Return to Transcripts main page
Erin Burnett Outfront
Trump Intensifies Pressure Campaign on Pence, Republicans to Dispute Election Loss: "How Quickly They Forget" I Helped Them; Pres. Trump Steps Up Pressure Campaign to Undo Election Amid Showdown on Defense Bill Veto, Stimulus in Limbo; Mueller Prosecutor: Trump Pardons His "Final Act" of Obstruction. Aired 7-8p ET
Aired December 24, 2020 - 19:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[19:00:00]
WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Santa knows this isn't a great time to travel, but he's taking extra precautions this year. Check out the mask he's wearing. And on behalf of Santa and all of us here in THE SITUATION ROOM, we want to wish you a Merry Christmas and a happy and healthy holiday season. Thanks for watching.
Erin Burnett OUTFRONT starts right now.
KATE BOLDUAN, CNN HOST: OUTFRONT next, President Trump lashing out at those who aren't helping in his futile efforts to fight the election results. Yes, even on Christmas Eve. A day he spent on the golf course, while millions of Americans are desperately waiting for help.
Plus, growing outrage tonight over pardons for Trump cronies while the President considers even more pardons. Is the President helping make a case for obstruction of justice now?
And coronavirus and holiday travel collide, and experts are warning how this scenario is going to play out in the coming weeks. Let's go OUTFRONT.
Good evening, everyone. I'm Kate Bolduan in for Erin Burnett. Welcome to a special edition of OUTFRONT.
Tonight, President Trump complains that Republicans aren't helping him with his failing attempts to overturn the election, while he fails to help the American people. President Trump spending the only visible part of his day today on the golf course in West Palm Beach, Florida. He spent three hours and 19 minutes at his golf club despite his schedule for the day from the White House reading this, "President Trump will continue to work tirelessly for the American people. His schedule includes many meetings and calls."
We have been told about no such meetings or calls. The only indication is this tweet from the President, "At a meeting in Florida today," he writes, "everyone was asking why aren't the Republicans up in arms & fighting over the fact that the Democrats stole the rigged presidential election?"
Of course, we know that is not true. There is no evidence. Those Republicans though are up in arms, but not about the President's unhinged quest to change the results of the election. They're up in arms about the President's veto of a defense bill. A bill his own party overwhelmingly supports and a bill that includes providing pay raises for the military.
They're also up in arms about the President throwing the COVID relief bill into chaos. A bill Republicans supported because they were assured by the President's own team he would as well. Republican senator Roy Blunt, telling CNN today, "We were assured that the President would sign the bill. The best way out of this is for the President to sign the bill."
And when asked about the second-best way, Blunt said, well, "Let's hope the best way works second best, the second best way is a lot more challenging."
And the challenge couldn't be more serious for millions of Americans depending on the aid in this bill, 12 million Americans will lose their unemployment benefits this weekend if this bill isn't signed. But the President doesn't like the bill, wants changes but isn't doing anything about it to help. He just keeps his laser focus on overturning the election. So much so he's becoming increasingly frustrated with his most loyal of loyalists, Vice President Mike Pence.
The new reporting tonight is that the two met for over an hour yesterday in the Oval Office before the President left for Florida. Then, Trump retweeted a call for Pence to reject the electoral votes when he presides over a joint session of Congress in January. Mike Pence can't do that.
Other than this, it's not clear the President is doing anything. He hasn't taken questions from reporters in 16 days. The only time that we've seen him over the past 12 days is walking to Air Force One or Marine One or playing golf. In fact, that is rich with irony ironic, because of how much Trump trolled Obama for golfing while governing. Here's a good one from October 23, 2014.
"President Obama has a major meeting on the N.Y.C. Ebola outbreak, with people flying in from all over the country, but decided to play golf."
Kind of like what Trump is doing right now. There always has been, always will be a tweet for everything with Donald Trump. But honestly forget the tweets when it's really the lives that matter here. So far more than 328,000 Americans have died from coronavirus under Trump's watch, 3,359 deaths were reported yesterday alone. That is one American every 25 seconds.
But the President decided to play golf on this Christmas vacation. A vacation that's great, but a vacation that most Americans won't have.
Jeremy Diamond is OUTFRONT near the President's Mar-A-Lago resort. He's joining us now. Jeremy, is there any indication the President did anything to clean up the mess that he created and then left behind in Washington? JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, you would think
after torpedoing or threatening to torpedo this $900 billion coronavirus relief that Americans desperately need this holiday season.
[19:05:02]
That the President would be on the phones, that he would be meeting with advisors, that he would be doing everything he could to try and salvage this relief for Americans at a time when more than 20 million Americans are currently unemployed. But instead, what we saw from the President of the United States was him going golfing, as he has done so often, especially in these recent weeks since the election.
But if chaos is the objective, Kate, then perhaps being part of the solution isn't necessary and isn't what the President wants to do. And clearly, that seems to be what we are watching playing out. Instead, we saw the President not only golfing, but I'm told by a person familiar with the matter that the President received a warm welcome at his golf club that he spent a lot of time chatting up some of the members and some of his friends and acquaintances there and talking about how he intends to continue contesting this election.
According to this person, the President seemed 'very resolute in continuing to contest the election', and believing that this election contest, which is over still is not. And at the same time, we also have this reporting from our colleague, Pam Brown, making clear that the President does not seem to understand this constitutional responsibility that Vice President Mike Pence has on January 6th to accept the results, the valid and legitimate results of the Electoral College.
The President meeting for an hour with Vice President Mike Pence and then tweeting, retweeting this message seeming to pressure Pence into refusing to accept those results. So again, this is the President grasping at straws, looking for any way he possibly can to try and overturn the results of the election, refusing to accept reality. And I think you'll see a lot more of that this week, Kate, as the President spends time hearing from many of his friends and allies here, too many of them, Kate, are yes men and they are going to be feeding the President's ego this week.
BOLDUAN: Jeremy, thank you very much. I want to go now to Phil Mattingly, who is in Washington for more on this. Phil, do Republicans have a plan of, I don't know, how to deal with the President's veto on the defense bill and also this suggested threat to the stimulus?
PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes. Kate, on the former the answer is yes. They've already teed up votes to override that veto. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell making very clear that the Republican-led Senate will definitely vote to override the veto so long as the House does first on Monday. That's the plan there.
On the latter issue. The answer is there's no plan. And I want to focus on this real quick, because it's important to note. When the President has done this in the past, legislatively, and we've seen it multiple times, including on other spending bills in the past, there's always been kind of a way to thread the needle or perhaps some plans going on in the background, things that people were trying to do for a plan B.
And as you read off, Roy Blunt told our colleague Kristin Wilson today, there's no real plan B right now, there's no alternative, there's no secret backup plan if the President decides to veto the COVID relief and spending bill package, there's nothing. And I think that's the difficulty, that's the frustration and that's why a lot of people on Capitol Hill right now are so unsettled.
Now, the bill itself is physically on its way to Florida as we speak. It was a roll today by the U.S. Congress. It was put on a plane. It's heading down to Mar-A-Lago. What we don't know is what the President is going to actually do when he gets there. And I think right now when you talk to Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill, their biggest concern, one, is that they don't know really who has the President's ear or what is going to do, but also the timetable right now.
You think about the fact that two unemployment programs are expiring on Saturday. You think about the fact that the government will shut down on Monday, if the President doesn't sign the bill. You think about the fact that the eviction moratorium will run out at the end of the year as well. There's several crucial programs that are in the COVID relief package that are necessary at this point, given where the economy sits that won't happen if the President doesn't sign the bill and they're running out of time.
The new Congress starts on January 3rd and so everybody's kind of looking around right now, as one person told me earlier, this is a hope and pray moment more or less according to this congressional aide, out of our hands. It's in the hands of the President and we just have to wait and see. And I think that probably more than anything else, given what we've seen over the course of the last probably three or four weeks for both Democrats and Republicans is what's most unsettling right now.
BOLDUAN: Yes. Phil, thank you very much. OUTFRONT now is David Gergen. He served as Presidential Advisor to Four Presidents, Alice Stewart who served as Communication Advisor to four Republican presidential campaigns and Toluse Olorunnipa, White House reporter for The Washington Post.
David, as Phil's laying out time is really of the essence right now and there is nothing from the President today, nothing on COVID relief, nothing on keeping the government open, just golfing and rage tweeting about the election. He did not need to insert himself into this. That's the thing that keeps getting me, but he did and now he's just sitting on it, how can he?
DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: I think we're in the most dangerous period of the whole Trump presidency here, these last four weeks when I think he's created enormous harm for the country and pose so much stress and made this a joyless Christmas for so many Americans, millions of Americans. I'll just say it just can't be stressed enough what we're facing here. [19:10:00]
Well, on Saturday, 12 million Americans will lose their unemployment benefits. On Monday, the government shuts down. On New Year's Eve, the ban on evictions. Well, it means many people will be chased out of their homes. They'll be evicted from their homes, because this president barged into the middle of these tedious, long, hard negotiations.
He sat on his hands for weeks and months. And then at the last minute, when everybody was ready to have a bill signed, he throws a monkey wrench into the middle of process and leave no one with any understanding what's going to happen. That's why so many people are so upset today and why newsrooms, apparently, across the country have been deluged with calls from Americans who are deeply distressed for what's going to happen to them and to their families.
BOLDUAN: And you make a good point, more stress is the last thing that so many people need right now, quite honestly.
GERGEN: Yes.
BOLDUAN: Alice, the President is mad about Republicans not being up in arms about the election. He's going after them even still tonight, of course, in tweets and he wrote, "I saved at least 8 Republican Senators, including Mitch McConnell," he's referencing from losing in the last election that obviously is not necessarily true for Mitch McConnell, especially. "Now they sit back and watch me fight against the Democrats. I will NEVER FORGET!"
BOLDUAN: Congresswoman Virginia Foxx, Republican, she's quoted to saying during a call about the COVID relief bill today. She is quoted to saying, "I don't know if we recover from this." And that's according to The New York Times and I'm sitting here wondering is she right.
ALICE STEWART, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Her frustration is shared by many Republicans in the House, Kate, and many I've spoken with say their concerned and their frustration with what's going on is this is President Trump's bill. Steven Mnuchin drove this train and they walked the plank for this COVID measure. And now all of a sudden, the king of the art of the deal is trying to change the deal in the 11th hour and that's the frustration with them.
Certainly, the Republican Party will do the right thing and Democrats because members of Congress realize this is not about the fact that the President lost this election. This is about the fact that American people are losing their livelihoods and their homes and not having food on the table. This is about winning for the American people.
And fortunately members of Congress will do the right thing and continue to move this legislation forward. We have to open up the economy. We have to get up.
BOLDUAN: Yes. But, Alice, they can't do anything until he makes a move or he sits on this for 10 days and 10 days is the matter of losing much needed benefits for people that are on unemployment right now. This isn't a casino in Atlantic City. This is people's lives. This is why it makes no sense when a lot hasn't made sense for a very long time in terms of his strategy. That's why it is so bananas.
I mean, Toluse, the bill is literally being flown down to Florida for the President to sign if he is going to. Is that some indication that they think he's going to?
TOLUSE OLORUNNIPA, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, they're hoping that he will. They don't really have very much indication at all about what's going to happen, because the President surprised even his own allies, even his own White House aides by deciding to come out against this bill so forcefully. So no one really knows what's going to happen. It's really something the President is keeping very close to his vest and essentially saying, I'll keep you updated. I'll keep you in suspense. Maybe there will be a Christmas miracle and I'll sign this bill at the last minute and save all of these millions of people from having their benefits cut off in a matter of days.
The President likes to be at the center of attention. He likes the drama surrounding some of these things, but even his aides do not know whether or not he's going to ultimately relent and sign this bill and that's part of the process, that's part of the drama that he likes to surround himself with. And it's pretty clear that there's not very much of a plan B within the White House. If he doesn't sign this bill, there are going to be millions of people who lose their benefits. There are going to be the impact of a potential government shutdown, harming the economy.
There are all kinds of ramifications for this bill getting hung up and not passing and the President is sort of keeping everyone in limbo while that plays out.
BOLDUAN: David, something Toluse just said made me think, he said he's holding people in suspense for like a Christmas miracle. Is that the game at hand? I mean, just looking at how all this played out, is he just looking to like get a cheap win and he actually expects people are going to give it to him.
GERGEN: It's important impossible to say, Kate, for sure. But he's acting in such a deranged way. I mean, it looks like he's crackers at this point. And I think he loves to be the center of attention, we all know that. He loves to hog the spotlight. He loves to cause dramas that he alone can then address.
BOLDUAN: And David, can I add one more thing on top of that, another unanswerable ...
GERGEN: Yes.
BOLDUAN: ... is how this has played out, I'm wondering is this all because Mitch McConnell publicly acknowledged that Joe Biden won the election. Trump is just mad.
[19:15:06] GERGEN: That's a darn good question and I mentioned there must be
Republicans who think that, that he's trying to punish McConnell somehow and say, I'm in charge now, I'll drive this train. Thank you very much, Mitch. You just screwed me in a lot of variety of ways. That's the way he's acting.
This man is capable of so many different grievances and feeling into grief in so many different ways that you can hardly say that's one versus - that that alone is driving him. But I think it's just unbelievable and I think from the tone of your voice that you share this view. It's unbelievable that one man's sort of desire to please his ego is putting millions and millions of Americans through hell on a holiday season. It's just unbelievable that he would do that.
And that's why I think that whatever happens here in the next 28, 27 days right now, one thing is very, very clear. He has demonstrated conclusively that as he looks to 2024 to possibly run again, he has become totally unfit to hold that office. This is nuts what we're going through now.
BOLDUAN: Yes. I mean, Alice, so many Republicans share this, because get involved in the negotiation, make it $600, make it $1,200 make it $400, at this point, who cares? But don't come throwing a wrench in it at the end for literally no reason? It makes no sense.
STEWART: It does not. Look, conservative Republicans, myself included, don't think we should have $2,000 on the table. Paying people more to not work than to get out and work. But that's beside the point. And I also think a lot of conservative Republicans who are fiscal conservatives don't want to see a lot of this wasteful spending, this pork barrel spending that's in the bill.
The problem is, Kate, that's in the bill. This was what House members agreed to, this is what Steven Mnuchin sat down with Nancy Pelosi and they agreed to this. And now we are here on Christmas Eve and I don't know if President Trump wants to look like Daddy Warbucks and be the one to save the day. But it's Congress that has actually done the hard work and put pen to paper on what the American people need and the bill they put on the table needs to be signed, because we need relief for the American people and that can't happen soon enough.
Because as you say, a lot of people - it's not just because it's Christmas time, but they need money in their bank accounts. They need to get back to work and that should be priority number one. And more than anything, there's certainly a lot of other more important things to focus on, COVID relief, getting these vaccinations out to American people and we have an election coming up in just a few weeks and those need to take top priority as opposed to trying to be art of the deal on the 11th hour.
BOLDUAN: Yes. And Toluse, the President is very clearly focused, though, continue to focus on trying to overturn the election. With this reporting that we learned today about how the vice president and the President they met in the Oval Office for an hour or more before Trump got on Air Force One and then tweeted out this call for Pence to not - somehow I laugh only because it's really is absurd, to not accept the Electoral College votes when he presides over a joint session of Congress on January 6th.
And sources have said that Trump has brought this up to Pence since the election and that Trump has 'been confused' as to why Pence can't overturn the results on January 6th, someone explained this to him, right?
OLORUNNIPA: Well, it's hard to know what the President is thinking inside his head, but he really places a high amount of attention on loyalty and he has had loyalty from Mike Pence over the past four years. There are very few things that Pence has been unwilling to sign on to or back the President on when the President has done things that have been controversial.
So the President essentially want Mike Pence to do one more act of loyalty for him by upending the Constitution, by upending the political process and essentially not allowing the will of the voters to be heard in Congress. Now, Mike Pence does not really have that power. He's more of a ceremonial role in the January 6th vote which is going to be moving forward through Congress, essentially, as a form of vote in which Congress is just acknowledging that the people selected Joe Biden to be the next president.
But President Trump stepped in and overturn results of the election when there's no sense that that (inaudible) ...
BOLDUAN: Toluse, thank you. Alice, thank you very much. David, I appreciate it.
OUTFRONT next, Trump's pardons for allies in the Mueller probe facing new questions and some say that he could now face obstruction charges.
Plus, more than half a million coronavirus deaths in the United States now projected by April, many of them preventable. But are Americans willing to do what it takes to save lives?
[19:20:07]
And the Senate run off race in Georgia is now in the final days with the focus on one influential group of voters.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Latino constituency can turn the vote and make a difference in this election.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:23:58]
BOLDUAN: New tonight, Robert Mueller's top deputies saying Trump could face obstruction of justice charges for pardons. Andrew Weissmann saying Trump's pardons of key figures in the Mueller probe like Paul Manafort and Roger Stone are his 'final act of an obstruction of justice'. Pointing to notes from interviews during the Mueller probe that show team Trump dangled pardons in exchange refusing to cooperate with Mueller's investigation. A lot of food for thought there.
OUTFRONT now, former Assistant Special Watergate prosecutor, Nick Ackerman, and Elie Honig, who was an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York.
Elie, you think these pardons actually do make Trump even more exposed to prosecutors once he leaves the office, why so?
ELIE HONIG, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: I do, Kate. Even over a year ago, shortly after the Mueller report came out, I was one of over 1,000 career non-political former federal prosecutors who signed a letter saying, we believe that the evidence even as laid out in Robert Mueller's report was enough to charge obstruction of justice. The relevant part here is the fact that the President went out in public, went out on Twitter and constantly dangled, offered out there the possibility of a pardon in exchange for people remaining silent.
[19:25:09]
He didn't say it quite that clearly, but I think anyone with common sense was easily able to read between the lines. What's changed since then he's now delivered on that potential promise, over the last couple of days, several people who had started cooperating.
Remember, Paul Manafort was cooperating with the federal government, with Robert Mueller's team and then he stopped. And now that Donald Trump has gone that last step and delivered the pardon, I think it's an even stronger case. Now, the new DOJ has got a very difficult decision to make but this should be high on their priority list to take a look at for sure.
BOLDUAN: And Nick, let me play some of what Weissmann has said about this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ANDREW WEISSMANN, LEAD PROSECUTOR, MUELLER INVESTIGATION: The President used his pardon power during the investigation in order to thwart cooperation. In other words, for people who are thinking they should cooperate with us, because otherwise they might spend a long time in jail, this president was saying, not so fast, because if you hold fast and you don't do what Michael Cohen did, you all get a pardon and he's made good on that promise.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: Do you think this means struggle for the President when he leaves office?
NICK ACKERMAN, FMR. ASSISTANT SPECIAL WATERGATE PROSECUTOR: Yes, it certainly should. I mean, this is, to my mind, a clear case of obstruction of justice, it was previously. And just because the President has the power to pardon and he can pardon whomever he wants, doesn't mean that there aren't limits with respect to our criminal justice system. The key question on obstruction of justice is whether or not Donald
Trump in pardoning Roger Stone and Paul Manafort and Michael Flynn did so with a corrupt intent, that is he improperly, improper purpose and improper use of his power, if that improper use was to keep these people silent to deliver on a promise that he had made previously with respect to pardons as long as these people didn't cooperate, yes, that is obstruction of justice.
It's just like I as a lawyer, I can advise somebody to take the fifth amendment in a criminal case, but if I advise them to do so in order to protect myself, because I don't want them to reveal facts that might incriminate me, that would be an improper purpose that would amount to obstruction of justice. If you just look at the two people in the Russian probe that have not received pardons, Michael Cohen and Rick Gates, those are the people that actually cooperated and neither of them have gotten a pardon.
So I would say that the case is fairly strong here for obstruction of justice. And I agree that the new Attorney General, the new head of the criminal division has got a tough decision to make on this one.
BOLDUAN: Yes. And Elie, you're writing a book right now about the Justice Department under Trump. What do we know about Jeffrey Rosen, the man now that is in and is now the Acting Attorney General since Barr just stepped down?
HONIG: Yes, Kate, so here's the most important thing to know about Jeffrey Rosen, until he became Deputy Attorney General under the Trump administration, the number two job in the whole Justice Department, the man had never worked a day in his life as a prosecutor. And by the way, same goes for Bill Barr, he had been Attorney General back in the '90s but he also has never tried a case on the front line as a prosecutor.
And in my view, that is a serious hindrance because when you go through that process, as I did, as Nick did, when you are on the front lines, doing cases learning, you learn to respect and have a deep respect for the independence of the Justice Department. It gets pounded into your brain from day one and you learn to live it and I think that was one of the reasons Bill Barr failed to protect DOJ's independence.
I hope Jeffrey Rosen does better. I hope he has more independence than we've seen from Bill Barr and I guess we'll get a look at that over the next several key weeks.
BOLDUAN: Yes, standby to standby. Good to see you both, thank you.
OUTFRONT next, new and staggering figures about projected coronavirus deaths in the country. This as millions are traveling for the holidays.
And Latino voters being courted by candidates in the critical senate runoffs in Georgia. Will they decide the balance of power in Washington?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The passion that the Latinos have, I mean, I think it's starting to generate more excitement with going to the polls.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:33:30]
BOLDUAN: Tonight, the influential IHME coronavirus model, cited by the White House, often by the White House, is projecting nearly a quarter million more Americans will die between now and April. The model showing if mask wearing increased to 95 percent, 49,000 of those lives could be saved, which the model says is more than will be saved by the vaccine at that point.
OUTFRONT with me now is Dr. William Schaffner, professor of infectious diseases at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, and Dr. Jonathan Reiner, director of the cardiac cath lab at G.W. Hospital and also adviser to the White House medical team under President George W. Bush.
Dr. Schaffner, this data is so important I think that's coming out. What sticks out to you in this new model? What is it telling you?
DR. WILLIAM SCHAFFNER, PROFESSOR, INFECTIOUS DISEASE DIVISION, VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER: Kate, what it tells me it's so stunning and yet so simple, simple mask wearing can avert an enormous number of deaths. We have known that but when you put a number on it, it becomes much more real and overwhelming. And it just reinforces my determination to go out and ask, plead, educate, persuade people to wear their masks, do the social distancing.
It's a New Year's resolution. Let's start it at Christmas. It's the best holiday gift you can give not only your family but everybody around you, wear the mask.
[19:35:00]
BOLDUAN: And, Dr. Reiner, this data is also more clear evidence of what health officials have all been saying going into the holidays, which is don't get together with other people outside your family, maintain distance and wear a mask, of course.
Dr. Anthony Fauci says he, for one, is staying home this Christmas. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: I really feel strongly that I need to practice what I preach to the country. This is the first holiday season of Christmas and my birthday that I have not spent with my daughters since they were born. (END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: Yet, Dr. Reiner, that is not the example the president is setting yet again.
DR. JONATHAN REINER, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: No, and it's so frustrating, Kate. If you look around the country and look at regional numbers, there are signs of hope. Cases are clearly dropping in the Midwest, they're starting to drop in the Northeast and earliest signs maybe starting to crest in the west, although California is still in deep trouble.
So there are signs of improvement. What we really need at this time is for people to shelter in place. Instead what we have is we have the president golfing in Florida, and we have the vice president, the titular head of the coronavirus task force, skiing in Colorado, skiing in Colorado.
So instead of modeling the behavior that could really start to break the back of this surge, which is you know, folks, these are tough times, we're all staying home, maybe having Congress actually pay people to stay home for a couple weeks over the holidays, break the back of the pandemic? No, they're modeling entirely the wrong behavior, they're pretending like nothing is going on. And we're going to see another surge in two to three weeks after the Christmas holidays, just the same as we saw after the Thanksgiving holiday.
It's so frustrating and so disrespectful for my brothers and sisters around the country who are working these holidays trying to save the lives of record numbers of people hospitalized with the coronavirus. It's just mind-boggling.
BOLDUAN: Now, on the -- on the vaccine Dr. Schaffner, Pfizer's CEO spoke up today about this new COVID strain that we've been discussing that's been seen in the United Kingdom.
Let me play for you what he said.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. ALBERT BOURLA, CEO, PFIZER: I'm cautiously optimistic, but we have seen some data already, but these new strains, it is equally sensitive to convalescent serum of people who have the disease.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: He's cautiously optimistic the Pfizer vaccine can handle this UK strain we've been talking about. What do you think that he's already been able to see, Albert Bourla, to be able to go that far with his language?
SCHAFFNER: Well, these are tidings of great joy, right, and they're very seasonally appropriate. He -- what he was saying is, some of his laboratory scientists have already taken blood specimens from people who have recovered from COVID and that those are the sorts of antibodies that are produced by the vaccine and have tested them against this new viral strain and the antibodies bind up the virus and don't let it do its mischief.
So it looks as though the vaccine is very likely to work. Perhaps not as well as against the regular strain. We'll have to see that. Let's not get ahead of our proverbial skis. Let the laboratorians work on this for another week, week and a half, and we'll have much better information.
But so far, so good. And, remember, beyond anything else, we just talked about the masks. They work against this new strain also. Masks work.
BURNETT: That's right.
Dr. Reiner, the CDC is reporting that just over a million people have gotten the first shot in the last 11 days. Nearly 9.5 million doses have been distributed. All of that is great news.
I heard a lot of different explanations over why there's this gap between distributed vaccines and shots in arms.
Is this something that you think we need to be concerned about?
REINER: I'm not concerned about it but it does show we have a lot to learn about how to give an enormous number of vaccine injections in a short period of time. We never really tried to do that.
You know, we vaccine people for influenza in much lower numbers over an expanded period of time. We're going to have to learn how to do this. We have to learn to do innovative things, drive-thru injections, drive-thru vaccination centers.
The other thing I think we're also starting to learn, even amongst folks who work in the health care setting, is there is a surprising amount of vaccine hesitancy. I would never have called this Operation Warp Speed because that sounds to people like it's been rushed. I would call this operation safe vaccine, which is what it is, a safe vaccine.
But we have to educate the public that it is so. And we're learning there's a lot of vaccine hesitancy, so we need to get on with educating folks.
BOLDUAN: Thank you both very much for being here.
And with millions of Americans out of work in the pandemic, we've also seen so many lining up for hours and hours and miles and miles in need of food. And ahead of Christmas, the need can be even greater.
OUTFRONT with me now for more of this is Paco Velez. He's the president and CEO of Feeding South Florida Food Bank.
Thank you for being here.
What have you been seeing in terms of the need at your food bank locations right now? PACO VELEZ, PRESIDENT & CEO, FEEDING SOUTH FLORIDA: Well, we continue
to see the need as cars and families flow through our distribution sites, we have more than 40 distribution sites across South Florida, the four county service area, and it's mimicked across the country in the Feeding America network. Along with that we have over 300 nonprofit organizations that we partner with that are continuing to distribute to our families.
We've seen that need grow from 706,000 to almost 1.5 million just here in south Florida and over 50 million individuals who are struggling through this pandemic to put food on the table across our country.
BOLDUAN: Paco, those numbers are kind of hard to wrap my mind around. Have you seen anything like this before? I mean, how does this compare to the need you've seen in the past?
VELEZ: I've been in food banking over 20 years, gone through the economic downturn, gone through many hurricanes here in South Florida and Florida. The government shutdown and now this pandemic, and never have I seen this much need, this many families desperate and struggling to put food on the table, wondering where they're going to get their next meal. It's really pretty dire for our families.
BOLDUAN: One our cameras visited one of your locations earlier this week, they saw people lining up even before dawn. Let me play for you what one woman told us.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: For people who have been here since 4:30 in the morning have got to be desperate to come sit for almost five hours to get a box of food for their family.
I would say for the first to be to get the last of something and the person behind me being in worse position than I am.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BOLDUAN: What other stories are people telling you about the need and why they need the help?
VELEZ: Well, first of all, this is obviously very heart-wrenching to hear and to see when we have these distributions. It's one of the reasons so many volunteers come out and help, and we're so grateful for them. Our families are coming up to us and they're extremely grateful in that moment of time for that food.
But we know when they go back home, they're going to have to make these decisions. How often do they eat versus how off and do their children eat? And always their children are going to eat every day versus the parents eating every so often.
We see -- we hear stories about the families not having enough food in their cupboards, refrigerators and on their tables. It's just very heartbreaking to see so many families, especially with broken spirits during the holidays, just hoping to get food and hoping to get some more hope, and hopefully our leadership in Washington can deliver that soon.
BOLDUAN: Look, I am not wanting to draw you into politics, but when you see that relief money is being held up by politics in Washington right now, that could be going to help these people who are coming to your food bank, what do you think about that?
VELEZ: It's infuriating. Most of these families, through no fault of their own, are in these lines. They haven't had any kind of resources since March, most of them. They don't have the funds to keep roofs over their head or food on the table and having to make a decision to stay home with their kids and going to work because childcare is so expensive.
It's truly frustrating that our leadership -- our leadership struggles to be a leader, especially at a time like this, when so many families are hurting and are desperate and really are at the end of their rope.
So being south Florida, the food network is here to provide that food and ensure our families know we're here for them and they can always count on us and hopefully our leadership does come through pretty soon because not having gone this far without these resources is just way too long.
BOLDUAN: Thank goodness you are at least there. Thank you very much, Paco.
VELEZ: Yes, ma'am.
BOLDUAN: OUTFRONT next, spending in the runoff races in Georgia is through the roof. Millions have already cast ballots.
[19:45:00]
But do Latino voters hold the key to the victory?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BOLDUAN: Tonight, more than 2 million Georgia voters have already cast their ballots in the Senate runoff elections that will decide the balance of power in Washington, and both parties are targeting one crucial voting group they believe will deliver them a victory.
Ryan Nobles is OUTFRONT.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RYAN NOBLES, CNN WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The hotly contested Georgia Senate runoffs --
(SPEAKING SPANISH)
NOBLES: -- providing another test of the political clout of the rapidly growing Latino vote in the state.
Overall, there are more than 1 million Latinos in Georgia, nearly 10 percent of the state's population, according to the Pew Research Center. But there are more than 400,000 eligible Latino voters in Georgia, just 5 percent of the exit.
Just last month, the exit poll showed up Latino voters made up 72 percent of the voters with 62 percent supporting Joe Biden and 37 percent backing Donald Trump.
Part of why Democrats are actively working to make sure Latinos participate in the runoffs.
JAN YANES, OSSOFF CAMPAIGN VOLUNTEER: I think it's going to make a big difference, as we saw in South Florida, that the Latino consistency can turn the vote and make a difference in this election.
[19:50:09]
We just need to get them out to the polls.
NOBLES: Mobilizing the Latino population, a diverse constituency with divergent concerns, involves crafting an array of messages.
VULLIN BUITRAGO, GEORGIA VOTER: I'm from a Venezuela community, which kind of voted more for Mr. Trump in the past. But I want to let people know that not all Venezuelans are the same.
NOBLES: Republicans are targeting some Latino voters by warning that a Democratic Senate would result in radical policies that would push the country towards socialism.
SEN. DAVID PERDUE (R-GA): You don't have to look at history. Just look at Venezuela today, Cuba, North Korea, Iran, how many people do you know trying to break into Venezuela right now? That's what they're trying to perpetrator on our dear beloved America.
NOBLES: Democrats are focusing their message to Latino voters by calling for comprehensive immigration reform, and emphasizing equal access to health care and treatment for the coronavirus.
REV. RAPHAEL WARNOCK (D), SENATE CANDIDATE FROM GEORGIA: For me, the Latino community is important. Brown community is important. The black community is important. White sisters and brothers, we need a multiracial coalition to push this country closer toward its values.
NOBLES: And after Georgia's razor-thin margin in the November presidential race, Latino voters say they are aware of the impact they could have in the January runoffs, and how those results could shape the direction of the state and the country.
YANES: It's been a long time coming. You know, the passion that the Latinos have, I think it's starting to generate more excitement with going to the polls and having them be on the map. I think it's really important.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
NOBLES (on camera): And these Republican attacks linking Democratic policies to socialism, and then by extension, Latin American dictators, there is some evidence that it is working. Take South Florida, for instance that is a state that Hillary Clinton outperformed Joe Biden when you compare 2016 to 2020. That's part of what has Democrats nervous about Latino turnout here in Georgia and why they are making a special effort to reach out to Latino voters in this state ahead of this important runoff -- Kate.
BOLDUAN: Ryan Nobles, thank you very much.
I want to bring in right now, Harry Enten, senior writer and analyst for CNN politics.
It's good to see you, Harry.
So, where does this race stand right now? Would you say that it's tight?
HARRY ENTEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL WRITER AND ANALYST: I would say it's as tight as it possibly could be. Remember, in November no one got above 50 percent, and no one is above 50 percent in the polls right now.
Look at this. You got a one point race in the regular. You got a tie in the special. Those races are within the margin of error.
The one thing that's good is if there were one state where the polls were good and they weren't good overall was actually in Georgia where very tight races in the Senate and down the presidential level.
BOLDUAN: That's interesting. The last time we had a Senate runoff in Georgia was in '08. And turnout dropped by a lot, like nearly half. That's clearly not happening this time, is it?
ENTEN: No, it's not happening at all. You know, as was pointed out in the last piece, turnout, over two million already. If we compare that to where we were at this point 12 days out before the November election, the turnout is basically equal at 2.1 million, 2.1 million.
Now, that may change over the Christmas holiday where that there won't be early voting say tomorrow. But the overall fact is that the turnout right now is tracking with what we saw in November in terms of the overall numbers. And Democrats were concern turnout was dropping. But at this point in the runoffs, we're not seeing it.
BOLDUAN: That is interesting. We heard from Ryan on how both campaigns are targeting Latino voters, but talk to me about black voter turnout. What are you seeing now? And how does it compare to the past?
ENTEN: Yeah, if you go back that '08 runoff the turnout dropped from the November election to the December runoff. What we're seeing now is the black share of the electorate for the Senate runoff, again, through the 12 days before the election is at 32 percent. In the November election, it was only at 29 percent at this point.
So what we actually see is that the black vote is making up a larger portion of the electorate. Again, we'll have to see what occurs with more days of early voting, what actually occurs on January 5th. But at this point, Democrats are hoping black voters would turn out for the special election, and so far, Kate, they are.
BOLDUAN: Fascinating. Great to see you, Harry, so much for coming in.
ENTEN: Thank you.
BOLDUAN: OUTFRONT for us next, President Trump spending the day on the golf course as millions of Americans are worried about food, rent, and jobs. Oh, and now a COVID relief bill in limbo.
And 12 states are seeing record coronavirus hospitalizations. We're going to talk to two doctors treating patients on the front lines about what worries them the most right now.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
MADDOW: Good evening, everyone, I'm Kate Bolduan, in for Erin Burnett. Welcome to a special edition of OUTFRONT tonight.
President Trump is focusing on sand traps on the golf course in Florida while President-elect Joe Biden is sounding the alarm on what he fears are the land mines that Trump is leaving behind for him in Washington.
The president spent his day playing golf on his Christmas vacation, his tenth time playing golf since Election Day, something the White House seems sensitive to at this point as they put out a schedule claiming that today, quote, President Trump will continue to work tirelessly for the American people. His schedule includes many meetings and calls.
The only thing he appears to be working tirelessly on is his futile quest to overturn the election, though. He apparently had another meeting on that today too, tweeting this: At a meeting in Florida today. Everyone was asking, why aren't the Republicans up in arms and fighting over the fact that the Democrats stole the rigged presidential election?
They're not up in arms because they understand something that the president still does not accept, that the election was not stolen. He lost fair and square, but he, of course, is refusing still to accept it, even complaining recently that his loyal vice president, Mike Pence, isn't doing enough to help him overturn the election. Perhaps that is because there is nothing that Mike Pence can actually do.
