Alison Stewart: This is All of It. How will they write about this week in the history books? Will the chapter mention president Trump's strategy to taint the election results? Will it mentioned Stacey Abrams' push for voter inclusion. Julian Zelizer, historian at Princeton University and CNN political analyst joins us to talk about what has happened in the past that we should consider to understand our present and potentially to help shape our future. I'm so glad he joins us again. Julian, thanks for being with us.

Julian Zelizer: Thanks for having me.

Alison: I want to ask you about what's happened particularly in the past 24 hours. Christiane Amanpour tweeted last night, "The last president I covered who refused to accept the vote count in an election was Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in Iran in 2009." When in history has an American president behaved in this manner, a manner like this during an election?

Julian: Well, I can't point to an example. Obviously, we've had presidents who have contested the results afterwards in 2000. We didn't have a sitting president, but we had a contest over the recount, but this is very different. The president, a sitting president, has challenged the legitimacy going into the election. Last night, as the counts are being done in the most normal of processes, he's throwing out accusations of voter fraud and stoking division at a fraught moment. This is one of those moments where we can say what we're seeing from president Trump is quite different from what we've seen from his predecessors.

Alison: You tweeted earlier today, "Reminder, the concession speech is not a constitutional requirement, it is a norm." Has there ever been an instance in US history when the person who lost the election did not give a concession speech?

Julian: Well, this is norm. This is a norm that is dated usually to 1896, from what I have read. It's a norm that's been followed as a way to at least temporarily bring unity and closure to an election. Back to 2000, even at that moment when Democrats were livid after the Supreme court stopped the recount in Florida, Al Gore, who was the Democratic candidate, decided to still go on and make a concession speech and call his supporters to support the new administration, which is what we have had. I don't know what president Trump will do, if he'll follow this norm or not. He doesn't have to, it doesn't mean anything in terms of the process of transferring power, but it would be an unfortunate signal to send. I think it would only intensify some of the division that's out there in the electorate.

Alison: When you think about this presidency and may continue on, but what we've experienced in this presidency thus far, I'll ask you for three moments you think will indeed end up in the history books?

Julian: Well, that's a good question. Obviously, I think Charlottesville, and then the comments after Charlottesville will forever be part of our memory of the administration. It was at that moment that the politics of racial backlash merged very clearly with the presidency. We saw on the ground some of what was manifesting itself after this election. I think that's one of the things we will remember. We'll certainly remember the Supreme Court pick.

I think for many reasons the announcement of justice Barrett, because, A, of COVID and the way in which that brings together the stories of the administration's policies and the maskless audience at that event with the politics, combined with this transformation of the Supreme Court with the 6-3 voting block that he put underway is something else we'll remember. Then, finally, I think it won't be him. It will be the memories of everything we have all lived through since last March, the lost lives and the fallout, terrible fallout from COVID. I think this will forever be connected with his administration.

Alison: Is there something that you, as a historian and someone who can take the telescope out view that has happened during this presidency that people have begotten exercised and nonplussed about, which really wasn't particularly unique, but may have felt that way at the time?

Julian: Sure. I think there are ways to look at how he uses presidential power very aggressively. I think that's something that is true. At least he talks about it and defends the use of a really grandiose vision of presidential power. There's some ways he does it in unique fashion, but I think that's an outgrowth of many decades where this country has lived with a presidency that kept getting stronger and stronger. We've seen variations of what he has done through many administrations. I've often tried to say we need to put that one in context, where we think this is all unique to the president, where it's not.

I think another part-- his Twitter account is pretty unique, the way he speaks, but the idea of a president trying to communicate directly to the public without the filter of the media is something we've also seen from other presidents. I think it's part of a long-term trajectory. Finally, a lot of the policies of the administration, I really think are outgrowths of Republican politics, the corporate tax cuts and the deregulation on climate change and the questioning of expertise. Now, these are elements of the modern GOP that have been at play certainly since the early 2000s, and I would argue even earlier, that we shouldn't just think are a product of president Trump. He very much reflected the priorities of the Republican party.

Alison: My guest is Princeton professor of history, Julian Zelizer. Have the events, the social and the political events of the past four years affected your perspective as a historian at all?

Julian: Yes, they have one way they definitely have is just to see how frail or sometimes invisible the guard rails are of our democratic institution. He does things that we've seen bits and pieces of, but in extreme fashion, whether it's the language he uses. A very toxic language in public or his Twitter feed, or the issues of his testing the limits of what a president is allowed to ask for and insist on. It's just remarkable how no one pushes back and that when you have partisan control of the Senate and the White House in the same hands, that overwhelms any concern of governance and any concern about institutions.

It's not a total surprise. I write about that, but when you see it actually happen in such extreme fashion, it does surprise me. Same with COVID. Look, I've written a lot about how polarized we are and the deep divisions that we have over policy, but to see it play out with something as basic as wearing a mask, and the way that's incorporated into presidential rhetoric is pretty stunning, even for a historian.

Alison: If, and we still don't know, but if vice president Biden becomes the next president of the United States, he is going to inherit a pandemic with skyrocketing numbers. He's going to inherit an economy in an incredibly difficult position. He's got inherit no climate policy, has there been-- and again, we know this is not happening, we don't have any conclusions-- Has there been someone who has inherited something like this, with these many things that need to be fixed, of this magnitude?

Julian: Yes, for sure. For sure. Look, FDR came into office in 1933 with the United States economy totally collapsed in ways that are even grander and worse than what is going on right now, and in an international situation in the '30s, that was fundamentally unstable. Biden will remember well. President Obama took office with financial markets collapsing, the economy collapsing and total turmoil overseas in Iraq. There are moments like these, often Democrats have not fared well.

Jimmy Carter took office in 1977 with a terrible economy and a foreign policy agenda that had just been torn apart by Vietnam. One of the added obstacles that Biden faces is he's going to probably face, if he's president, he's going to probably face a Republican Senate, and he's going to face an electorate where almost 70 million people voted for someone who's almost antithetical to who he is as a politician, meaning Trump's votes. He has challenges in terms of policy and he has a political configuration that's going to be quite tough to get anything through.

Alison: This is all to be continued. Professor Zelizer, thank you so much for making time for us today. I know you're incredibly busy. We appreciate you hopping on the phone.

Julian: Pleasure to be with you.

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