Harris will make history as the first female, first Black and first South Asian vice president, and she will be sworn in by the first Hispanic and third female justice in US Supreme Court history.

President-elect Joe Biden and Harris will take their oaths of office on the West Front of the US Capitol during a significantly scaled-down event on January 20.

Authorities are bracing for more extremist violence in the coming days after supporters of President Donald Trump stormed and breached the US Capitol on January 6 in a violent riot that left five people dead. The National Park Service announced Friday that the National Mall will be closed to the general public on Inauguration Day due to security concerns.

Biden rolled out his first legislative priority this week, announcing a $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package that included direct payments to Americans. Biden made clear during a speech on the plan that he wanted it to be the first issue Congress takes up after he is inaugurated on January 20.

"Full achievement of the Biden-Harris Administration's policy objectives requires not just the executive actions the president-elect has promised to take, but also robust Congressional action," Klain wrote.

And on January 22, Biden will direct his Cabinet agencies to "take immediate action to deliver economic relief to working families bearing the brunt of this crisis," Klain writes.

Biden will also order the federal government to determine how to reunite children separated from their families at the US-Mexico border, as well sign additional orders aimed at tackling climate change and expanding access to health care.

"Of course, these actions are just the start of our work," Klain writes. "Much more will need to be done to fight COVID-19, build our economy back better, combat systemic racism and inequality, and address the existential threat of the climate crisis. But by February 1st, America will be moving in the right direction on all four of these challenges — and more — thanks to President-elect Joe Biden's leadership."

Because Biden routinely promised to take action on "Day One" of his administration, hosts of interest groups and advocacy organization have put public pressure on Biden to live up to his promises.

"There is a lot riding on Biden ending the ban on the first day of his presidency because this is something he has campaigned on," said Iman Awad, national legislative director of Emgage Action, an advocacy organization for Muslim Americans. "With that, we understand that we are facing so much during this political moment: A current president making this transition nearly impossible, the insurrection, and the pandemic. Nevertheless, Muslim American communities are hopeful that the Biden Administration will fulfill that promise, despite the crises happening."

For climate change activists, Biden's promise to take swift action on an array of climate issues was a key part of why progressives rallied around Biden once he cleared the Democratic field, said Jared Leopold

"I do expect that the Biden-Harris administration will take affirmative steps within the first day or so of taking office to satisfy their campaign pledges," David said in an interview with CNN, highlighting the need to "ensure that the rights of LGBTQ students are enforced under Title IX."

"Presumably, The Temple was singled out by a racist and anti-Semitic group or individual bent on silencing our joint Temple-Ebenezer Baptist Church MLK Jr. Shabbat," Alexander wrote

"Authorities are conducting an investigation," the letter said. CNN has reached out to The Temple and local authorities for additional information.

Rothschild later befriended King, per The Temple and city of Atlanta's websites, and delivered a eulogy for King at a memorial service organized by Atlanta clergy members.

The foreign minister of Luxembourg openly called Trump a "pyromaniac," ​while diplomats are privately saying they "blame Trump squarely for the chaos in America since the election, including the Capitol riot," as one did to CNN, reflecting the sentiments of others in the same role.

"Europeans have considered the last four years extremely distasteful. They've been bemused by Trump's envoys, like Richard Grenell in Germany, who have turned up and started behaving like Fox News anchors and insulting the country they were supposed to be building relations with," Barker said.

While the assumption is that the transatlantic relationship will improve under Biden, four years of carnage has spooked the European political scene.

"From our perspective, Trump saw Europe as an enemy," a senior European diplomat told CNN. "The lasting impact of 'America First' is the US having fewer friends in Europe."

"The European relationship has changed and will now be shrouded in skepticism," said Cathryn Cluver Ashbrook, executive director of the Project on Europe and the Transatlantic Relationship at the Harvard Kennedy School.

Barker agreed, saying it would be "important to see how the new administration acknowledges the damage that has been done by Trump to America's reputation." And on top of the big picture issues like Iran and China, Barker said, "how can [Biden] send State Department officials to Ukraine to warn about corruption with any immediate credibility?"

Despite optimism that Biden will restore a more collaborative approach to shared priorities, European diplomats and officials are adamant that moves towards an independent defense policy and international "strategic autonomy" will not slow down.

"In some respects, it was a good thing Trump forced us to think more about diplomatic initiatives, NATO and withdrawal of US troops," said the German diplomat. "It might come as a shock to Biden, but the prospect of the US underpinning European security is not as attractive as it was when he and Obama left office."

"We cannot afford to be naive. If you look at the number of votes that Trump got, he wields an influence on American voters. This anti-global, 'America First' undercurrent in American politics is still very much alive and we have to hedge our bets," said the EU diplomat.

Regardless, the Trump era has left Europeans with little choice but to wait and see how much of a priority Biden places on reclaiming America's place on the world stage. 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Trump likely was looking at polling data that showed Biden, among the top contenders in the Democratic primary, was beating Trump in a general election matchup by the most and was better liked than Trump's 2016 opponent, Hillary Clinton.

What perhaps Trump didn't realize was that he was playing right into Biden's hands. His efforts seem to prove an important point for Biden: Biden was the Democrat Trump feared most at a time when Democrats were more likely than ever to prioritize electability over issue agreement.

Second, Biden defeated Trump in his re-election attempt. Biden did so by doing minimal campaigning, as Trump seemingly went everywhere during the coronavirus pandemic.

Biden seemed to learn the lesson of Clinton's campaign. Studies showed that Trump polled best when the media spotlight was not on him because he is not a popular politician. His best path to winning was by making the contest a lesser of two evils in the eyes of voters, which he failed to do in 2020.

Third, Trump was impeached a second time after an insurrection that he incited last week over outrage of the 2020 election results. Trump just couldn't seem to believe that he lost the election to Biden, which many of his supporters couldn't as well.

Trump it seems, couldn't stand not to be the center of attention, which is unusual for an outgoing president.

Meanwhile, Trump's overall approval rating has dropped below 40%, the worst for any president after one term and his approval rating among Republicans has dipped below the 80% mark for the first time in a long time.

Biden, it seems, not only won the election, but he won the transition period as well.

"This stuff has always been part of the stew," said Liam Donovan, a Republican strategist in Washington. "Trump just turned up the heat and brought it to the surface.

"You can't just push QAnon followers away," said Rothschild. "We've seen, certainly in the Georgia runoff, where these margins are thin, you can't piss off 1 or 2% of your constituents."

"If leadership doesn't hold certain members accountable, there's going to be a real problem," one Republican House member told CNN this week.

"It's like Trump looked for the most gullible members, found the Freedom Caucus, and decided even they weren't up for the job so he cooked up this mutated QAnon caucus," said one GOP operative.

So far, there's been close to zero pushback against QAnon candidates from national party leaders -- no denial of campaign funding or threats to revoke committee assignments.

QAnon devotion will linger within the GOP long after Trump leaves office.

There are plenty of Republicans in the conference disturbed by the prominence of "fellow travelers" of these conspiracy theorists and the long-term impact this will have on the party.

The centrality of Trump to the QAnon theory cannot be overstated, which is why it's an open question as to the movement's staying power. As long as he was the President, however, party leaders have essentially welcomed conspiracy theorists into the coalition.

Across the GOP, the emergence of QAnon candidates was either gently condemned or tolerated.

Whether the conspiracy survives in the next few years as a force in the party depends in part on how much Trump remains on the scene. For years, the President has been a crucial actor in the narrative of QAnon, and experts say it's not certain how believers will factor him in once he's no longer President.

By the time the coronavirus pandemic was in full swing, QAnon had absorbed much of the far-right conspiracy theories and concerns, says Rothschild."With the pandemic, everything became about everything," he told CNN. "It turns into Bill Gates, it turns into China, it turns into 5G. This all sort of mushes together and it becomes impossible to separate."

Once Trump began ramping up in his own false conspiracy theorizing about a "stolen election," there was a ready and willing community of people online ready to subsume those lies and act on them.

But the January 6 assault on the Capitol showed Republicans and the country the consequences of tolerating conspiracy theories without fully understanding them or justifying the threat of danger from them. For some, it was a wake-up call that the contagion had spread and could not be contained.

"To the extent it shows up in Congress, it's mostly in the form of 'just asking questions' or 'providing a voice' on behalf of constituents," said Donovan. "For those where this is a vocal constituency there's little incentive to confront the people who are voting for you. So I suspect it will be laissez-faire in most cases until another instance where it rears its head and can't be ignored."

Michael Pratt, a spokesman for Operation Warp Speed, also denied the notion the reserve was "exhausted" in a statement to CNN.

"It's just so disappointing," he added. "People are desperate for the vaccine, and we have worked so hard to be able to expand who's eligible, and to not be able to do it is just crushing right now."

Oregon Health Director Patrick Allen, in a letter to Azar in which he recounted a call with Brown and Operation Warp Speed CEO Gen. Gustave Perna on Thursday, demanded that the HHS chief reconcile his statement about "releasing the entire supply" with this revelation.

"I do not believe I misunderstood," Allen said. Allen confirmed that Oregon will have to delay its plan to start vaccinating seniors January 23, since no surge in vaccine is coming.

"I am demanding answers from the Trump Administration. I am shocked and appalled that they have set an expectation on which they could not deliver, with such grave consequences," Oregon Gov. Kate Brown, a Democrat, tweeted Friday. "This is a deception on a national scale. Oregon's seniors, teachers, all of us, were depending on the promise of Oregon's share of the federal reserve of vaccines being released to us."

Vaccine maker Pfizer says it has second doses of coronavirus vaccines ready to ship as needed.

"We are hearing there is not a stockpile of vaccine for second dose but that it was more of a 'paper exercise,' " said Dr. Marcus Plescia, chief medical officer for the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials. "The stockpile appears to be all on paper; they were tracking anticipated need but not actually holding back product."

"I think the original message got lost in a lot of overpromising," Plescia said. "Until there is a more robust supply we need to be clear with the public that opportunity to get the vaccine is limited."

"It was a complete surprise," Freeman told CNN on Friday, adding, "To hear that this had been done for several weeks was actually shocking to us."

"I don't know if the right hand knows what the left hand is doing here," she said, adding that there's a risk that people will not be inoculated correctly if the federal government isn't providing reliable numbers for its vaccine supply.

While vaccines were developed in record time, the process of getting them into Americans' arms has moved far more slowly than officials promised. That's largely because the Trump administration left it up to each state to figure out the herculean task of vaccinating its population. But the administration's constantly fluctuating estimates about how much vaccine will be available have also made it difficult for states to craft vaccination plans, state officials have said.

The President later released a stronger video denouncing the incident, but sources told CNN that Trump later appeared to regret making the video.

Although Trump has enjoyed widespread support from police unions in the run up to the 2020 election, even law enforcement organizations that endorsed him for reelection -- such as the powerful Fraternal Order of Police -- were appalled at the Trump-fueled January 6 attack on the Capitol.

In a strongly worded statement imploring the President to speak out against the Capitol violence, the group said, "the images coming in from the United State Capitol Building today are heartbreaking to every American. We call on President Trump to forcefully urge these demonstrators to stop their unlawful activity, to stand down, and to disperse."

With less than a week remaining as president, Trump's ceaseless false claims of mass voter fraud continue to threaten and make life more difficult for law enforcement in America.

"When you see these thugs being thrown into the back of a paddy wagon. You see them thrown in rough," Trump said, adding, "Please don't be too nice."

The Gainesville, Florida, police department said Trump had "no business endorsing or condoning cops being rough with arrestees and suggesting that we should slam their heads onto the car while putting them in." The department added that Trump's remarks "set modern policing back and erased a lot of the strides we have made to build trust in our community."

Trump's caustic comments about the investigators working to uncover Russian influence stood at odds with his attempted "pro-law enforcement" image, as did comments made by the President's attorney, Rudy Giuliani, when he compared career FBI agents to murderous Nazis.

While addressing a group of police officers early in his presidency, Trump encouraged those in attendance to be "rough" with suspects.

As the nation prepares to inaugurate Joe Biden as the 46th President of the United States, federal law enforcement agencies have transformed the nation's capital into a veritable fortress -- fearful that pro-Trump supporters could stage an attack along the lines of the Trump-inspired violent insurgence at the US Capitol on January 6.

Biden's relief proposal now shifts to Congress, where it may change substantially as Democratic leaders transform it into a bill. They must decide whether they want to use a special legislative process called reconciliation, which would require only a simple majority of votes to pass the Senate -- eliminating the need for Republican support -- but would limit the provisions that could be included. Also, reconciliation also be used only sparingly each year.

In his speech Thursday night, Biden said he would like to work with members of both parties to enact his American Rescue Plan, indicating that he wants to go the traditional route, which would require the backing of at least 10 Republican senators.

Whatever leaders decide, the effort is expected to have an easier time passing in the House -- which approved a $3 trillion relief package last May that contained measures similar to those in Biden's plan -- even though Democrats now hold a slimmer majority there.

In coming weeks, senators will have their hands full with President Donald Trump's impeachment trial and with voting on the President-elect's Cabinet nominees, none of whom have been confirmed yet.

Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York told The Washington Post on Thursday that people should get an additional $2,000 in stimulus checks on top of the $600 they received as part of the $900 billion relief package lawmakers passed last month -- more than the $1,400 top-off payment Biden is suggesting.

One of those senators is Joe Manchin, a moderate Democrat from West Virginia. He has recently expressed doubts over providing $2,000 in stimulus payments, preferring a more targeted approach.

President-elect Joe Biden unveiled a $1.9 trillion relief package Thursday that included more stimulus payments and other direct aid, but don't expect to see those funds in your bank account anytime soon.

There are clear political ramifications to all this. Biden promised to administer 100 million shots in his first 100 days and his team knows they will be swiftly judged by their ability to hit that target.

The list of promises is long and ranges from climate change policy and union rights to trust in government and foreign policy issues like rejoining the Paris climate accord and rescinding Trump's targeted travel bans. Right now, it's a little unclear what exactly Biden will sign on Day One. What is clear: He made a lot of promises, so January 20 could be a very busy day.

He'll need Congress to help with that and other plans. He's also inheriting some headaches, especially when it comes to foreign policy. On Taiwan and China, Cuba and Yemen, the Trump administration is handing Biden major policy changes he doesn't agree with but that he'll have trouble undoing.

The plan would send $350 billion to state, local and territorial governments to stem public-sector job losses, add $15 billion to an existing grant program to help child care providers and provide $15 billion to create a new grant program for small business owners, but much of that is in response to the coronavirus crisis and less of a permanent response.

This stood out as a very un-Trumpian thing for Biden to say: "There will be stumbles," Biden said on Thursday of his Covid plan. "But I will always be honest with you about both the progress we're making and what setbacks we meet." Trump would never admit to failings of his own administration.

Biden privately resigned himself to the fact that impeachment will be yet another issue facing his incoming administration. It certainly seems like he would rather have avoided the issue, especially because he regularly promised to "turn the page" from Trump. But that ship has sailed, and now Biden is pushing for a bifurcated approach to impeachment -- meaning the Senate would focus on impeachment for half the day and confirming his top administrative posts for the other half of the day.

Miller was also asked what he had learned about Russian activity below the threshold of war. "Good on them" was his surprising response.

"I kind of, you know, like professionally I'm like, wow, they're doing pretty well, and they're using a lot of irregular warfare concepts, information, all this stuff, in a way that, you know, like ... good on them," he said.

Miller became the acting secretary of defense when Trump fired Mark Esper via Twitter on November 9, two days after Joe Biden was declared the winner of the Presidential election.

On Friday, Miller touted the ongoing contentious troop withdrawals from Iraq and Afghanistan to 2,500 personnel in each country, despite opposition from Capitol Hill and Esper.

As Trump makes little effort to quiet the nerves of a rattled nation, details of what unfolded during last week's Capitol siege have become more unsettling by the day as federal authorities have raced to apprehend the most dangerous rioters while warning of plots for more violence next week when President-elect Joe Biden will be inaugurated. close dialogSign up for CNN's CNN's Chris Cillizza cuts through the political spin and tells you what you need to know. Sign Me UpNo ThanksBy subscribing, you agree to ourprivacy policy.Sign up for CNN's CNN's Chris Cillizza cuts through the political spin and tells you what you need to know. Please enter above Sign Me UpNo ThanksBy subscribing, you agree to ourprivacy policy.You're on the list for CNN'sCNN's Chris Cillizza cuts through the political spin and tells you what you need to know. close dialog/* effects for .bx-campaign-1245919 *//* custom css

The Washington Post was the first to report Friday that Pence and his family were whisked to safety in a nearby room mere seconds before Eugene Goodman led the mob away from some of the nation's top elected officials to another corridor where other officers arrived as backup.

Pence was clearly a top target in the riot; widely circulated video has shown the rioters chanting "hang Mike Pence" as they stormed the Capitol after Trump turned on his vice president by erroneously suggesting that he could have abandoned his duties and changed the outcome of the presidential election.

"Some guys started getting a hold of my gun and they were screaming out, 'Kill him with his own gun,'" Fanone, an officer for nearly two decades, told CNN.

"He was practically foaming at the mouth so just, these people were true believers in the worst way," Hodges told CNN.

"These men weren't drunks who got rowdy — they were terrorists attacking this country's constitutionally-mandated transfer of power," Sasse said in a statement. "They failed, but they came dangerously close to starting a bloody constitutional crisis. They must be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. The FBI is investigating widespread calls for violence across the country and every American has an obligation to lower the temperature."

Biden outlined his own plan to accelerate distribution of the Covid-19 vaccines on Friday. Though his proposal was short on details, he said he would expand eligibility for those 65 and up to get vaccinated -- a step the Trump administration also encouraged this week.

But several governors said they were furious Friday after learning that the federal government has no reserve of additional Covid-19 vaccine doses to distribute -- days after Trump administration officials announced with much fanfare that they planned to release a reserve of second doses to make more vaccine available to those 65 and older.

"It appears now that no reserve exists. The Trump administration must answer immediately for this deception," Inslee tweeted.

During a news conference, Oregon Gov. Kate Brown -- also a Democrat -- said she was "shocked and appalled" that the Trump administration set an expectation earlier this week, knowing that they could not deliver on it.

"Their empty promises are literally playing with people's lives," Brown said. "While the Trump administration pulled the rug out from under us like a cruel joke, let me assure you that Oregon's priorities, and my priorities have not changed. ... I remain committed to vaccinating our seniors quickly. But this failure by the Trump administration will unfortunately cause a two-week delay in beginning vaccinations for seniors quickly."

Pfizer has told CNN it has vaccine doses on hand to ship when they are requested by the federal government. "We are working around the clock to produce millions more each day," the company said in a statement.

More than 27,000 new Covid-19 deaths have been reported in just the first 10 days of 2021, according to data from Johns Hopkins.

At this rate, more people could die from Covid-19 in January than any other month of this pandemic. December had a record high of 77,431 deaths due to Covid-19.

He also expressed concern about "the inevitable arrival of the more highly transmissible" strain of coronavirus that was first detected in the United Kingdom and has spread to at least eight US states, including California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, New York, Pennsylvania and Texas.

There were 129,229 Covid-19 patients in US hospitals on Sunday, according to the COVID Tracking Project -- the sixth highest figure recorded. It was the 40th consecutive day that US Covid-19 hospitalizations remained above 100,000.

CNN medical analyst and emergency physician Dr. Leana Wen echoed that statement, telling CNN's Ana Cabrera Sunday, "The individuals who did not use masks or social distancing at the Capitol probably are also not following these guidelines when they go back to their home communities."

In Kentucky, Gov. Andy Beshear said his state was seeing a "real and significant increase in cases and our positivity rate from people's gatherings around the holiday."

"This surge that we're in right now is at least twice the rate, the seriousness, of the previous surges that we have seen," the governor said Friday. "This is our most dangerous time."

There were 7,497 Covid-19 patients in Florida hospitals on Sunday, according to the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration. That's about 3,000 patients more than were hospitalized in the state about a month ago, on December 12, when the AHCA reported 4,343 hospitalizations.

"The speed with which we are reaching grim milestones of COVID-19 deaths and cases is a devastating reflection of the immense spread that is occurring across the county," Los Angeles County Director of Public Health Barbara Ferrer said.

"The best way to protect ourselves, slow the spread, and stop overwhelming our hospitals, is to pause participating in any activities that aren't absolutely essential," she said.

Meanwhile, the nation's Covid-19 vaccine rollout "is absolutely not working as intended," said Dr. Megan Ranney, a CNN medical analyst and an emergency physician.

"We have three times as many doses that have been distributed to states as have actually gotten in arms," she said. "We have to do something different, and we have to do something different now."

President-elect Joe Biden will aim to release nearly all available doses of Covid-19 vaccines in an effort to quickly ramp up the US vaccine rollout, a spokesman for his transition team said.

But it could also be risky, because the vaccines by Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna require two doses administered weeks apart to be about 95% effective, and vaccine manufacturing has not ramped up as rapidly as many experts had hoped.

Officials aren't recommending patients delay receiving their second doses, she said. People should still plan to receive the second dose of Pfizer's vaccine 21 days after the first dose, and the Moderna vaccine 28 days after the first dose.

"Right now, the issue is not so much supply, but it's actually that last mile of getting (vaccines) from the distribution sites to, actually, people's arms," she said. "If we have more supply, that's not actually solving for the right problem."

If there isn't enough vaccine in reserve for people to received second doses, she said, "I think that could really fuel vaccine hesitancy and further erode public trust in these vaccines."

When Democrats began an impeachment inquiry against Trump in September 2019, removing him from office wasn't anywhere near as popular. Before House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced that inquiry, only about 40% of Americans were for impeaching and removing Trump. About half the electorate was against it.

The fact that so many Americans want Trump out of office is, indeed, historically unprecedented this early in the process.

The percentage of Americans who wanted Bill Clinton impeached after his affair with Monica Lewinsky never climbed higher than 40%. Likewise, the percentage of Americans who thought Richard Nixon should be removed or should resign from office was at about 40% when the House voted to formally start an impeachment inquiry in February 1974.

In order for Trump to be found guilty by the Senate this time around, at least 34% of Senate Republicans would have to vote yes.

Support among Republicans stood at just 13% in the ABC News/Ipsos poll. And an average of all polls since Wednesday puts that percentage at about 15%. About 10% to 15% of Republicans were in favor of impeaching and/or removing Trump during the last Trump impeachment proceedings. What happens to these percentages in the coming weeks is very much up in the air. Biden's going to be president in less than two weeks. He will be president and Trump will likely be gone from office by the time the Senate votes on any impeachment issues regarding Trump.

What is clear cut is that Americans are very unhappy with Trump after the events and aftermath of Wednesday. The mere idea of removing a president from office is a big step. A lot of Americans look ready to take it again.

The potential removal of President Donald Trump from office starts out more popular than any other removal process of a president in recent American history. Removing Trump from office remains quite unpopular among Republicans, however.

House Democrats are still discussing whether a vote to impeach Trump could be Tuesday or Wednesday, per aides.

"We'll take the vote that we should take in the House, and (House Speaker Nancy Pelosi) will make the determination as to when is the best time to get that vote and get the managers appointed and move that legislation over to the Senate," Clyburn told CNN's Jake Tapper on "State of the Union."

"It just so happens that if it didn't go over there for 100 days, it could -- let's give President-elect Biden the 100 days he needs to get his agenda off and running, and maybe we'll send the articles sometime after that," the South Carolina Democrat added.

By impeaching and removing Trump, even at this late stage of his term, the Senate could subsequently vote to disqualify him from ever holding federal office again, taking an extraordinary action against a former president.

The comments from Clyburn come as Democrats grapple with how impeaching Trump for a second time could impact Biden's early days in office, when he is working to get administration appointments approved in the Senate and tackling legislative priorities, like another coronavirus relief package.

Democrats plan to introduce their impeachment resolution, which already has more than 190 co-sponsors, on Monday and sources tell CNN that the party is looking at having votes no sooner than Wednesday but they are still sorting out their plans.

"There's strong support in the Congress for impeaching the President a second time," she said.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell previously made clear in a memo that even if the House moved in the coming days to impeach Trump, the Senate would not return to session before January 19. That would place the start of the trial on January 20 -- the date of Biden's inauguration.

Pelosi said in a interview on CBS' "60 Minutes" set to air Sunday evening that she liked the idea of invoking the 25th Amendment "because it gets rid of him," but explained, "one of the motivations people have for advocating for impeachment" is to prevent Trump from holding office again.

"The train has left the station on impeachment," an official close to Biden told CNN. "Trying to stop it would not only fail, but put Biden on the wrong foot with progressives and most Democrats across the party."

Already, several congressional Republicans have joined Democrats in making clear they want Trump to leave office, though not all agree that impeachment is the right option.

Sen. Pat Toomey told Tapper Sunday that he thinks Trump should resign. The Pennsylvania Republican -- now the second Republican US senator to call for Trump's resignation -- had previously said he thinks Trump "committed impeachable offenses," but that he wasn't sure removing him this close to the end of his term was the right course of action.

Alaska GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski said Friday that the President should step down from office, telling the Anchorage Daily News of Trump, "I want him out. He has caused enough damage."

Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, meanwhile, has endorsed invoking the 25th Amendment, which would force Trump's removal.

This is also critical if we are to overcome the demographic hurdles our labor market faces as Baby Boomers retire and the influx of Millennials slows.

The ugly truth of our criminal justice system is that one in three Black men in the United States has a felony record, putting them at a severe disadvantage.

Admirable commitments by companies to be more inclusive in hiring must be coupled with an intentional process for second chance hiring. My research has shown that "disposable employee" labor, in which the employer is trying to get the cheapest effective wage possible through minimum wage jobs that are subsidized by temporary tax credits (Work Opportunity Tax Credits), will not work because they do not adequately distinguish who is ready for reemployment nor do they make the sufficient investment to support rehabilitation.

Done right, second chance hiring that offers the needed training and support repays the required investment with loyal, productive and profitable employees (the upfront costs can even effectively be offset by tax credits). Without such an approach, our labor force cannot hope to reflect the diversity of our population.

Employment is foundational to rehabilitation for the millions of Americans with records and the more than 600,000 who exit prisons each year.

Even those businesses such as schools, defense contractors and financial institutions that have regulatory constraints on who they can hire have important roles to play. They can support education, reentry and workforce development nonprofits or advocate for policies that improve employment outcomes. 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Of course, such a move in the United States would immediately run afoul of long-established laws stemming from Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which set up the EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission) to adjudicate race-based hiring, firing and promotional grievances. Seminal cases such as Griggs v. Duke Power Co. (1971), McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green (1973) and Hazelwood School District v. United States (1977), among many others, served to advance the legal structure through which American companies now deal with matters of race and equity in the workplace

Over time, these lawsuits gave EEO policies more teeth by defining a legal framework for ensuring workplace protections. They also forced companies to rewrite or get rid of unfair employment policies and practices.

However, the cruel irony of America's efforts to curb workplace discrimination is that once Title VII forcibly removed race from the hiring equation, it immediately became that much harder to enact programs to address systemic racism in ways that might be beneficial, which is why our country's long attempts at promoting affirmative action programs ultimately failed.

No matter how we got here, the current system is clearly not working; White males still account for the majority of executive positions. Among the CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, only 1% are Black.

What if growing up in a low-income, single-parent household, instead of being seen as an impediment to climbing the social ladder, positioned high-potential young teens for corporate-sponsored talent development programs that would support them from junior high, through high school and college and into the sponsor's corporate ranks? Such a program executed at scale would invariably lift up disadvantaged White youths as well, but that would be a feature, not a bug, making the entire initiative less controversial.

CEOs should start by stripping down America's foundational myth of meritocracy -- the notion that one's ability to get ahead in life is solely a function of the combined strength of their efforts and abilities -- and approach corporate recruiting from a new angle.

Several corporate programs, such as Starbucks' College Achievement Plan, have taken steps to make higher education more accessible for employees, but fall short of addressing the social, environmental and economic vectors that impinge upon disadvantaged youths.

America has a diversity problem, and our largest corporations need to embrace bold new models about how to accelerate social and racial justice within their ranks.

Despite the controversy around the decision, the Trajanos are not wavering. "We want to see more Black Brazilians in positions of leadership in Magalu; this diversity will make us a better company, capable of delivering a better return to our shareholders," Frederico Trajano wrote in a recent article.

"Today the racial make-up of Brazil is over 50% Black and Brown -- it basically looks like what the United States is projected to look like by 2050," observed Frederico Trajano in a recent Zoom interview with me. "American CEOs of large companies would be well-served by looking at what we are doing down here in Brazil on many fronts, including how to ensure that a company's leadership team better reflects the public it serves."

Here in the United States, Americans just elected the first woman of color, Kamala Harris, herself the daughter of Jamaican and Indian immigrants, as vice president

American CEOs should look south, and take their cues on racial justice from a bold businesswoman and her son from Brazil.

According to the most recently available national data, approximately 35% of children under 6 were in non-parental childcare at least 30 hours a week.

We don't yet know what the long-term impact on women's employment and career options will be, but if women struggle to, or are not able to, return to work after Covid-19, it is evident that they and their families will be further harmed financially.

Childcare workers are currently among the poorest-paid workers in the country, earning a median income of $11.65 an hour.

These naysayers seem to forget that a lot of the federal and state money spent on childcare will go back into the economy.

National childcare should be viewed like many of the programs in the New Deal Era of the 1930s, which were used to help pump up a struggling economy.

From its earliest days, the coronavirus pandemic has exposed how necessary early care and education are to making America work. Rather than viewing childcare as an unsupportable tax burden, investing in high-quality childcare should be seen as an essential public policy and a necessary part of stimulating our struggling economy.

This needs to be addressed or else future generations of Americans will still be paying the price in decades to come.

Debt isn't always bad, however. There are times when it is useful, and now is one of those times. We need money to fight the pandemic, help the millions of people whose lives have been damaged, support businesses and prop up the economy until things get back to normal. We aren't out of the woods yet, even with the recent positive vaccine news, and we need to borrow more.

Here then is what the Biden administration should do. First, focus on getting the pandemic under control, helping those in need and supporting the economy.

Just because more debt is necessary right now doesn't mean it is harmless. We entered the last recession with debt as a share of GDP at 35%. This one is at 80% and we will leave it at well over 100%. US debt is growing faster than the economy and will break the all-time record set just after World War II as soon as 2023.

Even at today's rock-bottom interest rates, we could quadruple federal education spending or send every family an annual check of $2,200 with the money we are spending on interest.

Once the economy is strong enough, as indicated by growth and employment (rather than political whims), the administration and Congress should gradually implement sensible measures to get control of the debt. This could include repealing some or all of the irresponsible tax cuts of the past years, reducing health care costs throughout the economy, cutting some of the near $1.4 trillion of tax breaks in the code and restoring sensible spending caps.

We also need to address our major trust fund programs that are facing insolvency in the upcoming years, including Social Security and Medicare.

These could include sensible cost control measures, such as increasing the retirement age and encouraging those who want to continue to work part time into retirement to do so.

To Biden's credit, his campaign plan included trillions of dollars in revenue raisers and spending reforms, creating opportunities for lawmakers to fund new public investments in a fiscally responsible manner. It is a start, but there will be much more to do. Debt naysayers will want the new administration to opt for the free lunch approach -- borrowing rather than paying for new priorities -- but that is a dangerous economic plan in the long run that invites serious risk and leaves us vulnerable at a time we should be pursing an agenda of economic strength.

The details may be different for each family, but these are the kinds of questions parents of teens are asking themselves right now. As a psychotherapist, I’m concerned. The most important task facing teenagers is to detach from their parents and become their own, separate beings.

I know that the mind of a teenager is wired to pay greater respect to their peers than to their parents at this age, and my strategy has been, “If I can’t beat them, join them.” I tried to orient my home to be one where kids would feel welcome.

When schools shut down in the spring and I began to make my children follow social distancing guidelines, I saw the toll it took. They were lonely. They missed their friends. They were grieving missed school dances and birthday parties and sporting events. They were growing irritable with me, and with each other.

Initially, they were FaceTiming and texting furiously with friends. But as time wore on, I noticed even that fell off. I think my kids, like many others, were experiencing a collective despair, and the lack of real face-time interaction was causing feelings of isolation and sadness, even while they were surrounded by family all day.

My children are sure that I am making a bigger deal of Covid-19 than any other parent. I’m sure that I am not, but I’m also sure it feels as if I am to them.

They are watching sleepovers, birthday parties and indoor movie nights happening on Instagram.

They are aware that some of their peers have not experienced a drastic change in their social life or safety rules. Kids are congregating, just not at our house anymore

Which is how I found myself a couple of Thursdays ago, stealthily driving to the skatepark to see if my boys were, in fact, wearing their masks … and then screaming at them in front of their friends because they weren’t. I don’t want to be a mom who spies on her kids. I don’t want to be a mom who yells in public. And yet, here I am.

I don’t like the mom that Covid has made me. I don’t want to run my house like a police state, or control my kids’ every movement, or discourage them from spending time with friends. But as an asthmatic with a wonky immune system, I don’t want to catch Covid, and I’d never want my family to be responsible for infecting anyone else in our community.

In the midst of my growing unease about how all of this is affecting my kids’ mental health, though, I continue to fall back on the other tenets I know to be true about what teenagers need. Empathy. Unconditional love. A need to be known and heard and seen as their own person.

I commiserate with how hard life is right now. I grieve their losses and disappointments with them and take care not to minimize their frustrations with this season. I let them rant and complain, and I try to listen without handing out quick fixes.

I admit to them that I’m not liking how I’m parenting, and I apologize; not because I’ve done something wrong, but because even if I feel that I’m doing the right thing to protect them and our community, I can acknowledge that this year has been extremely hard for them.

I make promises about the things we will do and the parties we will throw when all of this is over, willing myself to believe that we will get there eventually, and return to a life where I am once again the mom encouraging their social life instead of hindering it.