Our coverage continues with Rachel Maddow. Good evening, Rachel. I have a jerky Gatorade, Diet Coke, coffee, water with bubbles and without. What do you need? That's great. I have just a lot of coffee, which is usually how I roll, I mean, situation. So I think I'm just going to go with that. But just pop over for some jerky. I will hook you up. I'm the jerky. All right. Thank you, my friend, and thanks you at home for being with us as our coverage of this historic Inauguration Day continues.

By definition, every inauguration day is historic. It all literally becomes part of American history. It does feel like there is something quite different about this inauguration, not only because of who was just inaugurated, but because of what has just ended. Personally, I'll just tell you, it is an almost unspeakable honor to be part of this coverage. And for all of us, it's an honor that you choose to choose, that you choose us to spend this day and this this night with.

So I'm Rachel Maddow. I'm here at our studios here in New York. I've been for it all day. I hope you will forgive me. I'm going to be joined this evening by my colleagues Joy Reid and Lawrence O'Donnell and a whole bunch of our friends and correspondents and some elected officials. I will tell you in just about half an hour, we expect to be hearing from the new president and for the first time today from the new vice president of the United States, they will be hosting a star studded inaugural concerts.

We're going to be bringing that event to you live and in its entirety. There's no need to switch to C-SPAN. We will show you every single minute of the inaugural concert, which starts in not that long. Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have been in office for eight hours and one minute now. But already things in Washington are looking like yesterday and today just took place on two different planets. Last hour, for example, the new White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, held the first press briefing of the Biden administration at which Psaki delivered factual information calmly and in an orderly fashion.

She answered questions from the press. She did not yell at any any reporters at all. Pinch me. That just happened. President Biden today held a covid safe virtual ceremony to swear in nearly a thousand new presidential appointees during that ceremony. It's interesting, he told his new appointees that the number one thing he expects from them is honesty and decency. In fact, he told them that upon pain of being fired, quote, on the spot, they must treat each other and the people they serve with respect and dignity and honesty.

Needless to say, that was a change in tone from the previous administration, the previous president and his trademark fire hose stream of ad hominem insults toward even members of his own staff. President Biden also today signed a stack of more than a dozen executive actions and his first visit to the Oval Office as president, it is remarkable itself just to see him sitting there behind the resolute desk. The executive actions he signed today included the United States rejoining the Paris climate accord and rejoining the World Health Organization that will meet tomorrow.

Dr. Anthony Fauci will be there as the representative of the United States government. The president signed orders today mandating face masks on federal property and an interstate travel. He reversed President Trump's Muslim ban. He stopped drilling leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He stopped construction on the border wall that Mexico never actually paid for. Meanwhile, Vice President Harris took up her new role as president of the Senate, where she will be spending a lot of time today.

She swore in three new Democratic United States senators, John USCIRF of Georgia, Raphael Warnock of Georgia, Alex Padilla of California, taking Vice President Harris's former US Senate seat from California with those three Democrats newly sworn in today, plus her tie breaking vote as vice president. The Democratic Party took control of the evenly split 50 50 Senate this afternoon. Chuck Schumer will now replace Mitch McConnell as majority leader. That new Democratic led Senate then confirmed President Biden's first cabinet official this evening, this was not at all something that we knew for sure would happen over the course of the day when Biden and Harris were sworn in today, none of their cabinet secretaries were confirmed by the Senate.

But tonight, Avril Haines is sworn in as director of national intelligence. She was confirmed by the Senate by an overwhelming vote of eighty four to 10. And that's all just been in the last eight hours. After outgoing President Trump this morning was a no show, the first outgoing president in modern times, to skip his elected successor's inauguration, we learned later in the day that it appears his last act as president, perhaps fittingly, was to issue one final pardon for felony tax evasion, pardon for the ex-husband of a Fox News personality who plays a character called Judge Jeanine.

We also learned today that on his way out, President Trump extended Secret Service protection to multiple family members and top staffers, people who are not automatically entitled to receive it. What it means in practical terms is that millions of taxpayer dollars and lots of Secret Service man hours will go toward the protection of President Trump's four grown children and their families for the next six months, as well as his former Treasury secretary. Secret Service protection, his former chief of staff will have Secret Service protection.

His national security adviser will have Secret Service protection. If the president felt strongly that all those people should have twenty four, seven top tier security, four months, there's no reason the president could not have just paid for that, could not have just paid for their private security if he thought they need it. But President Trump declared today that all of those people will have extended twenty four seven Secret Service protection that will be charged to the US taxpayers and taken out of the height of the US Secret Service, which frankly has other things to do.

Although the outgoing president did not attend today's inauguration, outgoing Vice President Mike Pence was there sort of glimmer of normalcy. Also in attendance were. Trump's predecessors and their spouses, Barack and Michelle Obama, George W. and Laura Bush, Bill and Hillary Clinton, all they're all those former presidents of striking sit sitting on an inaugural platform, the columns of which still bore traces of spray paint left by the violent mob that attacked the US Capitol two weeks ago today to try to keep President Trump in power by force.

Among the many symbolic moments on that inaugural platform today, I'll just pause to note this, this photo in particular, their eyes. First, African-American president giving a celebratory fist bump to the first African-American vice president. Also, the nation's first female vice president, Kamala Kamala Harris, today sworn in by Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Joe Biden sworn in as president by Chief Justice John Roberts and then Biden.

Joe Biden delivered an inaugural address focused like a laser on the theme of unity that I will faithfully. I know.

Speaking of unity, good sound to some like a foolish fantasy these days. I know the forces that divide us are deep and they are real, but I also know they are not new. Our history has been a constant struggle between the American ideal that we're all are created equal and the harsh, ugly reality that racism, nativism, fear, demonization have long torn us apart. The battle is perennial and victory is never assured through civil war, the Great Depression, World War, 9/11, through struggle, sacrifice and setbacks, our better angels have always prevailed in each of these moments.

Are enough of us, are enough of us have come together to carry all of us forward and we can do that now.

Enough of us came together to carry all of us forward. Interesting and subtle point from the new president. Doesn't expect every single one of us to be able to come together, but if enough of us do, we can bring the country forward. Joe Biden officially became president at noon Eastern today as he was in the midst of that speech. But as historic a moment as that was, we may have also arrived at a national consensus today that the breakout star of the inaugural ceremonies today was twenty two year old Amanda Gorman, the youngest inaugural poet in American history.

She read her poem called The Hill We Climb, which included this passage, which she apparently wrote late on the night of January 6th, two weeks ago after that violent mob stormed the Capitol to try to keep President Trump in power. We've seen a force that would shatter our nation rather than share it would destroy our country if it meant delaying democracy in this effort very nearly succeeded. But while democracy can be periodically delayed, it can never be permanently defeated.

Oh, and Amanda Gorman, all of twenty two years old, an unexpected star of today's inauguration, there was no traditional inaugural parade this year. We did see the president and his family take a short walk down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House and the vice president and her family walking to her new office across the street from the White House. But it's done and now the work begins, it has, in fact, already begun tonight. Hi, everyone.

Steve Kolonaki here. You may remember I hosted an NBC News podcast called Article two Inside Impeachment and follow the developments of President Donald Trump's first impeachment last winter. The article to podcast is back with a special episode bringing you the latest on the second impeachment of Donald Trump. I'm joined by NBC News Capitol Hill correspondent Leigh Ann Caldwell, who is in the capital on the day of the riots to break down the House vote. And what a Senate trial could look like.

Search for Article two inside impeachment, wherever you're listening right now to subscribe for free.

We are not here to curse the darkness, we are here to light a candle. I'm Chuck Rosenberg on my podcast, The Oath. I talk with people who served with integrity and honor, men and women who lights the way. This week, former Peace Corps director Carrie Hessler Ratliff. One of the most important elements of service is humility on the part of the person who is serving. We don't enter the community to save people. If anything, we are saved ourselves through service.

Join me for Season four of the Oath, an MSNBC podcast. Search for the Oath, wherever you're listening right now and subscribe new episodes every Wednesday. Well, those were all the fireworks left in America, so if we need anything for any other purpose, I'm sorry they've been used. That was an incredible ending. You see President Biden and the first lady there at the White House watching the fireworks. We saw Vice President Harris and her husband at the Lincoln Memorial also watching the fireworks, each of them speaking as part of this remarkable inaugural concert and celebration tonight, running just about 90 minutes.

Exactly. We've seen other celebratory inaugural concerts, none done in the sort of separate, physically separate way this had to be done. But the silver lining for having to produce this in a different way is that it was perfectly expertly produced with the most a list of A-list talent, including one of the bravest men in show business, John Legend. It takes real bravery to cover Nina Simone and to cover Nina Simone at the Lincoln Memorial after Vice President Harris gives her first remarks as vice president.

Now, that is that is that's brave. That's John Legend. That's remarkable. We also saw from three former presidents, we saw former President Obama and Clinton and George W. Bush all speaking together, all wishing their best and lending their support to to the incoming administration. I've never seen anything like this. I'm Rachel Maddow here in New York. Thanks for being with us for our ongoing coverage of Inauguration Day and the celebrations into tonight. I'm with my friends Joy Reid and Lawrence O'Donnell.

We've been watching this throughout, Joy. Let me get your reaction first. I went through half a box of Kleenex, but I made sure that I saved one in case you said anything that was also going to make you cry, because at this point, I'm just a faucet that can't turn off. I'll tell you, I was mostly dancing around and singing along to the extent that I could that I could. But I can keep up with the lyrics.

I have to tell you, I was a bit worried about this inaugural, having a feeling of just being the resistance to what we saw on one six, just being just an answer to that and sort of being defiant. You know, I was sure it would be and being this sort of an attempt. We talked about it earlier to sort of grab back, you know, the traditionalism of an inaugural. But what the organizers of this event managed to do is that they gave us that which we needed.

We needed an answer. We needed that resistance.

But they also gave us joy. They gave us fashion. They gave us celebrity. They gave us hope. We had an incredible inaugural earlier in the day where we saw the first black woman, first Asian-American woman, first woman period, vice president, do the walk, get sworn in and do all of that great stuff. We saw Joe Biden, who has lived his whole life for this moment. Look at all he's lost and all he sacrificed to get here and have this chance to really change the country in a profound way.

They did that thing. They did all of that. Then they went to work. They did a workday. They gave us a press conference where there were no lies, where it was like, all right, we got the opportunity to rediscover what it looks like to have a real normal administration, like aggressive normalcy was that we were calling it today. We got that. And when we got this, we were reminded that the thing the right hates the most about Democrats is that Democrats have the culture.

Democrats have the culture, they have the Hollywood culture, they have the glamorous culture and the right hates that. They feel that the culture is too Wolke, it's too multicultural. It's not John Wayne anymore.

There's all of this multiculturalism in welcomeness and liberalism, and they hate it, but they also envy it. They also wish they had it. And they hate the fact that after Ronald Reagan, they no longer had a claim to the culture. They want the culture more than they want the politics. And so this was this was that this was the culture answering what we saw on January 6th. And it was a it was a beautiful answer. Lawrence, what do you think?

You know, this team faced the biggest challenge I had ever seen in politics, which was how do you hold a political nominating convention, presidential nominating convention when you're basically not allowed to? What do you do instead? And they pulled off a miracle. They made it better than any convention I'd ever attended. And they've done it again today. There are a friend of mine tweeted, Can we make all inaugurations virtual that way? We all get to experience it the same way.

And that's the way I'm feeling about this. This has been an extraordinary day. And tonight, this last 90 minutes, a very tightly produced, not a dull second in it. It couldn't take your eyes off it, even if you intended to. It was really powerful all the way through. And and I just have to focus on the most prominent Republican in what we just saw, President George W. Bush. They had the three former presidents together.

And by the way, it's very clear now that of the former presidents, Barack Obama is clearly the leader of the club. And it played that way when they put them together in an unscripted way. Obviously, it was taped so they could edit it a little bit. But President Obama had more to say than the other two former presidents. But George W. Bush spoke at the end directly to President Biden and didn't just wish him well. He made it very, very clear that he is on Team Biden as of tonight, that he's not interested in policy arguments going forward from MySpace, which he's never going to engage in any way as a former president.

But it was a very strongly supportive and friendly outreach by George W. Bush at a crucial moment to hear that from a former Republican president.

You know, it struck me watching them when they did it, when they aired it. But also hearing you describe this now, Lawrence, that I'm not sure we've ever seen former presidents, particularly from opposing parties, come together, make a statement of national unity, support for our government, support for our leadership, pulling in the same direction except in the context of calamity. We have seen former presidents organize to deal with international disasters brought together to lead, for example, on trying to build confidence in the vaccine in the face of a global pandemic that brought together when something is very wrong and we need to put politics aside and show that at the worst times we can call on our leaders of different stripes and have different marching orders.

And they will they will help us despite the fact that we're a divided people most of the time. This in seeing them, it made me feel more serious about the crisis I think that we are in, because that's the only context in which we see former presidents from different parties speaking together like this.

I have to say, it made me also feel maybe in the spirit of your friend Lawrence, who came to you and said, can't all inaugurations be virtual like this? It made me wish that there were more moments like this with former presidents and different statesmen, different leaders of different persuasions who came together more often. I wish we didn't save it for the worst moments in our in our in our lives.

You know, Rachel, I suspect this is something that might not have happened if it wasn't a virtual event, because if it wasn't, remember what was going on in Washington at this time? Did the poor send a couple of Harrison? Doug would be running around to 15 different inaugural balls and going in for one dance and then getting dragged off to the next one and and this endless night. And and there's nothing important to aim a camera at, usually on inauguration night.

But getting those presidents together, I think, was one of the creative things that came out of being forced into the virtual format. Someone came up with the idea of, well, they're here. What can we do with them? Because, you know, on a normal inauguration night, they would be long gone from having anything to do with what's going on here. You know, they would have done their solidarity bit on the platform and that would have been it.

Yeah, it will be interesting to see how that moment. From George W. Bush has received among Republicans, I mean, the battle between Trump ism and Republicanism is as yet unsettled. And to the extent that this is seen as President George W. Bush making common cause with other former presidents, in part because of the crisis in our country. Well, because the crisis in our country is not just covered. The crisis in our country is also the crisis of our democracy brought about by what we just went through with this president.

I mean, does that call the question in terms of the Republican Party versus Trump ism in a way that hasn't been pushed that far before?

I mean, we'll see, Rachel, in our in our politics, what matters is not so much trying to speak directly to Republican voters. Only twenty five percent of our registered voters are Republicans. Forty one percent are independents. And it's in that space of independents. That's the largest group of us is independents, more of them than Democrats or Republicans. What George W. Bush was speaking to those people in that massive independent bloc who sometimes vote Democratic and sometimes vote Republican, those are the people he was speaking to.

And Rachel, can I just say that the other thing that I think we have is a bubble that George W. Bush can't penetrate any more than Barack Obama can. You know, on another network tonight that was not covering this, they were still doing Hunter Biden and still doing conspiratorial talk and ignoring this, for the most part, ignoring the celebratory moment that everyone else gets to share in. And so I think the problem is that the box that the right is in, that the that the base of the Republican Party is in is a box that's shrinking.

And even other Republican former presidents don't fit into that box anymore. I'm not sure Ronald Reagan would fit into that box anymore. And it's now really the fringe and they're chasing and chasing and chasing the fringe because monetarily there are new media outlets that are even further to the right, that are even more conspiratorial, that are even angrier at whipping people up into more and greater rage that they have to now compete with financially. So I think the challenge we're going to have is we're not going to do what Joe Biden said.

We need to all agree on a truth based, fact based reality. I'm not so sure that we're going to be able to do that in the near future because there's just too much financial incentive for certain outlets and media to prevent us from doing that.

Well, soon after Vice President Harris was sworn into her new office today, we all saw as she headed back to a very familiar place for her, her most recent place of employment, the US Senate. The chair lays before the Senate two certificates of election for the state of Georgia and a certificate of appointment to fill the vacancy created by the resignation of former Senator Kamala Harris of California.

Yeah, that was very weird, OK? There was a certain first day of school feel as now Vice President Harris settles into her new role as president of the United States Senate, a role that brings with it the responsibility to administer the oath of office to do senators, in this case, three history making new senators in their own right. California's first Latino senator, Alex Padilla, Georgia's first Jewish senator. John Asaph, Georgia's first African-American senator. The Reverend Raphael Warnock, all sworn in by Vice President Harris today on a day in which President Biden issued a call to unity.

It's worth noting that senators of both parties gave their newest colleagues a standing ovation today, shortly after he took the oath of office. Senator Warnock of Georgia released this statement today saying, quote, Today, my father, a veteran and son of South Georgia, would have been one hundred and four years old. Today, our country's first black woman vice president swore in his son, Georgia's first black United States senator. That this is even possible is a testament to the promise of our democracy and the covenant we share with one another as Americans.

He said, quote, I've got my shoes on and I'm ready to get to work. Joining us now live. I'm pleased to say, is the Reverend Raphael Warnock, just hours ago sworn in as one of two Democratic US senators from the great state of Georgia. Senator, thank you so much for taking a moment to talk to us on this on this enormous night. I really appreciate you being here. Thank you so much. I'm still getting used to being called senator.

What a great country we live in. Well, Senator, talk to me about about how you are feeling. I mean, we watched a lot of history here. You are Georgia's first black senator. Senator USCIRF is Georgia's first Jewish senator. Senator Padilla is California's first Latino senator. Senator, that in a state that's 40 percent Latino. Vice President Harris, who swore you in the first woman, the first black woman, the first South Asian to serve as vice president?

That is that is a lot of history stacked up on itself. How how are you feeling after this this day?

Well, thank you so much. And on a day that would have been my father and worn out, Reverend Jackson, one of one hundred and four birthday of the grand sweep and arc of our amazing American story is what is striking to me. He he knew a different America. He was a World War Two veteran who was asked one day to give up his seat on a bus to a young white boy who was 13 years old, maybe 14 years old.

My dad was dressed in his military uniform, but the day his son was sworn in as a United States senator, I believe from some balcony in heaven, he's rejoicing. And so it reminds us in this dark moment in our country that for all of our problems, what makes America America great is that we always have a path to make our country greater. We swore in today the first Latino senator from California, the first black senator, the first Jewish senator of Georgia.

And as I think about my brothers with whom I shared the oath earlier tonight, it gives me a great deal of hope. You know, the rabbi, Abraham Joshua Heschel, when he marched alongside Martin Luther King Jr., he said he felt like his legs would break. And John and I, we certainly are not Dr. King or Rabbi Heschel, but we we are we benefit from the path that they laid out. We're able to set. So we're able to take off tonight because they they paved the runway so smooth.

And so what I want to do is stand up now for all the people of Georgia and build a kind of multiracial coalition. We need to make sure that people have access to health care, that we get comic relief and that we stand up for the dignity of all we can.

I want to talk to you a little bit about that connection between your service in Georgia now, your senior pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Martin Luther King Jr.'s, former church. And that was somehow in some political jujitsu effort. They tried to use that against you and your political campaign, which seemed like an incredibly bad idea to me. And you did win that campaign. But I know that you've said that you intend to continue to serve your congregation while you're in the Senate.

Is what will that look like? Will you be commuting back to Georgia on weekends? Will you be able to deliver sermons on Sunday? How do you how do you see that work? Well, all the folks who work in the Congress, my colleagues, they all mostly go back to their home states for the weekend and, you know, I really see my service and the United States Senate is the continuation of what I've been doing for a long time.

You know, the last time I was in the United States Capitol, I was arrested in an act of civil disobedience. And what was I focused on? I was focused on health care and what will I be focused on as a United States senator, I will be focused on health care the last time I came engaged in protests. Now I get to be engaged as one who can create public policy. And so for me, there's a continuity of service here.

I will return home every weekend to preach and deliver sermons that have been used to serve the people there. And I think that, you know, when you think about what's happening in our politics, we got along right now with with a professional class of politicians. I think we need to remember that ours is a representative democracy, that in this grand idea of democracy, there is a sense that ordinary people, whether they are teachers or preachers or or lawyers or doctors, they go and they represent their citizens, a kind of tour of duty.

But the last thing I want to do is talk to politicians all day, every day. I'm afraid I might accidentally become ill. And I have no intention of becoming a politician. I intend to be a public servant.

Reverend Warnock, it's Joy Reid. How are you? And congratulations again on your election and being sworn in today. That was actually my favorite moment of all of the day, was watching the the newly installed vice president, United States, where the three of you all. And I thought that was a wonderful moment. But your election, as Rachel was just saying, it felt like part of what happened during that campaign was a kind of a war on the black church and on the teachings of the black church that are about liberation theology, which is such a fundamental part of the church that you are part of that I grew up in.

And so I wonder if if this is a moment in which you're going to see the black evangelical church reassert itself in our social politics the way it was during the era of Dr. King and really reassert itself the way you've seen Bishop William Barber doing, the way Reverend Sharpton has done and your church figures that have done that. But do you think the church writ large is going to be more prominent on issues like covid, on issues like health care, on issues like service to the poor, on issues like LGBT equality, which is something that you have also been very leaning forward on?

Are you going to are we going to see the church lean in?

Well, there's no question that over the course of my campaign, you saw Joy, an assault on my faith and on the faith of the black church, and I think the folks who sit in the pews of the black church, they heard it loud and clear. And it's part of what I think helped to consolidate the strong coalition that we built and that sent me into victory. But absolutely, I come out of that tradition. It is the tradition that shaped Martin Luther King Jr.

who came out of the of the needs of Baptist Church. Howard Thurman said by some amazing but created spirituality, the slave undertook the redemption of a religion that the master had profaned. And it is the peculiar assignment of the black church to bear witness to God's love and justice in the world. It is a spiritual foundation that has helped to make America better. Dr. King is just one iteration and one voice and a grand and epic tradition. And it came alive during my campaign.

I think you saw people of faith stand up and say, no, we we understand that Reverend Warnock is a Matthew twenty five Christian, that he's he's trying to speak to the soul of our country, helped to build that art toward justice. And I'm hopeful that we will see more of that in the days ahead.

Senator Raphael Warnock, one of two newly minted senators from the great state of Georgia. Senator, again, congratulations. A lot of people's hopes, not just in Georgia, but around the country, I think are resting on you in part because of that kind of message that you just described there and on which you run. You ran that improbable campaign. Congratulations and Godspeed to you, sir. Thank you. Thank you. God bless. Thanks. Vice President Harris today also got to swear in, as you saw moments ago, the person who succeeded her as California's new United States senator.

His name is Alex Padilla. He has his own history of trailblazing accomplishments. Nineteen ninety nine. He was only twenty six years old. He was elected to the Los Angeles City Council within two years and became the city's youngest and first Latino city council president. From there, he went on to become a California state senator, then California's secretary of state. And now he is the first Latino ever to serve as a United States senator from my home state of California.

Senator Alex Padilla, I'm very pleased to say, joins us now. Senator, it is great to see you. Congratulations and thank you for being with us on this big day. Thank you, Rachel. Good to be back with you together just a couple of weeks ago after the governor's announcement. That's right. And I was super honored to be able to talk to you soon after that designation was made. But now I get the chance to ask you, having been sworn in, having been part of history upon history, upon history, as we were just discussing with Reverend Warnock, how how do you feel?

I imagine exhausted as part of it. But how else do you feel?

A little exhausted, a little elated because of the history that's been made today. You hit the nail on the head in the previous segment, you know, historic vice president, first woman, first African-American, first Asian, vice president of the United States, swearing in the first Jewish American African-American senator from Georgia and of course, myself making history on behalf of California. That picture. Oh, my gosh. It just says so much in one. I got the sobered by the work that we know ahead of us.

covid-19 pandemic is still raging, as we heard and President Biden's speech earlier today. And so, you know, between getting our arms around the pandemic, rebuilding the economy, advancing equity in all its forms, we certainly have a lot of work to do. But majorities with which to grow from. And before we get to next question, just a quick buck for for Senator Warner. When we met earlier, just before the swearing in was tell him how I had a chance to visit Ebenezer Church back in twenty eighteen.

I was out there campaigning and he didn't invite me to come back and campaign for next year. It said to one come back and worship. So I think he's true to his word when he said he's not interested in being a politician. You want to continue to be a servant and I certainly appreciate that.

And inspired by that, Senator Podia, this is Lawrence O'Donnell. You among the three being sworn in today are the only one who didn't have to run for that seat you were appointed. Do you feel you have to now prove your value to the Californians who didn't get a chance to vote for you for this seat? And of course, I know I'm not the first one to break it to you, but you're going to have to run for this seat in twenty, twenty two if you want to hold on to it.

So maybe you get this weekend off. But California senators are needing to fund a campaign, find that to be in and of itself almost a full time job. It is so certainly a lot on the plate, on the official side, and we're going to ramp up the re-election campaign quickly as well. Look, the voters will have their say. They'll have their say in twenty, twenty two. I like to think that voters have been able to have their say starting in nineteen ninety nine.

When I first ran for the city council in Los Angeles, in twenty six when I ran for the state Senate and in 2014 when I was first elected secretary of State. So is it more work? Yes, but Lawrence, I've been having a prove myself my whole life so work and extra hard just to get even have the respect. That's just the way it is for far too many people. And even U.S. senators are no exception.

Sometimes, Senator, one advantage you have is that since you haven't been in the Washington end of California politics, back in your home state, you were probably constantly hearing complaints, questions, issues. Why aren't they doing this? Why aren't they doing that about what Washington isn't doing for California? What can you tell us about what you might bring to this that we haven't seen from a California senator yet? Now, look, I think twofold one would think this is a very within California thing and the first Southern California United States senator in a long, long time doesn't mean I'm only going to represent the southern half of the state, but the greater Los Angeles area being the largest population base in the state and maybe a better appreciation, understanding of some of the Southern California issues are part of it.

I think certainly my journey, the first Latino in California history to enter the United States Senate gives me that unique life experience to bring to bear in all the deliberations of the United States Senate. But I'm going to work hard to be the best senator I can be for all California. Senator, congratulations, first of all, on your being sworn in today, questioned about the body in which you're about to be working, Josh Hawley has already made it his business to try to interrupt the confirmation of the Department of Homeland Security secretary, and he based that on the usual right wing meems about Caravan's and his personal opposition to DACA and believing that that should not that people who are right now enjoy protection under should not have that protection.

Given that, how difficult do you think it's going to be to achieve Joe Biden's stated goal of having an immigration reform plan go through? Republicans look like they're not going to change their attitude. This is an issue that really does concern California in a very big way. Look, I think that's why the two victories in Georgia were so important. It may be a razor thin majority, but it is a majority nonetheless for Democrats in the United States Senate, together with the majority of the House of Representatives, Joe Biden in the White House.

I'm not suggesting any of the work is going to be easy, whether it's comprehensive immigration reform or certainly a more equitable and efficient covid response, tackling climate change, criminal justice reform and more. But we have the numbers barely by an edge. But we can't afford to be bashful. We have to be bold in both policy and in strategy to get things done.

Newly minted California US Senator Alex Padilla. Sir, again, congratulations. This is day one of what is going to be a real sprint for you and your colleagues. Thanks for taking a minute to talk with us tonight. We appreciate it. Good luck to you, sir. Thank you. All right, we've got much more to come here tonight, we're going to be talking about the history that was made today by our new vice president. And, of course, as we have been watching these historic events unfold over the course of the day, the nation's journalists have been breaking a whole bunch of news.

We're going to be catching up on some of that before the end of this hour, including some disturbing new reporting just out tonight since we've been watching these inaugural festivities about what may have happened at the Pentagon when they got that call on January 6th to send the National Guard, they said, no, we are learning more about the circumstances of them saying no. And it is an unsettling story. Got that straight ahead. Stay with us. Hey, it's Chris Hayes this week on my podcast, why is this happening?

I'll be talking with Kara Swisher about big tech, Donald Trump and the future.

There's two things you have to separate. One is, should they have been allowed to do this to Donald Trump? And I think most people agree they are businesses. They don't want to do business with them anymore. That's really it's a pretty basic thing. The second part is these platforms are so powerful that there's no other choices for people. This guy has broken the rules of these social platforms over and over again, and it's accelerated how he's broken them.

He's like a drunk driver who's been driving drunk for a long time. And he crashed and they said no longer. Right. Why are we turning to billionaires to help us? Because we really this is where we're at, is that the legislators couldn't do anything about this guy.

And it took two guys, Jack Dorsey and Mark Zuckerberg really, and a bunch of others.

You're right to shut this down this week on why is this happening, search for why is this happening wherever you're listening right now and subscribe.

Madam Vice President, what do you see as the first priority now? What is the first priority? No one can ever just walk into work.

Vice President Kamala Harris sworn in this morning by the first Latina Supreme Court justice. Justice Sonia Sotomayor sworn in as the first woman, the first black woman, the first South Asian woman to be vice president of the United States a few hours after she swore to support and defend the Constitution of the United States, Madam Vice President Harris paraded down Pennsylvania Avenue with the marching band of her alma mater, Howard University in VCU, of course, in front of her leading the way.

And yes, multiple proverbial glass ceilings shattered when the new vice president walked through the doors of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building to, as she says, get to work. Joining us now, Sherrilyn Ifill, president of the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund. Sherrilyn Ifill, it is so good to see you tonight. It's an honor to have a piece of your time on what feels like an exhaustingly historic and fourth day. How are you doing after this day?

Well, how are you doing? You've been at this for a long time. It's that it's late. But, you know, we've had lots of difficult days. And so we should really use as much of the of the positive days as we can and let them drag out as long as possible. So I'm good.

Let me ask you about the nature of the historic ascendance of Vice President Harris here. Obviously, she is the first in a lot of ways. She's also going to be vice president and an administration that is taking over after one of the tumultuous, most tumultuous and scary presidencies we've had in in modern times. She's going to have a lot of responsibility and this is going to be a momentous administration no matter what. Tell me how you are thinking about the fact that she is the first African-American to have this first black woman to have this decision, the first woman, first person of South Asian descent.

How do all those firsts factor into how you're thinking about her, her historic place today? Yeah, I was really fine this morning until her swearing in and honestly seeing Justice Sotomayor holding and swearing in the vice president elect and Thurgood Marshall's Bible there. And this was really important and full circle. In nineteen seventy eight, Justice Marshall gave a speech at Howard Law School in which he talked about the fact that the legal arm was not enough. You had to have the political arm.

And he said in that speech, now we have the legal and the political arm and we have to use both. So he understood the importance of politics to moving forward, the cause of of equality and justice for black people. And so I felt that full circle today. And, of course, Justice Sotomayor sat on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, which was the first judicial appointment that Justice Marshall received from President Johnson. He went to Harvard Law School.

Obviously the vice president, then Comilla Harris, talks often about her experience at Howard. And the Howard marching band was on Pennsylvania Avenue today. So it was extraordinary. But she said the most important thing, it's time for work. And that's really what this is about. This is about not only recovering from what was one of the most disastrous presidencies in our history and certainly disastrous for civil rights and for the rights of black people and other marginalized people.

But we also plan to make progress. We don't plan to just recover from Trump. We have to move forward. We have to move ahead and we have to move ever forward towards equality and justice.

As Sherrilyn It's joy. So I hopefully you have the chance to at least take in some of the black girl joy involved in Carla Harris getting OK, good. That's that's important because you're right, there is still a lot of lot of work to do. And there's also still the fact that what happened on January 6th was in part an attempt to undo what she had achieved and attempt to pull back and not allow her to be and not allow there to ever be another like her or another Obama or to allow Georgia to do the miracle that Georgia did to reverse all of that.

And so when you when you talk about voter restrictions and you talk about people being disenfranchised, the argument you get from the other side is, yeah, but you all elected Obama. Oh, yeah. But look, there's Kamala Harris. You don't need to fix the system of voting in this country. You don't need to push back. There's no nobody's restricting anyone from voting. Look at all that's being achieved. So what do we need to do in this moment to fix our election system so that it's unquestionably fair, given the fact that there are a lot of people who just don't believe there's anything wrong with it the way it is?

Well, I think part of what hides behind the curtain is the incredible work that happens of organizers, of activists and of civil rights lawyers. I was a lot younger and prettier a few years ago. We are working overtime and had to work overtime in order to ensure that black voters could participate equally in this election. It took our suit against the United States post office. It took on the ground voter protection work for every aspect of this election. It took working to ensure that there would be absentee ballots that were counted.

It took our partnership with LeBron James to make sure we had polling place workers so that polling places were open. What people don't see as they look at the result and they don't recognize the Herculean effort that it took to make it happen. And in a democracy, this should not be necessary. They're not counting the four hours that people stood on line to vote. They're not counting the people who passed out on line because they were exhausted but refused to leave because they wanted to cast their ballots.

You know that we filed suit, a suit still pending against President Trump, former President Trump and against the Republican National Committee for their efforts to discount the votes of black voters in Detroit and in other places around the country after the election. So all of this effort, time, energy resources that went into making sure these votes were cast and could be counted, people have to understand that just looking at the result doesn't take account of that. And we want to make sure that as we move forward, there's two important bills in Congress that have passed the House already, H.R. one, the for the People Act and H.R. for the John Lewis Voting Rights Restoration Act, both of which are essential to ensuring that we have an election system worthy of a democracy.

We're worthy of a sophisticated democracy in which America purports to be, and we need this to happen. It can't take all of this effort that it took this year just to ensure that adult citizens who have the right to vote have their votes counted and are able to cast their votes without impediment.

Sherrilyn and Lawrence O'Donnell, first of all, I haven't seen you beaming like this in about four years, so I'm really happy to see that. I want you to guide us through this night of firsts. We have our first black senator from Georgia, our first Jewish senator from Georgia, and then the biggest overlooked. First of the day, we have our first Jewish majority leader of the United States Senate. And then we have our triple firsts in Kamala Harris.

I feel funny about these firsts. I celebrate them. I feel the joy of them, and I feel an embarrassment for us that our first black woman running for president was nineteen seventy, 1972, with Shirley Chisholm. Geraldine Ferraro, the first woman on a vice presidential ballot in 1984. And here we are. Thirty six years later and the woman makes it all the way. But how do we balance this? The joy of the firsts with the embarrassment that it took this long?

Well, I think we do it by doing two things, one, recognizing that every piece of progress in this country, especially racial progress, is hard fought for. It takes effort and sacrifice and often blood. And therefore, it is incumbent upon us to celebrate when we pass these milestones. But we can't pat ourselves on the back. And this is one of the things I worry about now that Trump is out of office, that we will revert to what often happens in this country.

America pats itself on the back and says, look, democracy righted itself. You elected a woman and a woman of color as your vice president. And as you say, you're going to have the first Jewish majority leader. And Raphael Warnock and John Asaph were elected in Georgia. And people will say, hooray, you see, it's not as bad as you thought. And to that, I say, no, America cannot pat itself on the back, because, as I just suggested, the effort that it takes to overcome these barriers at this point in twenty twenty one is shameful for this country.

And we have to also recognize that we still don't know yet what this country could be if we lifted the shackles of white supremacy. What we saw three weeks ago, Lawrence, with the storming of the Capitol, shows you what we're against. It's the people who don't want what we saw today. It's the people who are afraid of that progress, who are continuing to try and fail America's feet to the floor so that we can't make progress. And they are a real force.

They are a dangerous force. They are a determined force. We should never underestimate them. They are not solely embodied in one man, Donald Trump, but they live among us. And this is something we have to struggle against so we can celebrate these firsts and these milestones, but understand this much more work to be done. And the stones are not just for the sake of having people who look a particular way in office there to actually make change happen.

And so, as much as I admire and love the vice president, I'm going to be pushing her. I'm going to be pushing the Senator Schumer. I'm going to be pushing everyone when we come to judges, I'm going to be looking at those two new senators from Georgia and pushing them. The point is to make change happen and to make real progress happen and move us towards equality and justice, not just to have a nice photograph that makes America feel good about itself in terms of diversity.

So we have lots of work ahead.

Sherrilyn Ifill, before we let you go, I have to confess to you that when I was at home in covid quarantine on that weekend, when all the networks called the election for Joe Biden, it became clear that Biden and Harris were going to be going to Washington. One of the things that I did that afternoon is I Googled you to figure out your age, because it occurred to me that day that you have to be seen and you have to know that you are being seen as a potential short list candidate for the Supreme Court.

If there is a retirement from the Supreme Court, particularly at the start of this administration, have you thought about that prospect? No, really, honestly, Rachel, as you can imagine with what has happened over the last four years, I've barely had a chance to really think about anything but the work that's in front of us. And I love so much my job and love being a civil rights lawyer. I love leading the legal defense fund. It is the dream of a lifetime.

And I really I don't have those kinds of ambitions. And so I hear all of that chatter and I think it's perfectly fine. It's great to have your name on short list. It's fun, but my job is a very heavy lift and I think about it every day. I'm up most of the night, to be frank, thinking about what I need to do. And so it would be really just kind of out of order for me to be thinking about something beyond what is in front of me, which is really about all I can do and is, as I said, the privilege of a lifetime.

And at this moment in particular, it's a pivotal moment. People think we're out of the woods, we're not out of the woods. There's a lot of work to be done. And I take it very seriously the responsibility of leadership at this moment.

Well, Sherrilyn Ifill, president of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, whether or not it is on your mind every day, I am looking forward to covering your potential confirmation hearings for that job that you are not thinking about. Sherrilyn. Thank you so much for being with us tonight. I really appreciate it. Thank you. All right.

As I mentioned before, we took a break a few moments ago. We have been watching ongoing reporting over the course of the day, including developing stories that maybe could not be told until the administration had actually turned over. Well, here's one of them. The Washington Post has a new reporting tonight on the attack in the Capitol two weeks ago. Of course, we have seen new arrests and increasingly serious felony charges brought against individuals every day since the siege two weeks ago, including recent charges against people accused of planning and organizing role or even a command and control role in the attack on the Capitol and on Congress.

But for the first time tonight, The Washington Post has an unsettling report about what happened inside the Pentagon when besieged lawmakers and police on Capitol Hill called the military and begged them to urgently send in the National Guard. The initial response from the Army to that call for help was no, they wouldn't do it, even though they were informed on that call that the Capitol had been breached, that the protesters were not peaceful. They were told on that call that shots had already been fired.

There were reports of shots fired already. But still, the army on that call told Capitol Police they would not send in the National Guard. That remains one of the disturbing failures about how the capital fell that day to the pro Trump mob. Well, now, tonight, The Washington Post is reporting that one of the senior officers who was in the room when that call for help was made to the Pentagon and when the Army response was, no, you can't have the help.

One of the senior officers in the room at the Pentagon for that call is a general named Charles Flynn. Flynn Charles Flynn is the brother of disgraced Trump national security adviser Mike Flynn, who, of course, called on President Trump to use the military and martial law to seize power after the election, which, of course, encouraged Trump supporters at the Capitol on January 6th, who is a central figure in the Q and on conspiracy theory that drove so many of the fervent attackers on the Capitol on January on January 6th.

Now, what is what makes this even more disturbing is that the Army had previously repeatedly denied that Mike Flynn's brother, Charles, was part of that call to the Pentagon on January six, part of that decision to deny National Guard support to the capital while it was being violently attacked. But the Army's repeated denials that he had nothing to do with that decision, that he wasn't in that meeting, that he wasn't on the call. Those were lies. General Charles Flynn and the Army are both now confirming to The Washington Post that, in fact, he was there when the Pentagon fielded that call and did not send the guard.

Incredibly unnerving news from The Post tonight about this previously unknown role played by Mike Flynn's brother at the Pentagon, and that's The Washington Post breaking news tonight. We'll let you know more as we learn more. Stay with us. At 12 08 this afternoon, President Biden, in his inaugural address, asked the American public to pause to join him in a silent prayer to remember the four hundred thousand Americans that have been killed by the coronavirus since the first case was identified in our country one year ago today.

He later signed the first executive order of his presidency, implementing a massive mandate. He's asking the public to mask up for one hundred days, and he's mandating masks and physical distancing. And all federal buildings then reversed the US withdrawal from the World Health Organization. The White House press secretary later announcing that Dr. Anthony Fauci will be there tomorrow as a representative of the United States government when the executive board meets tomorrow. Just within the past several minutes, the White House has released President Biden's letter to the officially rejoining the organization and another executive action.

Today, President Biden created the position of a covid response coordinator for the US government to create a unified national pandemic response to deal with testing treatment PPY vaccines. That role be filled by Jeff Zients, who will report directly to President Biden. He also today re-established the Directorate of Global Health, Security and Biodefense on the National Security Council, an entity that plays a pivotal role in pandemic preparedness and response, an entity that was inexplicably shut down during the Trump administration just in time for the global coronavirus pandemic.

The new CDC director, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, announced this afternoon that the agency will immediately this is interesting, review all of the CDC's covid-19 related guidance. This, of course, comes after multiple reports, including many on this network of the Trump White House interfering in scientific guidance on covid-19 from the beleaguered CDC. President Biden set to sign a number of additional executive actions tomorrow to address the crisis, expected to include expanding testing, protecting workers, establishing clear public health standards.

He has pledged to administer one hundred million covid vaccine shots in his first hundred days in office, in part by deploying FEMA and the National Guard to set up vaccine centers across the country. Community Vaccine Administration Centers Press Secretary Jen Psaki reiterated President Biden's support for invoking the National Defense Production Act to speed up vaccine distribution. She talked about that tonight in her first press briefing.

The administration is clearly making the pandemic priority number one after so much inaction and so much counterproductive action by the previous administration. Today, over four thousand Americans died today, four thousand four hundred and nine Americans died from Coronavirus just today.

What can we expect to immediately change? What should we expect from this obvious radical change in focus and policy? What should we, the public, be able to see as the fruits of those changes in the immediate days ahead? Joining us now is Dr. Celine Gounder. She's an epidemiologist, infectious disease expert. She has advised the Biden Harris transition for months. Dr. Gounder, thank you so much for being here tonight. It's as big a day for you as it is for all of us.

But I know you've just been incredibly busy working with the transition these past few months. Yeah, it's really been rewarding work, Rachel, and to see all of this come to fruition or start to come to fruition is really I think our team just feels really relieved and is hoping for the best.

What do you think that we, the American public, will notice first in terms of the changes? Obviously, in tone and in example, everybody noticed the dramatic change today of the rigourous masking protocols and social distancing protocols that we saw at the inauguration itself and in all of the associated events. That's an important thing for us to see, sort of burned into our into our retinas in terms of what we should expect to be and see and do as Americans.

Now, what what will we see a change on in terms of of policy and the administration's new focus? I think two key words here are science and partnership, and if there's anything that I would say is the Biden brand moving forward, it is to follow the science. And if you look at all the people he's nominated, whether it's David Kessler or Eric Lander or Rochelle Walensky, who I've known for years, this is an all star team of scientists and doctors and public health experts.

So I think that is a major change here to actually have grown ups, experts in the room making the decisions. I think the other thing you're going to see is a partnership. The federal government has been largely AWOL with the exception of the operation, warp speed effort to have vaccine companies, manufacturers develop and produce the vaccines. But they didn't really have a plan for what to do after that. And so now you're going to see the federal government partner with state, local, territorial and tribal governments and public health departments with primary care providers, as well as local pharmacies to figure out how to get the vaccine out in partnership together.

I both am eager, almost desperate to see science back in the lead. I am eager, almost desperate to see daily briefings on covid from CDC officials and CDC scientists, and also worried that agencies like the CDC have been so hollowed out, beaten down and in some cases corrupted, had their work corrupted by the political influence of the Trump White House. That I'm worried that at least at the outset, they may not be up to the task. How do you balance those concerns or how should I balance them?

Well, I do think there's going to need to be a fair amount of rebuilding at CDC, rebuilding of morale and rebuilding of staff, frankly, they have lost staff due to attrition, not enough funding being invested in the CDC, and that really predates even the pandemic. Part of the reason Dr. Walensky was nominated to lead the CDC is because she is an outsider. She's a top scientists in her field. And having worked in the field of HIV for years, she really understands what it is to manage and respond to an infectious disease pandemic that also has political aspects to it.

So she's she's somebody who really will be able to look at what's happening at CDC objectively as someone coming in from the outside and figuring out how to rectify things moving forward.

I know people who work at CDC have had sources in the agency and have been reporting on them for a long time, hearing people's confidence and knowing that it's an Schuckert, the deputy director, who's going to be doing the review of the covid-19 guidance made me feel better today, knowing the confidence that people who work at that agency still have with her. So maybe that is that is the place to start. Dr. Celine Gounder, epidemiologist, member of the Biden Transition covid Advisory Board, thank you for your work with the transition and thanks for helping us understand tonight.

Thank you. All right. We'll be right back. Stay with us. Hi, it's MSNBC's Hayes Brown. You know, these days, there's just so much news to wrap your head around, it's challenging to get a deeper understanding of things. So every morning go beyond the headlines with MSNBC daily, it features Bridon perspectives from people you know and trust, including Trymaine Lee, Maggie Hassan, Liz Plank and Frank Big Luzzi. They'll take you inside the most important issues of our times, issues like systemic racism, domestic terrorism and how we can bridge our political divide.

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