to double our defense budget and you are certainly inviting more bloodshed. >> all right, congressman from illinois, chicago, neighborhoods i lived in and loved, it is great to have you on. thank you very much. >> thank you, take care. >> that is all in for the week, alex wagner tonight starts right now. good evening alex. >> gun evening my friend, it is a day of reckoning of sorts on a lot of levels. a big booking tonight with our friends at the top of this hour. you are invited if you want to stay. >> i will watch. enjoy your weekend. and thanks to at-home for joining us in this special hour of breaking news. we begin with this. he is tall, lean, and blond, with dazzling white teeth and he looks ever so much like robert redford.

he date slinky fashion models, belongs to the most delegate clubs, and at only 30 years of age he estimates that he's worth more than 200 million. that is how the new york times described donald trump in 1976. if you ask donald trump then, and now, he would say his most valuable asset was his brand. and for decades, the name trump has been synonymous with wealth. trump promoted himself to the world as a business genius. want to be rich? you like trump. >> you will walk down the street sometimes and people will touch you, just for the good luck! >> i never figured that out. i never really understood it but it is something that has been happening, and i almost have to consider it a compliment. i don't know what it is, but perhaps going into a deal, or perhaps down to atlantic city or someplace, and they just want to have a little luck. >> but the myth of trump has always been riddled with inconsistencies. in 1987, he came out with what

would become the cornerstone of his business franchise. the art of the deal. years later, trump's ghost writer who actually wrote the book told the new yorker that he felt like he had put lipstick on a pig. in reality, trump's businesses have failed, over and over again. he bought an airline, it tanked. he bought a football team, the league folded. and still, donald trump managed to sell the public this idea that he was the monopoly man. >> trump's got a new deal, what's your game? >> trump's got a new game, what is it? >> mr. trump, please -- >> minute game, the game, trump. >> because it's not what you win or lose, it's whether you win. play trump the game. >> i think you'll like it. >> trump even lost money on casinos, not in them, on them.

as an owner. in the early niners, three casinos filed for bankruptcy. you have to be outstandingly but a business to not make money as a casino owner. but still, trump convinced the public that he was the epitome of success. >> i have mastered the art of the deal. and i have turned the name trump into the highest quality brand. and as the master, i want to pause along when eilish to somebody else. i am looking for the apprentice. >> everywhere you look, trump was on tv, reminding you how richie was, how profitable his businesses were, how lucky you were to be associated with him. >> it's great to be here on saturday night live, but i will be completely honest, it is even better for saturday night live that i'm here. >> trump stuck his name on everything to golf courses, to

apartments, to vodka, and stakes. there was even a trump urine test because why not? if trump was involved, it was good business. even if it was a urine test. so that was a story that launched trump's political career, and ultimately, the story that won him the white house. but the mid did not always matchup with reality. in 2016, trump was forced to pay $25 million to settle a lawsuit, claiming the university he stuck his name on was defrauding students, big lie. in 2019, new york dissolved his charity, because as it turns out, trump had been using it as a charity for donald trump. but still, if you ask the man himself the trump name remained sterling. >> probably my most valuable asset, i didn't even include on this statement, and that is the brand. i became president because of the brand, okay? i became president. i think that

it is the hottest brand in the world. >> that was trump's video deposition from his civil fraud trial in new york city. the case where today, the myth of donald trump came to an end. today, a new york judge, justice arthur engoron ordered trump to pay a colossal penalty which with interest will exceed 400 and $50 million. justice engoron also burn mr. trump from serving in any leadership roles in any new your company including the one that bears his name. the trump organization. for three years. now, the reason this penalty is so massive is because the fraud was, as well. as justice engoron put in his ruling today, the frauds found here leap off of the page and shocked the conscience. new york attorney general, letitia james, investigated trump and his businesses for years. and what she found was that trump had been fraudulently

inflating his net worth by billions of dollars for a decade. and i don't just mean in the press and on tv ads for trump hearing tests. but in financial statements and loan up lucky shuns. that meant not only was trump tricking the public into thinking he was wildly successful, he was tricking banks and insurance companies into giving him loans and rates that he didn't actually qualify for. he cheated. he is a cheat. and making sure that no one sheets and the world of new york business plays by the rules that central to judge engoron's decision today. this court is not constituted to judge morality. it is constituted to find facts and apply the law. in this particular case, in applying the law to the fact, the court intends to protect the integrity of the financial marketplace and thus, the public as a whole. that protection includes penalties for past wrongs, an

insurance against future ones. so one addition to freezing the trumps out of their family business for three years, the judges keeping an independent monitor on watch and he is appointing an independent director of compliance at the trump organization. engoron explained that without all of this, the cheating might never end. defendants refusal to admit error in the need to continue it constrains the court to include that they will engage in and going forward unless judicially restrained. as donald drunk tell said, people used to touch him for luck while he was walking down the street. today, it seems like he might be all out of it. joining me now to discuss today's ruling are my good friends and colleagues, the hardest bookings in america, rachel maddow and lawrence o'donnell. i am honored to have you on this program. rachel, we haven't heard from you today, lawrence, we haven't heard from you today.

i will let you get the first word here, but what was your reaction to what feels like a day of reckoning for donald trump? >> it is a day of reckoning, almost literally, for sure. and it is also one of a number of really important court proceedings that are going to have really important consequences for him. i feel like once i read as much as they could've the ruling, a lot of it is dense, what a lot of it makes sense. once we saw letitia james's explanation of what happened, we saw trump's reaction to, it i kind of setback and i realized , my biggest take away from this is that we need to protect the rule of law. that this is a candidate who is promising to basically dismantle the american system of government, he has been raging against the judiciary, and judges, and juries, and lawyers, and plaintiffs, and the whole system that is starting to hold him to

account. he wants to get back into power, he is saying that he wants to dismantle the whole thing. for all of the institutions that have failed against what donald trump is offering as an anti-democratic's, essentially authoritarian candid, the institution that has bent the least, that has stood up the best against his assault is the judicial branch of government. it is the rule of law. we need to protect, and we need to protect the clerk, laetitia james, we need to protect e. jean carroll, we need to protect her lawyers, the jurors, fani willis, we should talk about that. because that is happening right now. we need to protect jack smith, we need to protect judge cannon, and judge chutkan. we need to protect the people who are manning the barricades on this one branch of government that is doing its job, despite what has been a really, really pointed is sold from trump and his supporters that is about to get way more

intense. >> yeah. lorenz, rachel make such an essential point about the branch of government that is holding democracy aloft. i wonder what you thought of that ? >> on your trip down trump memory lane, i thought that i have nothing to worry. then came, i learned tonight, about the trump urine tests. which i believe might count, as you mentioned, three times. and i had no idea that he was not interested in that. so i just needed to leave that there. >> i know there were people in the audience still processing that memoir, to move on to this, but i've spent my entire adult life professional life, in and out of courtrooms following cases very closely. some cases every single day in the courtroom, and there are

some cases that are predictable. and so when you get to the verdict, it doesn't feel quite so momentous, or like something has changed because it was the only logical verdict. this trump verdict today was the most predictable trump verdict that we will ever have, because there was no jury. jury still contain suspense. there was no jury. one fact finder, the judge. he made it very clear because he is a rational human being, as the proceeding was going on, that all of this was outrageous and donald trump's conduct in the room was outrageous. everything about it was outrageous. so he returns this verdict that we could have kind of gets to the number within $10 million, because it was the number that kept being said, and yet it truly is, it landed with me as something truly momentous but here is this former president, current presidential candidate on his way to the nomination, and he's now very clearly on his way to what could be

functional bankruptcy, because the lawsuits that i think people have left too far into the back of mind, they might actually be the most expensive things he is facing, which are the lawsuits by police officers in washington d.c., for what happened to them on january 6th. we saw what the defamation verdict was against rudy giuliani in washington d.c. over 100 million dollars. donald trump could get hit with a verdict like this, against an individual police officer in washington d.c.. so he could be facing over a billion dollars in these kinds of must pay penalties. >> civil trials. >> that raises this other deep threat to the possibility of the trump presidency, which is how will he pay these things. the answer is, jared kushner knows a guy. and the guy is in saudi arabia, and how many many billion do you need? >> that raises a very important

question, which is that it is not good for democracy, and the raises point today that it is not good for democracy and transparency and rule of law for donald trump to face a really steep bill. not because he shouldn't have to face it, but because this leads you down, inevitably, the rabbit hole of which countries going to have to pay this tab, affective lee. >> yeah. when i was reading that part of the judges ruling today about how one of the restrictions here is that the trump organization cannot get loans from any bank that is registered in new york, in the normal scheme of things, when you cover financial trials, many trials that have ended up in espn why because there's a financial institution involved, the shorthand that you do when covering these things -- it is all financial institutions that are registered to do this. new york is the financial capital of the world, that is why they have jurisdiction over everything financial. but what lauren says is exactly

right. the, it was a mysterious russian bank that funded murray le pen and her pseudo-fascist run at the presidency. and it isn't expect split capably saudi arabia that has given two billion dollars to jared kushner for his great service in public life, which he now says he's not going to return to. so, the financial penalties here have incredible consequences if it is not the types of entanglements that trump will have no problem dragging into the white house with him if he is reelected. >> you bring up, lawrence, the civil fraud trial and isabel cases against trump. i have to ask you, i just want to say preemptively, you bring up civil cases. and i remember there is a huge question mark hanging over these

federal, criminal trials and whether they see the light of day this year before the election. if the american public only is able to hold donald trump accountable in a civil fashion like e. jean carroll, and laetitia james, or the first responders and police officers in january six, is not sufficient, is that enough? >> first of all, i don't think that will be the outcome for a couple of reasons. the first reason being that i don't believe donald trump is going to win the presidency. there are four with that belief i do not particularly care when the trials happen. everyone is worried about federal trials before the election because they are afraid if you do not get those federal trials done before the election, donald trump becomes president and he kills them. under that theory, he kills them anyway, because they would be on appeal. if he was convicted they would be on appeal. i don't believe he will be president. i believe that you will see every one of these cases go all the way to their conclusions.

and he will bear whatever criminal burden he has to bear as a defendant in those cases. none of them involved a mandatory minimum sentence. so the highest likelihood which is, i noticed -- it would be home confinement. imagine spending the summer in florida that would be unbearable. >> a fair point, my friend. and what if that pool floods the room again, goodness. rachel and lawrence, please do not move from your seats, i want to talk to you both about the political implications in today's gargantuan ruling, and the ethical and moral implications as well. please sit tight, we will have more on all of this coming up next.

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these are people who shouldn't be allowed to do the things they do. and they're using this as weaponization against a political opponent who is up a lot in the polls, and always will be. they are doing everything possible to step it away. but we are not going to stand for it. >> today, a new york judge ruled that donald trump and his company must pay more than 400 and $50 million including interest. a huge penalty for's companies ears long pattern of fraud. remember, in addition to that truly staggering amount of money, donald trump still has to pay a small army of lawyers who are defending him in for criminal cases. one of which officially goes to trial next month, on march 25th, right in the middle of presidential primary season. back with me or my friends and colleagues. thank you for sticking around, guys. rachel, i think there is something really important and judging the ruling that i would love to get your thoughts on. it is the notion that he's making this decision, not

particularly out of seeking obviously, he is punishing the trump organization and their fraudulent practices, but he is doing it in service of a common good. i will just read what he wrote. the court is not constituted to judge morality. it is constituted to find facts and apply the law. in this particular case, and applying the law to the facts, the court and has to protect the integrity of the financial marketplace, and does the public as a whole. that idea that this is not -- it is about new york, and wall street, but it is about the public good. i wonder if you think that has residents politically. that that notion, whether or not that is something that resonates with an american public, that might in some cases look at this and say wow, that is a lot of money for him to pay for a crime for which there is no apparent victim. >> right. that is what trump and his defense counsel are responding to the ruling today are banking on, this idea that oh, yes they

didn't get paid, many, many, many millions of dollars. they would have been paid had this not been perpetrated on them. but they don't mind so the fraud is okay. it is a very cynical politic approach that they are trying to take, both in the public relations efforts that they are making around this. but also in the courtroom. and the spelled it out in very blond terms over and over again making clear that it is not in the courtroom. i think they are hoping it will fly in terms of how the public will perceive this. alex, you made a very good point at top of the show. this is trump's university, which wasn't the university, it has been shut down as a fraud. trump's foundation wasn't really functioning as a charity, it has been shut down as a fraud. trump's business has been criminally convicted of fraud. trump has been found liable

personally for sexual assault, trump and his business now have been found liable civil leave her having perpetrated a multi hundreds of millions of dollar fraud on the people of new york. and on the people who all use the same market to engage in financial real estate transactions. and if you can explain one of those away, with a kind of cynical real estate specific argument, i guess more power to you. but ultimately, these things do start to seem like a pattern, and trump thought that being trusted legally to run his own company business for three years is a bad predicate to take to the american people for please let me run the free world for four more, plus. >> absolutely. the idea he could run all of these businesses, therefore how hard is it going to be to run the american government? that myth making has been destroyed. but i do wonder, in terms of what maga has become, at the

outset of donald trump's political career, it was very much builds on the notion that he was a tycoon, and that was the important part of his resume that you needed to pay attention to. i do wonder whether the grievance and the rage of maga has eclipsed the aspirational, you know, monopoly manic quality that made trump so attractive to republicans. >> if you are a maga republican voter, nothing can shake you from donald trump and nothing in the courtroom can shake you from donald trump. including, by the way, his very first promise to them as accounted. his very first promise was i am very rich, i don't need anyone's money to run for president. he paused, about a week, and then has never spent another day of his life, not asking those people for presents.

and we have people on msnbc with microphones in front of those voters and they are saying i am voting for trump because you can't buy him, because he doesn't need any campaign contributions. the next week, some of those people were sending him campaign contributions. that is an unshakable bond that is so deeply perverse and we will never unwind it. but trump university was basically civilly prosecuted by the new york attorney general during donald trump's first presidential campaign, and he was promising his voters i will never, satellite never settle, i am too tough to settle. then he settled for $25 million, they watched that, they voted for him, and here he is now getting hit with 20 times that. in one day, through the same office. going after him in court. so, what does it mean for those who decide the electoral

college in michigan, pennsylvania, arizona, places like that. all you can bet on is that it cannot help the margin. >> i do wonder, rachel, how you think this impacts the calculations being made right now in terms of donald trump being the likely nominee for the republican party. as outlined in the last segment, i think that this ruling was expected, given that the judge found the organization liable, the number is big, but it is in that ballpark that it had been bending about. do you think it has a meaningful impact, like nikki haley, who seems to be hedging against donald trump's criminal legal exposure, betting that maybe he doesn't make it to november? >> i think that nikki haley owes it to the campaign that she has run thus far to stay in no matter what happens, because

who knows what is going to happen with trump. it costs money to run a campaign, but in terms of her reclaiming that plays, the only reason to stay indoors if trump gets ruptured effectively. the more important thing here for us as a country is what is going to happen to the whole republican party. the whole infrastructure of the rnc, and everybody who mobilizes to elect a republican president in the election year. when donald trump is going to be waging war on the rule of law as a central point of his campaign. with 100 million dollars, around the e. jean carroll stuff, with a 400 and $50 million around this stuff, with the four criminal trials told to come, the whole point of his campaign is going to be that the court system and the legal system and judges and court rulings are terrible, and we have got to get rid of those things. it is the rnc, are all of the

donors, is every republican member of congress going to join him in that in trying to destroy the idea of the rule of law in america? and the idea that judges rulings are things that we should cover? that we should follow? and that court orders are things that are mandatory that we must follow? because we believe in the rule of law? are the republicans everywhere who have enabled him also going to enable him now when he comes after the next prosecutors and the next judges and the next jurors and the next witnesses and the next court clerks and the next bailiffs or whoever else is involved in the next courtroom drama he's involved in ? are all of the republicans going to line up and wage war on that branch of government as well? that is the central question for the future of the country regardless of how the election turns out. >> it is such a great point because it is going to be an unceasing stretch of courtroom trials. presumably until november. up until this point, lawrence, trump has tried to invoke biden

as the enemy behind all of this. but i think that rachel rightly points out, biden is not pulling the strings here. this is the american justice system, and you can run a campaign against joe biden but can you run one against the american justices? >> the whole trump operation runs on an audience who is incapable of separating fact from fiction. so he can give them any fiction he wants and they will accept it and then the elected officials live not so much inferior from him but they are desperately in fear of those voters who were congregated in their districts who worship donald trump. that is the trap they are in and they are all thoroughly to the bone cowardly about that. and unwilling with the rare exceptions like liz cheney who popped out and in any way, stand up against that. so, to the question that rachael just asked, i wish i could come out with a positive answer to it.

but i don't see how to do that. >> all i can say optimistically as we will see what happens. lawrence, i hear that you are going to be hosting it ten pm show? >> it is working friday night for me. i will go over to the other studio. >> firstly nine pm show, than the ten pm show. >> let's do this all the time. >> any day you want. standing invitation. please. please come back, she said, with clasped hands. have a wonderful show, lawrence, rachel maddow, thank you for spending part of your friday night with us. we appreciate you. >> thank you for having me. >> when we come back the local outcry after the reported death of russian opposition leader, alexei navalny, his longtime friend joins me later this hour. first, when multiple fines totaling $100,000 will mean for donald trump's bank account.

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i'm adam schiff, and i approve this message. this election is about who shares your values. let me share mine. i'm the only candidate with a record of taking on maga republicans, and winning. when they overturned roe, i secured abortion rights in our state constitution. when trump attacked our lgbtq and asian neighbors, i strengthened our hate crime laws. i fought for all of us struggling to keep up with the rising cost of living. i'm evan low, and i approve this message for all of our shared values. >> as far as realistic is concerned the process i like andy reid's and i like it is the creativity. i really would not like the business just to be a buyer and asa. lyra creativity of building something. and i believe that the resting

means to an end. i enjoy the finesse, i enjoy the financing, i enjoy the complications, but the thing that i really most like is the creative process. >> the thing i really most like is the creative process. as it turns out, donald trump associated with evaluation of his assets that he's now on the hook for over $350 million. that is on top of the nearly $90 million that he already owes e. jean carroll for defamation, and sexual abuse. altogether, these three decisions will cause trump over $440 million not including interest. if you add the interest from his civil fraud case, he's in for more than 500 and $40 million. which leads to one big question here. how is donald trump going to pay for all of this? new york times investigative reporter, suzanne craig, joins me now. suzanne, my mind went immediately to you, predicting on this television program that you thought that the punishment

here was going to be, did you say 300? i can't -- >> will go with that. but i think i did. >> you knew this was going to be a big price tag. but it does beg the question, is even solvent? does he have this cash? >> does he have the cash is a great question. >> that is the question, because he -- >> it will just push him into bankruptcy. and cash situations are always really tricky. i cover public corporations for a long time. sometimes when they are in trouble they will say that they have 500 million, a billion, whatever it is. then the next day they will make it withdrawal, but they will -- it is just a snapshot in time, so we can see from the documents that were filed with the attorney general that there is a lot of paper that went, in a lot of banking information, the key was headed into a difficult catch situation as he was entering the white house, and the reason for that is that

he lost a ton of these licensing deals. these one time cash hits that he was getting that we are keeping him going and he lost them because he made a very derogatory mark with mexicans and a lot of his partners didn't like that, and the left. since then, he had some asset sales. a hotel he used to own in d.c., he has had other money that has come in and he has also been quietly selling some condos and land around the gulf course he owned in l.a. some things that have not gotten as much headlines that have broad cash in. at the same time, he's got huge financial pressures on him. today is obviously the biggest one but we are also writing about an irs audit that has been going on that is happening behind closed doors that we don't have disability into it. if it goes against him mid

couldn't cost him more than $100 million but who knows what else could be out there there are things that you just never know. so can he need this? i don't think he has enough cash if he is going to appeal to put it up. we will find out. but we could get an appeal bond. this is devastating. this is a real number and it is on. >> what doesn't mean practically that they've appointed a babysitter financially speaking, the former judge, barbara jones, is going to keep overseeing what is happening at the trump organization and she, in turn, it is going to point an independent director of compliance. what does not mean from a practical standpoint in terms of the trump organization's ability to do business as fast and furiously as it might want to in a moment like this? >> those days are in the rearview mirror. keep in mind that this is a company. i sat through the trial, the

trump organization was found guilty and they were paying people, all of these perks with cars, apartments, they were not paying payroll tax on them. this was a fast and loose operation on that sort of stuff and on the stuff we are seeing today about the documents that they were submitting in banks and utilize that were embedded in them. >> i was stunned reading through some of this filing. how much of an amateur sounding operation it was. not just an devaluations, which were extraordinarily overblown, almost to a comic level, but the keeping of spreadsheets and data was in a file called jeff's supporting data that someone named jeff -- >> it was in quotation. >> titled jeff's supporting data. even when jeff wasn't working on it and patrick was, and patrick was still called jeff's supporting data it is like something out of beavis and butt-head, almost. and the sense of impunity was

staggering. >> and those days are behind them. they not only have a monitor over them who is reporting into the court, and there's been a lot of tension and problems with how it is being run but now they will have this extra level as we go forward. i expect an appeal that the trump will ask for a state of some sort, of donald still being involved in the business. but i don't know if that will happen. but this is where we are at, they have got serious supervision, and one of the reasons that there is supervision is because at the end of the day there may have to be a major asset sale. he owns the commercial business, trump tower, just to give one example. and that may have to be liquidated. it isn't all of our interest as a business running for the taxpayers, that it would have to be sold. so they want to make sure that there is adults in the room running these businesses now. >> so, trump tower, i have seen pictures of it, mocked up to look like a spirit halloween

superstore, that is not necessarily going to happen but it may not be trump tower as we have known it in the future. suzanne craig, i know that you are just -- we are going to keep you in heavy rotation over the course of the next few days and weeks. thank you, my friend. great reporting on all of this. when we come back, the strongmen warship of the modern day republican party. that is next. these underwear are period-proof. and sneeze-proof. and sweat-proof. they're leakproof underwear, from knix. comfy & confident protection that feel just like normal. with so many styles and colors to choose from, switching is easy at knix.com

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>> this is a persecution of a political opponents. the persecution of a political opponents. a persecution of a political candidate. this is nothing more than selective prosecution of biden's political opponents. >> donald trump's number one concern on the campaign trail, the thing he says he will not stand for, is when someone in power persecute their political opponent. he is of course talk about his own imaginary political persecution. but today we saw with the actual persecution of a political opponent looks like. alexei navalny, the 47 year old anti-corruption activist and chief rival of vladimir putin has died and a russian jail. that is according to russia's president service. president biden quickly condemned navalny's reported death and said president putin is responsible for it.

but there have been no words of condemnation from that effect out leader of the republican party. there have actually been no warts at all. donald trump has said nothing about navalny or putin, except for his forwards late last week when he told russia that it should feel free to go ahead and attack americas nato allies, or in his words do whatever the hell they want. and now putin -- is spritzing through the gop like a cancer. a week ago, right when personality tucker carlson sat down for a two hour interview with putin which agent putin himself says was full of a softball questions. carlson has since gone viral and videos and which he exposed the virtues of lavender putin's authoritarianism. yes, there is no democracy or freedom of expression but do they look up there were grocery carts so the unhoused can't steal them? when pressed about putin's habit of murdering those who

oppose him or jailing them an art -- arctic gulags -- carlson said this. >> every leader kills people, including much later. every later killed literally. leadership requires killing people. at a certain point, people can decide what countries they think are better, what systems they think are better. >> but it is no longer just people like donald trump and tucker carlson who feel that need to excuse putin's autocratic behavior. here it was republican senator tommy tuberville parroting putin's talking points just this week. >> you can tell putin on top of his game. one thing he said, it really run a bell, is the propaganda media machine over here. that is so anything they possibly can to go after russia. the republican party has come to worship strong men at a time when strongmen around the world are feeling quite emboldened. and now with what looks like a price in a tent by putin to

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a everyone asking me this question, how are you afraid of coming back to russia? my job is to not be afraid and go back to russia. >> that was russian opposition later alexei navalny in 2020, fell and returned to moscow just a few months after he was poisoned by a soviet era nerve agent for which he directly blamed vladimir putin. at that, point navalny was already well known and russia as putin's most prominent critic as a christened or against government corruption. in 2021, navalny returned to russia knowing he would be arrested on politically motivated charges. he was detained at the airport and had been under arrest since that day, imprisoned largely in solitary confinement in a penal colony above the arctic circle.

navalny was last seen alive yesterday during a court appearance where he seemed to be in good spirits, even cracking jokes with the judge. russian authorities claim that navalny died after collapsing and losing consciousness. joining me now is former u.s. ambassador to russia, michael mcfaul. ambassador mcfaul, then queue for being here with. us i know you were friends with mr. navalny and as wrenching as this has been for me, and i think everybody else who knew of him, i can't imagine what this has been like for someone who actually knew him and was friends with him. how are you grappling with this? >> it is shocking. i have to tell you honestly, i never thought putin would kill navalny. i just was with his life last night. i'm here in munich, we were talking about his health, talking about the video he showed. he was living under horrendous circumstances. much worse than even head understood until talking to yulia, who you are showing

there right now. there was nobody -- i was talking with his team, nobody thought he was on his deathbed. and i just never thought they would kill him. because i thought he was too strong. strong physically, strong mentally, strong emotionally. obviously i was wrong about that and it's a really horrible day for me, for the navalny family, not for everybody who believes and freedom in this world. >> i do wonder if you think, you know, the kremlin understood the political, the global outrage that would follow something like this and the inevitable response that will, presumably, happen and the coming months and days? >> first, let's be crystal clear about something -- not between us, but that general reporting on this, putin killed navalny. we'll learn, maybe, maybe not, to painting, because it is putin's russia, what exactly

happens -- but let's be crystal clear about. that it wasn't somebody's accident, he put him in jail, he tried to poison him before he was in jail. putin killed navalny. now the test will be, will the west respond, as you just said? presumably they will. i was very impressed with what president biden said today. but the proof will be, will we take real action to try to punish putin? and there is some very concrete things we can do today. the house of representatives can come off of their vacation and go back in session and pass that aid to ukraine. what better way to respond to putin than temperatures the killing that putin is doing in ukraine. i know that's what alexei navalny would want. and, two, we have seized russian as it. we have seized putin's money. billions of dollars here in germany, where i am today, europe, and in the united states, there is already legislative passed by the right

member sponsored legislation passed. so let's sign that into law. let's get our european allies to do the same. and let's transfer that 360 billion dollars that putin parked in our banks to ukraine. i know, also, that would be a response that alexei navalny would welcome. >> the timing on this, if putin does not want -- if he wants to prevent the securing of funding for ukraine, this is not what you do. kill alexei navalny. because the average, even in the united states is palpable. although i have to ask, your opinion on the fact that trump has said nothing? and as trump goes, so often does the republican party. >> you know, the last piece i wrote about alexei navalny for the washington post was four years ago, when mr. trump was president. it was the first time a used the phrase putin is able. i remember, i was berated about that, for being crazy. i stand by that claim. but i also asked, why hasn't mr. trump spoke out back then? he was president.

and i am shocked that he has not -- i applaud his vice president, former vice president pence did. many of republicans. have i am shocked that a leading nominee, the presumed nominee of one of the major parties of the greatest democracy in the world it is solid on a delicate. i hope mr. trump will reconsider that silence. >> one more for you. do you think we'll ever find out the truth of how he died? >> no. no. because it is putin's russia. tragically, i've had other friends that have been killed by this regime. i think -- 2014 and four years and years and years there was an alleged investigation into that. i suspect the same will be here. but i want to say it again. it doesn't matter exactly how he was killed. putin arrested him. he tried to kill him before he arrested