jonathan swan also reports the following. quote, a source who spoke to trump said the president was complaining about pence and brought up a lincoln project ad that claims pence is backing away from trump. this ad has clearly got inside trump's head, the source says. here is some of that ad which we smartly showed you earlier this month. >> there's one last thing, donald, on january 6th mike pence will put the nail in your political coffin when he presides over the senate vote to prove joe biden won. it's over, and mike pence knows it. >> wow, you could feel that one from here. back with us tonight, david plouffe, former campaign manager and senior advisor to president obama. also on the board of the director of the obama foundation. and tim miller, a contributor to the bulwark and former communications director for jeb bush. hey, tim, how does sorkin write the final scene where pence pulls away from trump's clutches to get in the motorcade to drive down the hill? they both know he has a job to do. they both know this may be

rachel scott, white house correspondent for abc news abc news, jonathan swan, national political reporter for axios. and susan davis, congressional correspondent for national public radio, and co-host of the n.p.r. politics podcast. jonathan, take us inside the white house tonight. how is the president handling this moment? jonathan: well, depends which pot of the moment you want to talk about. he is completely fixated still on grievance and wanting to being upset with people like mitch mcconnell who he thinks are weak, who he thinks aren't sufficiently fighting for him. he's, you know, spending most of his time thinking about the election and thinking about how to spin that he's still in with a chance and how to show his base that he's still fighting with them. he spends virtually no time at all thinking about covid or many of the other things that are roiling the nation right now. robert: sue, when you heard majority leader mcconnell acknowledge the political reality, was that partly about the upcoming georgia senate runoff elections and getting republican voters to get out and vote in

and as you said, jonathan swan, all over all that at axios as well.hank both of you for spending some time with us. >> up next, voting machine companies, they're the ones fighting back against trump and his allies. a new twist in this story of the phony rigged election talk. that's next. (announcer) do you want to reduce stress? shed pounds? do you want to flatten your stomach? do all that in just 10 minutes a day with aerotrainer, the total body fitness solution that uses its revolutionary ergonomic design to help you maintain comfortable, correct form. that means better results in less time. and there are over 20 exercises to choose from. get gym results at home. no expensive machines, no expensive memberships. go to aerotrainer.com to get yours now. gubut force factor's test x180 are tough. can help us man up, america, by boosting total testosterone. build muscle, fuel desire, and improve performance. get test x180 from force factor, the #1 fastest-growing men's health brand at walmart. that smart medics software was used to flip votes anywhere in

also joining us jonathan swan, political reporter for axios. this is your intereview.irst 60 minutes interview and in the interview with you is broadening out the culpable to the golf who is not standing by idly, they are the reason that he refused to rebuke the actions on the party and he could go about doing this. what did you detect from crebs about his feelings and what seems to me from that interview, his disappointment in the republican party at large. >> yeah, it is pretty clear from spending time with him that he thinks that this is a crisis and he's trying to sound the alarm. he himself has received death threats, not just the one that you mentioned in your introduction. but he's received other death threats but he's continuing to speak out nonetheless. look, it is two things. number one, what he did in this inview was he went further he had before in describing donald trump as a form of domestic threat in his words. he used the word "threat" and he said the disinformation is a form of threat. but when you saw his frustration come out as you said is when he ta

there's this reporting from jonathan swan at axios that part of the reason is that the president is a little fed up with mike pence and is a little worried that mike pence might actually do his job on january 6 when the electoral college folks are officially koicounted -- announced, elizabeth. how much do you think that could be playing into what we are seeing, that the president wants to make sure mike pence is with him until the bitter end? >> you know, mike pence has to sleep in the bed he made, so i don't feel too sorry for him. he has had multiple opportunities to come forward and speak the truth and he continues to try to look the other way and dance around the issues. so i don't feel sorry for him. i do -- i do kind of wonder if this latest gambit is an attempt by some of the advisers to channel his energy into something, you know -- i will use the term mildly constructive as opposed to, you know, discussing military coups and martial law. i still think it is a disservice to our country, damages our country, riles up and radicalizes his base. i have spoken about my concerns abo

jonathan swan tweeted this, giuliani could say all of this but i've spent the past four days and theo sidney powell more than just about anyone on his payroll and certainly more than his own white house council. sam stein, we'll deal with sean spicer who i haven't seen since dancing in a second, but talk about how this runaway train that even the crazy people can't catch with sidney powell ascendent. >> we're in both a bizarre and precarious moment, i think in the trump presidency. and closely tied and well sourced trump watchers are more and more aghast. we have the president feeling like he has to grasp at whatever straws he can to hold on to power and turning to people who frankly are peddling outright conspiracies and lies about what happened with the election. so much so that they are distrusted by even the most devoted trump boosters. we have reporting today that does confirm that sidney powell does have trump's ear. but also that rudy giuliani and others have been pushing back on her. and forcefully so. they made the case that trump should not bestow upon her some sort of form

so he is now pressuring barr to release that report, which he's convinced is finished, and jonathan swant replacing barr, nobody knows if he will. but he's definitely throwing that out there as he chats with the few people still in his inner circle. >> yeah, that was going to be my question to you is how long is barr for this world, which of course is pretty remarkable considering all of the times he has done what the president wanted or preemptively done something the president was later happy with him for. mike, let's stick with this future of trump question that you are also writing about, which is this possibility that president trump may run for president again. it's something that intrigues me because it obviously says it's going to determine a lot about what the future of the republican party is. what are you guys hearing on this question. >> yeah, so we have new reporting for you on this, casey, and last night at a christmas party, at the white house, the president throwing this out again saying if i don't get another four years, i'll see you in four more years. here's what presi

. >> jonathan swan reported this morning that the president turned his attention to mike pence. you and i had a talk about mike pence. he was at this meeting with members of congress who tried to object on the college count on january 6th. what do you think their relationship is and how much pressure is the president putting on mike pence? >> i think he's putting some pressure on mike pence. as jonathan reported that the president turned on everyone who's giving him some answer that he does not want or not going on television or ak no acknowled acknowledging joe biden. mike pence falls on that category and he's certifying the vote in congress in early january. people gotten into the president's head and there is something that pence can do there but really is not. >> thank you all for being with us tonight. >>> what the president had just done and from congressman jim himes and james clapper and a new covid strain and a likelihood of another holiday surge, that plus more breaking news. the president signaling he may veto the covid relief bill. little girl is lost. friend. she ne

i reached out to jonathan swan and said what does overwhelmed mean? when the pentagon says folks in the pentagon are overwhelmed and they want to take a pause with transitions, i'm not quite sure what that means because that is your job as a government employee in the midst of the transition switching from one president to the next to enable them to provide for them information. the biden team saying they didn't agree to this transition and the pentagon saying they did. it looks like overall the real story is the trump team believes the biden camp is leaking and that's why their holding off on this transition. what is going on here considering what we're dealing with when you have this major hack on top of a pandemic with thousands of people dying every day. >> yeah, it's not just the hack of the hack that is serious and we're not just talking about espiona espionage, something the pentagon should be focused on. we're talking about a serious breach here. what some democratic senators are calling an act of war and so there is that. there is also the ro

jonathan swan, national political reporter for axios.he wall street journal" and "washington post" columnist. as you listen to that, your thoughts? >> well, first of all, senator ron johnson is right. that is exactly what happened. we owe him and senator grassley a debt. they actually tipped off the country to these problems with hunter biden's actions. even though they were presented with evidence proving that that was not the case. what you are seeing here today is as ron johnson went to hold a hearing on election irregularities and election security and democrats questioning him, temper sprayed and he felt he needed to put the record straight. >> bret: his answers have been pretty short, but what will my care is one of them. okay, we had it. [laughter] he answered, are you confident your son hunter did nothing wrong and he says, i am confident. there is this back and whether there should be a special counsel in this investigation is the president-elect becomes the president on january 20th. >> this conversation comes at a time in whic

the pentagon responded saying reporting by mike allen, jonathan swan is inaccurate. they suggested a holiday break, the biden administration incoming administration said we have zero interest in a holiday break, they take office in 32 days. this is the reason we needed transition to start early and it is the reason to not take a break in them. i don't know who is lieying and who is telling the truth. the trump administration admits there was some delay in the transition with the defense department. >> you know, there was a lot of concern about him taking over the pentagon, coming over from national counterterrorism center, taking over this multi trillion dollar agency, then using it as a tool of the administration. everyone feared that. let me tell you something, as former senior enlisted man in the armed forces, here's what i have to say. do your job. the united states is literally under attack. all our national cyber infrastructure is under attack. you will be out of a job in 30 days, never to return, so least you could do is defend the constitution the next 30 day

those last two quotes were from jonathan swan at axios, who says this as well on his own twitter account. quote, i've been covering donald trump for a while. i can't recall hearing more intense concern from senior officials who are actually trump people. this is sort of the second of the three screens we're looking at right now, right? we've got the covid catastrophe. we've got the president, the second street, wound up in such a state, right, with these folks who are telling him he secretly won the election and he can use the government to seize control of voting machines and thereby flip the results. he can declare martial law and somehow suspending civil rights and putting the military in charge and the military in the streets, that will keep him in office too. i mean it's alarming enough to senior trump folks, people in the white house now, that they are rattling the bars and calling reporters and telling them this is the scariest it's ever been. we have no idea what he's going to do these last 30 days, but it's not going to be good. so screen one is the pandemic. screen two is this

but jonathan, you're right, our sources say it's the worst job in town. he has no idea swanty that is going to come his way but he'll be asked to be a party to, preside over, it will be the longest month of his life. >> mike allen, terrific stuff as always. thank you very much, my friend. >>> we wanted to fit in one more story this morning. dozens of cadets are facing disciplinary action after being accused of a major cheating scandal at west point. courtney kube has more. >> reporter: in what could be the biggest honor code violation in decades, more than 70 west point cadets are accused of cheating on a math exam while learning remotely last spring. 72 freshmen and one sophomore caught when they all made the same mistake on one part of the calculus exam. two have since been exonerated. four left the academy, but the others still face administrative actions. the 55 cadets who admitted guilt will be on probation for the rest of their time at the academy. west point's honor code states, a cadet will not lie, cheat or steal nor tolerate those who do. in a statement, a spokespe

and the reason i bring this up, jonathan swan at "axios" has new reporting that says, quote, pence's january 6th has begun to loom large in trump's mind for people who have discussed the matter with him. invalidating the election result as the ultimate betrayal. what's his constitutional duty, you ask? i want to play you what the vice president does when the electoral vote is counted. listen. >> george w. bush of the state of texas has received, for president of the united states, 271 votes. al gore, of the state of tennessee, has received 266 votes. >> barack obama of the state of illinois has received, for president of the united states, 365 votes. >> donald trump of new york has received, for president of the united states, 304 votes. hillary clinton, the state of new york, has received 227 votes. >> so, the law, laura, says that mike pence has to do that same thing. donald trump doesn't want him to. i'm curious to see how mike pence will respond to this. if there's any way for him to dear-leader his constitutional duty here. what do you think? >> it's hard to say, john, whether o

hahn, we reached out to him last night, jonathan swan broke this story.to have a potential rocky meeting here because dr. hahn is going to this meeting say we're going to follow a timetable set by science. white house officials are telling swan that they're concerned this is going too slowly. the emergency use authorization, they want to get the pfizer vaccine out faster. this is a great little flavor that gives you intense this meeting can be. they're questioning a week that hahn took on vacation in north carolina. what the fda is saying that hahn had felt isolated after an exposure. and so there's already disputes about whether or not the fda is working hard enough. that's the posturing going into this meeting. we'll see whether or not the president drops by this meeting. sometimes he does. and what white house officials have to say about it afterwards and crucially what dr. hahn has to say about it. kasie? >> well, hans, it means like one of the major challenges here and operation warp speed has clearly been effective. there's not a lot of dispute abou

>> so kasie, what i was reading -- this reporting from jonathan swan, listen to this.the scenes ranting this weekend, but kasie, this is the one that i picked out for you. it's all of john mccain's fault. so behind the scenes, president trump has been saying that arizona governor ducey who's close to john mccain -- was close to senator mccain in life, that that was part of president trump's grievances. so it's just a sign of how he's pulling everything out. something very interesting he's saying behind the scenes that he was going to reach out to these private legislators, trying to convince them to do something at the very last minute. here's what's interesting. yes, a lot of people around him think he'll announce for 2024. they're very skeptical about him actually doing it, but he won't talk much about it because it's acknowledging he's losing. he won't say i lost. he will say eventually i did not win. >> of course. because -- of course. all right, mike allen, thank you as always. my friend, i really appreciate that. remarkable reporting about john mccain. i will lea

. >> my old colleague jonathan swan good people. makes a good point.nd saying the last four years i accused the president of the united states of being an agent of russia. he then goes back to the russia card from the bottom of the deck, mind you and accuses axios not a bastion of conservative sentiment of colluding with the president to put this story out about him because the president cease eric friggin seawall well as a threat because he ran for president for five minutes or failed in his impeachment in so, yeah, that's the thing, right? perhaps the reason media outlets is not running with this because eric swalwell has been reliable guest. he has been on third two thirds of cable news not fox news hundreds of times the last four years again accusing the president of being an exagent of russia. that makes him provocative and that gets people that are on the left their comfort food on a nightly basis and perhaps, also, just like adam schiff the michael avenatti of congress he serves as a pretty decent source as well whenever you hear about unnamed s

in fact, in just the last hour, we saw this reporting from jonathan swan of axios, who says trump willnd clemencies as soon as today. a flood of requests coming to the white house shows how trump's dishing out of pardons last night and throughout his presidency follows a pattern. it's all about his self-interest. michael schmidt of the "new york times," who broke last night's pardon story, spoke of that pattern to our friend, rachel maddow. >> it's something that the president can create instantaneous loyalty when he does, and because of that, if you look at the past numbers that he has granted, the pardons he has granted, of the 45 that he had granted up until today, 40 of the 45, 88%, were either tied to one of his allies, someone who had special access to him, or was tied to something that politically benefitted him personally. >> as axios details, the absolute power of a pardon is very appealing to this president. trump loves pardons for the same reason he relishes executive orders, pure power and instant gratification. a long-time trump official says that pardons are uniquely sati

we are all seeing black swan events happening with alarming frequency. jonathanlessons of 2020 with all top men -- with paul tabuubman. alongside tom keene and lisa abramowicz, i'm jonathan ferro. in about 15 minutes we will catch up with emily roland, chief investment strategist at john hancock investment on the disparity in the economy. late cycle for housing, early cycle for the labor market. tom: that will be interesting. one of the things we have looked day, thes historic vaccine has been administered to a 90-year-old grandmother in coventry, england. right now, barry ritholtz joins us. he has a podcast, masters in business. it is hugely successful. he manages real money. start, where i want to looking into next year. bloomberg has a spectacular article out today looking at ever lower fees for the asset management business. the news is even the low fee people like vanguard have lower fees. how low can the fees go? in some areas they are free, with the caveat there is no free lunch and free comes with a cost come as we have seen with robinhood traders, there

swan events. >> rewrite some chapters in the textbooks. jonathan: some of those textbooks need ripping up. matt, very festive in the background. great to catch up. let's start with the lesson of 2020 for you. matt: happy holidays. lesson is about when governments and central banks work together to address worldwide problems for economies and the people that contribute to those economies. central banks and the government came together in ways we have not seen before in many cases. workingally about not at cross purposes but working together in unison toward a joint goal. it is powerful when it happens. to me, that was the big lesson of the year. jonathan: i wonder whether the conditioning this year will lead us to make mistakes as we navigate markets in the future. we have all been conditioned by experience to believe in a todemic, markets only go up, deemphasize near-term risk on the hopes things will improve because we have a vaccine. is this unique to the moment? is this something we can use in the future? is this something that leads us to make mistakes in years to come? matt: we have t