a new covid wave across the u.s. disrupting holiday travel plans for millions of americans. president biden s agenda remains in limbo despite that promised christmas deadline. we ll hear from the vice president about what s next for build back better. and the world remembers archbishop desmond tutu. he helped end apartheid in south africa. announcer: live from london, this is cnn newsroom with max foster. we begin with the growing concern over the rapid spread of the omicron variant in the u.s. as cases surge, so does the demand for tests. this is the scene at testing sites around the country. long lines with people often having to wait hours to get tested. and the nation s top disease expert says access to testing has got to get better. we should be using testing much more extensively than we have, even in a situation where you have people who are vaccinated and boosted, but the situation where you have such a high demand, a conflation of events, omicron starting t
the question is, where does this leave the president s domestic agenda? plus, the covid-19 surge. health officials predict the omicron variant will bring a record number of cases, and it will put more people in the hospital than ever before. the question is are u.s. medical systems ready? and tiger woods back on the green, his first competition since his devastating car crash, and playing with his son. the question is how did he fair? it s way too early for this. good morning and welcome to way too early, a show that needed that little bit of good government news. i m jonathan lemire on this monday, december 20th. after months of negotiations, senator joe manchin, the linchpin in the 50/50 senate, said he will not support president biden s build back better plan, effectively killing the $2 trillion social spending proposal in its current form. in an interview on fox news sunday, the democrat cited debt, inflation, and covid for the reasons why he is opposed.
that applies whether you re a u.s. citizen or not. foreign nationals have to prof t prove they are fully vaccinated. that does not apply to americans. there is still so much we don t know. one of the biggest questions, how dangerous is it? thus far it doesn t look like there s a great degree of severity to it, but we ve really got to be careful before we make any determinations that it is less severe or it really doesn t cause any severe illness comparable to delta. thus far, the signals are a bit encouraging regarding the severity. at the same time though delta remains the dominant strain in the united states. still, cdc director michelle walensky says omicron is being carefully watched. we know we have, you know, several dozen cases and we re following them closely and we are every day hearing about more and more probable cases so that number is likely to rise. u.s. now averaging about 120,000 new covid cases a day. as you can see there, that is the highest level in
dana: this is america s newsroom. you were in california for the reagan defense forum. bill: a great event, great weekend and great to see a lot of people we haven t seen in some kind. dana: all the issues you ve covered we ll have on jack keane on later today. michigan the couple s failure to appear in court friday set off an intense manhunt and police found the parents early saturday hiding in a detroit warehouse. bill: the pair is now being held in the same jail as we mentioned as their son, ethan. investigators say they may have had help evading arrest in michigan. everybody pitched in. we were confident to find them. we did. we believe they were assisted in that location to get there, to get in. and we are gathering that information and we re going to have the totality of that done fairly soon and present that to our prosecutor for potential charges for either aiding and abetting or obstruction of justice. bill: team fox coverage. andy mccarthy legal analys
south africa where it first appeared, germany, the uk and canada. so it s just a matter of time before cases start to pop up in the u.s., and that s a reality underlying president biden s remarks on monday. this variant is a cause for concern, not a cause for panic. we have the best vaccine in the world, the best medicines, the best scientists. and we re learning more every single day. what we don t know yet, and this is crucial, is whether omicron will turnout to be any more dangerous than the delta variant. that s now the dominant strain in the u.s. it will be at least a week or two before scientists learn whether omicron will turnout to be more infectious or more deadly. meanwhile, experts say the vaccines we already have are likely to provide protection. we have every reason to believe, even though this is an extraordinary unusual variant because of the number of mutations, there s no reason to believe that it will not happen that if you get the level of antibody hi