was, how united washington was after the terrorist attacks of 9/11. you got tape of hundreds of members of congress, democrat and republican together, sing god bless america on the capitol stems. the three-minute long bipartisan standing ovation president bush got a week after the attacks, that president bush could only become president because of the contested hard fought election not all that long before, how much have we changed on those lines? if god forbid another major attack on the united states, would we see these things? io, i don t think we would. this is the problem because 20 years ago, you know, if you and i were talking, we would have said maybe there is some division in this country by if there were a hostile atook on our territory that killed thousands of people, americans would have rinz up.
in president biden s covid speech yesterday, one of a lesser announcements in that speech is he is going to double the number of federal surge teams, fema teams and active duty medical teams, active duty military personnel going out to relieve hospital staff in under vaccinated states, where the hospitals have been overwhelmed by covid patients. earlier this week, we saw a 20-person active duty u.s. navy medical team arrive in ozark, alabama in dale county there. we saw an active duty u.s. army medical team arrive in idaho to this overrun hospital which has already had to convert conference rooms and classrooms into overflow covid wards. this week, of course, idaho had to take the first step of ac
but as the president indicated today, we also know republican governors and elected officials will sue and try to stop these new policies as if they re totally novel and this is some brand-new idea. the united states supreme court has ruled nult u multiple times, going back more than a century, it is not unconstitutional to require americans to get a vaccine. even if a person doesn t want to. in the context of a serious public health threat, you can be required to be vaccinated. they ruled that in the context of a mandatory smallpox in massachusetts. they ve you would that in 1922 in the context of vaccines being required of students if they want to attend school. the biden s administration s new rule that employees have to be vaccinated and all kansas that have 100 employees, that rule will be enforced through osha. it s a part of the labor department a part of a law richard nixon signed in 1970 so we have an agency that regulates
workplace conditions. the times says the biden administration appears to be on strong ground, it s granted to the oums i occupational osha by the legislative branch and supported by decades of judicial rulings. and you know what, you ut those things together. right? evidence, current evidence, that it works for the current pandemic. lots of historical precedent. not only for work, but for it being successfully and legally implemented in our country. clear uncontested supreme court precedent going back more than a century mack it clear that this is absolutely constitutional policy and on top of that, decades of judicial rulings on these core questions. you line those things up. that would have been the kind of thing that would make the person confident in how these mustering, chest pounding, promise lawsuits against the president s policy would be
accurate noses on his tie up close. boop. those are our new covid tests. it s friday, forgive me. i needed this. all right. tonight we are going to be talking about the commemoration plans, including the president s plans to mark what tomorrow will be 20 years since the terrorist attacks of september 11th 2001. we got much more on that ahead tonight in terms of what to expect tomorrow on the day of. today before president biden head out for those commemorations starting early tore, today he visited a middle school in washington to talk about schools setting up vaccination sites on campus and other things the administration is trying to do, trying to put motion now to maximize the percentage of the u.s. population that has the vaccine. you know, we re giving prizes to encourage children and families to get the shots.