“Cult-like lows”
Update: 2025-01-17
Share
Description
Nicolle Wallace on Kristi Noem’s confirmation hearing, TikTok’s uncertain future, what resistance might look like in Trump’s second term, and the anti-abortion movement’s ongoing efforts to erode reproductive rights.
Joined by: Vaughn Hillyard, Alicia Menendez, Rev. Al Sharpton, Tim Miller, Symone Sanders-Townsend, Mini Timmaraju, Charlie Sykes, Molly Jong-Fast, Luke Broadwater, and Annie Karni.
Comments
Top Podcasts
The Best New Comedy Podcast Right Now – June 2024The Best News Podcast Right Now – June 2024The Best New Business Podcast Right Now – June 2024The Best New Sports Podcast Right Now – June 2024The Best New True Crime Podcast Right Now – June 2024The Best New Joe Rogan Experience Podcast Right Now – June 20The Best New Dan Bongino Show Podcast Right Now – June 20The Best New Mark Levin Podcast – June 2024
In Channel
Download from Google Play
Download from App Store
United States00:00
00:00
1.0x
0.5x
0.8x
1.0x
1.25x
1.5x
2.0x
3.0x
Sleep Timer
Off
End of Episode
5 Minutes
10 Minutes
15 Minutes
30 Minutes
45 Minutes
60 Minutes
120 Minutes
Transcript
00:00:00
Skipping cold and flu season is plan A.
00:00:02
But if you do get sick, be prepared for plan B with Kleenex lotion tissues.
00:00:06
Kleenex lotion tissues moist dry skin, helping prevent the added discomfort of red, irritated skin on top of your cold and flu symptoms.
00:00:14
So this cold and flu season grab Kleenex lotion tissues.
00:00:18
Visit Kleenex.com to learn more and by now.
00:00:20
For whatever happens next, grab Kleenex.
00:00:23
Some things you wouldn't mind being stuck with, like a huge inheritance,
00:00:27
but a phone that has to be plugged in just right so it charges is not one of those things.
00:00:31
Switch to Verizon and we'll pay off your old phone up to $800.5 pre-paid mastercard for a new one on us.
00:00:37
Just trade in any phone from our top brands with select unlimited plans.
00:00:40
899 purchase with new smartphone line unselect unlimited plans,
00:00:43
minimum $90 per month, Xauto pay plus taxes and fees for 36 months required,
00:00:46
plus $830 trading slash promo credit flight over 36 months.
00:00:48
Trading terms apply.
00:00:49
Pay off phone requires smartphone purchase importing with new smartphone line unselect plan.
00:00:52
Must provide most recent bill showing pay off amount of eligible phone, additional terms apply.
00:00:54
[Music]
00:01:02
Hi everyone, happy Friday at 4 o'clock in New York.
00:01:05
Scrutiny on Capitol Hill today for the person picked for the job that was a controversial revolving
00:01:11
door in Trump 1.0 and is likely to remain a flashpoint in Trump 2.0.
00:01:17
A MAGA world favorite who was said to be in the running to be Donald Trump's pick for vice president,
00:01:22
that was until she herself revealed and narrated a detailed account of that time she shot and killed
00:01:29
her own dog in a book that also happened to be right with baffling inaccuracies.
00:01:34
South Dakota governor Kristi Nome was on Capitol Hill today before the Senate Homeland Security
00:01:40
Committee for her confirmation hearing. Eight years ago, the person in Nome's chair was retired
00:01:46
Marine General John Kelly and he broke with Donald Trump that day on a number of issues
00:01:51
from targeting Muslim Americans to Russian interference in the 2016 election and even the border wall.
00:01:58
Listen. Will you commit to ensuring that religion does not become a basis for US counterterrorism
00:02:06
or law enforcement policy, particularly as it relates to the targeting of individuals with
00:02:10
ancestry from Muslim majority countries? I don't think it's ever appropriate to focus on
00:02:17
something like religion is the only factor so yes sir. General Kelly, do you accept the conclusions
00:02:22
of the intelligence community regarding Russian interference in our election? With high confidence.
00:02:27
A physical barrier in of itself certainly is a military person that understands
00:02:32
defense and defenses. Physical barrier in and of itself will not do the job.
00:02:38
One Democratic Senator calling that hearing on that day a quote love fest.
00:02:45
Friend of the show and then Senator Claire McCaskill said this quote I believe him when he says he
00:02:50
will speak truth to power. General Kelly was confirmed 88 to 11 which brings us to today
00:02:56
and a confirmation hearing from a mega fire brand who could not even make it clear if she was
00:03:02
going to be in charge of the border and mass deportations. Those two issues of course day one
00:03:07
priorities for team Trump that should fall under DHS purview. Here is Stephen Miller on that topic
00:03:14
back in November. It's going to be a light speech Sean. The moment the president Trump puts his
00:03:20
hand on that Bible and takes the oath of office as he has said the occupation ends liberation day
00:03:27
begins. He will immediately sign executive orders sealing the border shut beginning the largest
00:03:32
deportation operation in American history. So this is a thing that if it's happening starts Monday
00:03:39
at noon and as we sit here today nobody knows if it's going to be that guy Stephen Miller alongside
00:03:45
borders are Tom Holman doing that saying leaving the charge or if it will be Kristineau who sat for
00:03:52
her confirmation hearing today. And question arises is the Trump administration trying to void congressional
00:04:00
oversight completely for whatever it is they have planned. Here's Senator Andy Kim on that.
00:04:06
I guess I just want to ask you just point blank like who's going to be in charge of the border.
00:04:11
Well the president will be in charge of the border it's a national security issue and the president
00:04:16
is in charge of this country and and has made a promise to the American people and we will fulfill
00:04:21
his agenda. But I guess I got confused when Trump made the announcement about Tom Holman he said
00:04:26
quote I'm pleased to announce that Tom Holman and said that he's in charge of our nation's borders.
00:04:32
So I guess again I just like to go back to you how are you going to work with Mr. Holman what is the
00:04:37
division there I'm trying to get a better sense of who's in charge. Yeah Tom Tom Holman is an
00:04:43
incredible human being who has over 30 years of experience incredible experience. I get that
00:04:48
I'm just trying to think through the insight and wisdom here. Decision making process when it comes to
00:04:52
your work for instance will he be giving orders directly to CBP ice USCIS that Tom Holman has a
00:05:01
direct line to the president he is an advisor to the president the borders are I obviously will be
00:05:07
if nominated and confirmed and put into the position of being the Department of Homeland Security
00:05:13
Secretary and responsible for the authorities that we have and the actions that we take.
00:05:16
So I just raise that as a concern of mine because not only is that about the function of our
00:05:22
executive branch but also the capabilities of this committee to be able to properly do our
00:05:27
constitutional duties for oversight the ability for us to be able to have that conversation.
00:05:32
Now I also face questions about other critical functions of the Department of Homeland Security
00:05:38
including disaster relief here's what she said about playing politics with disaster aid.
00:05:43
I assume you will agree with me that withholding disaster relief by President Trump or any other
00:05:53
chief executive of the United States is a violation of his duty and of law.
00:05:59
Well Senator leadership has consequences and looking at the tragedy that's happening.
00:06:05
I want to ask you yes or no with all due respect it's an easy one. What's happening in California is
00:06:11
the ramification of many decisions over many years but under my leadership at the Department of
00:06:16
Homeland Security there will be no political bias to how disaster relief is delivered to the
00:06:22
American people. So if President Trump were to say to you we're going to withhold money from
00:06:27
Connecticut or Michigan or any of the states Iowa because we don't like the governor or we don't
00:06:37
like the politics of the state you would stand up to him and say Mr. President we need to allocate
00:06:43
that money. Senator in three days President Trump will take a note to uphold the Constitution
00:06:48
and the rule of law in this country and he will do that and I'll be glad to have him back.
00:06:52
And I don't see that to you. I don't speak to hypotheticals which is what you're asking me to do
00:06:58
but what I will tell you is that as secretary I will do the same. I will deliver the programs as the
00:07:03
law is. Well it's more than a hypothetical with all due respect and I apologize for interrupting you
00:07:08
but my time is limited as you know as a veteran of these hearing it's more than a hypothetical.
00:07:15
It's based on experience with President Trump withholding money from Washington state and elsewhere.
00:07:22
I need to know from you will you stand up to the President?
00:07:26
Will you stand up to the President and answer question now about the person who will most likely
00:07:34
had the Department of Homeland Security in a second Trump administration. That was Christi Nome's
00:07:40
confirmation hearing and it is where we start today with some of our most favorite reporters and
00:07:44
friends. NBC News White House correspondent Von Hilliard is here with me at the table for the
00:07:48
hour co-host of MSNBC's The Weekend, Alicia Menendez's back, also back president of the National
00:07:55
Action Network, host of MSNBC's Politics Nation, the Reverend Al Sharpton's here. Let me ask you Von
00:08:02
Hilliard about Christi Nome. She was talked about all the time her name flitted around all the time
00:08:12
over the summer into the summer ahead of her own publicity tour for her own book about her own
00:08:19
account, about shooting her own puppy who was wild. It was reported that Trump didn't love that,
00:08:27
which is fascinating because let me put up a headline about what Trump wanted to do to migrants
00:08:32
to this country quote shoot migrants legs, build alligator moat behind Trump's ideas for border.
00:08:39
This was a 2019 piece of reporting in the New York Times that says this privately the president had
00:08:45
often talked about fortifying a border wall with a water-filled trench stock with snakes or
00:08:50
alligators prompting AIDS to seek a cost estimate. He wanted the wall electrified with spikes on top
00:08:55
that could pierce human flesh after publicly suggesting that soldiers shoot migrants if they
00:09:00
threw rocks the president backed off when the staff told him that was illegal. But later in a meeting
00:09:06
AIDS recalled he suggested that they shoot migrants in the legs to slow them down. That's not allowed
00:09:11
either they told him. This is a conduct I guess that could again fall under the purview of the
00:09:20
governor governor known and this is a political figure totally unique in American political life
00:09:29
who is ascending to the executive branch to a cabinet post after describing an act so brutal
00:09:36
I think about a hundred percent of Americans disapproved of it. Where does she stand today in Trump's
00:09:42
inner circle? She is somebody who let's be very clear Donald Trump is tasking with a remarkable
00:09:49
request to oversee what he says would be a mass deportation effort the largest since Dwighty
00:09:56
Eisenhower. Christy Nome from South Dakota I mean I was out there back in 2018 when she nearly
00:10:02
won her race for governor she was the congresswoman at the time and yet what she what he is asking her
00:10:08
to do is oversee a deportation program that frankly we have not seen in our major urban areas
00:10:17
since Sheriff Joe Arpio was at the helm of the Sheriff's Office in the Greater Phoenix area back
00:10:24
from 2005 to 2016 I remember Reverend Sharpton was out there at some of the protest back of the time
00:10:31
of the signing of SB 1070 and Joe Arpio and his Sheriff's Office was responsible for tens of thousands
00:10:38
of individuals in Maricopa County being deported yet ultimately his workplace raids in which his
00:10:45
office targeted workplaces in which there were suspected undocumented immigrants working and also
00:10:52
what he called crime suppression sweep which is where he had sent his sheriff's deputies into
00:10:57
predominantly brown neighborhoods and pull people over for example a broken tail light and then
00:11:02
check their immigration records and ultimately turn them over to federal ice authorities and
00:11:08
have them deported all of that came crashing down when a federal court stepped in and said that
00:11:14
it amounted to racial profiling and so I think what Christy Nome is being asked by Donald Trump is
00:11:20
something that Joe Arpio struggled to do even in just one locality and one jurisdiction and what is
00:11:27
in front of her is a promise that Donald Trump is made to American public quite prominently at the
00:11:32
Republican National Convention there were signs of mass deportations now and she is the one the
00:11:37
South Dakota governor who is being asked to go and ultimately work with ICE who has limited
00:11:42
resources relatively in order to pull off such a feat as this it's really quite a remarkable request
00:11:48
that is being put in front of her. She was asked about some of those Trump 1.0 programs and policies
00:11:56
let me show you her answer on child separation. Senator the Trump administration never had a
00:12:04
family separation policy they had a zero tolerance policy which said that our laws would be
00:12:10
followed what I'm alarmed by is the over 300,000 children that went missing during the Biden
00:12:17
administration and when we talk about children and and what they're potentially facing as far
00:12:23
as victimization in this country and the trafficking trafficking that's going on. This administration's
00:12:29
lack of desire to find out where those children are what they may be going through is alarming to me.
00:12:34
Let's put aside what happened in the past there are still a thousand children who are separated
00:12:40
and waiting to be reunited. I'd like your commitment that you're going to continue the effort
00:12:45
to reunite them with their parents. Senator keeping families together is critically important
00:12:51
to me and to this country. I'm concerned about Lincoln Riley's family that they no longer have her.
00:12:56
I'm concerned about the fact that that we have people in this country that don't know where their
00:13:01
children are or people in other countries who sent their children here and they've been lost by
00:13:05
this administration. You know I think it's clear that she is unprepared not only for the examination
00:13:15
but to take the job because much of what she was saying clearly had nothing to do with the
00:13:21
position that she's been nominated for. Donald Trump himself has said that he's going to separate
00:13:28
families and the parents ought to understand that and they can go with their take their children with
00:13:33
them. I mean this is not something that has been vague. He has said that himself. So either she's
00:13:39
going to defend the policy or either she's going to attack the policy or admit she doesn't know what
00:13:45
she's doing and I would say that is one of the last two. I also think that Vaughn is right to bring
00:13:51
up our payah. Let's not forget when we were out there when I was out there Vaughn was a little
00:13:56
guy that didn't have a bid yet. When I was out there being protested with others with our payah.
00:14:03
A payah became one of the biggest supporters of Donald Trump. The first recipient of a pardon. That's
00:14:09
right. He was the first recipient of a pardon and he toured around Arizona helping Donald Trump.
00:14:14
So and our payah was the symbol. He became the personification of having people's family separated,
00:14:23
racially profiling people because they were not pulling people over the day thought
00:14:28
look like they come from Canada. This was all based on race and then he would parade them around and
00:14:34
make them wear pink underwear once they had held them incarcerated until they deported them.
00:14:41
That is who Donald Trump is and that's who he says he is and you can agree or disagree but let's
00:14:47
not distort what he's made clear. And you're right. I mean when he's asked in interviews about
00:14:53
the brutality of immigration policy, he's pretty brazen in his responses. He says we got to do it.
00:14:59
We got to do it. I want to show you some of the list of Slotkins line of questioning for Christina.
00:15:05
If the president asks you to send in federal law enforcement to a state without coordination of
00:15:13
that governor, would you support that action? Senator, my job if nominated and sworn in as secretary
00:15:24
of Homeland Security is to uphold the Constitution. So you hold the rules of this country. Yes,
00:15:29
that will be the oath and the pledge that I will be making. And my goal also is to work with you to
00:15:34
ensure that we have situations that are always appropriate that we are well defined. I just need to know
00:15:40
your former governor. You can imagine that if Joe Biden sent in 700 federal law enforcement under
00:15:46
Secretary Mayorkas without coordinating with you, I think we can agree you'd be a little upset.
00:15:51
So I just ask that you give the same respect for coordination and that we just we are very sensitive.
00:16:00
People are worried about politicizing of law enforcement and the uniform military. That's a bad
00:16:04
thing. I hope we can agree. She's already been nominated. She makes me miss Sarah Palin. But this is
00:16:13
these are the flashpoints that are going to erupt. They may not actually happen under Vaughan's
00:16:18
watch in Washington DC. They may happen out in the states where people are trying to implement
00:16:25
Trump's policies. I just want to take a big step back. This woman has been appointed to run
00:16:31
the Department of Homeland Security. Yeah. If you watch today and you only watched her statement
00:16:36
and her answers, you didn't listen to the questions from the senators. You would think that the only
00:16:41
thing she would be in charge of was immigration and the U.S. Mexico border. In reality, the mission
00:16:46
of DHS is to secure the nation from the many threats we face, emphasis on many. You would know,
00:16:54
for example, that she's going to be in charge of FEMA. You would know that she's in charge of
00:16:57
America's cybersecurity. My big macro question coming out of this hearing is, is she so hyper-focused
00:17:05
on immigration and the U.S. Mexico border that she's not going to have her eye on other threats
00:17:11
to the U.S. homeland? Is that going to come not just in attention, but in resources? That's one
00:17:17
piece. On the immigration answer, yes. Then in addition to that, on the immigration piece,
00:17:23
it's so hard to watch these hearings if you know too much about policy because you're like, that's not
00:17:26
how this works. That's not how any of this works, right? They're talking about getting rid of this
00:17:31
app that actually allowed people a process to apply for asylum from their home country. It made
00:17:38
people less reliant on smugglers because they had a process. You talk about remain in Mexico.
00:17:44
Remain in Mexico requires cooperation with the Mexican government. Donald Trump is coming into a very
00:17:52
different counterpart than he had the first time around. Someone who's already proven that she knows
00:17:56
how to go toe-to-toe with him, how to call their bluff. Remain in Mexico also means Mexico gets to decide
00:18:02
which foreign nationals get to stay and which to go. It gives them a tremendous amount of power
00:18:08
and latitude. So if the intention of the incoming Trump administration is to take power away from
00:18:15
the smugglers, power away from the cartels, they're actually doing the opposite. They're creating
00:18:21
a void by limiting a lawful process. And you know who steps in when there's that void, the cartels
00:18:28
and the smugglers. And so they are making America and Americans less safe.
00:18:32
I mean, it's an interesting point, subtle one. I'll give Elise a bit of that, about competence here.
00:18:40
Why not put somebody, and I know Chris Christie has fallen out of favor, but
00:18:43
all the things Trump ran on, the one for which in Trump's mind, he believes he has
00:18:50
the greatest wind at his back politically, is immigration in the border.
00:18:54
Why not put someone with an undeniable record or brand of being competent in charge of DHS?
00:19:02
It's a question that I'm not sure that I, Nicole, not to dodge, may be the one and
00:19:09
necessarily best positioned to answer, other than I can tell you that the interesting part about
00:19:15
this is that I feel like we have lived through this, right? We lived through a first Trump
00:19:18
administration and so many of the commitments that Donald Trump made when selecting his cabinet
00:19:25
were in these months before he won the presidential election that he would pick people
00:19:30
who he had utmost trust in, and that they would be loyal to ultimately executing the policies
00:19:37
that he promised the country he would implement. And so when you're looking at the pool of
00:19:43
individuals to choose from, to nominate, the pool of individuals who have the credentials of,
00:19:50
for example, a member of Congress or governor, and match that with individuals who Donald Trump trust,
00:19:58
and knows will be loyal to carrying out what he wants executed on, I think that that pool
00:20:05
is significantly smaller than it was in 2017 when we covered that first transition,
00:20:11
because suddenly you wade out everybody like Chris Christie and Mike Pence and Liz Cheney
00:20:16
or people that are frankly maybe have more experience like a John Kelly who, right, Donald
00:20:24
Trump didn't have a personal relationship with his first, coming into his first administration,
00:20:29
I think that that is where the number of individuals that are apart from that small nucleus
00:20:34
of individuals who are entrusted by Donald Trump comes down to people like Kristi Nome and that's
00:20:39
why his VP list was actually quite small, too, because the number of people who he had faith of
00:20:44
carrying out what are, right, some people could consider extreme or serious executive orders,
00:20:51
or demands that push the limits of the executive branches powers is very narrow.
00:20:56
All right, no one's going anywhere. When we come back, there's some breaking news to tell you
00:21:00
about. It's about Donald Trump's pick to lead the nation's top health agency, RFK Jr,
00:21:05
and his push to do away with the COVID vaccine during the height of the deadly pandemic,
00:21:10
new scrutiny he sure to face, and his still upcoming confirmation hearing. Also ahead, a rare
00:21:16
unanimous decision from the United States Supreme Court today upholding a ban on TikTok,
00:21:22
citing national security concerns. The president-elect says, come Monday, he could reverse that.
00:21:29
And later in the broadcast, what President Joe Biden is doing in his final hours in the White House
00:21:34
to help ensure his own legacy, and at the same time, ensure minimum damage from what Donald Trump
00:21:40
has planned in the coming days. All those stories and more when Deadly White House continues after
00:21:44
Quick Break, don't go anywhere.
00:22:07
The other day, I saw a meme showing a baby in a womb, and it was captioned,
00:22:25
"This was the last time I slept well." Now at first, I laughed, but then I got concerned because
00:22:31
it was true. I always figured bad sleep was my fate until I took a leap of faith.
00:22:37
And replaced my pillow. Coop's original adjustable pillow seriously solved my sleep issues.
00:22:43
Before Coop, I tossed, I turned, and I woke up with neck pain feeling exhausted. Now, I sleep comfortably
00:22:50
and wake up feeling refreshed. Whether you're a side back or stomach sleeper, you can customize
00:22:55
the pillow's height by adding or removing the fill, which is this blend of microfiber and memory foam
00:23:01
that doesn't go flat. Don't settle for sleepless nights and groggy mornings, try Coop risk-free
00:23:07
with a one-hundred-night trial and get 20% off your first order. Better sleep starts with Coop's
00:23:12
adjustable pillow. Visit our website at CoopSleepGoods.com/health. That's COOPSleepGoods.com/health.
00:23:20
Work management platforms. endless onboarding, IT bottlenecks, admin requests. But what if things were
00:23:29
different? Monday.com is different. No lengthy onboarding, beautiful reports in minutes,
00:23:39
custom workflows, you can build on your own. Easy to use prompt-free AI. Huh, turns out you can love
00:23:46
a work management platform. Monday.com, the first work platform you'll love to use.
00:23:54
There's some incredible new reporting breaking in the last half an hour that offers some fresh evidence
00:24:00
of Kennedy's record on vaccinations. Let me read from it. RFK Jr. President-elect Trump's
00:24:06
choice to lead the nation's health agencies formally asks the Food and Drug Administration
00:24:10
to revoke the authorization of all COVID vaccines during a deadly phase of the pandemic when
00:24:16
thousands of Americans were dying every week. Kennedy filed a petition with the FDA in May of 2021,
00:24:23
demanding that officials rescind authorization for the shots and refrain from approving any COVID
00:24:29
vaccine in the future. Six months earlier, Trump had declared the COVID vaccines a miracle.
00:24:34
Von Hillured, how is RFK's confirmation going? This is a moment where I think the expectation
00:24:42
of this point in time the Kennedy is going to ultimately pass by here. But I think this is again
00:24:47
an individual who right publicly was calling and also here with a direct formal request of the
00:24:52
FDA was questioning in real time the emergency authorization of the COVID vaccine. And at a moment
00:25:00
in time where I questioned him when he was running for president, but then also during the transition,
00:25:04
immediately after Donald Trump's win, about his commitment to ensuring that COVID vaccines and
00:25:10
all vaccines would remain on the market. And now he says that he would not interfere with that process,
00:25:16
but there's a lot that goes into ultimately removing a vaccine from the marketplace versus,
00:25:22
let's say, another pandemic takes place. And there is the need for another emergency authorization
00:25:27
from the FDA of an additional vaccine to what extent would Robert F. Kennedy Jr. use his
00:25:33
department to try to slow down that process or require not emergency authorization,
00:25:39
but the more formal process that could take potentially several more months of time before
00:25:44
it were to enter the marketplace. And I think those are questions undoubtedly we will hear him face
00:25:49
from the senators, but at this point in time there doesn't seem to be too much hostility among
00:25:54
Republicans to ultimately backing his confirmation. I mean, let me be more of the evidence of what the
00:26:00
consequences would have been had RFK as an activist had his way to say nothing of RFK as the head of HHS.
00:26:08
As students have begun to show that the rapid rollout of COVID vaccines had already saved
00:26:12
140,000 lives in the United States. I understand that journalist covering this moment
00:26:19
have to make sure we understand the political reality and the political impotence
00:26:23
of Senate Republicans. But that doesn't mean that these are people who should lead agencies in
00:26:29
charge of keeping Americans healthy and alive. What do you make of this revelation? Had it broken
00:26:34
about a nominee to head HHS for any normal Democratic or Republican president-elect?
00:26:40
I don't think any normal person with that kind of background would have ever been nominated.
00:26:45
I was not surprised at the story because I remember when we were dealing with the outbreak
00:26:50
of COVID all over the country, National Action Network and other civil rights groups, we got
00:26:55
together formed a group called Choose Healthy Life for a Deborah Frazier House and Reverend Calvin
00:27:01
Buttons passed and I co-chetted. When they had people come to the churches to get vaccinated
00:27:10
and tested, they had people out there picketing black churches saying, "Go go and die." So in
00:27:16
Robert Kennedy was part of all of that. So this is no surprise to any of us. To have this man you
00:27:22
said it right, he was an activist against this. This is what no theory. He wasn't sitting somewhere
00:27:26
writing a column against it. They actively were trying to stop people from taking vaccines and
00:27:32
trying to stop the vaccinations from occurring. And then now have him in charge and to try to flip
00:27:38
all that he didn't say things he said is absolutely ridiculous. They actively try to stop the
00:27:45
distribution of vaccines around this country and I saw some of it firsthand.
00:27:50
Let me read Tim more from this time story just breaking. Interestingly, when I asked about the
00:27:57
times reporting on this, he does a little bit of a two-step. I mean, understanding that the politics
00:28:02
aren't black and white for him, even if his confirmation is. Quote, Kennedy's transitions
00:28:07
spokeswoman did not respond to requests for comment, but has said recently that he does not want to
00:28:12
take vaccines away. Quote asked in November by an NBC reporter, I think that's Yvonne, about his
00:28:20
general opposition to COVID vaccines and whether he would have stopped authorization. Kennedy said he
00:28:25
was concerned that the vaccines didn't prevent transmission of the virus. Quote, I wouldn't have
00:28:29
directly blocked it. He said it would have made sure that we had the best science and there was no
00:28:33
effort to do that at the time. Again, Trump is president. Yeah, and they're already interviewing people
00:28:39
for positions inside the agency. And one of the questions they're asking about is whether or not
00:28:44
they believe in vaccines and want to promote vaccines. This is front and center. You can't pretend
00:28:48
it's not this timeline. Here's also alarming to me. I mean, May 2021, he's described as being on
00:28:53
the fringes. And now here we are January 2025. And guess what? You may be running the agency that
00:29:00
gets to make all of these big choices that happens incredibly quickly. And I just want to pivot
00:29:05
real quickly back to known because as we were on air, there was breaking news. You have the fifth
00:29:09
circuit ruling against the DACA program again. But limiting and pausing its ruling pending appeal,
00:29:17
which means the DACA lives for now. And it presents a question to Chrissy Nome that I hope will be
00:29:22
asked of her, which is, will you continue to process DACA renewals so long as this is pending appeal?
00:29:31
Because the point of all of this, whether it's the vaccines, whether it's the DACA programs,
00:29:35
real people's lives, hanging on the balance, real people are relying on their government to keep
00:29:40
them safe. And that need remains even as governments transition. I'll stay with the pivot back to
00:29:47
immigration. Eric Adams is at Mar-a-Lago today. I haven't seen her read out all us Vaughan to jump
00:29:54
in if he has, but your thoughts about what and why he's there. He texted me last night, said he was
00:30:00
going. I told him that I was adamantly opposed to this president. He says I'm going to talk about
00:30:07
resources needed in New York. And I told him, I said it's going to be interpreted many ways.
00:30:13
Differently, I am against this president. I wouldn't trust him. And to go among the King weekend,
00:30:20
what a guy that says I'm going to sign an order against DEI, diversity, equity, and inclusion,
00:30:27
which has been part of your morality. Also, we can disagree without being disagreeable,
00:30:32
but I definitely think that it was, he put himself in the at the risk of this president elect,
00:30:39
manipulating him and saying, see, I can pardon all of these January six people because it was politicized,
00:30:47
because what happened to Adams was politicized. He should not allow himself to be used like that.
00:30:52
Did he say whether he was seeking the president's intervention into the investigate?
00:30:57
No, we didn't talk about that. We're first of all, we text. And he said when he gets back, we'll
00:31:02
sit down and talk. And it's not the first time we disagree on politics. But again, I know Donald
00:31:07
Trump. Donald Trump used to come to my conventions. And now I'm the biggest whatever that he ever met.
00:31:13
He, and he'll flip in a minute. And if I went to my logo, he talked about he was old friends.
00:31:18
I would say to the mayor that you, if you were in a cage with a rattlesnake and Donald Trump, trust
00:31:26
the rattlesnake. He's you know what I'm doing. I'll give you the last word on any of these threads.
00:31:32
New York Times, a city hall correspondent just ran into Eric Adams upon his return here to New York
00:31:38
City. He said that he will brief everybody tomorrow. I think it should be clear that he wasn't
00:31:43
dieted on federal corruption charges. And of course, there's a great deal of power that comes with
00:31:47
the presidency. And that would be that very pardon. So I guess we'll wait tomorrow to hear from
00:31:51
the mayor of New York City. It's a perfect tease. Bomb with your trade places. It's really my job for
00:31:57
me. Thank you very much, my friend. Up next, Trump has the future of TikTok in his hands as well.
00:32:03
And in typical Trumpian fashion, he's all over the place on that. At one time calling for a
00:32:07
ban on the app. And now, and now, he's invited TikTok CEO to his inauguration. We'll try to understand
00:32:14
why next.
00:32:21
Even though he talks a very tough game about Jaina, there is one guy who really does like TikTok.
00:32:30
We're looking at TikTok. We have some very big news on TikTok. I'm gonna TikTok now. I know a lot
00:32:35
of it on TikTok. I'm now a big star on TikTok. We'll take a look at TikTok. We're looking at TikTok. We
00:32:41
may be banning TikTok. We're not doing anything with TikTok. Joe Biden is responsible for banning TikTok.
00:32:47
If people want to save TikTok, they have to vote for me.
00:32:49
I could have banned it, TikTok.
00:32:51
I'm the one that says we should save TikTok.
00:32:53
TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok, TikTok,
00:32:53
Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok! Tiktok
00:33:23
Gorg gave the green light to a law that could ban the Chinese own social media site.
00:33:28
For its 170 million users here in the United States, that ban goes into place Sunday.
00:33:35
That was the point of the legislation anyway, but at this late hour, there is still a great
00:33:39
deal of mystery.
00:33:40
Remember lawmakers from both sides of the aisle have accused TikTok's China-based parent
00:33:45
company, Bite Dance, of stealing American user data and manipulating what people see on
00:33:51
the video sharing app to be decidedly more pro-China.
00:33:55
TikTok has denied all of this, but this afternoon, there's an open question as to whether
00:34:00
or not the law will actually be enforced.
00:34:03
President Biden, who will still be president on Sunday, is treating the issue like a hot
00:34:07
potato, handing the decision off to Donald Trump, who takes office Monday.
00:34:12
Now consider that we know Trump says he talked about TikTok with Chinese President Xi today.
00:34:18
We know Trump's at least considered an executive order designed to save his now beloved TikTok,
00:34:25
and we know TikTok CEO is expected to attend Donald Trump's inauguration Monday.
00:34:30
And if you're wondering why Trump is suddenly such a fan, just consider that earlier this
00:34:35
month's Trump himself, in the course of sharing enormous viewership data from his TikTok
00:34:41
accounts, ask, quote, why would I want to get rid of TikTok?
00:34:45
In our conversation, MSNBC political analyst Tim Miller's here.
00:34:49
He's a former RNC spokesman now, host of the Bullwark podcast, Alicia and Robert here.
00:34:55
So again, why would I want to get rid of TikTok?
00:34:59
Here's your own Secretary of State and National Security Advisor telling you why.
00:35:10
I want to ban TikTok for a very simple reason.
00:35:13
They allow the Chinese Communist Party to gain access to all of the private data on any
00:35:17
device in America that's using TikTok.
00:35:19
That's our kids, that's phones connected to our kids' phones.
00:35:23
And that's a national security threat, but it's a direct threat to our way of life, our
00:35:26
economics.
00:35:27
It's allowed them to interfere in the midterm elections.
00:35:29
This company should be banned.
00:35:30
I don't know why they're allowed to operate in the United States.
00:35:32
The debate I keep having with members of my family is I'm telling them to get off and
00:35:37
other folks in my network, it is a vacuum cleaner of every password, your financial information,
00:35:43
anything on signal or WhatsApp or any private communication you're having, and they're collecting
00:35:48
it by the millions.
00:35:50
So I guess for Trump, that's the why, but he's Trump, and so I'm not sure that that is
00:35:57
going to be the judgment that rules the day, Tim Miller.
00:36:02
Yeah, well, after watching that montage of the start, I'm going to need a cocktail.
00:36:06
I'll try to get off the air here and call.
00:36:08
So thank you for that.
00:36:09
I was a little too much Trump for me today.
00:36:11
It's time.
00:36:12
It's time.
00:36:13
It's okay.
00:36:14
It's 340 Central.
00:36:17
Here's the thing about Trump.
00:36:18
All right.
00:36:19
And this is important to kind of frame this up for this TikTok situation, but everything over
00:36:24
the next 100 days and four years.
00:36:26
Trump basically cares about four things.
00:36:30
Immigration, particularly deporting people that he thinks are, that are not from Scandinavian
00:36:36
countries, but that was obviously the motivating thing of his initial campaign all the way back
00:36:44
2016.
00:36:45
The tariffs, he's obsessed with tariffs.
00:36:47
He thinks they're magical.
00:36:48
It's his favorite word.
00:36:49
He likes tariffs.
00:36:50
So those are the two policy issues.
00:36:51
He cares about immigration and tariffs.
00:36:52
He also cares about the people that are mean to him being sad, owning the libs, if you will.
00:36:59
And he also cares about people being nice to him and flattering him or giving him money.
00:37:04
That's it.
00:37:05
I'm trying to understand what Trump is going to do.
00:37:07
You can just think about those four things and think, well, where does this fall?
00:37:10
It's not a immigration issue.
00:37:11
It's not a tariff issue.
00:37:12
It's not going to make the Democrats sad if he bans it because most of them voted for
00:37:19
the ban.
00:37:20
And so the question is, can the TikTok people flatter him enough to put spokes in the
00:37:28
wheels of this effort that has already passed overwhelmingly in Congress and was unanimously
00:37:33
affirmed by the Supreme Court?
00:37:36
I suspect, yes, and that's why the TikTok CEO is going to be at the inauguration.
00:37:40
That's why Jeff Yes is a big investor, gave money to Trump's campaign.
00:37:44
That's why they're out there putting up little graphics there of all the people that
00:37:48
latch him on TikTok.
00:37:49
So I mean, I think that's what it's going to come down to is does he feel like he's getting
00:37:52
enough flattery or cash to intervene?
00:37:55
>> Yeah.
00:37:56
So when you said four, I made a list and let me see how our list match up.
00:37:59
I wrote deportations, his press coverage, his wealth, the economy and retribution.
00:38:04
And I want to focus, I want to just follow up with you on his wealth.
00:38:07
I think Trump has also made clear and yesterday we had all of the tech bros up who were
00:38:16
tightwads in 16 and 20 who are now gushing millions of dollars to Trump's inauguration.
00:38:22
Trump has projected that the presidency is for sale.
00:38:26
What does that mean for TikTok?
00:38:28
>> I think it's good news for TikTok, it's better to have a president that thinks that their
00:38:34
platform is for sale than one that's going to stand on principle or care about national
00:38:37
security.
00:38:38
And so, look, yeah, if you look at that list that we had, I guess you were just slightly
00:38:42
nicer to him by saying cares about the economy and I said only about tariff.
00:38:46
So maybe we can say maybe he cares about the economy broadly, at least he doesn't want
00:38:49
it to crash probably because anything's going to look bad for him.
00:38:52
But that all ladders back up to this question about himself, right?
00:38:56
His image is flattering him or paying him and look, there's a story that got lost in all
00:39:02
the hearings this week, Pam Bondy, who was nominated for Attorney General.
00:39:06
She has invested like three million dollars, three plus million dollars in Trump's totally
00:39:11
worthless social media platform that nobody's on except for Trump that has no, it's making
00:39:19
no money and has no real value.
00:39:21
And she got nominated to be Attorney General.
00:39:23
Is there a direct thing there?
00:39:24
I'm not saying that there is or accusing it of it.
00:39:26
I'm just saying that this is so different from 2016 in just how much, how open they are
00:39:33
to these contributions from these big tech giants and other CEOs who are putting money
00:39:39
in the inaugural fund and into his pack and also for investments because now he has a private
00:39:45
company and he has a crypto coin that people can invest in.
00:39:49
And then he's got all of his hotels that people can stay at and there's so many ways that
00:39:53
you could contribute to Trump ink broadly now that like that is something that is definitely
00:40:00
going to be a factor on on issues such as this.
00:40:03
It's amazing and I have to ask all of you if that makes it easier to cover him that it's
00:40:09
all just mask off, close off, brazen, grift or more disorienting.
00:40:14
I had to sneak in a break first while I'll be right back.
00:40:19
Only see, I think people that aren't on the platform or haven't covered the debate closely
00:40:27
maybe miss.
00:40:28
The ban isn't about the content, the ban is about the technology.
00:40:31
Correct.
00:40:32
And it's agnostic in terms of what it is that you are posting.
00:40:36
I had missed that Donald Trump actually filed a brief in this case and in it he shares
00:40:43
his own truth social post for all those that want to save TikTok in America vote Trump.
00:40:49
That's from September 4th, 2024.
00:40:52
He also references his 14.7 million followers on the platform, so to say, like partly to the
00:40:59
list that you and Tim were putting together, there's audience slash crowd size, which is
00:41:03
important to him.
00:41:04
There's an audience here that he has built and does not want to lose.
00:41:08
He's trying to make the argument, well listen, because I use the platform, I actually understand
00:41:12
it better.
00:41:13
And he also references his own consummate deal making expertise and electoral mandates.
00:41:17
Like, don't worry, I'm going to figure this out politically.
00:41:20
I think this is for him, though, more politically fraught than he may realize.
00:41:26
>> Why?
00:41:27
>> Because there are a large number of Americans who utilize this platform, who love this platform.
00:41:32
And there are real security risks inherent in the platform and those two things are intention
00:41:38
and ordinarily he is able to simplify things to the point where one of those two becomes
00:41:42
just more important than the other.
00:41:44
But holding America's national security and American's privacy sort of high on his list.
00:41:50
He can't paint on two things, bringing down costs, sorry, he told us not going to be able
00:41:53
to do that.
00:41:54
And two, keeping Americans safe.
00:41:57
This needs to be part of that, yeah.
00:41:58
>> Right.
00:41:59
And China is one of his buggy men, Rob.
00:42:01
>> It definitely is, and it only brings more credibility to those of us that feel that
00:42:07
he's just going to do business.
00:42:10
He's just going to deal with whoever is beneficial to him and his family.
00:42:15
He knows that he's not going to be able to run again.
00:42:18
He's 78 years old.
00:42:19
He'll be 82 years old when he leaves office.
00:42:22
And I think that he'll bother with the Chinese, with the Russians.
00:42:26
It doesn't matter.
00:42:27
For him to make this 180 degree turn, and I didn't know he had filed a brief.
00:42:32
It's business with Donald Trump.
00:42:34
And anyone that has ever dealt with Trump like those of us in New York that's dealt with
00:42:38
him high end coal, for years, no, it's all about the bottom line for Trump or his self-angry
00:42:44
dies.
00:42:45
>> So, Jim Miller, this is where I feel like it's not about Trump anymore.
00:42:48
It's about us.
00:42:49
He has revealed himself so completely this time ahead of his second inauguration on Monday.
00:42:55
How do we adapt and adjust to this out in the open, everything's for sale, including
00:42:59
U.S. national security presidency?
00:43:03
>> Well, that's a big question, I mean, for some people, that stuff isn't affecting them
00:43:09
today, right?
00:43:10
And I get this question from Regal folks like, what am I supposed to do on Monday or next
00:43:14
week?
00:43:15
And I'm like, get involved in your community.
00:43:16
You don't need to engage in this minute-by-minute, but for the people who have a political
00:43:20
fear, if your question is to the Democrats or to the anti-Trump coalition broadly, right?
00:43:24
I think that the political opportunity here, which has really come into focus in the
00:43:29
last couple of weeks, especially, and it was part of Biden's farewell address, even though
00:43:34
that was not really part of the campaign in any meaningful way, is this notion that Trump
00:43:39
ran for the forgotten man, ostensibly, right?
00:43:43
Or for America, the American worker, like, that's the whole conceit of MAGA.
00:43:48
And here he is, he's not even in yet, and he's already selling the government, selling
00:43:53
people's security, selling people's jobs, some people's interests, to the highest bidders
00:43:58
because he likes being around rich people, and that's what he actually cares about, is the interest
00:44:01
of these billionaires, and he likes having Elon around, and he likes getting sucked up to by
00:44:07
Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos.
00:44:10
And I think that is a political opportunity for the Democrats that allows them to, once
00:44:14
again, kind of carry the mantle of being regular people against the overwhelming.
00:44:19
So I think focusing on that contrast and how Trump is betraying his own voters is a political
00:44:24
opportunity for the Democrats that is coming into focus right now, and obviously it's not
00:44:28
something they can take advantage of until the midterms, but that you can begin to, you
00:44:33
know, start the drum beat already.
00:44:36
Yeah, I mean, it's something to talk about next week with you, Tim Miller, but it is sort
00:44:41
of the ideological and brand tension that undergirds the musk band and fight that we've
00:44:45
talked about so much.
00:44:47
Much more on all of this as the days come into focus.
00:44:51
Tim Miller, Alicia Menendez, and the red thank you for joining us today.
00:44:55
Alicia, we'll all be watching you here tomorrow at N Sunday, at 8 a.m. for the weekend, and
00:45:01
drive your show politics nation at 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday.
00:45:05
Guess this week include the minority leader, Huckine Jeffries, and Martin Luther King, the
00:45:10
third and his family, none of us will miss any of your programs.
00:45:14
It'll be too cold to do anything other than much television.
00:45:17
Another break for us.
00:45:18
We'll be right back.
00:45:19
Today, one of the final sentencing in a January 6 case before Trump's inauguration, one of
00:45:29
the Capitol rioters involved in the assault on former DC Metro Police officer Michael Fanon
00:45:35
was sentenced to 71 months in prison, in line with what the government was asking for
00:45:40
in this case.
00:45:41
The rioter, Lewis Wayne Snutes pleaded guilty to assaulting law enforcement during January
00:45:46
6 and can be seen pushing officer Fanon through the crowd of rioters and holding him by the
00:45:51
arm while he was attacked by other rioters in video evidence presented by the prosecution.
00:45:58
Officer Fanon delivered a victim impact statement before the court and spoke to NBC's Ryan
00:46:03
Riley about Trump's return and why he feels let down by the Justice Department.
00:46:08
If we're to believe down Trump four days from now, they're going to be let free.
00:46:21
To me, that's not criminal justice system.
00:46:26
I signed up to participate in and dedicate to years of my life too.
00:46:33
Our next for us with the resistance will look like going up against a Trump White House
00:46:37
the second time around.
00:46:38
How that conversation next, don't go anywhere.
00:46:43
Hey, everybody.
00:46:46
It's Rob Lowe here.
00:46:47
If you haven't heard, I have a podcast that's called Literally with Rob Lowe.
00:46:54
And basically it's conversations I've had that really make you feel like you're pulling
00:46:59
up a chair at an intimate dinner between myself and people that I admire, like Aaron Sorkin
00:47:06
or Tiffany Haddish, Demi Moore, Chris Pratt, Michael J. Fox, their new episodes out every
00:47:14
Thursday.
00:47:15
So subscribe, please and listen, wherever you get your podcasts.
00:47:21
The other day, I saw a meme showing a baby in a womb and it was captioned.
00:47:25
This was the last time I slept well.
00:47:27
Now at first, I laughed, but then I got concerned because it was true.
00:47:32
I always figured bad sleep was my fate until I took a leap of faith and replaced my pillow.
00:47:39
Coops original adjustable pillow seriously solved my sleep issues.
00:47:43
Before coop, I tossed, I turned and I woke up with neck pain feeling exhausted.
00:47:48
Now I sleep comfortably and wake up feeling refreshed.
00:47:52
Whether you're a side back or stomach sleeper, you can customize the pillow's height by adding
00:47:57
or removing the fill, which is this blend of microfiber and memory foam that doesn't
00:48:02
go flat.
00:48:03
Don't settle for sleepless nights and groggy mornings.
00:48:06
Try coop risk free with a 100 night trial and get 20% off your first order.
00:48:11
Better sleep starts with Coops adjustable pillow.
00:48:14
Visit our website at coopslipgoods.com/health, that's c-o-o-p-sleepgoods.com/health.
00:48:19
Dear old work platform, it's not you, it's us, actually it is you.
00:48:27
Endless onboarding, constant IT bottlenecks, we've had enough.
00:48:31
We need a platform that just gets us and to be honest, we've met someone new.
00:48:35
They're called Monday.com, and it was love at first onboarding.
00:48:39
They're beautiful dashboards, they're customizable workflows that is floating on a digital
00:48:44
cloud 9, so no hard feelings, but we're moving on Monday.com, the first work platform you'll
00:48:50
love to use.
00:48:57
I'm concerned about how fragile democracy is, that sounds corny, but I really am concerned
00:49:08
because you've heard me say it a hundred times.
00:49:12
I really think we're at an inflection point in history here and then think about this way,
00:49:17
but I got involved in public life because of the abuse of power.
00:49:24
My dad would say, you know, the greatest sin of all is the abuse of power.
00:49:28
Hi again everyone, it's 5 o'clock in New York, in the final days of his presidency that fear
00:49:34
expressed by President Joe Biden, the fear of power being abused by the powerful.
00:49:40
The fear of democracy's fragility is not an abstract thing anymore.
00:49:45
It is well founded and not easily overcome.
00:49:49
The New York Times editorial board writes about this very thing, and it's last piece
00:49:53
before Trump's inauguration, it asks all of us, the American people and America's institutions
00:50:00
to try.
00:50:01
It writes of the style of Trump's governing, if we can even call it that at this point, they
00:50:06
write this, quote, his goal, Trump's goal and these efforts has been to push people to
00:50:10
check themselves rather than to check his power.
00:50:13
He wants to make dissents so painful as to be intolerable, and so the editorial board argues
00:50:19
we, the public, cannot shrink in the face of that, quote, "America's leaders and institutions
00:50:25
must remain undeterred.
00:50:27
They will need to show courage and resilience in the face of Trump's efforts as they continue
00:50:31
to play their unique roles in our democracy.
00:50:34
Vigilance is everything.
00:50:36
If institutions surrender to the fear and coercion by bending the knee or by rationalizing
00:50:42
that the next right actions aren't worth the fight, stress or risk, they not only
00:50:47
emboldened future abuses, they are also complicit in undermining their own power and influence.
00:50:53
We've already seen this happen in the month since Trump was reelected, and well ahead
00:51:00
of his official taking the oath of office and advance in advance, especially from the likes
00:51:07
of Congress and some of the most high-profile, global business leaders, underscoring the
00:51:13
urgency of this fight in this moment and the reality that it will be ongoing and uncomfortable
00:51:19
over these next four years.
00:51:21
That is why in these final days of the Biden presidency, we're watching the 46th President
00:51:27
take action.
00:51:28
From the Washington Post, quote, "Biden's designated national monuments in California and
00:51:33
remove Cuba from the list of state sponsors of terrorism.
00:51:37
He's blocked a Japanese company's takeover of U.S. steel, an extended temporary protected
00:51:42
status to nearly 1 million immigrants.
00:51:45
He's commuted the sentences of nearly everyone who was on federal death row, and he's granted
00:51:51
to his son Hunter Biden a sweeping pardon.
00:51:54
Outgoing presidents often conclude their tenure with a flurry of activities such as pardons
00:51:59
or proclamations, but Biden's efforts have been unusually wide-ranging, reflecting his
00:52:04
conviction that Trump represents a unique threat to American traditions, batting down
00:52:10
the hatches of our democracies, where we start the hour with some of our favorite experts
00:52:14
in France.
00:52:15
Co-hosts of MSNBC's The Weekend, my friend Simone Sanders, Townsend is here, plus President
00:52:21
of Reproductive Freedom for all many Timorajus back, MSNBC columnist and author of the newsletter
00:52:27
to the contrary.
00:52:28
Charlie Sykes is here.
00:52:29
Simone, I start with you on the Biden side of the ledger, your thoughts about his final
00:52:34
days as President."
00:52:35
Look, Nicole, I think there are a lot of people who believe that
00:52:40
maybe President Biden did not understand the moment we were in, right?
00:52:44
It's particularly when he welcomed President-elect Trump to the White House, and then the White
00:52:49
House released these photos of not just in the whole office, but literally, posing outside
00:52:53
the White House smiling with Trump, and there were folks who said, "Oh, no.
00:52:56
He just said he was a threat to democracy, and here he is welcoming him.
00:53:00
Maybe the Democrats were just all rhetoric."
00:53:02
But what the President, I think, is his legacy, and to be clear, legacies, they are evaluated
00:53:08
over time, not in one particular moment.
00:53:11
And I think the legacy that Joe Biden leaves here will be one that is what he told me when
00:53:17
he first talked to him in 2019, that the battle for the soul of this nation, and what he
00:53:22
did in the Oval Office addressed the other night, what he continuously reiterated in the
00:53:26
interview, the excellent interview that Lawrence conducted, is that Joe Biden understands
00:53:30
this moment.
00:53:31
And he wants the American people to understand this moment as well.
00:53:34
He is not going out, you know, all rainbows and bunnies, as I like to say, and given a laundry
00:53:39
list of all his accomplishments, and says, "Oh, it's going to be all right."
00:53:42
He is warning us all that if we do not stand guard, if we do not do something in the words
00:53:47
of, you know, Michelle Obama, this country is going to become something that we do not recognize.
00:53:51
And I know some people might say that that's hyperbole, but look around, open your eyes.
00:53:57
It is happening.
00:53:58
I mean, some on to your point, we leveth his farewell message, because not only in the context
00:54:06
of previous farewell messages, but to your point about people that are wondering whether
00:54:12
the Democratic Party and the pro-democracy movement understands the moment or believes
00:54:16
the warnings this issued, "Hell, yes, they do."
00:54:19
I mean, he warned of an American oligarchy.
00:54:22
I think it's an incredibly important, I mean, the choices he's made in these final days,
00:54:28
should leave no doubt in anyone's mind that it says, "Dire, as people have been warning."
00:54:32
Absolutely.
00:54:33
And, you know, to be clear, that is not how Joe Biden talks.
00:54:36
You know, anyone who knows the president, he doesn't speak like that.
00:54:40
This is not a speech, frankly, that he had given before.
00:54:45
And that, anyone, just take a look at what he has said.
00:54:49
That should let you know that he understands this moment.
00:54:51
The president is someone who believes in the institutions, right?
00:54:55
He talked about with the interview with Lawrence when he, why he got into public service in
00:55:00
the first place.
00:55:01
He started as a county councilman and then became the youngest person ever elected to the
00:55:04
United States Senate at one point in time.
00:55:07
Then obviously, vice president and now president.
00:55:09
Joe Biden is someone that even when we worked for him and we would say, you know, I would
00:55:13
get into very spirited battles, if you will, with the president when I worked for him on
00:55:18
the campaign trail in 2020, because Joe Biden would say, you know, this is, it would sound
00:55:24
sometimes that he is talking about a congress in a way of life and politics and no longer
00:55:28
exists.
00:55:29
And for all of us, even people that worked for him that doubted him, he went in and he got
00:55:33
all these, this worked in within the, with the congress, given the interesting dynamics.
00:55:38
He, it pains him, I think, to see what is happening in this country.
00:55:43
And for anyone that cares about our country, who loves it, who wants a future for our children
00:55:47
and our children's children, I think you have to be willing to, you know, take up your
00:55:51
ban or take up your mantle, you know, find your place in space here and lean in and do the
00:55:55
real hard work of defending these, the hard fought ones and gains that we have made in this
00:56:03
country.
00:56:04
Because Donald Trump, he doesn't care about those things.
00:56:05
He cares about other things.
00:56:07
His agenda is very different than the agenda for American democracy.
00:56:11
Charlie Sykes, a New York Times editorial board also stepping pretty brazenly and boldly
00:56:18
into the space of urging people to protect institutions, let me read you their editorial.
00:56:26
First is simply demonstrating conviction by identifying the right thing to do, then showing
00:56:31
the courage to pursue that path, even in the face of pressure.
00:56:35
Second is remembering that despite Trump's transactional nature, no one can count on remaining
00:56:39
in his good graces without continued unconditional fealty.
00:56:43
Talk those in his own inner circle who justified or turned a blind eye to misbehavior again
00:56:48
and again, only to be cast out for a single episode of standing up to his excesses.
00:56:54
Any advantage gain may be fleeting and he risk overcome may return.
00:56:58
Third is demonstrating faith in the American system with its remarkable series of checks and
00:57:03
balances, with its strong set of rights, with its promise of equal justice.
00:57:08
Your thoughts about this moment in these messages?
00:57:12
Well, obviously, I think the institutions need to stand up against Donald Trump.
00:57:16
I think they ought not to bend the knee.
00:57:19
But what we don't need is more empty rhetoric reciting the same sorts of things.
00:57:26
And I'm sorry I have to disagree about Joe Biden batting down the hatches for democracy.
00:57:31
He failed to batten down the hatches for democracy.
00:57:37
And I think that we need to be very, very clear-eyed about this.
00:57:40
I think that Joe Biden had one major responsibility, which was to hold Donald Trump accountable and
00:57:45
to prevent his return to power that was his prime directive.
00:57:48
And he failed to do so.
00:57:50
And he's leaving office with the Democratic brand, the opposition brand, badly tarnished.
00:57:57
Donald Trump is emboldened, empowered, immune, and about to take office.
00:58:04
A lot of the protections that could have been put in place, many of the steps that could
00:58:09
have been taken were not taken.
00:58:12
And I think that we need to be clear-eyed about that.
00:58:14
That, you know, yes, Joe Biden had a lot of successes, but the reality is that his legacy
00:58:19
will be as a parenthesis between the two terms of Donald Trump.
00:58:24
And for people who are thinking that I'm being too negative here, if we do not clear in a
00:58:30
very clear-eyed way, understand how we screwed up.
00:58:35
We won't be able to prevent screwing up again.
00:58:38
And so I do think that it is disappointing the way this has come to an end.
00:58:45
It didn't have to be this way.
00:58:47
And I think that both Democrats and members of the pro-democracy coalition have to ask, how
00:58:53
is it that with Donald Trump's character, a convicted felon, a man who made his, made
00:58:59
no secret of his authoritarian leanings, ran one of the ugliest campaigns ever?
00:59:07
How is it they were not able to prevent his return to power?
00:59:12
How was it they were not able to empower the institutions that used to be the guardrails
00:59:17
of democracy?
00:59:19
So I think we need to have a continued, every honest discussion about that.
00:59:23
What do we do now?
00:59:25
Well, I think that the opposition needs to be the opposition, but it also needs to be smart
00:59:31
about it.
00:59:32
Donald Trump is going to flood the zone on Monday.
00:59:36
It won't be the first 100 days.
00:59:37
It'll be the first 100 hours.
00:59:39
And I think that right now we, I think the key thing is not to be overwhelmed or distracted.
00:59:46
Donald Trump has a master of distraction.
00:59:48
I think we have to separate the noise from the signal, figure out what is important,
00:59:52
what is substantive, and to seize upon those issues because I think the Donald Trump and
00:59:58
the Republicans are going to be drastically and radically out of step with public opinion
01:00:02
on a lot of things.
01:00:03
Millions of Americans voted for Donald Trump for a variety of reasons, whatever the price
01:00:07
of eggs, but this is an administration that's going to be at ramming speed.
01:00:11
They're overplaying their mandate.
01:00:14
I think that they are going to push it too far.
01:00:16
I think that they are suffused with hubris and triumphalism.
01:00:22
And American political history would suggest that when a political party comes in and overreaches
01:00:27
in a radical way like that, that they will stumble.
01:00:31
And I think that Democrats and other members of this coalition need to be smart and need
01:00:38
to be selective in picking out those things that I think that are going to trip up the Trump
01:00:44
administration.
01:00:45
And also to defend the things that are the most important to defend, not to be distracted
01:00:49
by the ephemera, but to really go at the fundamental challenges to the rule of law,
01:00:58
to public health, to national security, all of those things that actually matter to the
01:01:03
average American.
01:01:04
I want one more question for you, and then I do want to give some other chance to respond.
01:01:08
But let me just ask you, there's a lot of criticism this week that the Democrats have perhaps
01:01:15
underachieved in the confirmation hearings.
01:01:18
What is one of the countries to political parties, especially the one of the minority?
01:01:24
What is the mission and what does success look like if Republicans, to a person, are more afraid
01:01:30
of a mean tweet from Donald Trump than someone with a record of appearing on the air and
01:01:36
at work drunk, taking female staffers to strip clubs, an allegation of rape?
01:01:44
What does success look like if one of the two parties is more afraid of Trump than putting
01:01:49
that person in charge of every man and woman in the military?
01:01:55
>> Well, that is the world that we live in, and we're seeing this on display right now.
01:01:59
I mean, the fact that somebody like a Joni Ernst would roll over and cave in on Peter
01:02:04
Higgs is an indication of that.
01:02:07
But you and I talked about this, I had high expectations for these confirmation hearings
01:02:14
highlighted the unsuriosity of many of these nominees, the absurdity of these appointments
01:02:24
on the real danger that they posed.
01:02:26
And I guess they did underperform because the reality is that, the reality is that I don't
01:02:36
know that they were ready to handle that particular environment that you're discussing.
01:02:41
Now, keep in mind that Republicans are afraid of the mean tweets, but they also have to go
01:02:46
back to their voters.
01:02:48
And if in fact you expose the extreme agenda, it's not just that Peter Higgs might be a drunk
01:02:55
and a man who sexually assaults women because apparently that's acceptable in the Trump world.
01:03:02
But that he embraces these extreme ideas that in fact will undermine our veterans, will
01:03:08
undermine our fighting forces, and to actually go with the substance of all of this.
01:03:13
So I do think that this was one of those lessons that we all have to be better at this.
01:03:21
We just can't keep reciting the same talking points, we can't use the same jargon.
01:03:26
We can't just simply assume that because a person is a bad character, they will be rejected.
01:03:31
We have to make it very clear to the American people what this means to them, what it means
01:03:38
to their lives and their lives of their children.
01:03:41
And some of the centers turned in very, very strong performances, but overall, I think they're
01:03:49
going to need to up their game after Monday.
01:03:52
Samantha, I'll let you respond to Charlie, but let me add one more question of my own.
01:03:57
I take the note.
01:03:58
I agree with the note, but I don't know that I could articulate the mission.
01:04:01
I don't know how you make people care about the character of a woman who writes in her
01:04:05
own book about brutally shooting and murdering her own dog, because it was a frisky puppy.
01:04:10
I don't know how you connect with the American people and make them care about the character
01:04:14
of a man whose own mother said he was awful the women.
01:04:17
I don't know how you connect or make people care about the lack of qualifications for the
01:04:22
person who will be in charge of mass deportations of more human beings in human history.
01:04:27
That's the ambition of the Trump mass deportation policy.
01:04:31
I don't know.
01:04:32
I take the note.
01:04:34
I agree with the note.
01:04:35
I too was underwhelmed, but I think there's a structural thing that no one wants to talk
01:04:39
about in terms of people's appetite and hunger for hate and punishing the other.
01:04:46
I think you're absolutely right, Nicole, and I agree with the note.
01:04:49
I think that maybe not even making people care, but I do think that a number of the questions
01:04:54
could have been more pointed and specific to the role of the job.
01:04:59
I think that there is a notion for us to get hung up on the character and the morality
01:05:03
of the things which I care about character and I care about morals, but the reality is that
01:05:09
many of these nominees are just simply unqualified.
01:05:12
You can let's set aside Pete Hegg says alleged issues with alcoholism and his infidelity
01:05:21
to his wife and perhaps even sexual assault.
01:05:26
He's not qualified.
01:05:27
What are his qualifications to be the Secretary of Defense?
01:05:30
The fact that he was a veteran?
01:05:31
Thank you for your service.
01:05:32
That is in fact not the qualifications, he couldn't name security agreements that the Secretary
01:05:37
of Defense was in charge of administering and overlooking as a part of the United States
01:05:42
government.
01:05:43
He could not name the countries in ASEAN.
01:05:45
He didn't know specifics and those are the things that I think Democrats need to focus
01:05:49
on.
01:05:50
Look, I understand that everybody is not going to feel the same way about Joe Biden.
01:05:55
I do think that legacies are not made in a moment and over time they change.
01:06:00
I will say this, public opinion, this is the weekend of MLK, before we celebrate MLK
01:06:08
Day on Monday in addition to this inauguration.
01:06:10
In the aftermath of MLK's assassination, you know the majority of people in this country
01:06:15
when asked an opinion poll said that Dr. King brought his assassination upon himself.
01:06:19
They said that he was a socialist and that he was a communist.
01:06:23
That is what the people thought of Dr. King in the aftermath of his assassination.
01:06:27
He is one of the greats in this country, right?
01:06:29
I say that to say that sometimes, the public opinion, sometimes the people are wrong.
01:06:35
There are many things that used to be the law of the land that people agreed with in this
01:06:39
country.
01:06:40
Everything from slavery to women that being able to, you know, have their own bank account
01:06:43
less associated with their husband, let alone other rights.
01:06:46
So I do think that part of the people that say they want to do the work of pro-democracy
01:06:53
of not just defending institutions, but defending the hard fought gains that the people, that
01:06:58
the institutions did not bring us these rights.
01:07:01
The people fought for these rights to be enshrined into the institutions, right?
01:07:05
Dr. King often said that one thing we knew in the South is that freedom is always won.
01:07:11
It's never given.
01:07:12
So people have to recommit themselves to whatever their work is and be specific and be consistent
01:07:18
and understand that they may not see their gains.
01:07:21
Joe Biden might be like Moses.
01:07:22
Okay.
01:07:23
There's a lot of bondage and then they wandered around into the wilderness for 40 years before
01:07:28
they got to the promised land.
01:07:30
Hopefully, it doesn't take 40 years, but the reality is that there's work to do.
01:07:35
My friend, I don't know if we have 40 years.
01:07:37
I need all of you to stick around.
01:07:38
I need to bring many in on all of this.
01:07:40
When we come back, what the next four years have in store for supporters of reproductive
01:07:45
healthcare, reproductive rights.
01:07:47
There are alarming new developments to tell you about and headlines about how abortion
01:07:51
opponents want husbands and boyfriends, sexual partners to report their partners abortions.
01:07:57
We'll bring you that reporting next and later in the broadcast, our friends Luke Brawwater
01:08:01
and Annie Carney of the New York Times with their forthcoming new book, Mad House, about
01:08:07
the epic levels of dysfunction in the U.S. Congress.
01:08:10
Some of it was on display for all of us to see all week long and it only promises to get
01:08:15
worse than White House continues after a quick break, don't go anywhere.
01:08:19
As the pro-democracy movement braces itself ahead of Donald Trump's inauguration Monday and
01:08:30
prepares to watch with their eyes wide open, just how dark the next four years can be, in
01:08:36
terms of our fundamental freedoms.
01:08:38
Anti-abortion advocates are already ramping up their legal efforts to further erode reproductive
01:08:43
rights and access.
01:08:45
Last night, yesterday, right-wing Texas judge Matthew Kesmerick ruled that the states of
01:08:50
Idaho, Kansas and Missouri can proceed with a lawsuit seeking to curb the use of the abortion
01:08:56
drug myth of Pristone and prevent it from being prescribed remotely.
01:09:00
It has been a vital lifeline for women living in states with abortion bans.
01:09:05
Kesmerick's ruling comes even though the Supreme Court dismissed the case last year and
01:09:10
either Idaho, Kansas, or Missouri as any ties to Kesmerick's district in Texas.
01:09:16
As these legal battles escalate, anti-reproductive freedom activists are stooping to new lows further
01:09:22
endangering the lives of actual women living in states with abortion bans in the process.
01:09:29
Washington Post reports this, quote, "As anti-abortion advocates launch legal efforts to stop abortion
01:09:34
pills from reaching women in states with bans, they are increasingly turning to one group
01:09:40
with uniquely intimate and specific information to help them find cases.
01:09:45
Male sex partners are women who decided to end their pregnancies.
01:09:49
This partner-focused approach will shift to a more public phase next month when Texas's
01:09:55
largest anti-abortion organization launches an advertising campaign on Facebook and
01:10:01
X to reach the husband's boyfriends and sex partners of women who have had abortions in the
01:10:08
state with the goal of recruiting them to file lawsuits against those who assisted the
01:10:13
women in ending their pregnancies."
01:10:15
One anti-abortion activist told the Washington Post this, quote, "The strategy right now is
01:10:21
to tell dads that if you're the father of a child victim of an abortion, you have legal
01:10:26
rights.
01:10:27
There may be a way to hold these people accountable."
01:10:30
We're back with Simone, Minnie, and Charlie, and joining us at the table, host of the Fast
01:10:35
Politics podcast, Special Correspondent for Vanity Fair, Molly John Fast is here.
01:10:40
Minnie, I start with you.
01:10:41
How do you fight these efforts on so many fronts?
01:10:46
Yeah.
01:10:47
This is the first Trump administration we're going to have under the DOBS decision.
01:10:52
I think that's really important.
01:10:54
So we have Republicans up and down the ballot from Donald Trump to, you know, down ballot
01:10:59
races, U.S. Senate races, governors races, AGs, legislatures, who ran away from the abortion
01:11:05
issue, who ran away from their party and their own records.
01:11:10
My Johnson promising not to take action on abortion bands, Donald Trump, really trying
01:11:15
to hide his record.
01:11:16
So one of the main things that I took away from the dialogue with Charlie and Simone just
01:11:23
now is there's a lot to learn from the abortion rights movement and how to tackle extremists
01:11:29
including Donald Trump, but also extremists like Matthew Cosmeric, you know, Triny John
01:11:35
Dan Paxton and Texas folks across the country.
01:11:38
And it's this.
01:11:39
It's we now have the for the first time policy makers who've been elected to office despite
01:11:47
their records on abortion.
01:11:48
The American people were unequivocal in their support on reproductive freedom.
01:11:52
So what we have to be doing now is very aggressively making sure the American people understand
01:11:59
when these policy makers are taking these actions, what they're doing about it and how they can
01:12:04
take, how they can take action.
01:12:06
So for example, we saw multiple nominees this week being grilled by U.S. Senators about
01:12:14
their positions on reproductive health.
01:12:16
We're going to see legislation, anti-abortion legislation on the House floor next week.
01:12:20
And we're going to continue to see action in the states by extremist Republicans like
01:12:23
the ones you just mentioned, taking out these really egregious offensive ads totally out
01:12:30
of step with the American people.
01:12:32
Now, if it happens without protest and without action from organizations like ours, we've
01:12:38
missed a massive opportunity.
01:12:39
The good news is we're ready.
01:12:40
We're rested.
01:12:41
We're marching in the streets tomorrow and states across the country.
01:12:44
And we'll continue to organize and they're giving us a hell of a lot to organize around.
01:12:48
Many, what do you do in the more intimate setting for women who, I mean, let me read you the
01:12:54
post reporting about how this would impact victims of domestic violence.
01:12:59
Quote, "Some of the men who have filed this kind of legal action have a history of verbal
01:13:03
and emotional abuse when a Texas man filed a lawsuit in early 2023 against three women
01:13:09
who had helped his ex-wife obtain abortion pills.
01:13:12
He had a history of harassing his former partner, according to court records, according
01:13:16
to transcripts of recordings his ex-wife shared with the court.
01:13:19
Marcus Silva threatened to persecute her if she didn't have sex with him and do his laundry.
01:13:24
He also threatened to send sex videos of her to her employer and her family and friends
01:13:29
transcripts show.
01:13:31
How do you take the activism in the streets and protect in the near term while Republicans
01:13:37
control all the levers of power?
01:13:40
How do you protect women while Republican policymakers are soliciting their abusers
01:13:46
to tell on them and wrap them out?"
01:13:50
It's extremely disturbing and chilling.
01:13:55
Women, in particular, when we organize and when we are activated, we don't just do it
01:14:01
in one sector, right?
01:14:03
Most activists we know in this space, in the gender equity movements across the board with
01:14:09
those paid leave, domestic violence, anti-family violence, rape, anti-rape organizations.
01:14:17
We're used to being advocates in every part of our life.
01:14:21
This is also an important note that pregnancy coercion, coercion, domestic abuse, it rises
01:14:30
when women are pregnant.
01:14:33
Pregnancy is one of the most dangerous times for women, not just because of the medical
01:14:37
situation she's in, the precarious nature of pregnancy, but also because of the rates
01:14:42
of domestic violence and assault that rise in intimate partner violence when a partner
01:14:47
is pregnant.
01:14:48
Look, the way that we tackle it is we organize but we organize in our communities.
01:14:54
Some of the most powerful civic organizations in this country or organizations that provide
01:15:00
mutual aid and resource to women in crisis who are in situations of domestic abuse or
01:15:06
sexual assault.
01:15:07
We work very closely with those organizations.
01:15:09
Our activists, many of our supporters are the same women and leaders in their communities
01:15:14
and we have to make sure we're continuing to reach out.
01:15:17
The good news is since dogs, our movement and organizations allied with us in the larger
01:15:23
gender equity space have been doing that through abortion funds, through assistance across
01:15:28
state lines and those same women, those same activists who do that work are often trained
01:15:34
dualists, they're trained advocates for women in other areas of their life too, so that's
01:15:38
how we're going to do the work.
01:15:40
Minis work has always been so vital, but I think that mysterically women, again, if they're
01:15:48
suffering or struggling or being in a situation of abuse or in a high-risk pregnancy need to
01:15:54
hear minis voice because what's going to happen Monday is a president who was found liable
01:15:59
for sexual assault will be sworn in.
01:16:01
I'm a vice president in JD Vance who believes that women should stay in marriages even violent
01:16:06
ones.
01:16:07
We'll be sworn in as vice president.
01:16:09
A credibly accused person will become the secretary of defense if all the reporting is
01:16:15
accurate.
01:16:16
RFK Junior also credibly accused by someone who worked and took care of his kids.
01:16:22
There will be very high profile men in control of the federal government who stand accused
01:16:29
of the kinds of abuses that Minis talking about.
01:16:32
Yeah, you know, look, this was the thing that was really shocking in the 2024 election was
01:16:37
you had voters vote for choice, right, in the state, they had these state ballot initiatives
01:16:43
and they voted overwhelmingly in many states, including red states, that they wanted choice,
01:16:48
they wanted power over their body, but they also voted for Trump.
01:16:52
And Democrats tried to thread the needle to say, you know, this guy, he's not, you know,
01:16:58
he's the guy who appointed the justices to the Supreme Court, who ultimately overturned
01:17:03
Robi Wade.
01:17:04
And they couldn't make voters believe it.
01:17:07
Again and again, we saw voters did not believe Donald Trump would do a lot of the things
01:17:11
he said he would do.
01:17:12
And on abortion, he smartly pivoted, right?
01:17:15
He said, I'm not, you know, I'm going to leave it up to the states.
01:17:18
He was very oblique in the way he talked about abortion.
01:17:21
So what's going to happen now is what we all know is going to happen, right?
01:17:25
And what this article we're talking about, the state, these red states are teeing it up
01:17:30
in order to go after the abortion pill.
01:17:33
And I think that part of what's going to have to happen is that voters are going to have
01:17:35
to actually see this.
01:17:37
And it's too bad because I think a lot of us hoped that they wouldn't have to do this,
01:17:42
that this wouldn't have to get so far, but I'm not sure what the other choices are at
01:17:46
this point.
01:17:47
A woman said to me, not enough women died and the last election at this ominous time, Simone,
01:17:56
we will be watching you tomorrow and on Sunday at 80's stirred on the weekend.
01:18:03
Simone, many Tamaraju, Charlie Sykes, thank you for spending time with us.
01:18:07
Molly sticks around for the rest of the hour.
01:18:09
When we come back, the authors of a brand new book about the historic levels of dysfunction
01:18:15
in Congress.
01:18:17
This title says it all, "Madhouse," how Donald Trump, "Maga Mean Girls," a former
01:18:21
used car salesman, a Florida nepo baby, and a man with rats in his walls broke Congress.
01:18:27
New York Times reporters look broadwater in any carny by the authors and they'll be our
01:18:31
guests next.
01:18:41
Admittedly, this nomination is unconventional.
01:18:44
The nominee is unconventional, just like that New York developer who wrote down the escalator
01:18:53
in 2015 to announce his candidacy for President.
01:18:58
That may be what makes Mr. Hegsith an excellent choice.
01:19:02
I don't think any board in the world would have hired Steve Jobs, or Elon Musk, or Mark Zuckerberg
01:19:08
when they founded their companies either, so this country is founded by young people who
01:19:13
had a great vision.
01:19:14
Conducted yourself very well today.
01:19:16
In fact, so well that I believe it's incumbent upon this committee to confirm you ASAP.
01:19:23
How many push-ups can you do?
01:19:26
I did five sets of 47 this morning.
01:19:30
That really happened.
01:19:32
I have to speak personally, it's hard to watch.
01:19:36
The shameless show of support and admiration from Republican senators this week for
01:19:44
one of Donald Trump's least qualified cabinet picks.
01:19:49
Heavy on the flattery and the jokes, and seriously lacking in any questions, not just about allegations
01:19:55
of sexual assault, but grave, grave mistakes on the management side of the things he's
01:20:02
run.
01:20:03
It's also the latest example of Congress's dysfunction, which is now out in public view.
01:20:09
And it's extreme members and the cult like following.
01:20:13
It's the subject that our friends from the New York Times, Luke Broadwater, and Annie Carney
01:20:16
write about in their new book.
01:20:18
The book is called Mad House.
01:20:20
How Donald Trump, MAGA Mean Girls, a former used car salesman, a Florida nepo baby, and
01:20:26
a man with rats in his walls broke Congress.
01:20:30
Luke Broadwater and Annie Carney are with us now.
01:20:32
So Luke, you go to first tell me who's who.
01:20:34
Take me through the title.
01:20:37
Well, we really want people to buy the book so they can find out some of these for themselves.
01:20:43
But throughout the book, we do spend a lot of time with certain members of Congress.
01:20:49
And you will see, as you read it, who exactly each person is that's described in the title.
01:20:55
But there's no shortage of infighting, of squabbling, of personal vendettas.
01:21:05
And you really get to see why Congress is so dysfunctional in this book.
01:21:10
And why the so-called workhorses of a different generation who are invested in sort of the serious
01:21:17
business of governing have been replaced by people who want to be on TV all the time are
01:21:22
obsessed with fame and frivolous things obsessed with impressing Donald Trump at all times.
01:21:30
And not necessarily doing the best thing for keeping the government open or for the American
01:21:36
people.
01:21:37
Annie, we, I'm going to try one more time to get it.
01:21:41
NEPO baby.
01:21:42
I mean, is that Matt Gates?
01:21:43
You're going to give me anything?
01:21:45
Okay.
01:21:46
So Florida NEPO baby is Matt Gates.
01:21:50
His father, Todd Gates, was a very powerful state senator.
01:21:54
Maggie Mean Girls, I'll give you because I think it's fairly self-explanatory.
01:21:59
That would be Lauren Bobert and Marjorie Taylor Greene, who probably hate each other more
01:22:04
than they hate the Democrats in Congress.
01:22:07
I'm going to keep man with the rats in his walls as a mystery for our readers.
01:22:13
And I forget, I still haven't memorized the whole subpanel myself.
01:22:18
Yeah, I think that one will be for the readers.
01:22:23
But it's someone who is going to be a main character in the next, in the coming year ahead.
01:22:31
And how do you look at this body that is seemingly at war with itself?
01:22:39
Speaker Johnson, after hanging on by his fingernails, House Congressman Turner, no Democrat, no
01:22:47
rhino, no Liz Cheney, really even, simply a Republican who spent time at Mar-a-Lago a week
01:22:55
ago.
01:22:56
They made him a cake.
01:22:57
They stuck a candle in it.
01:22:58
And then they chopped off his hat and kicked him off the Intel committee.
01:23:02
What does that portent?
01:23:03
I mean, the Speaker of the House, one could forget when one sees pictures of Mike Johnson
01:23:10
on the plane with Don Jr. and RFK and Trump and part of that crew, is the head of a
01:23:17
co-equal branch of government that is separate from the White House.
01:23:21
That is supposed to be a check.
01:23:23
That is like an equal, not a member of the entourage, not taking orders from the President.
01:23:30
And what we saw with Mike Turner is someone who was not seen as a Trump loyalist and Trump
01:23:38
expressed that he didn't want that person to be the head of the Intel committee.
01:23:42
And so that person is no longer the head of the Intel committee.
01:23:46
What we've seen, Mike Johnson, his strategy for survival is to tie himself closely to Donald
01:23:53
Trump and have no qualms with carrying out what the President wants.
01:24:00
This is not, I mean, he has a one-seat majority.
01:24:03
He wouldn't have been elected Speaker without Donald Trump's backing.
01:24:08
So this is his strategy.
01:24:09
It might be the only way to survive.
01:24:11
And frankly, it's not a strategy that there is anyone really pushing back on, that we've
01:24:15
seen the, you know, Trump's, the House of Representatives for the past few years has worked as like
01:24:21
the first line of defense for Donald Trump when he was out of office.
01:24:24
Now he's back.
01:24:25
That's only going to be even more of the case.
01:24:27
I want to ask both of you to explain why this matters to us ordinary people.
01:24:32
I have to sink in a quick break first.
01:24:34
We'll all be right back.
01:24:39
We're all back.
01:24:40
Molly, I keep thinking of why the broken Congress matters so much.
01:24:45
And I think it became clear this week.
01:24:48
All the analysis, we've heard all week long from journalists and former Republicans, former
01:24:56
Democrats, that the Democrats didn't win the week.
01:24:59
They didn't successfully stop any of these nominees.
01:25:02
These nominees had the votes before the hearings even started.
01:25:05
And what's broken might very well be the questions that were asked of the performance.
01:25:10
That's fine.
01:25:11
But what seems to be broken is that Republicans don't care about qualifications, Republicans
01:25:17
don't care about FBI investigations and delegations, Republicans don't care about the character
01:25:24
of the people that will lead the men and women of the military.
01:25:27
And it's downhill from there.
01:25:28
Yeah.
01:25:29
I mean, so it's funny because we were talking about this book and I was, I had been watching
01:25:33
the hearings and Bernie Moreno, who is the used car salesman in the top, in the title
01:25:38
of the book.
01:25:39
It actually did these hearings today with Christie Nome, the Homeland Security hearings.
01:25:45
And he, and he said all this stuff where I was shocked at how crazy it was, you know, stuff
01:25:50
about like what did the Homeland Security secretary under Biden kill this girl who had been killed
01:25:57
by an immigrant?
01:25:58
Was it actually his fault?
01:25:59
And stuff that is not, you know, it's just crazy.
01:26:03
And it turns out we found it on Fox News immediately, which I think is ultimately the
01:26:08
problem here.
01:26:09
It's right.
01:26:10
They're not doing article two.
01:26:11
They're not here to advise and consent the president in his cabinet picks.
01:26:16
They're here to get on Fox News.
01:26:18
And ultimately that creates a system where these members of the Senate and Congress become
01:26:24
more and more crazy than.
01:26:26
Look, ironically, I wanted to ask you if one of the things that emerged from the January
01:26:31
6th investigation was there is some insulation, there is some protection for members.
01:26:36
They were hands off for Marcarla and for Jack Smith for everyone that looked at January 6th.
01:26:41
And I think it's interesting that that hasn't seemed to result in anyone doing anything
01:26:47
closely resembling independence.
01:26:49
What do you predict over the coming two to four years?
01:26:54
Yeah, well, I think, you know, one thing we learned reporting out the book is just how bad
01:26:59
the state of Congress is and how everybody seems to acknowledge that when you talk to them
01:27:07
in the House, but they don't really see any real way to change it.
01:27:12
You know, the 118th Congress was, we believe the first ever really controlled by the Maga
01:27:18
Wing of the Republican Party in the House.
01:27:20
This was basically the people who most want to impress Donald Trump and carry out his agenda.
01:27:26
And what resulted was complete chaos.
01:27:29
And so now they're back again, maybe even stronger.
01:27:33
And so we're going to see at least two more years of their control.
01:27:36
And so we really documented in the book what these people are exactly like, what motivates
01:27:42
them, what they hope to achieve.
01:27:45
And I expect that, you know, the readers will see a lot more of this over the next two
01:27:48
years.
01:27:49
And these are folks who are up for election every two years.
01:27:54
Their position is just to start with on abortion or not popular at all.
01:27:58
Hanging out with billionaires traditionally has been very unpopular.
01:28:02
I mean, how many of the folks you write about will privately concede political risks to
01:28:07
Trump 2.0?
01:28:08
>> It's a great question.
01:28:10
Just quickly, Bernie Moreno is a former car salesman, but he is not the one in the subtitle.
01:28:16
That would be former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, also a former car salesman.
01:28:21
There's a lot of car salesmen in the Congress.
01:28:25
But to your question, some of the people we write about, the reason they can act the way
01:28:29
they do is because they basically have tenure in Congress.
01:28:33
Marjorie Taylor Green can stay there as long as she wants.
01:28:38
She's from a blood-red district in Georgia.
01:28:40
And she, her antics, pull the house to the right and make other members more vulnerable.
01:28:49
There are still some, like, some Republicans who represent districts that Biden won four
01:28:57
years ago, who, these New York Republicans are always on the bubble.
01:29:02
And when these MAGA Republicans control what the House does, it puts them in a terrible
01:29:07
position to take really hard votes.
01:29:10
I would say that if Democrats don't succeed in winning back the House next cycle, they've
01:29:15
done something very wrong, they should be able to do that.
01:29:21
Amazing.
01:29:22
Yeah.
01:29:23
That's amazing.
01:29:24
You've teased us with this title.
01:29:25
We're going to keep trying to draw it out of you guys.
01:29:28
I can't wait to read the book.
01:29:30
You win best title of not just the year, but of the Trump era.
01:29:35
Molly, thank you for being here with me.
01:29:37
Luke and Annie, thank you for joining us.
01:29:39
The book is called Mad House, how Donald Trump, MAGA Mean Girls, a former used car salesman,
01:29:44
a Florida Nepo baby, and a man with rats in his walls.
01:29:48
We don't know who that is.
01:29:49
Broke Congress.
01:29:50
It's available now for preorder, another break will be right back.
01:29:57
This morning, the Israeli security cabinet approved the ceasefire and hostage deal with
01:30:02
Hamas, and now Israel's full cabinet has begun meeting to consider the ceasefire and hostage
01:30:08
deal.
01:30:09
It's expected to pass despite opposition from far-right ministers after yesterday's delay.
01:30:15
The agreement hasn't marked the end of violence just yet.
01:30:18
A spokesperson for Gaza's civil defense says Israeli attacks have "intensified" since
01:30:24
the deal was announced with 116 Palestinians killed, 62 of them women and children.
01:30:30
If the plan moves ahead, it is expected to go into effect as early as Sunday, beginning
01:30:35
a six-week long truce with some hostages possibly released the same day.
01:30:40
We'll keep you updated on that, another break for us, we'll be right back.
01:30:47
Thank you so much for letting us into your homes for another week of shows, we are so grateful.
01:30:53
What's up podcast listeners, it's Tanks' host of the It's Meetings podcast.
01:30:57
Join me weekly on It's Meetings as I dive into topics like relationships, why it's okay
01:31:02
to feel lonely, fighting summer comparison, and pop culture's hottest takes.
01:31:07
I don't shy away from getting candid about my personal experiences and I want to share
01:31:11
all the advice I have learned with you.
01:31:13
I'm even joined by some of my friends like Claudia Asher, Connor Wood, and Amanda Hirsch
01:31:18
each Friday for our new office hours episodes.
01:31:21
You can listen to It's Meetings every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday wherever you listen
01:31:25
to podcasts.
01:31:27
And don't forget to follow the show so you don't miss an episode.
01:31:30
[BLANK_AUDIO]
