormous and multiplied problems ever to hit our transportation system. it is almost easy to forget how dramatic it was. right now, we are focused on getting the airlines to treat passengers better. back then, it was making sure that the airline sector did not completely god of business in this country. it was recognizing that set of problems, using government tools, in this case, making sure there is a rescue to keep those airlines in business, and then turning around as we faced a new set of problems like delays, cancellations, customer service headaches. and using our tools is a department to confront those. yes, so many different things went on in this administration, volumes will be written for the rest of my lifetime about their impact. they do have that pattern in common. a colossal problem, a belief in the potential of good government to make a difference and a willingness to go big. >> we did big infrastructure deals in the 1990s, acronym for

the last big one was iced tea that i worked on. you always leave stuff on the table that did not get done. you guys came along, it took decades, picked up stuff left on the table over 20 years. we have to squeeze in a break right here, we will be back with secretary pete buttigieg. ba up to 10 antacids a day. it's that simple, for 24 hour heartburn relief... one beats ten. prilosec otc. no more gross cough syrup. we all want you to feel better. i want extra tv time or i'll walk! how about this? introducing the only kids soft-chew for medicated cough relief. aaaaghhh! new mucinex children's mighty chews are mighty clever. jordan's sore nose let out a fiery sneeze,

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it should be called, the biden tunnel. it is the most complex infrastructure project funded by joe biden. it will provide a third tunnel

across the hudson river between new york city and new jersey, one of the most important interstate links in the country. as the vehicular traffic increase across the hudson river over the last 50 years, there has not been one additional lane added to that crossing. patrick monahan, 24 years in the senate, the champion of the tunnel that never got built, so were some new york governors, new york city mayors, no one could get it done, no one. then came joe biden. construction began this year on the new tunnel. for the next 100 years, people will be driving through that tunnel and have no idea who did that. they should call it the biden tunnel. secretary pete buttigieg is back with us. you know donald trump is going to take credit for that tunnel. >> absolutely.

we created a pipeline of good projects that will play out over the next few years. when i called projects like the hudson river tunnel the cathedrals of our infrastructure, i did not just say that because it is a poetic word for something big, i said it bearing in mind thinking about the world's great cathedrals is the hands that laid the cornerstones of those cathedrals were not even around 100 years later when other hands laid the keystone, some of the projects were funding, street safe project to intersection safer can be done in one or two construction seasons. others, working at work >>, the work of a decade or more . president biden deserves the credit for making these things happen because so many others before him promised and failed to get it done i will admit, one of the few times i was fooled by donald trump was when i was a mayor and he said that he would do a big infrastructure package. i thought, why not? it is good politics, both parties would like to see it happen. it seems to be something he talks about all the time.

of course, they didn't but joe biden did. amazing thing to watch, especially because the bipartisan nature of that deal, really specifically vindicated his model of how to get things done in this town at a time when people said, that is not how it works anymore. what resulted is even more things people said were impossible had happened. people have said it was politically impossible to do this, another thing they told me growing up it was impossible was for union jobs and manufacturing jobs to come back to the industrial midwest in places like where i grew up. >> we did not even think that was governmental action. private enterprise, factory here or they don't or they move a factory. the idea that government could get in here and influence what private industry is doing was something people were not really thinking about before this in any serious way. >> you are not allowed to use

terms like industrial strategy and get the results of the industrial strategy are the factories rising out of the prairie in places like northern indiana, where i grew up in michigan, where i live now kentucky and kansas, where a visited facilities where it would not be happening if not things for like the inflation reduction act and the c.h.i.p.s. and science act. >> let me stop you from moment on that because of politics, teach what is undone and political implications, when you say, rising out of the prairie, somewhere, what i've been reading about this, indicated something like 80% of the benefits of that kind of activity are happening out there in the republican prairie, whereby the way, there is plenty of room to throw up a new factory. it is not easy to throw up a new factory in los angeles county, not a lot of room. out there there is plenty and that is where it is happening. and you will not get political credit for that . >> right now, people in the building trades in these communities are telling me they had the biggest year ever had

telling these factories. they are not even online yet. most of these major factories and facilities are slated to come online in 2026, some in 2025, many in 2027. we will have a responsibility, whatever i might be doing by way of a day job, i will be reminding anyone who will listen. quite a few people maybe won't, these things are happening because joe biden major that american manufacturing -- >> anytime you want to remind people of this, you said something on monday at your alma mater, a version of which i have been saying to people, much less eloquent version. this is one of the fun things people experience listening to you on tv and public forumss, you say things on people's minds, sharply and to the point, this is an example. you said in moments like this,

our salvation will come from the local and state level. what did you mean by that? >> i think there is a lot of frustration and despondency where washington is headed. >> there is? i have heard of that, yes. >> first of all, a lot of good people in washington stepping up, many of them will be on the program, i saw them on the way in, in the house and the senate. a lot more political policy in light of this country than washington. part of it is my orientation having emerged as a mayor. the people that i see doing the work on the ground in our cities, our communities, our states, sometimes irritant for the centerleft, how much power this country is not national but state and local. right now, i think it is a healthy thing because we will see community stepping forward looking after people, demonstrating substance and style of politics that has more

decency and more focus, more discipline and better results than what i fear we are soon going to see from the executive branch in washington. i think it will light the way forward. >> mr. secretary, please, whenever you can, come back and understand who did that, i think it will be one of those issues we have to carry over the next four years. thank you for joining us. real honor to have you join us. nothing quite like seeing a dream come true and you keep making dreams come true. that is next. and i was done settling. if you still have symptoms after trying a tnf blocker like humira or enbrel, rinvoq works differently. rinvoq is a once-daily pill that can rapidly relieve joint pain, stiffness, and swelling as fast as 2 weeks for some. and even at the 3-year mark, many people felt this relief. rinvoq can stop joint damage. and in psa, can leave skin clear or almost clear.

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there's nothing quite like a dream coming true and when you are girl in mullally dreaming of going to high school is a very big dream. >> this was my dream school because i used to see girls from the school go to the district during education visits and playing at ball sometimes, do different activities. i could see them in the car. i really in particular loved and fell in love with the uniform. i thought that could be me one day. luckily, i got selected to the school. >> -- got to wear the school uniform that she fell in love

with when she was dreaming about being able to go to high school in malawi where public high school is not free and the girls graduation rate from high school is less than half the boys graduation rate. she knew that the biggest thing standing between her and her dream was the tuition fees to attend high school. she knew her family could not possibly afford to send her to high school or buy her a school uniform. >> i was part of the girls who benefited from the scholarships that the church offered. luckily, i got selected to this school. at that time, when i came to school here, the school was maybe a few years old. they didn't have many scholarships.

there were missionaries that were here and i was part of the girls who benefited from the scholarships that the church offered this school. when i talk about scholarships, talking about scholarships, i know exactly what it is, exactly how it was a bridge to turn my dreams into reality. when i looked at the girls, it felt like me a few years ago. whatever dreams they said they had, i believed that they would achieve them because i was beneficiary of scholarships and it made my dreams come true. >> scholarships do make dreams come true, i think we know that. her old high school has 60 girls in attendance thanks entirely to your generosity to the kind fund, the partnership i treated with msnbc and unicef to provide desks like this to

primary schools in malawi where the kids have never seen desks . and provide scholarships for girls to attend high school in malawi . something happened in -- first year of high school in malawi which is called form one that sent her in pursuit of another dream. >> when i came here, i didn't know what i wanted to become. when i was in form one, there were visitors from the -- corporation that interviewed us, youth program, on that day, i said that i wanted to be a dentist and i went to university. here i am. to come back to photograph the same class as i sat in when i dreamt of being a journalist and doing that means so much to me. i hope the same for the girls,

they will be able to come back here in the capacity whatever they want to be, to be able to put their school back on the map. >> you can help more girls pursue their dreams by going to --, make a contribution in any amount, specify your contribution is for desks or girls scholarships. you can make a donation in the name of anyone on your holiday gift list and unicef will send acknowledgment of your gift. >> it was very emotional for me to come back here because it is a school that made my dreams come true. >> unicef hired her as the official photographer of our recent tour of malawi schools, scheduled to visit the high school she graduated from before she became part of our team, it was a lucky coincidence. we asked a few of the 60 girls receiving kind fund scholarships at the school to

tell us about their career dreams and the first girl you will hear with -- standing right there as inspiration said, she wants to be a journalist. >> i like school just because i want my dreams to be fulfilled. we, mike -- have become journalists . >> when i finish school, i want to be a politician. >> i want to be a doctor. >> i want to be a nurse. >> i like school so i can stand on my own in the future and i want to be a surgeon doctor. >> journalist, politician, nurse, doctor, they have already achieved one big dream by attending high school and are aiming for bigger dreams now. no one knows better than -- how much your support of girls in

malawi means to them. >> scholarships change lives, it changed mine. i hope that more people donate to this fund so that more girls dreams can come to reality and there is hope for every other girl out there. i came from this district, a village up there, i made it out of fear to the city. i'm from the city to come back to my village to work. not just work, to work on related programs so i am so excited and happy and hopeful for the future. >> you have heard me say many times here, scholarships change lives. i think that is something we all know, nothing quite like seeing a life changed by a scholarship. >> i just want to say thank you. vaporize that cold.

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tonight's last words are thank you, thank you for the viewers, the technicianings and artists who get this program on. happy holidays and good night.

good evening once again. i am stephanie ruhl and you're watching a very special year end edition of the 11th hour. instead of looking at the year that was,