and i say this very sadly. when i was on the bench, i occasionally, we really got, threats but we didn't have the social media to help promote any of this. so these are the times in which we live. and yes, security is going to have to be beefed up, sadly. and the hope is again that we are supportive of our judiciary and its independence. that's really the key to all of this. we don't want these judges to look over their shoulders or put their fingers to the wind before making decisions. they have to rule on what's happening in the courtroom, and auto there. >> yeah, that is the sacrosanct and solemn duty of judges everywhere, including anyone involved in these cases. ladoris cordell, who knows well about what that entails, thank you very much supportive good evening, alex and happy new year. >> happy, new year, my friend. thank you for covering the swatting and hard essential work of judges and every other worker in the sort of scaffolding that

keeps our democracy in place. and thanks to you at home for joining me this evening. in february of 2021 joe biden had been president for less than a month. the united states senate was still in the middle of impeaching the previous president for stoking insurrection. the house impeachment managers, all of them democrats, were making the case that even though trump was no longer president, he had to be impeached because otherwise future presidents would be free to commit any crime or misdemeanor as long as they did so right before leaving office. to rebut that trump's lawyers offered this counter argument. >> if my colleague on this side of the chamber actually think that president trump committed a criminal offense -- and let's understand a high crime is a felony and a misdemeanor is a misdemeanor. the words haven't changed that

much over time. after he's out of office you go and arrest him. so there is no opportunity where the president of the united states can run rampant in january, the end of his term and just go away scott free. the department of justice does know what to do with such people. >> after he is out of office, you go out and arrest him. the justice department knows what to do. that's from trump's lawyers. in other words, there was no need to impeach a president after he left office because the justice department would bring criminal charges against him. and that laj logic was apparently so convincing for republicans, that the number one republican senator, mitch mcconnell cited that very argument in his speech explaining why he would vote to acquit trump in the senate impeachment trial. >> president trump is still liable for everything he did while he was in office. didn't get away with anything yet. we have a criminal justice

system in this country. we have civil litigation. and former presidents are not immune from being accountable by either one. >> trump did not need to be impeached. congress could acquit trump in the senate because the criminal justice system would take care of all of it later. that was the logic trump's lawyers and senate republicans relied on. today donald trump's lawyers went before the d.c. circuit court of appeals to argue the exact opposite. they argued trump cannot be prosecuted for anything he did as president and that the only way to prosecute a president for crimes committed durg his presidency is impeachment. >> i understand your position to be that a president is immune from criminal prosecution from any official act that he takes as president even if that action is taken for an unlawful or

unconstitutional purpose, is that correct? >> with an important exception. which is if the president is convicted and impeached in the united states senate in a proceeding that reflects widespread political consensus. >> you see, it's a shell game. congress impeaches trump for try ooing to overturn an election, and his lawyers say no, no, no, this is a job for the criminal justice system. criminal justice system charges trump and his lawyers say, no, this is a job for congress and the impeachment process. at one point judge florence pan tested that theory with a hypothetical forhe history books. >> could a president who ordered seal team six to assassinate a political rival who was not impeached, could he be subject to criminal prosecution? >> if he were impeached -- my answer is there's a political process that would have to

require impeachment and conviction by the senate. >> trump's lawyer actually argued in court today that trump could send seal team six to kill an apolitical opponent and absent an impeachment and conviction there's nothing the criminal justice system could do about any of it. it is a shocking position to take especially when you consider the number of times trump has toy would the idea of killing his political rivals, accusing general mark milley of treason punishable by death, encouraging a mob that rallied to hang vice president mike pence, announcing he could shoot someone, anyone on fifth avenue. so history happening here in this courtroom. maybe some prognostication, too. now, president trump was in the courtroom today just feet away from special counsel jack smith. trump was surrounded by his lawyers and by his body man

walt nauta. by all accounts the judges here appeared more receptive to the prosecution's arguments but trump and his lawyers may not really have been there to convince the judges anyway. for them the point may have been the hearing itself, delaying trump's criminal trial even if it meant explaining the hypothetical immunity in sending commandos to assassinate their political rivals. joining me now is former u.s. attorney and senior fbi official chuck rosenberg, also with me is former senior advisor to president obama and co-host of "pod save america." i was shocked and astounlded and not in a good way by trump's legal team in the courtroom. is there anything that they said that struck you as particularly meritus? >> no. >> full stop. >> they were very clear what they were going to do.

in an appellate case both sides filed briefs. the judge's clerks read the briefs and nerds like me read the briefs. the things the trump team argued today were all in their briefs. i think they made a legal and strategic mistake, alex, i think in that elitist position you described. no, i wasn't surprised today. i think that's the corner they painted themselves into. >> dan, are you winning when you can order seal team six to assassinate your political rivals. i think and i knowdentially i'm loathe to say this because we're talking about donald trump, dan. it feels like the -- the articulation of a strategy of

ultimate and total impunity even in a situation where commandos are assassinating rivals, feels like the crossing of a rubicon. >> look, we should stipulate most people are not going to follow what happened in this court case, but i think what is happening is donald trump ironically enough rose to power in 2016 by dominating attention, and he resurrected his political cull rear by being absent from attention. most of the public have not seen donald trump and by the speech president biden gave, he's reminding people why they were so uncomfortable with his temperament, his corruption, his authoritarian leanings in 2020. the specifics of this is that donald trump is returning to center stage to hone his greatest abilities at this point in time when people are starting

to wake up and pay attention. >> fair enough. chuck, there's the legal aspect of all of this beyond the question of presidential immunity. there is the potential, the litigation of all this has the potential to significantly delay this case, which is seemingly trump's ultimate end goal here. can you talk a bit more about how meaningful that delay might be? >> sure. this trial right now is scheduled for march 4th. and i think that date, alex, is endangered. perhaps not doomed but certainly endangered. every defendant benefits by delay. and mr. trump has open to him some avenues to try and incur even more delay. it's not clear to me that the d.c. circuit court of appeals of is going to take a long time to decide this case. i think it's relatively easy, and in the government's favor. but then mr. trump could ask for a full panel hearing, the entire d.c. circuit to hear it en banc. if it he loses there, he could ask the supreme court. there's no guarantee the support

will hear it there either, but you could ask. the more mr. trump does these things, the more he stretches out the time line, it puts the government at a disadvantageous. i still think this case could be tried. i think it's a remote possibility but i think they can get it done. >> i want to bring -- for folks who have not followed closely the hearing that unfolded today. judge karen henderson, one of it three appeals court judges had ties to say about tangentially the scope of presidential duties. let's take a listen to what she >> i think it's paradoxical to say that his constitutional duty to take care that the be faithfully executed allows him to violate criminal laws. >> what she's getting at here is basically the scope of what is official duties for the president. it feels like that's actually a

question that could -- beyond the immunity question could be sent to another court to decide and delay this in an even more meaningful way than just the back and forth between an en banc hearing and between the supreme court. >> by the way, if mr. trump's lawyers have not taken an solutist position, this is the logic for them. they could have said, sure, there might be a circumstance under which a president or former president could be prosecuted criminally, but this one ain't it. all they had to do was argue that what he is charged with in the underlying indictment was an official act, and then it's not an enormous leap to claim immunity for official acts. but they didn't do that. to your earlier point, they staked out this solutist position, painted themselves in the corner, and of course judge henderson or another one of the judges was going to ask precisely that question because that's the fallacy, that's the weakness in their argument.

>> dan, we started this segment off playing some sound from republican mitch mcconnell, who took a decidedly different tact than the trump team is taking today which is to say the justice department should sort it all out. he doesn't want to answer questions about that todays a trump is taking the opposite of mitch mcconnell's position. do you think senate republicans are in a different place when it comes to the questions about trump's liabilities here? i mean do they get the same for lack of a better term hall pass that trump gets among republican voters? >> no, i think ultimately it's interesting you played that footage of mitch mcconnell because mitch mcconnell is probably the person most responsible in the republican party that donald trump is still this figure. because as we all remember he floated the idea to convict, and at the last minute made up this

cockamamie excuse to avoid doing it and i think he thought trump would disappear. i think house republicanps mostly really firmly behind trump. there's a growing number of very pro-trump senate republicans, but most of them sort of tolerate him. they need him to win, need his money, and they're just going to abide by this and stay silent for as much as humanly possible. i'm sure for the msnbc capitol hill reporters if they were to grab these people, they would say i didn't hear that. they would refuse to comment on it to avoid talking about it. >> do you think that this -- trump has made hey of all these trials because he thinks it's good for fund-raising and burnishing his profile. that's a double-edged sword. but he's fund-raising off of this, and i wonder what you think the continuation of these trials, nonetheless there is

action happening, there is the threat of using navy seal commandos to assassinate political rivals. when you think of the base, can he continue to stoke outrage over the incremental process of being held criminally liable? >> absolutely. he will fund raise on this. the jail cell will be slammed with him behind it just as he will send out the final fund-raising e-mail on this. so that is definitely going to happen. i think the base will stay engage. this obviously helps them in a republican primary. when you look at the polling in this primary, the point where trump passes desantis and dominates the field comes right after that first indictment in march of 2023. the real question now is this primary could be over and in month to six weeks does this help them in a general direction. what is the electorate going to think when they see the

republican nominee sitting at the defendant's table having these charges read against him, having these witnesses testify against him, when you have republican witnesses like white house council pat cipollone testifying against him, what is that going to do? that's a huge moment that's going to have a real impact on this campaign. >> chuck, as dan talks about sort of outlining the total eclipse of the sum this could be in a presidential campaign, as you sit here now and i'm not asking you to make predictions, but what's a thoughtful assessment about if not march, given how the appellate court has been moving, what the supreme court, the "x" factor here might do, do you think it's likely that summer is a time for trials. >> let me ask you a question. >> as many as you want, 200. >> i may need it. if the circuit court decides as we expect for the government,

that he doesn't have immunity, if the entire d.c. circuit doesn't take the case en banc, if they don't agree to hear it now, i think you could hear -- >> that's a lot of things going in the special counsel's direction. >> a lot of things have to break his way. but remember, alex, this is in many ways the simplest case. i don't suggest it's easy. it's a one defendant case. there are only four charges, so in terms of getting this thing to trial, you're not dealing with classified information as you are in the mar-a-lago kaycase, you don't have 397 defendants as you do in the fulton county case, this is an easier case to get to trial. no case is easy to win because the government has to meet a very high burden and to a unanimous jury. but if things break in the right way for the special counsel, yes, you can try this case before the election. >> history being made every hour, every day, every week and

month. chuck rosenberg, dan, thank you for your time tonight. coming up as trump tries to delay, there's new reporting multiple members of trump's party have been talking to special counsel jack smith. swael have the latest damning revelations about what exactly president trump was doing and saying on the day of that attack. that is next. t attack that is next station saves us so much time it makes it really easy and seamless pick an order print everything you need slap the label on ito the box and it's ready to go our cost for shipping, were cut in half just like that go to shipstation/tv and get 2 months free attention hearing loss sufferers! do you struggle to hear loved ones? do you have trouble keeping up with conversations? just like that do you listen to tv on max volume? hearing loss affects your life. you miss out on important moments... you feel alone. start hearing better today with rca's all new, advanced hearing aids. these aren't cheap amplifiers that don't really work,

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here's something to consider. if donald trump does indeed go to trial for trying to steal the 2020 election special counsel jack smith will have stunning new testimony to use against him. according to abc news dan scavino who served as trump's deputy chief of staff for communications said trump was just not interested in doing more to stop it. former trump aide nick luna told investigators when trump was informed then-vice president mike pence had to be rushed to a secure location, trump responded so what. abc news also reports that after unsuccessfully trying for up to 20 minutes to persuade trump to release some sort of de-escalating statement that day, scavino and other aides

just left the president alone to watch the violence unfold on television. that is when according to sources, trump posted a message on his twitter account saying that mike pence didn't have the courage to do what should have been done. scavino, the only other person with access to trump's twitter account told both jack smith and white house lawyers at the time, quote, i didn't do it, meaning one of the most incendiary controversial messages of january 6th was all donald trump. joining me now is michael schmidt, investigative reporter for "the new york times" and author of "donald trump versus united states" i found this reporting stunning not just because what was reported but the sources themselves. first, let's talk about dan scavino. this is a person that i think has been with trump since he was a teenager. what doyou make of the fact he is talking and apparently being quite open with the special

counsel's team? >> so scavino tried really hard not to talk. he wouldn't cooperate with the january 6th committee. he was held in contempt. the justice department declined to charge him in connection with that. when the special counsel came calling, he again tried to not answer their questions and was ultimately compelled by a judge to do so. so a bit under duress, he went before a grand jury and on skew vino's side answered factual questions about what happened that day. if you are him, you're trying to strike this very odd balance between cooperating in a federal investigation where you can't lie and remaining as donald trump's, you know, tweeter assistant. and apparently he's trying to do that. he's still in trump's orbit at the same time we're learning about this testimony, which is new and different, we've known the basics of this story what

happens on january 6th in the west wing and trump. but when you read it and you see in this story what happened sort of through scavino's eyes and scavino is the person who's trying to get trump to stop this violence or scavino is being portrayed as turning to end it, it's pretty striking. even on a story that we sort of -- >> yeah, very much not an enabler in the eyes of scusceneo but someone who's saying this is not good and not a good look for you, mr. president. when a trump spokesperson says in this reporting dan scavino was one of mr. trump's longest serving most loyal aides. and his actual testimony shows just how strong president trump is positioned in this case. okay, i'm very interested in the sort of tenor of this statement because i wonder if you think the audience is people reading the abc news article or dan scavino. if this is kind of a, dan, you

would never betray me kind of statement? >> there's different statements that have come out, that trump has put out since leaving office. they really just sort of have nothing to do with the underlying issue. like that quote doesn't really speak to anything in the story. if you read the story and you read what dan scavino said regardless of what the law is and what the evidence may be, it's just not a pretty portrait of what goes on. it's actually pretty ugly. and if you were a juror and you heard this account for someone who is so close to trump, who's not really averse to trump, so it's not like you're bringing in someone who trump has broken with let's say bill barr or john kelly, this is someone who's still in trump's orbit like we see in that statement. so it would be interesting to me to see at a trial what would the jury see if dan scavino was the one saying, yes, donald trump

wouldn't respond to stop this violence, and this account were to come out of his mouth. now, do they call him at trial? do you take someone who's such a trump loyalist and put them -- >> yes. >> but you could also end up with dan scavino going on and on about a witch hunt this is. you're really rolling the dice in a way you're not with a less contentious witness. look, dan scavino has been contentious here. he tried to get out of having to give this testimony. >> michael schmidt, why are we hearing about this? who stands to gain from leaking this reporting about what dan scavino has said to special prosecutors? >> i always hate that question because as a reporter the notion we're sitting around and like the phone rings and here's the leak. the reason that stories like this come out is because it's a very big story. a lot of reporters are talking to a lot of different people. we don't know everything that's

going on. we don't have full access to everything for the grand jury, and little by little media institution by media institution we learn different things, we put them out and there and we get a better sense of this. this is an incredibly intriguing story. it would be the din ffb story about any other presidency because of the january 6th committee and the work they did it sort sf is adding onto something that's already been created. you know, at the same time it takes all these different stories for us to get the portrait that we have today, you know, how many many years we are into the trump story. it's because of stories here, there, and such and reporters out there trying -- >> to braid the strands together. stunning to me dan scavino and even evan corcoran who's offered some of the most damning details what trump has been doing in these federal cases remain in his orbit. >> the thing is when we get to someone like scavino right

around trump and still a trump loyalist, his account basically lines up with what the january 6th committee -- >> yes. well, there's apparently still more to come. michael schmidt, "the new york times," my friend great to see you. thanks for your time. heading into the first actual contest of the 2024 presidential campaign there's a heated race for the most embarrassing performance. plus, donald trump returns to a well-worn page of his campaign play. book, birtherism. that is coming up. , birtherism that is coming up. about life e through the colonial penn program. if you're age 50 to 85 and looking to buy life insurance on a fixed budget, remember the three p's. what are the three p's? the three p's of life insurance on a fixed budget are price, price, and price. a price you can afford, a price that can't increase, and a price that fits your budget. i'm 54.

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sometimes if you pild it, they don't come. yeah, i don't think there are any buses, you guys. >> that was minnesota congressman and long shot democratic presidential candidate dean philips today after literally zero voters showed up to his event in new hampshire. the people you see drinking coffee around mr. philips here are his own staffers. over in iowa where a winter storm has blanketed the state in deep snow and where we're now less than a week away from the iowa caucuses, the republican party's long shot candidates are also getting iced out. >> campaigns are canceling events today, not us. we have multiple events planned across north west iowa.

we're keeping them intact. if you can't handle the snow, you can't handle the xi jinping, that's what i would say. >> hours after posting that video the long shot candidate vivek ramaswamy posted these photos explaining he himself got stuck in the snow. it took six people to get his car unstuck. and then this morning mr. rock swami posted his campaign postponed one of his campaign events because of the snow. it appears he cannot handle the snow either. but the long shot candidate who takes the cake for the most embarrassing last 24 hours is arkansas governor asa hutchinson. for you, if you forgot asa hutchinson is still in the primary you are not alone. even his supporters forgot. in an interview with "the washington post" governor hutchinson said that while canvassing earlier today he knocked on the door of someone who said they loved him. this person then asked hutchinson who are you going to support, to which hutchinson

replied, i'm still running. just brutal. but points for honesty. in the words of dean philip, sometimes if you build it, they don't come. now, tomorrow night is the next republican primary debate. only nicky hilly and ron desantis and donald trump have polled well enough to qualify for that debate. but yet again trump is not actually attending the debate. instead he is running his own counter programming on fox at the very same time. so my question here is even though they are not the longest of long shots in this race, are nikki haley and ron desamt s also basically iced out at this point? they have both built a sizable presence in the iowa battleground, but next monday will anyone show up for them? i'm going to talk to the amazing hosts of msnbc's new show, "the weekend" about that and so much more coming up next. weekend" ab more coming up next.

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in iowa, it looks like it is donald trump's race to lose. but in new hampshire the republican primary could be a lot closer. maybe. depending on which poll you look at, trump is running either 7 points ahead of nikki haley or 20. so the most reliable indicator about whether trump is worried about haley, the window into the campaign soul if such a thing exists is truth social where president trump posted this week a link to a right-wing website that argues nikki haley is ineligible to become president because her parents were not

u.s. citizens when she was born in south carolina. you can call it rebirtherism. joining me now are my colleagues michael steele, simone sanders townsend, elycia menendez, all hosts of the brand spanking new msnbc show "the weekend" premiering this saturday. guys, i'm so happy to have you here because there's so much to discuss and yet in a way so little as well. alicia, first off, the first question i pose to you is nikki haley's background has not been fully explored as fully donald trump would like it to be in the republican primary. and i wonder if you think that toxic line of attack could be a successful one? >> i am curious about why it is he is choosing to launch it aside from the fact it is, of course, his favorite attack.

there is no person in the united states should at this moment be more familiar with the 14th amendment than donald trump given it is currently being used potentially ineligible for the presidency, given he partook in an insurrection. this is what he does. we saw him do it not only with barack obama, but in 2016 he tried to go after kenneth cruz. he should no in fact nikki haley is born in the united states and she's automatically a citizen, doesn't mean he's afraid, doesn't mean his ego is bruised. they are still both both she and desantis so far behind him in the polls beyond the sort of blasant xenophobia, his hatefulness, his laziness to go back to this attack, i don't really understand the rationale. >> i've got a possible rationale for it. internal polling -- is the internal polling, what their internal polling is probably showing him in new hampshire is

that that 7-point lead is probably more accurate than the 20-point lead. so he needs to create a little distance, particularly, if they wind up for iowa and swing into new hampshire, he wants some momentum for him a little bit of drag for her. the internal polling is always the tell when you see candidates start to do and react and respond to a certain way to their opponents particularly when they have a lead and they -- i'm it, i've got it all, but wait a minute, hold up, you know what, so okay -- i bet you more than anything -- >> i am reminded of barack obama, right, that his most infamous birther attempt and the fact that the went from barack obama to barack hussein obama. and i feel it's a matter of time. exactly, i feel that's the next tell, and i think it's the

double indignation he's being challenged potentially but by a person of color where, the daughter of immigrants, a woman, i mean that adds to the venom i think. >> i think it ads to the venom uti'll also note nikki haley has not exactly leaned into her heritage. i haven't seen a lot of brown folks standing behind her talking about how she's a child of immigrants and what that means and what she bring tuesday the republican primary. >> true. >> but i do think it is the internal polling is he's scared but the question i always have is when a candidate decides to attack another candidate because they do have indicators this president is a threat, they also have indicators what is a viable attack, and i don't actually think in iowa and new hampshire the, ooh, she's a scary brown lady because that's what he said. he's attempting to other her in an attempt to say she is not one of us, she is not a white woman. and this is one of the brown

immigrants i'm talking about that's coming in here trying to take things away from you. that's what donald trump is saying. i don't know that's effective in iowa and new hampshire. >> it's a double play, too. as you point out the birthright citizenship, which he doesn't like either. and by the way, if you are born in the united states, you are an american citizen. >> unless donald trump gets his way. >> true, true. i have to -- dredging up the ugly specter of birtherism, to me it's so important, it's such a reminder all the reasons why people of color in particular should be horrified by the candidacy of donald trump, and yet i bring this up to all of you guys the reality is that voters of color are increasingly either undecided about president biden and looking for a third party candidate or attracted to the candidacy of donald trump. do you have a working theory about how in one hand this man could be doing things that alientiate the latino community,

the black community and gains all those folks? >> yeah because he appeals to an interest politically they have about things that are important to them. he becomes an avatar, a manifestation of their particular interests or desires or how they feel about others in country. if you notice in the particularly along the border hispanics along the border sound no differently than some white folks from iowa when it comes to how they look at immigrants and migrants coming across the border. once he understands that and unpacks to knows that's a bit of your thing, he's going to lean into it, he's going to exploit it, he's going to expose it, and more importantly he's going to expand its influence and reach among others in the community. so when you see someone else like you seeing and acting a certain way on this issue, guess what, now you have permission to do the same. donald trump is all about giving you permission to go to the lowest common denominator

amongst the interests at hand. and that's what he does. >> and at the same time voters of color are the backbone of the democratic party. >> yes, they are. >> as we all know democrats have not won the white vote since lbj. if it were not for voters of color, there would not be the democratic party as we know it. that is why they're concerned or they should be concerned. even the slightest bit of erosion in these key states will make a difference. that said, we've oversimplified these leck trts. latinos, aapi voters have never been as baked in their partisanship as some operatives would want them to be. yes, they are mistrustful of republicans, but they also want leaders who are going to deliver for them. and that's going to be part of the task of the democrats in the next few months. >> i think democrats must treat black and brown voters, aapi voters, especially black and latino men as persuadable voters. all of the energy and messages

you put into independent voters, suburban women who are originally more diverse, by the way, suburban -- and the oldest -- the suburbs are young women at this point. hello, my senior producer brittany is one of them. >> senior producer brittany is one of them. >> persuadable young suburban mommy and she's black. again, it goes against the myth who we think about when we put people in these boxes. also i don't believe that a large swath of black and brown voters areo going out there and casting their ballot for donald trump. i think it's more likely they don't vote at all. >> i would say, simone, you appointment this out it's not looking at aapi voters as monoliths, as a monolith or latino voters. and black voters especially their generational divide is so, so real. on the biden campaign i think we have news they are -- sorry, it's a "d" triple "c," the democratic congressional campaign committee has announced an eight-figure investment to

mobilize black and latino voters. is that an overdue, good luck -- >> it's a laugh of like, yes, this is what we should be doing. and kudos to the dccc for doing that. i would say these should be applauded. >> i can tell you the fights i had inside the rnc for that money. >> they need to be in communities. ads are not going to move a voter that is frankly overly persuaded by the disinformation they might see on a social media site. it's peer to peer. >> she's been out more. i think they should get uncle joe a little bit more. aviator joe because people resonate to that.

neighborhood after neighborhood i think has a lot more viability among the voters you're talking about then president joe biden. >> listen, something tells me you guys are going to talking about this a little bit more in the future in the next couple of forevers. michael steele, simone sanders townsend, alicia menendez, they never allow us in the same room at the same time. it finally happened. tune in this saturday. the tell prompters moving all around. tune in this saturday at 8:00 p.m. for the premier of "the weekend." i didn't need the teleprompter because it's set on my tivo. that's right, i said tivo right here. coming up joe biden adopted many of the policies of the progressive left, and now he has an economy to show for it. but can he succeed in convincing the majority of americans to believe it? and josh green joins me to discuss his new book "the rebels." that's next. "the rebels." that's next.

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we have an economy that's incredible. we have an economy that's so fragile. and when there's a crash i hope it's going to be during this next 12 months because i don't want to be herbert hoover. >> he's been doing it for a while. in 2020 if it's about joe biden and the policies of the left that would unleash an economic disaster of epic proportions. the irony is the progressive policies championed by elizabeth warn and bernie sanders and aldruocasio-cortez were indeed adopted by biden and what was record unploimtd, the jobs market since the 1960s, lowest uninsured rate in american history, a manufacturing boom, decreasing gas prices, and

rising wages. joining us is josh green, authfer of the new book out today titled "the rebels," which chronicles how left wing economic populism and people like warren sanders and aoc have played a faithful role and will continue to in the upcoming presidential election. i want to hear from the man who's been on the ground in steel towns in pennsylvania. how the very voters joe biden needs to make sure are in his corner. >> i think the answer is in my travels they don't quite yet. but the story of the book is how these three characters gave rise to this brand of left wing populism and the party took the financial crisis of 2008 and the huge backlash that gave us donald trump for democrats to kind of wake up and say, you know, i think we need a more populus brand of politics. even though neither warren or sanders wound up in the white

house, they really had a profound affect on biden's administration. i was in pennsylvania a week ago. there's a new steel plant going up, unemployment is coming down. so economically things are turning in the right direction. the challenge for biden is getting that to translate into positive -- >> i just don't understand how you when you have architects of so much of the current economic policy, progressive democrats, self-described popialists, why does the democratic party not get credited? what is the disconnect? >> i think part of is it's about culture not economic. i think at the end of the day the kitchen table concerns, the state of the economy. i'm sort of flooded with economic numbers all day long. they all kind of point to this idea it's about to be morning in america again. all the numbers in the intro show things are turning in the right direction. i think a lot of times there's a delay effect but if you're joe biden, if you're an incumbent running for re-election, this is the economy -- >> how much are we missing sort

of the point that needs to be hammered home again and again when we talk about the economy? should there may be more focus about the price of eggs which is something chris hayes my friend and colleague loves to talk about? what is the metric that's the convincing metric about the health of this economy? >> tee moo it comes down to jobs and a broader question how is my family doing, what to my kids prospects look like? and if those things turning around, that's been what warren and sanders and aoc have hammered away on over the last few years and we've seen it translate into the biden presidency. i think when people go into the voting booth especially when trump is on the other side of the ticket that's really what they're going to be thinking about. >> biden's been talking a lot about democracy, institutional integrity, you know, the sacrosanct nature of the

constitution. does it matter to those voters? >> at the end of the day you want to be able to pay your mortgage. it's important obviously things like democracy and trump's authoritarianism are, you also have to focus on the kitchen table concerns. and the irony is biden does have a story to tell not just on the progressive left whose policies he's trying but really to americans generally who are worried about these kinds of issues. >> listen, it is an important read, it's a book everyone needs to read as we talk about all the other threats to democracy. like this is sort of the thing -- >> it's very yellow. >> it's a very interesting yellow. josh green, congratulations on pop paublication day, my friend. that is our show for tonight. "way too early" with jonathan lemire is coming up next. i think it's paradoxical to say that his constitutional duty to take care of