Transcripts For MSNBCW All In With Chris Hayes 20201028

And well go to the front lines of the pandemic nightmare in el paso, texas, where theres a covid curfew and the Funeral Homes are overrun. When all in starts right now. Good evening from new york. Im chris hayes. Well, we are now one week from the end of this election, or at least the end of votes being cast in this election. I think its fair to say there is an intense almost unbearable level of anxiety right now among the millions and millions of a people that make up the prodemocracy antitrump io majority of this country. Its a majority thats been ridiculed and belittled by the president and the conservative j party and conservative media for somehow being out of touch, d despite being the majority. There are reasons to be nervous. Number one, i dont have to remind you of this. Everyone remembers four years ago. And even though the National Polls were pretty close to accurate down the stretch, there were major polling issues in individual states, particularlyw michigan, wisconsin, pennsylvania, that meant that donald trump eked out that narrow victory in the electoralu college. Ic number two, if this election was decided the way that almost every other election in america is decided, by who gets the most votes, people would be less stressed out. D after all, joe biden is leading nationally by almost eight points in the nbc polling average and more than 66 million votes are already in. But of course it is not decided that way. Instead we use the Electoral College system, which has allowed republicans to win two of the past five president ial elections despite losing the popular vote. He and number three, the president is explicitly day in day out articulating a plan to undermine our system of free and fair elections, to undermine and subvert the legitimacy of legal ballots that are cast and to work with his allies that he has appointed to the courts, people he believes to be his allies. That will yet to be proven. In order to claim victory no matter what. Right now there are some troubling signs from w trumpappointed justices and judges like Justice Brett kavanaugh on the Supreme Court that theyd be all too happy to play along with the president s plan to stay in power. W were going to talk about that later. So if youre feeling anxious, you dont need me to tell you this, but ill tell you this, t its not crazy, okay . I know youre nervous. Im nervous. We are too. This is stressful. What can you say . But heres the other thing. If it was not this race, all right, and if it was not this race and this guy and we hadnt had the trauma of 2016. If this was just, you know, an electoral contest in another wa country or a small municipal race in a town you didnt know much about and i came here to tell you the numbers and talk you through it, youd have very little question as to who was winning, okay . By a lot. Think about this. Today, the democratic candidate for president , joe biden, was in the state of georgia, georgia, d seven days before the election. Now, joe biden can easily win the election and the Electoral College without winning the state of georgia. There are four or five more favorable states that could put him over the top. E in fact, a democrat hasnt won georgia since all the way back in 1992 when clinton carried it. Trump won it by five points last time. If trump were winning this race right now georgia wouldnt be contested. Thats just the truth. But it is. A poll out from the atlantajournal constitution showed it to be extremely tie. Listen to biden at his drivein rally today. There arent a lot of pundits who would have guessed four a years ago that a democratic candidate for president in 2020 would be campaigning in georgia on the final week of the election. Or that wed have such Competitive Senate races in georgia. We but we do. Because somethings happening here in georgia and across america. Georgias not the only state that could upend expectations. Later this week Kamala Harris is heading to texas. Texas, where polls show the democratic ticket within striking distance and where Michael Bloomberg is now dumping millions of dollars to try to put democrats over the top. In fact, today nbc news moved texas from leaning republican to tossup in the president ial race based on all the polling. Om if you pin me down as someone who has covered texas politics over the years, who pays attention to this for a living. A i would say donald trump is favored in that state. The fact its genuinely up in the air and remarkable. I you cannot underestimate and understate what a cataclysm a democratic win in texas would be for the entire Republican Party and conservative movement around the country. And that cataclysm for that movement and that party is a real possibility right now. This is the nbc news battleground map out today. It shows that right now bidens expected to win 212 electoral votes versus just 125 for trump. For biden to get to 270, he only needs to win a few tossup states in gray. Hes leading in a number of them. Lets talk about one in moore particular, florida, perennial florida where a nonpartisan poll out today showed biden with a wh twopoint lead. Y its always close. If trump loses florida, hes almost certainly done. Its one of the states we might know on Election Night because of how they process and count their votes. Former president obama was stumping for biden at a drivein rally in orlando today where he implored the democrats to do everything they could to deliver the state. O t we cant just dream for a better future. We got to fight for a better future. Weve got to outhustle the other side. Weve got to vote like never before. And leave no doubt. So, look, if youre stressed out, that makes sense. Lives hang in the balance. Thats the fact of it. I and it really feels like he american democracy hangs in the balance in some ways. There is only so much each of us as individuals can do about the collective fate of our nation. I think thats the stress, the gap in the stakes between the outcome and what we can do. But the situation does look hopeful all things considered. I know youre probably scared to let yourself hope, but what you can do is you can plan your vote, make sure it gets counted. Were going to talk about how to do that in a moment. Headsup, Postal Service is running slow so mailing your ballot might not be a good option anymore. Were going to talk about that. You can talk to your friends or loved ones. You can volunteer with campaigns or organizations that you believe in. You can donate to campaigns and causes and organizations that you believe in. The good news, the thing you can take inspiration, there are tens of millions of people right now that are doing that, that are doing everything they can to make things right. G someone who probably has a better sense of the lastminute Campaign Push right now than anyone is john podesta, chairmap of Hillary Clintons 2016 s president ial campaign, and he joins me now. John, ive been thinking about you a lot because i think a lot about 2016, we all do. T down the stretch of this election. What is your read, having lived through that campaign, the big polling miss, particularly in the midwestern states as you mi watch this unfold in the last week. Wheres your head at . Is im stressed out, chris, like the rest of democrats across the country, but i think you you gave the right advice. Just make sure you have a plan to vote. Make sure you vote early. Make sure your vote is in and counted. If you havent mailed your ballot in, drop it off or go to, you know, in states that n, where youre able to do it, go vote early, and just make sure your vote gets counted. But, you know, i think in reality, biden is in very strong position. You see that i think by the way the two candidates are campaigning. Biden confident in georgia, spreading the map. I think hes really campaigning partly, you know, to win he georgia, partly to try to help those two Democratic Candidates who are running. Yep. Partly nationally. Warm springs, which evokes a president who could really bring the country together as opposed to donald trump, who has both done a terrible job and split the country, you know, in half. Has as you look at where we are right now, is this where you thought we is this worse, better or about where you thought we would be under the presidency of donald trump . R oh, its worse. You know, i think that, you know, we made a concerted effort to say that he only thought about himself, he was unequipped yep. Ill suited to be president. Didnt have the personality for it. But i dont think anybody could have imagined a worse response to covid. Hes now effectively just thrown in the towel based on what hes been saying, what his chief of staff said on sunday. You know, it cant be controlled. Were just going to forget about it. Hes running around the country doing superspreader events. Ni and i think that no one could have anticipated how incompetent he was on top of what, you know, the his famous personality flaws, his bullying, his racism, et cetera. You know, theres always a suspicion i think when people read about politics think that, like, when you talk about internal numbers that campaigns have access to some secret set of data that shows whats really going on. Sometimes they have access to more sophisticated data, but largely the datas the data. You know, do you think that things have been corrected . Is your sense that obviously there was there was a blind spot, particularly among white noncollege voters in the greater industrial midwest, including pennsylvania, last time around. Like, is it your sense that the pollsters and the campaigns and everyone have have corrected for that . Yeah, i think theyve they have all obviously done a lot of selfreflection. I think they they missed those states. I think the other thing we sometimes forget is that we were fighting with jim comey that last week. Right. The race did tighten. We knew that it had tightened. We thought we were had kind of pulled out of that. Remember, he famously sends the letter to the hill and then a week later sort of says never mind. Yep. Er and so we thought we had kind of weathered it, but we knew it definitely had tightened in the last week and it was just enough to pull us under in those three states. But i think the polling now is better. Theres more understanding of the need to adjust for collegeeducated versus noncollegeeducated white voters in those states. But nevertheless, biden maintains a substantial lead in most of those states and a solid lead in wisconsin and pennsylvania. You noted floridas close, but he is bidens ahead. D and i think, again, we might know that on Election Night. Now, i might add one thing, chris, to what what the president said. Donald trump is closing this campaign saying really three things. One, im throwing in the towel on covid. Two, i put someone on the Supreme Court who is going to destroy the aca, take away Health Insurance from 15 Million People and jeopardize Health Insurance for the 100 Million People with preexisting conditions. And three, my main goal is to protect the subsidies to the oil industry, even as im not lifting a finger for people who are unemployed. That doesnt seem like a very strong Closing Argument to me. No, it doesnt. I mean, in some ways, i guess my final question for you is this. I tweeted this earlier today. I have to say that, you know, ive im covering politics o for 20 years more or less. The craziest thing in the 20 years ive covered politics thae i have seen is the fact that Donald Trumps approval number, which is bad, around 42 , is essentially what it was in october of 2019. B 225,000 deaths later. 8 million infected. Tens of millions out of work. A once in a century calamity. We spent three months in our houses. We all wear masks everywhere we go now. My kids arent in school. Same Approval Rating. Ar its nuts. Well, you know, as president obama said last week, its not normal. Hes not normal. Maybe the electorate isnt normal any longer. You know, this didnt happen to george w. Bush. You his Approval Rating crashed a yep. You know, particularly during the end of his term as a result of the iraq war. But trump as if nothing else has a solid base, but i think thats it. As yeah. He doesnt anything to try to improve upon that and his performance holds him back. So that 42 is just an anchor on what he can expect on election day. Early voting, i think, is showing that. Young peoples strong voting in the early vote is proving that. P yep. So, you know, i remain i remain nervous, but but hopeful. John podesta, who is stressed out like the rest of us, but made some time to talk to us tonight. E i appreciate it, john. Be good. Thanks, chris. With just a week to go until polls begin closing, im joined by two people with deep understanding of president ial politics. T stephanie, president of emilys list, the organization focused on recruiting and organize the vote for women candidates. Dave, let me start with you. Something that you and i have been sort of going back and forth on on twitter about and other contexts about the some of the polling were seeing in competitive house districts. I thought this was interesting. You you flagged this tweet of yours about a sienna poll in new yorks first Congressional District back in 2016 that was showing, you know, trump winning a district somewhat surprisingly as a kind of sign of a warning symbol, a red flag about clintons strength or weakness with a certain pool of voters. S what are you seeing in the er district level polling now . Y yeah, chris, so i went back this week and looked at what i was saying in the final week of 2016 and what others were ng saying, and there were a few of us in the data world who were following Congressional District level polling closely who were shouting from the rooftops that we were seeing flashing red warning signs for hillary clinton, real underperformances in districts with large workingclass white populations Like Northern wisconsin, the g Southern Tier of new york which borders pennsylvania. Suffolk county, long island. All over the place. So this time around, what are we seeing . Were seeing flashing red warning signs for president trump. Ei and were seeing them especially in suburban districts in swing states like grand rapids, michigan. Michigans third district. Were seeing in bucks county, pennsylvania, and in the northern suburbs of pittsburgh. A these are places where were seeing tenpoint underperformances from trumps margin in 2016. And thats just it defies logic that trump would be making that up in other parts of the state. And that is why i am so confident that that joe biden is on track to win this election. T stephanie, youve worked in a number of of campaigns and obviously emilys list is working with candidates all the time. Whats your read on what has changed, whats different this time around, where the big w shifts are that is producing the environment were in now . Well, we really saw it almost immediately, and i have to go back to actually, ingot to go back to the womens march. Yeah. And what we saw in virginia in 2017. That then resulted in a huge blue wave in 2018. Led by women candidates taking over the democratic majority in the u. S. House. Om but what that was really led by were women voters in particular in those suburban districts that were just fed up. And we are continuing to see that. And and dave is right. Were looking at these suburban districts, too. We have a lot of women in these and these candidates, great candidates in these house districts across the country. Talking about texas, michigan, pennsylvania. These are really strong candidates. These are in suburban districts that we didnt pick up in 18 where were leading in 2020. Where i do see these huge swings and its happening its happening in the senate races, s too, in places i didnt think necessarily wed be playing, and were playing in kansas. Were playing in texas. Were playing in iowa in the u. S. Senate. Yeah, the thing thats crazy to me. You just mentioned a bunch of states where there is both Competitive Senate races and also looks pretty competitive at the president ial level, dave. You know, one thing thats happening here is because of some of the shifts that are happen among certain demographic groups and how those are replicated in certain places, right . Particularly large metro areas with fairly significant numbersr of white folks with College Degrees who used to be a very bedrock republican constituency, particularly in the dallas metro area, for an example, right . Thats a real solid romney core that has now moved. You know, there is a sort of strange convergence happening where, like, georgia, florida, North Carolina and texas are all looking, like, not that different from each other in the polling right now, which is t pretty nuts because those were quite different and have been quite different prior. S yeah. The Florida Georgia Line so to speak it getting pretty thin for those Country Music fans out there. G were seeing those states basically converging in a similar tossup range. The one thing that florida, georgia, North Carolina and texas have in common. They were all won by president trump. Georgia by 5. 1 and texas by 9. 0 in 2016. Theyve all moved pretty proportionately to those margins in democrats favor. That means theyre all kind of in the same narrow trading range at the moment and thats excellent news for joe biden. What were seeing simultaneously is modest but consistent leads for biden in the states that the he absolutely needs in order to get to 270. Which include my book arizona, michigan, pennsylvania and wisconsin, he needs three of those four. And michigan, stephanie, quickly, is a state where the ic kind of thing that youre talking about we saw on display in 2018, the election of gretchen whitmer, the election of a few different Democratic Women in those sort of swing seats. And now its sort of like its from a perspective of having some power that state is happening, and were seeing some of the same trends which is which is interesting to me. Thats exactly right. And when you elect somebody like Governor Whitmer to run the state of michigan, you get this whole new energy because you realize that youve got the power to make the change in your vote. And i think thats the other thing that youre seeing in these states, chris, is youre seeing voters recognize their power. That when they come together and they vote, they win, and they needed to be reminded of that after 2016. Yeah. And thats what 18 did and thats why i think youre seeing huge early vote turnout across the country and youre going to see high turnout all the way through voting on tuesday. Also, it turns out in georgia in texas if states are swing states lots of people vote turn out. Which is nice, right . Lets all have our votes count. Get rid of the Electoral College. L thank you, thank you both. Next up, the trump strategy to sow chaos once all the ballots have been cast. U and now it seems as though the Supreme Court handed him a it pretty big victory in a crucial state. Ill explain after this. You can your comfort on both sides, your sleep number setting. Can it help me fall asleep faster . Yes, by gently warming your feet. But can it help keep me asleep . Absolutely, it intelligently senses your movements and automatically adjusts to keep you both effortlessly comfortable. Will it help me keep up with mom . You got this. So, you can really promise better sleep . Not promise. Prove. And now, during our veterans day sale, save 1,000 on the sleep number 360 special Edition Smart bed, now 1,799. Only for a limited time. To learn more, go to sleepnumber. Com it would be very, very proper and very nice if a winner were declared on november 3rd. Instead of counting ballots for two weeks. Which is totally inappropriate. And i dont believe that thats by our laws. I dont believe that. Mr. President so well see what happens. Hes, of course, wrong there. Its completely by our laws, but the president s approach to this election is very clear. Polarize mailin voting, right, by questioning its integrity, get your people to turn out on election day. Depress turnout generally. Claim victory on Election Night before millions of votes are counted, the mailed in ones, because you know theyre mostly from the democrats. Then use the courts to try to get the ballots tossed out under completely baseless accusations of fraud. Its a crazy crazy scheme, its vicious, but republican legislators in swing states like pennsylvania and wisconsin are actively helping with the plan. I mean, their position, listen to this, is that they cant count ballots that arrive after election day because they have to know the winner by Election Night. At the same time, the same republican lawmakers in pennsylvania and wisconsin have stood in the way of efforts to allow their states to presort the mailin votes so that they could produce a quicker count on Election Night. Right . They want this sort of liminal space of ballots counted. Thats key. For him and trump tv and gop lawyers to exploit. Now you have a Supreme Court justice taking up this same pastime. Just before the Senate Confirmed Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court last night, it handed down a 53 decision to throw out mailin ballots in wisconsin that are postmarked by election day but arrive after the day, right . Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote an opinion that sticks out for how much it parrots trumps talking points on mailin ballots. Quote, states want to avoid the chaos and suspicion of impropriety that can ensue if thousands of absentee ballots flow in after election day and potentially flip the results of an election day. Result . What . That argument for fear for fear of impropriety and suspicions is so twitter hid the tweet behind a warning saying it might be misleading on how to participate in an election. Kavanaugh is one of three Supreme Court justices along with Amy Coney Barrett and chief Justice John Roberts who were part of bushs legal team during bush v. Gore. It appears the model of that dubious victory is now on the minds of many on the right. Ron klain bears the scars by the last president ial race decided by the Supreme Court. He was the general counsel, can you imagine that, on al gores Recount Committee and he joins me now. Ron, you have an interesting set of experiences being the recount dude in florida, the ebola czar. Youre now part of the biden campaign. Whats your reaction having been in the trenches of the last brutal fight to read those words by justice kavanaugh, this idea that, like, we have to know Election Night to watch what the president s doing. Whats your reaction having lived through this . Well, before Justice Brett kavanaugh took the position he took in that opinion yesterday, lawyer Brett Kavanaugh stood in florida and argued that votes could be added to the tally as late as thanksgiving. In fact, if lawyer Brett Kavanaugh had not gotten votes added to the tally thanksgiving weekend, al gore would have been president of the united states. Al gore was set to go ahead on the recount that weekend. And Brett Kavanaugh and the Bush Legal Team went into courts, went into canvassing boards and asked them to count votes that, by the way, had no postmarks on them, no indication when they had been voted at all and simply were sitting around and he jammed into the tally. So theres no way to look at this as anything other than rank hypocrisy and a reversal of convenience by justice kavanaugh. In my interest to bend over backwards to be fair, the role of an advocate and a justice is different. He had a client in that case. The bush lawyers pursuing zealously their cause. He is now a justice. But there is something troubling about just, you know, the logic he uses is not that differently necessarily on legal grounds than some of the other folks in that 53 decision, but that he goes out of his way to make these claims. Justice kagan i thought had a good rebuttal. Justice kavanaugh alleges suspicions of impropriety will result if ballots flow in after election day and potentially flip the results of the election. There are no results to flip until all valid votes are counted. That, to me, is the key principle for all involved here. Chris, i think youre right. Look, i mean, i thought justice kagans opinion had it right, of course, but to your point before. Election lawyers know there is a trick to this game. You want your client to be ahead and then you want the vote counting to stop. You know, that was the strategy that george bush pursued in florida. While also simultaneously adding additional votes to the tally. It was an effort just simply to win at all costs. They won, we lost. The countrys suffered for 20 years as a result. And, look, theres only one answer. If youre out there listening tonight and heard john podesta at the start of the show express his anxieties. We all have one tool that can prevent Brett Kavanaugh from impacting this election, and thats for people to go out and vote. And if we vote and we win by enough votes, then the courts dont get involved. You know, wisconsin lived through this in april. At the start of the pandemic with an election for a Supreme Court justice, a state Supreme Court justice, where wisconsonians in the middle of a pandemic voted in record numbers and produced a surprise tenpoint win for the wisconsin Supreme Court. So this is in the hands of the voters of wisconsin. Theyre the ones who can decide if the Supreme Court decides or not. And i think, yeah, i think thats an important point, but i just want to push back a little bit or say this. From a motivating perspective and from a descriptive political analysis, i agree. A Joe Biden National victory of eight or nine or ten points settles the question, right . But but in a narrow, normative sense, if joe biden wins pennsylvania by 100 votes when all the votes are counted and that gives him 270, hes the next president. Theres no special rule that democrats have to win by more. Like, you win if you win, you win, and if bush v. Gore, 537 votes in florida proved one thing, its like there shouldnt be any understanding that democrats have to somehow pad the lead to actually legitimately take office. No, chris, absolutely not. Of course youre right and of course Vice President biden has a team of some of the best lawyers in the country ready to go to court, if needed, to establish that a win if he achieves it is a legitimate win and to make sure the courts dont set it aside. Were prepared to fight this campaign in the courts if it comes to that. My only point is that it shouldnt come to that. Right. And it shouldnt come to that not because democrats have some special burden to win by more votes but because donald trump is a horrible president and democrats and everyone else, independents and democrats should show up the polls and make a clear statement that the era of trump is over and its time to get this country back on track. Thats a political conclusion, not a legal conclusion. Im telling you i think im absolutely right about what should happen next tuesday, based on the trump record and the alternative joe bidens offering people. Yeah, that well, that segues nicely to our next segment. Ron klain who is a very, very busy man and will get more busy as time goes on, thanks for making time for us tonight. Thanks for having me, chris. With only seven days until the end of voting, it is officially crunch time. If you or someone you know hasnt voted yet, you do not want to miss our next segment. What you need to know right after this. Im meredith vieira. Whats complicated and confusing that many people over 65 deal with each year . Medicare. That was too easy. The time for making changes to your medicare plan is now. Some things are different. Youll find new options this year. And i think its always wise to see what else is out there. Heres a great resource for you. Myhealthpolicy. Com. This is Medicare Advantage made easy, your way. For some of us, it means the internet. If thats your goto, your first step might be exploring on your own. announcer go online, compare options like plans with Prescription Drug coverage or zero premium. If youre like me, you like to ask questions and get firsthand answers. With myhealthpolicy, you have choices. announcer you can talk to a licensed Insurance Agent on the phone. Or maybe you prefer a facetoface personal connection. Myhealthpolicy offers that too. announcer you can meet with a local licensed Insurance Agent in your community. Whatever way works for you. Compare, sign up, switch plans. With myhealthpolicy, its easy. See for yourself. bright music heart monitors that let your doctor watch over you, just like you watch over your best friend. Another lifechanging technology from abbott, so you dont wait for life. You live it. We are one week from the end of voting, and if you have not cast your ballot yet, it is crunch time. As i mentioned before, you can go to nbc. Com planyourvote for all the information about how to vote in every single state. And the other thing that weve been talking about in the runup to election day is the added complexity caused by the mail slowdown. Youll remember under the trumpappointed postmaster general, republican fundraiser louis dejoy. And guess what . The mail is still slower than it should be. Before dejoy instituted changes this summer, the Postal Service routinely delivered over 90 of the nations firstclass mail on time. In the week of october 16th, 85. 6 of all firstclass mail was delivered on time and it was significantly worse in some key battleground states, particularly regions within them. In the philly metro area, just 97. 9 was on time. In the detroit postal district, which includes parts of and a messaging shift democratic leaders. Heres the governor of pennsylvania, who was on our air earlier today with his advice to voters. Were actually suggesting encouraging people to to walk their ballots in right now. I dont think people should be waiting until the very last minute to send in their mailin ballot. They should be doing it right now. So this is the final sevenday window. If youre one of those people who havent voted yet and want to talk about how you can still vote. Here to help us with that is the is the Communications Director of the Democratic National committee. I should note the advice is the same no matter what party youre voting for or which candidate. We just want to make sure your vote gets delivered. So i guess the first point to make here is there is obviously always election day. Like, if youre registered to vote, you can go to your local polling place and vote like normal. What is your advice peoples worries about safety and social distancing and the like . Well, my advice is that its easy. We want people and they have options. If you take out your phone right now, if you are one of the people like chris said who has not voted yet, i want you to take out your mobile device right now and i want you to go to iwillvote. Com, and i want you to make a plan to vote right this minute. And whether that is if you hold your ballot in hand, find a way to drop it at a drop box. If you decide that youre going to vote in person, go ahead and figure out, can i vote in person early this week are am i going to vote on election day . You have options and we want to make sure voters understand that. If you are voting in person, bring a mask, bring a pen, bring some hand sanitizer. It is easy. I actually voted in person in the primary, and what i notice was that there were hardly any people around me. There were people out voting, but at the same time, people were keeping their distance, and it is easy to do. So we want voters to understand that they have options but you only have one week left. This is it. If you dont want four more years of donald trump then you need to go and vote. It is critical. If you want to make sure that youre seeing your grandchildren because of this pandemic, after this pandemic. You want to make sure that were dealing with covid19 and you want steady leadership, we need to go out there and vote for joe biden. It is urgent. Okay. So so inperson voting, i mean, one thing i will note about inperson voting, i went early inperson voting. It was fairly crowded. There was a long line. But everything was outside, right . So the risk and my understanding is you dont want a lot of people inside, particularly unmasked for long periods of time. Most voting sites ive seen have been keeping people outside, limiting the number of people inside, a fairly short amount of time inside. Thats one thing. The second think is the question over mailin votes. So lets say i have an absentee ballot and i havent sent it in yet. What should i do . I want you to go to iwillvote. Com and figure out where you are turning it in because you can either put it in a drop box, you can either potentially take it to your polling location or you can go ahead and vote in person. And so there are various options right now, but you have to make that plan right this minute because there are different laws in various states, and you want to make sure that you are following the rules in every state. Yeah. So thats a key point here. If and, again, rules vary by state, but you it is fine and i dont know every States Election law, but i generally know if you get an absentee ballot, if you dont you can just say, okay, you know what . Im going to go vote in person and go vote in person and its not, like, wrong to do that. Even if they sent you an absentee ballot. You can always go vote in person even if you got an absentee ballot . Thats right. In some states youre able to go ahead and do that and go ahead and vote in person. But, again, in every state it varies. And in every state you want to make sure that you are following the rules, whether that is if you are voting by mail and putting it in a drop box and following the laws in your state, you want to make sure that you are filling it out with ink. Follow the directions on there. Right. Make sure it goes into the envelope and then the other envelope. Make sure you sign it. You want to follow all of the directions very carefully because you want your vote to count. And it the every state has done it, so it is easy for voters to either vote in person or they can vote by mail, whether it be a drop box or by other means. All right. You can go to nbc. Com planyour vote or iwillvote. Com, both of them will guide you through local state election laws to make sure that you can get your vote counted. Thank you so much. Coming up, hospitals in el paso are so overrun with coronavirus cases theyre reportedly setting up a Field Hospital to manage the influx of cases. The troubling stories coming out of one of the countrys hardest hit areas just ahead. brad apartmentsdotcom makes getting into a new home easier than ever. woman 1 how hot do you think it is . woman 2 a million. If only we had a c. Im so happy. brad apartmentsdotcom. The most popular place to find a place. Dont let it dominate. Dont let it take over your lives. Dont let that happen. We have the greatest country in the world. Were going back, were going back to work. Were going to be out front. For months now the president and the Vice President , forum tv, conservative media have all been downplaying the threat of coronavirus and telling americans to get back out there. Even though the president got covid19 and was hospitalized for it, got top quality publiclyfunded health care. And that happened after a white house superspreader event that appears to have sickened more than a dozen people. The president also apparently helped spread coronavirus to supporters in minnesota as well. Authorities traced almost two dozen cases to Trump Campaign events in the state last month. Five pence staffers have tested positive though the Vice President is denying quarantine guidelines. New york times reporting fox employees including the president of the network and anchors brett bear and Martha Mccallum were told to quarantine. Thats as its onair anchors continue to downplay the dangers of the virus day in, day out. This is just a window in one small part of life in america in october 2020 where we have an out of control virus across the country. The white house has now just given up on trying to contain. Were seeing the results of that decision every day with more than 225,000 of our fellow americans dead. The numbers climbing every day. In utah new cases have been hitting record highs in recent days. Patients are pouring into the intensive care units and hospitals in that state. As the president of the Utah Hospital Association told the salt like tribune, quote, were down 20 to 30 . Hundreds and hundreds of nurses are not able to work as they were because of their own disease or in their family, moms and dads. Some are worn out. Some are on leave because theyve been doing this for seven months. Wisconsin, another hot spot, now seeing thousands of new cases daily, hitting a triple record high today of deaths, hospitalizations and daily cases. In el paso, texas, officials have set up Field Hospitals after hospital and icu beds reached full capacity this week. They got to the brim. Were going to talk to with a county official in el paso who is ringing the alarm and asking the governor for more resources. Next. A live bookkeeper is helping customize quickbooks for me. Okay, youre all set up. Thanks that was my business gi, this ones casual. Get set up right with a live bookkeeper with intuit quickbooks. Its moving day. And are doing the heavy lifting, jess is busy moving her xfinity internet and tv services. It only takes about a minute. Wait, a minute . But what have you been doing for the last two hours . Delegating . Oh, good one. Move your Xfinity Services without breaking a sweat. Now thats simple, easy, awesome. Xfinity makes moving easy. Go online to transfer your services in about a minute. Get started today. No matter how many times the president said we are rounding the turn on coronavirus doesnt make it true. In fact, things are getting worse. Theyre getting bad very quickly. Infections are spreading across the u. S. The fastest rate since the start of the pandemic according to nbc news latest numbers. 71,000 new cases per day average is the most of any sevenday stretch. Right now el paso, texas, is the hardest hit spot in all the country as we come into the mounting third wave. The area is dealing with 13,000 active cases this week, active cases marked by the yellow dots. It skyrockets. More than 900 people are currently hospitalized. 206 of them are in icu beds. The Convention Center there is converted into a 50bed Field Hospital, able to expand up to 100 beds. There are some very scary stories coming up that highlight the out of control nature of the virus. Local funeral director jorge ortiz hes been forced to put an overflow of bodies into a chapel of a funeral home. He said hes converted a chapel into a cooler. Were not going to have visitations there anymore. The county judge imposed a 10 00 p. M. Curfew for the next two weeks for anything other than emergencies or travel to and from work as a first step in trying to mitigate the spread. And on thursday, the judge sent a letter to the Governor Greg Abbott reporting the coronavirus outbreak saying i urge you to push the approval for William Beaumont hospital as a resource for treating coronavirus patients. The judge of el paso joins me now. Its good to have you, judge, and im sorry that you are going through what you are there in el paso. We know what it looks like here in new york. Describe to us what the situation is there right now. Well, you know, obviously were in a crisis situation. Weve got full capacity of your hospitals. Youve got, you know, everybody trying to pull together. One of the things, weve got almost 800 personnel medical personnel from texas that weve been given to be able to address the virus. Weve got pence coming in with negative pressure. Weve got the Convention Center, as you mentioned, chris. Weve got almost everything that we need to do. Recently one of the steps that ive taken is to get neighbors. Were right up with our neighbors. Weve got new mexico also there. We also have a very different dynamic. A lot of the individuals passing from juarez to el paso pass through juarez so, we have a lot of things we need to look at. It is a crisis. A lot of people think it surprised us, but really weve been working on this almost three months. We purchased a hospital that were opening up for noncovid patient. Were trying to do the best we can in order to understand the situation. And id like to just to add, chris, that when we were focusing on Public Health and trying to minimize the economy, there was a reason we were able to start opening businesses. As soon as we shifted from focusing on the economy and trying to minimize the impact of the virus, i think thats when our numbers began to increase. So, im doing just the opposite and going back to what we did. I guess my question for you, obviously it sound lieks youre dealing with this supply constraint on the amount of Health Care Provision you can have in your area, right . So, health care workers, hospital bed space trying to expand. But obviously the virus is going to outrun that unless the you know, that curve comes down. You have a curfew right now. What is your understanding of what tools you have at your disposal as a local policy maker to break the back of that curve . Well, were under the governors order. So, what i did what i requested, i actually requested to see we could have a shutdown. It wasnt denied but it wasnt approved. It was one of those things. The best thing i could do, chris, is to take the shutdown and whatever provisions under the shutdown under my authority i would be able to implement. The curfew is obviously one. Were trying to stop mobility. Also young adults going into party and entertainment cells there. We stopped that. So, in essence, the shutdown really takes place after 10 00 p. M. Because were able to not allow individuals to be out. But im so constrained by the fact that we have a 50 capacity on restaurants and venues like we could have weddings and so forth still under the 50 , gyms which we get a lot of comments about the situation there. Were still at 50 . So, within the governors order, ive done Everything Possible to do something that would not go against the order because i know its happened before. Well go against the order and get an injunction and be more in this situation instead of looking at resources and working with the government in those positive areas that have been so important to us during this crisis. So, let me ask this. I know that in arizona, for example, during the summer there was closing bars and mask mandates and things like that. Is behavior changing in el paso . Weve seen interesting interplay in terms of policy and behavior which is that if theres an outbreak even if you dont say close restaurants or gyms people stop going to them because they dont want to get sick. Are you seeing behavior changing in your traffic data and the amount of people masking in terms of people going to bars and things like that that gives you faith that that curve can be brought down . Well, you are know, the way it starts, chris, is we go from 50 to 75 and everybody gets excited and they drop their guard. So, im always very careful when we were moving forward because the first thing that would happen, people stop going to testing. Things seem to get better and then were right back to the same situation, especially after every holiday. So, once we saw that, then obviously it does help. When we went to restaurants, first restaurants no service after 9 00, that didnt work very well. And then i implemented in my order that you would have to be out of the business by 9 00. So, i know thats going to be a huge contributor of the curfew. Obviously, like i said, not allowing young adults to cross back and forth from juarez. I think were changing the behavior. Were trying to do the best we can. Theres a lot of recommendations. For example, if you go by yourself at one per household to go shopping, that obviously limits the mobility. So, anything that prevents us from having either an accident or any situation of somebody ending up in the hospital, were actually contributing to do that. So, mine is two weeks. My order is very strong at two weeks to give us the opportunity to be able to determine whether we take the next step, which would be me asking for a shutdown. And ill be extremely just up front. And im going to do that good evening, rachel. Good evening, chris, my friend, much appreciated. This is one of those records from history that looks different to us now through our pandemic eyes. But have a look. Here it is. This is closing time at the polls in birmingham, alabama, in may of 1966 because we are all