i just heard rick santorum say that donald trump is not doing anybody any favors.tive, now, from someone who knows how the president operates. tony schwartz, who co-wrote donald trump's "the art of the deal." he also wrote "dealing the devil, my mother, trump, and me." tony, what do you make of this? what's your takeaway from these pardons of the president's friends, his associates, family? what do you think? >> well, i think he's determined the trump modus operandi is, particularly, under these circumstances, is maintain dominance, in any way i possibly can. and make other people suffer more than even i am suffering. so, all this is consistent with it. i think this is exactly the scenario that i foresaw, in the fall of 2016, just before his election. at that time, i thought he was going to lose. but even then, my assumption was that he would never, never acknowledge it. that he would do everything possible to mobilize opinion against it. and that he would do whatever he could to cause a destruction. i don't believe donald trump has a moment's interest in $2,000 fo

i would love to see david gergen throw a glass of chardonnay in rick santorum's face. >> rick santorumd the claws come out! >> yes, they do. >> that gloria borger is so catty! but what was she wearing? ( laughter ) why did gloria borger wear that ball gown that was in lisa's reject pile in 2011? >> stephen: that's the question you've got to ask this year, andy-- anderson. anderson. anderson has to ask it. would you ever want to trade jobs for a day to do each other's gig? >> i could not-- >> yeah, i would like-- >> i could not do what andy does. >> i would like a day off to deal with his panel. i would love it. cakewalk! yeah. >> stephen: well, listen, guys, i think we've covered all the subjects. i think so. are you going to watch -- >> stephen: i was going to talk about the electoral college, but i think all of this is just as important at this point. >> where are you anything to be on new year's eve. >> stephen: i'm going to be out on the open road fighting crime. ( laughter ) you know? you should call in. >> you should. >> stephen: can i call in, really? >> we would love you to cal

rick santorum, paul, thank you very much to both of you. >> thanks, jim. >>> breaking news this hour. in america, as america set another record for people hospitalized with the virus vaccinations are stepping up. concerns persist over a new variant of the virus believed to have begun in england now spreading around the globe and later you'll recall the jarring images from last march when dozens died in a washington state nursing home. we'll bring you an update from the epicenter of the first pandemic crisis. bottom line is, mom's love that land o' frost premium sliced meats have no by-products. (his voice) "baloney!" (automated voice) has joined the call. (voice from phone) hey, baloney here. i thought this was a no by-products call? land o' frost premium. fresh look. same great taste. it's moving day. and are doing the heavy lifting, jess is busy moving her xfinity internet and tv services. it only takes about a minute. wait, a minute? but what have you been doing for the last two hours? delegating? oh, good one. move your xfinity services without breaking a sweat. now that's simple,

perspective now from former pennsylvania senator, rick santorum. and paul begala. senator santorum, do you think the president allies actually believe this? particularly, members of congress. because it all seems incredibly dishonest. >> here's what i believe. i believe there are lots of legitimate grounds to protest this election. the chairman down there, david schafer, instead of jumping into bed with rudy giuliani and sydney powell actually did the homework you should be doing, every state chairman should have been doing, which is looking at how many people voted who weren't registered to vote? how many people were felons? how many people were dead? i mean, go through the numbers and see whether there is enough votes there of people who didn't vote legally to overturn the election. and he actually put a very compelling case together but you don't hear anything about it because you have all these, what i consider to be, you know, the giuliani, powell, linwood, these people out there sowing these conspiracy theories that make no sense at all. running with statisti

perspective from two cnn political commentators, rick santorum. senator santorum, do you think the people supporting this, the attorneys general, members of congress, president's allies believe this, particularly the members of congress because it seems incredibly intellectually dishonest? >> here's what i believe. i believe that there are lots of legitimate grounds to protest this election. if you look at the state of georgia, for example, the state chairman down there, david shaffer, instead of jumping into bed with rudy giuliani and sidney powell actually did the homework, which is looking at how many people who voted weren't registered to vote. how many people moved out of the state. how many people were felons. how many people were dead. go through the numbers and see whether there's enough votes there of people who didn't vote legally to overturn the election. and he put a very compelling case together. but you don't hear anything about it because you have all these, what i consider to be, you know, the giuliani, powell, lynnwood, these peop

kirsten powell and rick santorum and john harwood, john, let me start with you of all these questionsthe past four days of donald trump's feelings of national security and the rule of law. what do these pardons say to you? >> i think the pardons he did represent open corruption. this is a president whose goal for much of the last four years has been to try to absorb himself politically and legally from the connection with russia that prompted the mueller investigation. let's recap briefly, donald trump, russia was a financial factor of trump before he ran for president. russia helped donald trump become president by interfering in the election. donald trump lied about what he knew about that, fired the fbi director who was investigating that and as president has taken actions that no other world war ii presidents had done to advance the objective and to weaken nato and enforcing article 5 of nato and weakening the western alliance. his administration is now ending with a mass activiive russian h the u.s. government and business. when his own secretary of state says it was russia's fau

perspective from former senior political commentator, current kmem tod commentator rick santorum. santorum i want to start with you. you have personal experience with this. 16 years ago when the joint congress was about to certify george w. bush over-john kerry, barbara boxer made a challenge to the results in ohio, to be clear, john kerry had already conceded that race the day after. there weren't dozens of court battles, et cetera, going on. i just wonder when you look at -- by the way, you, at the time, scheduled a role call vote to get people on the record about this. i just wonder do you consider this challenge as baseless as that challenge in 2004? >> if you just listen to what josh hawley is saying, he basically is saying the same thing in my opinion that barbara boxer said, which is i can't certify this election knowing of the irregularities that i believe happened in ohio. that's what she said 16 years ago. and hawley is saying the same thing, there were irregularities in pennsylvania, which there were, and irregularities in other states and he's not going to stand by wit

i mean, even listening to rick santorum saying i don't like the way they put out these conspiracy theories but you know, party down there in georgia he's got a good lawsuit, he showed there are 7,000, 8,000 -- he hasn't even shon the proof yet. it's in superior court. he won't show the proof to the media. these guys are banking on the division. how do we come back from this? >> first of all, this old chestnut in republican circles about voter fraud, that they don't have the evidence to back up, and people like ben ginsberg, who is an election law specialist who has said that repeatedly, that there's no there there, that there's not fraud here, but this is such a part of the arguments that a lot of republicans make and now trump and his allies have taken it to a more dangerous level, they're trying to use democracy to undermine democracy. and that's the question of how do we come back from that. because this is someone who does not respect the presidency. this is someone in donald trump who came to prominence political ly on the back of a racist lie, saying that barack obama wasn't born in

efforts we have underway to support children's and family and of a leadoff discussion with senator rick santorum and doctor leanna and moderate by the chief operating officer kelly darnall and early childhood work linda smith will be taking us through specifics about art recommendations. let me make the point and i think those of you who know bpc, know this well, we don't write studies to make ourselves feel good. we don't have the hubris to hit print and think we've changed the world. we are instead in building a coalition of passionate, committed driven people who can work together to support the members of congress and who want to get something done. we strongly believe that democracy is the world's greatest team sport and we know that momentum matters. the ability of this country to get back on his feet is to to be determined by what our government can come together early next year and put wins on the board. that is what we are seeking to describe in this document and that is the effort we hope you all work with us on very, very soon. thank you. >> tonight on the communicators. chief policy

see pretty clearly that it was actually done in an incredibly transparent way and earlier today, rick santorumis point and, you know, he was making it in a slightly different way, but i think it is important to point out, as you just said also, jake, there are a lot of officials across this country, many republican, who pushed back against enormous pressure to do something other than what they are required to do by law, in many cases in their states, and what is right to do, which is the will of the voters. >> right. >> they pushed back. than went off without a hitch. we haven't seen a faithless elector today which is different from even four years ago when there were a few, a handful. it's not unexpected that might happen but we have not seen that and i think it's a testament to people all across the country doing the right thing, doing their jobs and standing up for the constitutional process. >> right. you're talking about not just secretaries of state who are, you know, bound i guess mostly political but bound to really shepherd the elections through their states, but very political indivi

. >> rick santorum was on with me last night and he was squirming over these pardons.id he didn't like them one bit. this is not something republicans by and large, except maybe the fox tv crowd are rallying arourally i ing around. so what did charles kushner, jared kushner's dad do, you might be asking this morning. allow me have chris christie, former governor of new jersey, former u.s. attorney who prosecuted charles kushner explain. listen. >> i just think that it was so obvious he had to be prosecuted -- i mean, if a guy hires a prostitute to seduce his brother-in-law and videotapes it and then sends the videotape to his sister to attempt to intimidate her from testifying before a grand jury, do i really need anymore justification than that? i mean, it's one of the most loathsome, disgusting crimes that i prosecuted when i was u.s. attorney. and i was u.s. attorney in new jersey, margaret, so we had some loathsome and disgusting crime going on there. but i just laid out the facts. and any objective person who looks at the facts knows, confronted with those facts,