there. our own lester holt reflects on the symbolism of the francis scott key bridge in baltimore. watch this. >> back now from baltimore, the francis scott key bridge was built where the famed poet watched in horror as the british fleet fired on fort mchenry in the battle of baltimore in 1814. after all of it, the infant nation's flag was famously still there. tonight, we can't help but think of the star-spangled banner when you imagine those moments of heroism earlier today. the acts that saved lives and the rescuers searching for survivors in dawn's early light. now, the national anthem, speaks to the resiliency of this community and the flag that unites us all. >> well said, my friend.

we are thinking of everyone affected by this tragedy in baltimore tonight. on that note, i wish you all a very good night. from all of our colleagues across the networks at nbc news, thanks for staying up late. i'll see you again tomorrow. t. thanks for joining me this hour, in 1993, time magazine called it the pill that changes everything. the new abortion pill was part of a true for medication abortion, and it changed the american healthcare landscape and the landscape across the globe, the people in china, the united kingdoms, sweden, france where the drug it already been improved. had the ability to end pregnancies without undergoing surgery and even in some cases from inside the four walls of their own homes. according to time, ru486 made abortion a truly personal and

private choice. but it also opened a new frontier of antiabortion backlash. as soon as the drug was first developed and approved in france in the 1980s, it sparks protests. facing intense pressure from the catholic church, the company behind the bill decided to temporarily pull it from the market. in the u.s., the pill was considered a banned substance. federal research was forbidden during the reagan and bush years. finally, in september of 2000, after four years and three rounds of fda reviews during the clinton administration, ru486 was approved in the u.s. but, the war had just begun. in other news this morning, abortion opponents say they're outraged over the government's decision thursday approving the use of the abortion pill ru486 in this country. abortion-rights supporters call it a victory over medical mccarthyism. it's a drug that fundamentally changes the way a woman can end

the pregnancy. nbc hilary lane reports. >> reporter: no bigger than aspirin, mifepristone, better known as ru486, may be the most controversial drug the fda ever has approved. >> medical advances should go through a rigorous scientific process, but they shouldn't have to go through the kind of political process that mifepristone has had to deal with. >> protesters lined the streets across the country for months in the years 2000 and 2001, calling for the fda to rescind its approval. these were relatively small groups of protesters, but they were loud, and they were persistent. today, nearly 24 years later, the protesters were back. this time in front of the supreme court where their legal advocates were inside petitioning the highest court in the land to restrict access to ru486 , now known as mifepristone. led by aaron holly, whose

husband is republican senator josh hawley, today a group of conservative christian lawyers calling themselves alliance defending freedom the courts conservative justices to ban the use of mifepristone after seven weeks of pregnancy and to revoke the fda's 2021 decision to allow mifepristone to be mailed after a telehealth appointment. holly and her group are some of the same lawyers who helped argue the dobbs case, the one that overturned roe v. wade, and that is no coincidence. there is a reason why the group behind dobbs is now targeting mifepristone. that's because, despite the patchwork of states that band abortion after dobbs in 2022, the number of abortions in the u.s. actually increased the following year in 2023, according to data. the reason for that is largely telehealth. it has allowed allowed women who live in states where abortion has been banned to still access abortion medication through the mail.

pills were used in two thirds of abortions last year when we saw that increase. the antiabortion movement knows this and does not like this, and so they want to do everything they can to stop it. which is why they are now targeting mifepristone, and targeting telehealth appointments, and targeting the mailing of pills. and they are hoping that this supreme court, the one that overturned and invited more legal challenges to all sorts of established freedoms, they are hoping that this supreme court will help them do it. today, ms. hawley tried to convince the justices that mifepristone, which, by the way, is safer than both tylenol and viagra, that it is somehow dangerous for women. and that its use causes emotional harm to emergency room doctors who might someday, hypothetically, have to treat a woman who took mifepristone for a medication abortion. nearly 650,000 women take

mifepristone every single year. it's no surprise that respondents have experienced an increase in emergency room visits and indeed, treated women suffering from abortion drug harms, outsourcing of abortion drug harm to respondent doctors forces them to choose between helping a woman with a life-threatening condition, and violating their conscience. when they are called on to that down to the operating room to treat a woman suffering from abortion drug harm, that is diametrically opposed to why they enter the medical profession. it comes along with emotional harm. >> but the justices today, even conservatives like neil gorsuch and clarence thomas, even then, seemed more than a little skeptical of the group of doctors hawley represents, which includes physicians and dentists. they seemed less than convinced that these seven doctors have anything more than a really long shot risk of treating a

patient with a very rare complication from mifepristone, and that's in part because 6 million patients have taken mifepristone since the year 2000, and the risk of fatal adverse effects is 0.0027%. it's a really, really small chance anyone has severe complications from taking this drug. and even more to the point, doctors who have conscience objections to treating patients with mifepristone complications are allowed under federal law to refuse to treat those patients. all of that notwithstanding, justice kagan asked ms. hawley for one example of a doctor with a conscience objection was forced to treat one of these patients. she essentially begged hawley for something , anything, that would give her plaintiffs legal reason to file this lawsuit in the first place, something known as standing.

>> you need a person. you need a person to be able to come in and meet the courts regular standing requirements. so, you agree with that, yes? >> that's correct, your honor. >> so who is your person? >> there is no person. justice ketanji brown jackson, for her part, was not having any of this. she suggested that the remedy here with getting rid of mifepristone for everyone was ridiculously broad, especially given the highly unlikely and as yet totally hypothetical harm that could be done to this group of seven physicians and dentists. >> counsel, can i ask you, about the remedy, and sort of the way that i was talking with the sg. i mean, it makes perfect sense for the individual doctors to seek an exemption, but as i understand it, they already have that. and so what they're asking for, here, is that in order to prevent them from possibly ever having to do these kinds of procedures, everyone else

should be prevented from getting access to this medication. so, why isn't that plainly overbroad scope of the remedy the end of this case? >> from that question, we finally, finally got the central argument as to why national restrictions must be imposed to shield the seven doctors. >> these are emergency situations. respondent doctors don't necessarily know until they scrub into that operating room whether this may or may not be abortion drug harm. because these are emergency situations, they, they can't waste precious moments scrubbing income is coming out. >> no no no, i'm saying, assuming we have a world in which they can actually lodge the objections that you say that they have, my question is, isn't that enough to remedy their issue? do we have to also entertain your argument that no one else in the world can have this drug or no one else in america

should have this drug in order to protect your clients? be mexican, your honor, it's not possible given the emergency nature of these situations. >> let me interrupt there, i'm sorry. >> that was a real argument before the supreme court today. that mifepristone has to be banned for everyone after seven weeks of pregnancy because emergency room doctors don't have time to wash their hands repeatedly. we will have to wait until june to know what the court thinks of that. joining me now, author and writer of abortion every day, kerry and baker, smith college professor peter beating and author of a forthcoming book history and politics of abortion pills in the united states, a timely read, and dahlia, senior editor and host of the great amicus podcast, there are no better people to be talking to in this crisis moment. jessica. scrubbing in and scrubbing out. it's just too much for doctors,

therefore, no mifepristone for anybody. i was, i found it appalling, but also shocking, if you think that can be possible. >> i almost didn't find it shocking because the group of doctors that they brought for the with this case are such an egregious radical group of antiabortion extremists. this is very much who they are. they don't care about patients, they don't care about women's health. this is a group, one of the doctors that they have involved in this case, this is a group that wants doctors to be forced to give women with life- threatening pregnancies c- sections instead of abortions. that's how radical they are. and i don't want that to get lost in this conversation. these doctors, they're not run- of-the-mill. this is not one good-faith side of the political debate. >> i wonder, when you listened to the skepticism from the part of some conservative justices, do you feel like this case, and i'm going to limit it to this case because we'll talk about the broader landscape for reproductive freedom and the

second, but do you feel like josh hawley, erin hawley, i shouldn't say josh hawley, erin hawley's husband, that erin hawley is making the case that goes anywhere with this court? >> it didn't sound like it. it sounded like the court was prepared to dismiss the case on standing. the standing is so weak, but not just the standing. the facts are weak, the science, the law is weak. this case is weak across the board, it's absurd that it's even before the supreme court. mifepristone, as you said, is so safe, safer than tylenol, it should be over the counter. it's been highly restricted to because they antiabortion movement has been pushing from the very beginning to restrict access, to prevent people from being able to access the drug. so, i'm hoping that the court will dismiss it, but the antiabortion movement will not give up. they will come back. the project 2025 has promised that if a republican president gets into office that he will direct the fda to pull mifepristone from the market.

or at least, restrict telemedicine abortion, which has been a key way that more people have asked us abortion. they're not going to give up even if the court does dismiss this case. >> dahlia, why did the court take this case up? is this damage control post dobbs? what was the point of this? was it to give clarence thomas which is absurd manner of any manner of social issues? >> not exactly. the court has a structural problem. the structural problem is that anybody who wanted to file this case could go down to amarillo texas where judge matthew is, it's like putting your quarter in the candy bar making. the only judge you're going to get in amarillo was judge kaczmarek, and then they knew that after getting him, he would do something incredibly dopey like file a nationwide injunction, making it impossible for anyone in the country to get this drug. so we have a judge shopping

problem in this country that i should note, the courts are trying to address now, but for the moment, the court has the problem of one rope judge, a rogue fifth circuit that last huge chunks of his irrational, indefensible logic, and the court had no choice but to take this case. i think as long as we have judges that are way, way to the fringes, judges who make samuel alito and clarence thomas look like centrist moderates, like they did today, those cases are going to rock it up to the court and the court is going to be embarrassed and they were embarrassed today. and they will have to take them and batted them away. that's a problem with judge shopping, it's a problem with fake facts, and as kerry said, bad science. that somehow makes it into the courts lap, and the court has to muck out the stall. >> i want to get back to kaczmarek in the second, but, we don't know what the court is going to do, they sounded

skeptical and before we get to the dismissal of this case being gobbledygook nonsense, there is a very real impact that all of this has when we talk about re-regulating mifepristone. especially when we're talking about women in states where abortion has been banned. women across the country, people who are pregnant across the country will be affected, but it is acute, it is a real, real crisis for these women, in states where they can have access to basic reproductive choices. >> there's a reason that we saw the use of abortion medication go up so drastically from 2020. it was 53% of abortions in 2020, now it's 63%. a lot of that is accounted for women in anti-choice states were getting that medication shipped to them. if they don't have that choice, and they don't have the ability to leave the state, they're trapped, they're hostages in the state that will not let them get basic healthcare. >> i do think as we talk about what happens to these women,

regardless of, as the supreme court takes this up, dahlia points out and you point out, rightly, that the fight is not beginning to be over. kaczmarek has suggested he might take this case, re-rule on this same issue, in a different kind of context, and there was talk today about the comstock act, which is a zombie law, and anti-pornography law that restricts the mailing of abortion, it's from the 19th century, but that shouldn't stop the republican party. can you talk more about the way in which you think this court may use the comstock act in the future if this case doesn't work as well? >> so the comstock law inhibited mailing, as you say, and what they antiabortion movement is doing is trying to revive that law 150 more years later, to try to ban mailing mifepristone, and it wouldn't only impact mifepristone, it

would impact other medication, the second medication you take, and you can use it's widely available, it can eventually be banned from mailing for anybody. instruments used in abortion, designed for procedural abortion could also be banned, it's a really extreme approach that they're taking that could limit access to abortion not only for people in states that ban it but states like new york, massachusetts, california, it would make abortion, they are trying to ban abortion nationwide by using this backdoor. i've also got to say they could also use that law to ban the shipping of emergency contraception, which they say is abortion. alliance defending freedom, the ceo and president give an interview to politico a couple of days ago where she admitted that they believe emergency contraception is abortion. so once you have these groups redefining what abortion is,

and you have a law that says you can't mail abortion medication, that could include emergency contraception. they can use this so broadly, and it's so important that we're thinking about all of those impacts. >> they're coming after contraception as well as abortion. >> when you say life begins at conception you enter into a whole host of interesting moral quandary's. i will say to your point, jessica, jonathan mitchell, who has been the architect of a lot of this in legal circles have said, we don't need a judgment from the court, we have the comstock law on the books. we're done. we just need a republican president in office. those are the stakes. the indispensable resource on all things abortion related, reproductive freedom, thank you for your time. carrie and dahlia, stick with us, we have to talk more about this court, especially the legal ramification of today's arguments. also ahead tonight, journalist paula ramos has a special report for us, for us, this show, from across the southern border where there has been a network of underground

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determine the future of medication abortion and also the future of drug approval in this country. the fda, after all, is the federal regulatory agency that approves new drugs in the united states, and this case calls into question whether the courts should believe the fda when it says a drug is safe. justice alito skepticism tells us a lot about the courts conservatives, and it suggests that they may be thinking about something much bigger than even abortion. namely, whether conservatives are going after the regulatory state on whole. right now, right-wing judicial activists have brought a series of cases that threaten to up and 40 years of supreme court precedent, and hobble the federal government's basic ability to enforce laws. the lawsuits are trying to limit regulators ability to enforce everything from laws against insider-trading to laws that protect the food we eat, and the air we breathe. back with me are carrie baker and dahlia. dahlia, let me talk to you, this case is about mifepristone, but it really is

about whether we believe the fda as alito says. is infallible? do you think this court is prepared to get into it with big pharma? >> that's the question. it was very clear from justice alito's questions today not only that he wants to second- guess the fda, but he really wants to stake a claim that the maker of these pharmaceuticals is moneygrubbing and greedy and doesn't want to know how dangerous their product is, so they won't do the studies. there's a real sly dig over and over again at big pharma, but big pharma is so profoundly arrayed against judge kaczmarek's crazy order because you can't test drugs, you can't create drugs, you can't do anything if one person objecting in south dakota can get the entire medication

pulled. this is, in some sense, an easy case for a big business court that really wants big pharma to win, but i think under your question is this harder question which is, this entire term has been a deregulatory juggernaut where the court keeps usurping, to itself, the power to decide what clean air looks like and decide how bureaus work, and to decide how fishermen have to enforce fishing rules, and this is of a piece with that. the stripping contempt for federal regulation, and the most interesting moment, i thought, after justice alito said that question about, are they infallible? justice ketanji brown jackson came back very quickly with, are we best suited to make deep dives on science and scientific regulation? this is the pattern that we see in this court.

they're here to tell us what the clean water act looks like, now. >> i totally agree with you, that moment where it's like, wait, does sam alito know more about ulcer medications than the fda? you know the history of this, this drug has been regulated more than most drugs on the market, is that fair to say? >> absolutely, is heavily restricted, the fda has faced all of their decisions on voluminous science, the idea that judges who have no medical background, no research background are better at assessing the science than the experts at the fda is ridiculous. but that's the role they're trying to take for themselves. >> dahlia, they're looking at the chevron doctrine which is the foundational decision that undergirds a lot of regulatory power in the united states. it allows the federal government to do its thing, if you will. can you talk, can you talk a little bit about what you expect haitians are for the ruling in that case?

it has massive effects on american life rathole, much more than just one single reproductive freedom issue. >> the chevron doctrine is a simple rule that says we defer to agency's own interpretations of how their laws work. we don't second-guess the experts and the scientists, and the accumulated years of expertise, because we're a bunch of judges in robes, and as carrie just said, we don't know a lot of stuff. and as you said, that is on the chopping block this year. in some sense, it comes hand-in- hand with the major questions doctrine, another doctrine that isn't a doctrine and has no roots in anything shallower than sand, and it's another rule that the court has given itself that says, if something is a big deal, for instance, president biden's loan forgiveness plan last year, then we get to decide on that,

too. so we're seeing the court with his other lack of humidity go from agency to agency and pick off, as you said, the notion that agencies can enforce their own rules in ways that are reasonable, and even, in some cases, to say, that's just too big a deal, so, it's a way of both knee capping the federal government, how government works, and also of giving to the justices almost unbounded authority to decide how we live. >> leonard leo, who is in many ways the architect of this conservative court, says, the hard left because that's how basically they get there social safety net established, and that is who this court is going after. dahlia litwin and carrie baker, thank you both so much for your time and expertise, really appreciate it. coming up next, the number

of women using abortion pills to end pregnancies has surged since the dobbs decision in 2022. we have a special report from mexico city where underground networks are helping women in states with bands get the reproductive care that they need elsewhere. that's next. an alternative to pills, voltaren is a clinically proven arthritis pain relief gel, which penetrates deep to target the source of pain with nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory medicine directly at the source. voltaren, the joy of movement. [music playing] tiffany: my daughter is mila. she is 19 months old. she is a little ray of sunshine. one of the happiest babies you'll probably ever meet.

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according to the institute in 2023 more than 60% of all abortions in the u.s. healthcare system were done using abortion medication. in reality, that number could be much, much higher. a new report from the journal of the american medical association shows that most women who chose to self manage their abortions in the six- month period after the supreme court overturned roe v. wade obtained their abortion pills outside of the formal healthcare system. particularly, from the networks of volunteers that quickly mobilized and expanded after the 2022 decision overturning. some of these networks are here in the u.s., but others are in places like mexico, where networks are packing and shipping abortion medications, sometimes for free, two women in america who are trying to circumvent their states harsh abortion bans. in the process, these networks are also increasingly witnessing a secondary reality,

an alarming rise in sexual violence against migrants on the mexico side of the border, one that is leading to unwanted pregnancies here in a post-roe america. this is a special report from msnbc contribute are paula ramos. >> we're about to talk to a young asylum seeker who was sexually assaulted on the mexican border town, and then found out she was pregnant as soon as she stepped into texas. the only reason she agreed to talk to us today is because we will not be disclosing her identity, or where we are right now. when valentina left el salvador for the united states, many of her friends cautioned her against it. they knew about the harrowing experiences of women heading north. [ speaking in a global language ] >> at one point after entering texas did you find out you were pregnant? >> [ speaking in a global

language ] ] >> reporter: valentina found herself in texas, pregnant, alone, planning and abortion. >> were you aware of the strict abortion laws that are enforced in texas? >> [ speaking in a global language ] >> and what did you learn? >> [ speaking in a global language ] >> were you looking for clinical help? what did you learn? >> [ speaking in a global language ] >> the pills valentina are referring to are a combination

of mifepristone and misoprostol, the fda approved regimen for termination of pregnancy, more than 60% of all abortions performed in the united states are done using these pills. but since the supreme court overturned roe v. wade in 2022, 14 republican read led states including texas have banned the medication. >> lil' >> valentina found a group that was able to ship the bills to a friends house in a nearby state. at 14 weeks pregnant she found herself packing once more. this time, to carry out a self managed abortion. weeks after she returned to texas, valentina managed to obtain more packs of misoprostol, one of the abortion pills she used. inspired by her own struggle, she decided to break the law to help women in similar situations. >> were you aware that what you were doing was illegal? >> [ speaking in a global

language ] >> do you have any left right now? >> [ speaking in a global language ] >> are you still thinking about helping other women? >> [ speaking in a global language ] >> reporter: valentina says she's no longer providing abortion pills, but on the other side of the border, activists are working day and night to fill the void. >> [ speaking in a global

language ] >> this is evelyn, a young doctor from mexico city who is part of an international network helping women obtain both mifepristone and misoprostol. since the overturn of roe v. wade in 2022, much of that help is being routed to texas. she asked for her identity to be concealed in order to protect the operation. >> reporter: approximately how big is this network? how many people are part of it? >> [ speaking in a global language ] >> and who are they mostly? where are they contacting you from? >> [ speaking in a global language ] >> how many packs are you sending each week? >> [ speaking in a global

language ] >> how do you hide these pills? how do you make sure no one knows what your mailing? >> [ speaking in a global language ] >> many people would ask, what's in it for you? you're not doing it for economic reasons. why do you do it? >> [ speaking in a global language ] >> back in texas, valentina feels the same way. >> you risk your life and your status. why? >> lil'

>> msnbc contributor file that special report from south of the border and we will hear more from her tomorrow. first, coming up, where there is tragedy, there is conspiracy. how the right wing is talking about the baltimore bridge collapse, right after the break. break. add olay retinol24 to your nighttime skincare routine. it combines hydrating moisturizers with powerful retinoids to renew millions of surface skin cells while you sleep. plus, it hydrates better than a $100 retinol cream. wake up to smoother, younger-looking skin with olay retinol24. learn more at olay.com this has been medifacts for olay. meet the traveling trio. the thrill seeker. the soul searcher. and - ahoy! it's the explorer! each helping to protect their money with chase. woah, a lost card isn't keeping this thrill seeker down. lost her card, not the vibe. the soul searcher, is finding his identity, and helping to protect it. hey!

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collapsed late last night, tonight, that mission switched from a rescue mission to a recovery effort, as all six individuals are now presumed dead. thanks to a live stream of the bridge and police dispatch audio, we now know just how close this bridge collapse came to being an even bigger disaster. this is the livestream of the bridge last night, about two minutes before it collapsed. you can see there is a steady flow of cars going over the bridge. this happened moments later. >> from the south side, when you guys on the north side, hold all traffic on the key bridge. there's a sick ship approaching that just lost their steering, we've got to stop all traffic. >> i'm in route to the south side. >> i'm holding traffic now, i was driving but we stopped prior to the bridge, so i'll have all elderly traffic stopped. >> in less than 20 seconds, the

police had stopped the flow of traffic on the bridge, and about 30 seconds after they did that, the bridge collapsed. >> 10 for, is there a crew working on the bridge right now? >> if we can stop traffic, just make sure no one on the bridge right now. i'm not sure if there's a crew out there, you might want to notify you of the foreman is, see if we can get them off the bridge temporarily. >> 10 for, was the other unit gets here i'll write up on the bridge. i have all inner loop traffic stopped at this time. >> what you get here, i'll go grab the workers on the key bridge, and then stop the elderly. >> this patch, the whole bridge just fell down. start, start, whoever, everybody. the whole bridge just collapsed. >> to the authorities confirmed that the six individuals they are still looking for the remains of were all members of the crew that was working on the bridge. they were reportedly fixing

potholes. authorities say there are no signs of foul play, they believe this was an accident. but, the right wing is already pushing conspiracy theories that this was a cyber attack that somehow the obama's were part of, or that the real cause here was diversity, equity, inclusion programs because the shipping company practiced inclusive hiring policies. despite the fact that there are still six individuals now presumed dead, whose bodies have yet to be recovered, individuals we now know were construction workers from el salvador, guatemala, honduras, and go, despite that, the right is desperate to use this tragedy to fan the flames of xenophobia. >> the ship involved in the collapse of the bridge is 948 feet long, called the "dali", a singaporean flag container, but of course you've been talking a lot about the potential for wrongdoing or potential for foul play, given the wide open

border. >> to my friends in the conservative media, sometimes it's okay to report on something bad that happened and not blame it on liberals or liberalism and/or brown people. this was an accident. this was a tragedy. treat it like one. we have one more story for you tonight. spoiler alert, independent presidential candidate robert f kennedy junior has just made a very big decision that could inject chaos into the presidential race this november. more on that , ahead. ahead. claritin clear? yeah. fast relief of your worst allergy symptoms, like nasal congestion. live claritin clear® everybody wants super straight, super white teeth. they want that hollywood white smile. new sensodyne clinical white provides 2 shades whiter teeth and 24/7 sensitivity protection. i think it's a great product. it's going to help a lot of patients.

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entrepreneur, and she is the ex- wife of google cofounder sergei brent. now, shanahan has never held office, but she has plenty of money. she donated $4 million to kennedy's superpac to help pay for his very questionable super bowl ad. in addition to the cash prize here, kennedy is selecting now, because many states require independent candidates to pick a runs mate before they can apply for ballot access. the biden campaign has a team in place to fight his candidacy. joining me now from oakland is michelle goldberg who covered today's campaign announcement. michelle, thank you for dialing in from the west coast. my first question is how was the speech? >> her speech? so, her speech, first of all, she is obviously not a practiced politician and it really shows.

i think there is a bit of bafflement not necessarily among political professionals who chose her so she could self- fund their ballot access campaign. but i think among quite a few kennedy supporters there were people in the crowd excite about this pick. but the rally had been going on for i think a couple of hours. her speech was a little meandering. and you can see the auditorium kind of emptying out. and so it was, there was a big difference between when she started and finished. >> nicole shanahan has supported democratic causes before. i believe she gave to the biden campaign in 2020. there is a narrative that kennedy's candidacy hurts biden more than trump. can you talk a little bit about who was in the audience today?

>> so i know that's the narrative and that may well be true. i don't think we know. when i have spoken to pollsters and people at the dnc, kind of everybody agrees that kennedy is somewhat of a wild card. i will say that coming to oakland which is obviously in the middle of a very progressive part of the country, i think i expected to meet more disaffected democrats. instead, what i met, i met some very far left people you know, one guy who had an ask me about 9/11 button on who described himself as a socialist. a lot of them voted for trump in 2020 or said that if kennedy wasn't on the ballot, they would vote for him in 2024. it was the more right leaning than left leaning crowds for sure. >> the polling on quinnipiac shows that in a three way

matchup, biden, 38, trump, 36, and kennedy, 22%. how was he as a candidate on the stump? >> i would say on the one hand, he certainly speaks to, he mixes kind of grains of truth or genuine concerns. speaks to people who genuinely feel somewhat despairing about the level of division and rank order in politics and wish we could go gabbing to a time of more unity and inspiration. but he weaves that with a lot of conspiracy theories and misinformation and i think ultimately there is obviously kind of democrats who might be attracted to him because of the kennedy mystique and the kennedy name. but you know, i think when he is talking about things like border security and social

media sensorship. lockdowns, it is not really democrats he is appealing to. >> it is a matter of moments before the entire kennedy clan is on the campaign trail with joe biden. so we'll see how that work out for him. michelle, my friend, opinion columnist for the new york times heading up our oakland bureau. thank you for making the time tonight. before we go, have an update on the story many of you have been following. nbc news has dropped ronna mcdaniel as a contributor. it is due in no small part to the efforts here in front of the camera and behind it to make clear that her hiring was a very serious mistake. a lot of my colleagues have weighed in on this. election denialists do not belong in the payroll of a news

organization. people who undermine democracy should not work at an institution that seek to preserve it. the man the boss of all of us, nbc universal chairman confirmed she would not be an nbc news contributor either. no organization he says can succeed in less it is cohesive and aligned. it is important to speak up when we feel like the right thing was done. companies make mistakes. sometimes very big ones. sometimes very publicly. what matters in the end is how they correct them and from what we see, looks like our company listened to us, to you, and did

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