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The Situation Room

House Dems to Call on Mike Pence and Cabinet to Use 25th Amendment; Trump and Pence Have Not Spoken Since Capitol Hill Attack; Interview with Representative Debbie Dingell (D-MI) about Removing Trump over Capitol Hill Riot; Interview with Michael Cohen about the Capitol Hill Siege; Two Capitol Hill Rioters Arrested and Charged by Federal Authorities; Security Concerns Grow Ahead of Biden's Inauguration; Biden to Release Nearly All Available COVID-19 Vaccine Doses. Aired 8-9p ET

Aired January 10, 2021 - 20:00   ET

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

[20:00:41]

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Welcome to our viewers here in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington. This is a special edition of THE SITUATION ROOM.

And we begin tonight with breaking news out of Capitol Hill. House Democrats just announced that they will, repeat, will introduce a resolution calling on Mike Pence and the Trump Cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution removing President Trump from office. The House is giving Pence 24 hours to respond. And then House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says they would move immediately toward the impeachment proceedings.

President Trump has only 10 days left in office. Speaker Pelosi spoke earlier tonight to CBS News about why impeachment is still so critical.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LESLIE STAHL, CBS "60 MINUTES": What if he pardons himself?

REP. NANCY PELOSI (D-CA): What if he pardons these people who are terrorists on the Capitol?

STAHL: Or pardons himself?

PELOSI: What if he does that? He can only pardon himself from federal offenses. He cannot pardon himself from state offenses, and that's where he's being investigated in the state of New York.

STAHL: There is a possibility that after all of this there's no punishment, no consequence, and he could run again for president.

PELOSI: And that's one of the motivations that people have for advocating for impeachment. STAHL: Won't that take more than the 10 days? And does it actually

make sense?

PELOSI: Well, I want to point to the amendment because it gets rid of him, he's out of office. But there is strong support in the Congress for impeaching the president a second time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Let's bring in CNN's Ryan Nobles. He's following all the breaking news for us. He's up on Capitol Hill for us. Also joining us CNN's Jeremy Diamond who's over at the White House.

Ryan, this new development, the statement from the House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that she will formally call on the vice president and the Trump Cabinet to use the 25th Amendment, the power in that amendment to remove the president from office during these final 10 days. It's a process that starts moving tomorrow morning. Update us on this timeline.

RYAN NOBLES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, that's right, Wolf. This is the first time that Speaker Pelosi has made it clear that her caucus and her fellow Democrats in the House of Representatives are ready to move forward with impeachment proceedings. We're still not exactly sure when that process will begin in earnest. We know that it begins at least in part tomorrow morning when she introduces this resolution on the House floor where she'll ask for unanimous consent to essentially put Vice President Mike Pence on notice, and tell him that he has 24 hours to tell them whether or not he plans to take the step of using the 25th Amendment to remove President Trump from office.

Now if Pence doesn't respond or if he says that he's not going to take that route then the House will begin the process of impeaching the president. Now the wrinkle that we're not exactly clear on yet and we're told that the speaker's office is intentionally being vague on is exactly when all this process could take place. It's very unlikely that they'll be able to push through this resolution through unanimous consent because only one Republican would have to object to it and therefore they would then need an up or down vote on the House floor.

So it could begin Tuesday, could begin Wednesday, but it is pretty clear that it will start at some point this week. Of course the big question here is exactly where Vice President Mike Pence stands on all of this. He's yet to say specifically where he stands.

And then the other question, Wolf, is what happens after the House passes those Articles of Impeachment, which does seem likely. There doesn't seem to be a lot of will from Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell on the Senate side to move forward with a trial and then ultimately a conviction of President Trump, so it seems unlikely that at this stage impeachment will lead to President Trump leaving office within the 10 days that he has left in his term but it seems pretty clear that at the very least Speaker Pelosi is looking for something to hold President Trump accountable for his role in the riots that took place here on Wednesday.

We'll have to see how the whole thing plays out this week -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Jeremy, it's clearly a second shoe falling for the White House and the president right now. He was already on notice for the House to introduce formal Articles of Impeachment. Tell our viewers how all this breaking news changes -- potentially changes things right now. What are you hearing from your sources?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, this is going to have two major impacts, Wolf.

[20:05:02]

First of all, it's going to make it increasingly likely that President Trump will become the first president in American history to be impeached not once but twice. And then secondly, this is going to really ramp up the pressure on Vice President Mike Pence. He has already faced calls to invoke the 25th Amendment along with the majority of the Cabinet, to strip President Trump of his presidential powers, and so far he hasn't spoken to this directly.

We have heard from sources close to him that while he is highly unlikely to invoke the 25th Amendment, at the same time he has yet to take this option off the table, instead seeking to preserve this in the event that President Trump should become even more unstable. But what will be interesting to see, Wolf, in these coming days as the House passes this resolution is whether this ramps up the pressure on the vice president to actually make a statement, to make very clear himself, not through people close to him but himself directly on the record where he stands on this option of the 25th Amendment.

And it is remarkable that the vice president so far hasn't had to do that or certainly hasn't chosen to put those views on the record, especially after four years of being unfailingly loyal to President Trump, his relationship with the president clearly deeply damaged. But this resolution could put the vice president on the spot to at least say whether or not he considers the 25th Amendment a viable option.

BLITZER: And just to be precise, they haven't even spoken in several days, the president and the vice president. They're not talking to each other right now, is that right?

DIAMOND: That's right. We've heard that they have not spoken since just before that mob stormed Capitol Hill. We know that the president called the vice president just before he went on stage and went on to pressure the vice president to refuse to certify those electoral votes, but then after that, since then, they have not spoken, including during that siege on Capitol Hill when Vice President Pence was in a secure location on Capitol Hill with that mob storming the halls chanting, "hang Mike Pence," the president still did not call the vice president at that moment or since.

BLITZER: Yes, Pence did what constitutionally and legally he was supposed to do after the electoral college decided who won the election. He certified it together with other members of the Senate and the House of Representatives. He, as the vice president, is the president of the Senate. He did what he had to do but the president hated that, and no one has been more loyal to the president than the vice president over these past four years, but that doesn't mean anything to the president, clearly.

All right, guys, stick around. I know we're going to get back to you. But joining us now, Democratic Congresswoman, Debbie Dingell of Michigan.

Congresswoman, thanks so much for joining us. So let me get your reaction to what the House speaker is doing, giving the vice president and the Trump Cabinet 24 hours to go ahead and invoke the 25th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Do you think there's a chance that Pence and company might do that?

REP. DEBBIE DINGELL (D-MI): Well, we're all guessing until he tells us what his intentions are, I would have preferred that as a method last week and I said that. I think it's cleaner. Last week there were indications that the vice president didn't want to go in that direction but it is correct that he has never taken it off the table.

I think that a lot of people at the White House that are in this administration have noticeably noticed a real difference in the president's behavior, even worse than it was, are concerned about the kinds of things that he could do and there's a lot of damage that could be done or in 10 days, tomorrow is nine days, that the president could do. The vice president has a very serious responsibility to make sure there is no further harm to this country. So I think we'll see what kind of signal he sends out in the next 24 hours, and then what happens will happen after that.

BLITZER: Yes, these are critical moments indeed. As you know, Congresswoman, Republicans, they lost control of the House of Representatives in 2018, they've now lost control of the Senate with the two Democratic wins in Georgia, and they obviously have lost control of the White House, the presidency, Trump is the loser in the presidential election.

So what do these Republicans lose at this point by publicly formally breaking with him?

DINGELL: You know, I -- one of the things we've got to be very careful here is that nobody is monolithic. Democrats aren't monolithic, Republicans aren't monolithic. Quite frankly there are some Republicans who have been totally irresponsible in what they have done, some of the newest freshmen Republicans have been egging many of these people on, telling people where Speaker Pelosi was. Some have encouraged the violence on the street.

There are others that have been very consistently concerned. Senator Mitt Romney is one, I have colleagues from Michigan that have been as well. So I think that there are people that are speaking up very openly and very candidly. That Lisa Murkowski is another Republican senator that's been very clear about what she thinks.

[20:10:03]

You know, I don't think that any of us wants to see this country further divided. This country has been -- you've heard me say this many times over the course of the last few years, it's being divided with fear and hatred. I think what happened this past Wednesday made a lot of people understand what we were saying. And I think quite frankly, one of the things you're seeing on the hill is people are getting angrier and angrier as they really understand that there was a group within the group.

Some people came just to exercise their right to freedom of speech, but there are people that came to do harm, to kidnap, to hurt and to kill members of Congress. And someone has got to be accountable for that and the president of the United States helped incite that.

BLITZER: Your colleague, Congressman Cory Bush, is actually introducing a resolution tomorrow, we're told, to expel members of Congress who she says, quote, "incited a white supremacist coup attempt that has left people dead," close quote, and we know there were neo-Nazis, white supremacists, all sorts of awful people who stormed Capitol Hill.

Will you back that resolution?

DINGELL: You know, I'm looking at all of the resolutions. Some of my colleagues are introducing censure resolutions. I'm getting more information about what some of my other colleagues have done. I think the Ethics Committee led by Ted Deutch needs to be take a very serious look.

One of the things we've got to be very careful of right now is facts. I have heard many non-facts, things that are not true. There are a lot of rumors. We need an investigation that's done very quickly, very accurately. There's a lot of conflicting information about what people said or not said. I want the facts and then people need to be held accountable.

BLITZER: Your late husband, Congresswoman, John Dingell, a great man, a man I knew well, interviewed him on many, many occasions, was the longest serving congressman in our nation's history. What do you think he would be saying now if he had been alive and he was a witness to this attack on the U.S. Capitol?

DINGELL: He would tell you that this was one of the saddest days in American history. He would also tell you that those that don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it, and he would be giving us all a very long lecture on what happened in Europe in the mid-19th Century.

I would like to tell people that Arnold Schwarzenegger did a YouTube seven-minute piece today that I would recommend to all Americans, to learn from history, hear what he talked about in his own family and the need for all of us to come together. It was one of the most moving pieces I have seen.

BLITZER: Yes. I watched it earlier today. We aired it here on CNN, it was really powerful. Very quickly, are you OK? You went through hell sure like every other member of the House and Senate on Wednesday. How are you doing? DINGELL: You know, thanks, Wolf. I'm still angry. I think quite

frankly if you're a woman from Michigan or have been in Donald Trump's hate tunnel, you maybe knew what people were capable of more than some of my other colleagues did, so I'm just on the anger. I have been living with this for a couple of years with quite frankly some pretty other violent moments in my experience in Michigan some of which you know. And I am just angry that our country is being torn apart. And I am going to even use this word on television, I'll be damned if they're going to get our democracy. I'm going to fight to defend our democracy.

BLITZER: Yes. Keep on fighting because it's an awful situation, hard to believe this is happening in our country right now.

Congresswoman Debbie Dingell, be careful out there. We'll in touch -- in close touch. Thanks for joining us.

DINGELL: Thank you.

BLITZER: A huge decision now faces the vice president of the United States, Mike Pence, and the Trump Cabinet. Would they dare to invoke the 25th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and actually remove President Trump from office? I'll speak with a former member of President Bill Clinton's Cabinet to discuss that, what Cabinet secretaries may be thinking right now. William Cohen, the former Defense Secretary, is standing by live. We'll discuss when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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BLITZER: Welcome back to our breaking news coverage here in THE SITUATION ROOM.

In the coming hours, the House Democrats plan to introduce a resolution calling on Vice President Mike Pence and the Cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment to remove President Trump from office. They will give the vice president 24 hours to respond and then if he doesn't they will proceed with their plans to bring impeachment legislation to the floor of the House of Representatives.

The former U.S. Defense Secretary William Cohen is joining us right now, also a former Republican senator.

Thanks so much for joining us, Mr. Secretary. What's your reaction to this move by House Democrats led by Nancy Pelosi calling on Pence and the Cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment and remove Trump from power even though there's only, what, 10 left?

WILLIAM COHEN, FORMER SECRETARY OF DEFENSE UNDER PRESIDENT CLINTON: Well, the most important thing is to get him out of the White House before his term expires. Whether it's invoking the 25th Amendment, if that could be done quickly, and there are a majority of the Cabinet left who would support it. That would be the easiest thing. Failing that, the impeachment resolution would pass, I assume, and pretty overwhelmingly in the House. I'm not sure if it would be even taken up in the Senate.

But the one thing I would ask is Vice President Pence in addition to invoking Article 25, Amendment 25, I would -- I would just ask him not to pardon the president. I would ask him to forebear on that so that the president, if he is going to pardon himself, that's open to legal challenge in the future. Second, I would hope that the Congress moving forward would revise and look at revising the internal guidelines of the Justice Department that say that a sitting president cannot be indicted or convicted of a crime.

That rule, and not a law, but a policy was developed as a result of a compromise reached back during 1973 and '74 when Spiro Agnew and Richard Nixon were both under consideration of being indicted, so I think that ought to be looked at again, but I would ask Vice President Pence not to pardon the president and make the president seek to pardon himself and then challenge that in the future.

He should be held accountable, what he has done. He has led a lynch mob on Capitol Hill. These people were out to lynch members of Congress and even the vice president of the United States.

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And remember, this is not only about members of Congress or black people or brown people, they had the T-shirt that said six million was not enough. It tells you there's something fundamentally wrong in the country today that the president of the United States can call upon his people to carry out a lynching if at all possible, and kill people in the process. He needs to be held accountable, not only by removing from office, making sure he can't run again, but also hold him criminally responsible.

BLITZER: Yes, these was one guy wearing, what, a sweatshirt that said "Camp Auschwitz," these were neo-Nazis who were storming Capitol Hill. It was so, so totally, totally disgusting.

What do you think -- do you think there's a chance that Pence might do this, invoke the 25th Amendment? And hypothetically, let's say the president were to say, I'll resign but you have to guarantee that you'll give me a pardon, do you think the vice president should do that under those circumstances?

COHEN: Well, I don't think the president should be pardoned. I think he should be held accountable for all that he's done. Not just this, which is just the most horrific recently, but for everything he's done since the time he took office. He has soiled the White House with his conduct. He has soiled the presidency. He has embarrassed us internationally. He has undercut our relationship with our allies and emboldened our enemies.

So I don't think he should be granted a pardon. If that would get him out of office in the next 10 days, I would prefer that we seek to invoke to remove him under the 25th.

BLITZER: So what is your sense right now? You know who's in the Cabinet, you know the vice president. What do you think? Is there a chance the vice president might do this? And the relationship between him and the president, as you know, has completely deteriorated over these days. They're not even talking to each other right now.

COHEN: Well, the president put Vice President Pence, his life, and that of his wife and family at risk. Vice President Pence is a Christian evangelical with strong religious beliefs, and I think that he should do the right thing based upon his own religious principles and conviction and conscience, but he's in a tough spot but he deserves to be in a tough spot. That's what the vice president is there to do. When the president of the United States becomes so unstable that he poses a threat to our society and to the nation at large, it's incumbent upon the vice president to invoke the 25th and to secure the necessary votes to remove the president before he can do more damage.

So it's a tough spot, but that's why he's vice president. He should measure up to that and look to his conscience and his heart to see what this president has done to this country. And then we have to move on beyond Trump because he still has his followers out there who are peddling hate, the kind of hate that you have seen on the hill against black people, brown people, Jewish people, people of the Muslim faith.

He is determined to try to invoke white nationalism or white racism in order to preserve white privilege or white power. These are the same folks who used to wear hoods and now they don't have to wear hoods because they feel emboldened. They have the president of the United States who has encouraged him to storm the hill so they became his Storm Troopers and he said he was going to lead them, and he went back to the White House. Typical of what he does, encourage others to take the fall while he's safe in his bunker.

BLITZER: You were a Republican congressman in the House of Representatives during Nixon and Watergate, and then you became a senator, then a member of the Cabinet. But give us a comparison, if you don't mind, Mr. Secretary, the severity of what our country was going through during Watergate and Nixon compared to what our country is going through now?

COHEN: I think by comparison it was quite mild, even though there was a lot of tension during Watergate, there were bomb threats, there were marches, there were individually threats upon our lives. But ultimately President Nixon believed in the system and he was told he had to resign he's going to get convicted, well, he resigned. But the interesting thing about character is, after all of those years President Nixon used to call upon me. He used to exchange letters with me.

I gave him a copy of a book of mine on Capitol Hill in Bob Dole's office because he still respected the institution. Yes, he was driven out of office through the impeachment process but he recognized that he felt more about the country than trying to stay in office over the objection of the leaders of the Republican Party. So we now have to have leaders of the Republican Party who were like those back during Watergate, the John Rhodes, we had Barry Goldwater, and others and Howard Baker. Where are those Republicans to stand up now and say, Mr. President,

you have to go? You have done too much damage to the country to allow you to stay in office during this very dangerous transition period of time in which we have a new administration coming in, and you need to hand off the baton now and get out of town.

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BLITZER: Yes, and you were in that group as a young congressman from Maine, in that same group of Republican congressmen, I should point out as well.

Secretary Cohen, thanks so much for joining us.

COHEN: Pleasure to be with you, Wolf.

BLITZER: Four days since the pro-Trump riot up on Capitol Hill, and federal authorities have just charged two more men for their alleged roles in the insurrection. We're getting new information, we have details, we will share with you when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

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BLITZER: New arrests and new federal charges today after a mob incited by President Trump attacked our nation's capital. I want to get right to our justice correspondent, Jessica Schneider.

Jessica, so you're getting new information. What more are you learning?

JESSICA SCHNEIDER, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Wolf. Two new sets of federal charges tonight against men from Texas and Tennessee, and prosecutors tonight revealing disturbing details about one of those men in a criminal complaint just filed in federal court and then just released. So his name is Larry Brock and he is now under arrest. He's charged with violently entering the U.S. Capitol.

His image was captured in several locations inside the Capitol. You can see him there with the green helmet, green tactical vest, a black and camouflage jacket, and prosecutors say the beige pants he wore, you might be able to see, had white flex cuff or a white flex cuff attached. That's something that's used by law enforcement to restrain suspects.

And we've now learned tonight that he is a retired Air Force Reserves officer. His record shows that he served as an A10 pilot until 2007, he retired in 2014. And the FBI was actually tipped off to his identity when Brock's ex-wife called the FBI on Friday. She said she had seen him in photos that had gone viral and she told the FBI this, she said, quote, "I was afraid he would be there." Brock is now being held in Texas.

And there's a second person being charged federally tonight. Eric Munchel. He's being in Tennessee. He was referred to as zip-tie man online because he was carrying several of those zip-tie plastic hand restraints. You can see him there. He is now also federally charged with violent entry and entering restricted grounds.

Wolf, this now makes 20 people facing federal charges. But the acting U.S. attorney here in D.C. is saying this is just the beginning. He says hundreds of people may end up under arrest as they continue this investigation.

And Wolf, this investigation encompasses hundreds of prosecutors. Hundreds of FBI agents working from three command centers 24/7. And one of the things that we've heard from law enforcement is that they have been getting tips from people. Of course this is what led to the arrest of Larry Brock, the tip from his ex-wife, as well as another witness but a lot of tips flooding into the FBI tip line and that's helping law enforcement move in to make arrests of these people who are at the U.S. Capitol but have now gone far and wide across the country.

You saw Larry Brock arrested in Texas, another suspect tonight was arrested in Tennessee, so a lot happening all over the country as law enforcement moves in -- Wolf.

BLITZER: Yes. I suspect there will be hundreds and hundreds of arrests coming up. That, as I keep pointing out, the U.S. Congress has so many closed-circuit cameras in there. They've got video, they've got still pictures, they've got a lot of evidence potentially that can be used.

SCHNEIDER: They do.

BLITZER: Jessica Schneider, thank you very, very much.

Coming up, we're getting new details also tonight about the lack of coordination between authorities in the leadup to the deadly riot up on Capitol Hill, and the threats that remain ahead of President-elect Biden's inauguration in 10 days.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:37:48]

BLITZER: Ten dangerous, very dangerous days lie ahead here in the United States of America as the clock runs out on the Trump presidency, one that will be marked and remembered by a deadly insurrection on our nation's capital that he incited, but even with the end so, so near, each hour seems to carry a new threat to America's fragile democracy.

I want to bring in our national security analyst Samantha Vinograd.

Sam, today Democratic Congressman Jason Crow actually released details of a call he had with the U.S. Army Secretary Ryan McCarthy who said at least 25 domestic terrorism cases have been opened as a result of the attack on the U.S. Capitol. What's your biggest concern with inauguration now only 10 days away?

SAMANTHA VINOGRAD, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Wolf, we have to confront two security realities. In the first instance, there's a global message that there's havoc in the homeland. That signals to a host of maligned actors that we are distracted and that we may not be paying as much attention to other threats overseas. Certainly the inability or the unwillingness of the federal government to protect Americans in our Capitol doesn't inspire confidence that we are able to do so in other corners of the world.

I think maligned actors may view this as an opportunity to hit us in other areas. Here in the homeland, Wolf, we are in a live high threat environment. The Department of Defense, Chuck Schumer, the FBI, Twitter and others have warned about the risk of further violence. There is a million militia march planned and we've seen ongoing chatter related to potentially further violence.

In terms of targets, Twitter specifically named the U.S. and state capitols. There are a host of other politically affiliated entities, individuals and events, including the inauguration, that really represent a range of softer targets. For that reason we really need right now is public officials to come out and brief the public on the threats that we understand what is happening so that we can be vigilant.

BLITZER: What needs to happen right now, Sam, to ensure that things run safely and smoothly, especially on Inauguration Day, January 20th?

VINOGRAD: Well, certainly we would imagine that at this juncture, federal, state and local law enforcement officials are trying to get a grasp of the ongoing threat.

[20:40:03]

There were clearly security and intelligence failures. Wolf, this was a preventable catastrophe. For years, we have had DHS, the FBI and other officials specifically warned about the risk of domestic violence and extremism or DVE. The reason Homeland Security assessment specifically warned about post-election violence and warned that domestic violence extremists may try to exploit otherwise peaceful First Amendment activities to pursue their own violent and criminal agendas.

The writing for this attack was on the wall and it was ignored. A bipartisan commission needs to investigate why this happened and how so that we try to mitigate the chances of it happening again.

BLITZER: Well, are you concerned -- I know I am -- that potentially there could be more violence in the days and weeks ahead?

VINOGRAD: We should certainly expect more violence and in particular we should expect violence in and around political entities, individuals and events. That's why we need more information from the federal government about what to expect and what we can do about it. We are seeing social media companies trying to mitigate online radicalization and operational planning by de-platforming certain apps like Parler, and by kicking off certain users including President Trump. Behind the scenes, ostensibly law enforcement and intelligence

professionals are trying to gather threats perhaps through the Joint Terrorism Task Forces, which is run by the FBI, but at this juncture the public needs more information and we need to hope that there is increased coordination behind the scenes.

Longer term, Wolf, we do need to have a serious conversation strategically about how we got here. You know, my father who's watching tonight, I believe, is a holocaust survivor and he has taught me for a long time the costs of staying silent and has taught me that despots don't appear overnight. They are emboldened over time by enablers, whether people actively support that person or stay silent.

As a country, once we get to this high risk period, we have to have a strategic conversation about how a man, Donald Trump, was able to feel so omnipotent that he incited an insurrection in our nation's capital. That's a strategic conversation that we need to have once we get through this high threat period.

BLITZER: An important conversation indeed. And we will have that conversation in the weeks and months ahead. So many lessons have to be learned.

Samantha Vinograd, thanks so much for joining us.

VINOGRAD: Good night.

BLITZER: The coronavirus is surging across the United States right now. And amid the surge, the vaccinations are much, much lower than planned. Now some doctors even throwing away -- get this, they're throwing away doses. What is going on as people are dying in record numbers in the U.S.?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[20:47:34]

BLITZER: We'll have much more on the breaking news. In just a few moments House Democrats moving forward right now with immediate plans to try to remove President Trump from office, but there's other important news we're following including more on the pandemic and a lagging response here in the United States.

The Centers for Disease Control now says the U.S. has distributed more than 22 million doses of coronavirus vaccines to hospitals and health centers around the country, but only about 6.7 million Americans have gotten the first dose. Even as the virus continues to surge across the country, record cases, hospitalizations and deaths.

So what's the hold-up? Joining us now our medical analyst, Dr. Seema Yasmin. She's a former disease detective for the CDC. She has an important new book coming out this week entitled -- there you see the cover -- "Viral BS: Medical Myths and Why We Fall for Them." Also joining us Dr. David Shulkin, former Veterans Affairs secretary under President Trump. Dr. Shulkin, Operation Warp Speed as it's called is clearly not living

up to its billing. In some medical facilities, pharmacies around the country there are vials of COVID-19 vaccines that just sitting there, idle. They're not making it into arms? So what's your view? What has gone so horribly wrong with this rollout as so many Americans are dying?

DR. DAVID SHULKIN, FORMER SECRETARY OF VETERANS AFFAIRS UNDER TRUMP: Wolf, it's clear that the issue is not the supply of the vaccine. The issue is not being able to get enough people injected with the vaccine. And so what we need to do is we need to expand the eligibility of the people that should be getting the vaccine, go beyond category 1A of the health care professionals, vaccinate those that are senior citizens, our highly vulnerable populations, those frontline responders, and expand that capability, as well as dramatically expand the access sites to be able to get a vaccine.

Every health care professional that can give a vaccine should be eligible as long as they can store the vaccine safely to be able to give these. And so we have a lot more that we need to do because right now across the country the freezers are filling up with this vaccine and it's not where we need it.

BLITZER: Yes. I'm so afraid that some of those vials will be wasted. They'll be thrown away unless they start injecting those doses into people's arms.

Dr. Yasmin, let me ask you about this new Biden plan as it's being projecting.

[20:50:03]

He's proposing to stop holding back second doses, make them -- make the total supply available immediately for first doses. Some people, including Dr. Paul Offit, who is on the FDA Vaccine Advisory Committee, they say that's potentially a risky strategy.

What do you think?

DR. SEEMA YASMIN, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: I think it's a calculated risk, Wolf, based on vaccinating tens of millions of Americans now. So basically as you're saying, we have so much vaccines sitting in freezers that needs to be administered. The Biden administration is saying let's distribute that now, let's give it to the people who need it with the hope that in the coming months we'll have the vaccine available for those when they are due their second dose.

So I don't think they're throwing caution to the wind or doing away with the science in any way. In fact I think they're staying in line with what FDA and World Health Organization have said in the last week, which is that if you receive the Pfizer-BioNTEch, you need your second dose after 21 days. If it's the Moderna vaccine, then up to 28 days. But this is really trying to address the fact that, yes, vaccine has been distributed, more still needs to be that when it's not being administered, that's a real problem. BLITZER: Dr. Shulkin, are we taking advantage of the enormous

infrastructure, the capabilities that exist in the United States, for instance, could various -- you know, could military operations, could the military be mobilized to get the job done? What about FEMA? If there is a hurricane or tornado, FEMA is mobilized. What about all that?

SHULKIN: Well, Wolf, this is the problem with not seeing a national response and not treating this as the true national emergency that it is. Not only should we be activating FEMA like we do in response to weather emergencies and other natural disasters, but frankly, the entire health care system should be mobilized.

And this is not that different than the flu vaccine where we do 125 million flu vaccines each year, where doctors' offices, clinics, supermarkets, other places that can use pharmacists and other health care professionals can vaccinate. And frankly, we haven't even begun to start tapping into that system that we already know works and that we rely on every year. So it's time that we put this as a priority and treat it as a national emergency, and I know that's what the Biden administration will do in 10 days.

BLITZER: I hope so.

Dr. Yasmin, we're hitting the two-week mark since Christmas. We're starting to see the leading edge of the predicted holiday surge in cases. Already some hospitals, they are swamped. In Los Angeles, they're running out of ICU beds. How much worse do you expect it to get?

YASMIN: It's really difficult to wrap your mind around it getting any worse than it is right now, but we fear that's exactly where we are headed. From where I'm speaking to you in Santa Clara County, California, we are having ambulances in some cases waiting six or seven hours to unload sick patients into the E.R. because it's that backed up. But when you look at the models for California, we still think it's going to get worse in terms of the number of daily infections until at least January 27th with a peak in the number of COVID-19 deaths on February 9th.

So it looks to be getting worse because we're only just now starting to see because of the lag. The real after-effects of people traveling for Christmas. We're not even seeing the after-effects of people congregating, perhaps, for New Year's. Nationally there are some projections that show more than half a million Americans dying by mid- February. It's hard to even say that. And about 600,000 deaths by the end of March.

So we have to do everything right, of course, and we expect that to start happening in 10 days' time, but even if we do everything right now, there are still numbers of people who will die just baked into these models because of how high the infection rate has been in recent days. So hard to wrap our minds around, but it's going to get worse, we think, before it gets better.

BLITZER: Yes, we need a national program. This has got to get done because so many people are dying right now.

Dr. Seema Yasmin, Dr. David Shulkin, thanks to both of you for joining us.

YASMIN: Thank you.

SHULKIN: Thank you.

BLITZER: Tonight I'll be hosting a new CNN Special Report "24 HOURS THAT SHOOK AMERICA." I'll be looking at the insurrection up on Capitol Hill that happened this week. And what happens next? Here's a little preview.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED PROTESTERS: Fight for Trump. Fight for Trump.

MANU RAJU, CNN SENIOR CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: We have been told by Capitol Police that the Capitol is in lockdown.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They broke the glass.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Everybody stay down, get down.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Gunshots rang out. The rioters actually start -- tried to ram the doors down.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST, "THE LEAD": We are watching an attempted sedition. We are watching an attempt at a bloodless coup in the United States.

[20:55:02]

JIM ACOSTA, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: This is a bonfire of the insanities that we're watching in the nation's Capitol right now, and it all flows from Trump.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: His initial reaction was not horror, which was almost everybody else's reaction. His initial reaction was to watch the show.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I heard multiple conversations loudly and publicly, find the vice president, hang the vice president.

UNIDENTIFIED PROTESTERS: We want Pence. Hang Mike Pence.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There is a very real possibility that we will see aggrieved members of his base at the inauguration conducting protests. What we don't know is whether those will turn violent.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Make sure you join me for the CNN Special Report, "THE TRUMP INSURRECTION: 24 HOURS THAT SHOOK AMERICA." That airs later tonight 10:00 p.m. Eastern right here on CNN. House Democrats wasting no time after Wednesday's assault on the U.S.

Capitol, moving ahead with impeachment faster than we've ever seen. We're going to tell you why it could call on the Vice President Mike Pence and the Cabinet to invoke the 25th Amendment and remove Trump from office.

We have details when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN Breaking News.

BLITZER: Welcome to our viewers here in the United States and around the world. I'm Wolf Blitzer in Washington. This is a special edition of THE SITUATION ROOM.

We have breaking news right now here on CNN. The speaker of the House laying out the steps to