with me, yes, because of coming from a similar place and having similar interests. that's a great question. >> fantastic. >> thank you. >> well done, leo. >> that was a great question, something we can all learn from michael and leo, take your time, be kind. on that note, i want to wish you a good night. stephanie ruhle will be back tomorrow night. you can get me saturdays and sunday mornings on my show, the weekend, starting at 8:00 a.m. eastern right here on msnbc. from all of our colleagues across the networks of nbc news, thanks for staying up late. i will see you this weekend. last summer a tiktok account posted this video that had an explosive claim. the video claimed the daughter of a former ukrainian defense

minister had purchased this luxury villa in spain, which is the video claimed was worth 7 million euro. the implication was the money the u.s. and foreign governments to ukraine for weapons was actually just being embezzled by ukrainian leaders to buy luxury homes abroad. but, the whole thing was made up. a joint investigation by the bbc and the atlanta council digital forensic research lab found this video was part of a massive russian influence campaign, one that used social media to push the very specific line that ukrainian officials were taken for in cash and buying homes abroad. that lie has now been thoroughly debunked. yet, here was that very specific piece of russian disinformation coming out of the mouth of a sitting u.s. senator yesterday. >> we are thinking about giving

ukraine more money to waste it. these people can't buy any more houses. this got beach houses all over the world. let's start thinking about our country. >> that was u.s. senator and a member of the senate armed services committee, tommy tuberville, parroting russian disinformation. senator tommy tuberville is a far from the only official setting this. last november, a russian disinformation website disguised as a local news outfit called "d.c. weekly," pushed the, again, explosive, but entirely false claim that ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy had bought two luxury yachts. totally false, incredibly specific. and, again, thoroughly debunked. that did not stop the republicans. >> there are people who would cut social security, throw our grandparents into poverty, why? so one of volodymyr zelenskyy's ministers can buy a yacht. that is not happening. >> that with senator jd vance of ohio parroting russian

disinformation. congressman marjorie taylor greene published a story pushing this same specific lie on twitter. it feels like republican elected officials have started taking russian disinformation and propaganda and just going with it. don't just take that from me. here was the republican chair of the house intelligence committee, mike turner, this sunday. >> it is true. we see directly coming from russia attempts to mask communications that are anti- ukraine and pro-russia messages, some of which we hear uttered on the house floor. >> if that is not enough for you, how about this from the republican leader of the house foreign affairs committee, michael mccall? "i think russian propaganda has made its way into the united states, unfortunately, and it has affected a good chunk of my party space." republicans used to be the

hawks in congress. they used to be reliable anti- russia vote in congress but now they are pushing a very specific, very pro-russia version of american isolationism. the russia ukraine issue has quite literally become a litmus test to see if you are enough to make it in today's republican party. >> roger wicker will spare no tax dollars to secure the border. he headed out $40 billion to ukraine instead of funding the border wall. >> america is being invaded. matt: thanks border security can take a backseat to biden's agenda in ukraine. >> ukraine treats america like their atm. there man in alabama, jerry carl. >> victorious books put ukraine first, chuck goodrich will put america first. >> those were ads for republican primary races." even as for the general election . those were ads where

republicans were trying to outflank each other, trying to show how much more conservative they were than their opponents by proudly declaring how willing they are to stop funding ukraine and to let russia win. what happened here? how did the republican party to a 180 on russia? well, like pretty much everything else in the republican party right now, the answer is trump. donald trump has not been shy about how he feels about the war in ukraine. in the first days of the war, he called what vladimir putin was doing in ukraine, "genius" and "savvy." he has since claimed if he were in charge, he would end the war in one day by telling ukraine they have to make a deal with russia. for whatever reason, and there are plenty of reasons one could speculate, trumps thinking appears very in line with that of russian president vladimir putin. at this point, most of the republican party has now fallen in line behind trump. we are

seeing all of this on display in a most spectacular fashion in the house of representatives. the body of the u.s. government with the power of the purse, the body of the u.s. government that is the most vital in terms of sending military aid to ukraine. with a majority so thin he could only afford to lose one republican vote, republican speaker of the house, mike johnson, is very much in the hot seat here. far right republican marjorie taylor greene is donald trump's soldier, trying to use that razor thin majority and the threat speaker johnson could be ousted from his position by a motion to vacate, literally any time, to push johnson and not sending any more money to ukraine. today, speaker johnson and marjorie taylor greene met behind closed doors for more than an hour to discuss congresswoman greens threat. at around the same time this afternoon, in the middle of this power struggle, sources leaked to the press speaker johnson will travel to mar-a- lago this friday to hold a press conference with donald

trump and presumably kiss his metaphorical ring. johnson and will be addressing trumps other favorite conspiracy theory, the idea that u.s. elections are rigged. what comes out of this meeting is really anyone's guess. on one hand, johnson has the fight to save ukraine. on the other, he has trump and vladimir putin. as "punch bowl news," put it, "it is clear that louisiana republican has a stark choice in front of him. passed a ukraine aid bill or remain speaker." >> how he handles funding ukraine is going to tell our entire conference how to handle the motion to vacate. >> joining me now is washington correspondent at "puck news," focusing on national security and domestic politics, julia, it is great to see you. i am so eager to hear your assessment of how and why this is happening.

the russian propaganda piece of it, which is so blatant and so obvious, is it all just a desire to curry favor with trump or do you think the roots of it extended deeper than that? >> there are a couple things here. you mentioned all of the examples of republicans parroting russian propaganda point. this week, there was a report from the kevin belton, and incredible investigative reporter in ""the washington post"," who found kremlin documents that show exactly how the kremlin and the spin doctors it hires and the social media accounts it creates, how it pushes exactly the kind of messages that you showed in those primary ads about how it is either the border or ukraine, about how ukraine is correct and how we shouldn't spend any more money on ukraine and that it is either money for ukraine or money for roads in your district, which, of course, let's be honest, republicans are not going to

vote for all the things you want in your district because they don't think the government should be providing them. the one thing democrats and republicans can usually agree on is defense spending. that is the job of government. one of the people that the kremlin spin doctors singled out in these documents was representative matt gaetz, that he was an excellent messenger for them. this goes back, how long do you have? first of all, the american conservative evangelical movement, especially the world congress of families, has been working for a long time with right-wing nationalists, anti- feminists in russia, to do things like infringe on rights, to limit abortion access, which has been illegal in russia for over 100 years, and trump was told, he was briefed on the eve of his inauguration that vladimir putin tried to help him win the election. volodymyr zelenskyy, eight to

ukraine became the stuff of the first impeachment against trump. there are all kinds of reasons that he does not like ukraine and he likes russia. and the other pieces, just pure ideological affinity. the american right-wing looks at russia, looks at vladimir putin and they see a white christian nationalist who is banning gay rights and the gay rights movement in russia, curbing women's access to abortion, who is pursuing an expansionist , imperialist military policy, who claims that he's fighting against gender-neutral bathrooms in ukraine. i'm not making this up. it is like what tucker carlson said on the very eve of the full-scale invasion in 2022. he said "why are we fighting russia? we should be allies with russia. they believe the same things

that we do." some of it is just as simple as that. >> i understand the ideological affinity and certainly tucker carlson has been very articulate on that, for lack of a better term. the general principle of supporting democracy around the world, you know, the position that has dominated much of the last 50 years of republican foreign policy has been thrown out and in its place, you have republicans acting as useful idiots on the subject of ukraine. what surprises me to some degree, julia, there's not enough self-respect, apparently among some of these republicans to understand that they are being used as tools of a propaganda machine. i understand, separate from ukraine, there is legitimate affinity as you say between what vladimir putin is doing, what republicans would like to do in the u.s. on ukraine in particular, it seems like they don't fully realize or they don't care they are being used

as tools for the kremlin. >> i wonder if they don't care. just another wedge issue and if it is just another way to deny president biden a win, a policy win, then great. if they are using, they are using russian propaganda too. russian propaganda is spreading their message. it is a two-way street. they are allies in this. so, i don't know that they care very much. as for the spreading of democracy, fighting for democracy, i asked chairman mccall about this. he said he's a reagan republican. "i try to tell people in my district, don't you believe in freedom? don't you believe in democracy?" i was like does that resonate with people in your district? he said he doesn't really know. what we have also seen is part of that ideological affinity is just an affinity for authoritarianism. in the parts of the country where the republican party dominates, you know, there has historically been an affinity for authoritarianism. in the 19th century and 20th century and in the 1930s with

the america first movement in part didn't want to get involved in a world war in europe because it was bloody and expensive but also, they didn't really see a problem with fascism. i think they don't love democracy as much as you would like them to. >> yes, and i think the figurehead at the top of their party is no big fan of democracy either, donald trump. julia ioffe, my friend, thank you for your time and expertise on this. i really appreciate it. with his job under threat, republican speaker, mike johnson, will travel to mar-a- lago to meet with donald trump, as we discussed. there, they will discuss the subject of election integrity. asked by nbc to describe what that meant to him, speaker johnson described, "free and fair elections." in 2020, johnson was one of the key architects in the house trying to overturn biden's victory.

he spearheaded a legal effort by more than 100 house republicans to support a texas lawsuit before the supreme court that would challenge the results in four key swing states, none of which was the state of texas. this right-wing obsession with imagined election fraud has taken a very real toll on actual american elections. nbc's jane tim reports election worker turnover has reached historic highs ahead of the 2024 election, with many siting threats and increased public scrutiny as reasons for their departures. joining me is senior reporter for nbc news, jane, thank you for being here. i feel like it is essential as we talk about misinformation, the real-world effect of it, the narrative of election fraud and the narrative that elections need to have more integrity, the real-world effect of that need to be examined and you've done such a great job of putting this out. can you tell me what is happening to american election workers in the wake of all of

this? >> we are seeing huge turnover in these jobs. we have new data from the bipartisan policy center that shows us that 2020 absolutely escalated a long-standing trend of election workers leaving their jobs. so, we've been talking about what election denialism might do election workers for years because these people, for good reason, these people are getting death threats. in some extreme circumstances, we are seeing people driven from their homes because of election conspiracy theories. what we now know is in large jurisdictions, where 80% of american voters live, jurisdictions with more than 100,000 voting age residents, turn over is growing very quickly after 2020. between 2018 and 2022, 46% of large jurisdictions had new election officials at the top end of these jobs are hard, they are institutional knowledge based and having people that know how to do these very difficult and complex jobs, let's remind ourselves, are constantly changing as we keep rewriting our elections. it is tough, it

makes it hard. asked people what it is like to do the stops and they say things like drinking from a fire hose. baptism by fire. these are incredibly difficult jobs and people don't want to do them anymore. they are not well-paid either. >> it sounds like, in many ways because they want to help be part of the democratic process, do the right thing, here we are effectively driving them from these jobs by making them more onerous, more dangerous and otherwise more complex. it is worth noting it is not just they have to withstand the existing narratives of election fraud, increased scrutiny, they are changing the way elections are run and a lot of states, especially republican states, where the theory of election fraud, the fantasy of election fraud has proven to have the deepest hold. in north carolina, in this election, for the first time ever, voters will need to show i.d. for the first time ever to vote, mail-in ballots must include a copy of someone's idea, plus a signature of a notary or two witnesses. and, also, north carolina, mail-in

ballots have to be received by election day, not three days after. when you are talking about the men and women who have jobs running these elections, it would seem like you have to be not only willing to put up with the changing roles and the excessive scrutiny but potentially a lot more litigation and a practical battle over whether or not people can vote, you have to be prepared for the long haul, it would seem, to run an election in america. >> absolutely. many of the republican- controlled legislatures have added penalties for election workers who make mistakes or judges to make, election judges who make mistakes. it makes it more and more, this criminalization happening in our election process so that people are afraid to do the wrong thing and it makes it harder to do these already hard jobs. election workers will tell you it is hard to run a perfect election but that is what we demand of them. in an era where routine

administration is misconstrued as a sign of fraud, mistakes are even worse. i've seen firsthand what happens when you have big turnover. i watch this county in virginia last year, where election denialism had driven everyone to quit to the point that they couldn't register voters for a couple of weeks. in 2022, they had brand-new staff and struggled to get election results out. they are the only county in virginia that couldn't tell you who won their elections and that can be. for new people, these are hard jobs. it is getting harder. >> this is what happens when you push a narrative that is so deleterious to the basic functioning of democracy. jane timm, nbc news, thank you for your reporting. we have a lot more ahead, including maga's new plan to elevate rfk junior in order to defeat joe biden. we will discuss that with someone who knows all about election day spoilers, coming up. first, trumps ex-finance chief was sent to jail today, again. we will get into the message that sends to other potential witnesses and his upcoming

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in precisely 5 days, the first criminal trial of a former american president is set to begin in new york city. soon after that, a parade of witnesses is expected to take the stand. according to abc news, several members of trumps inner circle are expected to testify at his upcoming criminal trial. that list includes rona graff, trumps executive assistant, the former director of trumps overall office operations and hope hicks, trumps former white house senior advisor, who was once considered one of his closest confidants. it is an open question whether or not they will give up the goods on their former boss. today, manhattan district

attorney alvin bragg appeared to send a strong message to any potential witnesses who may or may not be considering lying for trump on the witness stand. the former chief financial officer of the trump organization was sentenced to five months in jail after alvin bragg's office prosecuted him for lying in his testimony in trumps recent civil fraud case. alan weiselburg is 76 years old and this is his second stint at rikers island. he served three months behind bars just last year for tax fraud. joining me now is former assistant district attorney in the manhattan das office trial division and also a new york criminal defense attorney, great to see you. it sure seems like a message to throw alan michael burton in jail, again, at 76. he was already seen as a tough move to throw him in jail the first time. a second bid right before the criminal trial begins. >> i see it not as a chilling

effect that will adversely impact these witnesses to say we shouldn't testify but it will be more in terms of a reality check. if you believe, if you tell a story that isn't true, you misrepresent, we as prosecutors will do our homework and hold you accountable. if we can put an older gentleman in custody, you can find yourself there too. >> it would suggest come clean or else. >> or stay home. >> don't come. don't come at all. >> when we talk about some of the witnesses i listed off, what is your expectation about how forthcoming they will be ? some of these folks have testified in separate cases or to separate law enforcement parties or grand juries, how much of a lift do you think it's going to be to get them to speak the whole truth about what trumpeted? >> they will see the writing on the wall. they have to be consistent if they testify in any capacity. the consistency could raise the same issue. i would expect they would be put on the stand and cross examined. they will be relatively forthright, relatively being the key. are they going to not recall certain things, will face way a

little bit, that can happen? if there is a testimony and there is a history, they will stay with that. otherwise, that exposure can be huge. and, they don't want to become the storyline. this is donald trump's storyline, there's. >> it is also michael cohen's storyline too, right? one of the interesting carveouts in the alan weisselberg deal for the current rikers island sentence is that prosecutors agreed they would not call alan weisselberg to the witness stand during the upcoming criminal trial. that is interesting to me because the only person who could really directly refute michael cohen's testimony in the most high-stakes fraudulent, allegedly fraudulent dealings here is alan weisselberg, right? if michael cohen, if there is a defense witness who could undermine michael cohen's testimony, it is probably alan weisselberg, isn't it question >> i think michael cohen undermines michael cohen. he is rich with all sorts of

material you can challenge him with. his intent, his motive, his change of story, his own convictions. there's ample evidence to challenge him. if you recall, at one point, trump said you shouldn't be able to testify because of their history and what you've been found to misread present. that is not how the law works. you can cross-examine but you can't preclude him. i think there will be ample opportunities but also, the prosecution is not putting this solely on michael cohen's shoulders. it is not just the michael cohen opportunity. it is beyond him, it is more. >> you can see from the list of witnesses we know about but this is not going to just be michael cohen. he will figure largely in it. it does seem, just reading the tea leaves, which have not been startled, donald trump does not want this trial to start. i think every single day this week, and it is only wednesday

he has filed a request to stay the trial for some different reason each day. he has been summarily rejected each and every time. how unusual is that? >> to have article 78 used in this way is unusual. >> an article 78 is ? >> it is challenging part of the judges decision saying it is improper, i will go to a higher court, the appellate court, give it to a judge and say this is capricious, it's not based in law, it is a mistake. he's going to fail and he's going to fail and he has failed. at some point, he has to move forward. the judge is saying this has to go forward. not to minimize or belittle the former president but despite his facade, despite his boisterous behavior, he is a frightened little boy. he's terrified about what could happen to him. the felony is not what is happening in washington, d.c. or florida. the felony is real and he sees allen weisselberg. this is what he's trying to avoid. >> talk about a chilling message if you are donald trump and seeing allen weisselberg go to jail for perjury about the square footage of donald trump's apartment. at the age of 76. that have to send a shiver down

donald trump's spine. perhaps there will be two more requests in the coming days. jeremy, jeremy saland, thank you for your time tonight. watch out joe biden, there is a new liberal and. he is and and effexor, he's against gun control and he has promoted a national abortion ban. with a second. trump conservatives want to convince liberals that rfk jr. is there liberal champion. but, will it work? that is next. hi, i'm tali and i lost 85 pounds on golo. (upbeat music) i started golo because i was unhealthy due to my weight. the minute i started taking the golo release, i knew it was working. i was not hungry, and i did not have any cravings. since losing weight with golo, i'm healthier now than i've ever been, and my doctor is thrilled.

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if you are unfamiliar, fox host sean hannity devotes a significant portion of his show each night to attacking president biden. recently, another candidate has captured his attention, rfk jr. . >> if you are a left-wing voter, kennedy frankly gives you all the nutty biden, bernie sanders, green new deal climate alarmist religious cult policies without the corruption and sleaze and chaos and he definitely knows what day of the week it is. >> if you are a left winger, you will love tran 29, according to sean hannity. today, we learned that particular argument may be part of a trump world strategy to elevate rfk jr. among liberal voters by raising his profile on the issues they care about

the most. according to "the new york times," allies of donald trump and promote robert f kennedy junior as a champion for choice, to give voters, for whom abortion is a top issue and don't like mr. biden, another option on the ballot. trump ice bin to amplify the progressive environmental records of mr. kennedy. for the record, rfk jr. has done nothing to suggest he would be an ideal candidate for people concerned about climate change and abortion. in fact, rfk jr. is, so far, the only candidate in this race who has openly endorsed the national abortion ban. here is what he told my colleague on the subject late last year. >> i believe that the decision should be up to the woman during the first three months of life. >> you would assign a federal cap on that, three months? >> yes, it would. >> rfk jr.'s campaign tried to walk those comments back, claiming he misunderstood the question. the video speaks for itself.

since then, kennedy has raised more questions about his commitment to reproductive freedom after he chose a running mate, whose official abortion position is a word salad more than it is a coherent statement. here it is. "there are a number of extenuating circumstances that would lead me to consider writing terminating a pregnancy. those include my health, the health of the baby, and considerations of what happens to that baby if that baby is being born into a situation that cannot sustain a good and healthy life. in the consideration of, in the situation of economic considerations, i support bringing babies into the world through community support of both mother and baby." what? rfk jr. isn't exactly a leading candidate when it comes to climate change either. one of the environmental nonprofits that kennedy used to work for has endorsed joe biden, citing biden's historic investments to fight climate change through the inflation

reduction act, a bill rfk jr. said he would not have signed as president. over the course of this campaign, kennedy has really aligned himself with the right. >> i'm not going to take people's country. anybody who tells you that they will be able to reduce gun violence through gun control, at this point, i don't think is being realistic. you talk about solutions for the palestinian people, the palestinian people are, arguably, the most pampered people by international aid organizations. >> are you kidding me? >> dr. anthony fauci destroyed our schools, our churches, our businesses and our economy. >> that is the platform that rfk jr. is running on. the facts may be beside the point. trumps allies are willing to do whatever they must in order to get democrats to jump ship for kennedy and they are doing it in the open. he's new york state director was caught on camera saying this.

>> the kennedy voter and the trump voter, the mutual enemy is biden. whether you support bobby orr trump, we all oppose biden. 270 wins the election. if we don't get to 270, if nobody gets to 270, congress asked the president, right? right now, we have a majority of republicans in congress so who are they going to pick? who are they going to pick if it is a republican congress ? they pick trump. >> the kennedy campaign has tried to distance himself from those comments. that doesn't mean the alliance between kennedy and trump world is weakening. the trump teams of you is simple and is backed by public and private polling. "the more candidates in the race, the better for mr. trump." the question is now, how do democrats deal with this? i will ask the only person in

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today, 280 days before election day, a left-wing candidate for president announced his running mate. >> one of the great freedom fighters of a generation, one of the great love orders of a generation, she's a doctor, she's a professor, she is a lover of the people. her name is melina abdula. >> dr. cornell west appeared on a popular like a radio

talkshow to introduce his running mate, a muslim black woman and cofounder of black lives matter los angeles. while cornell west has only earned 1 to 3% of voters in national polygamy is focused on drawing a contrast between his campaign and president biden in an effort to appeal to black and muslim american voters who may be dissatisfied with the biden administration. that makes him exactly the kind of third-party candidate donald trumps allies plan to amplify. according to the new york times, trump allies plan to elevate outside candidates like robert f kennedy junior, cornel west and jill stein by positioning them to biden's left. joining me now is senator tim

kaine, democrat from the great state of virginia, former chair of the democratic national committee and hillary clinton's former running mate in 2016. also, if you needed anything else on the resume, the author of a new book "walk, ride, paddle, a life outside." senator tim kaine, thank you for being here tonight. i am eager to know what you, you know what an election with spoilers is like. 2016 saw gary johnson and jill stein in the race. some people think they took away from hillary clinton and her very well-documented margin of victory in the popular vote but not in the electoral college. what lessons did you learn from that and should democrats take away from that? >> i'm glad you asked me that. i have always called myself and electoral college dropout since 2016. winning the popular vote big, winning the virginia vote that i've always one and still falling short. that just means in 2024, we democrats have to be focused on not just winning but winning big. i think we will that we have to deal with these spoilers who are really donald trump boot

liquors. they are in this race, especially rfk, to help donald trump win. we have to make that plane to american voters so they don't get bamboozled. >> do you think, when you talk about making a plan, when you look at the polling, in a five way race, trump beats biden, rfk gets 13% of the vote. in a head to head matchup, biden beats trump. rfk jr. plays a role in maybe handing the race to trump. what exactly should democrats do? is it talking about rfk jr.'s record or exposing the allegiance the kennedy campaign apparently has to the trump campaign? >> you need to expose that rfk is a boot liquor for donald trump, not just because his campaign team wants trump to win and abide in and lose. look at rfk positions. he is, he has been sympathetic to the january 6th rioters who

tried to overturn a peaceful election and disrupt american democracy. he is enticing. he is for a national abortion ban. he has picked a running mate who is just against the 12 million people on the planet who have grown their families by in vitro fertilization. this guy is a donald trump boot liquor and he's going to do everything he can to push it to donald trump. i think when people really figure out the stakes, they will realize that what a dispersion signal it is for donald trump to say i don't think i can win votes myself so can i prop up these potemkin puppets and try to get people to vote for them? i think virginia voters, i'm on

the ballot in 24 and i'm worried about virginia. i think virginia voters and american voters will figure it out. >> part of this is also biden addressing where he may be most vulnerable, where voters would be most likely to want a third- party candidate. i know you've been vocal on the subject of gaza. there is some reporting trump allies are discussing running ads in dearborn, michigan and other parts of the state with large muslim populations thanking biden for standing with israel. so, the plan there or the goal there would be to diminish muslim american turnout for biden. how vulnerable do you think the president is on gaza and what is happening there and how much of that is an issue that can be tackled directly by biden? >> gaza is heartbreaking. the hamas attack on israel was despicable and unforgivable. not only the hamas effort to go after civilians and take hostages but also they timed the attack to disrupt a

discussion between the u.s. and israel, and saudi arabia that included a future for palestine that had been under the radar and not discussed for years. hamas attack was despicable but the aftermath has also been heartbreaking with civilians deaths in significant numbers and insufficient humanitarian aid to gaza. everybody knows donald trump would be worse. if you are not happy with what is going on in gaza, donald trump would be infinitely worse than joe biden and take donald trump and his rhetoric and record back to the united states. donald trump's first action as president was a muslim man. anybody who thinks donald trump is going to be better overseas to get over it. anybody who thinks donald trump will be okay here at home, his

first action as president was a muslim ban and that is what it is going to be with donald trump. people he doesn't like, whether it is muslim, lgbt, people who want reproductive freedom, he's going to go after them with a vengeance. folks better wake up and not only worry about what is happening thousands of miles away, they should think about what is going to happen right here at home if joe biden is president or donald trump is president. >> real talk from senator tim kaine, democrat for virginia and author of the new book, walk, ride, paddle. filled with pearls of wisdom. thank you sir so much for your time tonight. time tonight.

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grab liquid labs in the walmart vitamin aisle today. president biden issued an ultimatum to benjamin netanyahu saying they dramatically increase the amount of humanitarian aid flowing into the gaza strip and if israel did not act upon this, there would be consequences including the conditioning of u.s. aid to israel. israel announced it would open new aid crossings but there are new signs the promises have been kept. there has been no apparent work

done yet on increasing aid to gaza. officials have said the amount of said trucks has spiked the past three days to an average of over 400 trucks per day. the u.n., however, disputes that arguing there has been no increase in the daily average of trucks going into gaza. the u.n. official told the times that aid trucks carrying aid are half full after inspectors prohibit some of the contents. by the time the aid is unloaded and distributed, the tally of full trucks is much lower. this is all happening as manmade famine looms. palestinians then now make up 80% of all people on planet earth currently facing famine or severe hunger. the aid group said people in northern gaza were surviving onage average of 245 calories a day. which is less than a can of

beans. joining me now is david miliband. president and ceo of the international rescue agency. it is such a pleasure to have you on the show. what's your assessment about the aid increase? >> who will provide security in gaza in the future? there is a trickle of aid and it need to be a deluge of aid. whether it is 400 trucks half full or 200 trucks fully full, that is not enough and that is how you end up in a situation where one million people are a catastrophic levels of hunger and another million people are at crisis or emergency levels of hunger. this is a made made catastrophe and one at least in this aspect that has a very clear set of solutions. >> are the israeli inspections of the trucks that are going in particularly onerous? is it unusual that a truck would be losing half of its

contents before making it in? >> it is a half full truck that gets doubled up. so there is special bureaucratic measures that are undoubtedly getting in the way of the trucks going in. and if a truck is found to have something alleged to be dual use, a par of scissors as an example. could be used in surgery or other means, then the whole truck gets turned around. it is also the number of crossings. the crossing promised friday has not opened. what we should always remind ourselves when the president of the united states puts his foot down, people notice. and now, the words he has promised have to be taken into action. >> do you get the sense the white house is incensed? >> no question they need to see change and they have made that clear, we have been warning for a very long time about the public health emergency that was brewing. never mind the loss of 33,000 lives. never mind the 200 aid workers who have been killed there as well. we suffered ourself, my own

organization suffered israeli missile strike on our guest house in the middle of january. we warned, then, that the so- called deconfliction system was not working and people have paid with their lives. >> i think immediately of the world central kitchen workers targeted and killed. has that changed the way you distribute aid or changed your operations on the ground? >> we have sustained an emergency medical team and partners across the gaza strip. but our measures have to be at the highest order. we keep the authorities informed of movements and this points to a simple truth. in somewhere as densely populated with such desperate needs to protect life. the cease fire that the president says he is going for, that is desperately needed. that is a humanitarian call that is essential in hours and days as long, for every hour that the war is on, the

desperate need to fulfill the aid requirements rises. >> we say the word famine and it is uttered frequently. invoked frequently. but what does that mean for a population? >> it means that you are going to starve and people either die because of lack of food or die from awe associated illnesses. the group that assesses famine is one of the small seed conservative technical groups. it is people on the ground assessing the situation. when they say 25 children have died of starvation, that's a very unusual thing to say. we don't use the word famine strictly. it is called level 5. that is what we describe level 5 food insecurity. a diplomatic way of putting it. level 5 means famine is a catastrophe. level 4 and 3, level 4 is the emergency level. 3 is crisis. crisis means you don't know where your next meal is coming

from. and frankly, if only every gazan had that can of beans you were referring to. many of them don't. >> 245 calories. this must be unlike anything you have seen in recent memory. >> it's the density and speed of the decent into absolute hell. let's not forget, there are 25 million people in sudan suffering from a civil war. people in syria. refugees and elsewhere who need our attention as well. but in terms of density of population, speed of descent, this is in a league of its own. >> thank you so much for your time. that is our show this evening. now it is time for the last word with laura jarrett. >> we have a couple of supreme court experts with us tonight. senator sheldon white house. i'm always taking notes when he speaks and neil catial will join