there remain barriers in terms of the stereotypes that are applied to black women. even in the u.s. senate today, i feel like some colleagues apply those stereotypes to me. >> how do you experience that? >> you know, you have such a great temperament. as if they expect what? that you're angry? what is the expectation? that is an interesting question, isn't it? you have -- you know, you just have the right approach to being in the u.s. senate. again, and i think it is potentially well intended if i start with assuming no motivation or ill intent. i think there's just

as the only black woman in the senate right now, i asked what the biggest barriers are that make it difficult for more black women to do what she's done. >> there remains barriers around i think the perception of black women and their leadership. there remains barriers in terms of the stereotypes that are applied to black women. even in the u.s. senate today, i feel like some colleagues apply those stereotypes to me. >> how have you experienced that? >> you know, the you have such a great temperament. >> as if they expect what, that you're angry? what is the expectation? >> that is an interesting question, isn't it? you have -- you know, you just have the right approach to being in the u.s. senate. again, and i think it is potentially well intended. by 1944 --

they hunted down a german u-boat, they hunted it down, found it about 150 miles off the coast of west africa. but they didn't sink it. they captured it. they had depth charges while it was undersea. they fired on it when it surfaced. they then boarded the sub, american sailors boarded the sub on the high seas. they stopped the germans from scuttling the sub, from deliberately sinking it. they rescued the german crew that had bailed out into the sea. they took them prisoner. and then they took the sub. they towed the german u-boat away. it was the first time the u.s. had captured an enemy ship on the high seas since the war of 1812. and it turns out it was a gold mine. better to capture it than to

just sink it. now not only did the allies have a u-boat to study how it operated, learn its vulnerabilities. they also got all the stuff that was onboard that german u-boat, including code books. they got code books, they got all these classified german military documents. they got german communication equipment, state of the art german communication equipment. they even got a german enigma siver machine with all the most up to date coding and decoding stuff, all the up to date siver rotors. it was a total gold mine. the german crew was taken prisoner. they were held at a p.o.w. camp in louisiana. the sub itself was towed away. they towed it thousands of miles so it could ultimately be studied by u.s. military intelligence. they painted it, though, for the tow. for that tow across thousands of miles of ocean.

they painted it to look like it wasn't a german u-boat. they painted it to look like an allied sub while they were taking it off to be studied. they camouflaged it that way because it had to be a huge secret. they didn't want the germans to know the allies now had its huge intelligence trove. not just the ship itself, but the code books and enigma machine and all the rest of it. for obvious reasons. if germany knew the u.s. had all of the current code books and current up to date enigma machine, they would have changed their codes. so the u.s. didn't want germany to know that they had that u-boat. it was not until after germany surrendered in 1945 that the u.s. revealed that we had captured this sub. and then remarkably, remarkable series of events, only about a decade after the end of the war, that u-boat, u-505, ended up in chicago of all places where you today can buy a ticket and go

see it. that u-boat is all restored. you can go inside it. they built a huge purpose built exhibit hall for it. which is an amazing thing. and war, of course, is most often about finding an enemy's ships or tanks or planes or submarines so you can destroy them, take them off the battlefield. but sometimes one of the most valuable things you can do is not just destroy as many as possible but see if you can take one, if you can capture it so you can study it, how it operates, so you can better target similar hardware that your enemy has been using against you in the fight. and sometimes like in the case of this german u-boat that you can see on display at that chicago museum, the value is partially having the sub itself, so they can study the sub itself. but equally it was having what they found inside it when they captured the sub.

capturing something is often much better than killing it. strategically speaking. in may 1960, in the cold war, the soviet union shot down an american high altitude spy plane, a plane called the u2. the u.s. had secretly been flying very high altitude spying missions over the soviet union for about four years by that point. but we were denying we were doing it. on may 1st, 1960, when the soviets hit our u2 with a surface to air missile, they not only were able to capture the pilot, a cia pilot named francis gary powers, they were also able to take custody to seize all of the pieces of his plane that came down when the missile hit it. and that gave the soviet union intelligence about america's technological capabilities with these u2 planes that were able to take pictures of what was going on on the ground from 70,000 feet up in the air.

it also gave them a great propaganda victory because it gave them something to put on display. the soviet union put pieces of francis gary powers' shot-down u2 cia spy plane on display in moscow to show the russian people the soviet government had been right about the u.s. spying on them, that the u.s. had been spying and the u.s. had been lying about it. and here were the parts of this plane to prove it. so capturing the enemy's stuff in war time or even in cold war time, you get the thing itself. you potentially get good intelligence from whatever was on board or inside the thing. you also potentially get the propaganda or political benefit from what you're having the thing can prove to the public. mostly in war time, we try to shoot each other's stuff to smith renes but there is a golden ticket if you can seize

the other side's stuff. even if you can seize pieces of the other side's stuff. and so it was last summer, august 2023, a russian pilot at the controls of a twin engine mi-8 russian military helicopter took off from an air field in western russia, not far from the ukrainian border, and he was supposed to be flying inside russia. he was supposed to be flying replacement parts for russian fighter jets, but instead, he took his cargo of russian fighter jet spare parts and he flew straight for the ukrainian border. he flew in radio silence. he flew at extremely low altitude. he was reportedly shot, shot in the leg by russian forces, as he flew his helicopter across the border into ukraine. but this apparently was a long planned mission, this russian pilot had planned for months to

defect to the ukrainian side. his family had reportedly already been extracted from russia before he made that flight over the ukrainian border. he landed that russian helicopter in eastern ukraine, landed it at a ukrainian air base about 80 miles from the border with russia. in so doing, he delivered both himself a russian pilot and this russian military chopper to ukraine. and to ukrainian intelligence. where they made fast work of making the most of it. this was david ax's reporting on it at the time. the headline there, the mi-8 is one of russia's best assault helicopters, a defector just flew one to ukraine. quote, russia just unwillingly donated to ukraine an up-armored mi-8 transport helicopter. now, russia first tried to say the pilot must have gotten lost. they called it a navigational error. but then, within a couple weeks,

that was very profoundly disproven when oh hi, there he is at a press conference in kyiv, in ukraine. explaining at a press conference alongside ukrainian military intelligence officials, that he had defected, he had reached out to the ukrainian intelligence service months earlier because of his own distress as a russian about his country invading ukraine and starting this war. so when he defected, they got him, including the value of him speaking about why he defected. they got his up-armored assault helicopter. and they got it reportedly with a bunch of spare fighter jet parts that had been loaded onto it. fighter jet parts that actually fit the kinds of fighter jets that ukraine uses so those were helpful. but having this russian military pilot and all he knows and just the fact of him to show the

world, yeah, the helicopter is one thing, but he was a big part of what they gained there too. today, multiple news agencies are reporting that pilot has been found dead. shot to death mysteriously in a parking garage in a town in coastal spain. now, nbc news has not verified these reports so i'm bringing you news at this point we can only attribute to other news agency. again, we cannot verify these reports ourselves. but if these reports turn out to be true, as the guardian newspaper in london puts it today, quote, the finger of blame is likely to point to the kremlin. and that's because the kremlin does stuff like this all the time. in 2006, russian intelligence agents used radioactive polonium to assassinate a dissident. they put the polonium in a pot

of tea and they met with him in a restaurant in london. in 2018, russian military intelligence agents used a proprietary russian military nerve agent to try to assassinate another russian defector in england. they didn't quite kill him but they did kill an innocent british bystander who mistakenly handled the prison. in 2019, another russian intelligence officer murdered a chechen dissident in a park in berlin, right by the german chancellor's office. he rode up to him on a bicycle in the park, shot him dead. in february 2020, russia even tried it in the united states. a russian effort to assassinate a former high ranking russian intelligence official in miami after he became an informant for the u.s. government. that assassination plot on u.s. soil was only foiled by the arrest of the guy who was sent to surveil the target before he could convey his location back to his fsb handler.

and now, the russian pilot who flew that helicopter, that russian helicopter, over the russian border into ukraine and landed saying he was troubled by his country, by russia having invaded ukraine, and he and his helicopter were now being put in ukrainian hands. and they kill these guys in germany and at least two assassination attempts in the uk. they seem have to tried it in the united states, maybe they have now done it again in spain. who cares, they'll do it anywhere. if you're a dissident in russia, if you difect from russia, turn against putin in russia, it doesn't matter if you're no longer in russia. he'll send assassination teams anywhere in the world and hunt you down. so there's a clear message here, obviously. don't be a russian dissident. anywhere in the world, at least that's the very clear message

from vladimir putin. the message from the rest of the world, of course, is do. do please be a russian dissident, because the world needs you to. because vladimir putin now in his 25th year in power, is not someone for whom his ambitions or the damage he's willing to impose are things that are confined by russia's borders. he operates anywhere in the world. doing whatever he wants. it's like he can't try any harder to make clear that this is a -- this is a whole world problem. let me show you part of a report that richard engel aired tonight on nbc nightly news. watch this. >> the ukrainians broadcast warnings telling russian troops to stop shelling at the risk of a nuclear disaster. the warnings went unheeded.

russian troops occupied the plant and the territory around it. ukrainian forces held on to the far bank of the deneap row river, leaving the nuclear power station right on the front line. two years on, the international atomic energy agency which has inspectors at the plant, is sounding the alarm. >> responsible for nuclear security all around the world. >> yes. >> is this the most dangerous nuclear facility on the planet right now? >> it's the most dangerous situation that we have. it's my job not to, you know, sow panic, but at the same time, i have to tell the truth of what is happening. >> nuclear experts point to three main dangers. first, a military strike on the plant. either accidental or deliberate. second, a power cut. the plant's six uranium reactors require electricity for cooling, but ukrainian officials say three of the four power lines are damaged.

and the fourth is faulty. there have already been eight blackouts as recently as december. >> when you have a blackout, the cooler function of the reactors is lost, and you could have a meltdown. >> and finally, it's understaffed. ukrainians say the russians have been abusing employees. 11,000 people worked at the plant before. only 4,000 work there now. irina is responsible for radiation detection for the ukrainian government. her office predicts how if there was a meltdown, a cloud of radioactive particles would spread across much of ukraine and neighboring countries. >> this is istanbul right here, the city of istanbul. contaminated the entire city on the black sea. it's a catastrophe. >> she says the fallout would last up to 100 years. a nuclear disaster here would be felt around the world.

and leave large parts of ukraine and beyond uninhabitable. >> that's nbc's richard engel reporting tonight on nbc nightly news. and if you remember, we heard a lot about the zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, the largest nuclear power plant in europe at the start of russia's invasion of ukraine. now, two years into russia's invasion of ukraine, with russian troops there, 7,000 of the 11,000 people it takes to safely run that reactor are gone. they're having regular blackouts. they're allegedly torturing some of the remaining people there, trying to keep the thing from melting down fukushima style. i mean, that is part of what putin is bringing to bear on the rest of the world right now. you may also have seen the news just a few days ago which started off as a sort of cryptic warning from the intelligence committee in the house and its republican chairman about some kind of grave new national security threat from russia that the american government needed

to be addressing and talking to congress about. started off with that cryptic letter from the house intelligence committee chairman. it was soon reported all over the place that the point of concern was russia developing a new nuclear capability that they would deploy in space, a nuclear weapon, they have thousands of nuclear weapons just like we do, except this one would be put into orbit around the earth. so it could strategically be detonated to wipe out satellites orbiting the planet. which would have the effect down here on earth of wiping out not only communications technology but navigation and military capabilities like missile defense. "the new york times" summed it up like this, quote, global communications systems would fail, making everything from emergency services to cell phones to the regulation of generators and pumps go awry. quote, debris from the explosion

would scatter throughout low earth orbit and make navigation difficult if not impossible for everything from star link satellites used for internet communications to spy satellites. so here's the game plan. we'll assassinate our enemies anywhere on the earth, including in the united states by any means we choose including by the use of military grade nerve agents that we will dump willy-nilly in civilian areas thus killing bystanders. we will bring a war inside the gates of one of the world's largest active nuclear plants, threatening a continent-wide century long radiation disaster and no one and nothing is allowed to protect that site. we'll do what we want with it. and we'll put nuclear weapons in orbit around the earth for the first time in human history so we have the power to knock out not just your gps and cell phones but your emergency systems and your power grids and

water systems and everything else. oh, and we'll invade georgia in 2008 and ukraine in 2014 and ukraine again in 2022. we'll get europe back into the game of large land wars for the first time since world war ii. at the munich security conference this weekend in germany, nato secretary-general shared new nato intelligence. he repeatedly shared new nato intelligence that they believe what putin intends to do next is try and attack on one of the smallernato countries on its border. estonia, latvia, lithuania, they're all nato members. new nato intelligence says putin's next designs are on one of them. if he indeed attacks one of them, which nato says they think he's planning on, that would bring russia into war with all 31 countries part of the nato alliance, which includes a little country called the united states of america. there is not another entity like

this on earth. there is not another country on earth that is doing anything like this. there is not another leader on earth that is doing anything like this. and so what do we do about it? what do we the united states do about it? what does the world do about it? this is what the russian embassy in london looks like. normal times on a normal day. this is what it looked like this weekend. on the right side of your screen, that's what it looked like this weekend after putin killed russia's charismatic, creative opposition leader alexei navalny at the age of 47 at a siberian prison camp. at the russian embassy in london, they projected this image of navalny onto the side of the building. it takes up basically the whole side of the russian embassy. russian embassies all over the world this weekend in eastern europe, in western europe, as far away as india, at the russian consulate in new york, at the russian embassy in d.c.,

people left flowers and signs in alexei navalny's name. inside russia, anybody leaving flowers or leaving signs or even just showing up in public to pay their respects for most of the weekend, they got beaten up and hauled off by police. hundreds of people. arrested this weekend, literally for laying flowers in public, for holding a sign with navalny's name on it. in munich at that international munich security conference right after vice president kamala harris spoke about the need for the world to help ukraine defend itself against this now two-year-long russian invasion, alexei navalny's widow, yulia, appeared without announcement after vice president harris spoke. she appeared to everyone's surprise, making unannounced remarks.

asking the world to stand up, to stand together, to fight against the putin regime in russia. then this weekend, she posted this sort of stunning, straight to camera video in russian, saying that she is not afraid, that she will carry on her husband's work. she said that will start by naming and showing the faces soon of the people who carried out the murder of her husband at that prison camp. she said people do not need to be afraid. they need to do everything they can to fight against putin's regime. and of course, we have to wonder if she is now marking herself for death as well. by stepping forward into that kind of a role now that her husband has been killed for it. the whole world needs for there to be russian dissidents. because the world needs for russia to change. the whole world needs for there

to be russian dissidents and needs for them to not only survive but ultimately to win. because of the incredible threat that an increasing threat, an increasingly aggressive and unconstrained threat that putin poses to the rest of the world as long as he remains in charge of russia. but how do we get that? here in the united states, we have the leader of the republican party trying to return to the white house saying, quote, i would encourage them, meaning i would encourage russia, to do whatever the hell they want to our allies. that was just before russia killed navalny. he has made one comment about navalny's death, not until today, saying online today that it was a, quote, sudden death and not lamenting it at all. he'll be running for the white house this fall against the incumbent administration, which is trying to continue the life or death support that we have been providing, the country

russia has invaded, which is trying to maintain a global coalition to pressure russia and to pressure putin, which is trying to act in the interests of russia's brave and until now basically invariably doomed dissidents. as putin kills them one by one without consequences. at home and anywhere in the world. what else can they do? what else can we do as a country, literally, what else can we do? a very small but surprising silver lining may have just emerged on this, and that's next. stay with us. saved hundreds. that's great. i know, i've bee telling everyone. baby: liberty. oh! baby: liberty. how many people did you tell? only pay for what you need. jingle: ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ baby: ♪ liberty. ♪ when i was diagnosed with h-i-v,

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white house gave us information today, they're going to remain in close contact with leaders of congress on the issue, and it will be dealt with. steady hands at the wheel. the united states can't rely on other nations to handle matters like this. we must do it ourselves and we will. >> the bottom line is we all came away with a strong impression that the administration is taking this very seriously and that the administration has a plan in place. we look forward to supporting them. but in the interim, i have great faith in what the administration is currently doing to try to address this matter and i appreciate the support and the working relationship on a

bipartisan basis i have with my ranking members. >> you are not hallucinating. that was two senior republicans including the speaker of the house, mike johnson, praising the biden administration. saying how much they trust them and value them to deal with what was first reported last week as an emerging national security threat, of russia trying to put satellite killer nuclear weapons in orbit around the earth up in space. for this unbelievably partisan and dysfunctional republican congress to have senior leaders praising the biden administration on a national security issue related to russia is perhaps the tiniest of teeny, teeny tiny silver linings of hope that maybe the u.s. government as a whole might be able to get it together to stand up to putin on at least some things. in the wake of not only two years of war in ukraine, but now the murder of russian opposition leader alexei navalny. i'll take it.

joining us now is pulitzer prize winning author, staff writer for the atlantic, anne applebaum, she just returned from the munich conference. it's great to see you. thanks for making time to be here tonight. >> thank you. >> first, let me ask you, i know you were at munich when news about navalny's death was announced. what went through your mind, how did everyone react? it must have been an amazing and awful thing. >> i shared the feeling that i have heard a lot of russians say in the last day or two, which is you know, you feel like the future has been stolen. navalny represented the idea of a different russia. that russia could be a different kind of place, different kinds of people could rule and it could operate by different rules. it wouldn't be a threat to the world. it wouldn't be the backer of iran and of north korea. it wouldn't be invading ukraine. and what putin is trying to do by killing people like navalny

is destroy that hope, to give people the feeling that there is nothing we can do. putin is inevitable and autocracy remains. and it's really, really important that his wife has now stood up to say, i will do that. i will try to be the person who gives you that hope, who makes you believe that something can be different, because if no one believes it can be different, then it never will be. >> how do russians see yulia navalnaya? as an american who has followed mr. navalny's career, who is gutted by the news of his killing, i feel like i have been aware of them as a force together, and i have been aware of the way they were able and willing remarkably to put their family and their relationship in the public eye despite the threats to him. how do russians view her, the first thing i felt when i saw her give that direct to camera, those video remarks this

weekend, i felt like she was marking herself as a target, just after her husband was killed for doing exactly this. >> so she's made a point actually of not speaking much in public. she decided that her role was to support him and be the person who gave him the strength to do what he did. you know, obviously, she's now made this decision to shift. it's extremely painful and difficult for her. i did see her privately at munich, and she's like an ice statue. she's frozen and horrified. but she understands that what he did that was so important was he modeled civic courage by deciding to go back to russia. he was famously poisoned in russia. he left the country. he was cured. he made the decision to go back. he went back with her, and he went back to show russians there is such a thing as bravery in a society that is trying to kill off bravery. i think she understands that and is now trying to be that person

as well. >> what can the u.s. government do that we are not already doing to support bravery like that and to help them in their cause? >> first of all, we can win the war. the war in ukraine is a war of a democratic state against russia. it's also the war of the democratic world against russia. we created this spectacular coalition of 50 countries. europeans are giving more money to ukraine, to aid the war than we are. yet, we are strangely divided about it. we have allowed a very small minority of republicans inspired by the former president to block that aid, and that's giving putin this inspiration, this feeling he can go farther. it may even be why he killed navalny, just to show he can. look, i don't care what any of you do, i'm going to keep going. we can enforce our sanctions. we have sanctioned russia. we have put out dozens of export

controls, all kinds of things. but we do very little to enforce it. if we were serious about winning this war, you know, we would have thousands of people working on sanctions. thousands of people, not a few guys at the treasury department, a few policemen here and there. we would be taking this seriously. you know, there are two ways this war can end. one way this war can end. the war ends when russia leaves ukraine, but that is not just -- that means that the point is not merely to help ukraine. the point is to defeat russia. and we have many different spheres in which we can defeat russia, political, military, economic. i don't feel we have taken it really seriously yet. >> anne applebaum, thanks very much for making the time. difficult subject, i feel lucky to talk to you about it. thank you. all right, we are much more ahead here tonight. stay with us. ie's disease? will it get worse? how common is it?

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...our republican opponent here on this stage has voted for donald trump twice. mr. garvey, you voted for him twice... as your own man, what is your decision? garvey is wrong for california. but garvey's surging in the polls. fox news says garvey would be a boost to republican control of the senate. stop garvey. adam schiff for senate. i'm adam schiff, and i approve this message. for years now, for more than a decade, democrats in the state of wisconsin have been trying to level the playing field in wisconsin politics. even when wisconsin democrats have won state-wide in recent years, turfing out the republican governor, scott walker in 2018, even when wisconsin democrats have gotten way more votes for state

assembly, say in 2018, when they got 54% of the vote of state assembly votes. even when they have been outvoting republicans, that clearly, democrats have been getting way less when it comes to seats in the state legislature. in that 2018 race, democrats won the total vote for state assembly by a margin of more than 200,000 votes. but republicans still got more seats. democrats won 54% of the votes for state assembly, but that 54% of the vote only earned them 36% of the seats. ever since wisconsin republicans got control of their state government in 2010, they have redrawn the political maps, the state legislature and the congressional maps so that republicans effectively can't be voted out of power. so they can win more seats from wisconsin despite getting fewer votes from wisconsin. in wisconsin, it's the democrats who have won 14 out of 17 of the

last state-wide elections, but republicans consistently win more seats even though they have fewer votes. the state consistently votes overall for democrats, most recently in the 2022 election. but republicans nevertheless got nearly two-thirds of seats in the state assembly and a full two-thirds of the seats in the state senate. for the past 13 years in wisconsin, the bottom line is that democrats can basically win as many votes as they want, but those votes will not put them into power in the state. and for years, wisconsin democrats have been trying to fix that, have been trying to level the playing field, again, so that what people vote for is what they get in terms of state government. in 2017, wisconsin democrats brought a legal challenge to the republican drawn maps, all the way up to the u.s. supreme court. that got swatted down. in 2022, following his re-election, democratic governor tony evers was able to push

through revised maps, not quite ungerrymandered but a step in a less gerrymandered direction. the u.s. supreme court threw those out too. finally, it was what happened last year that changed the course in wisconsin. after dogged campaigning and organizing by the democrats, wisconsin voters elected a new liberal judge to the wisconsin supreme court. and that effectively flipped control of the court to the liberals. and wisconsin voters then filed a new lawsuit arguing that the republican maps were illegal, the state supreme court agreed. and they ordered new maps for wisconsin. new, fair, ungerrymandered maps that meant the playing field would not be tilted in either party's direction. today, just today, 13 years after this all started, governor evers has signed new state maps into law. maps that will effectively end republican gerrymandering and

give equal party a fair shot at trying to control the legislature in that state. it took 13 years of perseverance by wisconsin democrats. but those old, unbelievably outrageous republican maps are finally gone, which means when republican or democratic voters go to the polls in wisconsin, however they vote will now be reflected in their state government. shocking, i know. now for now, these maps apply just to the state legislature. on the congressional level, it's still the way it was. there's a fairly evenly split electorate in wisconsin. it is a purple state. but even so, because the congressional maps are still gerrymandered under the old system, of the eight seats that wisconsin has in congress, six of them are held by republicans. now, the wisconsin supreme court hasn't yet decided whether they're going to take up a legal challenge to the congressional maps as well as the legislative

maps they just did take up the challenge for. but you can expect that to be the next battle and you can expect wisconsin democrats to fight as hard for that as they have for these past 13 years. still, though, take a moment to recognize what a victory this is in wisconsin. a victory not for capital "d" democrats per se but for small "d" democracy. a victory for an out of perseverance and organizing and dedication. the chair of the democratic party in wisconsin is going to be on with lawrence o'donnell next hour to talk about what it took to win this fight and how it can be a model for this nation. that news out of wisconsin today is also a good reminder about the many democratic victories in the states recently. democrats in the biden era really do keep winning election after election after election. you can consider pennsylvania also as a case study. pennsylvania just held a special election for an open house seat in the state. in 2020, this was a district

that joe biden won by 11 points. but in the special election last week, the democrat in that race not only won, he beat the republican by 35 points. in the past year, there have been six special elections in pennsylvania. democrats have won six out of the six. democrats also won last week in new york. they flipped the congressional seat that once belonged to republican congressman george santos. that's an increasingly red district. everybody has been saying, but the democrat won that race. and you can read that as a democratic party victory. for sure, and the democrats deserve credit there. but look also at the republican party response to that victory. steve bannon, senior adviser to donald trump, very influential right wing podcaster now, he's saying publicly that new york special election was rigged for the democrats. he says, quote, they stole this election in new york. so we are in this era now where we have one party competing to

win elections, persevering year after year after year to win in a democratic system. level the playing field to compete and win. they're doing very well at it in the biden era. working their hearts out in a small "d" democratic way. but they're working against an opponent that does not really want elections to determine who gets to be in political power anymore in the united states. what do you do about that? how do you win that democratic fight with an opponent that doesn't want democracy to be the way we solve our problems? we have expert help on that next. stay with us. children are the greatest joy and our best hope for a better future. friends, they are the future. but did you know that millions of kids

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he said, quote, i won't take a penny from these donations. and quote, i'm taking nothing, zero. and quote, it's not possible to steal the money. those were the promises made by a crowdsourced campaign to build a trump border wall with donations on gofundme that started in december 2018. by august 2020, four leaders of that we build the wall thing had been federally indicted for fraud. three of the four ended up convicted and sentenced to years in prison. the fourth is trump aide steve bannon, who got a federal pardon from his former boss on his last day in office. although i should mention bannon now faces state charges. basically for the same fraud in new york state. on friday, a new york judge

ordered trump himself to pay more than $450 million including interest in a civil fraud case involving his real estate businesses. but don't worry, if that sounds like a lot of money, a new gofundme campaign has raised half a million dollars already to help the former president to that end. more than $27 million in trump campaign fund-raising went to his legal fees in the last half of last year alone. now that trump's working to put his own people in charge of the national republican party, some senior republicans are saying they're worried he'll end up tapping republican party coffers as well. the prospect of keeping many people up at night is the idea that it will be a foreign government, some sort of foreign entity, perhaps a hostile one, that could decide they'll just cover it all. how would that fit with trump's announced plans for a second term and for his strong man style of promised governance? our next guest studies the

relationship of corruption and foreign influence being bought. ruth ben-ghiat is a professor of history at nyu, author of an essential book called strong men, from mussolini to the present. ruth, it's a pleasure to have you here. thanks for joining us. >> a pleasure. >> the prospect of massive foreign support for a president who is in serious financial trouble feels like a very singular thing that we have never faced before in the united states. but the way you write about money and corruption and its relation to authoritarianism in your book makes me think this is not something necessarily that should be seen in isolation to trump here but maybe should be seen as more a larger part of the authoritarian project. >> yes, exactly. trump is what we call a personless ruler, meaning he personalizes politics. and holding pulic office or

running for office in this case, the goal of it is and the party and government agencies, they're supposed to solve the leader's personal, legal, and financial problems. so holding office is a mechanism of self enrichment, so the campaign in this case. trump in that sense is very similar to other authoritarians, at its most extreme like in putin's russia, you have a kleptocracy. but what we have here is a party mechanism as laura trump is saying every penny has to go of the rnc and donors to electing trump and solving his financial problems. and sadly and disgracefully, the rnc was already doing this. it's incredible, rachel, that a whole year after the election, the 2020 election, the rnc was paying trump's personal legal bills. and so this is an example of the

personalization of power where there's no -- there's no division or recognition of the difference between public and private. and so when trump says openly that he received millions from chinese to his businesses while he was president for quote services, and he says this openly, he's telling you that he embraces that conception of power. >> does it have to work only on his supporters so that they will give him their own money? or does it also have to work in such a way that as you say even foreign money, even obviously corrupting foreign influence funneled as money to the leader personally has to be made into a political virtue as well? >> yes, yes. it has to be both. and the key here is the republican party. that is a linchpin of this. it is a willing accomplice to

trump's financial corruption. and you know, it was okay with him hiring his family, jared kushner in power, and is not doing anything to stand up for the division between personal and political indeed is embracing this kind of authoritarian leader cult where trump can do whatever he says and says that putin can do whatever he says as well. so it can be hard for americans to understand because it's a completely proprietary vision of power. that everything is for your taking. everything is yours. there's a kind of megalomania, and that's how you can end up with highly classified government documents in the bathroom of your private residence. or think it's okay to say that the chinese gave my businesses millions of dollars for, quote,

services. most people who are democrats would not say such things, but for trump, it's a boast. and this is why he admires xi jinping and putin, because they get away with things like that. it's been very open, the corruption, and corruption is institutionalized, and that's what he would like america to be like if he comes back to the white house. >> ruth ben-ghiat is professor of history at new york university, the author of strong men, mussolini to the present. ruth, thanks very much for talking with us tonight. i appreciate you being here. >> sure. a pleasure. >> of course, the root and branch of all american anticorruption protections has been about transparency, the