county, detroit, and also in ann arbor. right now, i'd say, you know, he needs to shore up the numbers. maybe this will help. >> social media, particularly tiktok, seems to be filled with anti-biden rhetoric, which may be impacting young voters. certainly, you're right, trump is offering them nothing. there is also a chance polls may be broken yet again this cycle. we shall see. >> exactly. >> eugene robinson, terrific analysis. we appreciate you joining us this morning. thanks to all of of you for getting up "way too early" on this monday morning. "morning joe" starts right now. in a new interview, donald trump claimed president biden was high on cocaine during the state of the union. saying he was all jacked up at the beginning. by the end, he was fading fast. huh, it almost sounds like donald trump knows exactly what it feels like to be on cocaine. you know, like at the beginning,

you've got a lot of energy. ♪♪ but then, by the end, you're fading fast. >> just recently heard that saudi arabia and russia will we be -- oh. >> it's too good. there's so much. good morning. welcome to "morning joe." >> projection or confession. >> monday, april 8th. speaking of donald trump, he spent the weekend trying to cut into president biden's large lead in campaign funding. we'll tell you about his fundraising dinner with republican megadonors, how much he says he made, and how the biden campaign responded. also, congress returns to capitol hill today, but the increasingly chaotic atmosphere there has several house republicans choosing to leave washington rather than serve another term. we'll tell you what that means. plus, an undefeated season ends up in a championship for

the south carolina women's basketball team. we'll show you how they knocked off the great caitlin clark iow. incredible game. also today, the long-awaited solar eclipse will move across america this afternoon. safety warning, if you plan on looking at the eclipse, please wear protective glasses. don't do this. >> no. >> just fyi. with us, we have the host of "way too early," white house bureau chief at politico, jonathan lemire. don't do that, jonathan. >> he did it last time. stared straight up at it. so pretty. >> u.s. national editor of "the financial times," ed luce is with us. columnist and associate editor of "the washington post," david ignatius. former supreme allied commander of nato, james stavridis is

here. chief international analyst for nbc news. author and nbc news presidential historian michael beschloss joins us. thank you, all, for being with us this monday morning. we begin with the israel military reducing the number of ground troops in southern gaza. officials made the announcement yesterday, saying the country is pulling the 98th commando division out of the area to, quote, recuperate and prepare for future operations. now, it's not clear if this is just a simple troop rotation, raising fears that the israeli military may be preparing to launch a ground offensive in rafah where more than a million people have sought refuge. the move comes as israel marks six months since the october 7th terrorist attack. yesterday, benjamin netanyahu praised the military's achievements in the war thus far and reiterated his call to release the more than 100

hostages in gaza, saying there will be no cease-fire until that happens. the war is now the longest involving israel since the 1980s, and some have been requesting whether netanyahu is dragging out the conflict to prevent the collapse of his right-wing coalition and extend his time in office. this as the war has caused ramifications beyond the gazan border. as "the new york times" notes, the war derailed efforts to normalize diplomatic relations between israel and saudi arabia, prompted protests, strained israel's international legitimacy, and threatened to evolve into a regional conflict. of course, there is the hostages and the families and the country of israel and others who are in agony, awaiting to learn their fate. >> the hostages held over six

months, it's unspeakable. unspeakable about how things have been badly mismanaged from netanyahu from the very beginning. how badly they were mismanaged when they had information this attack was coming and they didn't act on it, when they continued to fund hamas. netanyahu continued to fund hamas. you've had over 240 people that were kidnapped on october 7th. 123 releasereleased. four americans among those released, but six still in capt captivity. 30 hostages declared dead. david ignatius, i spoke all weekend with, as i know you did, with many people involved in this. in the conflict. there is frustration and anger

on the israeli side, saying we have to go do rafah and not let hamas survive. the political world is saying you can't kill 10,000 more civilians to achieve your military goal. here, we have this tough reality that we always talk about. two truths. one, i believe, and i think a lot of friends of israel believe, hamas must be destroyed. that said, 10,000, civilian deaths to do that and the onset of a famine to do that is just something that is not politically possible in the united states, across the region, across the globe. how does this play itself out over the next month? >> joe, we're going to be watching, i think, over the next week, i'd say strong possibility, maybe even likelihood, of a hostage deal which would obviously be a

joyous moment. think about the six-month anniversary of the war. think about how it began, the absolute horror of october 7. i think like you and mika, i had the painful experience of watching the go pro videos of that massacre as it happened. israelis will never forget those images. i won't either. but that's how it began, with this horrible attack that's still in the dreams and nightmares of israelis. we have to remember that. and then i watched from israel, from gaza, the confusion that is true up to this very day on the israeli side, about how this ends. what comes after? what will gaza be like in the future? it is something israelis oddly

never really gave systematic thought to. we had an announcement sunday by the idf, that they will be withdrawing all their major combat forces from gaza. they will have one brigade left where they once had four divisions. enormous force in gaza. they're down to a very few week. there are no signs, i'm told, that they're actually preparing for an assault on rafah. netanyahu keeps talking about it, but they haven't put the troops in place, certainly haven't put the provisions for civilians in place. there is now a surge that seems to be under way finally, finally in humanitarian assistance. there are over 330 trucks that went in yesterday, the highest number since the war began. i'm told that that number will grow this week. finally, we have some real pressure, at last, on qatar to insist hamas take part in this

cease-fire arrangement and begin to stabilize things. i'm told the message from president biden to the ruler of qatar last friday was, look, if hamas does not agree to these terms, hamas cannot have a place in your country. hamas has had refuge. that would be an important move. to sum it up, joe, this war has brought devastation and horror to everyone. i can't imagine that netanyahu will stay in power much longer. he is deeply unpopular in israel. it's a war that could lead to a breakthrough in a more stable region. today, what you see is devastation, enormous tragedy of war for civilians. >> admiral, you read just

military strategy. military history going back to the art of war thousands of years ago. the past six month, of course, started with hell for the israelis. but you can't help but look and think that hamas got exactly what they wanted. israelis coming in, killing civilians, get more than a black eye across the world, young americans turning against them. what do we do? i'm sure you agree hamas has to be destroyed as a fighting force. not to put words in your mouth, but you'd also agree that 10,000, 15,000 more gazans, civilians, can't die to achieve that means. how do you do it? >> militarily, let's start with,

in my view, the perhaps hopeful sign that david just mentioned, of the pulling out of massive troops. i'll add two other factors that went into the decision. certainly, the u.s. pressure is starring to have real effect here. number two, six months into a war, an army like israel's, which is based largely on reserves, they called up every reserve they had, understandably, immediately in october, those folks are the backbone of the israeli economy. they're the butchers, bakers, candlestick makers. they need to get back to running shops and cyber offices and the entire office and economy of israel. they've got to start putting people back to work. third and finally, if you look at this, the israeli forces have been in intense combat for four

months, and they're going to need a break. a rest and refit. it's a combination of those things. how i read into it, talking to my sources as you and others have been doing, the hostage deal is closing. good sign is the presence in cairo of our cia director, bill burns, arabic speaker, former ambassador to jordan, former ambassador to moscow, as well, a master diplomat as well as currently plugged in at the highest levels of all of these governments. i think we're moving toward that. a hostage deal, a cease-fire of some length, call it 45 days, then you can really flood the zone with humanitarian aid in that window, also the construction of the u.s. pier which unleashes a huge amount of aid moving in. the houthis are striking less in

the red sea. things are trending somewhat positively, but i'll close with a cautionary note, joe. hanging out there is the iranian response to the attack on their embassy, their consulate. i believe a justifiable one. iran certainly will respond in the next five, ten days, probably go after an israeli consulate. iran not looking to widen the war. if you look into the future, there is a narrow window here where we may be able to move toward some form of a cease-fire that could be built upon. >> so many caveats as it pertains to the hostages. we don't know the fate. we don't know how many are alive and what state they're in. the israeli military recovered the body of a man who was taken hostage during the october 7th attack. officials say 47-year-old

katsier was killed mid-january. it was believed he was held in gaza by palestinian islamic jihad. his body was found buried underground in khan yunis. a quarter of the residents in his kibbutz were killed or abducted. his father was killed while his mother was taken hostage. she was released in november as part of a brief cease-fire deal. as we said, over 240 hostages were taken by hamas and other attackers on october 7th. six months later, at least 134 remain missing. among those include an israeli-argentinian mother and her two very young sons. her youngest just 10 months old on october 7th. now, he's had his first birthday, as best we can imagine, in captivity, a time

when most babies are learning to stand, say their first words, take their first steps. also among the hostages, his 4-year-old brother. a 26-year-old woman who was abducted from the nova music festival has a mother with stage 4 brain cancer whose last wish is just to see her daughter one more time. i don't have a lot of time left in this world, her mother said. the oldest hostage, an 86-year-old iraqi born carpenter and father of 12, he likes the ice cream, and the public was asked to eat frozen treats in his honor. the desperation is beyond imaginable. >> ed luce, it's been six months. the protests, of course, risin to a fevered pitch for families wondering why this has dragged on for six months, and wondering

why netanyahu and the government's focus, according to these families of hostages, has been on getting their family members and their loved ones back. here we are six months later, and their frustration growing by the day at the government's policies or lack of policies focused on freeing the hostages. and the most recent when the families of the hostages gathered together over the weekend to commemorate the six-month hell they've been going through. not a single member of netanyahu's government attended that. the reason why is because, all along, the families have been shunned, ignored, sidelined, disrespected. netanyahu hasn't wanted a hostage deal. there have been many occasions he could have had a deal, but he hasn't wanted one because that would bring about an earlier

send to this war. as we all know very well, his only method of surviving in the job he's got is to prolong this war. so there is no constituency in israel more cynical and critical of israel's prime minister than the familieshostages. they know they haven't been a priority for netanyahu. signs now they might be becoming a priority. admiral stavridis points out that bill burns is very important in egypt, and the conversations with qatar very, very important. the reason why there might be a deal in the offing now to release the hostages is because the biden administration is finally putting real pressure on the netanyahu government. we see what pressure actually does do.

it opens the gates to more aid to the gaza strip. it produces the possible hostage deal. american pressure does work. we're seeing that happen now in real time. the hostages, that's the best thing we can hope for in the next few days, and it might well happen. >> let us pray that it does. jonathan, if you're a member of the hostage, if you're the family of hostage members, obviously, we've seen the frustration at the netanyahu government this weekend and over the past several weeks especially, and for good reason. people who watch this show know, it was benjamin netanyahu who allowed illicit funds to flow into the coffers of hamas so they could build their war machine they used to kill and rape and savage and kidnap

israelis. it was benjamin netanyahu's government who had the plans for october 7th a year beforehand. netanyahu and his government ignored warning after warning after warning that hamas was coming, the attack was coming. it was benjamin netanyahu's government, he sent the head of mossad to qatar three weeks before the attacks. qatar's leaders asked, do you want us to keep feeding money to hamas, keep building up hamas? netanyahu's government said, "yes, of course we do. of course we do." so he continued to prop up a terrorist organization, and he did, he propped up and funded by his actions a terrorist organization dedicated to killing jews, wiping israel off the face of the earth, and seizing hostages and now holding them for six months.

>> yeah, and as we hit the six-month mark, so many of these relatives of hostages are speaking out. over the weekend, we had a family here on "morning joe" at the end of last week. it is a visceral fury at prime minister netanyahu for allowing this to happen, the security failures, allowing it to happen in the first place, but also to not prioritize the return of hostages. there is this sense among those family members and, candidly, many in the biden administration, who believe netanyahu simply has not been interested in making a deal to get the hostages home because it'd mean the war ending and that'd mean his own grip on power could come loose. certainly, he was in real dire straits before october 7th and even more so now. michael beschloss, of course, the president and his advisors know there's a domestic political consequence for joe biden running for re-election. >> sure. >> well documented that many young and progressive voters are unhappy with his handling of the gaza war. i did some reporting over the weekend about how this was also just fear that his inability to control netanyahu is sort of

undermining one of his central arguments for re-election, this idea of competency, restoring america as a valued global statesman. netanyahu has been open defiance. talk about what you're seeing from netanyahu, if you'd like, this challenge posed to president joe biden right now. >> well, i think you've got it exactly right. you know, i'm sure that joe biden and his people do not look at this primarily through a domestic election political lens, but, you know, the democratic convention is going to be in chicago this summer. there was a pretty rocky democratic convention that came apart over a war in vietnam in 1968. the last thing they want to see is crowds outside the convention hall protesting a war still going on and a president that doesn't seem to have managed it. you go back to history. israel is there because of the holocaust. remember that. on the 7th of october, it was the worst attack on the jewish people since the holocaust. at the same time, since then,

tens of thousands of innocent civilians in gaza who did not need to die, and a prime minister who stayed on against most expectations in israel after his own failures. what does that mean? historically, go back to history. almost every single israeli conflict, the americans have been strong allies of israel in most cases, but also strong critics. your critic is your friend. 1956 suez. 1967 the six-day war. 1973, the yom kippur war. late 1970s, mika's dad, dr. brzezinski, and jimmy carter brilliantly, both encouraged and, you know, applied very strict pressure on the israelis to say, "we think you need a camp david peace treaty that will lead to peace in the middle east." without the american influence, that peace, which the israelis

benefitted from for over 40 years, never would have happened. i think what you're seeing is a president who is acting in the way that americans have, american presidents in the context of past history, and at the same time knows you can't get into a fall election where something like this is so much in play and international actors know that they can mess around with the american campaign by causing trouble. >> yeah, you know, it is interesting. it is almost like we wrote notes for each other. >> he has that list. >> the suez, the camp david and -- >> great minds think alike. >> bush 41 and the growing settlements. >> absolutely. >> each one of these cases, american president said, "we love you. we support you. we're not going to let you take these actions that are going to

undermine our interests and, long term, your interest in the middle east." >> right. >> on that front, david, we have to face the fact that we are now dealing with a prime minister and many leaders that have turned their back on a two-state solution. now, i've said on this show since october 7th, i do not expect the israeli people right now to be clamoring for a two-state solution with palestinians. i completely understand why they'd not want to talk about it, discuss it, even imagine it. the fact is, leaders have to be looking down the road. i wish netanyahu and the cabinet read your column after october 7th, where you were talking about the day after the war. we all know looking over the horizon, despite the feelings of the israeli people right now, and, again, justified feelings,

a time will come where we have to have the two-state solution. yet, we have radicals in the israeli government, radicals on the palestinian side who once supported the two-state solution, who now don't ven talk about it. how do we get from where we are today, where it seems implausible, to where we need to be, where a two-state solution is inevitable? >> joe, we get there by hard, careful work, led by the united states you're right, today, the strong majority of israelis would reject the idea of a palestinian state. they see the palestinians as enemies. that's why the u.s. has to insist on a new palestinian authority that gains the trust of, first, palestinians, who

think the p.a. has been corrupt and incompetent, and, more fundamentally, as israelis, who see this as a possible partner for living side by side. it is going to take a while. that's why people, i think, sensibly talk about the two-state solution as a process or a horizon. that is the way secretary of state blinken talks about it often when he goes to saudi arabia. as the rise of dawn, we'll have relations between saudi arabia and israel. that's a big deal. that's a tangible way to see we're moving into an area of greater security, as the p.a. gets more confident, saudi arabia has our back, not our throat, and the world begins, finally, to look more severe for israel. just one more point that we do need to touch on. even as gaza is heading toward a much lower level of conflict, it

appears, the conflict in the north remains extremely tense. 80,000, 100,000 israelis can't go home because of the danger of rocket fire from hezbollah. there is a feeling, i hear from my contacts in the idf, this has to be resolved maybe by military force. the hezbollah fighters have to be pushed back. when this gaza conflict ends, that doesn't mean the story, this horrific story, is over. what happens in the north has to be resolved. still ahead on "morning joe," a top republican lawmaker is warning that russian propaganda is being repeated on the house floor. we'll show you those new, concerning remarks. plus, donald trump panders to the ultra wealthy, promising to keep their taxes low if he is elected in november.

how the biden campaign is responding to that. and president biden heads to battleground wisconsin today. we'll take a look at the administration's new effort to win over a key voting block ahead of november. you're watching "morning joe." as the sun comes up over new york city. >> chopper 4, thank you. look at that, the sun is rising. >> it's a beauty. we'll be right back. hello, ghostbusters. it's doug. we help people customize and save hundreds on car insurance with liberty mutual. we got a bit of a situation. [ metal groans] sure, i can hold. ♪ liberty liberty liberty liberty ♪ in theaters now. hey! asthma's got you going through it? grab nucala for fewer asthma attacks. nucala is a once-monthly add-on injection for severe eosinophilic asthma.

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country. without a republican majority, we have no hope at that. >> that was house speaker mike johnson acknowledging the challenge his party faces as republican dysfunction on capitol hill continues to drive a wave of house retirements. so far, at least 21 house republicans have decided to leave their jobs this year, a trend that shows signs of a broader drop in morale within the gop. why is this happening? some cite difficulties in passing legislation. the party's inability to govern and growing fears of maintaining the majority in november. after wisconsin congressman mike gallagher resigns next friday, republicans will control 217 house seats to the democrats' 213, meaning republicans can only afford to lose one vote when all the members are present. out of the 21 leaving, some have included powerful committee chairs and rising stars inside

the party. at least five are seeking higher office, while others plan to spend more time with the family or pursue other opportunities away from capitol hill. it's not just members of congress heading for the exits, it's their staffers, as well. in a new report, the congressional management foundation found that the toxic rhetoric and partisanship have made half of the senior staff on the hill consider leaving public service. survey sums up the feeling in washington with just three words. quote, congress is broken. the non-profit whose stated goal is to improve lawmaker effectiveness also found that the desire to head to the doors is higher among democratic staff members but also almost six in ten republican staffers said they thought about leaving because of their own party's actions. in many ways, it feels the wheels are falling off the bus

because of this extreme partisanship and in terms of problems getting things done, the perfect example is the border deal. the bipartisan border deal. >> you look at the data, michael beschloss. the data shows this is the least effective congress in a generation. they're not getting things done. >> easily. >> it is calculated, not to get things done. they have people in their caucus, unlike a lot of the committee chairman and chairwomen, but you have people in the caucus interested in gestures. they're interested in posting on tiktok what they're doing instead of working. >> sure. >> you know, i was -- i was, by almost all ratings, one of the most conservative members of congress when i was there. every time i walked spot house floor, i took a left turn and went and sat with democrats. >> right. >> i gained democratic friends that i still have.

we got things done. just talk about how radically things have changed, especially over the last five, six years. they've been getting worse. i mean, my friends there have told me they've been getting worse for some time. but talk about how -- >> i think this is what trump wants. >> -- monumentally bad they've gotten now that if a republican talks to a democrat, donald trump is going to tweet at them and, you know, say they're communists. >> right. and they're all terrified. i do not want to put you on the spot this morning, but i have to tell you, joe, the number of times i have watched this program and wondered if, under current conditions in congress, if a young, idealistic joe scarborough would have wanted to run for congress in 1994 to be in the midst of all this. i don't want -- >> no. >> -- an answer. i'm just telling you that question has been on my mind. it is out of keeping with what

james madison and the founders wanted. they wanted everyone to duke it out. this wasn't the british monarchy. they thought the best policy would come out of big policy fights. at the same time, they expected negotiation, compromise, even friendship, just as you demonstrated among members of the house and senate who are from different parties. it doesn't happen. i cannot help but think that donald trump and the people around him think that they will benefit if the entire system looks broken. if you get a border deal, that may suggest that congress works. if you block one and it doesn't happen and the border problem gets worse, it allows trump to say, you know, i'm running for strong leadership in a system that is not working. you have to think there is a candidate here. >> admiral stavridis, committee chair mike turner said he's heard some of his colleagues repeat russian propaganda on the house floor. let's take a look at his

remarks. >> we see directly coming from russia the attempts to mask communications that are anti-ukraine and pro-russia messages, some of which we hear being uttered on the house floor. members of congress today still incorrectly say that this conflict between russia and ukraine is over nato, which, of course, it is not. vladimir putin having made it very clear, publicly and to his own population, that his view is that this is a conflict of a much broader claim of russia to eastern europe. including claiming all of ukraine territory as russia's. now, to the extent that this propaganda takes hold, it makes it more difficult for us to really see this as an authoritarian versus democracy battle, which is what it is. president xi of china, vladimir putin himself, have identified it as such. we need to stand up for democracy. we need to make certain that we know that authoritarian regimes never stop when they start an aggression. ukraine needs our help and assistance now, and this is a

very critical time for the u.s. congress to step up and provide that aid. >> boy, it's so important for him to say that. i'm glad to hear the chairman say that. >> thank you, congressman turner. >> mccaul has spoken out in support of ukraine. it's about freedom. >> in an interview last week, chairman hike michael mccaul said, quote, i think russian propaganda has made its way into the united states, unfortunately, and it's infected a good chunk of my party's base. admiral stavridis, what is going on here, big picture? what are the dangers? >> by the way, the chairmen you just showed are grown-ups on the house floor. >> yeah. >> i don't agree with them on everything, but in the realm of national security and intelligence they're the best the republican party will

produce. turner was head of the nato parliamentary association, connecting us with the parliaments of many of the nato members. what are the dangers? that's what we ought to focus on right now. it is precisely what mike turner laid out a moment ago, chairman turner. it is the infection. i use that word deliberately. big chunks of the republican party with propaganda that is flowing, not only from moscow, but increasingly from beijing. to the chairman's point, the danger here, mika, is the fact that putin will not stop at ukraine. what's in his head are, at a minimum, the borders of the old union of soviet socialist republics which, news flash, included moldova, estonia, latvia, lithuania, the old borders of russia. the latter three, of course, are

members of nato. so the danger here is if we back away from providing this sensible amount of aid to ukraine, we can count on vladimir putin continuing to press forward and, eventually, we'll end up in a collision between nato and the russian federation, which, believe me, is a collision we want to avoid, they want to avoid, and the world wants to avoid. >> yeah. >> ed luce, let's bring you in on this. obviously, we have daily reports from ukraine about ukrainian soldiers there running out of ammunition. russia making slow, grinding, steady progress. real fears of another significant russian offensive in the months ahead. with this russian propaganda being on the house floor, this ukraine aid bill is top of mind for many. what's your sense of what could come of this? speaker johnson has said in recent days he's been more focused on this idea of trying to get some sort of ukraine aid

bill through, but he suggested, instead of taking the senate bill, which passed with bipartisan support, he might try to create his own. unclear whether democrats would go for that. it also means if there was a coup attempt for johnson by taylor green and others, democrats might not help out. >> we've been talking about the six-month anniversary on the war in gaza. we're coming up on the six-month anniversary of speaker johnson being elected. he inherited this ukraine funding need and has done nothing for six months. has just avoided, parried, used excuses not to put this to the floor. if it were put to the floor, as chairmans mccaul and turner show, you would get a clear majority in the house voting for new aid for ukraine.

so i don't know what the precise contours of this package will look like, but i think we have deep grounds for skepticism that it won't include things that marjorie taylor greene and lauren boebert and all the kinds of people who aren't leaving congress would like to see in that bill. we've got a spring offensive coming up from russia. in the past two years, we've talked about a ukraine spring counteroffensive. they mismatch now in capabilities between the two sides. it's so great, the only offensive that's in the offing is a russian offensive, a spring offensive. we're seeing foretastes of it with nightly drone and missile attacks on cities like kharkiv and odessa. zelenskyy is saying, we're outnumbered 10-1 in terms of air

defenses, artillery, all kinds of military equipment that could really, easily, be recycled from the united states to ukraine. most of this is old equipment. this is spending on upgrading the american military, stuff that's needed anyway. this is 90% spending at home. i look forward to seeing what speaker johnson comes up with. i am very skeptical it will be good faith. >> well, hopefully, at some point, those who are arguing in good faith about this war being about authoritarianism versus freedom, the very things that ronald reagan devoted his life to and republicans are supposed to believe in, hopefully they'll move in that direction. i want to read from "the wall street journal" from april 5th, following up on the misinformation, disinformation that some of these stupid

republicans are -- these maga extreme republicans are echoing. it's not just russia. now, it is chinese-linked campaigns laundered false information through fake accounts on social media platforms, seeking to identify divisive political issues and potentially influence elections. they've used fake accounts and a.i. generated campaigns to weaken america's resolve in fighting, not just against the russians, but also china and taiwan. please talk about that. also, you've discussed recently about the cyber war, that the ukrainians are making the best of what they have. we've also got reporting that, of course, as admiral stavridis would tell us, the sea war has gone pretty well for the ukrainians. and the ukrainians continue, as far as the air war goes, continue to destroy some extraordinarily important russian assets on the ground.

>> joe, one of the amazing things about this war is just how resourceful ukraine has been in this period where u.s. military assistance has been slowed or even cut off. they've been inventing their own new systems, primarily drones. there are now 300 companies in ukraine making drones, sea drones, air drones, ground drones, so that soldiers won't have to cross the trenches as they have been. ukrainians realize their most precious resource is people, as they've been losing people at a horrible rate. they want the next phase of the war to be done more by their smart machines. they have drones that can reach all the way into beyond moscow. a drone landed 200 miles east of moscow at a target recently. they can go to st. petersburg. these are home built. if the u.s. says, we're nervous

about escalation, the ukrainians say, zelenskyy said to me, it's not your problem. you didn't make these drones. they're ours. we should applaud the ukrainians for being inventive in their hour of need. it is true, nonetheless, that unless they get more u.s. basics, ammunition, artillery, rockets, as zelenskyy told me, they're going to have to retreat. they'll retreat slowly, step by step. they hope their cities won't be at risk. two points i take away from this. one, they need us. two, we need them. and their incredible ingenuity in figuring out how to combat russia and this authoritarian society that wants to roll them right off the map. they're resisting it. i wish -- after i was there, i wish speaker johnson could listen to volodymyr zelenskyy

explain why he is fighting so hard for freedom. >> "the washington post"'s david ignatius, thank you very much. u.s. national editor at "the financial times," ed luce. nbc news presidential historian michael beschloss. and retired four star navy admiral james stavridis. thank you, all, very much for being on this morning. >> thank you, admiral. still ahead, south carolina pulls off a perfect finish, beating the iowa hawkeyes for its second national title in three years. "washington post" sports columnist sally jenkins will break down yesterday's championship game and what's next for iowa star caitlin clark, as she wrappings up her record-setting college clear. "morning joe" is coming right back. ♪♪

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six seconds to go. perfection with a touch of sweet redemption. undefeated south carolina has won its third national championship. >> i want to personally thank caitlin clark for lifting up our sport. she carried a heavy load for our sport, and it just is not going to stop here. >> that was south carolina head coach dawn staley thanking the opposing team's star player. iowa's caitlin clark after an incredible championship game yesterday that saw the gamecocks win their third national title since 2017. joining us now, sports columnist

at "the washington post," sally jenkins. she was at yesterday's championship game in cleveland and writes about it in a new piece entitled, "decades in the making, south carolina-iowa final was a perfect finish." where to begin, sally? it seemed inevitable, ultimately, for south carolina. they were just strong and big in their actual playing. the game was incredible. it was incredible basketball. caitlin clark was incredible, as well. >> she did. she got 30 points despite everything. south carolina was the top scoring defense in the country. iowa was the top scoring offense in the country. you had an undefeated team from south carolina. you had the all-time ncaa scorer, male or female, in caitlin clark. it was really a titanic collision. it was something the women's game, i think, was really

excited about and felt was a real turning point for their game in terms of popularity. >> a little more about that, like, this was a magical year for women's college basketball. caitlin clark, the headliner, of course, and she'll be the first pick in next week's wnba draft. she's inspired so many young girls to play the sport. it's really great. also, let's not overlook this south carolina team. dawn staley undefeated. last year they were, as well, but picked off in the final four. this year, they finish it. talk about how this could catapult the whole sport to new heights. >> well, so the viewership really built by literally millions. you had 12 million viewers built to 14 million just in the last weekend. the audience build was really tremendous. dawn staley now enters the real pantheon of all-time greatness in the sport. the only other people who have three national championships, gio, pat summitt, tara

vanderveer, vulkey, and now dawn staley. that's the company she's in now. >> i covered gino as a local reporter in connecticut, and he is the greatest. i love dawn staley. i'm curious about the coaches that are becoming stars in women's basketball, and then the up-and-coming stars we saw on the court yesterday. because it goes without saying, caitlin clark is incredible, is a phenom, but i saw a lot of other incredible players there just waiting in the wings for their moment in the sun. can you talk about that? >> sure. the big question with caitlin clark going in the wnba draft is who is coming behind her in the women's game? you know, it's so star driven and narrative driven, that women's collegiate basketball needs someone to come up behind her. really good news is probably the most talented freshmen class in history was on the floor in the

ncaa tournament. you've got scorers like juju watkins at southern california. hannah hildago at notre dame. south carolina is loaded for next year. this was a young south carolina team with a lot of great freshmen on the floor. the leading scorer for south carolina last night was tessa johnson, a freshman. there's a wave of talent coming. one of the dynamics in the women's game that makes it so exciting is that the arc of performance has risen so steeply just in the time i've been covering the game or that you have been covering the game. i think it's really electrifying, and i think that's part of what the audience has been responding to here. gino said it used to be if you had a diana taurasi for uconn on the floor, everyone would say, there's a woman who can play with the skill level of a guy. there is no male comparison anymore.

people have forgotten that. there's so much rich talent at all five spots on the floor now for both sides that that sort of comparison that you had to try to equal, you know, a male performance, that's really starting to go away. caitlin clark is the leading ncaa scorer all-time, male or female, and she did something that no great male scorer ever did, which was also wind up in the top three record book in assists. she's the greatest passer as well as the greatest scorer. it's a truly unique achievement. oscar robertson didn't do it. larry bird didn't do it. caitlin clark is the only person who did it. >> amazing. >> so cool. >> we need to go to break for the top of the hour, but i have to ask quickly, was it a moving quick in the semifinal game? >> unquestionably. it was totally a moving pick. you're talking about the uconn call with nine seconds left? >> yup. >> it appears to deny them a final shot. do one thing, try one thought

experiment. go back and watch the replay and watch iowa's defense. uconn wasn't going to get the shot off probably because paige bueckers is pinned on the sideline by hannah, and uconn would have a hard time getting what they wanted out of that shot, out of the play. >> okay. "washington post" columnist sally jenkins, thank you so much. we'll also talk about the men's game tonight, tomorrow. >> yeah. ahead, gabe sherman joins us with his piece, "inside the terrifyingly competent trump 2024 campaign." plus, we'll dig into donald trump's promise to wealthy donors and what he would do with his signature tax cuts if he's re-elected. and hours from now, a total solar eclipse will grace the skies over north america as millions are set to gather to watch the moon slip between the

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house republicans introdugsed the bill to rename an airport after trump. airports are like trump. a chaotic nightmare that turns you against your own family. >> welcome back to "morning joe." it's monday, april 8th. jonathan lemire is still with us. joining the conversation, we have former aide to the george w. bush white house and state department, elise jordan. and the president of the national action network and host of msnbc's "politics nation," reverend al sharpton. good to have you both along with us. donald trump is promising to

extend his tax cuts for the wealthy if re-elected. at a private fundraiser saturday, which cost a minimum of $250,000 to attend, trump spoke about securing our southern border, reducing inflation, and extending the trump tax cuts. that's according to his campaign, which declined a request by nbc news to have a reporter present or to make a transcript of trump's remarks available. next year, some of the key provisions of trump's 2017 tax cuts are set to expire, including a break that benefits hedge funds, private equity partnerships, and privately held companies. after saturday's fundraiser, trump bragged on truth social, i guess, was it truth social? yes, it was. on social media, about the money his campaign brought in, which was reportedly north of $50 million.

in response, the biden campaign posted photos of some of the, quote, scammers, racists, and extremists it says are funding trump's 2024 run. >> yeah. you know, jonathan lemire. >> that's him at his liv -- he had a golf tournament. >> yeah. >> very -- >> we'll get into that. >> -- trump by. >> we'll get into it a little bit. yeah, the fact he's talking to billionaires, jonathan, saying -- well, you know, the night he passed the tax cut, he had all the millionaires and billionaires sitting around him at mar-a-lago. he said, i just made a lot of you a lot of money tonight. i think he flew down and told them that, "i made you guys a lot of money." here, he's basically promising the same thing. of course, it'd be great to move the tax cuts to help small

businesses, small family restaurants, small businesses in general, start-ups, entrepreneurs. but that's not trumpism. trumpism is give the billionaires, give the people at the very top billions and billions of dollars. allow them to, you know, pay less of a percentage of their taxes than their secretaries, pay less in a percentage than people who do their lawns. it's an outrageous setup. it leaves small business owners and the middle and working class behind. >> first on the fundraiser, the trump campaign said it raised $50 million. we don't have anything to back that up yet. it'll come in filings down the road. even with that number, it still leaves him way behind president biden's re-election campaign in terms of having cash on hand. but you are right, this is another moment where donald trump made clear who his constituency is. some portions of the trump cuts

passed in 2017 are set to expire next year. trump said he'd not only extend them but try to further them, rev. i think that does show, you know, who he caters his policies towards, which is why, again, there's that sort of conundrum, the contradiction, that, yes, he serves the wealthy, and they tend to vote for him, but so much of his supporters are from the working class and poor people who get nothing from his policies, yet still stand by him. >> he tries to appeal with cultural issues to those working class and poor, and they identify culturally because many of them feel that they've been somewhat forgotten or cast aside. i think the messaging challenge for the biden campaign is to make it clear, these are the people that are sponsoring him, that are standing with him despite his legal troubles, and these are the people who his

policies help. he did make them rich and didn't help you more. he didn't help you with student loans. he didn't help you with things like housing and other issues that are of your concern. don't let the fact that a guy can be culturally pretending to relate to you get in the way of your own interest. we've had people in my community that could be my brother but could be doing me in. he's the guy that's doing you in. they've not quite nailed getting this message to a lot of voters across the country. >> the trump tax cuts come up for renewal in 2025, so this election hinges on who goes into office, what is your tax rate going to be? i think what we see from the fundraiser look at the billionaires who lined up and were featured on the invitation for it. they are betting that trump going to get re-elected in november. that's where the substantial majority of the billionaire class is right now.

possibly it's to their benefit, but they're hedging right now to get in there. so this is a billionaire class that, it doesn't matter if there is an insurrection at the capitol, that donald trump isn't necessarily supporting free and fair elections. they don't care, as long as their tax rate stays low. >> yeah, and he's saying a lot of that out loud. let's take a look at the strength of the trump campaign. joining us now, special correspondent at "vanity fair," gabriel sherman. his piece, "inside the terrifyingly competent trump 2024 campaign." also joining us, national political reporter for "the washington post," isaac arnsdorf, "finish what we started, the maga movement's ground war to end democracy." gabe, in your new piece, you write in part, quote, "while trump's 2016 agenda was frequent

ly stymied by infighting and incompetence, signs point to a second west wing staffed by loyalists who would carry out his policies. president trump knows who can deliver and who can't. the backstabbers who weren't around in 2016 won't be in the next white house. trump's senior campaign adviser jason miller told me trump's 2024 campaign has already demonstrated trump can run an effective operation. this campaign is locked down, a republican close to trump said. most of all, trump is disciplined because fear is a powerful motivator. his wealth and freedom are at stake. he is terrified of going to jail, a longtime friend from new york told me. the criminal charges helped solve trump's messaging problem. prior to the indictments, trump was a one-line artist singing a tired tune that the 2020 election was stolen. but the dozens of felony counts gave him new material. he cast himself as a political

martyr being prosecuted by the biden white house. he's so distracted with the legal stuff, that's why the campaign is smooth, a republican close to trump said." gabe, you know, he says out loud that he would be a dictator and that he is your retribution to his voters. he says a lot of the quiet part out loud, even the frightening part out loud. he also has a campaign construct that now has his daughter-in-law built in. there are a lot of different factors to this that didn't exist the first time around. >> that's right, mika. everyone here on this show has been covering trump for years, and the big story in 2016 and to some extent 2020, was his campaign was a soap oprah. it was slashing personalities and nonstop drama. this cycle, the thing i've been

struck by time and again, it is a low-drama campaign. operatives don't want press, don't want their egos out there. they're focused on getting trump to the white house in november 2024. as i write in the piece, his freedom is at stake. really, the only thing that's guaranteed to keep donald trump out of jail is becoming the next president of the united states and appointing an attorney general who will get these charges thrown out. it is really that simple. i think that is really why you see donald trump so focused. yes, he says incendiary things on the stump, but when it comes to the mechanics of running the campaign, it is a much different operation. >> well, of course, the campaign, i mean, insiders on the campaign have told me that their goal is to basically minimize him as much as possible, keep his mouth shut, stop him from blowing himself up every day. >> that's right. every time he opens his mouth, he creates a news cycle. the fundraiser this weekend, we saw headliners that he said, why

don't we have more immigrants from, quote, nice countries. all the countries he mentioned were majority white populations. he says the quiet part out loud. this is a candidate who does create his own controversies, but, you know, that really is baked in now, i think, to his brand. i think the mechanics, the underlying ground game, you know, the getting the state parties in line, getting the republican national committee in line is really, i think, what is fueling this success he's had on the campaign trail. now, aapparently, he has the money behind him, as well. >> we noted despite his public proclamations, he'd happily be nelson mandela and go to jail, he's actually terrified at the prospect. now, congratulations on the book. the maga movement, writ large, steve bannon and the others, the intellectual heft behind it, what are their goals? how do they plan to use trump to accomplish what they want,

isaac? >> what happened, the way the movement really regrouped from january 6th going into the party structure itself, starting at the bottom, the precinct level, going to the counties, the districts, the states, getting to the rnc, making it possible to get a new chair and co-chair who would be trump's own daughter-in-law. whatever is going on at the trump campaign, whatever is going on president trump trial, that organization is going to be out there in the field focusing on looking for voter fraud and also for getting out the vote among trump supporters. that is a huge part of making him a more formidable candidate than he has been in the past. >> rev, i am going to pitch you a softball and let you weigh in on your thoughts on donald trump comparing himself to nelson mandela. >> well, that is a softball. i hope the bases are loaded. you know, the insult of that is that nelson mandela did 27 years

in jail, to, among others, get blacks in south africa the right to vote. donald trump is facing jail for denying blacks and others the right to vote. i mean, he's a direct opposite of nelson mandela if he goes to jail. i might say, by the way, donald, if you're watching, mandela did 17 yea 27 years, if you want to equal him there. a lot of people wouldn't be disappointed. i think what caught my eye, isaac, about your book, because i think some of us that consider ourselves progressive, me and the civil rights side of that, fail to really build. we try to work on this now with national action network, build an infrastructure. talk about how they redid themselves and went from the bottom, very local, very grassroots, up. i think that's underestimated in all the flash we see of donald

trump. >> absolutely. it's been very under the radar, and it is in the past few years it's really, since trump left office, that this has been happening. steve bannon had a huge part in this by popularizing the precinct strategy, which was exactly that. starting at the bottom, at the precincts, and going up in the party organization itself. this was the innovation over the tea party, which was, like, you know, everyone go to this tea party meeting, you know, this tea party, that tea party. the idea here was, no, we have the republican party. we're going to use the republican party organization, the republican party structure. there's real power in that. there is money. there is volunteers. there's infrastructure. that's the infrastructure all the candidates use. and the motivation for that, which has truth in it, actually, is the reason trump failed in 2020 was because of a few uncooperative republicans. by taking over the party apparatus and purifying the party, they would make sure that

wouldn't happen again. >> gabe, you did a great job here of nailing the sophistication of the trump campaign this go-around, and that it is not just a hack organization the way it was playing by the seat of their pants back in 2016. >> that's right. >> so if the campaign competency continues over into the policy realm, that's where i think democrats should really worry. you know, not only that the campaign might be successful and win, but then in the policy realm. what are you hearing about there? do you think it is going to be run with equal sophistication? >> well, i mean, by their own admission, jason miller said if they win the election, the white house will be staffed only with loyalists. they've weeded out the backstabbers. important figure in the whole drama is mcatee, trump's man in the 2016 cycle. he was the head of white house personnel in the trump administration. his job is really to vet

thousands and thousands of potential appointees who will go into the civil service and carry out the maga agenda. he is working with the heritage foundation. they're creating, similar to this ground game, an army of people that will be ready in january 2025 to get to the government and carry out trump's agenda. >> you think kushner might return as secretary of state here? >> that's a separate conversation. i think, you know, obviously, jared and ivanka are seeing which way this is going. if trump wins, it is clearly, he is leaving the door open to return to foggy bottom as america's top diplomat. >> gabe, finally, how does the campaign interact with people like steve bannon and kash patel when they go on podcasts and say that trump is going to throw political opponents and reporters in jail, and he looks into the camera and says, and, "morning joe," we're coming after you. you're going to jail. how does this bottom-down

campaign respond to that? >> well, i think they, not only do they respond to it, joe, i think they're encouraging it. jason miller is close to steve bannon. there's a whole network of people who have, while they're not officially part of the campaign, they have links to the campaign. they're using it through the maga media to get the troops, the maga foot soldiers riled up. you know, i think we have learned since the last cycle, let's not, you know, pretend. take trump at his word. i think the media, all of us, democratic party, even the few republicans who are anti-trump, are sort of not paying attention. just look at what they're saying. this is a national emergency. i think donald trump is just hoping that, throw enough sand in people's eyes, he can get into office. as anthony scaramucci told me, trump's former communications director, you know, they want to be a dictator. he said it out loud, and we should take him at his world. >> isaac, you've written the book on it, we'll leave it with

you. trump says he is going to throw reporters in jail. he is going to throw political opponents in jail. kash patel, who is supposed to play a large role, said the same thing. they're going to -- reporters that aren't positive toward donald trump are going to be thrown in jail for treason. is this part of the game plan? >> trump will never say a bad thing about anyone who supports him. the campaign will never contradict the boss. so much as there are some strategists on the campaign who are looking at that as perhaps not the most helpful general election message to win over independents and moderates who are going to decide the election, still, never will hear trump disavow it. the same as he still is trying to align himself with the defendants in the capitol riot on january 6th, promoting the song he recorded with them,

offering to pardon them. he has still never said that he'll accept the outcome of the election and that he will disavow violence. >> the new book is entitled "finish what we started: the maga movement's ground war to end democracy." it goes on sale tomorrow. isaac arnsdorf, thank you for being on. "vanity fair" special correspondent gabriel sherman, thank you, as well. we'll be reading your piece online now. still ahead on "morning joe," there is growing frustration among some democrats following the israeli air strikes that killed seven humanitarian workers in gaza. democratic member of the foreign relations committee, senator tim kaine, will weigh in on the u.s. policy toward israel. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. tic arthrit, symptoms can sometimes take you out of the moment.

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24 past the hour. more than three dozen house democrats, including nancy pelosi, are calling on president biden and antony blinken to impose conditions on u.s. military aid to israel amid mounting frustration following the air strikes on world kitchen workers. a letter was sent, asking the administration to reconsider a recent decision to authorize an arms package transfer to israel. the white house did not respond to a request for comment on the letter. the move comes as some biden allies are publicly calling on the president to re-evaluate the government's military support of israel. here's senator chris coons. >> i think we're at the point where president biden has said, and i have said, and others have said, if benjamin netanyahu, prime minister, were to order the idf into rafah at scale,

they were to drop 1,000-pound bombs and send in a battalion to go after hamas and make no provision for civilians or humanitarian aid, that i would vote to condition aid to israel. i've never said that before. i have never been here before. >> joining us now, democratic senator tim kaine of virginia. a member of the armed services and foreign relations committees. he's also author of the book entitled, "walk, ride, paddle, a life outside. we'll get to that in a moment. >> sounds great. senator, let's talk about the balance you and the president and republicans that care about this issue are having to do right now. one, we don't want the bomb togs bombings to continue. we don't want another 15,000 civilians killed in further fights in rafah. at the same time, we don't want to send a message to hamas that they won.

how do we balance those things? >> joe, it's really tough. it is a heartbreaking situation. israel has a right to defend itself against those who would annihilate it. hamas, hezbollah, iran. the u.s. has always been a partner, trying to help israel defend itself against those external threats. palestinians have a right to live, and palestine has a right to a future of autonomy promised them in 1948. the right thing to do now is to, in any weaponry to israel, it should be defensive only. replenish the stock of iron dome which can intercept missiles fired at israel. let's constrict military aid to defensive weapons only. second, we have to lean on israel much more about allowing humanitarian aid into gaza. the u.s. shouldn't have to be doing dangerous air drops of aid into gaza. we shouldn't have to be doing a goldberg pier constriction in

the eastern mediterranean to get aid into gaza. the way to get aid into gaza is for israel to allow more aid to come in through the border crossings already there. it's taken way too long, way too long for israel to allow the border crossings to be used the way they should be. >> senator, we want to turn to a domestic matter. minutes ago, donald trump posted on truth social a video in which he says, finally, he explains his position on abortion. he's been teasing this a week or two, that he is going to do that. he believes it should be left up to the states. he supports the bans that any state has put forth already. he also says, quote, i was proudly the person responsible for the ending of roe v. wade. lots of mixed signals from the former president. let's get your reaction, sir. >> well, he's proud that he ended roe versus wade, which was a law that stood for 50 years, that allowed women to make their own reproductive choices about pregnancy. he did more than end roe versus

wade. the court, in striking down re versus wade, struck down 100 years of precedent that says the 14th amendment grants people some autonomous rights to make decisions about their own families. it's not just pregnancy. it's contraceptions. it's invsit -- in vitro fertilization. it is dobbs. he's proud to strip away freedoms we've had for a century. the stakes are high. he is fine with states criminalizing women. he's fine with states giving bounties to those who might report somebody who terminates a pregnancy. great. you put that out there, and we democrats and joe biden, kamala harris, we're going to say, we appreciate women's reproductive freedom should be protected in the country. whatever zip code you live in, whatever state, it shouldn't be up to a group of mostly male legislators deciding how to criminalize your behavior. >> mika, what he just said, i'm

really surprised. i thought he'd try to weasel out of it more than he did. what he said was he supports, like, florida's six-week ban. >> yeah. >> six-week ban. >> insane. >> before women know whether they're pregnant or not. >> dangerous. >> and bans like wisconsin had, you know, the 1849 almost total ban. i'm not sure if it is still in effect now. there are, again, crazy, extreme laws that have been passed that donald trump just said he supports and he salutes and said, "i'm responsible for that." >> yeah, he's proud of it. democrats should drive that message home, because for women, this is a matter of life and death, and the men who love them. i mean, these laws, depending on how they differ in different states muddle the medical your

journey that could have complications, a situation could be dire, they have the choice to bleed out, be sterilized, or give birth to a baby that won't live more than a few minutes, along with the emotional stress. thank donald trump for that. democrats need to be sure they understand that they've got to get the message out across the country, especially to republican women. >> senator, you've seen it in virginia, how this is a unifying issue for so many people who consider themselves even pro life before roe was overturned. they see the extreme laws being passed and say, no, i want no part of that. >> no, thank you. >> joe and mika, let me give you the perspective from virginia. we're the only state in the south that protects women's rights, in connection with roe versus wade, because of state statutes.

the surrounding states to our south don't. it is not uncommon for women in tennessee who get cancer diagnoses to be unclear if they can take the cancer medicines because it can interrupt a pregnancy. they get cancer treatments in virginia. they come across the border no virginia to make their own reproductive health care decisions. we're proud of the fact that in virginia, we're the only state in the south that protects women's rights to make reproductive decisions, but we're dissatisfied it's come down to this. in my senate campaign this year, the presidential race, everything we're doing forward, we're not going to rest until women in any zip code in this country can make these decisions. again, it is, ivf. what could be more pro life than the 12 million people that are walking around the planet today whose parents suffered through failed pregnancy after failed pregnancy, then decided to use ivf to build a family? yet, what states are doing, and

what republicans are doing, what donald trump is proud of, is stripping away legal protections that would protect these families' ability to grow their families as they want. >> senator kaine, since former president trump wants to take credit for stacking the supreme court and coming out with the dobbs decision, wouldn't it be wise for democrats to also say, therefore, to young people, he's taking credit for taking back student debt loan forgiveness, and to blacks and others, that he is taking credit for ending affirmative action and other things that this court has done? because not only has this court turned around the dobbs decision, this court has turned around affirmative action, student debt loans, and other things that the biden/harris campaign are challenged with in terms of those constituents. >> reverend sharpton, you said it better than i could. i think the -- this court, with

the sort of two stolen seats, the blockade of president obama's nominee and then the rush job on justice comey barrett after the republicans had promised, hey, in a presidential year, if there is a vacancy, you have to wait until the presidential election is over to fill the seat. their manipulation of two seats on the supreme court has produced a parade of bad decisions, and donald trump is responsible for every last one of them. we're certainly going toheavily and november. >> want to ask you, senator, about your book, "walk, ride, paddle, a life outside." in recent weeks, over a period of several years, you've hiked 559 miles of the appalachian trail that crossed virginia from harper's ferry to the tennessee border, biked 321 miles. it goes on. i want to ask how you did this with long covid. and tell us about the book.

>> mika, thanks for asking. when i turned 60 in 2018, i was running for re-election, i wanted to mark the milestone and think about ages, but i didn't do it in the election year. i said, next year, i'll do something special. i created the virginia nature triathlon, a quest that's a love letter to my state, hike the whole a.t., cycle the blue ridge parkway, and canoe the james river and learn about my state, myself, and my country along the way. it was a remarkable journey, and i'm happy to share it with folks. >> nice. the new book is entitled "walk, ride, paddle: a life outside." it comes out tomorrow. virginia is for lovers of nature. senator tim kaine, thank you. >> you got it. great to be with you. coming up, we're hours away from an event in america that won't happen again for another 20 years. a total solar eclipse.

we'll have more about this rare phenomenon straight ahead on "morning joe."

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♪♪ it is 20 minutes before the top of the hour. a live look at new york city. in just hours, one of the most hotly anticipated sky watching events in recent years will grace the skies over north america. meteorologist angie lassman explains today's eclipse. >> a solar eclipse occurs when the moon passes directly between the earth and the sun and the

moon blocks the sun for a viewer on earth. during a total eclipse, the moon lines up perfectly to fully obscure the sun, resulting in totality. the result is a shadow that will cross north america from mexico to canada. this is why the 2024 eclipse event will be known as the great north american eclipse. it starts as the moon slowly obscures more and more of the sun. as it progresses, the surroundings take on an unusual hue, and shadows become crisp p and detailed. as the sun dwindled to a crescent, as seen through eclipse glasses, daylight dims and shadows might dance across the landscape. then comes totality. the soft wisps of the solar corona surround a huge hole where the sun used to be. the solar corona is the outer part of the sun's atmosphere. this corona, normally hidden by the sun's brilliance, becomes visual during a total solar eclipse when the moon completely blocks the sun's surface. you find yourself in an eerie

twilight, surrounded by a spellbinding sunset glow. finally, totality ends. the sequence unfolds in reverse. now, let's take you through the time line of how the solar eclipse will sweep across north america. the path of totality will sweep over parts of 15 u.s. states, starting in texas and ending in maine. the whole event will take about two and a half hours for the shadow to go from the pacific to the atlantic. you have to be between the 108 to 122 path of totality. you have a partial eclipse visible from nearly everywhere in the united states. some places will see it better than others. for cities in the path, like dahl dallas, indianapolis, cleveland, and buffalo, totality will last approximately four minutes. during those minutes of totality, you might notice a temperature drop and a change in the behavior of any nearby

wildlife. the mesmerizing moments of a total solar eclipse along a narrow path for just a few minutes make it one of nature's rarest firsthand experiences. >> that was angie lassman. for more, let's bring in editor at large at "time," jeffrey klugher. he covers science. author of 12 books, including one on "apollo 13," serving as the basis for the 1999 film. it is great to have you on the show. tell us how this is exciting scientifically on a number of levels. i'm curious just about how animals and nature react to it. >> animals and nature react the way they would if evening were descending. in zoos, captive animals return to their enclosures. in the wild, daytime birds will go quiet.

in one remarkable episode, the research center in 1984, a troop of captive guerrillas climbed to the top of the enclosure and stared almost reverently at the disappearing sun with one juvenile chimpanzee gesturing to the sun. it was quite remarkable. >> that is remarkable. obviously, we're seeing people in the coverage here wearing glasses. you should not look at it directly. we should emphasize that, right? >> absolutely. yes, even when there's just -- >> what are the dangers? >> even when there is a sliver of the sun left, the dangers are exactly as if you were looking at a complete sun. the back of the retina can burn the macula, and the middle of the eye is susceptible to damage from the sun. the public misconception exists that damage to the eye leads to permanent and immediate

blindness. it does not. but it can lead to scarring that can affect your vision for life. >> jeffrey, this is going to lead to some huge tourism across the country. i know i heard from a lot of people who are heading to vermont. if you're in the northeast. the south, arkansas, it's supposed to be huge there. they're expecting more tourists than they ever have had before. where are the peak places to check out the eclipse today? >> the peak places, as we said in the intro, are anywhere in the band of totality. i'm in cleveland, in a ballroom in the wyndham hotel right at the airport, since even two months ago, airport hotel were the only ones left in cleveland. arkansas, as you pointed out, will see about 1.5 million visitors. that's a state of 3 million people. their population will grow by 50% today. >> wow. >> the longest totality will be in a tiny town in texas, radar

base, texas, with 73 people. if you can make your way to radar base, texas, today, you'll be contributing to the size of the population there. anywhere along the band of totality, from southwest texas to northeast maine, as long as the skies are clear, should be quite a show. >> oh, so if it is a cloudy day, you miss it, right? >> it's a cloudy day, you miss it, yes. our team from "time" magazine sent a wonderful, big field group out to casper, wyoming, in 2017 for the eclipse there, and the sky was perfectly, sapphire clear. the last instant, a scrap of cloud appears, and happily, it halted just to the east of the sun so we got our eclipse. >> okay. editor at large at "time," jeffrey, thank you very much for coming on the show this morning. still ahead on "morning joe," commerce secretary gina

raimondo will be our guest with another major announcement about investments from the chips and science act. plus, 50 years ago today, baseball icon hank aaron broke babe ruth's home run record. mike barnicle and mike lupica will join us to discuss the historic moment and its impact on the game and the country. "morning joe" will be right back. why would i use kayak to compare hundreds of travel sites at once? i like to do things myself. i can't trust anything else to do the job right. kayak... aaaaaaaahhhh kayak. search one and done. because for 54 years they were trying to get roe v. wade terminated. and i did it. and i'm proud to have done it. joe biden: in 2016, donald trump ran to overturn roe v. wade.

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okay, that's uncalled for. ♪♪ one of the greatest song writing duos of all time, elton john and bernie taupen are the 2024 recipients of the library

of congress gershwin prize. the duo was honored in washington, d.c. a special performance by 2023 gershwin prize joni mitchell joined by brandi carlile and annie lennox to perform "i'm still standing." and honoree garth brooks who took the stage for "sorry seems to be the hardest word" and metallica brought the house down for a funeral of a friend love lies leading. ♪♪ ♪ ♪♪

>> the award honors living musical artists whose contributions in the field of popular song amplify the standard of excellence associated with george and ira gershwin. the electrifying two-hour concert special, elton john, and bernie taupin, will air nationwide tonight at 8:00 eastern and is available to stream on pbs.org. and the pbs app. look forward to that. so, passengers onboard a flight getting ready to take off in denver were given quite a scare when they looked out and saw what appeared to be part of their plane peeling off. nbc news correspondent steve patterson explains. >> reporter: it is the very last thing anyone wants to see, looking out of the window of their plane.

passengers onboard southwest flight 3695, stunned treated to white knuckle watch party, witnessing part of their own plane ripping off in realtime. the boeing 737 scheduled to fly from denver to houston this morning, when part of the engine's cowling, or the protective cover that houses the engine appears to peel back. >> let's go ahead and declare an emergency. we've got a piece of engine cowling peeling off apparently. >> reporter: the faa saying in part the pilot reported the engine cowling fell off during takeoff and struck the wing flap. the boeing was towed to the gate, the faa will investigate. >> it's typically due to failure of maintenance personnel to properly secure the engine. >> reporter: while the plane is manufactured by boeing, the engine is not. right now, it's unclear what the source of the malfunction is,

but southwest has recently had a series of runway scares including a possible engine fire on thursday that grounded a vegas-bound flight in lubbock. >> these small incidents occur but they're rarely catastrophic. >> reporter: passengers onboard reported okay but stun by a moment they won't forget. >> oh, my god, that took off and came back -- are you kidding me -- no. nbc's steve patterson with that report. still ahead, we'll go through the dysfunction on capitol hill that has more than 20 house republicans leaving congress. plus we'll have willie's conversation with larry david as the last ever episode of "curb" aired last night. the two took a walk through the neighborhood that inspired "seinfeld" "morning joe" will be right back.

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in a new interview donald trump also claimed president biden was high on cocaine during the state of the union, saying he was all jacked up in the beginning. by the end he was fading fast. huh, it almost sounds like donald trump knows exactly what it feels like to be on cocaine. you know, like in the beginning you've got a lot of energy. ♪♪ [ laughter ] >> but then by the end, you're fading fast. >> just recently heard that saudi arabia and russia will re -- ah -- [ laughter ] >> that's too good. there's so much. good morning and welcome to "morning joe." it is monday, april 8th, speaking of donald trump, he spent the weekend trying to cut into president biden's large lead in campaign funding. we'll tell you about his fundraising dinner with republican mega donors, how much he says he made, and how the

biden campaign responded. also, congress returns to capitol hill there, but the increasingly chaotic atmosphere is there has several house republicans choosing to leave washington. rather than serve another term. we'll tell you what that means. plus, an undefeated season ends up in a championship for the south carolina women's basketball team. we'll show you how they knocked off the great caitlin clark and the iowa hawkeyes. it was an incredible game. also today, the long-awaited total solar eclipse will move across america this afternoon. a safety warning, if you plan on looking at the eclipse, please wear protective glasses. >> and don't do this -- >> no. >> just fyi, with us, we have the host of "way too early" and white house political chief at politico, jonathan lemire. don't do that -- no, do not do

that. >> coke glasses and stared straight up at it. so pretty. >> u.s. national editor of financial times ed luce is with us. columnist for "washington post" david ignatius. former supreme ally commander of nato, navy admiral james stavridis is here. he's chief international analyst for nbc news. and author and nbc news presidential historian michael beschloss joins us. thank you for joining us this are monday morning. we'll begin with the israeli military reducing the number of grounds troops in southern gaza. officials announced saying they're pulling the 98th commander division out of the area to, quote, recuperate and prepare for future operations. now, it's not clear if this is just a simple troop rotation or fears that the israeli military may be preparing to launch a ground offensive in raf fashion

where more than 1 million people have sought refuge. the move comes as israel marks six months since the october 7th terrorist attack. yesterday, prime minister benjamin netanyahu praised the military's achievements in the war thus far. and reiterated his call to release the more than 100 hostages in gaza, saying there will be no cease-fire until that happens. the war is now the longest involving israel since the 1980s. and some have been questioning whether netanyahu is dragging out the conflict to prevent the collapse of his right-wing coalition and extend his time in office. this, as the war has caused ramifications beyond the gazan border. agency "the new york times" note, the war has derailed efforts to normalize diplomatic relations between israel and

saudi arabia, prompted protests and strained the legitimacy and threatened to evolve into a regional conflict. of course, there's the hostages and the families. and the country of israel. and others who are in misery in agony, waiting to learn their fate. >> the hostages now being held over six months. it's just unspeakable. >> no. >> and what the families are going through, unspeakable about how things have been so badly mismanaged in israel by netanyahu from the very beginning. how badly they were mismanaged when they had information that the attack was coming. and they didn't act on it when they continued to fund hamas. netanyahu continued to fund hamas. but over 240 people kidnapped on october 7th, 123 released, four americans among those freed. but 100-plus people still in captivity including six americans. 30 have been declared dead.

david ignatius, i spoke all weekend with, as i know you did, with many people involved in this conflict. there is frustration and anger on the israeli side, saying we have to go in rafah, we can't allow hamas to survive. and then the rest of the world is saying you can't -- you don't have the political space to kill 10,000 more civilians to achieve your military goal. so, here we have this tough reality that we always talk about, two truths. one, i believe, and i think a lot of friends of israel believe hamas must be destroyed. that said, 10,000, 15,000 more civilian deaths to do that. and onset of a famine to do that is just something that is not politically possible in the united states. across the region, across the

globe. so, how does this play itself out over the next month? >> so, joe, we're going to be watching, i think, over the next week, i'd say strong possibility, maybe even likelihood of a hostage deal which obviously would be a joyous moment. you think about the six-month anniversary of this war. and you think, first, of how it began, just the absolute horror of october 7. i think like you and mika of the painful experience of watching the gopro videos of that massacre that happened. israelis will never forget those images. i won't either. but that's how it began, with this horrible attack, it's still in the dreams and nightmares of israelis. you have to remember that. >> uh-huh. >> and i watched from israel

from gaza, the confusion that is true up to this very day on the israeli side about how this ends. about what comes after. about what will gaza be like in the future. it's something that israelis oddly never really gave systematic thought to. so, we had an announcement sunday by the idf that they will be withdrawing all of their major combat forces there gaza. they will have one brigade left, where they once had four divisions, enormous force, in gaza. they're down to very few people. and there are no signs, i'm told, that they're actually preparing for an assault on rafah. and they keep talking about it, they haven't put the troops in place. certainly, haven't put the provisions for civilians in

place. there seems to be a surge, finally, in humanitarian assistance, 300 trucks went in yesterday. the highest number since the war began. i'm told that number will grow this week. and finally have real pressure, at last, on qatar to insist on hamas to take part in this cease-fire arrangement and begin to stabilize thing, i'm told that the message from president biden to sheikh amin the ruler of qatar last friday was, look, if hamas does not agree to these terms, hamas cannot have a place in your country, where hamas has had refuge. finally that would be an important move. but, you know, to sum it up, joe, this war has brought devastation, horror to everyone. i can't imagine netanyahu will stay in power much longer. he's deeply unpopular in israel.

it's a war that could lead to a breakthrough in a more stable region. but today, what you're looking at, is devastation, enormous tragedy of war for civilians. >> well, and, admiral, you read just military strategy, military history going literally back to the art of war, thousands of years ago. the past six months, of course, started with absolute hell for the israelis. but you can't help but look at what's happened and think that the gazans -- that hamas got exactly what they wanted. israelis coming in, killing civilians, having younger americans turned against them. the question is, what do we do

from this point? i'm sure you agree with me that hamas has to be destroyed as say fighting force. but i also didn't mean to put words in your mouth, agree with me that 10,000, 15,000 more civilians can't die to achieve those means. so how do you do it? >> well, militarily, let's start with that, in my view, perhaps hopeful sign that david just mentioned of the pulling out of massive troops, and i'll add two other factors that went into that decision. certainly, the u.s. pressure is starting to have real effect here. number two, six months into a war, in army-like israel which is based largely on reserves. they called up every reserve they had, understandably, immediately in october. those folks are the back bone of the israeli economy. they're the butchers, bakers, candlestick makers.

they need to get back to running shops and cyber offices and the entire office and economy of israel. so, they've got to start putting people back to work. and then third and finally, if you look at this, those israeli forces said they've been in intense combat for four months. and they're going to need a break. a rest and refit. i think it's kind of a combination of those things. but here's what i, at least, read into it, again, talking to my sources just as you and others have been doing, the hostage deal is closing. and a good sign is the presence in cairo of our cia director sand pastor bill burns, arabic speaker, former ambassador to jordan, former ambassador to moscow as well, a master diplomat, as well as currently plugged into the highest levels of all of these governments. so, i think we're moving toward

that. and a hostage deal, a cease-fire at some length. let's call it 45 days. and then you can really flood the zone with humanitarian aid in that window falls the construction of the u.s. which really unleashes a huge amount of aid moving in. the houthis are striking less in the red sea. things are trending somewhat positively, but i'll close with a cautionary note, joe. hanging out there is the iranian response to the attack on their embassy, their consulate. i believe a justifiable one. iran certainly will respond in the next five, ten days. probably go after an israeli consulate. iran, however, not looking to widen the war. so, i think if you look into the future, there's a narrow window here where we may be able to move toward some form of a cease-fire that could be built upon. >> so many caveats.

as it pertains to the hostages. we don't know the fate, we don't know how many are alive, and what state they're in. the israeli military has recovered the body of a man who was taken hostage during the october 7th attack. officials say the 47-year-old was killed in mid-january. it's believed he was being held in palestinian islamic jihad. his body was found buried underground. he lived in a kibbutz, either a quarter of the residents there were either killed or abducted on october 7th. including his parents. his father was killed in the attack while his mother was taken hostage. she was released in november as part of a brief cease-fire deal. and as we said, over 240 hostages were taken by hamas and other attackers on october 7th. six months later, at least 134

remain missing. and among those include an israeli/argentinian mother and her two very young sons. her youngest just 10 months old on october 7th. now, he's had his first birthday, as best we can imagine in captivity. a time when most babies are learning to stand, say their first words, take their first steps. also among the hostages, his 4-year-old brother. a 26-year-old woman who was abducted from the nova music festival has a mother with stage 4 brain cancer whose last wish is to see her daughter one more time. i don't have a lot of time left in this world, her mother said. the oldest hostage, an 86-year-old iraqi-born carpenter and grandfather of 12. his family says he loves ice

cream. they asked the public to eat frozen treats in his honor. the desperation is beyond imaginable. >> it's been six months, the protest, of course, rising to a fever pitch. the families wondering why this has dragged on for six months. and whether netanyahu and the government's focus, according to these families of hostages, has been on getting their family members and their loved ones back. and here we are, six months later. and their frustration growing by the day at the government's policies. or lack of policies, focused on freeing the hostages. >> yeah. and the most recent, when the families of the hostages gathered together over the weekend to commemorate the six-month -- what they've been going through. not a single member of netanyahu's government attended that.

and the reason why is because all along the families have been shunned. ignored, sidelined. disrespected. netanyahu hasn't wanted a hostage deal. there's been many occasion where is he could have had a deal, but he hasn't wanted one, because that would bring about an earlier end to this war. and as we all know very well, his only method of surviving in the job he's got is to prolong this war. so, there is no constituency in israel. there is more critical and cynical about israel's prime minister than the families of the hostages. because they know that they haven't been a priority for netanyahu. and signs now that they might be becoming a priority. and that bill burns' presence as pointed out is very, very important in egypt right now. and the conversations with qatar

very, very important. the reason why there might be a deal in the offering now to release the hostages is because the biden administration is finally putting real pressure on the netanyahu government. and we see what pressure actually does do. it opens -- it opens the gates to more aid and to the gaza strip. it produces a possible hostage deal. american pressure does work. and we're seeing that happen now in realtime. so, the hostages, that's the best thing we can hope for in the next few days. and it might well happen. >> let us pray that it does, jonathan, but if you're a member of the hostage -- if you're a family of the hostage members, obviously, we've seen the frustration with the netanyahu government this weekend. and over the past several weeks,

especially, for good reason, as people who watch this show know, there's benjamin netanyahu who allowed illicit funds to continue to funnel into the coffers of hamas so they can build their war machine that they use to kill and rape and savage and kidnap israelis. it was benjamin netanyahu's government who had these plans for october 7th, a year beforehand. and netanyahu and his government ignored warning after warning after warning that hamas was coming. and the attack was coming. it was benjamin netanyahu's government that, you know, he sent the head of massad to qatar, three weeks before the attacks. and qatar's leaders asked, do you want us to keep feeding money to hamas? keep building up hamas? and netanyahu's government said, yes, of course, we do. of course, we do.

so, he continued to prop up a terrorist organization and he did. he propped up and funded by his actions a terrorist organization dedicated to killing jews, wiping israel off the face of the earth and seizing hostages and now holding them for six months. >> as we hit that six-month mark, so many of these relatives of hostages are speaking out. over the weekend, we had a family here on "morning joe" at the end of last week, it's a visceral feeling, visceral feeling for netanyahu, for allowing this to happen, great failures to allow this to happen, but not prioritize hostages. those and many in the biden administration believe that netanyahu is simply not interested in getting the hostages own because it would mean the war ending and his own grip on power could come loose. certainly, he was in dire straits before october 7th and

even more so now. and michael beschloss, across the president and advisers know there's a domestic consequence here for joe biden running for re-election. we've well documented that young progressive voters are not happy with his handling of the war. and the reporting over the weekend, also the inability to control netanyahu, sort of undermining one of his central arguments for election. the idea of competency and restoring america as a global statesman, netanyahu is just open for defiance. talk to us what you see from netanyahu, if you'd like to, but also the challenges being posed to joe biden right now. >> well, i think you've got it exactly right. i'm sure joe biden and his people do not look at this primarily through a domestic election political lens. but, you know, the democratic convention is going to be in chicago this summer. there was a pretty rocky democratic convention that came apart over a war in vietnam in 1968. the last thing they want to see

is crowds outside the convention hall protesting a war that's still going on. and a president that doesn't seem to have managed it. so, you go back to history, you know, israel is there because of the holocaust. let's remember that. on the 7th of october, it was the worst attack on the jewish people since the holocaust. at the same time, since then, tens of thousands of innocent civilians in gaza who did not need to die. and a prime minister who has stayed on against most expectations in israel after his own failures. so what does that mean? what that means, i think, historically, go back to history. almost every single israeli conflict, the americans have been strong allies of israel in most cases. but also strong critics. and your critic is your friend. 1956 suez, 1967, the six-day war. 19 sfeshgs 73, the yom kippur

war. and mika's dad applied very strict pressure on the israelis to say we think you need a camp david peace treaty that will a allow for peace in the middle east. that treaty which the americans have benefits from over 40 years never would have happened. so i think what you're seeing a president who is acting in a way that americans have -- american presidents in the context of past history. and at the same time knows that you can't get into a full election where something like this is so much in play. actors they can mess around with the american campaign by causing trouble. >> yeah. it's so interesting it's almost as if we wrote notes for each per. >>. >> exactly. >> eisenhower, suez, nixon in

'74, carter and bush. >> great minds think alike, joe. >> great minds think alike. bush 41 and the growing settlements. >> absolutely. >> where in each one of these cases, the american president said, we love you, we support you, we're not going to let you take these actions that are going to undermine our interests and long term your interests in the middle east. >> right. >> right. >> on that front, david, we have to face the fact that we're now dealing with a prime minister and many leaders who have turned their back on a two-state solution. now, i've said on this show, since october 7, i did not expect the israeli people right now to be clamoring for a two-state solution with palestinians. i completely understand why they would not want to talk about it, discuss it even imagine it. the fact is, though, the leaders have to be looking down the

road. and i wish that netanyahu and the cabinet had read your column right after october 7th, where you're talking the day after the war. we all know, as we look over the horizon, despite the feelings of the israeli people right now and, again, justified feelings, a time will come where we have to have that two-state solution. and yet, we have radicals in the israeli government. we have radicals on the palestinian side who once supported the two-state solution. who now don't even talk about it. how do we get from where we are today where it seems implausible to where we need to be, where a two-state solution is inevitable. >> so, joe, we get there by hard, careful work led by the united states. you're absolutely right, that today, a strong majority of

israelis would reject the idea of the palestinian state. they see the palestinians as implakable enemies. that's why the u.s. has to insist on a new palestinian authority, that gains the trust, first, of palestinians who thank you that p.a. has been incompetent, but who see this as a possible partner for living side by side. it's going to take a while. i think people sensibly talk about the two-state solution as a process, a horizon. that's when secretary of state antony blinken talked about it when he goes to saudi arabia, he says as this horizon dawns, we'll have normalization of relations between saudi arabia and israel. that's a big deal. so, that would be a tangible way for israelis to feel. we're moving into an era of greater security, as the p.a. gets stronger and more

competent. saudi arabia begins to have our back, not our throat. and the world begins, finally, to look for secure for israel. just one more point that we do need to touch on. even as gaza is heading toward a much lower level of conflict, it appears, the situation in the north remains extremely tense. 80,000, 100,000 israelis can't go home because of the danger of rocket fire from hezbollah. there is a feeling, i hear from my contacts in the idf, that this is going to have to be resolved maybe by military force. the hezbollah fighters are going to have to be pushed back. when this gaza conflict ends, that doesn't mean that the story is this horrific story is over. because what happens in the north has to be resolved. >> all right.

still ahead on "morning joe," a top republican lawmaker is warning that russian propaganda is being repeated on the house floor. we'll show you those new concerning remarks. "morning joe" is coming right back. t back i've struggled with generalized myasthenia gravis. but the picture started changing when i started on vyvgart. ♪♪ vyvgart is for adults with generalized myasthenia gravis who are anti-achr antibody positive. ♪♪ in a clinical trial, vyvgart significantly improved most participants' ability to do daily activities when added to their current gmg treatment. most participants taking vyvgart also had less muscle weakness.

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her uncle's unhappy. i'm sensing an underlying issue. it's t-mobile. it started when we tried to get him under a new plan. but they they unexpectedly unraveled their “price lock” guarantee. which has made him, a bit... unruly. you called yourself the “un-carrier”. you sing about “price lock” on those commercials. “the price lock, the price lock...” so, if you could change the price, change the name! it's not a lock, i know a lock. so how can we undo the damage? we could all unsubscribe and switch to xfinity. their connection is unreal. and we could all un-experience this whole session. okay, that's uncalled for. we got to be ready to govern if we're going to turn this mess around 180 degrees. we got to get through this difficult time. my job is to keep everybody together and rolling in the same direction, our mission is to save the country. without the majority, we have

none. >> that was house speaker mike johnson acknowledging the challenge his party faces as republican dysfunction on capitol hill continues to drive a wave of house retirements. so far, at least 21 house republicans have decided to leave their jobs this year, a trend that shows signs of a broader drop in morale. within the gop. so why is this happening? setting aside difficulties in passing legislation, the party's inability to govern, and growing fears of maintaining the majority in november. after wisconsin congressman mike gallagher resigns next friday, republicans will control 217 house seats to the democrats' 213, meaning republicans can only afford to lose one vote when all the members are present. out of the 21 leaving, some have included powerful committee chairs and rising stars inside the party. at least five are seeking higher

office, while others plan to spend more time with the family. or pursue other opportunities away from capitol hill. and it's not just members of congress heading for the exits, it's their staffers as well. in a new report, the congressional management foundation found that the toxic rhetoric and partisanship have made half of the senior staff on the hill consider leaving public service. the survey sums up the feeling in washington with just three words, quote, congress is broken. the nonprofit whose stated goal is to improve lawmaker effectiveness also found that the desire to head to the doors is higher among democratic staff members but also almost 6 in 10 republican staffers said they thought about leaving because of their own party's actions. so, in many ways, it feels like the wheels are falling off the bus. >> yeah. >> because of his extreme

partisanship. in terms of projects of getting things down is the border deal. the bipartisan border deal. >> the data, michael bechloss going this is calculated to not get things done because they have people in their caucus, unlike a lot of the committee chairmen and chairwomen. but there are a lot of people in that republican caucuses who are interested in gestures. they're interested in posting on tiktok. >> true. >> what they're doing. instead of working. you know, i was -- i was was stunned by almost all ratings, one of the most conservative members of congress while i was there. every time i walked the house floor, i took a term and sat with democrats. i have many democratic friends that i still have.

and we got things done. talk about how radically things have changed, especially over the last five, six years. they've been getting worse. i mean, my friends there have told me they're getting worse for some time. >> i think this is what trump wants. >> talk about how monumentally bad they've gotten now if a republican talks to a democrat donald trump is going to tweet at them, you know, sand say they're communists. >> right. and they're all terrified. and i do not want to put you on the spot this morning, but i have to tell you, joe, a number of times, i have watched this program. and wondered if under current conditions in congress if the young idealistic joe scarborough would have wanted to run for congress in 1994, to be in the midst of all of this. >> no. >> i don't want an answer, i'm just telling you that question has been on my mind. >> yeah. >> and it's totally out of keeping with what james madison and the founders wanted.

they wanted them to duke it out. this is not the british monarchy. they thought the best policy would come out of big policy fights but at the same time, they expected negotiation, they expected compromise, they expected even friendship as you pointed out from the senate and house and different parties, and it doesn't happen. and i can't help but think that donald trump and the people around them think they will benefit if the entire system looks broken. if you get a border deal, that may suggest that congress works. if you bought one and it doesn't happen and the border gets of course it allows trump to say i'm wronging for leadership in a system that is not working. >> yeah. >> so, you have to think there's a cynical candidate here. >> admiral stavridis, house committee chair mike turner says he's heard some of his republican colleagues repeat russian propaganda on the house floor. let's take a look at his new remarks.

>> we see, directly, coming from russia, attempts to mask communications that are anti-ukraine. and pro-russia messages, some of which we even here uttered on the house floor. there are those who say this conflict with russia and ukraine is between nato, which it is not. they've made it clear this view is it's a conflict of broader claim. to the extent that this prop gand ga takes hold, it makes it more difficult for to us really see this as an authoritarian versus democracy battle which is what it is, spread xi of china, vladimir putin himself identified it as such. we need to stand up for democracy. we need to make certain that we know that authoritarian regimes never stop when they start aggression. ukrainians need assistance now and this is a critical time for

the u.s. congress to step up and provide that aid. >> wow, it's so important to hear him say that, chairman mccaul has spoken out clearly and unequivocally in support of ukraine. >> and similarly with news last week, house foreign affairs committee chairman michael mcfaul has said i think russian propaganda has made its way into the united states, unfortunately and it's affected a big chunk of my party's base. admiral stavridis, you can talk about what's going on here, the big picture and what the dangers are? >> i'd love to, by the way, the two chairmen you just showed are grown-ups on the house floor. >> yeah. >> i agree with them on everything, but in the realm of national security and intelligence, they are the best the republican party will produce for those seats. and i've worked particularly with mike turner when i was supreme allied commander of nato. he was the head of the nato

parliamentary association connecting our congress with the parliaments and many of the nato members. what are the dangers? that's what we got to focus on right now. it is precisely what mike turner laid out a moment ago, chairman turner. it is the infection, and i use that word deliberately, of big chunks of the republican party with propaganda that is flowing, not only from moscow, but increasingly from beijing. and to the chairman point, the danger here, mika, is the fact that putin will not stop at ukraine. what's in his head are, at a minimum, the borders of the old union of soviet socialist republics. which news flash included moldova, lithuania and all three

of nato. dangers are if we back away with providing this sensible amount of aid to ukraine, we can count on vladimir putin pushing forward, we'll end up in a collision with nato and the russian federation which, believe me, is a collision we want to avoid, they want to avoid and the world wants to avoid. >> ed luce, let's bring you in on this. obviously, we have daily reports from ukraine, about ukraine soldiers running outside of ammunition. russia making slow, grinding steady progress. real fears of another initiative of russian offensive in the months ahead. with the russian propaganda being bandied about the floor. this ukraine aid bill top of mind for many, what's your sense of as what can come of this. speaker johnson has said in

recent days trying to get some form of bill through. he suggested instead of a senate bill he might try to create his own which is unclear if democrats would go for that. it also means if there's a coup attempt for johnson by marjorie taylor greene and others that democrats may not help him. how do you see it? >> we've been talking about the six-month anniversary of gaza, we're coming on the six-month anniversary of speaker johnson being elected. and he elected this ukraine funding need and has done nothing for six months just avoided and used excuses not to put this to the floor. and if it were put to the floor as chairmens mccaul and turner show, you would get a clear majority in the house voting for new aid for ukraine. so, i don't know what the

precise contours of this package will look like, but i think we have deep grounds for skepticism that it won't include things that marjorie taylor greene and lauren boebert would like to see. coming just after the key collapse in baltimore, the next guest was tackles economic fallout at that busy port. congresswoman gina raimondo brings us an update straight ahead on "morning joe." the only migraine medication that helps treat and prevent, all in one. to those with migraine, i see you. for the acute treatment of migraine with or without aura and the preventive treatment of episodic migraine in adults. don't take if allergic to nurtec odt. allergic reactions can occur, even days after using. most common side effects were nausea, indigestion, and stomach pain. it's time we all shine.

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this building which is kind of where you got your start in comedy at the improv -- >> yes. that's where i bombed hundreds if not thousands of times. there's a slight ptsd factor here. >> sure. >> i'm already hearing "get off the stage!" you're funnier than this guy, go to hell, you know.

>> coming up, willie's "sunday sitdown" with larry david who has closed out his hit show "curb your enthusiasm" last night after 12 hilarious seasons. that conversation is just ahead on "morning joe."

welcome back. last night it was the final episode of "curb." i can't believe it. i love him. is that okay? >> it's fine. >> "curb your enthuenthusiasm" on hbo for the last episode.

we won't give any spoilers, but we heard it was pretty, pretty, pretty good. willie spent the day with larry david walking around hell's kitchen in new york city. >> that's where i got banned from. >> which became an episode. >> you're banned from the store. you're banned! >> what am i going to do for fruit? >> he gave me bad fruit. >> the groundwork for those famous "seinfeld" moments was here on the gritty streets of hell's kitchen. >> when i'd go home at night because it was such a terrible neighborhood, i'd pretend to be a drug addict so i wouldn't get mugged. i'd be walking home like this.

>> and people would stay away? >> and people would stay away, yeah. i moved here in 1973. when i'd come home i'd take my army boots off and go in the bathroom and turn the light on and attack the roaches in the tub. >> it was a routine every night? >> every night, yeah. light on, boom, boom, boom. >> was the army boot from your time in the reserve with the petroleum storage unit? >> yeah. after i was walking around with it for a couple of years, i noticed they became popular. >> your fashion between real life and "curb" is similar. is that fair to say? >> it's the same thing. i haven't shopped in 24 years. >> you just take it off the rack. >> i take it right from the

show. now i'm going to have to buy my own clothes, i guess. >> my name is george. i'm unemployed and i live with my parents. >> david wrote george costanza as a stand-in for himself. kramer was inspired by kenny kramer, david's former neighbor. >> how much was kramer like the real kenny kramer? >> only for the propensity to stay in the apartment and avoid employment as much as possible. i wanted to sublet. they didn't allow you to sublet. the only way i could get to my apartment was to buzz the real kramer, larry david here to see you. kramer never left the apartment so he'd say send him up.

i'd go up into my apartment. it's an odd way to live. >> it takes a lot to return produce. >> produce is very tricky. you've got to get them on the right day. sometimes they don't let you touch them. >> hand off. >> cantaloupe, how are you supposed to buy that without touching it? coming up, we'll break down last night's thrilling national championship game in women's college basketball. and to preview tonight's game on the men's side between purdue and uconn. plus a look at the night hank aaron broke the all-time home run record 50 years ago today. "morning joe" is back in a moment. "morning joe" is back in a moment

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a united airlines fright from germany was forced to return to the airport after the toilet broke and leaked into the cabin. it's the perfect punishment for people who take their shoes off on planes. >> i'm not -- okay. welcome to the fourth hour of "morning joe." it's 6:00 a.m. on the west coast, 9:00 a.m. in the east. joining us now, former white house director of communications to president obama jennifer palmieri. after repeatedly dodging questions about whether he would sign a national abortion ban if reelected, donald trump unveiled his thoughts this morning on the issue.

in a 4 1/2 minute video posted on truth social, the former president said he supports ivf treatments. that's nice. once again, he said he is proud to have ended roe v wade and said the issue should be left to individual states. >> many people have asked me what my position is on abortion and abortion rights, especially since i was proudly the person responsible for the ending of something that all legal scholars, both sides, wanted and, in fact, demanded be ended, roe v wade. my view is now that we have abortion where everybody wanted it from a legal standpoint, the states will determine by vote or legislation or perhaps both, and whatever they decide must be the law of the land, in this case the law of the state. >> taking some breathing exercises here. i'm going to go to jen palmieri. many people say that's why a lot

of voters will go democratic on election day because of what he did to women's health. >> he made the overturning of roe v wade possible. he's proud to do that. he's endangered the health of millions of women in doing so. in saying the states should decide, he's embracing the most extreme bans, which are the six-week bans taking effect may 1 in florida and have already taken effect in other states. women are being denied critical care. doctors are not sure what they can do about ivf. two years on from this decision, we're feeling the real impacts for women, for doctors, for med students. you know, he is embracing the only position that he probably can given what his record is.

you know, i think it is going to be a hugely resonating issue with women and men both come november. >> there's no question of that. every election since the overturning of roe v wade has been decided in part by abortion. the biden campaign already has clipped that video from trump on truth social and put it in a digital campaign ad highlighting the part where he said he was proud to overturn roe v wade. trump is in a little bit of a bind. he's already been criticized by some pro life groups saying he's not come out far enough. let's be clear, this is still him supporting some states' draconian measures to outlaw abortion. he is touting that he's the one to appoint the supreme court

justices who overturned set law. >> i'm surprised that he jumped into the fray, because i did think he was going to try to keep avoiding and making vague statements and not really giving that much to be pinned down on. in that sense, i'm surprised he went forward on this. he knows it is his worst issue coming up in 2024, just like democrats know that immigration is their worst issue and something that voters are upset about. this is something that motivates democratic women, suburban women that democrats need to win. >> he's in the middle here, as far as he's going to be picked apart now by both sides. his position, though, by

adopting the florida ban, the six-week ban and all the other bans out there that are draconian, such an extreme position. it's a no-win situation for him if he doesn't come out with what other republicans are talking about like a 15-week ban, something like that. again, he's taken the extreme position. i go back to you, because we always talk about that focus group you did in atlanta even with the most extreme trumpers, men saying not my business. i suspect it's going to be that way in atlanta, philadelphia, charlotte, milwaukee, detroit, philly. just devastating. >> some prominent strategists believe the election is going to come down to what they're calling dobbs dads, those

conservative men who are infuriated about the government restrictions on health care that women in their lives have that the government has gotten so involved in basic women's health care. those are voters that biden needs to keep. they tend to lean more conservative, and they cross over and they were voting republican. this continues to be an issue at the forefront. that's a good thing for democrats. >> meanwhile, trump is promising to extend his tax cuts for the wealthy if reelected at a private fundraiser on saturday which cost a minimum of $250,000 to attend. trump spoke about securing our southern border, reducing inflation and extending the trump tax cuts. that's according to his campaign, which declined to request to have a reporter present or to make a transcript of trump's remarks available. next year, some of the key

provisions of trump's 2017 tax cuts are set to expire, including a break that benefits hedge funds, private equity partnerships and privately held companies. after saturday's fundraiser, trump bragged on truth social about the money his campaign brought in, which was reportedly north of $50 million. in response, the biden campaign started posting photos of some of the, quote, scammers, racists and extremists it says are funding trump's 2024 run. >> it's a perfect look if you're joe biden for trump once again doing what he did the night the tax cut for the rich passed. he went to mar-a-lago, had dinner with billionaires and said, i just made you a lot richer today. he's done it again. he likes to highlight this,

because it makes him feel powerful. for the biden campaign, this is a extreme come true. of course, instead of focusing on tax cuts for billionaires and hedge fund managers and running over issued like carried interest, you have joe biden talking about building from the middle out, looking at tax cuts for small business owners, tax cuts for family restaurants, tax cuts for young entrepreneurs trying to break into the market. that's where we need to focus. so you have trump, who of course loves the richest of the rich and has passed tax cuts for the richest of the rich. then you have another candidate talking about building from the middle class out. tax cuts for small business owners, tax cuts for family restaurants, tax cuts for businesses on main street, whether it's barbershops,

hardware stores, family restaurants. that's where the focus needs to be, not with trump's billionaire buddies. >> the middle building out is exactly where you need to be and exactly where the voters will be. i think if the biden/harris team and the dnc puts out the contrast, trump with the billionaires, joe biden with trying to help small businesses, joe biden on the picket line when there was the strike with the autoworkers, donald trump playing golf with billionaire scammers, i think the contrast will help them a lot. and, again, reminding voters he bragged about his supreme court overturning dobbs, voting rights, affirmative action. the contrast will bring people

in who may not be excited otherwise. >> it's time that somebody -- and a think the biden campaign is starting to do this -- it's time to call out the populism. the guy who has working americans voting for him being aspirational. yet, what does he do? he helps the largest income distribution scheme in the history of the world. you look where the money is going. just look at it! this is basic economics. look at the data over the past 40 years. the middle class has been hollowed out. billionaires and corporations wealthier than ever, taking a bigger percentage than ever. the only time that's turned around in the past 40 years that's turned around is over the past three years. it's a pretty good story to

tell. >> first of all, trump has to have the approbation of billionaires. he can't resist saying look what i'm going to do for you. the biden team doesn't necessarily think that polling will show that people trust biden with the economy more than trump, but they know they can prove that trump is in it for himself and people like him. he is not in it for you. you just heard that come out of his own mouth. he's saying that himself at mar-a-lago. the third thing, you can make the argument of how are you going to pay for those tax cuts? by repealing the good foundation of the programs that made this good new economic foundation. the republican congress led by

trump will get rid of the infrastructure money, the chips and sciences money, the climate change provisions. they will roll that back. so you can make this argument that he is in it for himself, and also what is working for you, they're going to take away to pay for these tax cuts. >> as a conservative who was there when we balanced the budget four years in a row for the first time since the 1920s, they'll do what they did last time. they'll blow a hole in the deficit. they will have what donald trump had last time, the largest deficit in history, trump and the republican congress, the largest debt in history. i tell you what else he'll do. he talks about it, then he pulls back, which we know what that means.

he's going to do it when he gets a chance. that is cut social security. andrew ross sorkin, i want to talk to you about janet yellen saying she's not going to rule out tariffs on china's green exports. but first let's talk about cutting social security. >> he put it on the table very much so. i know there's been some debate on exactly what he said about that and how far he would go. if you go back and look at the clip, there's a little bit more nuance to it than i'm going to start cutting entitlements completely. >> no. but he put that out as an option. >> absolutely. if you're going to balance the budget, eventually one of the ways you're going to do is probably to raise taxes on one end and cut entitlements on the other. i'm not putting it in the category of completely irrational, however, it has

completely been the third rail of politics for as long as we can remember you can't really talk about. that is something donald trump has done many times. he talked about things most people won't. to the extent there are people who support him at all out there, that is one of the reasons they do. >> let's talk about china. reporting inside the white house says that president xi for the first time in some time was eager for this phone call. he and joe biden had a good, long phone call ahead of janet yellen going to china. now janet yellen is talking about the possibly of tariffs on china's green exports. what's that about? >> there is a deep distrust between the chinese and the americans. this is janet yellen's second time in china in the past year and a half. she is trying to mend fences, but at the same time she's trying to figure out what can we

do on the tiktok front and what can they do when it comes to exports. there's such an oversupply of product in china and there's a worry it's being dumped right here in the united states specifically as it relates to e.v.s and batteries and the like and whether we're going to have to put tariffs on. i don't think there's that much movement on any of this. not to say this is theater, but a lot of what the chinese are now doing, they're trying to wait and see where things really stand come november of this year. are they going to be dealing with president biden and, therefore, secretary yellen? or are they dealing with a completely different group of people and what their priorities are going to be? this was a bit of a holding pattern kind of meeting to keep everybody on sides to the extent that they can.

>> china now doing what russia did, getting engaged in campaign disinformation for the benefit of trump, because they think he's easier to manipulate and they think they can get better deals out of him. finally, i got to ask you what's the feel on wall street this morning after yet another big jobs report? are all hopes dashed for two rate cuts this year? or does optimism still spring eternal? >> i think we're now at the point of two rate cuts this year. that is the expectation. there's a letter that came out this morning from jamie dimon, the ceo of jp morgan. one of the things he said was, despite the economy being quite

strong, that he is very worried about persistent inflation. we keep talking about can you get inflation down. he says, look, there are persistent inflationary pressures, including fiscal spending, global trade. all of these things over time are going to keep the pressure on inflation. the idea that we're going to get back to 2% any time soon is a long shot. the question some people are asking this morning is, does the federal reserve need to revise its thinking? is 2% too low? is 3% the better number? it doesn't mean the fed is ever going to say we're not going back to 2%, but they may not be rushing to get there. >> cnbc's andrew ross sorkin, thank you very much for coming on this morning. coming up on "morning joe,"

south carolina scripts a perfect ending to its undefeated season. we'll break down the women's title game and preview tonight's men's championship between purdue and uconn. plus, today marks 50 years since the swing that helped hank aaron achieve baseball immortality. we'll look at its lasting impact next on "morning joe." s lastingt next on "morning joe." liberty mutual customized my car insurance and i 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. ♪

♪♪ president biden will travel the critical battleground state of wisconsin today to announce his plans for student debt relief. in the college town of madison, biden is expected to highlight a plan the education department has begun working on and still has been working on since the supreme court struck down his

administration's original policy to ease student debt to a greater degree. meanwhile, on friday president biden visited baltimore to receive an update on the collapse of the francis scott key bridge. he met with the families of the victims of the accident. he called upon congress to authorize the payment for the rebuilding of the bridge. he promised the people of baltimore, quote, your nation has your back. on that trip, the biden campaign put out a video showing how donald trump treated governors and mayors in moments of crisis when he was in the office compared to joe biden. >> so i think california ought to get their act together and clean up their forests and manage their forests, because it's disgraceful. they better get their act together. some of these governors, you know, they take, take, take and then they complain. you have the mayor of san juan who's incompetent.

she doesn't know what she's doing. she's a totally incompetent person. >> in the weeks to come, i want you to know we're going to have your back every step of the way. i guarantee it. >> such a huge difference. let's bring in right now u.s. secretary of commerce gina ramondo. let's talk about the tragedy in baltimore and the impact on commerce. how does it make it through this very difficult time that can stretch over years? >> good morning. good to be with you. as the president said, this is going to be a long row to hoe and we have their back. i spoke with governor moore just a week ago. we at the commerce department are working with individual companies all over the country to try to help them navigate the

challenges to their supply chain. i'm working with the governor and his team to help small businesses and big businesses in baltimore who have been affected by this tragedy. it's not going to happen overnight. i've been a governor. i know the difference it makes when a president and his team reaches out to the governor in the tragedy. we're going to continue to work with the governor and the people in baltimore to get their economy back up on their feet and work with businesses all over america to help them navigate the disruption. >> this is about a national issue. why the federal government government should be involved because supply chains are involved here that could impact people across the country and the world. any idea, speaking to government officials and officials in maryland and baltimore, how long a rebuild of this bridge will

take? >> that's a better question for the experts. this is not an overnight tragedy, which is why it's so important that the president is saying we've got your back. we have to be in this for the long haul. the point you made is so important. of course we're standing with baltimore, but there's companies all over america who ship through that port. my team is working day and night literally with companies to help them find alternative ports and logistics plans. we're going to get through it and stay at it as long as it takes. >> the biden administration also is announcing this morning the taiwan semiconductor manufacturing company is set to receive up to $6.6 billion in grants that will help bring the most cutting-edge semiconductors to the united states.

when you look at what this administration has done regarding semiconductors, this is almost like our sputnik moment. it's so critical that the federal government, the biden administration, you have gotten involved and focused on how important this is for american competitiveness, but also american national security. >> this is a sputnik moment. the president is delivering. this is huge, joe. this is the first time in a long time that the united states of america will be manufacturing leading-edge semiconductor chips in the united states on our soil with american workers. i can't overemphasize how important this is. by the way, all artificial intelligence runs on these chips. this is an important piece of

legislation now that a.i. is the defining technology of our time. this creates jobs, brings back the chip supply chain to america. it makes america stronger. i really think 20 or 30 years from now we'll look back at this moment as a turning point in the semiconductor supply chain and advancing manufacturing in the united states of america. >> madam secretary, good morning. can you go a little deeper into that kind of detail? i think people aren't quite certain what it would mean to have a semiconductor plant built here. there's the actual production of the chips, but there are spinoff jobs not just for construction but i imagine for other industries. what does it mean to be able to

make this technology here, and how does it affect other parts of the economy in the u.s.? >> good morning, jen. we lived the pain during covid of what it's like not to be able to get semiconductors. during covid, there was a time when gm and ford were furloughing thousands of autoworkers because they couldn't get access to the chips they needed to make a car. in your car, there are over a thousand chips. in your computer there's chips, in your phone there's chips. if we can't access them because they're all made in one or two countries in asia, that can bring our whole economy to a halt and destabilize americans who are put out of work. by the way, not to mention the chips that are in military equipment, satellites, drones and all artificial intelligence.

by making this announcement, what the president is saying is we're going to secure america's jobs by making sure we produce this stuff in the united states and we'll be creating hundreds of thousands of new high-paying, family-supporting manufacturing jobs. for me, it is personal. you know, my dad worked in manufacturing. he always said there's something special about making a living making things. this is making the most sophisticated chips in the world in the united states with american labor. >> it is so critically important. u.s. secretary of commerce gina ramondo, thank you very much for being with us. we'll be right back with espn's jay bilas on march madness. and the 50th anniversary of hank

aaron breaking babe ruth's home run record. we're just a few hours away from that total solar eclipse. please do not follow the advice of bruce springsteen blinded by the light or by example donald trump the last time we saw it. ed trump the last time we saw it. i was scared when i was told age related macular degeneration could jeopardize my vision. it was hard, but taking preservision was easy. preservision has the exact clinically proven areds 2 formula recommended by the nei. i'm taking control like millions of others.

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won its third national championship. >> south carolina with a win over iowa in the ncaa women's basketball championship. caitlin clark is expected to be the first overall pick in next week's wnba draft. let's bring in college basketball analyst for espn jay bilas. first of all, let's talk about south carolina, the dynasty they've built there. more importantly, for the long run, what has this year meant for women's college basketball? >> joe, south carolina was magnificent, not only in the championship game and the final four, but all season long. i'm not sure how many basketball observers expected that before the season started, because dawn

staley lost her entire starting line-up from last year's team that went to the final four and wound up losing to iowa. to do that with a basically completely new team, it's hard to put into words how amazing that is. you have to thank caitlin clark for the impact of this season. the viewing numbers were literally off the charts for women's college basketball this year. it's largely because of caitlin clark. she's one of the great players of all time. she's the all-time leading scorer in women's college basketball. what is beyond debate is that

caitlin clark is the most impactful college basketball player on the women's side than we've ever seen. she brought more eyeballs to this game, more interest. we've never seen her like before in the game. i doubt from the impact standpoint we'll ever see her like again. >> extraordinary. this usc team got a bunch of transfers. reminds me of alabama last year. alabama was supposed to have lost most of their stars. it reminds me of what i heard jay wright say at halftime of a march madness game talking about kentucky. he said college basketball has changed. the days when you can recruit hotshot freshmen are over, because now they be the best three or four years from now, but they're going to be going up

against seniors who have plaed for one or two different teams who just have the experience. talk about that change. we can throw kentucky into the mix because cal perry can recruit the best players in the country. they just leave after their freshman year. >> yeah, that does happen. there are still one-and-done players. i generally agree with jay wright, but i think that's always been true. you would always rather have talent and experience rather than inexperienced talent. coaches were able to bring in so many super talented freshman that they could go to a final four and win a national championship with that inexperienced super talent. for most coaches, they can't get that type of talent in larger

numbers. the choice is now can we go into the transfer portal and get experienced players over a new younger player that may be a little bit more talented. we're certainly seeing that. because of the transfer portal and what you've said and pointed out, you can restock a team a lot quicker than you could years ago. you used to have to build over time, and now you can have a ready made team of talented players through the transfer portal. that's what you'll see them do. >> first, let's turn to the national title game tonight, purdue versus uconn. uconn, of course the favorite, the storied program there. how do you think tonight's going

to go? >> uconn is the best team. now, the best team doesn't always win in these games. the matchup that everybody is going to want to see is going to be zach edey of purdue. he's put up numbers in this tournament that put him alongside the true greats of this game. he's going to be going against donovan clingan, who's 7'2" and a sophomore and who has been a monster in this tournament. another matchup is at the point guard position. braden smith of purdue is the second leading assist man in the country. he's one of the best guard rebounders in the country. he's likely going to be matched

up with stephan castle. if purdue doesn't turn the ball over, they're going to have a chance. but they turned it over 16 times in the national semifinal against nc state. if they do that again, uconn is going to have their way. if purdue turns it over, they don't get a shot. they don't get a chance to get fouled. purdue spends a lot of time at the free throw line. >> i'll note again that a 9:20 p.m. tip-off is brutal for those of us in morning television. let's go back to the news of a stunning move to arkansas. what do you know? >> it's a great get for

arkansas. john calipari is a winner, a proven champion. in kentucky their expectations are so high. even john had raised the bar there to where final fours were expected every year. in the last four years when the transfer portal came in, he got some really good players. but the last four years they hadn't made it past the second round of the tournament. the kentucky fans were grumbling. there were some losses this year and a couple in a row. i think it was three in a row. it became a difficult atmosphere. john calipari is a smart guy. he had a lifetime contract there. he'll do very well at arkansas.

i'm surprised by the timing of it. i guess, this is the time of year for it. but i'm not surprised that he decided to make a move. >> espn's college basketball analyst jay bilas, thank you so much. >> thank you. 50 years ago tonight, april 8th, 1974, one of the most famous swings in major league baseball history when hank aaron hit career home run number 715, surpassing a milestone set by babe ruth decades earlier. that moment, memorialized by the late great sportscaster, vince scully. >> one ball, no strikes. fastball. there's a high fly to deep left center field. it is gone!

what a marvelous moment for baseball. what a marvelous moment for atlanta and the state of georgia. what a marvelous moment for the country and the world. a black man is getting a standing ovation in the deep south for breaking a record of an all-time baseball idol. it is a great moment for all of us and particularly for henry aaron. >> what a great moment. it made the front pages of every major paper from coast to coast. aaron would go onto hit another 40 home runs before retiring. in the half century since that

historic day, only one other player has surpassed hank's record. let's bring in mike barnicl. first, rev, i was born in atlanta in the '60s. it was the land of lester maddox, eventually the last of jimmy carter. but the atmosphere that surrounded hank aaron during this chase of babe ruth was, in one sense for him, very concerning, but the impact on kids like me who will still tell you hank aaron is my single greatest sports hero, always will be. there will never be a close

second. a remarkable man. like jackie robinson, who showed so much dignity, this man showed the greatest of dignity through his entire lifetime. what an extraordinary man, what an extraordinary player coming at an extraordinary time in american history. >> no doubt about it. and all that you've said you can also say had even more of a meaning to black americans that had seen hank aaron and his family under threat, you better not break that record. he operated with grace. he never would say anything. i was 19 going on 20 at that time. i remember the older civil rights leaders that i grew up under were talking about this is going to be a great day like when jackie robinson broke the color line. he did it in '48.

this was our moment where we saw a guy break a record as a black, but he did it with such dignity and pride that everyone was proud. atlanta in the deep south embraced it and stood with it. it was just a great moment not only for the sport, but for the country. when i met hank aaron a couple times, he talked about how when he moved from milwaukee, he played for the milwaukee braves, he had some trepidation about going back south to atlanta because he grew up in alabama in deep segregation. he was embraced by atlanta and he made history there in the capital of the old south. >> born in mobile, alabama. there's only one word that keeps coming to mind with hank aaron, dignity, dignity in baseball, dignity in life, dignity in retirement. what an extraordinary example,

you know, for all of our kids, but especially for kids like me growing up in the deep south. >> i was so lucky to speak frequently on the phone with him in the last years of his life. i called him mr. aaron out of complete respect. this is a kid from mobile who started out in the pros making $200 a month with the indianapolis clowns of the american negro league. he was born in the '30s, but he considered himself a child of the great jackie robinson. they were friends. he talked all the time about how jackie taught me to never take no for an answer. he taught me to constantly bear down, but never bow down. he kept those letters that al was just talking about because he said they're part of my story

too. one day he said to me, i wasn't trying to break babe ruth's record. i was just trying to set my own. that's exactly what he did. it's not just a seminal moment in baseball history, it's a seminole moment in american history and it happened all that time after jackie robinson broke the color barrier. >> he was such an extraordinary athlete. one of the funny stories about how he began, he actually held the bat wrong. he actually had his hands he actually had his hands reversed and got it corrected later. it's one of the things that a lot of baseball experts said actually, because he had to swing this way -- swing this

way, when he reversed it, you see the wrists snapping. it's one of those flukes that made him an extraordinary hitter. >> yeah, he was an extraordinary hitter, joe. he was a very strong hitter. he had wrists like you never seen before. his real strength, reverend al pointed this out, his real strength was his character. he was along the lines of jackie robinson, larry dobby. hank aaron carried a quiet strength and character throughout his career. bud sealy became one of his closest friends. he became one of hank aaron's closest friends in the latter years of hank aaron's life. he would tell you the litany of threats, protests, threats of violence against he and his family that followed him

throughout the years -- as mike pointed out, he had no intention of beating babe ruth's record. he performed every single day under threat of violence somewhere around him and look at him. look at him today. a tremendously strong character that people could copy in business or sports, any time. >> it's a good thing -- it's a good thing -- i'm glad he was friends with bud sealy because he certainly wasn't friends with booey kuhn while he was making the charge. he seemed to make the run more difficult every day. >> joe, always remember this about mr. aaron. he was 6 feet tall and 180 pounds. his home run hits kept getting bigger and bigger. he said the only thing i ever took was chewing gum. i'll tell you something else about him.

.715 and .755 he hit. the big number for him was the number of rbis he hit. he said i hated striking out and leaving a runner on base. >> he was a great home run hitter, mike, but also a great hitter. for average, rbis, you name it. >> joe, he once said to me he can't believe he never won the triple crown. he said, i should have won two or three. >> mike barnacle? >> his consistency was phenomenal. when he broke that record 50 years ago today, at that time he hit 364 home runs on the road, 350 home runs at home. i mean, that's a consistent hitter. he was first a consistent hitter. then he was a home run hitter, but he was a great hitter all the way around. >> mike barnacle, mike lupica,

the mikes, thank you for the conversation. ahead on "morning joe," a new documentary looking at america's food system and its effects on our health, the workforce and on our planet. we'll speak with the producers when we come back in 90 seconds. freestylelibre.us.

you sit down to eat. when the pandemic hit, the cure tan was peeled back. there were whole crops being buried. at the same time there were shortages in the supermarket. that's not the only problem. >> working in the fields our work is essential, but we as people were treated as disposable. >> how could i work for these billion dollar companies and feed all these people all to come home and hear my son's stomach growl? >> we'll create health and well being in all aspects of our lives. >> i want rural america to be vibrant again. >> we're not going to let some big mouth senator from montana stop us. that's "food inc. 2." the new installment looks at the immense power the food industry has in controlling nearly every

aspect of food production. the documentary makes the argument that corporate consolidation has left the nation's food system vulnerable in the wake of the covid pandemic. joining us now co-producers of the film. thank you for being here. gentlemen, congrats on this. eric, let's start with you. why was a follow up needed to the 2008 version? >> a lot has changed. the pandemic revealed how fragile our food system is. suddenly hogs were being slaughtered and buried, not eaten and there were huge lines of people waiting for food. it made us think, what's going on? one of the things that changed is the growth of monopoly power and consolidation. when you try to understand the political extremism in america today and the inequality, it's because a handful of companies have taken over our food system.

we've lost half the cattle ranchers in the united states since 1980, 90% of hog farmers and more than 90% of our dairy farmers. in between new york and los angeles the heartland is being hollowed out by this corporate consolidation. >> what should the government do? should they be enforcing anti-trust laws? it's devastating when you go to a rural place like where i grew up. there used to be a lot of families who gained their livelihood from farming. it was a really hard way to go. risks with the weather. you could have a bad year. you know, the weather failed. it was a livelihood. how can we bring farming back to american communities and make it a viable occupation again? >> anti-trust is crucial. you know, a market is said to be controlled by oligarchs when

there are four companies that control more than 40% of the market. take beef for example. in the 1970s four companies controlled about 25% of the market for beef. now four companies control 85% of the market for beef. you go through one sector after another. what happens is the middle class is being affected and the money is being kept by a small number of companies and not given to farmers or workers. you look at the stagnate wages of the typical american workers and the rise of ceo wages, it's extraordinary. i'll give one example and stop talking. in california there's debate about the new minimum wage for fast food workers. the median wage of a fast food worker in california is $15,000 a year. in 2021 the ceo of mcdonald's made $20 million a year. what that means is the typical

fast food worker would have to work for 1,300 years to earn what the ceo earned. >> a galling statistic. michael, give us a sense as to the impact of the covid pandemic exacerbated the problems. >> it exposed it. it peeled back the curtain on the american food system. if something goes wrong with one of these companies, we all feel it. we had a recent example with baby formula. only two countries control baby formula. when one had a contamination event, babies went hungry. you know, the lesson here is you don't put all your eggs in one basket. that applies to the corporations feeding us. we need diversity and that will also help bring