there's. >> he set his alarm every day. >> at the front door waiting. that looks good. >> just what matt needed. new friends. >> you look like one of us. >> he is. >> he found them. three times his age. >> i'm bringing up the rear. >> they are everything to him. he comes home and he talks about them. so once i wasn't here today, but they think he is sick. i hope he's okay. >> the mud ducks don't play games. they just play. enjoying hockey. >> attaboy. >> and each other. >> it's been a blessing for everybody. >> when steve saw how mad was thriving, east island bringing his own son, will, who has autism. >> hey, look at that going. >> now learning to skate. and getting encouragement from matt. >> we are doing good, bro. >> what did he say? they let him be who he is and they are inclusive.

>> when we leave he gives us a hard. >> there you go. >> thanks, steve. >> it means a lot. >> wisdom borne of age. and friends born of a -- >> he's a mud duck. >> we are so happy that matt found his flock. i'm so grateful that my colleague megan found this story, that mauro produce it and then boyd shared. it and please remember, it costs absolutely nothing to be kind, and i can assure you any nhl team owner that i know, i'll be emailing you the segment tonight. you sure as hell better stand this man some cool gear. with that i wish you a good night. from all our colleagues across the networks of nbc news, thanks for staying up late with

me. >> today the supreme court made a momentous decision, one that has significant implications for the rule of law in this country. at five pm eastern, this afternoon, the supreme court agreed to take up former president trump's claims of presidential immunity. these are not credible claims. that has been thoroughly litigated in district court and federal appellate court. by nearly deciding to do this, by side setting side whatever the courts final ruling, is the court has upended the attempt to hold on trump accountable for his actions to subvert democracy. in fact, the court may have ended that attempt entirely. this decision is almost certain to reshape the 2024 presidential race, and it will likely pay a determinative role in its outcome. but as much as the significance of this ruling is already apparent, the full consequences

here hinge on the timing. now in its ruling tonight, the court said it would hear oral arguments in the case the week of april 22nd. now april 22nd is not close to today. and we will get into why exactly the court didn't choose a day that is a lot sooner than that. but april 22nd, on its face, seems pretty far from the november election. it's not. because when you start crunching the numbers and looking at how a trial could actually timeout avid the supreme court makes its decision here, the window in which trump could face trial, the window for that happening before the november election, is incredibly small. the first thing you have to take into account is that the prep time that the judge, who was overseeing this case, judge tanya chutkan, the prep time she alerted for trump and his lawyers has been effectively stalled. judge chutkan initially gave donald trump and his team seven months to prepare for this

case, from the day he was indicted, to the original trial date in march. back in december, on december 7th, trump's legal team asked for a pause, a stay in this case, while trump's immunity claims were appealed, and judge chutkan granted it. that pause didn't just freeze the case. it also paused all the prep time is well. trump's team still had 88 days left to prepare before the case was paused, and the expectation now is that they would still get those 88 days or something similar to prep when this case is an paused. so that's point number one. even if the supreme court rules this case can go forward, the day after they hear oral arguments, the trial can't just start right away. trump's team would get another 88 days. point number two is about how long a trial would actually take. last year, before the case had been paused, potential jurors

for the case in the d.c. area received this pre screening form. you see it there on the screen. it specified the trial would last approximately three months after jury selection is completed. special counsel jack smith and judge chutkan have also signaled we, are looking at something like a three-month trial for this. so just to ballpark this really quickly, let's assume 88 days for trump's team to finish their prepped before the trial. then let's assume the three months needed for the trial itself is a nice round 90 days. that comes out to 178 days. that is how long it would take for this trial to actually conclude after we get a decision back from the supreme court. so let's go back to the calendar. the election is november 5th. an oral argument on trump's presidential community claims that the supreme court is set for the week of april 22nd.

this would be the fastest possible scenario here, is everything stands at present. the supreme court meets monday, april 22nd and, they make a decision the next day, tuesday, april 20 served. if we are 178 days to tuesday april 23rd, that would mean the trial would finish on wednesday, october 16th, 20 days before the general election. that is what we are working with here, in the best-case scenario. joining me now, neal katyal, former acting solicitor general of the united states and under president obama and dahlia lithwick, senior editor at slate, covering the courts. thank you both for being here tonight. i just first want to start with your reaction to the court's decision here. and your level of optimism about this trial actually happening before the election. >> i have a lot of institutional respect, alex, for the supreme court out there

this morning. with my team arguing a different case and yet i find myself greatly concerned by this decision by the supreme court to hear the case and wait until april iron dome gravely concerned for the rule of law. don trump has a bogus legal argument here. the supreme court is spending precious months trying to hear it. the courts known for a lot of things and certainly efficiency is not one of them and i think the best that can be said is that without schedule is everyone a little unhappy, too fast for donald trump but too slow for jack smith, it creates far too much uncertainty about the preservation of the rule of law in the outcome. later we can talk about those dates, the hundred 78 days, 90, 88 days. i think there is still a strong possibility the case could be tried against donald trump before the election. i can go into detail later about that, but i certainly

think right now i am concerned. >> i want to talk about the mechanisms by which both the doj, special counsel, and judge chutkan might try and shorten that 178 days. but first, dahlia, neil raises a point. in the world of possibility the supreme court thinks that somehow reaching a compromise decision here by having this on a timeline it's faster than trump wants, which is next never rory, and slower than jack smith which is would like, which would've been in march. >> yeah, i mean i think we were hoping we were hoping a week or two ago that the compromise was that trump might prevail in the colorado case and lose absolutely in this immunity case. that was supposed to be the ground bargain. now we are doing a z knows paradox we were taking smaller and smaller halves of what we thought might be a win. i think that the real issue for me, and neal just made this

point, of the court knows how to act quickly when it needs to. it certainly acted very quickly in that colorado bumping them off the ballot case. in fact it acted much more quickly. so i think one of the things that worries me about this case is the sense that the court tells us what an emergency is, and it has done that in case after case over the last couple of years. it doesn't seem to feel that there is any emergency or any exigent kind of shock clock going on here. for those of us who are doing the math that you are doing and that neal is doing, trying to eke out some kind of case on the merits before the election, what the court did today with sort of advance almost no concern for the fact that it's kind of democracy itself against this shock clock. it seems to be that they are not bothered by either of those. >> neal, to dahlia's point,

judge chutkan sees the clerk. you mentioned there might be ways to shorten the timeframe 178 days. let's start with what judge chutkan might be able to do. is there a way to narrow the prep time window, the 88 days that trump team has, assuming a court that the supreme court does not rule in trump's favor on the immunity claim. >> even before we get to judge chutkan, the question is, when is the court gonna decide the case? i think dahlia makes such an important point in saying look, this is a court that moves quickly. for example i was a lawyer and bush versus gore, that was a 36- day start to finish. i remember the first case of the supreme court we had like four days to brief it. so we had gone from four to like 40 in this supposedly expedited case. so that does concern me. having said that, i do think the court, and i hope they listen to the pressure of the american public, to decide this thing quickly after they hear

the case unable 22nd. judge chutkan in the interim does some options. she said she's gonna give long trump 88 days to prepare for his trial. but she said that well before trump had the supreme court grant hears immunity case. and trump's lawyers can walk and chew gum at the same time. they don't need all of those 88 days. and so judge chutkan can even now say if this case comes back to me, donald trump, you're not going to get the full 88 days. that was in a world in which you didn't have months and months of pre-existing delay, like you do now. >> dahlia, in addition to the prep time that she could shrink, is there something that jack smith could do? i know andrew weissmann had suggested they trim the charges against trump. is that likely? if it is, what may be taken out? >> in some sense jack smith has doggedly made the case, time

after time, to the court, you've got to do this more quickly. and in some sense, as we have said, we had a little bit of a split the baby today where he doesn't get where he wants, but don trump doesn't get what he wants. whether he can, i don't, know hive of some of this. this was a pretty tight case as compared to the fani willis sprawling case in fulton county. this was a pretty tight case. i suppose there is a way to tighten it, but i think the real thing we have to ask ourselves is, are we going to wait for weeks and weeks and weeks for somebody to write a dissent in this case of the supreme court and then it's coming down at the end of june. what i worry about more than anything is that no matter what judge chutkan or jack smith can do, if you have four votes at the supreme court, or three votes, that want to do the run out the clock play, i think that they can kind of keep this

thing starved for much much longer. >> do you read neil, to dolley's point, the fact that they don't seem to be working expeditiously and they know how to work quickly when they want to? do you read anything in that in terms of how much they are going to favor trump in all of this? it seems clear that they understand the political reality here. how could you not? do you think that suggests they might actually find in his favor on these ludicrous claims of presidential immunity? >> now, alex, because they are so ludicrous. no i do not expect any justices to side with donald trump on the merits of his claim. it's crazy. and he even said so. his lawyers, back when he was being impeached, after january six, he says you can't impeach me. the only remedy is to indict me after i leave office, so that's what dak smith did, and now he's complaining and saying you can't indict me because i have

absolute immunity. it has all been a long long shell game. i take dahlia's point about the court and maybe a desantis something like that. but i think that when the court hears this case and realizes just how bogus donald trump's claims are, they will decide it quickly. and even if there is a dissent, the chief justice has the power where the members of the majority to release the majority of opinion without waiting for the dissent. in a case like this, with the american public deserving so much on what happened on january six on a formal trial to get to a bottom of it, i sure hope that's what will happen once we get there. >> to the rulings that have preceded the supreme court taking it up, dahlia, the appellate court ruling was, i think you call it a bench slap. there was no room for entertaining any legality in trump's argument. i don't supreme court is taking

it up. if you're sitting on the circuit court of appeals, and you're one of the judges that took your time to write a very thoughtful wide-ranging opinion about how this team did not hold water, this immunity claim, sort of like, what are the implications there that the supreme court decided to take it up anyway? >> i'll go you one better. don't forget when the colorado case was argued, when anderson was argued at the supreme court, the court didn't want to touch the question of the insurrection and on trump's responsibility for the insurrection. in fact donald trump's own lawyer was like, yeah that was super bad. so we don't even have a court that wants to touch the merits of how barren january six was. and i would add to that, the american public has seen the january six commission, has seen the impeachment trial. they have seen two e. jean

carroll verdicts. they have seen a verdict in new york in the trump financial misconduct case. there is a pile of and refuted evidence, including the finding and the colorado supreme court that donald trump insurrection. all that stuff has not been touched, as best as i can see, by the u.s. supreme court. i'm not confident they want to touch it. two neal's point, it's important to understand, when you get to the merits, when you get to the past the shell games about timing and court feeling it needs to weigh in on this, it couldn't do a summary. we haven't had a single signal from the supreme court that that three judge opinion that came out of the d.c. circuit is anything but bulletproof. i think it is still bulletproof. i think we're just trying to figure out how to get there. >> i have to say is, maybe the supreme court judges does should look at how judging

goren, how judge kaplan, oh judge marchand have handled their cases here in new york where we get things done when it comes to holding people accountable. not saying, just. saying neal katyal and dahlia lithwick, thank you so much for coming tonight. really appreciate it. we have lots more ahead this evening, including the breaking news that an illinois judge has disqualified donald trump from the 2024 presidential ballot over his actions on january six. supreme court, over to you. but first, more on this stunning decision of the supreme court entertain donald trump's immunity claims. which justices wanted to hear this case? that's coming up next. up next.

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to take it up. so not a majority, although it can be. four out of nine is the bare minimum. it's the magic number. and now, with the news of the supreme court has decided to hear donald trump's claim that he is somehow immune from criminal prosecution, it begs the question, which of the nine justices decided to take up this case? and why did it take the court so very long to do so? after all, it took just 51 days from the time trump was kicked off the ballot in colorado and december 19th to win the supreme court oral arguments for that case, the 14th amendment case, on february 8th. on december 11th, 2023, special counsel jack smith asked the supreme court to quickly weigh in on trump's presidential immunity appeal, and to do so early. which the court rejected. and now, by the time we get to april 22nd, which is when the court plans to hear oral arguments in this immunity case, it will have been 133 days since the court was first

asked to hear the appeal. so the paces is, curious? around 50 days when it appears to help donald trump, and over 130 days when it doesn't. joining me now, mark joseph stern, senior writer for slate, covering courts and the law, and ali must, of justice correspondent for the nation. elie, first let's talk about the optics of this order. it's unsigned, there are no dissents. i'm asking you to answer. maybe it's unanswerable. do you think it's possible that this was unanimous decision? but the liberal justices on the court cosigned, taking this case up? >> i highly doubt it. as you, said you only need four votes to take the case at all. most likely it was the four horsemen, it was thomas, alito, gorsuch, and kavanaugh, the four horsemen of the apocalypse, who decided to hear this case. i'm a little more interested about the fifth vote because there was an option. for the supreme court to take the case but not grant a stay, but allow justice to go forward, and they must have had a fifth vote to even come up

that process so it looks like it came from roberts or barrett or both. i doubt highly than levels were in on it, but what i will say is that, dalio was talking about colorado earlier. so the liberals are apparently going to allow trump back on the ballot, and they've got nothing for that. they traded away that for nothing because the deal, potentially, of letting trump be on the ballot, but denying his immunity question, -- >> that seems to be up in court smoke. >> mark, after go back to the medium way back machine to revisit the conversation we had. i don't remember when it was, two weeks ago? wow. two weeks ago. seven years ago on tv anchor time. you suggested that the supreme court may, have already decided to take up the immunity case. you suggested that they had sort of maybe cleared their april calendar to take up a

high stakes case. can you talk a little bit more about what feels like a very prescient piece of analysis? >> yes. i'm saddened to learn that my educated guess was correct there. but what i noticed was that in december, shortly after jack smith first asked the supreme court to take this case on an expedited schedule, the court was granting new cases but not putting them on the april calendar. one case in particular, a filing reveal that the court had secretly toward the parties, we are holding this over until october so you don't need to rush. in january another major case, a death penalty case. the court rather bizarrely hung on to it and held it over until next term. that was a strange pattern to me. i've covered the court for a long time. usually don't see. that the justices like to clear their plates with these cases by filling up the calendar right until the end of april. and so that was why, when we

spoke a few weeks ago, or maybe a few years ago at anchor time, it seemed to me there was a real chance that what the justices were thinking was, look, we're going to have at least one more blockbuster emergency case. it will probably be the immunity case. and so we are going to hold up in space for it later in the term. again, just my guess, but i fear that in light of today's news, it is quite plausible. >> if they did that, first of all i'm reminded of the jobs decision where they decided they were going to take up the case but didn't actually put it on the docket for several months because of political realities. could this court have done that again? and what does that suggest to you? they could've taken this up in january when special counsel jack smith said hey, can you carry this on an expedited basis. but they chose not to. then the appeals court gives a bulletproof ruling as dahlia says, and still decided to take it up. >> they are corrupted political actors who act in bad faith.

the reason why people like mark and people like dahlia seemed to have a crystal ball is because they are real. because they are realists. they understand the court for what it is. and at some point people in the media, people at home, and people sitting in the white house have to stop pretending that the supreme court is some kind of benign trying to do its best institution and start to realize that there are six republicans, not conservatives, republicans on the supreme court who view it as their job to help for the republican party. and until we do something about that, until we take back that power, until we draw the line on them there, they will continue to do this. they will help trump, they will take away abortion rights, they will and affirmative action, they will liberalize gun rights. they will do all of it until we stop them. and somebody needs to start listening in the high alert higher echelons of the democratic party, because we will keep losing every day if

we allow the six republicans in robes to rule over all of us. >> mark, i so appreciate elise passion and disdain for this court. i mean, it's an incontrovertible fact that when the 14th amendment kass moved they were able to move quickly, even though the stakes are even higher in this case. i wonder if there's any explanation that you could even fathom other than craven political calculation? >> look, i think there's a possibility that over the last two weeks the liberal justices were trying to come to a compromise with a handful of conservatives. i think elie is right, probably roberts and barrett were seen as the most gettable here. to issue a summer summary of ferments of the d.c. circuits -- or deny us day, the court could've denied a stay, allow the trial to move forward in

the preliminary stages, and also heard arguments and render a decision to affirm that the trial could move forward in the summer. the court had other options. and i really do think that the justices on the left were struggling to find something, salvage something out of this over the last few weeks that would make it anything less than a disaster. but frankly, it appears that they have failed. and i cannot come up with any other justification for what the court has done here. delaying, delaying, over and over again, allowing trump to run out the clock. but only in cases that he wants the court to move slowly on. as you have said, when he's bumped off the ballot, he gets to the court the next month. when he raises a bogus immunity claim, he gets to push his trial back so many months, then it probably won't happen before the election. that is a disturbing pattern. i have to say, i am cynical about this court, and even i am shocked by what happened today.

last term there were some decisions that suggested maybe a few of the justices in the middle we let us have some democracy, we letters have voting rights and make our own decisions and vote in a free and fair election and hold people accountable for subverting that election. and now i just don't think that is true. i have to agree with elie's extreme cynicism. i have to think that this court is in the tank ferdinand. >> you rightly point out, the vested interest to some of these conservatives have in the reelection of trumpism pertains to their retirement. >> there's thomas doesn't want to die in that court. and he's getting old. and he's never gonna retire during a democratic president. so clears thomas, one of the reasons he's not recuse himself, is that clarence thomas needs trump to win again so clarence thomas can retire. and most likely, sam alito needs trump to win again, so alito can retire instead of having to die on the bench. and so that's at least two of the nine who have a vested

professional interest in seeing continued republican hedge money over this country. and that's why the first thing time this is happened. sandra day o'connor also wanted george bush to be president and also thus appointed him president in bush v. gore because she wanted to retire under are public and president. this is how republicans role. >> well, on that note, we're gonna have to leave it there. the conversation is by no means over. please come back, mark joseph stern and elie mystal, thanks so much for your time and passions during these dark moments. still to come this evening, the man who was arguably the most responsible for the 6 to 3 conservative majority supreme court. dropped a bombshell of his own today. we'll get to that. plus another breaking story. for the third time donald trump has been kicked off a state ballot. what happens now? more on that, coming up next.

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>> breaking news tonight, a judge in illinois has disqualified former president trump from appearing on the states republican primary ballot. cook county judge tracey porter cited the 14th amendment insurrection clause in her ruling, ordering the state election board to remove donald trump based on his actions on

january 6th. illinois is now the third state to disqualify trump from 2024 primary ballots. the others are maine and colorado. as of right now, though, all three of this disqualifications are on hold, pending a supreme court decision that could come down any day. judge porter acknowledged as much in her ruling tonight, right in it she knew her decision could not be the ultimate outcome. whenever the court rules on this issue, it is sure to be considered in light of tonight's news that the court will now take up the question of presidential immunity in jack smith's federal election interference case. joining me now to discuss all this, mary mccord, former senior doj official for the national security division and an msnbc legal analyst. mary, thanks for joining me tonight. some breaking news on all fronts. let me first get your thoughts on the immunity question and the degree to which the fact that the court is already mulling over the 14th amendment case is at all a factor in the

decision tonight on immunity. >> i know there have been people that have said ever since the court decided to take up the 14th amendment section, three question, and people listen to the arguments and most of us who listened felt that the court was not prepared. there are not five justices prepared to borrow donald trump from the ballot. they are concerned about in a state having the ability to bar presidential candidate from a ballot. i know a lot of people said, they're gonna balance that against ruling either affirming the d.c. district he in the immunity case or just not taking it up at all. i think, you know, in a subconscious of the justices, those kind of balancing things out may exist but i think they would very much deny they would do anything like that. one cases related to another in that way, lead on legal issues. i do think it's interesting

today to just think about the justification of this ruling out of illinois, with the decision to take up the question presented by the supreme court. so the question presented is, the question that the supreme court has limited their review to, is whether a former president enjoys immunity from criminal prosecutions for things that were within his official acts as president. so we typically think of that based on a law that applies to immunity in civil cases, things that are within the outer perimeter of a presidents official acts may receive immunity. but that question has never been asked for criminal cases. so when you think about what our president's official acts, on the same day as this decision to take up this case, we have a court in chicago, or in illinois, like courts and other places, who have said donald trump engaged in insurrection. just thinking about engaging in

insurrection, the very thing that his criminal prosecution, in washington d.c., is based on, engaging in this entire scheme that led to insurrection. it's hard to even conceive of that scheme as being within a former presidents official acts. so the supreme court could've handled this much differently. and so we don't have to address questions about, in the generic space, about a president could ever be immune from prosecution for things within the outer perimeter of his official acts, because here, this case in front of us, is about a multifaceted conspiracy that led to an insurrection, an attempt, an effort to overturn the votes of the american people. and whatever else you might say about official acts, that is not a presidents official act. >> it just seems like the court has been handed a lot of data points, if not just very strong rulings suggesting here's a person who fomented insurrection. here's a person who has no claim to presidential immunity,

according to the appellate court system. does it surprise you that they even feel the need to weigh in on this and that there was no noted dissent in the ruling today? >> you don't normally have a descent from a grant of cert. you might have to get that from deniers of spirit, or statements that have to explain why the cert was denied. so adjusters who is opposed to search, there is a good chance that justice will be opposed to the ruling of the other members and can issue a dissent of that poor point. i'm not surprised about. that i am surprised the drug almost two full weeks for them to decide to take this case. i can't imagine why they couldn't have known immediately, justice by justice, whether they have the case was important enough to take. and i have heard others say, and i don't disagree with this, this could have been an effort by some of the justices to actually convince others not to take the case and maybe that is

why it took this amount of time. they could have been also trying to hammer out what the actual question would be that they decided to take. but still, almost two weeks is surprising to me. i think that's why a lot of us thought they would deny cert. i'm i surprised about the justices? i think there's at least two who may want to side with the former president on this, or at least don't want to see him go to trial before the election. which is different from necessarily siding with them. but i think that most of the justices ultimately i think will come down in the same side as the d.c. circuit and determine that on these facts, if they reach, this if they don't send it back to judge chutkan to determine whether this was within the scope of this official acts are not, but if they actually look at the facts of this case and address whether, or on a case with these facts, that could possibly immune from criminal prosecution, i think the answer will be no from a majority of

the justices. >> you sure would hope so. i know this is going to be a subject of an emergency episode of your podcast with andrew weissmann prosecuting donald trump. and i will be listening, mary mccord. thanks so much for your time tonight. >> a pleasure. >> still ahead this evening, in the past two years alone this supreme court has upended some of the foundational rights of honored american society. and there is one man who is not only responsible for holding this conservative court, he consider considers at his greatest accomplishment. that story is next. is next. i think it's a great product. it's going to help a lot of patients.

>> the united states supreme court has once again created chaos. today the high court announced it will take up donald trump's immunity claim in late april, a timeline that could in the possibility of holding trump accountable for trying to steal an election before americans cast votes in another election this november. the court is set to make one of the most consequential decisions in modern american history at the precise time with americans and hugely distrustful of the institution is still reeling from the courts other recent decisions. because of the courts 2022 decision to overturn roe v. wade, the future of reproductive health care, including abortion and fertility treatments, is now at risk. and then there's what the court did in the past two years. it ended race based affirmative action, a blocked gun safety legislation, it allowed businesses to discriminate against lgbtq people. this court has radically

unilaterally upended american life. and there is one man who almost more than anyone else is responsible for all of this. addison mitchell mcconnell the third, or mitch to his friends and foes alike. it was eight years ago this week that senator mitch mcconnell took one of the most unprecedented and consequential steps in the modern history of the united states senate. >> republican threw down the gauntlet today in the fight over the future of the supreme court. senate majority leader mitch mcconnell said there will be no vote or even any hearings before the election on anyone president obama nominates to replace justice antonin scalia. >> after the death of supreme court justice antonin scalia, mitch mcconnell announced he wouldn't even hold a hearing on any nominee president obama chose to replace scalia. why? because it was an election year, he said. >> the next justice could fundamentally alter the direction of the supreme court.

and have a profound impact on our country. so of course the american people should have a say in the courts direction. >> no one in modern history had ever actually stolen a supreme court vacancy from a sitting president until mitch mcconnell. and that decision had a profound impact on the future of the country. trump won the election thanks to those votes from evangelicals interested in a supreme court appointment. and he went on to appoint neil gorsuch to the seat that had been stolen from his predecessor. next year, trump appointed brett kavanaugh to the bench as well. and as yet another presidential election year approached, people started to wonder, what would mitch mcconnell do if another vacancy opened up on the court? when he helped confirm a third trump justice in an election

year? >> [inaudible] >> we would fill it. [laughter] >> i would feel. it on september 18th, 2020, supreme court justice ruth bader ginsburg passed away, and with less than two months until the presidential election, mitch mcconnell rushed through the appointment of amy coney barrett. that is how we got the radical conservative majority court we have today. this is mitch mcconnell's legacy. and today senator mcconnell announced that he would be retiring from senate leadership this november. >> i'm immensely proud of all the things i've played some role in obtaining. thoroughly disappointing night critics. i intend to do so with all the enthusiasm with which they have become accustomed. >> mitch mcconnell will no longer be running the upper chamber. after falling out with the former president, mcconnell may be trying to wash his hands clean of the trump era

republican party. the irony, of course, is that it is mitch mcconnell who more than almost anyone else abided donald trump and may have just helped him evade justice. we'll talk about all of that, coming up next. up next. plan from unitedhealthcare. with this type of plan, you'll know upfront about how much your care costs. which makes planning your financial future easier. so call unitedhealthcare today to learn more about the only plans of their kind with the aarp name. and set yourself and your future self up with an aarp medicare supplement plan from unitedhealthcare.

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>> 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. >> that was senator mitch mcconnell during trump's second impeachment, explaining the mcconnell would not vote to convict trump, but the trump was still liable on the american court system. today senator mcconnell announced he is stepping down as republican leader, just hours before the supreme court, that he helped compose, announced it would delay justice in trump's election interference trial. joining me now, michelle goldberg, opinion columnist for the new york times. michelle, thank you for being here. it kind of feels like

mcconnell's leaving the scene of a car accident that he helped create. >> that he caused. >> yeah, that he caused. is that fair? >> yes. i think that the only thing, the only kind of maybe sliver of a grim irony is that he has laid the foundation for the destruction of the party that he so deeply loved. so he has enabled, he makes no secret of his disdain for donald trump, even though i would imagine he will endorse him and bend the knee like everyone else does. but you saw after january 6th that he was clearly angry. he wasn't angry enough to take the step and show the leadership that would put an end to donald trump. but he thought somebody else would do it for him. and the reason, one reason, that we are unlikely to see any sort of serious criminal accountability before the election is because of the very

supreme court that mitch mcconnell used these really devious norm breaking tricks to reshape. >> his influence in shaping this court cannot be underestimated. not only does he hijack merrick garland's nomination to get one of trump's picks in the court a conservative, he also ensures that evangelicals and conservatives who are skeptical of donald trump in 2016 every's and come out to vote for him, which is dangling an empty supreme court seat to the american public and saying whoever wins gets to have. this that was hugely influential in donald trump's win, i think. >> and also was able to pack all of these lower courts. and so we have these increasingly bananas decisions from, for example, our friend michael kaz merrick in texas. he has reshaped our court system in this country in a way that kind of all avenues towards both accountability for donald trump and justice for

people who have been oppressed by the various republican policies or just being systematically shut down. >> i also, to go to the earlier point about how he has abided trump, we will not stop playing that sound of him saying presidents are not immune from prosecution, but we're not gonna do it here in the senate. it is choices like that that have led us to this moment, where donald trump, it's an open question whether he will ever be held accountable for his actions on january 6th. and the inability of mcconnell to understand sort of the harvest he was suing, both during his time, before january six and thereafter, was just appalling. >> mitch mcconnell is also an old-fashioned cold war republican who has now or the complete capitulation of his party to russia and vladimir putin and has been unable to engineer even something that you would think would be as

bipartisan as aid to ukraine when it's running out of ammunition. so he has just left such a path of destruction in his wake. not just of his him nominees but of his own ostensible values. >> there was some reporting that the straw that broke the camel's back, or one of the catalyst for this announced retirement from readership is, that he really wants to press on ukraine aid. to that i say, how is it that retirement has to be a precondition for republicans to -- ? >> it's also the opposite. if you really want to press for ukraine aid, that's actually a position in which to do it. >> i think the open question is, there has also been a lot of back and forth in terms of reporting and general scuttlebutt in the upper chain chamber, about whether he's going to actually endorsed donald trump. it's amazing to me that a man who so clearly recognizes the destruction of his party can be entertaining the notion of elevating the distract or back to office. >> he's 86