CHUCK TODD:
This Sunday: A Covid crisis out of control.
ROBERT REDFIELD:
I actually believe they're going to be the most difficult time in the public health history of this nation.
CHUCK TODD:
Record hospitalizations.
JENNIFER DAWSON:
Once they get to us, we're not seeing a lot that make it out of here.
CHUCK TODD:
Record number of cases.
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI:
I think we have not yet seen the post-Thanksgiving peak.
CHUCK TODD:
Record number of deaths.
ERICA LOPEZ:
My dad taught me so much about life, but never how to live without him.
CHUCK TODD:
Health care workers overworked and falling ill.
ERIN MCINTOSH:
When we're gone there's just nobody that's going to take care of you when you're in the hospital and that should scare everyone.
CHUCK TODD:
This morning I'll talk to Dr. Deborah Birx, White House Coronavirus response coordinator. Plus: After months of discord, help from Congress may finally be on the way.
REP. NANCY PELOSI:
There is momentum. There is momentum.
SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL:
Compromise is within reach.
CHUCK TODD:
But will it be enough? Democratic Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia joins me. And President Trump holds a rally for the two Republican senators in Georgia's January runoff.
PRES. DONALD TRUMP:
They cheated and rigged our presidential election, but we'll still win it.
CHUCK TODD:
Focusing more on his own personal grievances than in helping the actual candidates.
GABRIEL STERLING:
It has to stop. someone is going to get hurt. Someone is going to get shot. Someone is going to get killed.
CHUCK TODD:
I'll talk to Georgia elections official Gabriel Sterling. Joining me for insight and analysis are: NBC News national political correspondent Steve Kornacki, Kimberly Atkins, senior opinion writer for The Boston Globe, Reuters White House correspondent Jeff Mason and Danielle Pletka of the American Enterprise Institute. Welcome to Sunday. It's Meet the Press.
ANNOUNCER:
From NBC News in Washington, the longest-running show in television history. This is Meet the Press with Chuck Todd.
CHUCK TODD:
Good Sunday morning. Consider what has happened over the past week. Hospitalizations in the US for Covid-19 exceeded 100,000 for the first time. Daily cases of Covid-19 exceeded 200,000 for the first time and the second and the third and the fourth. The confirmed daily death toll from Covid-19 exceeded 2,000 for the second time and the third and the fourth and the fifth and the sixth. This past week Covid was the leading cause of death in America. If only that were the worst of it. Robert Redfield, the head of the Centers for Disease Control, says December, January and February will be "the most difficult time in the public health history of this nation."
[BEGIN TAPE]
ROBERT REDFIELD:
I do think, unfortunately, before we see February, we could be close to 450,000 Americans who have died from this virus.
[END TAPE]
CHUCK TODD:
Amid this exploding crisis, President Trump gave what he said, was quote, "maybe the most important speech I've ever made". It's not about Covid. A 46-minute attack on American democracy. It was filled with debunked claims, false assertions and outright lies -- charging that the Democrats rigged the election to steal his presidency. That the president has chosen to ignore the worst health crisis we've faced in 100 years almost doesn't matter anymore. What matters is that both the good news -- the emergence of multiple vaccines -- and the bad news -- the rising case and death counts -- are accelerating. But until those vaccines get here, overworked health care workers around the country are fighting a two-pronged battle: to save lives and more importantly to convince skeptical Americans to finally take this deadly virus seriously.
DANIEL BOESE:
It's hard to come into work some days, knowing that you're short, and knowing that you're going to see people die.
JODY WHITE:
We're tired but we get up and still do this every day.
DR. TUNJI LADIPO:
I’m afraid we are going to get overrun by the sheer volume and the intensity of the sickness of the patients.
MIKAYLA BAKER:
We try and celebrate the small victories. But, you know, recently it's been -- it feels few and far between.
BETH DEJONG:
I have a 4 and an 8 year old and they don’t run to the door anymore because we don’t give hugs when I get home.
AJ BROINES:
I think we were getting around 4, 500 calls at some points, maybe even more. And like I said, almost every patient was Covid.
ERICKA NICHOLSON:
Two weeks ago we were at red. We were full. We had nowhere to ship people. We were keeping people too long and literally our doctors were begging regional medical centers to open a bed up because people -- they were going to die here.
DR. MARK MOROCCO:
It's an unfortunately common experience for emergency physicians like me to have encountered patients who just don't believe that this is happening to them.
DR. THOMAS HUTH:
A lot of people are making a lot of sacrifices to make this work and so it's aggravating, frustrating for us to have difficulty conveying this, you know, the seriousness of the situation.
DR. ALEX JAHANGIR:
We've come a long way. But people are dying still, people are getting sick, and if we just hold it together for a few more months, I really think we're going to win.
CHUCK TODD:
Joining me now is the White House Coronavirus response coordinator, it's Dr. Deborah Birx. Dr. Birx, welcome back to Meet the Press. You heard from those frontline medical workers. I know you travel the country speaking to a lot of these frontline workers. Do you understand their frustration now when they feel as if they are at their wits' end? They've been pulling the double and triple shifts, they've been working so hard for eight months and half the country's not paying attention.
DR. DEBORAH BIRX:
I understand it completely, and it's been a privilege to meet with them -- from the Billings Clinic in Montana to across this great country -- to meet with healthcare workers and hear their frustrations. And also meet with communities and hear their frustrations. And I think we have to come together with a joint understanding of how this virus is spread and how we can prevent the spread.
CHUCK TODD:
What would you say to those healthcare workers? You're saying this, you're wearing a mask now indoors. This is the new CDC guidance if you're not in your home. So I think I totally understand why you're doing that now. Yet, the White House and the State Department are throwing indoor parties all this month. I mean, as you know, this mixed messaging that the country's been getting -- you say one thing. Dr. Fauci says one thing. And the president does another.
DR. DEBORAH BIRX:
I think it's really important that every single person understands that the way this virus is spread is if you're with anyone indoors without a mask, that's a viral spreading opportunity. If you're outdoors and hugging and kissing individuals, that is a viral spreading opportunity. We have to really understand how contagious, how infectious, this virus is. And it's really important at this moment in time that everyone understands also how much virus is out there. There isn't a state without increasing cases right now except Hawaii. So this is where we find ourselves. And we have to listen right now to what we know works, which is mask, physical distancing, washing your hands. But not gathering. You cannot gather without masks in any indoor or close outdoor situation.
CHUCK TODD:
I don't mean to belabor this point. And I understand your frustration, probably, as a public health official being asked about what is happening on the political side of things. But the fact of the matter is, we've been through this for eight months now, and you have given us all these warnings. And, again, the president and others in the administration just flout them. And so do you understand why some of the public then say, "Well, if he doesn't think it's a big deal I guess maybe the health -- maybe he thinks all the health people, they're overdoing it. They're overselling it."
DR. DEBORAH BIRX:
You know, I've heard that personally. When I go out I just don't meet with healthcare providers and governors and mayors. But I also meet with community. And so I hear community members parroting back those situations. Parroting back that masks don't work. Parroting back that we should work towards herd immunity. Parroting back that gatherings don't result in superspreading events. And I think our job is to constantly say, “Those are myths, they are wrong and you can see the evidence base.” And right now across the Sun Belt, we have governors and mayors who have cases equivalent to what they had in the summertime yet aren't putting in the same policies and mitigations that they put in the summer that they know changed the course of this pandemic across the south. So it is frustrating because not only do we know what works, governors and mayors used those tools to stem the tide in the spring and the summer. And this fall/winter surge is combining everything that we saw in the spring with everything that we saw in the summer, plus the fall surge going into a winter surge. And I think that's why Dr. Redfield made this absolute appeal to the American people. This is not just the worst public health event. This is the worst event that this country will face, not just from a public health side. Yet, we know what behaviors spread the virus and we know how to change those behaviors to stop spreading the virus.
CHUCK TODD:
What states right now, what governors -- talk to them right now. What states would you like to see increase the mitigation efforts right now?
DR. DEBORAH BIRX:
You know, all the states are trying to do something. And I don't want to be critical of any governor and mayor. I like to talk to them one-on-one where I can be very direct and really have a joint understanding of what their data is showing. But every state across this country needs to increase their mitigation, and every state needs to be critically informing their state population that the gatherings that we saw in Thanksgiving will lead to a surge. It will happen this week and next week. And we cannot go into the holiday season -- Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa -- with this same kind of attitude that “those gatherings don't apply to me.” They apply to everybody. If you don't want to lose your grandparents, your aunts. Let's be clear, 70 -- if you're over 70, 20 percent of those over 70 who contract Covid are hospitalized. And still, 10 percent of them are lost. So if you have anyone in your family with comorbidities or over 70, you cannot do those things. You cannot gather with your mask off. You cannot hug and kiss people outside. We won't have a vaccine for even the most vulnerable Americans -- I'm thrilled with the vaccine. But we won't have them for the most vulnerable Americans until February. So we need to do this now. Yes, the nursing homes will be vaccinated. But there's 100 million Americans that have these comorbidities that put them at substantial risk.
CHUCK TODD:
Talk to me about the hospital systems right now. How close are some to breaking points? And what does “breaking point” mean for the average person watching right now?
DR. DEBORAH BIRX:
I think what's really critical for people to understand is our hospitals normally in the fall and winter run between 80 and 90 percent full just caring for our routine health. So when you add 10, 15, 20 percent Covid-19 patients on top of that, that's what puts them at the breaking point. Because our normal healthcare system runs at 80 to 90 percent full throughout the fall. Now I have seen, and part of the reason I've traveled, I've seen really successful examples. And that's part of the reason I'm going out is to find out what is not working but what also is working. We've seen in Chicago, Illinois hospitals come together and create a unified dashboard. So they know at any one time for every single patient that comes into the emergency room where there is a bed that serves the needs of that individual patient. We've taken that across the states so that they understand how to do that same kind of sharing and dashboard. And so there are good examples that can help preserve the lives of others. But I want to be very frank to the American people. The vaccine's critical. But it's not going to save us from this current surge. Only we can save us from this current surge. And we know precisely what to do. So if you have loved ones that you want to protect, you have to follow these guidelines now.
CHUCK TODD:
The CDC came out very late, about a week before Thanksgiving, and advised against travel during Thanksgiving. Are we going to get travel advisories for Christmas and New Year's sooner than what we got before Thanksgiving?
DR. DEBORAH BIRX:
I think they're already saying that. I think they've made it very clear about how dangerous travel is because it mixes households. And I think what we've learned over the last eight to nine months is how significant this asymptomatic spread is. That's the silent spread. Those are individuals who are younger and just don't know they're infected. And so they're passing on the virus. And so we've called on every state to increase their testing, particularly for those under 40, so that they can be -- you can find that asymptomatic spread before it infects their aunts, their grandparents, their uncles and really stop it. It's what universities did. We have examples now, very clear examples. Universities that tested 100 percent of their students on and off campus at least weekly infected less than ten -- one percent of their student body. When you tested the way United States is testing -- symptomatic, contact tracing, some surveillance -- 10 percent of their student body became infected. So we have an example how important testing is as part of this whole public health response along with masking, physical distancing and our hand hygiene and stopping our gatherings outside of our households.
CHUCK TODD:
Dr. Deborah Birx, the response coordinator for the Coronavirus task force. I'm going to leave it there. I appreciate you coming on and sharing these dire warnings. I hope your boss also hears the same dire warnings that you're telling the rest of us. Thank you for coming on.
DR. DEBORAH BIRX:
Thank you for having me.
CHUCK TODD:
Turning now to financial relief from the Covid crisis. Joining me is the Democratic senator from West Virginia, Joe Manchin. Senator Manchin, welcome back to Meet the Press.
SEN. JOE MANCHIN:
Good morning, Chuck. It's always good to be with you.
CHUCK TODD:
I want to start first with the situation with the virus here. You just heard from Dr. Birx, you've heard from Dr. Fauci. I think the frustration is, why is it that we can't have even Washington unified? Why can't even you guys in the United States’ Senate come together and everybody say, “Hey, let's wear a mask?” I mean, it does seem absurd how polarized we've gotten over this, and it does seem to emanate from one individual, the president.
SEN. JOE MANCHIN:
It sure does. In my beautiful little state of West Virginia, you know we have 800 deaths have been registered, 17,000 cases, Chuck, and we are now having 1,000 cases a day. We have never ever ever seen this. Never thought we would. And we're going into the most challenging difficult time. So, absolutely we're concerned. The Senate in Washington as far as all of us, 100, most everybody is wearing a mask. The Senate Democrats, we haven't met, as a group, since it started in March of this past -- of this year. So, we've been very, very diligent about that. Now, our Republican colleagues are doing the same. They're not meeting, they're doing more Zooms like we have been doing all along. So everyone, I believe, is taking this more serious. The president has not. It’s been part of his political posturing. It's very dangerous. It's extremely dangerous. You know over -- what close to 280,000 deaths, so far? It's unbelievable, Chuck.
CHUCK TODD:
And if you've seen the models, it may double by April 1st.
SEN. JOE MANCHIN:
Yeah, we're scared to death of that.
CHUCK TODD:
That’s -- let me go to what I invited you on for, which has to do with this bipartisan deal you guys are coming together. It looks like it's going to be just under $1 trillion. How close are you? Is this a deal that we're going to see come to fruition before the end of this coming week?
SEN. JOE MANCHIN:
Well, it's a deal that must come together. We don't have a choice now. It's one of those things that has to be done. And I'll tell you the reason why. This is a -- I want people to understand, this is a Covid emergency relief -- started out as a relief framework. You've seen the framework, how we came to $908 billion in all the different categories. And what we did as a group, we came together and said, "Listen, we have got to do something." After the election, we started coalescing around how do we move this forward. And we looked at basically everything that was going to terminate at the end of December. The lifelines that people are depending on. Whether it be food assistance, whether it would be shelter, whether it would be healthcare. Whether the necessities that people have, childcare that's needed to try to get our lives back. All the things were going to be eliminated, Chuck. And we said, "That can't be done. We cannot allow this to happen." Democrats and Republicans came together. And we're moving forward.
CHUCK TODD:
It's not the deal that a lot of people think is needed, including the chair of the Federal Reserve. I mean, I think he is concerned that it's more likely you're underdoing it than overdoing it. Do you concur with him? Are you worried that you're probably doing less than you should be doing?
SEN. JOE MANCHIN:
Chuck, this is an emergency relief package only until April 1, the first quarter, to get through the first quarter. Every indication says more money is needed. We see that. This gets us through basically the lifelines that people need and the small businesses that can survive and not go under. Unemployment checks that people are going to be losing. If we don't invest this money now, Chuck, every indication says that more is needed. The President-elect Joe Biden says this is a down-payment. He can come in as president, when he does come in as president, his team can put together a different proposal that takes us further down the road for more recovery. If we don't do something now, and both of my -- on both sides of the aisle, my colleagues have said, "The $908 billion of investment we make into the citizens of this country and trying to keep this economy from collapsing could be more important than $2 trillion would be in February and March if we do nothing. And maybe then it might be too late for so many people and small businesses."
CHUCK TODD:
Let me ask you a bigger picture question about the sort of the state of the two parties. Why do you think Joe Biden outperformed the Democratic Party, and what lesson is there from Joe Biden, that Democrats can learn? Because he clearly outperformed the Democratic Party.
SEN. JOE MANCHIN:
Almost certainly. In my state, you know, I’m the – I’m the last Democrat standing. The bottom line is, is this -- we've been identified as something we're not. I'm, I'm a West Virginia Democrat, a proud West Virginia Democrat, and I don't know of any Democrat, that I know of, that would ever defund the police. And how that got on as the mantra that that's a Democrat slogan, that's not true. And how all these other things that seem to be extremes are not true. It's not who we are. But we were tagged with that. We were slow, probably as, as a party of responding to it, and saying, “Listen there's more to us.” If you look at basically our, our bedrock of who we are: how do we protect workers? How do we protect families? How do we give people opportunity? How do we have inclusion? Income equality. Things that basically people are depending on in order to survive in these very, very difficult, troubled times.
CHUCK TODD:
Senator, you said -- actually, you weren't just talking about this year, though. You said, “I've watched the last three elections -- ‘16, ‘18, ‘20 -- we truly should have been in the majority and it didn't happen.” Why is that?
SEN. JOE MANCHIN:
What that tells you is the message we have is not for all America. Basically, who are we as a party? If you're a Democrat, why are you a Democrat? Why? I tell people I'm fiscally responsible and socially compassionate. Can't you be both? Can't you be fiscally responsible and socially compassionate? Do you have to be labeled as a Democrat -- do you want to give everything away without any accountability? It's not who I am. It's not the Democrats I was raised with. And that's basically what we have lost: who we are. How we basically will fight for workers’ rights, human rights, but still yet do so in a reasonable way that doesn't put so much burden on people and say listen, “Unless I'm hurting, unless, I'm in a minority, unless I'm this -- you're giving more attention” -- we're not. We're trying to bring everybody together with the same opportunities. We're not basically explaining that in a way that the average American understands. And we're allowing other people to tag us, and that's just unfair. It really is. And to have anybody, Chuck, that basically -- it’s what the president’s doing, blaming the Democrats for everything. I told President Trump one time -- I said, “Mr. President, why are you blaming the Democrats? If it wasn't for Democrats that were upset, you’d have never been president. Why don't you bring us together rather than dividing us further?”
CHUCK TODD:
Joe Manchin, Democrat from West Virginia. As he said, still a proud Democrat from West Virginia. Thanks for coming on and sharing your perspective with us, sir. I appreciate it.
SEN. JOE MANCHIN:
Thank you, Chuck.
CHUCK TODD:
All right, coming up.
[BEGIN TAPE]
GABRIEL STERLING:
Stop inspiring people to commit potential acts of violence. Someone's going to get hurt, someone's going to get shot. Someone's going to get killed.
[END TAPE]
CHUCK TODD:
The Republican election official pushing back on President Trump's repeated false claims that the election in Georgia was rigged. Gabriel Sterling joins me this morning.
CHUCK TODD:
Welcome back. President Trump made his first campaign trip yesterday since Election Day. And he made it and he went to Georgia. Mr. Trump is supposedly working to reelect Republican Senators David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, while focusing more on his baseless claims that Georgia's election system is rigged and that he won Georgia's 16 electoral votes. Well, that brought a spirited response this week from top Georgia election official, Republican Gabriel Sterling, directed at both Mr. Trump and fellow Republicans who have been repeating his falsehoods.
[BEGIN TAPE]
GABRIEL STERLING:
It has to stop. This is the backbone of democracy. And all of you who have not said a damn word are complicit in this.
[END TAPE]
CHUCK TODD:
Gabriel Sterling joins me now. Mr. Sterling, welcome to Meet the Press, sir.
GABRIEL STERLING:
Morning, Chuck.
CHUCK TODD:
I'm going to play for you something from the president last night and get you to respond to it on the other side. Here's what he said about Georgia.
[BEGIN TAPE]
PRES. DONALD TRUMP:
We're all deeply disturbed and upset by the lying, cheating, robbing, stealing that's gone on with our elections. We know the Democrats will have dead people voting. They have people signing their own name over and over. They have, they have people signing names with the same pen, with the same signature. They don't even change because they know once they get it in, it'll never be looked at. It'll never be looked at again because of people like your secretary of state and your governor.
[END TAPE]
CHUCK TODD:
Mr. Sterling, you had made an impassioned plea there that we just played that this has to stop. It doesn't look like he chose to stop. Is there-- could you please debunk or, what he said there when it comes to your role in the Georgia elections?
GABRIEL STERLING:
At this point, it’s a game of whack-a-mole as we’ve been saying. The president's statements are false. They're disinformation. They are stoking anger and fear among his supporters. And hell, I voted for him. The situation’s getting much worse and it’s an environment that’s been built out over years, and it's not just -- you know, Republicans and this side this time. But even in polling up to 2019, up to 50% of Democrats think Russians flipped votes on machines. So this is going both ways. It undermines democracy. We've got to get to a point where responsible people act responsibly.
CHUCK TODD:
Well, I'm just curious what was it that sparked your decision to come out as, you know, to come out as direct as you came out earlier this week? Was there a specific incidence or incidents that have been happening to you or others?
GABRIEL STERLING:
It wasn’t happening -- obviously, I have a police car outside my house right now. I could see it out the right side of my peripheral vision. There has been police protection for the secretary, his wife received sexualized, violent threats on her personal cell phone. But what, for lack of a better word, set me off on Tuesday was about an hour before, hour and a half before a producer-scheduled news conference, I got a call from the project manager from Dominion Voting Systems out of Colorado who was telling me in a very audibly shaken voice that one of their contractors had received some threats in Gwinnett County. And this is just a young tech. He took a job a few weeks ago. He's one of their better ones. And when I was going through the Twitter feed on it and I saw, it basically had the young man's name, it's a very unique name. So they tracked down his family and started harassing them. And it said his name, "You have committed treason. May God have mercy on your soul," with a slowly swinging noose. And at that point I just said, "I'm done."
CHUCK TODD:
You know, you said something else earlier this week. You said, "Let's face it. Senator Loeffler and Senator Perdue were forced by President Trump to ask for my boss, Secretary Raffensperger's resignation. The implicit threat was that he would do two tweets and torpedo their campaigns." Do you stand by those comments? Do you really believe that Loeffler and Perdue essentially had to do what Trump said?
GABRIEL STERLING:
There's nothing else that makes sense. Because even their staff were surprised when they put that out. You know, it had been about a week and a half, I guess, since the election had been over. And it's safe to say, it's one of the things they said is that we were not transparent, we were literally doing two press conferences a day and sending out hourly press releases on the count. Nobody has any specific allegation. They just want to keep the Trump supporters whipped up because they think that's the best path to win the Senate races. I personally think by doing what I had asked and stepping up and saying, "This disinformation has to stop. These potential intimidations and violence has to stop," they would get more votes rather than less. And I'm still supporting it. I'm a Republican. We need to hold on to the Senate. So I'm still going to vote for them. But I'm not happy with how they conducted themselves in this particular situation.
CHUCK TODD:
I was going to ask there. I mean, look, you seem to be somebody that -- you know, you want to be viewed as somebody who has the highest ethics, highest integrity, particularly in a position that you're in right now with, when it comes to overseeing elections, helping to oversee elections. Do you believe that these folks running as Republicans right now have the same ethical standards that you have?
GABRIEL STERLING:
Well that’s -- why don't you give me an easy question, Chuck? I mean, politics is a complicated profession. I said that earlier this week too. And the values and the things you have to fight for, sometimes it gets to be complicated and difficult. I said something difficult on Tuesday to people who are in a position of responsibility who I would hope would show a higher sense of leadership and duty. But at the end of the day, I believe that their opponents would do more damage to this country than they would on this particular front and that particular day.
CHUCK TODD:
Do you regret your vote for President Trump now?
GABRIEL STERLING:
Well, I can say one thing, I would have been a lot happier if it had been 13,000 votes the other way in the state. My life would have been a lot easier.
CHUCK TODD:
But considering how he's behaved, does it, d you ask yourself, "Hm, maybe he isn't the right person to lead the country, at least if this is what he's going to do to the democracy?”
GABRIEL STERLING:
I think that we have this on all sides. President Trump has a higher sense of responsibility, should be held to a higher standard. But we have a governor candidate in this state who still hasn't conceded. We have people who, like I said earlier, believe Russians switched votes. I mean, all sides, Republican and Democrat, have to stand up and do a better job -- the president included and especially.
CHUCK TODD:
Do you believe that the president is doing damage to the Republican Party in Georgia by continuing to stir this pot?
GABRIEL STERLING:
Yes.
CHUCK TODD:
Do you think it could cost Loeffler and Perdue their Senate races?
GABRIEL STERLING:
Yes. When he and his lawyers and even his former lawyers -- some of his former lawyers are literally saying, "Don't vote." It's mixed messaging, it's confusing and if you're telling people don't trust the election system, why would they bother to show up? I mean, the best argument how some people is if you think they're stealing it, show up and vote to make it at least a little bit harder for them to steal.
CHUCK TODD:
Gabriel Sterling, who, again, helps to oversee the election system there, working for the secretary of state, you spoke out pretty, pretty hard this week. I appreciate you coming on and sharing your perspective with us, sir.
GABRIEL STERLING:
Thank you, Chuck. I wish I didn't have to do it.
CHUCK TODD:
All right. Please stay safe out there.
GABRIEL STERLING:
Thank you.
CHUCK TODD:
When we come back, could President Trump's phony claims about rigged elections keep enough Republicans from voting in Georgia's runoff election and risk handing the Senate to the Democrats? Panel is next.
CHUCK TODD:
Welcome back, it is panel time. NBC News national political correspondent Steve Kornacki; Kimberly Atkins, senior opinion writer for the Boston Globe; Reuters White House correspondent Jeff Mason; and Danielle Pletka of the American Enterprise Institute. Mr. Kornacki, I'm going to start with something that The Wall Street Journal Editorial Board said on Thursday. Here's what they wrote about the president and Georgia: "At least for now he can say, with justification, that he helped the GOP gain seats in the House and avoid a rout in the Senate. But that narrative changes for the worse if the GOP loses in Georgia after Mr. Trump divided his own party to serve his personal political interest." And they wrote this Thursday, I don't think anything changed watching that event last night, Steve.
STEVE KORNACKI:
Yeah, I think there is a real risk here for Republicans in Georgia. It works on two fronts. I think you mentioned one of them there and that's simply the sort of core Trump base, the core Republican base in Georgia with everything that Trump is saying about Republicans in that state, about the integrity of elections in Georgia, everything he's alleging there: Does that depress that core Republican base in any way? But I think the other big concern Republicans have to have is that it's clear when you look at the results from November, there are split-ticket voters in Georgia. Joe Biden was able to beat Trump by about 12,000 votes. Meanwhile, in that Perdue/Ossoff race, Perdue finished about 88,000 votes ahead of Ossoff. And when you really break it down, I think what you see are voters, particularly in the Atlanta-Metro area, often in well-to-do places -- Roswell, Alpharetta, Sandy Springs, places like this -- I think that's where you saw this dynamic the most at work. Folks who it really seems went out there on Election Day in November and said they wanted to do two things: vote against Trump and vote against Democrats having control of the Senate. And I think the risk for Republicans is Trump's not going to be on the ballot in this January runoff. But to the extent Trump makes this election about him, do those same voters who had that instinct to vote against Democrats, do they say, "You know what, this is too much about Trump. I'm going to use this to vote against Trump again”?
CHUCK TODD:
You know, and Dany Pletka, that was the story of the 2018 midterms, where it became a proxy and a way to sort of send a message to Trump. I know this president is somebody that knows how to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. But if he wants to be formidable in 2024, losing Georgia's Senate seats is not a way to get there. He will get the blame for even one loss now, will he not?
DANIELLE PLETKA:
Oh there's no question. And by the way, if he has anybody to blame, it will be himself, because he is the one who has chosen to make this about him. He is the one who has chosen to continue this spurious narrative about the stolen election. And he had a couple of kind words for the two candidates who are up in Georgia in a few weeks, but he spent most of last night's rally talking about himself. And he is going to depress turnout and he will get the blame. Make no mistake.
CHUCK TODD:
Jeff Mason, you're in that White House every day. Look, I'm aware there are people that are trying to change his, sort of, at least public posture on all of this stuff. He seems more dug-in than ever.
JEFF MASON:
Yes. He absolutely does. And those people that you're referring to, Chuck, just aren't the ones that he's listening to. There are advisors who are saying, "Hey, focus on your legacy,” and the Georgia race will be a part of that legacy, as Dany and Steve were just saying. But there's so many things that he could be focusing on that he's not. He's listening to the people who are continuing to say, "Keep fighting on,” and those people are the ones that we see as part of the legal challenges: Rudy Giuliani, Jenna Ellis and that team.
CHUCK TODD:
And then, Kimberly Atkins, even when you hear when Bill Barr comes out -- I want to put his quote -- and he says, this was on Tuesday: "To date, we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have effected a different outcome in the election." He said that on Tuesday to The Associated Press. I would imagine, Kimberly, if this has changed, they'd be screaming from the rooftops of the Justice Department building to say, "Hey, this has changed." So here we are, still nothing there. And now the president wants to turn on him.
KIMBERLY ATKINS:
Right. You're seeing the same playbook where now the president is reportedly fuming and considering firing Bill Barr. He himself said, "Wait for a couple of weeks." Meanwhile, there's only six weeks left in the Trump administration. But Bill Barr who, to be sure, has been a staunch supporter of Donald Trump's, both his policies and his rhetoric right up to the election, even casting his own doubt about the election security and the possibility of fraud. Even empowering his own prosecutors to publicly initiate investigation, changing DOJ policy leading up to the election in a way that could have influenced voters' confidence in it. But at the end of the day, there was no there there, and even the attorney general cannot start criminal investigations into something that didn't happen. Whether the president likes that or not, that was the line that Bill Barr finally drew. And as you said, it's the best evidence that nothing has happened.
CHUCK TODD:
And Jeff Mason, besides the other thing that the president focused on this week, besides his own election problems -- he ignored Covid again -- he started talking about the pardon situation, and they're making these radical changes over at the Pentagon where they're firing a defense board and appointing a couple of campaign operatives from campaigns past in Corey Lewandowski and David Bossie. What is going on? What is the president trying to do to Biden's presidency in these last few weeks by putting people -- planting them inside the government? What is the strategy?
JEFF MASON:
Well, a number of things, Chuck. I think number one, despite the fact that he has not conceded the election to President-elect Biden, he is aware of the fact that he'll be leaving, he being President Trump, on January 20th. And so he wants to leave as many hurdles as he can for his successor. And that includes what you were talking about at the Pentagon. It includes the difficulty that he has made, up until just a week or two ago, for Biden and his team to get access to information. And it also suggests that despite him pushing forward to challenge this election, he is aware of a legacy and he wants that legacy to be this. And he wants that legacy to have an impact on his successor. It's, some would say, in the same way that he tried to undermine President Obama when he was in office.
CHUCK TODD:
Dany Pletka, is there a good faith argument that exists for appointing Corey Lewandowski and David Bossie to this Pentagon review board?
DANIELLE PLETKA:
Well, on the one hand, this Pentagon review board has often had appointees on it who have a somewhat tenuous relationship to national security. On the other hand, the wholesale purge of former officials -- including, by the way, senior Republicans, people like J.D. Crouch, someone like Henry Kissinger, for heaven's sake -- that smacks of the kind of cronyism, the kind of dictatorial loyalty test that Donald Trump loves. On the other hand, I don't think that that is going to throw up much of a barrier to Joe Biden because he can push out all of these new appointees almost as easily as Donald Trump's folks did.
CHUCK TODD:
I think that's something that everybody's figuring out here. And I wonder if the Trump folks realize how much time they may be wasting doing what they're doing right now. We shall see. I'm going to pause here. When we come back: the presidential election was not as close as you think. But it was a lot closer than elections some of us grew up with. That's next.
CHUCK TODD:
Welcome back. Data Download time. More than a month after election day, the story for many is just how close the presidential race was. Yet although many expected a wider margin, the relative closeness of Biden's almost 4.5 point popular vote victory over Donald Trump actually should not have been a surprise, because, when compared to recent years, it wasn't really that close at all. Biden's margin of victory was actually bigger than all but one election since 2000, including George W. Bush's 2.5 point win in 2004 and Barack Obama's 3.9 percentage point win in 2012. In fact, the only bigger margin was Barack Obama's 2008 win, which was actually only just above a 7 percentage point victory over John McCain. But as we all learned in 2000 and 2016, the popular vote does not decide the presidency. It's the Electoral College. And those victories have also been narrowing as well. In fact, since 2000, only once has a presidential candidate carried more than 30 states. George W. Bush, with 31 in 2004. Now, that may sound like a lot today, but a presidential candidate breaking 30 states, well, that used to be pretty common, at least in my childhood. Let's take a look at the '80s. Each presidential winner in that decade captured 40 or more states on the way to the White House. Even Bill Clinton carried more than 30 states. In fact, we can go even further back. In the 19 elections from 1920 to 1992, the winner of the presidential race carried fewer than 32 states just three times. Now, remember, Bush's 31-state win in 2004 is the most states we've seen a candidate win in the 21st century, period. Here's another way to think about it. Since 1988, every presidential election has been decided by single-digit margins in the popular vote. Nine straight presidential elections, going back to George H. W. Bush's victory in '88. To find the last time the country had a string of close races like that, you’d have to go back more than a century, when the country saw seven consecutive single-digit elections between 1876 and 1900. Think about that period of time, right. The economy was transitioning. We were getting out of the Civil War still. Not a surprise that that was a polarizing time as well. The deep divides in our country have made razor-thin margins the norm every four years, making it increasingly difficult for whichever party comes out on top to get anything done. When we come back, how hard is it to keep all the factions of the Democratic Party happy these days? President-elect Joe Biden is finding out.
CHUCK TODD:
Welcome back. Now a little bit of a focus on the incoming administration. Steve Kornacki, as President-elect Biden puts together a cabinet, you won't be surprised not everybody's happy with the picks so far. There's a little bit of an issue when it comes to representation. Let me just put together a few comments we have here. "I really thought at this stage of the game I would see more African American appointments in the top positions," said Bonnie Watson Coleman, a Democratic member of Congress from New Jersey. "It's no secret that we don't see too many Asian-Americans there, do we?" said the DNC's chair of the Asian-American Pacific Islander Caucus. "We're very, very concerned as a community, as the Latino community," said Congressman Vicente Gonzalez. Steve, right now we know Latinos, they believe they don't have anybody, it looks like, in the big four. You see African Americans, Jim Clyburn has said this, he would like to see that pace increase. What kind of pressure is the Biden campaign feeling on this?
STEVE KORNACKI:
Well, it's interesting, there's the question of demographic representation. There's also the ideological question, the progressive wing of the party and what they're looking for here. I do think the context, when you talk about demographic representation, the political context of this is interesting because, of course, the victory that Joe Biden just put up in the November election came with Democrats actually losing ground with non-white voters. I think specifically with Latino voters, to some degree with African American men. Certainly there's some evidence there, especially when you look at, like, Orange County in California, look at some of the House races out there, I think Asian-American voters as well. So, Democrats come into this administration, I think, you know, the last four years, really the Trump era, I should say, you know, putting a lot of their future calculations on growing non-white population and an assumption that they're going to continue to rack up gigantic margins there. They certainly won by a wide margin with non-white voters, but not as wide a margin as I think they were expecting. And I think that's one of those questions to be looking at going forward. Is that something that kind of reverts to mean in the Biden era or is there a start of a trend there that continues in some way and that could alarm Democrats.
CHUCK TODD:
Kimberly Atkins, as Steve mentioned, it's not just about demographic representation. You have ideological disputes as well. We know the Bernie Sanders world is not happy, for instance, that Neera Tanden is the designee for Budget Director. What does the Biden campaign have to worry about politically, both of these ideological appointments and on the demographic appointments?
KIMBERLY ATKINS:
I think the main issue here isn't so much necessarily counting the numbers. Are there X-number of progressives, X-number of Black and brown folks in his cabinet. It's who they are, where they are, and what they are doing. And I think that applies in both these situations. You have the Biden administration coming in the middle of a pandemic and right on the heels of things like protests, demands for justice in the form of policing reform. And so, you see the people. And while what Steve said is true, the share of Black and brown voters shrunk, but it was Black and brown voters in states like Georgia and states like Wisconsin and Michigan that helped Joe Biden win. And what I am hearing from folks who are not entirely pleased with his picks so far is that he has not shown that the people closest to him understand the issues that drove those voters to the polls in the first place, understand the issues that, if you're talking about growing the party, will continue to push more of those voters, whether it's progressives, whether it's Black people, whether it's brown people, Latinos, Asian-Americans, to the polls to ensure that the Democratic party is showing them that it is the party for them. And I know that Joe Biden wants to rely on people that he knows, people that he trusts, which includes Neera Tanden. At the same time, he has to be willing to listen to those who are closest to him. And so, he has to demonstrate that in some of these positions that are remaining, particularly HHS and Attorney General. Those are the ones that folks are watching closely.
CHUCK TODD:
They definitely are. I think Xavier Becerra suddenly being a front-runner at HHS -- he's the current attorney general in California, former member of Congress. I think that tells you that they've at least been listening to the Latino criticism. Jeff Mason, here, it does seem as if Joe Biden's got an interesting challenge here. I think he does owe some representation, particularly in the African Americans community. I mean, he said it himself, they had his back so he's got to have theirs. But one could argue he has a mandate to diss progressives. Now, he probably can't get caught saying it that way, but they were decidedly not only not with him, they tried to defeat him.
JEFF MASON:
Well, yes. And I think the message from Biden camp on all of this, whether it's progressives or concern from other minority groups, is we hear you, but we've got this. And he does feel like he has a mandate. And he's also facing the reality that President Trump did not face, which is that when he governs, he is likely to continue to face challenges from his own party. But he's aware of that and he has said repeatedly, "Look, I didn't pull the wool over anybody's eyes during this election. I'm a moderate. That's who I am. That's my background and that's how I'm going to govern."
CHUCK TODD:
Dany Pletka, a Democrat's moderate is still a conservative's liberal. And this cabinet that Joe Biden is putting together though, it looks more center-left than it does progressive-left.
DANIELLE PLETKA:
Well, it does in some cases. And you know, Politico reported last week that national security progressives and far-left activist groups like Win Without War and Code Pink are now trying to coordinate their response to these appointments. They're trying to stop, for example, Michelle Flournoy, who is one of Biden's candidates to head the Department of Defense. They don't like her because she's worked with defense contractors. And I think that that's what we're going to see is that there is going to be pushback. Let's remember all of these political parties, this happened with Donald Trump as well, once they lose that outside boogeyman, they become circular firing squads and it becomes very hard to get stuff done.
CHUCK TODD:
Steve Kornacki, tonight you're supposed to explain the NFL playoff picture to us. Here in Washington, the football team would like to know if they could make the playoffs, but a lot of us are thinking, "Are we going to have a recount when it comes to the NFC East and maybe those ballots ought to be thrown out?"
STEVE KORNACKI:
The NFC East is going to test if it's possible for 6 and 10 to actually make the playoffs. I mean, you look at those schedules those three teams are playing today who are near the top right now. The possibility that no one's going to have a losing record, I think, very strong there. I mean winning record.
CHUCK TODD:
Forget the pressure of election night mapping. We're going to see you tonight, Football Night In America with Steve Kornacki. I look forward to it. Hey, thank you all, panel. Terrific. And thank you all for watching with us. We'll be back next week because, if it's Sunday, it's Meet The Press.