Summary
Trump's refusal to concede election threatens U.S. democracy. Secretary of State Pompeo says, there will be a smooth transition to a second Trump administration. Biden says, Trump's refusal to accept election results will not interfere in transition planning. Obama calls for unity after divisive election. Brennan says, continuity during transition is vital to U.S. national security. GOP is all-in on entertaining Trump's voter fraud conspiracies. Joe Biden's victory has been built on a broad coalition within the Democratic Party, but it was black women, Latino and indigenous voters who helped put him over the top, and it will be the same groups that the new administration will need to build on as it looks to repair the damage from the past four years.
Transcript
ARI MELBER, MSNBC HOST: As the saying goes, laugh now, cry later if you need too.
That does it for THE BEAT with Ari Melber. You can always find me @arimelber. "THE REIDOUT" with Joy Reid starts now.
JOY REID, MSNBC HOST: We are now witnessing the most volatile post-election transition period in modern American history with Donald Trump standing out among the president's before him, by refusing to concede while his Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, jokes about a coup de etat.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Is the State Department currently preparing to engage with the Biden transition team and, if not, at what point does a delay hamper a smooth transition or pose a risk to national security?
MIKE POMPEO, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: There will be a smooth transition to a second Trump administration. All right, we're ready.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: Yes, illegal seizures of government are just hysterical. You're such a card (ph), Pompeo.
And whether it's denial, defiance or delusion, or a combo platter of all three by the current president, make no mistake the people around the president backed by elected Republicans and conservative talking heads are deliberately creating the false impression that they can somehow stop Joe Biden from becoming the 46th president of the United States.
And because the truth is they cannot do that. They're trying to sprits the stench of illegitimacy on to a Biden/Harris administration. It is a cynical and, frankly, as bizarre as it gets.
According to The Washington Post, White House officials are pretending the election just never happened at all. The White House Budget Office is instructing federal agencies to continue preparing the Trump administration's budget proposal for the next fiscal year. While Trump appointee, Emily Murphy, the administrator of the General Services Administration, the department that formally recognizes a president-elect for the transfer of power to begin, is refusing to green light the process.
And that process, it isn't just about getting a tour of the oval office. President-elect Biden and his transition team are being blocked from millions of dollars that are budgeted for transferring to a new president and to access to government officials, office space and equipment that every single winner of a presidential election has enjoyed, including Trump. Biden is denied presidential briefings in classified intelligence reports, again, everything that Trump enjoyed when President Obama kicked off the transition process for him.
You see this photo? This was two days after Trump, the O.G. birther, won the election. Now it's Trump's turn to hand over the keys and instead we are faced with another Trumpian effort to gaslight the American people by delegitimizing the presidential process, the president that you chose. Trump is refusing to accept the loss.
And so, we are faced with a Trump baby. No, no, not the balloon, but an actual child-like tantrum, that sends this message loud and clear, if I don't win, no one wins, as if we're in some broken down banana republic. And it is true. No one wins from a blocked presidential transition, especially now, as Trump inherits -- as Biden inherits the Trump wreckage in the middle of a pandemic that has taken more than 240,000 lives in America and crippled Americans economically.
But, again, let me just repeat, and assure you, none of what Trump and his minions are doing or saying will stop Joe Biden from taking the oath of office at noon on January 20, 2021, at which time presidential power will immediately be stripped from Donald Trump and transferred to him. That is what's going to happen. And it's something a very calm President-elect Biden addressed head on today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, U.S. PRESIDENT-ELECT: So I'm confident that the fact that they're not willing to acknowledge we won at this point is not of much consequence in our planning and what we're able to do between now and January 20th.
I'm letting him know that America is back. We're going to be back in the game.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: Joining me now is Jonathan Lemire, White House Reporter for the Associated Press, and two people who help led Barack Obama's presidential transition and then serve in his administration, Melody Barnes and Patrick Gaspard.
And, Ms. Barnes, thank you for being here and welcome to the show. You know, the thing that is frustrating, I think, for all of us who are watching this game that's being played by Trump and his enabler is that we already know what's going to happen January 20th. This is not a question. You know Joe Biden is going to be president and it's going to happen. Can you just walk us through what the delays and the sand that's being thrown, what does that actually do to the process of the transferring power?
MELODY BARNES, FOMER. OBAMA TRASITION OFFICIAL: Well, Joy, it's a pleasure to be with you this evening. And as you were saying at the top of the show, no one wins. The 73 days between an election and inauguration may seem at this point like a lifetime. But for those who are about to walk into the White House and for the president-elect and the vice president-elect, it is a very short period of time.
And in that amount of time security clearances have to be attained. Briefings have to be provided. Remember on Election Day -- or in inauguration day 2009, there was a credible threat of a bomb scare on that day. And it was because the two administrations had been working together then classified briefings had been provided that they were able to address that. Luckily, nothing happened. But those are the kind of things that can happen.
Agency review teams have to go into departments and agencies to understand what has been happening there, litigation, regulatory issues, personnel issues. And I think given the concerns that so many of us have about data retention, about the hallowing out of the civil service because of those who left, we know that those departments and agencies are not in robust shape to deal with the issues that face the American public.
So all of those issues are issues that get reviewed in those 73 days before a person stands in front of the American people and takes the oath of office. It is about continuity of governance.
REID: And I know that you described in previous interviews that it's like taking a business with that has one CEO and one full set of management and like transferring the whole thing over. It's that complicated. And it is a process, you know?
And, Patrick, it's great to see you. I just want to play for you. This is just for memory sake. Let's just say for the memory hall, to get out of the memory hall. This is President Obama welcoming Donald Trump to the White House. And keep in mind, he's welcoming the O.G. birther to the White House who just became president. Take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BARACK OBAMA, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: I believe that it is important for all of us, regardless of party and regardless of political preference, to now come together, work together, to deal with the many challenges that we face.
Most of all, I want to emphasize to you, Mr. President-elect, that we now are going to want to do everything we can to help you succeed, because if you succeed, then the country succeeds.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: You know beyond just that being a decent grown up thing to do, and, Patrick, because you have both been the political director inside the White House, but also an ambassador and have served overseas for the Obama administration, what does that -- the atmospheric of the transfer of power, does it matter in the real world, and if so, how does it matter?
PATRICK GASPARD, FORMER. OBAMA TANSITION OFFICIAL: Well, it absolutely matters in the real world and it matters in a reality T.V. world that half of America seems to be living in right now. Look, Joy, it's great to be on. But looking at that video, one is a reminder of the magnanimity, the grace that President Obama and previous presidents demonstrated in transitions. All of that seems like it's out of the Victorian era now.
I received phone calls today from activists, leaders in some sub-Saharan Africa, in Latin America, in Europe, who heard Pompeo's statement and were just absolutely aghast. He may have been making a joke. But it's disconcerting and believes that absolutely undermines the process.
Melody and I had the privilege of serving on the 2008-2009 transition teams, managing personnel. Melody is correct. The scale, the scope of government now requires as hasty and as cooperative a transition as possible. But, of course, in this moment when we have a national security threat in the form of a global pandemic, but there's a greater urgency that has ever existed before.
I've also suggest that there's a really cynical ploy that is going on here. We expected this from Donald Trump. But the rest of Republican leadership is really just playing to a group of voters in Georgia, for instance, that where they hope to gin people up for turnout in the special election in January, and it's really just profoundly troubling, not just here in America but for the watch around the world, see such cynicism being utilized that thwart democratic practice.
REID: And I think that's absolutely true, that my suspicion is a lot of this is about Georgia, Jonathan, that is, that a lot of this is about keeping Republican voters hype up and hopped up and angry so that they'll come back out and vote in January. So like that's a lot of it.
But it is -- I wonder if, behind the scenes, because this is what I'm hearing, this is what Nicolle has talked with Philip Rucker earlier on her show, that Republicans behind the scenes are admitting that this is farce. Like when there's nobody around and they think that their names won't be used in stories, they're admitting that this is just B.S., that they're doing this as B.S. And if that is the case, if they're saying, just let Donald Trump feel like a winner for 70 more days, what harm can it do? Here is what John Brennan says, the harm that it could do. Let's just take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOHN BRENNAN, FORMER CIA DIRECTOR: I think it is very concerning because it's critically important during periods of administration transitions that there be as much as continuity as possible from the standpoint of ensuring our national security and our homeland security is going to be secure.
And the fact that the Trump administration continues to give the stiff arm to the Biden team is that it's indicative of their unwillingness to really take the interest of the American people first as opposed to the interest and the pettiness of Donald Trump.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: Jonathan, do Republicans get that? And are they just being -- I mean, if they get that, then why are they still doing this?
JONATHAN LEMIRE, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS WHITE HOUSE REPORTER: It's extraordinarily dangerous, Joy. But Republicans are willing to play along at least for now. I mean, Senate Majority Mitch McConnell is the one seen by many in the GOP who could nudge President Trump towards the exit and sort of signal that this is over. It's time to give up the fight, and he's not doing that.
Contrary, he's doing the exact opposite, emboldening him, suggesting that it is his legal right to pursue these challenges and that every vote should be counted and potentially prolonging this for days, if not, weeks. I think you're right, those run off races in Georgia play a large role in this.
In terms of inside the White House, there are some small number of aides who like the president and encouraging him to keep fighting. Others do seem see the writing on the wall here. They recognize these legal challenges, they have not gone anywhere so far. And even if they were too, it's such an uphill crime.
It's not just the president -- this isn't 2000 in Florida, where it's one state and a few hundreds of votes. It's thousand of votes, sometimes tens of thousands of votes across several states. But even if he was to win one court case, it wouldn't be nearly enough to overturn the result of the overall election.
And while this is happening, Joy, it should be noted, the president is not really doing his day job. It's been more than a month since his schedule has advised that he received a daily intelligence briefing. He hasn't had a readout, there's hasn't been a readout of a foreign leader call in weeks. He has not convened -- he has not participated in the coronavirus task force meeting in well more than a month, if almost two.
And outside of ousting the secretary of defense yesterday and other some other aides, he isn't really governing this country. He isn't leading this White House at a time when the coronavirus pandemic is surging out of control to record in extremely dangerous levels.
REID: And so, Melody Barnes, if we go through another 70 days of this, what are the biggest risks, in your view?
BARNES: Joy, I think as Patrick would also tell you from serving in the -- our time serving in the White House, this is a dereliction of duty. And there are, as Jonathan was just saying, significant issues like COVID-19 that have to be addressed. The president-elect has identified a task force to begin to deal with those issues. We know, we've been told that there is a vaccine that should soon be available.
There's a matter of making sure that Americans are able to access that and the government working with those departments and agencies, and companies to be able to do that. We also have issues of our economy. That is in tatters right now. And the ability to work with Congress to formulate plans and to move an agenda forward are things that are being undermined.
But I think even more significantly, most significantly, democracy isn't guaranteed. We have -- we are nation of laws. We have a Constitution. We are supposed to be a nation of tolerance and some pluralism, but those things require all of us. They require a Democratic culture.
REID: Yes.
BARNES: And right now, that is at risk. And right now, what we're seeing are the basics, the fundamentals that have held our country together for almost 250 years being used like a play thing for someone else's self-aggrandizement as opposed to putting the country first, which when you serve in the White House, you know is the most important thing that you do.
REID: Yes. And democracy is also apparently requires and adult supervision, and adult in the White House would be helpful. Jonathan Lemire, Melody Barnes, Patrick Gaspard --
GASPARD: Well, let's appreciate that Joe Biden is being an adult here. We should be reassured by how calm and cool he is, and be assuring in this moment of constitutional challenge.
REID: Yes, absolutely, Patrick, a 100 percent amen to that. Thank you all very much. I really appreciate you guys being here.
Up next on THE REIDOUT, Hillary Clinton conceded the day after the election. And this election isn't even as close as that one was. Why the cult of Trump refuses to acknowledge Biden's victory, and why top Republican are still, still genuflecting to the loser in the Oval Office.
Also tonight, actress and activist Eva Longoria joins me on the importance of the Latino vote in 2020 and beyond.
Meanwhile, with Trump totally distracted, the nation plunges into COVID hell. Ben Johnson's 24 year-old wife who had just given birth is fighting for her life on a ventilator.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BEN JOHNSON, WIFE HAS COVID-19: Think of how you would feel if you were in a position where you had to watch someone that you cared about struggling for their life.
Now, at this point, I'm fully comfortable that she will make a full recovery. But on Tuesday, I was fairly certain that she was going to die.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
REID: Okay. To reiterate, Joe Biden handedly won the election. You know that. Elected Democrats know it. Elected Republicans know it. You heard Joe Biden's confidence in the press conference say, so you know that he knows it. And deep down, Donald Trump knows it too.
And there is not one iota evidence of voter fraud that would overturn said election, period. And yet, Republicans are all-in on misleading their base to pacify Trumps ego, sure, but also to solidify their own power by keeping Republican voters on edge with a crucial election looming in Georgia in January that will determine who controls the United States Senate.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY): President Trump is 100 percent within his rights to look into allegations of irregularities.
SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R-SC): We win because of our ideas. We lose elections because they cheat us.
SEN. ROY BLUNT (R-MO): The president wasn't defeated by huge numbers. In fact, he may not have been defeated at all.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: GOP senators also today did their usual reporter avoidance.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
QUESTION: Senator, did Vice President Biden win the election?
SEN. RICHARD SHELBY (R-AL): We don't know yet, do we?
QUESTION: Have you spoken to Vice President Biden yet?
SEN. MARSHA BLACKBURN (R-TN): I have not.
QUESTION: Do you believe he won the election?
Have you congratulated Vice President Biden yet?
SEN. RON JOHNSON (R-WI): No.
QUESTION: Why not?
JOHNSON: There's nothing to congratulate him about.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: Trump's top henchman, Attorney General William Barr, is even using the awesome power of the Department of Justice to encourage the president's delusions, authorizing federal prosecutors to investigate fantasized voter fraud.
It's such an obviously cynical, outrageous move that the DOJ election's crimes chief has resigned over it.
I'm joined now by Stuart Stevens, senior adviser to The Lincoln Project and chief strategist for Mitt Romney's 2012 campaign.
And Stuart, if it wasn't obvious, if the Georgia election didn't exist, and Republicans didn't need those two seats in order to control the United States Senate, I think it would be -- it would be hard to understand what they're doing, right?
You would think maybe they have all gone mad. Maybe they're all Donald Trump. But I am -- I am clear-eyed enough about what Republicans want, which is power, to understand that all of this is about getting those Senate seats, getting white voters, frankly, in Georgia all hopped up, thinking that there's some fraud here, that they can save the republic by voting for those two senators.
Am I wrong?
STUART STEVENS, THE LINCOLN PROJECT: Well, let's play that out.
You may very well be right. But I think it's a disastrous political strategy, to raise the hopes of these white voters, and then they know it's not going to happen. He's not going to be president.
By the time they're voting in Georgia, this is going to be settled, formally settled...
REID: That's true.
STEVENS: ... the electors having voted him.
I think it's the best way I can think of to mobilize African-Americans, because, basically, this is just sort of Jim Crow modern tactics of trying to take away the right to vote by powerful people from black people.
REID: I -- yes.
STEVENS: And if one of the -- if one of the issues is, how do you motivate African-Americans in a run-off, I think Republicans have played this hand disastrously.
REID: You make an excellent point, because you have got Bill Clinton winning an election in large part because of the black vote that was not only created by the Civil Rights Act and the Kingian movement, but then really mobilized in 1984 in 1988 through that massive voter registration campaign called -- the Jesse Jackson campaign, gets Clinton in.
Immediately, oh, Clinton's not legitimate. That's not a legitimate election. Lots of black people wanted him. Not legitimate.
You go forward to Barack Obama, oh, that's not legitimate. He's not even born in America, the birther thing about saying he's not legitimate. All of those black folks that voted, that's not legitimate. And now you literally have them saying, not saying anything about North Carolina.
There are eight there are networks that have called North Carolina. NBC has not. But they're not saying that that's illegitimate because the Republican won, but all of a sudden the election is influenced by Detroit, Milwaukee, out West, a lot of Hispanic voters in Arizona.
And it is so blatant that I don't understand why they don't think we can see it.
STEVENS: Yes, I mean, I expect Mitch McConnell to show up in the well of the Senate with a big jar of jelly beans and ask people to guess how many are in there.
(LAUGHTER)
STEVENS: It really -- it really is extraordinary and it's transparent.
Look, Georgia made history in this election. And it was Georgia African-Americans for the most part that made that history. I think there's a very good chance they can do it again. I think Republicans are playing with fire here.
But the greater -- the troubling thing here is just how little these Republicans are demonstrating that they care about America. You're taking what was supposed to be the greatest deliberative body in the world, the U.S. Senate, and turning it into a kooky kind of conspiracy theory late-night talk show. It's a disgrace.
REID: Yes.
STEVENS: And every one of these Republicans knows that Joe Biden won. And it wasn't a really close election at all.
REID: No.
Look, it wasn't close at all, to the point that, in 2016, Donald Trump won by a margin of 77,744 votes in three states, on the way to losing by three million votes.
Joe Biden has the largest win, the biggest margin of any challenger to a president since FDR. He's over 50 percent in the popular vote, and he's winning by 216,000-plus votes. It isn't close.
STEVENS: No.
REID: And they know it isn't close.
And you're right. The fact that they -- that you have got Kelly Loeffler and Perdue calling for the head of the secretary of state, who's a Republican, who's the spawn of Jack Kemp, right -- he's a clone, a mini-Jack Kemp. You have Jack Kemp coming out and putting his face on -- out on a tweet, saying, don't worry. Only the lawful votes will be counted.
Dude, you have nothing to do with counting the votes now. You're the governor. It is -- one wonders where the -- then they're -- are they going to revert back and say that they're the party of patriotism? Is that what happens in January?
STEVENS: Look, in the Lincoln Project, we said that...
REID: Brian Kemp. Brian Kemp. Sorry.
(CROSSTALK)
STEVENS: ... Trump and Trumpism.
And it's just clear how deeply Trumpism has become embedded in the Republican Party. What's really extraordinary here is, I mean, they know that Donald Trump is going to lose, and they're still afraid on him? I mean, this is the home of the brave?
I just really -- it's just extraordinary. If these same Republicans were in power in 1776, we'd be celebrating the queen's birthday.
(LAUGHTER)
STEVENS: What, we're going to fight the king? Are you crazy?
It really, I think, just shows the deep, deep rot that is in the Republican Party. And the only way you're going to get rid of that is to beat these people. You just have to beat them at the polls.
And it started on Tuesday. And I think it's going to continue.
REID: And what do you make of the fact that you now have the Trump children and Kimberly Guilfoyle saying, you know what, we're just going to grab the RNC, and we're just going to -- Trump -- Trumpism is going to be here forever, because we're going to take over the party?STEVENS: Yes, I think they are going to grab the RNC.
And I think one of the reasons they're going to grab the RNC is because the financial doings of the RNC, if exposed, would be appalling to the average Republican donor.
I think they have to put somebody in there. I hear they're going to try to put Corey Lewandowski in there. They have to cover up what's been happening to this money.
The entire Trump campaign has been a large criminal enterprise. And some of these people have gone to jail. More are going to go to jail. But it's going to just -- it's a money laundering operation. And they need to cover this up. It's a crime syndicate. And they need their own person in there to make sure the grift doesn't get exposed.
REID: The great Stuart Stevens, who he knows what he's -- what he's talking about when it comes to Republican politics.
I really appreciate you being here tonight. Thank you. It's always good to talk to you.
And still ahead: Hospitals in the Midwest are under massive stress right now.
Listen to this emergency room physician from Michigan.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. ROB DAVIDSON, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, COMMITTEE TO PROTECT MEDICARE: COVID-19 has to be -- has to be what we're working on right now. This president has done nothing for us. He's made it worse. We have got patients being transferred hour-and-a-half away.
We have got patients waiting five, six hours to get into a bed because so many hospitals, including mine, including every hospital in the vicinity, they're all full.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: That doctor, Rob Davidson, joins us next on THE REIDOUT.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
REID: President-elect Joe Biden has made clear his first priority is tackling the pandemic, even as the current administration obstructs his transition.
Most of the U.S., 46 states, have seen an increase in new cases over the past two weeks, after a single-day record of more than 133,000 cases on Monday, and already exceeding 100,000 cases today.
There are now more than one million new cases in the U.S., I mean, this -- just this month in just the last 10 days. More than 59 million Americans are currently hospitalized, as states grapple with the surge. With North Dakota's hospitals at 100 percent capacity, its governor decided to allow COVID-positive nurses to keep working in COVID units.
Iowa's governor announced new rules on mask wearing amid a surge there. Meanwhile, El Paso, Texas, is running out of morgue space, with six mobile morgues already in place.
And in especially hard-hit Wisconsin, after another day of record hospitalizations and new cases, a short time ago, Governor Tony Evers called the crisis in Wisconsin urgent, and urged and advised residents to stay at home.
I'm joined now by Dr. Rob Davidson, emergency room physician in West Michigan.
And I want to start. We played a little clip of you talking about what the surge looks like there on the ground. But I want to give you an additional opportunity. Just explain what is happening in the hospital where you work.
DAVIDSON: Well, basically, we're full.
And almost every hospital in the vicinity is full, to the point where any time someone needs to be admitted for whatever, but most of them are for COVID-19, we have our supervising nurse calling around to all the other hospitals. And every 30 minutes or so, it changes. You might have a bed at one point, and then you call back 30 minutes later, said, oh, no, someone else got that bed.
We had a fairly big hospital, a tertiary care center -- and I work in a fairly small community hospital. They were calling us to see if we had beds. I heard of a hospital in Muske -- or in Ludington, on the west coast of Michigan, flying someone across to Southeast Michigan that had to be admitted to an ICU.
So it is at the breaking point, for sure. And flu season hasn't hit yet. And we know that cases continue to go up. And this is just going to get worse. So our patients are definitely suffering.
REID: I want to read a little bit of a "USA Today" piece that was actually quite chilling. I found it quite chilling.
And I don't know folks have read it online, but I will read a little bit of it.
It says here: "A deceptive calm hovers over the COVID ward. The patients are calm because they are terribly sick and must be deeply sedated. So deprived of oxygen are their bodies that they must be sedated to the point of paralysis. They cannot afford to consume even the modest amounts of oxygen needed to move an arm or a leg."
I'm terrified of COVID. I will just be honest with you. And I am shocked that people aren't, that people take it so casually or even think we should get it, because look how Trump looked so robust.
Like, can you just explain? When somebody has COVID sickness, what does that patient look like, what do they experience? Because this article terrified me.
DAVIDSON: Yes, I saw someone last night who has multiple family members hospitalized in other hospitals, had to send him about an hour away to be hospitalized. He just came in saying, I have never had so much pain in my life, breathing 40 times a minute.
If you do that at home, that's fast, and working so hard. And I had him put on oxygen levels three, four times normal oxygen that you breathe, just so he could catch his breath. And this is someone in the early throes of this.
When they present to the emergency department, largely, they look better than they do three days from now, when they're up in the hospital and they end up going into the ICU. That's when they're sedating people. That's when all of that is happening.
And this person said, I have never felt this bad in my life, and really just with a look of terror.
REID: Yes.
DAVIDSON: It's something you wish -- wish you could show more people. Unfortunately, you can't.
And you wish that we had leadership that would tell people this and so we could get people to wear masks, we could get people to take it seriously.
REID: The president of the United States in his reelection campaign came to Michigan a lot. I asked my producers to tell me how many times exactly during the later part of the campaign.
Michigan has reported 600 -- 6,473 new coronavirus cases and 84 deaths in -- just on Tuesday the 10th. Pennsylvania, the daily record shattered -- was shattered again with those cases.
And Donald Trump traveled eight times to Pennsylvania, six times to Wisconsin, and six times to Michigan after the Republican National Convention. Do you suspect that those rallies, where it was masks-optional, contributed to this surge?
DAVIDSON: Yes.
And I -- one of them was 30 miles from my hospital. Another one was about 60 miles of my hospital, about 30 miles from my home in Muskegon and Grand Rapids in the last few weeks of the campaign
And 100 percent -- 100 percent. The numbers were already starting to go up. And then, since then, they have exploded, with positivity rates in our area of about 12 to 14 percent. There is no doubt. We have seen studies that show it, but I can just tell you, from on the ground, this -- something like this, with this number of patients with this kind of a disease that is largely preventable, has never happened before, hopefully never happens again.
And we don't know what the next two or three weeks is going to look like. And I would say he had a lot to do with this.
REID: Yes. And I will note that the current president mocked Joe Biden for doing smaller rallies where everyone stayed in cars. But it seems pretty clear that that was the wiser way to go.
DAVIDSON: Absolutely.
REID: Dr. Rob Davidson, thank you so much.
Be well and stay healthy. We appreciate you.
DAVIDSON: Thanks.
REID: Meanwhile, moderate and progressive Democrats are now butting heads over the future of the party.
What does this mean for key issues like health care, like social justice, and climate change? We will dig into that next with one of the newest star freshmen in the Democratic Caucus.
Don't go anywhere.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
REID: Today, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments on a case that could decide the fate of the Affordable Care Act. Republican state officials and the Trump administration pressed the court to over turn the ACA. At least five justices including Brett Kavanaugh and Chief Justice John Roberts seem skeptical.
(BEGIN AUDIO CLIP)
CHIEF JUSTICE JOHN ROBERTS, U.S. SUPREME COURT: I think it's hard for you to argue that Congress intended the entire act to fall with the mandate was struck down, when the same Congress that lowered the penalty to zero didn't everyone try to repeal the rest of the act. I think frankly that they want the court to do that, but that's not our job.
(END AUDIO CLIP)
REID: President-elect Joe Biden promised to expand Obamacare while calling the court case a partisan move it over turn the will of the people.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENT-ELECT OF THE UNITED STATES: This doesn't need to be partisan issue. It's a human issue. It affects every single American family. We can't subvert the growing consensus based on an argument put forward in the briefs seeking to invalidate the law, that even many conservative legal scholars, including the "National Review", considered to be, quote, ridiculous.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
REID: Last week, Cori Bush, a registered nurse, activist, and ordained pastor was elected to represent Missouri's first congressional district. She's now the first black woman elected to Congress from that state.
Joining me now is Congresswoman-elect Cori Bush of Missouri.
First of all, congratulations on winning the election. Change has come. You are the first I think person whose last name is not Clay to represent the district since 1960s. So, congratulations on that.
But let's talk about this healthcare situation. You are a registered nurse. You understand the issue so well.
Josh Hawley who beat our friend Claire McCaskill in an election largely running against the ACA, largely saying he didn't like the law. When he was the attorney general of your state, he joined the lawsuit that we're now hearing before the Supreme Court, though, he was trying to -- they want to over turn the whole thing. And today there is a hearing on the appeal of that case.
What would it mean to people in your state if the ACA were to fall?
We're having trouble with the audio. Let's stop for a minute. I don't know if you are on mute. Let's make sure you get your audio together. What are we thinking?
Do we have it?
CORI BUSH (D), MISSOURI, CONGRESSWOMAN-ELECT: OK.
REID: I can hear you. Magic. What would it do -- what it mean -- what would it mean your state? Because I'm not sure if Missouri expanded Medicaid. But what would it mean in your state?
BUSH: So, we just recently expanded Medicaid. We had to vote the August 4 this year.
So the issue is we just talk about children. So many children have been knocked off of the Medicaid roles and it's been okay by the local government. When talk about the ACA and how we have people who have preexisting conditions that need the ACA. We have thousands of people. We have tens of thousands of people even in my own area.
We talk about the state, millions of people will be effected if we don't have the ACA and hear people talk about, you know, well, this is it's a burden on the system. Let me tell you what a burden is, you know, when your family member shows up at the hospital I don't pay attention to insurance they have. I make sure the family member is taken care of, with the best quality care I can.
But if you take away the ACA, if you take away what I have to work with, how do I keep your family member alive? This just doesn't effect who you want it to effect. It will affect everyone. That is how I look at it from the standpoint of a nurse. People deserve healthcare and deserve it right now.
REID: You know, there's a whole debate that's happening now inside the Democratic Party where you got moderate Democrats blaming progressives and saying, well, it's their fault and talking too much about criminal justice reform and things like that, trying to blame the Squad and saying that's why we didn't win Senate seats.
These are issues that are quite important. Real basic issues, whether people have healthcare. A piece Doug Jones who just was defeated in Alabama, it was a civil rights hero. It was a shame he was defeated.
But he said, look, Stacey Abrams work in Georgia could be a model for the party work in individual states. He said the DCCC meaning the Democratic Senate and congressional committees, they put a lot of money into the race and spent too much time investing in candidates not the electorate. They don't invest in house districts, they invest in states.
Do you agree with that? That the apparatus of the Democratic Party are so focused on can we find a self-funding candidate to run for Senate, but they're not focused on developing the votes of people who really need government?
BUSH: You know, I have to say that I have never had the experience of working with either one of those groups. I'm on the outside.
REID: Yes.
BUSH: We had to do it from the ground. We didn't have machines helping us. Our only machine was the people.
But I know what I have heard. You know, my sister Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has been talking about how people who ran in swing states, those who ran on Medicare for all won. And those who didn't run on Medicare for all didn't, you know?
So, I will -- I will not take the onus for what people are trying to say people causing -- being a part of what caused people to lose seats in the swing districts. I tell you what, we worked from the ground. We worked our butts off knocking on doors and making the phone calls, talking to hundreds of thousands of people. That's what it took for us.
I'm showing up at the mall at the park, I'm showing up everywhere with a mask and reaching my people. And so, I think that's a difference. We use digital like crazy. We spent crazy money on digital. We have to look at what we could have done differently in our areas. If defund the police and Medicare for all didn't do it for you I'm sorry. In my community I'm speaking on it.
And this is not breaking up the caucus. Let me just saying, you know, we are fine. I have a relationship with all the people on the caucus, a lot of them that are saying, you know, that this was hurtful. But what's hurtful for me is people in my community dying. What's hurtful is St. Louis is number one for police killings since 2013, for six years straight, according to some research, and we are -- we are keep having this happen. We have a super-aggressive police department, and they don't get to continue to just kill black folks in my community, and I'm not saying anything.
So, yes, defund, but defund, you take that money that we're using for MRAPs, the money that we're using for tear gas and stockpiling SWAT gear. We want to take that money and put it into substance abuse programs, we're going to put that on education and mental health resources. We're going to take it and use for our un-house population. We are reallocating funds.
You know, we're not trying -- I'm not trying to hurt anybody's district, anybody from keeping their seat. I'm not looking at feelings. I'm looking at life. I'm trying to save lives.
REID: Yeah, and you have been part of this on the ground since the Ferguson uprising, because of Michael brown. I believe Ferguson is your district.
BUSH: Yes.
REID: And so, what advice you gif to those organizing in Georgia, who wanted -- they want to see the Senate seats do what you did, which is to come in, have a message on the ground and win? What advice you give the two Senate counties candidates in Georgia?
BUSH: I will say, look at the connections. Use your connections, use the ground. We got to do something different. There are people who have all of this data and people who have the super-smarts, you know, as it relates to running for office.
But then there's another group of people. There are grassroots organizers that know how to galvanize people. That's who they should be reaching out to. So I know they have been doing some of that work, but continue in that -- our grassroots folks have -- when we talk about what has happened across the country, you know, grassroots organizers, especially that have been dealing with and working with Black Lives Matter groups have kicked butt making sure that people know that your vote counts and that you got to show up.
So I think that's another thing that they need to do, and then also stand on your message. It's not okay to be milquetoast, so don't be milquetoast. I know both of those candidates, I've been looking them up, and I hope to be in Georgia to kind of help them, but make sure that your thing is your thing.
I stood on what I believed in and the people wanted that. The people want a fighter. They want a champion, somebody that they can believe in. So be that.
I'm looking forward to their wins and I'm going to help.
REID: Well, Ms. Cori Bush, Congresswoman-elect Cori Bush, you are definitely a fighter. We can't wait to see what you did in this new freshman class. Thank you very much. Thank you for being here.
BUSH: Thank you. Thank you.
REID: Thank you. Cheers.
All right. Actress and activist Eva Longoria joins me next to talk about the importance of the Latino and Latina vote in 2020 and Black/Latino voting solidarity this election season and beyond.
Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
REID: Ballots are still being counted, but President-elect Joe Biden has already received more votes than any other presidential candidate in U.S. history. In fact, with 50.7 percent of the popular vote, he has the highest percentage by any challenger since Franklin Roosevelt in 1932.
Biden is still leading in Arizona and Georgia and he could be the first Democrat to win those states since the 1990s.
Biden's victory has been built on a broad coalition within the Democratic Party, but it was black women, Latino and indigenous voters who helped put him over the top. And it will be the same groups that the new administration will need to build on as it looks to repair the damage from the past four years.
Joining me now is actress, director and activist Eva Longoria.
And, Eva, thank you so much for being here. I know you had a flight today, so I'm thankful that your flight landed on time.
(LAUGHTER)
EVA LONGORIA, ACTRESS & DIRECTOR & ACTIVIST: Thank you. Thank you for having me.
REID: Absolutely. So you did a little TV over the past couple of days talking about this, and, really, the kind of I think false impression that people have had of what Latino and Latino voters actually did in this election. I know it caused a bit of a stir.
LONGORIA: Yeah.
REID: And I wanted you to have an opportunity to sort of update your remarks.
LONGORIA: No, thank you.
I -- I think like many of us, we're all exhausted after this election, and, you know, in my effort to celebrate Latina turnout, I diminished the importance of the black women's vote in this election, and what I said was wrong. It is a fact that African-American women showed up in record numbers and brought us to victory. They saved this country.
And I recognize the harm that my words caused. If we've learned anything from this administration is that words matter, and so I take full responsibility for that mistake because I want everybody to know that we stand on the shoulders of black women, who always show up. Black women have carried us for decades when it comes to civic engagement.
And I get that there is a collective exhaustion and hurt at feeling erased, yet again. And I contributed to that pain in a moment where black women should have been lifted up, not erased, and I failed to do that, but -- not but, this is an uncomfortable moment. This is what an uncomfortable moment looks like.
REID: Yeah.
LONGORIA: And I can only show up and be better and do better, and that's what I'm doing.
REID: Well, ma'am, I have been there, and one of the reasons I really wanted to talk to you is that, you know, I think that you can say one thing when you're trying to say one thing and saying another thing. And then Twitter takes it from there.
LONGORIA: Yeah, yeah.
REID: And I really -- you and I have spoken about this. And, you know, I know that you know that, you know, as you said, black women voters are just stalwart for the Democratic Party and delivered once again.
LONGORIA: Right.
REID: But I think there is also a false impression, to be honest, about what Latino voters and Latina voters did this election.
Just going to go through real quick.
LONGORIA: Right, yeah.
REID: People are thinking Miami-Dade -- Miami-Dade, Miami-Dade, Miami-Dade, that's Cuban-American voters and, yes, they did go toward Donald Trump for a lot of reasons.
But in Nevada, white voters basically split, you know? Trump won 56 percent, Biden won 41 percent. But it was Latino voters, 56 percent for Biden, 37 percent for Trump.
You go to Arizona, white voters again, it was very tight, 47-51. But for Latino voters, it was not tight, 63 percent to 36 percent. Nationally, white voters went 58 percent for Trump, black voters went 87 percent for Biden. But, you know, Asian-American voters, overwhelmingly, 61 percent for Biden.
But Latino voters went 65 percent for Biden.
LONGORIA: Right. Well --
REID: And you go through and you even looked at Hispanic voters in the exit polls.
I mean, no matter what numbers you look at, you know, and Latinas -- and this is the last poll I'll show -- Latinas, 69-30, for Biden. Overwhelming.
LONGORIA: Yeah, yeah.
REID: So why do you think that that narrative got -- why did we get it wrong when people were just talking about it?
LONGORIA: Well, you know, that's what we were trying to unpack the other day when I made my mistake, and that's why I wanted to use this opportunity to talk about solidarity building -- deep solidarity rooted in deep conversations. Because when women of color come together, we are unstoppable. You -- just all the statistics you just mentioned. You know, and not to -- not to exclude our Afro-Latina and black Latina sisters who are often marginalized by blacks and Latinos, not fitting here, not fitting there.
And so, we have to start having these conversations because we're coming out of an administration that normalized white supremacy, that normalized injustices against people of color. We have a big fight ahead of us and we need this coalition. We need to be together.
And so, I didn't mean to cause division among us. Latinas, we need to have the backs of our Afro-Latina sisters and African-American sisters every day.
REID: Yeah.
LONGORIA: First up, we have a fight in Georgia.
REID: Yes.
LONGORIA: So, I'm going to see y'all in Georgia.
REID: Yes, yes, let's do it.
Well, I wish we had more time, Eva Longoria. But thank you so much for being here. Really appreciate you. And we are in this fight.
LONGORIA: Thanks, Joy.
REID: Thank you so much.
All right. That is tonight's REIDOUT.
"ALL IN WITH CHRIS HAYES" starts now.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.END
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