that too. we mostly do weird stuff on the show because my brain works weird. and i'm aware of that. i know the way we approach things can occasionally be a surprise, but even with all the weird things that we have done over the years to cover the news, i have never before done this. nor did i ever anticipate that one of the things i would need to do on the air some day in order to explain the news would be to break down a new trend in recent amazon.com reviews for yankee candles. but that day has arrived. and so here we go. review number one. quote, no scent, very disappointed, one star. review number two, no scent, very disappointed and embarrassed as this was a gift. one star. review number three, fraud, smells like wax when lit, definitely not a yankee. one star. now, those scented candles purchased online could theoretically have been duds that got sent out to amazon customers even though they had no scent. theoretically i guess that could be true. that's not actually what seems to have happened here at all. there is an assistant professor of political science at northeastern university named nick beecham. mr. beecham studies this kind of phenomenon. and when he saw this new trend in these amazon reviews, for smelly candles, he had an inkling of why that might be. >> why it might be that all of a sudden scented candle companies started getting all these complaints about their candles not being smelly enough. professor used a computer program to scrape all of the amazon reviews for yankee candles from january 1st to yesterday, the program flagged reviews that either used the words no smell or no scent. and then he graphed the number of reviews that had language like that on this chart. and you can see, this is a thing that has definite trends. big peaks and big valleys in this chart of people advancing this very specific kind of complaint about their candle purchases. and now independently on its own, this makes no sense. until you overlay the chart about the people complaining their candles don't smell with the country's covid infection rates for the same dates. the purple line shows candle reviews where people complained about not being able to smell the candle, and the red line is covid rates in the united states. put on the same time frame. you think there is a correlation there? one of the symptoms, of course, of covid infection is losing your sense of smell. as more and more americans get infected with covid, more and more of them lose the ability to smell anything and apparently a very predictable number of them start blaming the poor candle company for the fact that they as a customer can't actually smell anything. it is not the candle company's fault you have covid. and this is not the first time this exact correlation has been spotted. a researcher at bryn mawr did a similar data scrape and found much the same results. and it is good to remember that we already use metrics sort of like this in public health all the time. it is not all that different than looking at places where lots of fevers start getting detected by smart thermometers and that gives you an inkling that something is going on there. but tracking people's complaints on the lack of delicious smelliness in their lives for their candle purchases, it is like a disconcerting cheery way to track a pandemic. but the bad candle reviews are going up and the numbers are going up and those things are related. and, you know, just the plain numbers themselves right now are as dramatic as what the candle reviews are telling us. this is newly reported cases in the united states right now. look at the far right side of the chart to see the most recent days. look at how steeply cases are rising right now. that line on the far right side of the screen is basically vertical. in new york state, they not only hit their highest case numbers ever this week, and new york state they broke the record for daily new cases, five times in one week. this is new york state. massachusetts just today reported the highest number of new cases they have seen ever since the start of the pandemic. washington, d.c. has a relatively small population, and when big things happen to small populations, these things can often look kind of warped or outsized when you put them on a chart. but honestly, look at the chart of washington, d.c. and its new covid cases. this is the washington, d.c. chart of new covid cases reported over time. look at the right side of that graph. looks like a glitch, looks like somebody dropped it, right? that is not a typo. that is real. and if you want a little slice of life in washington, in terms of people who work and/or live in washington, d.c. who you heard of, we had a lot of high profile cases this week. democratic senator cory booker, senator elizabeth warren, now senator chris coons, they announced they tested positive for covid. james clyburn is positive, congressman jason crow, congresswoman jan schakowsky. staffers who worked with president biden and vice president harris have been infected. both the president and vice president have been repeatedly tested themselves and they remain negative. we are told. but it is -- it is all over the federal government, among other things. today, seven different people who had recently traveled with the deputy secretary of defense, they all came down with it as well. seven of them. and in all of those instances, i just named, we don't know of anybody having to be hospitalized. even though some of those folks do say they have had covid symptoms. i think all those people i just mentioned said they had been vaccinated and boosted. so these are breakthrough infections for people who are nevertheless well protected from serious illness by the vaccines. and we also do know that while, yes there can be breakthrough infections for people who are fully vaccinated and boosted, but we know that, we also know for sure that people who aren't vaccinated are way, way worse off and more vulnerable right now. and i can show you that very easily. let's do new york city, for a second. as we talked about, new york state is having record-breaking numbers, new york city is having a huge spike in cases. new york city is a highly vaccinated city. but you probably heard about their big upswing in cases recently. look at this. and at first glance i know this looks boring. it has a good payoff in a second, trust me. so this is covid cases in new york city, week by week, and it is the covid cases going back to late september. the number of covid cases being reported per 100,000 people in new york city from late september until now. and you can see this number -- these numbers go up. starting right at thanksgiving, in late november, the new covid numbers started ticking up in new york city. they pop up a little bit, right? but you know what, put the label on that line. that number that we have -- that part of that chart that we were looking at, that line there, that is how the cases haveriesen in risen in new york city of those vaccinated. watch this. bink. this, in the same time period in the same city, this is how cases have risen in new york city among people who are not vaccinated. yeah, they both started to go up at the same time, but, oh, dear. so not only are vaccinated people who are getting infected way, way, way less likely to end up seriously sick or hospitalized because they had the vaccine, but look how fast the new cases are rising in unvaccinated people versus people who have gotten the shot. man. get your vaccine now. please. if you haven't been boosted, get your booster. now is the time. look at this graph. which line would you rather be on? as this omicron variant just runs us down in the road, right now. that said, at the same time, it is a remarkable confluence of things. a remarkable confluence of events that this week, this christmas week, we simultaneously have this epic surge of new cases from the omicron variant. lots of breakthrough cases among people who are vaccinated, but tons and tons and tons of new cases who are unvaccinated. we have this big new surge of cases. and at the exact same time this same week we have this big leap forward. and all this interesting stuff to think about and to potentially change up around all the drugs that are available right now to fight this thing. this has been a huge week in terms of case numbers, through the roof. also a huge week in terms of how we fight covid. start with the vaccines, we know now, omicron has been here long enough, we know there is still effectiveness from our vaccines against the omicron variant. but it is reduced effectiveness, so you need to get your booster, if you're fully vaccinated and booster, you can still get a breakthrough infection, but you're unlikely to get seriously ill enough that you need to be hospitalized. for people who get infected, who are at high risk of getting seriously ill and trying to stay out of the hospital, our country over the past few months had pretty good success with these monoclonal antibody treatments, drugs you take as an infusion or series of injections. that's all changing right now too. because the bad news about monoclonal antibody treatments that saved so many people and done so well for so many people over all these recent months, the bad news about them now is that the two most commonly used ones, the one from lilly and regeneron, they don't work against the omicron variant. that said, there is a third monoclonal antibody, made by glaxo, that one is less available, it is harder to get, as yet it is in very limited supply. but that one does work against omicron. and there is a very interesting story behind the administration realizing that early on as soon as omicron reared its head, the administration has been trying hard to marshal all the supplies we have got of the one last monoclonal antibody that works on the omicron variant, working hard to increase the supply of it, but had interesting decisions to make as to what to do with the limited amount of it that we already have got. on top of the monoclonal antibodies, yesterday and today, the fda approved two different new drugs you can take at home. antiviral pills you can take to prevent serious illness and hospitalization. the one from pfizer that was approved yesterday appears to be more effective and to have potentially fewer side effects, fewer safety concerns, fewer other things to worry about than the one that was approved from merck today. so pfizer one appears to be a preferable option to the one from merck. both in terms of effectiveness and complications. but the one from pfizer, the better one is in really, really, really limited supply and will be for a long while yet. the merck one, the one not as good, the one that is not useful for a lot of people for a lot of different reasons, there is more supply of that one. but, again, it is not as effective and has safety concerns that the other one doesn't. the merck one was basically approved today as something to be used for if other treatments aren't available or aren't appropriate for some reason. a whole bunch of restrictions. only for adults, not for pregnant women. that said, we have millions of doses of that one and only less than 100,000 doses of the other. so our home landscape for what we have got for drugs in terms to fight this thing, it is all changing now as we speak this week. we have got this huge new crush of cases, we have got two new drugs approved. two others that were pretty widely used or rendered obsolete by the new variant, as soon as you think you have your head around the various options available to us, it is all changed. as soon as you think you know what's going to happen next, boom, you can't smell the butter popcorn scented candle. we all have to do our best to understand it. this is not only news you can use, it is news you need to use, to make practical decisions right now, about vaccines and boosters for yourself and for your family members, about testing, whether or not you can easily access testing, what is your strategy around using testing to keep you and members of your family safe around the holidays. also, what are you going to do if someone in your family is positive? what are you going to do and how are you going to approach it if you or someone you love is maybe going to need one of these treatments? the treatment landscape as well as the vaccine landscape and all these things is very much in flux right now. but the good news is that there are experts among us who can help us understand them and none of it is so complex that we as regular lay people can't absorb it. joining us now is our friend dr. david kessler, he's been a great source of guidance for us on the show, the chief science adviser to the biden administration's covid response. dr. kessler, thank you for making time to be here tonight. i said i would love to have you back soon. i hope you don't mind that i cashed that in so quickly. >> my pleasure, rachel. >> let me ask you if i explained any of that wrong. it is, i think, a little bit hard to keep track of how our medicine cabinet is changing in terms of what our vaccines and treatments can to help us with the new variant. did i screw any of that up in the explanation? >> no, i think you got it perfectly. i think we have to recognize, you just showed in the graphs, is that we are going to break the peak of this pandemic next week. in the number of cases. and we have to recognize that that is just bringing a lot of stress and a lot of concern right before christmas to a lot of families. i don't think there is a family -- certainly where i live in washington, d.c. now, in the new york area, that is not confronting what do i do about being exposed to somebody, somebody who has a positive test. let me just take a minute or two, rachel, if i can, just to see if i can put this a little in context where we are as we go into this holiday. this is no doubt a highly, highly infectious disease. there is an exploding number of cases. what is absolutely critical to understand, while this is highly infectious, most people who will get it are not going to be seriously -- become seriously sick. omicron infection is considerably less severe in people who are fully vaccinated and boosted as indicated because they are immunized against the variant. the observed severity of omicron is less than delta. cases are up 45% in the last week, but hospitalizations are flat. here's who i'm most concerned about in the next couple of, you know, days, people who really at the center of who we have to make sure we take care of. these are, you know, people who despite vaccination may still be at increased risk. the extreme elderly, the medically fragile, the immunocompromised, those who -- those are the people who have to be -- we have to take great care to protect them. they obviously are protecting themselves, for the rest of us i think this is very important. if you don't have symptoms, or if you only have mild symptoms, you know, we see these long lines, i don't think, you know if you don't have symptoms, if you only have mild symptoms, i don't think right now there is a need to stand in a line for hours to get tested. if you have a home test, then use it. but if you have a head cold and a good fitting mask, please use this. and for those of us who are vaccinated and boosted, please understand we have our shield, we have our protection, yes, an enormous number of cases, but we're going to get through this just fine. >> one of the things i wanted to ask you about, dr. kessler, is the changing options for people who need treatment, for people who are sick, and who are at high risk of advancing to serious illness, needing to be hospitalized, high risk of potentially dying from covid, these monoclonal antibodies saved a lot of bod lives over t last few months. people who weren't willing to get vaccinated, in many cases they were willing to consent to that type of treatment, once they fell ill, i don't pretend to understand it, but we observed that. now the monoclonal antibodies we have been using most often don't work against omicron. can you tell us about the decision-making you've been part of, the government has gone through, over that one remaining monoclonal antibody in such short supply that does seem to work against omicron? >> rachel, you helped us, you know, over the months, get out the word how important the monoclonal antibodies are. but when we started seeing the omicron variant in south africa, right, just at the very beginning, at soon as it got reported, no evidence in the united states, we looked at the molecular biology and did our analysis of those mutations and realized that two of the three monoclonal antibodies were not going to work. we used our best science and recognized that the regeneron and the lilly were not going to work, but there was still plenty of delta. we made sure people use that, but we pulled back for a number of weeks the gsk vir monoclonal. that allowed to us have more we shipped out this last week, we are shipping out more. we have about 300,000 regimens in january. we just bought another 600,000 for the first quarter. we're buying everything we can get our hands on, but the important part, if you put up your graphic again, you see that those monoclonals are only -- they're very important. but the great news is, you know, we have now that medicine cabinet, certainly for our patients, we have oral antivirals too that were approved yesterday and today. we have a new intravenous, the drug is not new, remdesivir has been out there. there was a paper in "the new england journal" yesterday, profound results for use as in and out patient to prevent hospitalization. there is a range of therapies. there is one that is also very important, there is a monoclonal that just got authorized and that's the astrazeneca and that's for prevention, even before you get infected for people who are immunocompromised. those people who have been afraid to go out, whether it is cancer or organ transplant or other reasons if they're immunosuppressed now can get something, not the response of a vaccine, but giving them that monoclonal will give them the equivalent of a vaccine and that protection. so, many more therapies today than we had in the past, that access to oral treatment will allow the public to easily use outpatient therapies. when we have enough of these, when that pfizer drug, when we have millions of doses a month, yes, it is going to take a few months to get there. that's going to be a game changer. >> just as a lay observer of these things, that drug you're talking about, that pfizer drug, i feel incredibly bullish on the prospects for that drug, just because it is clinical trials data was so impressive that unanimous recommendation from the vaccine advisory group that it should be approved, the fact that it is easy to administer, it is three pills twice a day, five days, boom, you're done, just such effectiveness, three days after symptoms, is, you know, maybe hard to do, still shows some effectiveness and people get it five days after symptoms. there is so much good to say about that pfizer pill and how many lives it could save. the only part about it that i despair of is how few doses there are and i know that the united states government is buying up everything we can there, but is there -- are we at the physical and scientific limit in terms of when -- what could be produced in terms of that pfizer drug? there is a lot of the merck drug, which has a lot -- is less appealing in a lot of different ways, but that pfizer pill is so promising, it could be a game changer as you say. is there anything we can humanly do to get more of that made? >> so we're working day and night and pfizer is working day and night, and they already accelerated. but the chemical synthesis takes six to nine months. so there are some rate limiting steps, we're trying to overcome those. we'll have about 265,000 doses in january. but we'll be in the millions by april. >> will the administration have a sort of communication plan, a messaging plan to let people know about their treatment options? obviously, that one, when we have got it in a way that we can deliver it at scale, it will be a good solution for a lot of people. until that's available, more widely, treatment decisions can be complex, certainly health providers need to be involved in those decisions. is there some effort that you are planning or the administration is planning to let people know more? especially if millions of americans are going to get infected with this omicron variant, it seems to me like upping people's consciousness about treatment options is going to make a big difference in terms of whether or not people actually access treatment that might save their lives. >> absolutely. not only just patients, it is also doctors. you have to understand, these drugs and now that we have five outpatient therapies that work against omicron, they vary in effectiveness, in risks and they vary in availability. and so we have to educate physicians too and we're doing that. and we're going to have to, you know, to maximize the benefits of these therapies, we're going to have to be sure that the higher risk patients get the most effective medicines and they go first. and, you know, tonight, the most important thing is to those who have been immunocompromised, those not able to mount a vaccine there are drugs being shipped that you can take. >> dr. david kessler, chief science adviser to the biden administration's covid response, it is always an honor to have you here. thank you for your time tonight and for your ongoing service. i know you will not get nearly enough time off around the holidays, but i hope it is a restful time for you and your family in any case. >> merry christmas, rachel. >> you too. all right, much more ahead. stay with us. oo all right, much more ahead stay with us ♪ ♪ 'tis the season to break tradition in a cadillac. don't just put on a light show—be the light show. make your nights anything but silent. and ride in a sleigh that really slays. because in a cadillac, tradition is yours to define. so visit a cadillac showroom, and start celebrating today. ♪ ♪ hey, angie! you forgot your phone! so visit a cadillac showroom, and start celebrating today. hey lou! angie forget her phone again? yep. lou! mom said she could save up to $400 on her wireless bill by switching to xfinity internet and mobile. with nationwide 5g at no extra cost. and lou! on the most reliable network, lou! smart kid, bill. oh oh so true. and now, the moon christmas special. gotta go! take the savings challenge at xfinitymobile.com/mysavings or visit an xfinity store to learn how our switch squad makes switching fast and easy this holiday season. the house and the senate are both done for the year. both of them wrapped up their legislative business last week and then hightailed it home for the holidays. the house is scheduled to be back january 10th. but in the senate, they're coming back a week earlier than that, which is notable for among other reasons because it means that the senate will be back in session on january 6th. and that, of course, is a controversial thing in terms of whether or not elected officials and, say, capitol police officers actually want to be at work and at the capitol on january 6th given what happened on that date one year ago. that said, there is also a real urgency for the senate to get right to work at the start of the year, given the list of things they are looking to accomplish. not the least of which is legislation to protect voting rights. there has been this tidal wave of voting restrictions expected to pass in republican-controlled states ahead of next year's midterm elections, federal protections on voting rights, well, kind of now or never. and on that issue of voting rights, i would like to draw your attention to something. sort of remarkable turn in the debate around voting rights. i'm a little surprised this hasn't received more national attention. i believe it deserves it. but judge for yourself. it involves a political candidate in georgia, a very famous one, herschel walker, a football legend, heisman trophy winner, former nfl player. he's now running as a trump-endorsed republican for the u.s. senate seat in georgia that is currently occupied by democratic senator raphael warnock. mr. walker, while he's very famous for his football career, he is not necessarily the most natural choice for u.s. senate candidate. shortly before he announced his bid for office, the associated press had a worrying report about the portrait of him that emerged from readily available public records, quote, an associated press review of hundreds of pages of public records tied to walker's business ventures and his divorce sheds new light on a turbulent personal history that could dog his senate bid, accusations that he repeatedly threatened his ex-wife's life, meaning he threatened to kill her. exaggerated claims of financial success and he alarmed business associates with unpredictable behavior. the history that the ap ran down included the fact that his ex-wife actually secured a legal protective order against him because of his threats, and perceived violence. further complicating matters, mr. walker was encouraged to run for the senate seat in georgia, despite the fact he does not live in georgia. he actually had been living in texas for a really long time. that makes georgia a hard place for him to be the senator from, despite all that he entered the race after getting signup from former president donald trump and from mitch mcconnell. this isn't just a trumpee republican thing. one other interesting thing about herschel walker and his senate race, until now, despite his major name recognition, and his major endorsements, he's kept a very low profile. he has tried to avoid public interactions with voters, for example. he has turned down basically all interview requests with mainstream journalists. and we may be starting to understand why that is. this is a clip from a recent interview mr. walker gave on a far right internet or talk radio show, just let this wash over you. just sink into this. >> raphael warnock doesn't talk about inflation. he doesn't talk about the price of gas. he doesn't talk about supply chain disruption or anything of that nature. but he brings up voting rights, the john lewis voting rights bill. what do you say about raphael warnock trying to push this, during this time to try to, what i call, federalize elections? >> you know what's sad about that, you know, to use the name of a great man to brand something that is so bad i think is terrible to do. you know, senator lewis was one of the greatest senators that's ever been and for african americans that was absolutely incredible. to throw his name on a bill for voting rights i think is a shame. first of all, when you look at the bill, it just doesn't fit with what john lewis stood for. i think they know that. i think that is sad for them to do this to him. >> the lewis herschel walker is talking about there is john lewis. john lewis was not a senator. what did he say there, senator lewis, one of the greatest senators that has ever been. john lewis was never a u.s. senator. he served in the house of representatives for over three decades. he then said to throw his name on a bill for voting rights, i think that's a shame. it just doesn't fit with what john lewis stood for. voting rights was the cornerstone of john lewis' life's work, one of the key figures responsible for the voting rights act, the landmark 1965 voting rights act. even if you can't wrap your head around all of that, it is this next part of the herschel walker interview that will make your head spin. >> let's go to the voting rights, if you want to talk about voting, first of all, you want to get people to vote because if they're legal to vote, you want to try tone courage people to vote, that's the most precious thing you have. not encourage, but encourage and what i mean by that is, you know, you get things done now, don't talk about it after, or talk about it during. but get it done right now. and no one is not legal to vote, why don't we go in and get the i.d.s and get everything done right now and instead of waiting until it's time to vote and start talking about it. and we shouldn't -- and i think that's what people got to remember. >> that's what people got to remember. you got it? we got to encourage -- not encourage, but encourage, you know what i mean? mr. walker's trying to clarify his position on voting rights, which he says senator john lewis would never want to be associated with, if he's trying to clarify his position on voting rights there, i do not think he was successful. even if you diagrammed each sentence, i don't think you get any closer to figuring out what he's getting at. and, look, it is totally fine to not be an expert on voting rights legislation. but to be clear, this is the guy the republican party both the trump wing and the mitch mcconnell wing are throwing their full weight behind for the u.s. senate seat from georgia currently occupied by raphael warnock. this is who they want representing the people of georgia next year. watch this space. watch this space okay, so the company was called atlas technology international. it appeared to be funded and perhaps run by a company in china, shanghai. what the company says its business was when it filed its report with the s.e.c., what they said their business was was selling cakes and cupcakes in the united states. quote, we are a bakery based company in california, specializing in freshly made cakes and cupcakes. we engage in the business of selling a wide variety of cupcakes and other baked goods under the brand name sweets & treats. okay, so they're doing business as sweets & treats, but their real name is atlas technology. which is kind of a weird name for what is a cupcake company, right? but, okay. watch what happens next. the following year, the same company atlas technology international, they filed their annual report with the s.e.c., but now instead of the cupcakes name, which disappeared, now, quote, the company develops, designs and distributes touch screen technology. that is quite a change in business plan. the annual report goes on, quote, the company has yet to establish atlas as a renowned brand for touch screen technology. well, yeah, give them a break. just last year atlas was selling fresh baked cupcakes. they only just have gone from baked cupcakes to touch screens. give them some time. the branding hasn't followed them as they made that leap. that was one company. the can company that started off saying it made cupcakes and then immediately switched to touch screens. that's their business. cupcakes or touch screen, depending. we learned about this odd business from "the washington post" today, which noted the same shanghai folks behind that company also ran another company, this one claimed to be a smartphone sales company in miami beach. but it did not appear to have sold anything, not a single thing, ever, to anyone. you're a sales company? there was also a company run by the same guys in shanghai, different company, that claimed to be developing autonomous drone software. pretty cutting edge stuff. well, that company, it has zero employees, maybe the drones were so autonomous, they were going to design themselves. really cutting edge. so the s.e.c. looked at these companies, publicly traded companies in the united states, that all appear to be fake. and the s.e.c. determined that, yeah, these were fake companies. these guys in china were not running companies selling smartphones or drones or cupcakes with or without touch screens. but if you're running, you know, publicly traded entities, there is a lot of rules about not being fake. and so the s.e.c. stepped in and more or less kicked those companies off the stock exchange. for a couple of them, they issued what is called a stop order. the s.e.c. forcibly stopped these companies from selling any more public shares. and stop orders are a serious thing and they are a rare thing. in the past ten years, something like 35 companies total have gotten stop orders like this. of the 35 in the past ten years, at least three of them were run by the same group of guys in china. in shanghai. well, now, this chinese firm, shanghai, that appears to specialize in launching publicly traded companies that mislead regulators and investors, and then get everybody involved in trouble, i'll give you one guess as to what their new high profile investment is. yes, it is donald trump's latest business venture, the former president's supposed media company. this is the lead today at the washington post. this is incredible. quote, a chinese firm helping former president donald trump take his new media company public has been the target of investigations by federal securities regulators who say the firm misrepresented shell companies with no products and few employees as ambitious growing enterprises. huh. misrepresenting your companies as wildly successful businesses in order to get people to fork over their cash to you. whatever could have attracted this chinese firm to the founder of trump university. game recognizes game, right? i guess. the thing to remember about the trump media company that was just launched announced a couple of months ago with great fanfare, donald trump is going to launch a new social media platform, he's going to have all this digital and streaming content and it is going to be like facebook and fox news and netflix rolled into one. the thing to remember about this company, it appears to not exist at all yet. one securities lawyer telling the post today, quote, there is a shell company, one of these companies created by the chinese firm, basically merging with another shell company because as far as we know the trump media company hasn't yet been formed. but that has not stopped this chinese firm's company from raising hundreds of millions of dollars. hundreds of millions of dollars, from the public to supposedly eventually invest in this trump media company which does not exist. a financing deal that is now under investigation by both the s.e.c. and by finra, the financial industry regulatory authority, because even by the wild west standards of kind of the scummy end of wall street, this deal is sending up red flags left and right. and i know nothing should surprise us anymore, but even for the most cynical among us, this is gone smacking. this guy spent the entire presidency talking about getting tough on china, china, right, to turn -- he turns to a dubious chinese firm to finance his first business venture, since leaving office, and they're immediately under federal investigation because of all of the previous cons they have pulled off. joining us now is "washington post" reporter doug mcmillan who with jonathan o'connell broke this story today about trump's partnership with this chinese firm. mr. mcmillan, thank you for your time tonight. i appreciate you being here. >> rachel, thank you for having me. >> over the last few years, looking at sort of shady business stuff around the former president, one thing i have found difficult on a personal level is that his business to some degree ma, maybe for the most part, has been real estate and strikes me that big city real estate of the type he's involved in always seems really shady and scummy to everybody who looks in on it from the outside who doesn't know the business. and sort of hard to tell whether he was worse and doing more egregious things than everybody else in what is already sort of a dirty business. applying that same standard to this as a wall street story, is this chinese firm an outlier in terms of this corner of wall street, these types of deals, and the kind of scrutiny that they have attracted? >> well, this is definitely an unusual firm to choose for one of most high profile deals on wall street. the trump spac is something a lot of people are talking about, a lot of people are looking forward to and has drawn a lot of investor interest despite as you mentioned little being known about the actual business. it appears that trump's media and social media business very nascent. it put out some power point presentations about how it plans to compete with social media companies like twitter and streaming companies like netflix, but there seems to be very little substance behind those claims right now. and they have, you know, very few known employees, for example. and apparently no revenue. this is a company that through this deal would be turned into a public company overnight. so we took a close look at the deal and we started looking more and more at this company, arc capital, and found that this is definitely an outlier. this is a tiny firm, based in shanghai, they have some global offices, but no offices in the united states, and we talked to former employees of these companies who said that the founder and the leaders of arc capital are really interested in this idea of the u.s. regulatory markets and the s.e.c. is easier to get into, and easier to list shell businesses or businesses with little revenue or little behind it or very early stage startup businesses than the regulators in china or hong kong or parts of asia. so part of their business model from the get-go was to try to help chinese firms with, you know, very nascent business models bring their companies public in the u.s. market and they have had, you know, very mixed track record. we haven't found a whole lot of success stories and yet they have, you know, this regulatory clout, a number of deals end up in the cross hairs of s.e.c. investigators as you mentioned. >> is it a problem if trump's company turns out to be fake like those other fake companies associated with this shanghai group that you guys wrote about today? is it -- are there rules about all this money that has been raised by these means for this supposed trump media venture if it never comes to fruition, can they take the money and run? >> so, interesting thing about this deal, it is a merger deal, not a traditional ipo. and that somehow gives them a little bit more latitude to make bold claims they don't necessarily support right away. once the merger goes through and the trump business is publicly listed, they're going to have to pretty soon start sharing their financials, they have to start having audited financial statements, quarterly earnings reports and you have to actually start to see what is this business. and if it is a shell business, you're allowed to have a shell business, with no active operations in the u.s. you have to, like, be clear and up front about that. but, you know, it appears they're not going that route. it appears they are going to try to build this, you know, media company, social media company, and, yeah, eventually they are going to be investors who want to see that company happen. at the end of this deal, there is going to be over $1.2 billion in donald trump and his associates' pockets. and they're going to have responsibility or there is going to be an expectation by investors who own shares in that company that they own shares in a media company. so, yeah, i do eventually think they have to make good on some of the promises, do they have to, you know, meet their rosiest possible projections that trump is making? predicting something like over $3 billion in the next five years. i don't think legally they're bound to that. but i think that you definitely have to start seeing some efforts towards building a business and it is going to be interesting to see what happens if, you know, that ends up not being the case. >> yeah. i will believe it when i see it. when we cross that point. doug mcmillan. thank you for being here. fascinating story. thanks. >> thanks, rachel. we'll be right back. stay with us. thanks, rachel. we'll be right back. stay with us quick update for you on a story we covered last night that we have been covering for some time, every time we talk about this story, we hear a lot from you guys about it. it is about two election workers in georgia, ruby freeman and her daughter, who were loudly and repeatedly but falsely accused by donald trump and his campaign of somehow rigging the election count in fulton county georgia. she and her daughter had been repeatedly cleared of any wrongdoing, but despite that, trump, his lawyer rudy giuliani, budge of trump media outlets repeated the same boeing bogus allegations. they have filed a federal lawsuit against rudy giuliani and one pro trump news outlet for defaming them. the complaint says, quote, the harm they have caused to plaintiffs' reputations, privacy, safety and earnings and other loss is immense. i don't know if rudy giuliani has a good lawyer at this point. i don't know who he still would be able to call if he wanted to try to get one. watch this space. all right, that's going to do it for us tonight on this beautiful christmas eve eve. we'll see you again tomorrow. as we prepare to mark the new year, we also know that means january 6th is coming. one year since the attack on the capitol. i sat down recently with three of the officers who testified before the american people about being attacked that day. the one officer trapped in that doorway and all three of them kept coming back to one word in this interview. they kept saying accountability and they told me that means if it leads right to the very top, we want accountability. do you agree with those officers? >> i think accountability is necessary. look -- >> that means if it goes to -- >> no matter

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