i believe there are ten phenomenon we are witnessing today that were recorded centuries ago in bible prophecy. (male announcer) join dr. david jeremiah in his new series, "where do we go from here?" on the next episode of "turning point." right here on this station. >> brennan: welcome back to "face the nation." we turn now to the mayor of new york city, eric adams. good morning to you, mr. mayor. >> mayor: good morning. good to be on with you. >> brennan: thank you. yo have said somewhere around 70% of the hospital beds in your city are currently occupied. are the hospitals close to be overwhelmed? >> mayor: no, not at

all. my daily briefings with my health care professionals -- i had one earlier today -- they stated they are stable. they're doing an amazing job. the nurses and doctors and hospital employees, we just need to commend them for the job. we are going to make sure we respond and pivot as covid continues to do so. >> brennan: we wish you luck with that. you have the largest school district in the country in your city, and you're very clear you're keeping schools open. to do that, are giving out n-95 tests, and everybody has to have routine testing, but you're not requiring a negative positive to return to the class. that is something they're doing here in the district of columbia. are you confident you can keep the level of distribution low? >> mayor: covid is a

formidable and moving target, and we have to pivot and shift on that. our policies have been rooted in "i need my children in school." if my medical professionals tell me, eric, we have to do a mandated vaccine, we're going to do that. right now we have brought over 1.5 million tests in our schools, as you indicated, n-95 masks, as well as other resources and tools. we have been doing an amazing job because of one thing: coordination and communication with our u.s. team and other agencies involved. i believe we're doing the right thing for our children, having them in the safest place, and that is in the school building. >> brennan: you're talking about the union there. you have kept schools open, but the plain fact of the matter is people are still going to get sick. i know you have had some staff shortage as a result of that. attendance in school was about 70%, so about 300,000 out of a million

students missed class. are you going to have to elongate the school year to make up for all of this? >> mayor: i'm so glad you said that because i think many people are missing that. there was an amazing article in the "new york times" which stated this is the first time we spent more time and energy about protecting adults and the future of our children. i'm troubled we almost had a two-year loss for our children. they're behind in math and english. we're going to sit down with our new chancellor and state how we're going to start doing the catch-up. because the remote options can't be used correctly for those children who don't have access to high-speed broadband. i know we have to look at a different way of living with covid each time a new variant comes out. one area is education. >> brennan: but you do have these staffing shortages, as many schools are seeing around the country. the federal government says they're giving out plenty of money to hire people to come in.

but how do you get someone to take a job as a teacher in the middle of a pandemic at a low wage? >> mayor: well, we need them in. our teachers are paid according to a great union contract, and they get the support that they deserve. we need to attract people to do what i like to say, teacher is a calling. we want the best in front of our children. >> brennan: right. >> mayor: and what we have done successfully here in the city is pivot and shift based on the needs and how covid is changing. we must learn to live with covid, and we have to do it in a safe way. >> brennan: well, we may have to live with it, but for the infection rate, when i look at the new york state department of healt report, which i just did, it said, severity of the omicron variant may also play a role in increased rate of hospitalizations for children under age 11."

what makes you confident that omicron isn't causing a bad outcome in kids when the state makes this point? >> mayor: let's look at something else the city as stated: a child is four times more likely to be hospitalized if they are not vaccinated. so i am saying to my parents and the people of new york, get vaccinated and give booster shots. we don't have to feel helpless, like in the beginning of this science in 2020. science and global communities came together. we now have the tools that we need. so let's empower ourselves with the vaccination and booster shots. if we do that, we will bring down those hospital rates, and that is what i'm encouragingparents to do. >> brennan: but some parents are just not vaccinating their five to 11-year-olds. but what about kids who are four and under? they don't have an option to take a vaccine, and that is where you're

seeing the fastest growing infection rate. are you going to keep day cares open and pre-schools open when those kids can't be vaccinated? >> mayor: yes, we are. we're going to continue coordinating with our health care professionals. when you start to disrupt the stability of child care and pre-school, it has a rippling impact throughout our entire city. parents can't keep their children home. they have to work. the economy is also part of this crisis that we're facing. and with the proper balance of cre of creating a sae environment inside our day cares and our schools, or parents can go and do the job they need to do. that is what i must face in the city: we have to make sure the financial eco-system is healthy as well as our children and families are healthy at the same time. >> brennan: mr. mayor, we'll be watching. thank you for your time

this morning. >> mayor: thank you. >> brennan: around the world, we have reached another milestone. there have now been more than 300 million reported infections since the pandemic began. our liz palmer reports from bangkok. >> reporter: good morning. the beijing winter olympics games are going to start in less than a month now, and china is desperately trying to keep covid at bay, but the outbreaks haven't stopped. most recently in ti tiangjing, an army of health care workers are testing the city's 14 million residents after two omicron cases were confirmed. in the northern city, state media shows government food deliveries to some of the 13 million citizens in lockdown since december 23rd. orde tlude welding the doors shut of

anyone thought to have contracted the virus. nnnovak djokovic, he is now grounded in his hotel. some tennis fans and most anti-vaxxers are furious as an australian court prepares to decide whether he'll be allowed to play or be sent home. finally, omicron is surging in europe, with more than 300,000 new cases yesterday in france alone. in britain, hospitals are at capacity. but there are, at last, very early signs that the surge has peaked, at least in london. while israel is now offering a second booster, that is a fourth vaccination, to the vulnerable. consider vaccine inequality, though. the world's richest countries have given more booster shots alone than

all of the vaccines administered by the world's poorest countries put together. margaret? >> brennan: elizabeth palmer, thank you. we'll be right back. adults with moderate to severe plaque psoriasis... ...can uncover clearer skin and improve symptoms at 16 weeks. tremfya® is the only medication of its kind also approved for adults with active psoriatic arthritis. serious allergic reactions may occur. tremfya® may increase your risk of infections and lower your ability to fight them. tell your doctor if you have an infection or symptoms or if you had a vaccine or plan to. emerge tremfyant® with tremfya®... ask you doctor about tremfya® today. at fidelity, your dedicated advisor will work with you on a comprehensive wealth plan across your full financial picture. a plan with tax-smart investing strategies designed to help you keep more of what you earn.

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>> brennan: since the 2020 elections, georgia has become ground zero in the fight over election integrity. the state's republican secretary of state brad raffensperger joins us now from atlanta. good morning to you, mr. secretary. >> good morning. >> brennan: just to remind our audience, you became known nationally in the wake of that election because you refused to succumb to pressure from president trump when he specifically asked you to, quote, "find 11,780 votes." president biden, of course, won that state by 11,779 votes. now you're up to election, and you are being primed by someone who rejected the president's election.

do you fear that republicans in your state may try to change the outcome of an upcoming election for purely political purposes? >> the person i'm running heist, hs never done ace o certification for elections, and yet for president trump he said you couldn't trust that. that is a double-minded person, and as a pastor, he should know better. so i'm going to run on integrity and the truth. i don't know what he is going to run on. >> brennan: to that point, is the level of what is at stake here the possibility that an election outcome in your state could be manip manipulated? >> the laws that we have in place, there have been concerns raised, but no. the results will be the results. and those results will be certified. you cannot overturn the will of the people. and so that won't matter. but at the end of the day, iwill be re-elected and he will not be. >> brennan: well, let me

ask you about something that the former president claimed this week, which, once again, he says there was fraud in georgia. he says people were being paid $10 for their ballots. i know asking a third party to drop off your absentee ballot is illegal in the state of georgia. but i wonder, has there been any evidence that any of those ballots were actually fraudulent or cast by ineligible voters? >> it is an ongoing investigation. what i can tell you is we just got that information in november 2021, over a year after the election. i wish we could have gotten in sooner. but no one has alleged those are fraudulent voters. the allegation is they were collected and delivered by a person. but that is one thing i do think we need, to make sure that nationwide there should be a law that bans

ballot harvesting. i don't think that ballot harvesting is good. the only person who should touch your ballot is you and the election official. number two, i think we should have a constitutional amendment, a u.s. constitutional amendment, that only american citizens vote in our elections. and i think we should also have photo i.d. we have -- >> brennan: only u.s. citizens do currently vote in elections. >> but we don't have a constitutional amendment. cities are trying to push non-citizenship voting. i think only citizens should be voting, and that is supported by a wide majority of americans. just like photo i.d. is pported by the majority of americans. so that is another solid, common-sense federal reform measure if they really want to get series about election reform. >> brennan: i assume you're referring to the president and the vice president, who will be traveling to your state in the coming days. they are doing so to campaign for two laws: the

freedom to vote act and the john lewis voting rights act. >> right. >> brennan: the freedom to vote actually does promote a national standard for i.d.s, you can use a bank statement, a utility bill. i wonder why do you think republicans -- >> it does not have photo i.d., and photo i.d. is the most secure way of making sure you can identify who the voter is. i think that is very important. and they also want same-day registration. and i think that undermines trust in elections. and right now we need to restore trust wherever we can. in georgia, we've been fighting this theme of stolen election claims from stacey abrams, and in 2020 it is about voter fraud. both of them undermine voter trust. >> brennan: they may both undermine voter trust, but i'm sure you hold a distinction of someone who doesn't hold any office and the

president of the united states actively putting pressure on you to find and manufacture votes. >> january 6 was terrible, but the response doesn't need to be eliminating photo i.d. and having same-day registration. in georgia, we've actually increased the number of days of early voting. we have more early voting now than new york, new new yorkw jersey, and delaware. >> brennan: i understand. but when i was talking about stacey abrams, i was acknowledging she didn't call on people to attack the state capitol when she was questioning the outcome of the 2018 gubernatorial race. >> the president is the top, you know, official that we have in our country. and obviously that position of power is much higher than a candidate running for governor. be that as it may, when people lose races, i think the proper thing to do is to admit you lost and if you want to run again, by

all means do so. >> brennan: georgia has a bad representation with racial past. and why did georgia have to seek some federal pr-clearance where it came to changing their election laws -- i won't get into all of the details of it, but this is one of the reasons the white house says this is so important in the john lewis voting right act. do you think there should be more federal oversight in states that have a history of racial discrimination? >> georgia has moved so far ahead. we're not where we were in 1965 -- >> brennan: but this was in place until 2013. >> i know. i think we have shown that georgia has fair and honest elections. we have record registrations and record turnout. georgians have an opportunity to vote up on election day. we were just recognized by

heritage as the number one state for election integrity. >> brennan: by heritage, and i think the public will hear a different version when the president goes to your state, and that's why we wanted to talk to you today. mr. secretary, thank you for your time. >> thank you. >> brennan: and we will go to the director and founder for the center for election, innovation, and research, david becker. good morning to you, david. >> good morning, margaret. >> brennan: i want to talk about a number of things. is there anything there that the secretary laid out that you would like to respond to? i know specifically on voter i.d. and what he referred to as ballot harvesting, you have some views? >> well, i mean i think there is room for disagreement in the states on a variety of the administrative policies around elections. how many bloo ballots a third party may be able to deliver from a place like a nursing home, and how ridge the i.d. system should be, and to make

sure that eligible voters don't get excluded from voting because they don't happen to have i.d. i think what we're worried about because of the lies being spread are the efforts to sew confusion and chaos into the vote counting and certification process. that's what i'm working on and looking at in the states, and both brad raffensperger and others are looking around the country. >> brennan: looking nationwide, 25 states enacted 62 laws that expanded voting since 2020. 19 states enacted 34 voting restrictive laws. all of those had g.o.p.-controlled legislatures. when you look at that breakdown, what does it say to you? and when it comes specifically to georgia, is it really the case that what they have done is jim

crow on steroids, as president biden refers to it, because the secretary of state there says that is not what he is seeing? >> obviously that is not the sign of a healthy democracy. our democracy is in crisis right now. i'm as concerned as i've ever been. and certainly in the states where republicans control majorities in the legislatures, those majorities are being fueled by the lies from the losing presidential candidate of their party. we are now over 400 days after what was, by any measure, the most secure, transparent, scrutinized election in american history, more audits of those ballots than ever before, and more court scrutiny, including judges appointed by the losing presidential candidate himself. so in states like texas, florida, arizona, and, yes, even georgia, we see election policy being considered in a way that is not entirely constructive. it is partisan, and it is based on some false

premises on how well the election was run. the facts are in georgia and the other states and throughout the country, the election was run exceedingly well. it is remarkable how well, it was run with resources being scarce, with the highest turnout we've ever seen, and in the middle of a pandemic. in georgia, it is true -- compared to most of the other states, georgia has pretty accessible voting policies. with that being said, the legislature removed some powers from secretary raffensperger, and he and his staff did a remarkably good job in 2020. but in other states, like texas, it is even worse, where the voting laws are much more restrictive and more chaos being injected into the process. >> brennan: so because o what is happening at the state level, the white house is making the broader argument that there needs to be more federal election law crafted. they are putting their their shoulder about two bills, and we'll hear about the

freedom to vote act and the john lewis voting right. the white house says athletes are absolutely essential. they don't have the votes to pass either of them. but on the premise there needs to be more federal oversight, do you agree? >> i think there could be some value given the unprecedented attack on our democracy, and the fact that tens of millions american citizens have been led to believe, fueled by lies, that our system does not have integrity. just to be clear, we have the most integrity in american elections than we have ever had in american history at this point in time, and that will continue to grow. but there could be some use for some federal standards. as you noted, it is highly unlikely that either has even 50 votes to pass the senate. if there could be a truly bipartisan effort and try to find ways to resolve issues so we don't have confusion and chaos in the

post-election period, that the person who gets the most votes is the winner in the systems that are transparent, that would be really good. >> brennan: one of the ideas that was floated in the past week was trying to update the electoral count act. even some of the democrats on the january 6 committee, including congresswoman lockrin had supported that kind of archaic law, but both of vice president and the senate minority leader both really shot that down this week. in fact, senator schumer said clarifying the electoral act is a distraction. it is sort of like saying i'm going to rig the game, but then i will make sure you count the score accurately. what the hell is the point if you rig the game to count the score accurately? were you surprised to hear

that from the electoral leader? >> there is obviously a lot of politics in getting whatever bills can be moved in the next year as we enter the mid-term elections. but i agree with many experts and members of both parties it would be good to clarify and revise the electoral count act of 1887 and to make it clear that the joint session of congress is purely a ceremonial session. they are just counting the vote. >> brennan: right. >> it is really like the oscars. they are not voting on who won best picture. they're just announcing who won best picture. >> brennan: exactly. >> and i think that would be really available. >> brennan: thank you, david becker, for your perspective, as always. we'll be back in a moment.

>> brennan: that sit for us today. thank you all for watching. until next week, for "face the nation," i'm margaret brennan. ♪♪ in boston, where biotech innovates daily and our doctors teach at harvard medical school,

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captioning sponsored by cbs captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org so much for jog

us. so much for jog it was a devastating day here in new york city. one of the deadliest fires in decades has killed at least 19 people, including nine children. dozens of others have been injured. the massive fire broke out just before noon. it began in a third-floor apartment of a 19-story building in the bronx. investigators believe the cause was a space heater. at least 200 firefighters responded. cbs's tom hanson is there for us tonight. tom? >> reporter: good evening, jericka. paint a terrifying picture for the hundreds of people living at