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Don Lemon Tonight

Congress Extends Government Funding to Avoid Shutdown; FDA Issues Emergency Use Authorization for Moderna Vaccine; Trump Shows No Leadership as U.S. Faces Multiple Crises; Secretary of State Pompeo on Hack on Government Systems; Michael Flynn, Pardoned By President Trump Suggests to Use Military to Maintain Power; Lara Trump Served on Board of Company Through which Trump Political Operation Spent $700 Plus Million; Supreme Court Puts Off Ruling on Whether Census Tally Should Include Immigrants in U.S. Illegally; Laura Coates Makes Her Case; CA Hospitals on the Brink as COVID Cases, Deaths Surge Aired 11p-12a ET

Aired December 18, 2020 - 23:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[23:00:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LAURA COATES, CNN HOST: This is CNN Tonight, I'm Laura Coates in for Don Lemon. And we begin with breaking news. Congress voting tonight to avoid a government shutdown which would take place one hour from now.

At just midnight eastern, both the House and the Senate passing a stopgap bill, a two-day extension of government funding, to keep federal agencies operating just through Sunday night. Why just Sunday night you ask, well, here is where it gets a little confusing.

Congressional leaders are trying to tie together a $900 billion pandemic relief deal. With a massive $1.4 trillion package to keep the government funded through next year. And so far both sides, Republicans and Democrats, have failed to come to an agreement on the COVID relief deal that millions of Americans are waiting for and counting on.

So, lawmakers are going to have to stay in Washington over the weekend trying to hammer out a final COVID stimulus agreement that they have said for days they are on the cusp of reaching.

Also breaking tonight, the FDA issuing an emergency use authorization for a second coronavirus vaccine, this one made by Moderna. All that needed now before Moderna's vaccine can be distributed, well, is a green light from the CDC. Its advisory panel is meeting this weekend. And if all goes well the Moderna vaccine could be given to Americans starting next week. And it can't come soon enough with the pandemic raging out of control. More than 249,000 new cases of COVID 19, and more than 2,800 deaths just reported today.

And sources telling CNN there were early warning signs months ago of a possible massive cyber hack of critical U.S. government infrastructure. But the evidence was apparently inconclusive. Despite these initial indicators, a tremendous scope of espionage campaign and its sophistication only became clear last week. And with all of these important breaking news stories tonight, one big question, where is any leadership from President Trump?

A lot to discuss, I want to bring in CNN's White House correspondent John Harwood, Mark McKinnon, a former adviser to George W. Bush and Senator John McCain, and also CNN's economic commentator, Catherine Rampell.

I'm glad to have each of your minds here tonight. Thank you. I want to begin with you, John, because President Trump, well he's been holed up in the White House with country in, well, what can be describe only as a crisis. The coronavirus is raging. We're under a cyberattack. So, what is Mr. President Trump doing?

JOHN HARWOOD, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Laura, you know what, I think it's not all that hard to figure out. The presidency is a really hard job. Especially if you do it right. And to do it right requires you to care about things other than yourself to be interested at least to some degree in public service. Donald Trump is interested in self- service.

So, for most of his presidency, he's gotten gratification from the public performative parts of the job, the adulation, the attention, the news coverage, that sort of thing. But once he lost the election those public duties become kind of humiliating. And so what the president's been doing is staying in private, nursing his grievances, lying to claim that he did not lose the election, that it was stolen, lashing out at his enemies.

And not attending to the American peoples business either on this pandemic. He's not played a particularly active role in the negotiations over the COVID relief bill, and we've had almost no public response from him on this Russian cyber intrusion in much of the U.S. government.

COATES: You know, when you call humiliation, every other president has had to do it with the transition. So, they've still been able to run through the tape somehow as you know.

[23:05:08]

Mark, the man with the hat, let me go to you. President Trump is encouraging Republicans, as you know, they'll love it, to help keep him in office and it won't happen. But why is he fighting so hard to keep a job that -- I've been talking with John, he doesn't seem to want to do anyway?

MARK MCKINNON, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: I'm sure it's not about the job. It's about his legacy. And it's about the psychology that he can't confront, which is losing. He's not wired to accept the notion that he can lose anything ever. And it strikes me that this -- we are facing in this transition period some of the greatest challenges we've ever met.

So, at the time we have challenges that are so substantial, I can't recall a time when challenges this substantial had been met with such an inadequate response, not just inadequate, but not a response at all. As John pointed out, we are facing, you know, multiple challenges on

multiple fronts. The virus itself, the rollout of the vaccine, the cyberattack by Russia, which I think is maybe one of the most under reported, underappreciated, long term problems and lasting damages that this country may face, that we may not understand for years to come. And may be facing consequences for years to come.

COATES: And look, if we don't know what happens still in Helsinki, imagine it's not knowing what the scope and the breadth of this particular cyberattack is right now. It's a really shocking thing.

And as you say, I mean, Catherine, I want to bring you in here, because as you know, the House majority leader, Steny Hoyer says the earliest we can see even a vote on an area of profound importance to the American people, this COVID relief bill, the earliest might be Sunday. And this deal, I mean it cannot come soon enough. I mean, Americans are struggling. Why can't they get this done?

CATHERINE RAMPELL, CNN POLITICAL REPORTER: I think when it comes down to is one party seems to care about governing and about the vast suffering that you were describing, you know, whatever it is, 12 million people who say that they don't have enough food in their household last week, the 8 million who'd fallen into poverty just since June. The rising numbers of people filing for unemployment benefits, etcetera. There's a party that cares about them and is trying to solve their problems.

And then there's a party that doesn't. That is using this as a source of political leverage to try to trash, basically, non -- you know, urgent -- other kinds of urgent matters. The things that are about to fall off the cliff next week. Like this unemployment benefits per se. And perhaps even trying to salt the earth as a new administration, a Democratic administration comes in the door.

So, yes, I mean, it seems like both sides were inching towards a compromise just few days ago. And yet at the very last minute, another ranch was thrown into negotiations, trying to take away the emergency lending powers of the Federal Reserve for no apparent reason. And once again we do not have a deal.

COATES: Well, you know what, Catherine, it's interesting. Because I think a few days ago, we would have been able to tell which party was which in the scenario you talked about. Who cares? Who's throwing the wrench in the plants? But John, I mean, President Trump signed the funding bill to avert the government shutdown for now.

But now Bernie Sanders, Senator of Vermont, is warning that he won't allow a spending package to pass the Senate without what he called substantial direct payments. He's actually pushing for $1,200 checks to individuals. So, could this negotiation still break down even at this point?

HARWOOD: I doubt it. It's always possible. And Congress has the ability to reach an impasse at any moment. But I do think that both sides, and Catherine framed it correctly, Democrats care a lot more about solving these problems than Republicans do. Republicans are the anti-government party. They don't want to spend money except on things like tax cuts. And so, they just have less interests.

However the scale of the suffering is enough and the attention on it has been enough, that Republicans I think cross the Rubicon and decided we got to do something. Not as much as is needed, not as much as Democrats want, but something substantial, $900 billion is a lot of money.

And I do think that at the end of the day they are going to figure out a way to park some of these concerns about the fed, some of the -- other concerns about liability, shields for corporations that Republicans have raised, and the direct payments were a way to provide some aid that wasn't aid to state and local governments that Republicans were resisting because they don't like government. And I do think that they're going to, after a weekend of negotiating, get something. And before leaving for Christmas pass a bill.

COATES: I mean, the idea that we have Congress kicking the can down the road, and you have got every day Americans looking in their cabinets trying to find enough cans to have a holiday meal is just something that's beyond most people's comprehension about the role of government.

[23:10:05]

But you know, Mark, all of this on the backdrop right now. You raised the cyberattack that has happened. And Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, you know, he was asked about the cyberattack. Here's where he told Marc Levine.

This was a very significant effort he said, and I think it's the case that now we can say pretty clearly that it was the Russians that engaged in this activity.

The president says he's the toughest on Russia and he hasn't even said a word right now, Mark. What do you make of that?

MCKINNON: Well, one thing that strikes me is how much we miss John McCain in a moment like this. Not just on (inaudible) issues, but especially on international issues and foreign policy with nations like Russian. McCain would always stand up and his famous mantra was of course, country over party. In this case it seems like Donald Trump is dedicated to the notion of party over country.

It's great to see Pompeo say the obvious. What is striking to all of us and has been an ongoing mystery since four years ago, is how many times can we count that the president has ever said anything critical of the Vladimir Putin including and especially now. It's hard to imagine a greater invasion of our security then what's just occurred. And yet the president is still mute.

COATES: Mute and everyone is trying to have an explanation. Some semblance of security that going forward even in a new administration. I cannot imagine what the fallout and the cleanup will have to be. But Catherine, you know, General Mike Flynn, let's we forget about national security and the role of say Russia. Michael Flynn enters the picture again. Recently pardon by the president. He was on a far-right channel. And he was spewing some un-American frankly nonsense, about how President Trump could maintain his power.

Because he suggests using the military, even calling for martial law, and Catherine he went so far as to say, he's not specifically calling for that to happen, but the idea that he's just putting it out there, I mean, just in case anyone is listening. I mean, it's crazy, right?

RAMPELL: It's absolutely insane. I mean, we have to keep asking the question that political scientists have been asking for the past four years, what would you say if this was happening in another country, right? If a general were urging, suggesting, (inaudible) the president to you know, to use martial law, essentially, to steal an election from a duly elected opponent, what would you say? You would probably call it a coup.

I mean, there's an ongoing sort of philosophical you know, whatever, word choice debate going on about whether a coup is the right word, but it's pretty clear that Mike Flynn at the very least is nudging us in that direction. Now, of course whether it will happen is a completely separate issue.

But again, I mean this is just, this is stuff that happens in a banana republic. This is not the kind of thing you would expect to happen in the United States. And I think it just speaks to the fact that what used to be sort of the lunatic fringe of the Republican Party has increasingly gobbled up the center.

You know, Mike Flynn was the former national security adviser. And now he's the one spreading these conspiracy theories. It's really shameful and frankly embarrassing.

COATES: It is. And these really are hypotheticals at the end of an exam in college when the professor runs out of question to ask. And yet right now it's our democracy. Thank you all. I appreciate your insight tonight.

You know, a critically important development on the coronavirus vaccine front. The FDA authorizing a second vaccine for emergency use. This as the number of daily cases and deaths hit record highs.

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[23:15:00]

COATES: Breaking news tonight. The FDA granting emergency use authorization for the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar saying that almost 8 million doses of both the Moderna and Pfizer vaccine have been allocated for distribution next week. And Dr. Anthony Fauci saying Moderna vaccinations could begin as soon as Monday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: I would anticipate, Savanah that we likely will see shots in the arm by the very early part of next week. I would hope Monday or Tuesday. But you know, we just have to wait to see for the final decision. But very soon, literally within a few days.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COATES: The usual vaccine distribution could not come at a more crucial period in our fight against the virus. You know, today is the 17th consecutive day where we had set the record for hospitalizations. And with more than 249,000 new cases reported just today, a single day record. That is a streak that's not likely to end anytime soon. Just think about that. Almost a quarter of a million Americans diagnosed with COVID today alone.

Joining me now, CNN medical analyst Dr. Larry Brilliant, an epidemiologist. Dr. Brilliant, I'm glad you're here today. Thank you for joining and bringing your insight and expertise. Because people could be receiving the Moderna vaccine as soon as Monday. So, when will we start to see the impact of this second vaccine on the pandemic, Doctor?

DR. LARRY BRILLIANT, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: Thanks for having me, Laura. It's a great holiday present. Having a second vaccine like this available now. You know, we have 200 million doses of the Moderna vaccine ordered. A hundred million of the Pfizer vaccines. They are very similar. If we had 300 million times two, which is 600 million, enough vaccine for almost 300 million people to be vaccinated.

[23:20:03]

We'll really see a huge impact, but the 8 million that we are having now, the 4 or 6 million will have by the -- addition by the end of the year, we won't start seeing this impact until we start reaching maybe April, March, April. We'll see a little bit of impact. But it's still, it's still a great Christmas present. And it allows us to see as everyone is saying, the light at the end of the tunnel.

COATES: I mean, how do you eat an elephant? When bite at a time. We want to start getting through it at this point in time.

BRILLIANT: Right.

COATES: Dr. Brilliant, you know, officials from a number of states are saying that they're about to see less vaccine dosage shift to them than they initially planned. So, what's the story here? What's happening?

BRILLIANT: We can't figure it out, there's no transparency as so much with this rollout. I think the important thing, the really big picture is that this is -- especially the Pfizer vaccine. It has to be kept 100 degrees below zero Fahrenheit. That's quite a bit. At least the Moderna vaccine can be kept almost at regular refrigerated temperature. It's extraordinarily complex. It's like a diver that has a dive that's rated as a 10 as difficulty. We have to expect there to be some glitches. But we don't want this many.

COATES: Well, if we don't have transparency, we're not going to be able to have an effective and equitable rollout, I might add too. I mean, the vaccines are only as good as those who are vaccinated by it. Dr. Brilliant, the influential IHME model is now projecting this horrible number, that over 560,000 Americans will lose their lives to this virus by April. And that is up 60,000 from (inaudible) just last week. So, is it a sign that we're still not handling this virus correctly? I mean, are people just not getting it right now?

BRILLIANT: People are just not getting it. 600,000 is a number of deaths in 1918. We're going to almost double the number of deaths before summer. We are just now seeing the effect of thanksgiving. We haven't finished seeing the bump in hospitalizations and deaths from thanksgiving. We're soon going to see Christmas, and then New Year's, and as long as people think that this is still not serious, which I can't comprehend, we are going to have this for a long time.

And I do want to mention what you just said is so important. That if we don't have transparency, if don't have honesty, if we're not clear and open with everyone, how can we engender trust in something that is as new as a vaccine like this?

COATES: If we're seeing this follow-up from thanksgiving, I can only imagine what's going to happen after Christmas and New Year's. People realize the gravity that's involved. Dr. Brilliant, thank you, thank you so much.

BRILLIANT: Thank you, nice to see you, Laura.

COATES: Nice to see you too. Happy holidays. And we've seen a lot, a lot of grift frankly from President Trump since Election Day. And now a new report says that his daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, used to be a board member of a company that a lot of Trump campaign money was funneled through since 2019. So, the big question is what was that money spent on?

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[23:25:00]

COATES: President Trump raising hundreds of millions of dollars just since Election Day by pushing lies and bogus claims of election fraud. Now we're learning more about some of the financial operations of the Trump campaign that raised all kinds frankly of legal and ethical questions.

The New York Times is reporting that Lara Trump was on the board of a company that Trump (inaudible) operation used to spend more than $700 million just since 2019. Joining me now, New York Times national political reporter, Shane Goldmacher and who broke the story. Also joining us is CNN legal analyst, Elie Honig, and investigative reporter David Cay Johnson.

What a team to have tonight. Thank you for being here. Shane, let me begin with you. Because you got a limited liability corporation, you know, a LLC, called American Made Media Consultants. And it is set up with Eric Trump's wife on the board. So, why would the president need that? What did they spend all of that money on? SHANE GOLDMACHER, NATIONAL POLITICAL REPORTER, NEW YORK TIMES: So, the

Trump campaign had this set up where they used this LLC, and they routed almost half, about half the total spending that they did to this entity. And what this does is it prevents the public reporters, anyone from really seeing the final destination of all those dollars.

And they're not the first to use an LLC to obscure some of their spending, but it is unusual to have a family member overseeing it. And something that didn't come out until just today after the election.

Again, $700 million went through this, for media buys, television buys and staffers that we don't know who they are yet or consultants making money. We just don't know who was paid through this entity.

COATES: So, you report that the whole arrangement has never been disclosed. But this LLC was the subject of complaint to the FEC. Right? Tell us about that.

GOLDMACHER: Yes, so the existence of the LLC we knew about. We knew that they were routing their payments through this company. And then you would not see the final destination of the money. So, over the summer a watchdog filed a complaint said, hey, look guys, you're basically just trying to hide where the ultimate money is being spent. Now the FEC, this is not a place that moves quickly for most (inaudible). They don't have enough commissioners to formally meet.

So, that complaint is ongoing and pending. But what we learned today is that there were family members, Lara Trump, the president's daughter-in-law, as well as John Pence, a nephew of the vice president were on the board until late 2019. And their names were on early drafts as signatories of the creation of this LLC from the very beginning.

[23:30:00]

COATES: What is the campaign saying to try to explain any unmute sound so suspect? What are they saying if anything?

GOLDMACHER: They're not saying much of anything. They just saying so far look, this was legal. There is nothing unethical about it. And that's the only answers that we've gotten so far.

You know, I think that there are going to be more questions about what exactly happened to the money that went to this LLC. But, you know, that complaint process is slow.

I think the other part of the story is really what Trump is going to do next because he continues to raise a large amount of money in his post-presidential time, going into potentially running again in 2024. He has raised $60 million for a new PAC since he lost the election.

He is going to be able to use that money to fund his post presidential activities, again, higher staff, keep a political operation in place. And he may continue to use this LLC or some other entity to not exactly share where all the money is going.

COATES: And no transparency and no explanations. I'm guessing that, Eli, that you have some concerns as a prosecutor about this --

(LAUGHTER)

COATES: -- that you might think there is some potential illegality about all of this. Tell me your thoughts.

ELIE HONIG, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: I do have some concerns, Laura. First of all --

COATES: I knew it.

HONIG: Look, I'm sure you share them as a former prosecutor. This looks like just a good, old-fashioned grift in a couple of senses. First of all, it is just a bait and switch, like the pitch out there to potential donors is help me fight this campaign, help me overturn these results. We know what a flawed doomed effort that was.

But it turns out because the election laws are so broad, the money that is coming in and people may not understand this, the president, Donald Trump, can use that, yes, to pay his legal fees, but that is a small portion of the money to retire campaign debt, but really to build up his war chest for potential future runs. So, that's one part of it.

The other part is this is what prosecutors call a shell corporation, this LLC. The only reason it exists is to move money from here to here. That is it. And if you needed any more red flags, how about this fact of Laura Trump being the CEO? I'm not buying that. Are you?

COATES: Well, you know, I hate to have my name be used for nefarious purposes. OK --

HONIG: So differently.

COATES: Laura should be on the up and up at all times. David, I want to bring you in on this. You know, you say a lot of Donald Trump's business arrangements. So, tell me, what is going on here?

DAVID CAY JOHNSTON, INVESTIGATIVE REPORTER: Well, this is, Laura, a very classic Donald Trump. What he has done here is diverted more money than his entire 2016 campaign spent to this entity. We call them shell corporations, but their real purpose is to blind us to what is going on in the other side.

And since we know that some of this money went back to members of the family, we can assume that more of it went back to members of the family and who knows where else.

The thing to keep in mind is that weak as our campaign finance laws are, they are shot through with problems of nondisclosure. And the fact that Trump didn't appoint federal elections commissioners so the commission for the moment can't do anything, fraud is always and everywhere a crime.

And prosecutors need to be looking at, was there fraud here, both in the money that flowed through American made media consultants and the money that is flowing now post-election toward Trump.

COATES: Something tells me it is certainly on their radar. David, I want to follow up with you here. I mean, you have New York authorities who you know are already investigating millions in tax write-offs from the Trump Organization and some that may have gone to Ivanka Trump.

Eric Trump has been deposed in a private investigation into whether that organization has defrauded tax authorities. So, it looks like all of Trump's inner circle might be under a very large microscope now.

JOHNSTON: Well, this is how Trump has always operated. I mean, Donald Trump is the head of a white-collar crime family. These are not people who break your legs or kill you, they are people who cheat you, don't pay you, and use the white collar laws, which are not particularly strong either, in order to make money off of you.

And so, you want to keep only people who are beholden to you or in the family in the know about your nefarious activities to minimize your risk. And trump has lots of risks here.

You will remember that Eric tried to avoid testifying to Letitia James, the state attorney general's team. She has inherent civil but not criminal authority.

But I am sure that his lawyers advised him to be cautious because the state attorney general's investigation could easily morph into a New York State (INAUDIBLE) enterprise case, a criminal case that would be very devastating to the Trumps.

COATES: Gentlemen, thank you all. Shane, incredible reporting. I appreciate it tonight.

You know, President Trump is often low he likes to fudge the math when it's not in in his favor. And now, the Supreme Court is botching the arithmetic, too, over his push to exclude undocumented immigrants from the census count.

[23:35:02]

COATES: I make my case, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COATES: In what might be one of the most consequential cases ever, the Supreme Court kicked the can down the road. In an unsigned opinion with a noted dissent from the court's liberal justices, the high court decided not to rule on whether the president of the United States could exclude human beings from the census count.

[23:40:05]

COATES: Sure, you can add whatever prefix you want to a human being, citizen, noncitizen, legal, illegal, documented or undocumented. In the Constitution, the founders contemplated counting everyone, using words like persons and numbers, even if enslaved persons because there were only 3/5 human at the time. But the concept of arithmetic or the result in congressional representation that stemmed from that arithmetic, it was never questioned.

I mean, what could be more clear? And yet it seems that arithmetic is President Trump's nemesis. When it comes to counting, Trump always seems to be annoyed. Subtraction is his best friend and his one solution fits all.

Take the number of the voters who lawfully voted early or by absentee ballots or by mail. Subtract them from the popular vote. Take the number of Electoral College votes that president-elect Joe Biden received. Subtract those numbers and put in a new slate.

Don't like appointees who put the country over filthy? Get rid of them. Fear that there might be too many congressional seats from blue states that might have undocumented immigrants. Subtract the undocumented from the census count and shuffle the seats. Will of the people? Discount it.

The trend is clear. What is not clear is why the Supreme Court, now comprised at even more justices who regard themselves as original list, would refuse to just say how addition works? One human plus one human equals two humans, simple enough. All (INAUDIBLE) understand is that undercounting hurts us all.

But no, the Supreme Court majority decided that even a cursory lesson in counting was somehow premature and opted to take a wait and see approach for a president who thrives on unpredictability, even when the rest of democracy is clear.

I guess it is better to add to the uncertainty that Americans feel about the sanctity of our Constitution then subtract any doubt that it's a government of for and by human beings, a republic, if you can, well, add.

You know, hospitals in California are getting overwhelmed by the coronavirus, and medical workers are running out of options.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNKNOWN: We're getting crushed. I'm not going to sugar coat this. We are getting crushed.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[23:45:00]

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COATES: As COVID-19 rages out of control, hospitals in California being overwhelmed amid an unprecedented surge in cases. ICU capacity is dropping down to nearly zero in Southern California. The state is the nation's worst hot spot, recording a shocking 270,000 new cases just in the past week. All of this as the country braces for another surge after the Christmas holiday.

CNN's Lucy Kafanov now on the dire situation Southern California, where doctors say they're getting crushed by the pandemic.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

LUCY KAFANOV, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In Southern California, hospitals are at their breaking point. Too many coronavirus patients and as of Thursday, no ICU beds left.

Just outside of Los Angeles, the Arrowhead Regional Medical Center in San Bernardino, so overwhelmed they have had to treat COVID-19 patients inside the surge tents.

UNKNOWN: Look around. This is not ideal.

KAFANOV (voice-over): All 48 ICU beds full. The majority is COVID patients. The relentless pace, the deaths, and the suffering are taking a toll.

UNKNOWN: It's probably the hardest year I've ever had as a nurse. And we still have our families and our loved ones to worry about.

KAFANOV (voice-over): Dr. Rodney Borger, who oversees the emergency department, says this is the worst crisis he has faced in his 25-year career.

RODNEY BORGER, CHAIRMAN OF EMERGENCY DEPARTMENT, ARROWHEAD REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER: The thing that keeps me up is when there is a time where we have to decide who gets something and who does not.

KAFANOV: So if things don't change -- your concern?

BORGER: If things don't change, we are going to probably be rationing care, and that is something that is very concerning.

KAFANOV: That is a decision no doctor wants to have to make.

BORGER: That's a decision nobody wants to make.

KAFANOV (voice-over): The state reporting more 147,000 new coronavirus cases in just three days, activating its mass fatality plan, ordering 5,000 body bags, and 60 refrigerated trailers on standby as makeshift morgues.

UNKNOWN: That means that we expect to have more dead bodies than we have spaces in morgues for them. That frightens me. And it should frighten you.

KAFANOV (voice-over): In Los Angeles, where the mayor is in quarantine after his nine-year-old tested positive, officials say an average of two people is dying every hour. The number of patients hospitalized across L.A. County tripling over the past month to more than 5,000.

UNKNOWN: We're getting crushed. I'm not going to sugar coat this. We are getting crushed. KAFANOV (voice-over): In some areas, emergency rooms are so crowded that ambulances had to wait hours to offload patients, some on gurneys outdoors waiting. The entire San Francisco bay area is now effectively locked down.

[23:50:02]

KAFANOV (voice-over): Ninety-eight percent of the state's population ordered to stay at home.

(INAUDIBLE) is a traveling nurse who arrived to California in May. She is exhausted from all the deaths and wants people to take the

virus seriously.

UNKNOWN: It's really frustrating because, like today, I lost my patient. She is like -- and so that was somebody's family member. And for people to still believe that this isn't real is just like -- I don't know. I take offense to it and I would take a greater offense if that was my family member.

KAFANOV: Laura, the doctors, the nurses here say they've never seen anything like this before. Yes, vaccines are being distributed. There is hope on the horizon. But there is also the holidays coming up. And if people let their guard down right now at this critical time, the doctors here say there are going to be dark, dark times ahead. We have not yet turned the corner on this pandemic. Laura?

(END VIDEO TAPE)

COATES: Lucy Kafanov, thank you so much. It is just heartbreaking to see those images.

I want to bring in Dr. Anish Mahajan, who was the chief medical officer at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center. Doctor, thank you for being with us here tonight. I appreciate it. You are actually in L.A. Country, and you are actually out of ICU beds.

So, it begs the question, what happens now when people who need them arrive at the hospital? Are they just turned away? That can't be.

ANISH MAHAJAN, CHIEF MEDICAL DIRECTOR, HARBOR-UCLA MEDICAL CENTER: No, we don't turn people away, but we don't have anything near the usual or ideal situation.

When we reach a point like we have in Los Angeles, where there are no more ICU beds, where our hospitals are overflowing already, what happens is ambulances have fewer choices to go to hospitals as hospitals are on diversion.

But when every hospital is on diversion, the ambulance has to go somewhere. So, it comes to hospitals like ours. But it takes longer for the patients to get off the ambulance and get cared for in the emergency room because our emergency rooms are filled with patients who are seriously ill with COVID.

COATES: So, why is Los Angeles seeing such a surge right now? What has happened?

MAHAJAN: It's a lot of factors. But I think the most overriding factor is that people haven't really been able to or have not chosen to take this as seriously as they should and stay at home.

People -- what we are seeing in our hospitals as causing the overflow of the hospitals right now is what happened over Thanksgiving holidays. People mingled, people saw their families and their loved ones, and we're seeing the infections now two or three weeks later.

We also have the situation like we do in the public hospitals where we treat the working poor. People need to put food on the table. They need to make rent. And we have yet to see relief from Congress, paycheck relief. We need that badly. We need to tell people that we want you to stay home, but we have to give them the ability to do just that.

COATES: The dignity to thrive is so important. I mean, nationwide, right now, I mean, this is the 13th-straight day of record hospitalizations. I mean, tell me, what is the toll that this is taking on frontline workers like your staff? I mean, you got this vaccine but -- is that enough hope right now?

MAHAJAN: The vaccine is an incredible hope. We started vaccinating our employees this morning at 6:00 a.m. We vaccinated over 600 of our highest-risk employees, ICU nurses and doctors, ER nurses and doctors, and others. It's a great glimmer of hope.

But our folks are tired. This is the tenth or eleventh month of the pandemic. And people are tired. Some of them are getting sick from COVID. Others are getting sick from stress-related conditions. And we're overwhelmed. We have just too many patients, and we don't have enough ICU nurses and ICU doctors.

So, what happens is people get stretched thin. People who are working a desk job for many years, when they were a nurse 15 years ago, are back at the bedside pitching in. But this is not ideal and it creates very stressful situation.

COATES: Doctor, thank you for your time and thank you, in particular, for making sure that we drew attention to the working poor because COVID-19 has magnified existing inequities. It didn't necessarily create them but it's magnifying. We have to do more to correct the things that were taking place, even before now. I appreciate your time. Thank you. We'll be right back.

MAHAJAN: Thank you.

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[23:55:00]

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COATES: This year "CNN Heroes: An All-Star Tribute" celebrated the incredible people behind this year's biggest stories. I mean, it was a truly amazing finale. Anderson Cooper shares your choice for this year's most inspiring moment.

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ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Sometimes, a photograph can capture the mood and the attention of the world. In June, one image did just that.

During a protest in the streets of London, events turned violent. Black Lives Matter group was there to condemn statues of people with racist ties and many white protestors were there to protect the statues. Things got heated.

One man, Bryn Male, a white former police officer, wandered into the crowd and he started to get beat up.