>> we heard from the goldman family yesterday, still anguished about what happened 30 years ago. it can't be said enough, that trial, forensic evidence, we weren't as educated then, but we are now. for reasons, celebrity, race, class, the legal system, that trial nothing like it before or since. we appreciate your analysis this morning. former u.s. attorney and msnbc legal analyst joyce vance, we'll be talking a lot next week. thank you, joyce. thank you for getting up "way too early" on this friday morning and all week long. "morning joe" starts right now. well, former president trump's hush money trial is set to start on monday, and for the third time in three days, a judge just rejected his attempt to delay it. yup. trump is trying everything, even requested a delay so he can mourn the loss of o.j. that didn't work. >> jimmy fallon last night. good morning. welcome to "morning joe." it is friday, april the 12th.

donald trump's hush money trial is on track to start on monday, and now we are learning who may take the stand in that trial. we'll be joined by the legal adviser to michael cohen, a key witness in the case. also ahead, speaker mike johnson leaving washington for mar-a-lago to meet with the former president. this comes as his speakership hangs in the balance over funding for ukraine. and we'll have the latest on efforts to repeal arizona's abortion ban ahead of a visit today from vice president kamala harris. with us this morning, the host of "way too early," white house bureau chief at politico, jonathan lemire. president of the national action network and host of "politics nation," reverend al sharpton. associate editor of "the washington post," eugene robinson. former senior aide to the biden and clinton campaigns, adrienne elrod. good morning. great to have you all with us. joe, "morning joe" conversation kind of continued a few blocks away in new york with you and rev yesterday. >> i'll tell ya what, rev, you

had quite an event there yesterday, and you, of course, always are the convener and star of the show. but mika brzezinski was given an award. it was moving. the entire thing was so moving. >> mika was awarded by the women of national action network, and it was very moving. hundreds of women thanking her for raising on a global level their value. she was moved. i think she underestimated the kind of emotion they had. >> yeah. >> then i think you underestimated your impact among this kind of community. we had a couple thousand people in the room and had a fireside chat. >> right. >> talked about how our relationship evolved. the way people cheered, i mean, i thought you were running for president or something. >> no, no. >> i've had presidents. in fact, the president is going

to do a viral speech this afternoon at our conference, and i've had presidents there. they didn't get a better reception than you got yesterday. people need to really look online and see how they treated joe scarborough. i was a little jealous, to be honest. >> not jealous at all. it was -- you know, what i've heard about national action network through the years, and i'll tell ya, phil has told me about it for some time, how closely he's worked with it, is that you're always there. the organization is always there for the people who need it the most. i mean, most people don't know, but when you get off of this show, you know, you get on the phones. you're calling around and asking people what they need for help, how you can help an individual who is in trouble right now. of course, these things that get on national news, these tragedies of young black men usually, but sometimes young

white men, sometimes young hispanic men, people see that, but they don't see everything that goes on day in and day out, you helping people with their rent. just, again, helping when people need something. >> well, you can't, in my opinion, use victims as props. they are victims. but once the cameras are gone, you need to still be there. that's why we build an organization, not just me out there. we've been able to do that. also, as history, joe reid was there with a book late yesterday afternoon, and she was received well. medgar evers' assassination helped galvanize the march on washington in 1973. >> right. >> these tragedies become the turning point for changing social policy if you use it right. so my feeling is you must protect the families, the victims, but you also must change the policies and the laws so you don't continue to have the victims.

you must do both. you can't drop them and go for whatever else you see as the next item. >> yeah, exactly. turn that tragedy into promise. of course, again, the president of the united states going to be speaking at the national action network today. jonathan, this isn't a shock, what's on the front of the tabloids. o.j. simpson, great running back for usc and then the bills, accused of murder. eventually acquitted but, obviously, other charges, spent time in jail. that's what much of the discussion on tv has been over the last 24 hours. >> it's been striking. o.j. simpson is not a name many people have said the last few years. he's faded from the headlines. he was convicted for a robbery, trying to steal sports memorabilia in las vegas.

he spent nine years in prison. other than the occasional social media video, largely faded from the spotlight. when the news came yesterday he had died, it was a thunderclap for a lot of people who remembered not only his time as a star athlete but, particularly t trial we're seeing here. the chase in the white bronco. people, you know, of my age, you know, and older, you know, it's almost the kennedy assassination, in terms of people remember where they were when the slow-speed chase happened on los angeles freeways. then, of course, this trial, which was so divisive in many ways, and then the stunning verdict of not guilty. it really divided the country. >> yeah. >> certainly, there are not many tears shed, i think, for o.j. simpson's death in many places in this country yesterday, but an important figure and one that touched on celebrity and captured a lot of what america was. >> willie, and changed the media forever, for better or worse.

most would say for the worse. chief tv critic for "the new york times" has a piece, "o.j., made in america, made by tv." writes this, "it was a tragedy too, of course, and viewers could not agree which part of it was a tragedy, and that, too, was the tragedy. it was also a preview of coming attractions. it was the model for the all-in immerse coverage that 24-hour news would apply to everything from wars to missing-person casings to sex scandals. the all-o.j.-all-the-time news would seamlessly become all-clinton-lewinsky-all-the- time, complete with legal commentators reprising their roles." it's created the media landscape that we inherited from 1994 forward. >> it is. it started even before the trial, as john said. if you remember the slow-speed chase, it was on one of the

nights of the nba finals, the 1994 nba finals between the knicks and the rockets. all the networks were going wall to wall, ultimately almost 100 million people in this country were watching. nbc took the nba finals and put it in a split-screen. you had marv albert doing play-by-play on one side for a basketball game where patrick ewing and olajuwon were going at it. then tom brokaw, the anchor of "nbc nightly news," anchoring this chase as crowds gathered on the overpasses. people made signs, cheering o.j. on, many of them. truly a bizarre spectacle. gene robinson, you're writing about this this morning. people who don't remember news pre-o.j., pre-1994, where every story that's major, sometimes not so major, is covered wall to wall, with analysts brought on set and talking through whatever

is happening that day. >> yeah. >> it was truly, yesterday, a moment to stop and think about, wow, 30 years of, obviously, the victims of the crime but also 30 years of the way our business has changed, as well. >> absolutely. this was day one of the media landscape we live in now. you know, people certainly my age, your age, we remember that trial, the drama of that trial. the characters were so vivid. it was really the first time, i think, that the nation collectively got to watch the process of a trial, got to watch a really skilled and expensive defense team sort of pick apart a prosecution case, or at least create enough reasonable doubt that -- to convince a jury to

acquit. you know, in a verdict that a lot of people think was unjust and, even more, people think was fundamentally wrong. i think it was wrong. i think he did it. but a different question, as to whether the case was proved beyond a reasonable doubt. and we saw the sort of messiness and, i would argue, the greatness of our legal system. it is weighted in favor of the defendant. that's the way it's supposed to work. and it left, i think, nobody really happy, except o.j. simpson and his defense team. of course, o.j. later got sentenced to 33 years in prison, an incredibly harsh sentence for armed robbery. he was trying to get back some

sports memorabilia in las vegas, had a gun. a lot of people saw that as a makeup call, to sort of make up for the fact he didn't get convicted for the murders. >> you know, willie, we have a lot to talk about today. at 7:00, we'll have fareed zakaria on. he'll be talking about how the united states sent a top general over to israel. he is over there to help coordinate military strategy on what many fear is a pending iranian strike. also, just to send the very strong message to iran, don't even think about it. don't even think about it. i will say, i think this is very helpful for the biden administration. i don't think there's any doubt that vladimir putin mistook joe biden's actions in afghanistan as a sign of weakness when, in fact, we were all predicting,

and anybody that had read anything that joe biden said about afghanistan since 2009 knew that he was going to get us out of afghanistan. he was opposed to barack obama's policy of tripling the number of troops there. he thought that the united states, he thought 65% of americans were right, america needed to come home from afghanistan after 20 years of war. russia misread that. vladimir putin misread that as a sign of weakness. i think it is very important that we've sent our top general over from the region into israel to say, "don't misread what we're saying about gaza. our friends are in a fight right now, trying to figure out the best way to sort through this. but, iran, don't even think about attacking israel right now." it's a very strong message that's being sent, i think to iran and across the world. >> yeah. i think this is important tactically but also symbolically, as you say.

iran and hamas and others think they see cracks in the relationship between the united states and israel. there may be some in this moment over the way that israel handled the war, but president biden sending this message to say, no, we stand shoulder to shoulder be israel. be clear, we have a family squabble about how this is going on. much more on that in a minute. let's get to vice president kamala harris traveling to arizona today, just three days after the state supreme court ruled an 1864 law criminalizing nearly all abortions can be enforced. while in arizona, harris expected to underscore the stakes of the 2024 election for abortion health care and reproductive freedom. the vice president also expected to emphasize tuesday's ruling by arizona's high court was made possible by donald trump. the campaign released some excerpts from her prepared remarks including this. quote, "we all must understand who is to blame. it is the former president, donald trump. it is donald trump, who during his campaign in 2016 said women

should be punished for seeking an abortion. donald trump," she goes on, "is the architect of this health care crisis, and that's not a fact he hides. in fact, he brags about it. here's what a second trump term looks like: more bans, more suffering, less freedom. but we are not going to let that happen." that's an advanced look at prepared remarks for kamala harris in arizona today. she's right. couple days ago, donald trump said it was an incredible achievement to get rid of roe, saying, quote, "we did that." he is now living with the consequences. >> senatorial candidate also living with the consequences of what she said a couple years ago, though she is trying to sound as moderate as humanly possible, picking up the phone, calling people, but kari lake, of course, going to be spending the rest of this campaign outrunning earlier comments. "new york times" headline, "democrats hammer a simple attack on abortion, donald trump did this."

and he did. and the consequences are absolutely terrible for women and also for republican candidates. >> yeah, while willie was bringing in this story, i wrote four words on the paper, "donald trump did this." >> that's the message. >> that's the message. that's what the biden campaign said. it is simple and powerful. i think we'll hear "donald trump did this" about a lot of issues as the year goes on, including those connected to the assaults on the democracy january 6th. >> also, donald trump, and we'll be talking about this, too, he is desperately trying to run away from all the times he said he wanted to do away with obamacare. >> yes. >> now he's saying, "no, no, forget what i said about john mccain going like this, maybe, maybe i like obamacare." he's flip-flopping. he just looks so weak. >> yeah. >> desperate right now. >> truth social video yesterday, he tried to say, "i'm for obamacare. i just want to change it." we can fact-check that. a thousand times he said he wanted to overturn it.

donald trump did this. as much as the biden administration knows they have to put forward a positive message, so much of what they'll say between now and november is, "look, this is what trump did. he's changed your life, taken your freedoms and threatened to do more." donald trump did this will be about abortion. the vice president, who is this administration's best messager on this issue, heads to arizona which is trying to enforce a civil war era near-total ban on the procedure. a battleground state that seemed to be slipping away from the president now firmly up for gaps again. talk about the message we'll hear from the vice president, donald trump did this. will it work? >> sometimes, lemire, the simplest words are the most effective message. you'll see the campaign playing that, donald trump did this on abortion and, as joe was saying, on a number of other issues. look, the vice president is an effective messenger on protecting women's right to

choose, to make her decisions about her health care, about her own financial decisions and economic decisions. you'll see the president travel across the country, but i'm proud of the campaign for getting on top of this, going to arizona immediately. the vice president had to change her schedule, but they jumped on top of this. there is so much at stake. arizona, of course, is a top battleground state in this campaign cycle, and, you know, we narrowly won, the campaign narrowly won arizona in 2020. it'll be a very close race this time around. they want to make sure that every single voter, the vice president wanted to make sure every single voter, the entire american electorate is squarely aware of who is responsible for this decision, for putting three supreme court justices on the court that were against a woman's right to choose. donald trump is flip-flopping around, can't figure out what the right message is right now. he's not going to be able to run

away from what he did, and this campaign isn't going to let them forget this. >> rev, i've talked for some time about how pro-life conservatives have seen the extremes of 10-year-old girls being rape victims fleeing states of mothers, of children being denied treatment and possibly being sterilized or having their very lives put at risk, changing the viewpoints. i found it fascinating, talking to people yesterday at the national action network, and hearing you talking about how, you know, your organization, you have a lot of churches from across america coming together. some of them fundamentalist. even people fundamentally

pro-life are saying, "this is too extreme. we want no part of this." this is too much, especially for daughters, for our wives, children, and community. >> that's exactly the attitude and opinion i get even from the pro-lifers who are part of the civil rights movement or national action network. many of them say, what i would guide myself by or advise my daughter by does not mean that i think you ought to criminalize it. we're talking about criminalizing people's choices, or i ought to force government to make that choice. you have a choice in religion. you can do good or evil. go to heaven or hell, as we believe. but that's your choice. you can't force people to do what you think is right, and you can't make them criminal if they don't. that's what you saw yesterday. i think what the right-wing and the trumpsters have done,

they've gone too far. they're criminalizing it, robbing women of the dignity of making their own choice. that's why even some pro-lifers are saying, wait a minute. i can be for life and, at the same time, say, but wait a minute, it is up to a woman to make her own choice. >> willie, we're seeing this in the christian community, in the jewish community, the muslim community. we're seeing it in the secular communities. people who may have had a position closer to traditional pro-life position being pushed away by the extreme positions of what's happening in arizona, what was happening in wisconsin when they were clinging to an 1849 abortion law. you look across the country. places like kansas, kentucky, ohio, really conservative states just saying, enough. we are not signing up for this extremist maga approach to

women's health. >> there are many people on moral, religious ground, whatever they may be, think a 16-week ban, 15-week ban, something like that would be appropriate. once you get below that and talk about six weeks in florida, alabama starts talking about getting rid of ivf, and now you're talking about no exceptions except for the health of the mother and putting doctors in jail for two to five years based off a law from the civil war era. even people who don't like abortion are going, whoa, that's a bridge too far. adrienne elrod, i expect we'll hear more about this, as you've been saying, because this could just be the beginning of what we're going to see in these states, now that roe has been gone almost two years. we've seen some of the trigger laws go into effect with abortion bans, they seem to be getting more extreme as we go along in the process here. >> yeah, exactly right, willie. what's coming next, right? what's the next shoe that will drop on this?

again, going back to donald trump's strategy, it is not effective. he says, well, we'll leave it up to the states. that's where it should be. but every time he says that and something else happens in a state that affects a woman's right to choose, it's disastrous for him. if you are the average voter saying, how do we stop this? obviously, every measure on the ballot to allow women to have access to their reproductive health decisions has passed overwhelming by democrats, republicans, and independents, but it still is a herculean effort to get something on the ballot and to get it passed. it's not an easy feat. sure, donald trump can say it's left to the states. if you're the average voter trying to decide who to vote for in this election cycle, maybe teetering back and forth, not decided yet, you're looking and saying, man, it shouldn't be left to the states. it's such a disastrous consequence when you look at what happened in alabama, when you look at the fact that arizona is going back to an 1864 law. it's been on the books since women even had the right to

vote, since arizona was a state. it's crazy. the contrast could not be more clear. again, president biden and vice president harris are going to make sure that every single voter in america knows who is responsible for putting us in the position we are today and who is responsible for giving women these very difficult decisions they have to make about their own health pause the government is not protecting them. >> again, the biden campaign only has to play video cape of donald trump as recently as two days ago going, "we did that." president biden and vice president harris saying, you sure did. we'll have more on this this morning. barring last-minute delays now, jury selection in former president trump's hush money trial is set to begin on monday. we'll talk to the legal adviser to michael cohen, who will be a likely key witness for prosecutors about what to expect in court. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back.

all—new subway wraps are packed with delicious ingredients in a pillowy lavash wrap. finally a refreshing lunch that tastes deli— perfect for pro athletes like me, right? can i finish?

buy one wrap get one 50% off in the subway app today. the future is not just going to happen. you have to make it. and if you want a successful business, all it takes is an idea, and now becomes the future. a future where you grew a dream into a reality. it's waiting for you. mere minutes away. the future is nothing but power and it's all yours. the all new godaddy airo. get your business online in minutes with the power of ai. why would i use kayak to compare get your business online in minutes 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.

i told myself i was ok with my moderate to severe rheumatoid arthritis symptoms. with my psoriatic arthritis symptoms. but just ok isn't ok. and i was done settling. if you still have symptoms after a tnf blocker like humira or enbrel, rinvoq is different and may help. rinvoq is a once-daily pill that can rapidly relieve joint pain, stiffness, and swelling in ra and psa.

relieve fatigue... and stop further joint damage. and in psa, can leave skin clear or almost clear. rinvoq can lower your ability to fight infections, including tb. serious infections and blood clots, some fatal; cancers, including lymphoma and skin; heart attack, stroke, and gi tears occurred. people 50 and older with a heart disease risk factor have an increased risk of death. serious allergic reactions can occur. tell your doctor if you are or may become pregnant. done settling? ask your rheumatologist for rinvoq. and take back what's yours. abbvie could help you save.

trump is a conman. he asked me to pay off an adult film star with whom he had an affair and to lie about it to his wife, which i did. mr. trump directed me to use my own personal funds from a home equity line of credit to avoid any money being traced back to him that could negatively impact his campaign. and i did that, too. without bothering to consider whether that was improper, much less whether it was the right thing to do or how would it impact me, my family, or the public. and i am going to jail, in part, because of my decision to help mr. trump hide that payment from

the american people before they voted a few days later. >> that is donald trump's former personal attorney and fixer michael cohen testifying before the house oversight committee in february of 2019 and taking responsibility for the things he did on behalf of donald trump. nbc news has learned cohen is on the list of witnesses expected to be called to testify in the former president's hush money criminal trial with jury selection set to begin on monday in new york. cohen, you'll remember, pleaded guilt any 2018 to campaign vie finance charges related to two women before the election. including adult film actress stormy daniels. joining us is legal adviser to michael cohen, lanny davis. and state attorney for palm beach county, florida, dave aronberg. lanny, can you confirm michael cohen will be a witness in this trial? >> yes. >> he will be a witness in this trial. so we should remind people that

michael cohen went to jail for over a year for charges related to this. he served home confinement for another year and a half or so, almost three years of time served. so as you look at this, lanny, what is this trial about, exactly? we have some distance from it, about eight years since these payments were made in october of 2016, just before election day. what is this a trial about, the way you see it? >> well, let me quote donald trump's justice department's prosecutors in public when they made the charge that donald trump, and they wrote this, directed michael cohen to pay this money to ms. daniels. they said this case is about the impairment of democracy by allowing wealthy people, such as mr. trump, to buy silence a few days before the election, to prevent the american people from gaining information they need. they describe this case as about democracy. that's the federal district of

new york, southern district of new york prosecutors in a public document, hiding in plain sight. so every time someone describes this in a disparaging way, as about sex or something else, quote donald trump's prosecutors describing this case as seriously about the undermining of democracy. >> lanny, can alvin bragg in a state court in new york make that connection? can he go beyond the narrower violations of, you know, falsifying business records and how that became a felony, can he go beyond that to make the connection to the election? >> not to narrow. he's charged mr. trump 34 felony counts. those involve 34 times that he booked as expenses for legal services what federal prosecutors working for his administration described as

payments to silence someone right before an election, which made them illegal. the answer is yes, he can connect the violation of fraud to new york state crimes, at least three of them, and he laid them out in the indictment. yes, eugene, that is definitely part of the case. >> dave aronberg, you're a prosecutor. we can already figure out what the trump defense is going to be about michael cohen. they'll paint him as an untrustworthy witness. they'll say he pleaded guilty to lying to congress. their going to say, you shouldn't believe a word this man says. so how do you then as the prosecution, how do you use cohen effectively with that as the backdrop? >> jonathan, the reason why michael cohen went to prison for lying and for other felonies is he was lying for donald trump. it was, as lanny said, for the felonies that are at issue here. so he's going to try to attack michael cohen, but cohen will have corroboration. that is key for prosecutors. corroboration in the form of

stormy daniels herself and perhaps hope hicks, a loyalist to donald trump. including david pecker, the head of the former "national inquirer." also, i think trump will try to use the john edwards defense, which is, these payments were not for campaign reasons, they were to protect his family. but that can be easily debunked. he'll try to say, i was trying to protect melania from finding out. cohen and stormy daniels' lawyer first spoke about this affair in 2011. this was known for years within team trump, yet no money changed hands until two week before the election. that is really damaging. plus, as far as falsification of business records, why do that if you're trying to protect the information from melania. she was not likely to pour over the books of the trump organization, which is a private company, so why falsify the internal records to keep it secret, unless you knew it was a campaign election crime? also, trump allegedly directed michael cohen to delay paying stormy daniels until after the election because he didn't want to pay her at all.

after the election, it wouldn't matter. why? because trump knew this was about the campaign. a lot of good facts for the prosecution. in the end, i think this is headed towards a conviction. >> you've seen some of the names, dave aronberg, on the prosecution, possible witness list for the prosecution. is there anybody, in particular, you'd call, that you'd be interested in their testimony? >> hope hicks. hope hicks gave some different testimony when she appeared before congress, joe. i'm interested in seeing what she says now. she did testify before the grand jury, and she is a trump loyalist. she was steaming his pants on air force one. now, she's going to be there to corroborate michael cohen. we'll see what happens that, but that'll be a powerful witness. trump will try to bring in politics into this, trying to say, you know, biden is behind this, but the judge is not going to allow this to become a circus. besides, i must add, as a state prosecutor, the thought that joe biden is somehow involved in this is ridiculous. i can tell you in 12 years as a

state prosecutor here, i've never gotten a call from the white house about any case. that's not how it works. for those who think, well, that's manhattan and he wouldn't call here, remember, in palm beach county, my jurisdiction, i oversee mar-a-lago. if anyone would get a call, you'd think i would. never got a call. so i do think that judge merchan is going to keep this case right. he is going to keep it moving. and the jury pool has to really concern donald trump. that's an area up there where trump got, like, 12% of the vote. that's got to scare him a lot. >> lanny, i've known you a while and we're working with the transplant justice issue now. i know how passionate you are about people being about what is right. tell us with michael cohen, who i had prior with -- prayer with before he went to jail, what does he represent to a jury? he went to jail for lying but

had been passionate about what he did and why he did it. why do you feel as an experienced attorney that this would resonate with the jury? >> first of all, thanks for getting that question from reverend sharpton, who is a preacher who knows about sinners taking ownership. the testimony you just showed of michael, i happened to be sitting behind him, wearing the same tie, just to show you i'm the same person, he owned, reverend, what he did wrong. he started out by saying, "i am ashamed, and i am contrite. i don't expect to be forgiven. i only expect to be heard." nobody on national and international television can doubt that he took responsibility and did his time. the federal prosecutors who work for donald trump -- let me repeat this because this has been missed, reverend -- found that donald trump directed michael cohen to pay the money for which he did time. they also found that he falsely

booked, or at least the bookings were for legal expenses that he knew did not exist. and the new witness we know this morning, a woman who was there when donald trump, as president of the united states, joe scarborough and i were on tv together on "cross-fire" about bill clinton. well, this is a sitting president of the united states writing these illegal checks -- the federal prosecutors called them illegal, not me, and they worked for trump -- writing checks from the oval office, joe, signing his name to michael cohen to reimburse him, not to pay for the legal expenses. the federal prosecutors said that was false. i quote the prosecutors working for donald trump who charged michael cohen, targeted michael cohen, and never said a word. they called him individual one until the media found he was donald trump. now, we're going to have the truth come out under cross-examination. remember, michael cohen went

through oddles of cross-examination in the new york case. the judge heard that and found him to be truthful. we know at least that during a cross-examination, he told the truth, and the judge made a verdict finding him to be truthful. >> calling this the hush money trial only tells a part of the story. it is, of course, that. $130,000 to a porn star. this is also about interfering in the 2016 election. legal adviser to michael cohen, lanny davis confirming for us this morning, michael cohen will be a witness. jury selection gets under way in the trial monday. lanny, thank you for being here. state attorney for palm beach county, dave aronberg, thank you, as well. ahead this morning, donald trump repeatedly said he wants to repeal the affordable care act. we'll take a look at what he is saying now amid new attacks from the biden administration. "morning joe" is coming right back on a friday morning.

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. not for sudden breathing problems. allergic reactions can occur. get help right away for swelling of face, mouth, tongue, or trouble breathing. infections that can cause shingles have occurred. don't stop steroids unless told by your doctor.

tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection. may cause headache, injection site reactions, back pain, and fatigue. ask an asthma specialist if nucala is right for you. at bombas, we're obsessed with socks. tees. and underwear.

because your basic things should be your best things. one purchased equals one donated. visit bombas.com and get 20% off your first order. norman, bad news... one purchased equals one donated. i never graduated from med school. what? but the good news is... xfinity mobile just got even better! now, you can automatically connect to wifi speeds up to a gig on the go. plus, buy one unlimited line and get one free for a year. i gotta get this deal... that's like $20 a month per unlimited line...

i don't want to miss that. that's amazing doc. mobile savings are calling. visit xfinitymobile.com to learn more. doc? picture of the white house at 6:42 on a friday morning. after eight years of vowing to repeal the affordable care act without offering a viable replacement, donald trump now says he only wants to make obamacare better. in a video posted to truth social yesterday, trump claimed president joe biden is misrepresenting trump's position on the health care plan used by about 40 million americans. as recently as last year, trump was still saying, quote, he was looking at the alternatives to the aca and bemoaning the failure of the 2017 senate vote to repeal it. here is what trump said yesterday followed by a few of

his many comments over the years. >> i'm not running to terminate the aca as crooked joe biden says all over the place. i'm running to close the border, stop inflation, make our economy great, strengthen our military, and make the aca, or obamacare as it sometimes is known, much better, stronger, and far less expensive, because it is much too expensive now and it's not very good. >> we're going to create great health care, get rid of obamacare. we're going to terminate it. >> we're going to win by knocking the hell out of obamacare, terminating it. >> with obamacare, getting back to the boring subject, it is almost a waste of time talking about it. when we terminate it, we'll just say it was a bad experience for the american people. >> we are decimating obamacare. we have a bad vote. we had a bad vote the evening we were going to terminate obamacare. hopefully it'll go to the

supreme court to terminate obamacare. >> we want to terminate obamacare. it's bad. look, we're running it well, but we know it is defective. >> we want to terminate health care for under obamacare because it's bad. >> we almost got it done, but john mccain voted against it. that was a bad day. remember that? thumbs down after campaigning for ten years. thumbs down, everybody. >> donald trump through the years, joe, saying he wants to terminate obamacare, which is very, very popular in this country and, by the way, only getting more popular as the years go on. there were questions about how it'd work, how much it would cost, and now 40 million americans use it. people with pre-existing conditions now get coverage. yet, donald trump has picked this issue, which even in polling, republicans say, eh, let's stay away from that one. he seems to want to drill down. now, in the statement yesterday, just like with abortion rights. he's scrambling to cover himself. he can't run from all the tape

we just showed. >> no. gene, way too much tape. you have starting in 2016, he's going to terminate obamacare. 2018, decimate obamacare. even in 2023, talking about terminating obamacare. as you see, he, at one point, he gets carried away and says, we're going to terminate health care, like he's focused on this. >> i know, yeah. >> but let's be clear, in that recent post, he said it's not good health care. there's no running away from this. >> yeah, no. >> even recently, he's said, it's not good health care. wants to get rid of it. >> yeah, i mean, what's the saying in politics? if you're explaining, you're losing. i mean, he's explaining all over the place, right? he's now trying to back off of what he said a zillion times about obamacare, that he wants

to get rid of it. he is very, very clear. now, he's saying, well, i didn't mean get rid of it. he's doing the same thing with roe v. wade. he's doing the same thing with abortion, trying to back away from what he said very clearly and what he did. he's trying to have everything both ways. that's really hard to do. he knows he's in danger of either losing some of his base or losing independents and others who disagree with these radical positions. and he's -- that's where he is. it's not been a good few weeks for donald trump. >> adrienne, certainly, that video shows that donald trump has been pretty clear on his position in wanting to overturn affordable care act. maybe some of his believers will just believe what he says now, but the independent voters who often decide elections, they'll see the tape. they're going to remember what trump said before.

trump did this or is going to do this, that's the biden argument going forward. what's the best way for this administration, this re-election campaign, to frame this argument? the polls show, the affordable care act is popular in red states, too. >> it sure is, lemire. i don't know when republicans will finally learn that repealing the affordable care act is not a popular thing to do. we mentioned the 2017 vote in the senate that failed by one vote to repeal it. that's what really catalyzed a lot of excitement about wanting to make sure the affordable care act is protected. republicans tried multiple times to dismantle it, and it is not popular and it's a strategy that doesn't work. what the biden campaign is doing effectively is using trump's own words against him. they're literally playing video after video of him saying, "i want to repeal the aca. i still want to repeal the aca." i don't think the truth social posts that he is doing, of these kind of three-to-four minute

monologues are effective. we saw him do it on the situation in arizona, and it didn't really play well. he's scattered all over the place in terms of where he stands on abortion. he's also scattered all over the place in terms of where he stands on the affordable care act. bottom line is, we got him on record multiple times saying he wants to repeal it. the campaign, the biden campaign is using his words effectively against him. voters are going to remember that. you cannot take back, you know, multiple years of trying to repeal the aca and now, all of a sudden, try to come up with some different position. oh, maybe i want to fix it but i don't want to completely repeal it. people are confused on where trump stands on this. the truth social posts aren't working. you know, he can't run away from his past position. >> the only thing the social posts do is they actually give the biden campaign more video to show how weak he looks. he's flip-flopping like a fish. just looks so weak here.

i mean, and when you're talking about terminating obamacare for eight years, which is what he's been doing, talk about how that impacts working americans. how important is obamacare to working americans? >> it is extremely important. because most of the people that we're talking about did not have any health care before obamacare, or they had inadequate health care. >> right. >> we're talking across party lines, racial lines, which i think the republicans underestimated that this affected their base. that's why you started seeing in town hall meetings, people coming out by the hundreds, attacking their congressmen that they voted for, saying, what are you doing, taking away our health care? >> right. >> as you pointed out, it was ironic that trump slipped and said, "i want to repeal health care," because that's exactly what he was doing. >> exactly.

willie, you just -- he's on the wrong side of all of these issues. he's taken the most extreme position. he's responsible for the most extreme positions on abortion. i mean, these are 80/20 issues. same thing, you know, with obamacare. he wants to terminate obamacare. as adrienne said, popular even in red states. you just do down the list of positions. even guns, universal background checks, he's with the 10%. i mean, he's with the 6% of americans that don't want universal background checks. we won't come out for red flag laws on guns. i mean, you go to all these issues. i think the thing that's so fascinating to me is, when i was coming of age politically and when i was campaigning, democrats always seemed to be on their back heels when it came to social issues. now, it's republicans on their back heels.

maga extremism has staked out the most extreme positions on abortion, the most extreme positions on obamacare, the most extreme positions on universal background check, most extreme positions on red flag laws, you name it. these social issues that democrats used to be afraid of are issues now that they're going to use to beat donald trump in swing states. >> as you say, it's not that difficult a political position to be in when you have the support of a vast majority, in some of the cases as you're saying, of the country. turns out, people like health care, reasonably priced health care. it doesn't matter if you are a republican or democrat. this could hit him among independents. we also know he's on the wrong side on the issue of democracy. he still believes the 2020 election was stolen. we know he said if he loses, he'll call it into question again. majorities of americans don't buy that story. they don't believe the lie, yet, he digs deeper into that. you're right, he is staking out extreme positions and has for so

long. no matter what overnight social media post he puts out to try to suddenly reverse his position, people with eyes and ears are not buying it and won't believe him. still ahead, congressman henry cuellar will join us to discuss biden's plan to limit crossings at the border. also, we'll speak with naacp president derrick johnson on what he's hearing from black voters ahead of the election and how their support for either biden or donald trump will impact the election. we're back in just two minutes.

with the freestyle libre 3 system... know your glucose levels no fingersticks needed. all with the world's smallest and thinnest sensor. manage your diabetes with more confidence and lower your a1c. try it for free at freestylelibre.us. try it for free at - if i told you something extends your life span, improves your sleep, makes you more empathetic, and reduces stress and cognitive decline, you would think it was a miracle drug.

but i'm talking about reading. reading every day does all those things and more, which is why i started my book club, read with jenna. so start a reading streak, even if it's just a few minutes every day, on the way to work, your lunch break, before you go to bed. every little bit helps. the more you know. former cornell university students pleaded guilty to making threats to jewish students following the attack on israel. on wednesday, 21-year-old patrick day admitted to writing the messages that sparked security concerns on campus in

october. one post in a student forum, he threatened to, quote, bring an assault rifle to campus and shoot all you big jews. he faces up to five years in prison when he is sentenced in august. let's bring in the ceo of anti-defamation league, jonathan greenblatt. his group is out with a report grading out colleges, including cornell, responded to anti-semitic incidents on campus. i noticed in these gragradings,u do have schools of interest. williams, vandy, cornell. >> harvard. >> you left alabama out of there. we know we would have graded an a-plus on that anyway. >> i'm sure. >> i want to talk first of all about something off the top of the show that you and i were discussing. that is, that is that iran, a

country since 1979 that's been the epicenter of terrorism across the world, that is considered by the united states the great satan since 1979, i'm glad to see we're sending our top general in the region to israel and sending a very strong message to the iranians. >> yeah. >> don't mistake friends having heated arguments with friends not backing friends in times of trouble. we're going to be there for israel, especially when it deals with iran. >> yeah, look, iran is israel's enemy. iran is america's enemy. iran is the enemy of all liberal-minded people, you know, in the world. i mean, this is a fascist theocracy. we've seen what they've done to their own people, shooting protesters dead in the streets, right? we've seen what they've done around the region, destabilizing countries, weakening economies. no one is happier, no one is happier about the rise of

anti-semitism here in the united states, about the rise of extremism everywhere, about things unfolding in our streets, than tehran. they love the chaos. let's be clear, they are no real supporters of the palestinian people. they support hamas and jihad. they want violence, and they -- >> i'll say here. not only are the iranians not supporters of the palestinian people, very few arab countries across the region are supporters of the palestinian people. >> yeah. >> never have been. that's why i think we do have an opportunity right now with the jordanians, with the emiratis, with the saudis, with a group of sunni arab nations saying, "we want to help in gaza. we want to figure out a way to come in and help out if the united states is there with us." i think that's a hopeful and positive development after the hell of this war comes to a

conclusion. >> yeah. i want to talk about this report card. before we get into the report card, which we know is going to be bad. i could have had this conversation in 2003 on "scarborough country," and we could have named 15 incidents that happened the past couple months. >> yup. >> it is, unfortunately, just happened with left-wing professors for a very long time. now, it is infecting the rest of the, i'm afraid, too many administrations and also the students. i'm curious, though, from october forward to now, have you noticed some universities realigning and being more responsible and supporting free speech, at the same time, supporting the rights of jewish students who, at many times, have fled to their dorm rooms in fear for their safety? >> oh, yeah. look, i spent the day at harvard law school yesterday. the stories there were shocking. this is harvard law school. to hear how so many of the

students there don't seem to understand the first amendment, think freedom of assembly means the freedom to assemble around your jew ijewish students and intimidate and terrorize them. i've heard students retreating to their dorms but also leaving campuses all together, joe, pause the environment is so uncomfortable. look, to your point, there are some good stories here. leibowitz, the president at brandeis, stepping up and shutting down a group, students for justice in palestine, the progenitor of the intimidation on campus. elon university, they've done some really good stuff to bring students together. at dartmouth, the president has been really important. >> by the way, can we talk about dartmouth quickly? >> sure. >> from the very start, it wasn't an us or them. you had professors, one who sympathized with the palestinian people, even in the days after the attack, was not afraid to

stand up and do that. and you had an israeli professor. these two people were friends before october 7th. >> yes. >> they were friends after october 7th. they came together, and they brought the student body together. the president brought the student body together and said, "listen, we disagree with each other. couldn't disagree with each other any more. but we're going to have a conversation. we're going to talk through this." >> i entirely agree. >> isn't that incredible, what they did there? >> there may be things dartmouth could do better, but the way the professors stepped up, the president, she knew she had to do something. president julio frank at the university of miami has been a stalwart. ben sasse at the university of florida. you have seen these people, the presidents, and that's a good point. leadership is the difference between an a and an f. demonstrating you don't just have academic standards, but you also have moral standards. all the students on the campus, irrespective of how they pray or

where they're from deserve to get the right treatment and respect and have their identities supported. there's something deeply wrong for these schools that talk about diversity and inclusion when that involves the exclusion of jewish students. >> rev, when you have what happened on college campuses, where you have israeli professors, palestinian processors coming together, you not only protect jewish students from hate, you attack and stop attacks against muslim students. you send a message. this is not acceptable. we will talk to each other, but muslim students will talk and walk around the campus in peace and jewish students will do the same. >> absolutely. you can't protect muslims or others if you don't protect jewish students, as well as vice versa. you know, jonathan, you and i,

adl and national action network, urban league, we got the first hate summit at the white house with president biden year before last around these things. i think, one, what i'm asking you is, a lot of the anti-semitic attacks we saw happened even before what we're seeing now going on. it's only been exploited by many haters on what is going on in gaza and israel. you and i have frank discussions. i disagree with netanyahu. i think he is bad for everything. at the same time, you can be anti-netanyahu and not anti-israel. >> of course. >> you can be anti-hamas and not be anti-gaza. talk about how we must have the kind of situation where we can unite even if we disagree on some things and disagree openly, but we unite around stopping the hate this report brings out

about what's happening to jews. because even though you and i may have different views on some things in terms of netanyahu's leadership, we still work together, talk together often on how we stop the hate. >> of course. just because -- >> and hate attacks. >> of course. just because you don't like a politician doesn't mean you can't find common ground in so much else. the jewish and black communities have so much in common, including the vast majority of american jews want dignity and decency for palestinians. but the anti-zionism that's coming out, rev, that exploded on october the 7th here in america, to your point, with slander and intimidation and attacks, clearly that's not okay. so i think what we really need to see, and this report card is designed to create a conversation, to create, like, an objective baseline so universities, colleges, all of them will realize. again, if you want to support all your students, you need to make sure they all feel equally

protected, including your jewish students. that's what this is about. again, let's be entirely clear, just because you don't agree on politics or on every single issue doesn't mean you shouldn't agree on the decency of all people. >> exactly. ceo of the anti-defamation league, jonathan greenblatt, thank you. before we let you go, tell us about the dog tag you're wearing. >> the dog tag is for the hostages, including five americans, 130 some odd people, men, women, elderly, sick and disabled, being held in tunnels, in cages below gaza. this war will end tomorrow if hamas would commit to handing over the hostages. that's what this dog tag is for. it is almost 190 days. >> over six months. >> six months. >> six months held in caves beneath gaza. thank you so much for being with us. >> thank you. >> willie? we are just after the top of the hour now. american officials are bracing for a possible iranian attack on israel in response to an april 1st strike inside syria that

killed several senior iranian commanders. as a result, u.s. embassy officials say staff have been told not to travel outside the greater jerusalem or tel-aviv areas. that's out of an abundance of caution, wanting them to stay in major cities. tehran blamed the attack in syria on israel. israel hasn't commented on that. now, the united states sent a senior military commander to israel to coordinate on a potential strike by iran. israel says it is on high alert and ready to face a number of scenarios. a strike from iran on israel's soil would mark a significant widening of the conflict, of course. meanwhile, on capitol hill, house speaker mike johnson is facing a rebellion within part of his own conference over aid to ukraine. house majority leader steve scalise sas johnson is working with the white house on a plan that would deviate from the senate-passed aid package. options floated by republicans include turning the aid into

loans, selling russian assets in the states, and pressuring the white house to relax climate action in exchange for ukraine support. this comes amid an attack on a power plant in kyiv. the facility was completely destroyed. in a rare admission, russian president vladimir putin took responsibility for the wave of strikes launched across ukraine yesterday, which mostly targeted electrical facilities. joining us now, weekly columnist for "the washington post," fareed zakaria. author of "age of revolutions." great to have you. let's talk about the book in depth in a moment, but let's go back to the conversation we were having a moment ago about israel and this step now taken by the united states to send a top military commander to tel-aviv to coordinate with the idf, to consider the possibilities and the potential for that iranian retaliation for the strike in damascus a couple of weeks ago. what do you see in the move from

the united states, both tactically and symbolically? >> i think the u.s. has been worried from the start that while it defends israel's right to defend itself and pursue its adversaries, the manner in which it has conducted this war has been something the biden administration has been, frankly, opposed to from the start. they believed they should have been more discreet and discriminating in the attack. they're worried about the war widening. what happened here, of course, it was an israeli strike on an iranian consular facility in syria that is provoing the circumstance. what i think the biden administration is trying to make sure is that the war doesn't spread. obviously, that means they're very worried about iranian retaliation, but they are worried about the way in which israel is going about this. look, it's crass to point this out, but it is true.

prime minister netanyahu has extremely low approval ratings. there is no question that were the war to end, he would face a political reckoning. something like 75% of israelis want him out once the war is over. so there is, obviously, a danger that this war goes on and that this war expands because that is in the prime minister's political interest. these things are awkward to say, but that is the reality. >> that is the reality. it is also -- it's awkward to say, as well, because hamas is responsible for what happened on october 7th, and yet it was made possible in so many ways by benjamin netanyahu. we've been trying to get answers from israeli officials and others. maybe you can provide some insight. why didn't netanyahu know

about -- when he knew about the resources in 2018, why didn't he do something about it? he sent the mossad chief. qataris were saying, do you want us to still give money to hamas? sure we do. why did it take four, six, eight, ten, twelve hours for israel to respond to the brutal raping and slaughtering of jewish people in the worst holocaust -- worst killing of jews since the holocaust? you know, when 9/11 happened downtown, our first responders were there in two minutes. why? do you have any answers? >> look, the broader strategic problem is that bibi netanyahu was colluding with hamas. it was an informal collusion, but it was a collusion which was strategic from his point of view. he wanted to kill the idea of a

two-state solution. how do you kill the idea of the two-state solution? you say the palestinians are ungovernable. they've got -- they're divided. one part of them is run by this fanatical crazies. in order to keep that fury alive, you have to make sure that the fanatical, crazy jihadists, hamas, are well funded. >> so he funds the jihadists. then, talk about how that frees him up to actually put pressure on palestinians on the west bank and allow illegal settlements to continue to grow there. >> look, in the last three weeks, the day tony blinken was in israel, he announced an appropriation of 2,000 acres of land in the west bank for further settlements, something that not only the united states but almost every country in the world believes is a direct violation of international law. so, you know, the strategy is

still, at some level, in place. why there was that failure on that horrible day where there was the brutal massacre that hamas did and for which it is solely responsible and it should be destroyed, i think that may have been an idf failure. but it is fair to say that bibi netanyahu was not spending his time worrying about, you know, an attack from hamas. that was not his concern. >> we've talked before about how much dr. brzezinski, great respect he had for you. i went back, and i know you spoke with him a good bit. >> yup. >> went back and read his memoirs about camp david. even then, even going back to '78, there were constant discussions, constant battles about illegal settlements. can you explain why it is in

israel's best interest, cynically, to keep pushing these illegal settlements in the west bank? something the united states, whether it is jimmy carter or ronald reagan or george h.w. bush or joe biden, why israel keeps ignoring the united states and putting these illegal settlements in the west bank. >> i think it is not in israel's long-term interest. >> they think it is. >> the best advocate on this issue is the founding prime minister of israel who was, himself, you know -- david ben-gurion, the man, probably more than any other single human being created israel and allowed it to survive, when the war takes place in '67, a few months later he says, "give back the territories. you'll regret this. trust me." this is a man who, in founding israel, had to take a lot of land and expelled a lot of palestinians. >> right.

>> this is a tough guy. >> right. >> he said, "you're going to rue this. because you're going to be stuck with this problem," which is exactly what has happened. >> right. >> land acquired by force is something the world is not going to recognize. we don't recognize it when putin does it. we don't recognize it when israel does it. therefore, making -- you know, the reason we have accepted the fact that israel has these occupied lands is because it has always been -- the idea has always been, there is a path here. you know, we're trying to work this out. this is a temporary acquisition. >> right. >> the settlements make that permanent. but, to be fair, it's always important to state in these situations, there have been israeli governments that have made real good-faith efforts to deal with this issue. there was 98% offered for the

territory. >> right. >> the problem we have right now is that was, you know -- and this is why i think issues on campus are different -- the israel you and i remember, joe, is an israel that made serious offers for peace and the palestinians turned them down. for the last 15 years under bibi netanyahu, israel has made no such offers, has been appropriating land, has been arresting people, keeps palestinians under martial law, and has supported hamas. so that's a very different israel than most young people have seen in the last 15 years. >> willie, it's been that cynicism with one focus, and that is doing everything possible to avoid a two-state solution. that's what netanyahu has been doing. again, that's what has caused the cynicism for so many young americans. >> yeah, we're seeing it -- >> willie, one more thing, too. for people just tuning in, i will say, when fareed talks

about those opportunities and those deals, just so people don't say, "oh, my god, he's so pro-israel." i've heard fareed say time and again, talking about 2000, which is, of course, when i brought it up with dr. brzezinski. that's when he called me stunningly superficial. as fareed has said, he's used that quote that we've heard diplomats say before, the palestinians have never passed up an opportunity to pass up an opportunity. so, you know, this is two sides looking past each other. >> by the way, you can still get your stunningly superficial murch online at morningjoe.com. >> the mug, t-shirt. >> coffee mugs, yes. golf visor for the masters. make it a package. >> exactly. >> before we get to the book, fareed, and the aid needed by

ukraine that's been held up without any sense of urgency by the house, particularly republicans in the house, what is your sense of how that delay is being felt on the front lines and impacting ukraine's ability to push back russia, as it has for more than two years now? >> it is a matter of life and death. it's the word of the united states and the commitment that the united states government, bipartisan, has been making for years now to support ukraine and is now pulling the rug from under them at an absolutely critical moment. it rewards the worst kind of aggression. it rewards the most anti-american dictator with the greatest power in the world. i mean, it is extraordinary, the party of ronald reagan is holding up aid to a group of people who are desperately fighting to become more pro-western, more pro-american, more part of the western and the american world. ronald reagan called the afghans

the moral equivalent of the founding fathers. if they were the moral equivalents of the founding fathers, the ukrainians fighting for their freedom are some exponential version of that. these are really the good guys. they have taken incredible losses. they're up against a russian aggressor. marjorie taylor greene has some bizarre argument that we should be supporting russia because they're christians. the ukrainians are christians, too. they're fighting for a liberal democracy, not a religious state. but the russians have destroyed 100 ukrainian churches because they bomb absolutely indiscriminately. it is not indiscriminate, actually. they're targeting civilian facilities, religious facilities, water treatment plants. this is one of the most brutal campaigns an aggressor has ever waged. and he might win because the

united states is dawdling over something like this. >> because house republicans are dawdling. >> to be fair, again, it's not even house republicans. a majority of house republicans would vote for this. it is because you have this, you know, minority that is really trying to build a profile on social media and not -- you know, this is part of what the problem with american politics is right now. with a one or two-seat majority, the republican party is behaing as though it has a two-thirds majority and is being governed by the most extreme 10% of the party. >> the fate of the ukraine aid may come down to a meeting between speaker johnson and former president trump at mar-a-lago this afternoon. fareed, let's turn to your book, "age of revolutions, progress and backlash from 1600 to the present." some notable revolutions you choose not to include as you tell your story. explain why. >> sure. the ones i'm looking at are the ones that really transformed

society in the way we are being transformed today. you know, huge economic changes, huge technological changes, huge social changes. if you think about, you know, the globalization, the information revolution, the identity revolution, those are the kind of revolutions i focus on. >> yeah. fareed, what are the revolutions we're in the middle of now, and how do you see the potential results of them? >> look, we are in the middle of the biggest cultural backlash, i think, honestly, certainly one of the biggest cultural backlashes in hman history. think of the changes. the creation of a digital economy from scratch, which rendered the old economy almost, you know, nonexistent or subordinate. the massive rise of globalization. china plus india coming into the global market alone is 2.5 to 3 billion people. that dwarves everything that's happened in the past. think of social change.

the role of women in society. we don't think about this because it's happened and, you know, obviously, it's such an important thing. but for most of human history, women have been second-class citizens. thousands and thousands of years. that was the basic power dynamic in the basic unit of the family. we've upended that, correctly and high time, but all of this is causing a backlash. we're living through it, and it is a cultural backlash. the one thing i think the biden people don't get is they're still trying to figure out, why is the economy not helping biden? because we are living in a world of cultural backlash. this is about culture. this is about the big cultural issues like abortion, immigration, you know, all those issues that people have, in a sense, feel much more viscerally, those are the issues moving the electorate right now. it's been going on for a while. obama, the stock market tripled under barack obama.

his approval rating barely went up. why? might have had something to do with the cultural issues spawned by the first african-american occupying the white house. >> yet, the united states, and i think so much of this is obstructed by those culture wars, strongest military in the world. i mean, strongest military in the world, not a close second. >> by far, not even. >> strongest economy in the world right now. china hasn't overtaken us the way many predicted they'd overtake us by now. our soft power never stronger. cu culturally, if you use kennedy's measurement of relative power, and, of course, rise and fall of the great power starts about this timeframe, 1600 forward. >> exactly. >> relative to the rest of the world, if you use, what was that, '86, '8 7? if you use those benchmarks, the

united states is stronger today than it probably has been since 1945. yet, most americans would be shocked to hear that. >> because we have been sold this doom and decline by trump and the whole movement. it's so rooted in this idea that, you know, the united states has been hollowed out. we're in this terrible position. joe, you are so right. in 2008, the time of the financial crisis, before the financial crisis, the euro zone economy and the u.s. economy were the same size. today, the u.s. economy is twice the size of the euro zone economy. i mean, if you look at technology, which is always the leading indicator of economic dominance, our technology companies, our seven big technology companies that people often talk about, if you add their market cap together, it is larger than the market capitalization of the entire stock market of britain, france, germany, and canada put

together. >> i had one foreign minister tell me a couple weeks ago, if you all would just get your political act together, we would take all of our money and just invest in microsoft and take a vacation. >> right. >> is this not when you talk to leaders across the globe, is this not what they scratch their head and wonder at the most? that we are stronger, we are more powerful, we are in every way but politically, we are more resilient than ever before, yet, we don't know that ourselves. >> no. in fact, i end the book with this discussion of how much, at the end of the day, does decline have to do with a lack of confidence? a lack of a sense of your own strength. you know, if you sort of psych yourself into believing that you're losing, that everything has been going terribly. i point out in the book, what country would we have traded places with over the last 30 years? who has done better?

>> right. >> rather be in germany's position with not a single company in the information space? they're stuck in an old economy of cars, chemicals, you know, machines. >> what country would not trade positions with us right now? >> right. >> can't name one. can i read this quote that you're talking about? "it is the lack of confidence more than anything else that kills a civilization, said clark. we can destroy ourselves by cynicism and disillusion just as effectively as by bombs." >> that's from the conclusion, you had it. exactly right. >> right. >> and i think this is the worst thing that donald trump has done. he's made americans think that their country is, you know, going to hell in a hand bsket. it's weird, they claim to be ultra patriotic, but when you scratch the surface, they hate everything about modern america. how can you love your country

when you actually dislike everything in it? >> right. i hope you have a big carveout because we'd love to have you back. >> i write the books just to come on "morning joe." >> well, we are grateful. that's a lot of work, a lot of work to be with somebody as stunningly superficial as me, but we all appreciate it. fareed, thank you so much. the new book is titled "age of revolutions, progress and backlash from 1600 to the present." it is extraordinarily important read. fareed zakaria, thank you so much for being with us. >> always a pleasure. ahead on "morning joe," the biden administration this morning announced it is cancelling another $7.4 billion in student loan debt. we're going to talk about how that move could play into the presidential election. before we go to break, willie, what do you have planned for "sunday today"? jack wants to know. >> i have somebody rev was with yesterday, as well. i did an interview with the great alicia keys, then i sent her off to be with rev.

she's producing a broadway show, "hell's kitchen," loosely based on her own life, her own music but rearranged. i saw the show a couple days ago. fantastic. "hell's kitchen." talked about her career, the rise from the new york city neighborhood to becoming a 16-time grammy winner. one of the most talented people on the planet. alicia keys coming up this sunday over on nbc. we'll be right back here on "morning joe" on a friday morning.

[coughing] copd hasn't been pretty. it's tough to breathe and tough to keep wondering if this is as good as it gets. but trelegy has shown me that there's still beauty and breath to be had. because with three medicines in one inhaler, trelegy keeps my airways open and prevents future flare-ups. and with one dose a day, trelegy improves lung function so i can breathe more freely all day and night. trelegy won't replace a rescue inhaler for sudden breathing problems. tell your doctor if you have a heart condition or high blood pressure before taking it. do not take trelegy more than prescribed. trelegy may increase your risk of thrush, pneumonia, and osteoporosis. call your doctor if worsened breathing, chest pain, mouth or tongue swelling, problems urinating, vision changes, or eye pain occur. ♪ what a wonderful world ♪ ask your doctor about once-daily trelegy for copd because breathing should be beautiful.

power e*trade's easy-to-use tools, like dynamic charting and risk-reward analysis, help make trading feel effortless. and its customizable scans with social sentiment help you find and unlock opportunities in the market. e*trade from morgan stanley.

with powerful, easy-to-use tools, power e*trade makes complex trading easier. react to fast-moving markets with dynamic charting and a futures ladder that lets you place, flatten, or reverse orders so you won't miss an opportunity. e*trade from morgan stanley. switch to shopify and sell smarter at every stage of your business. take full control of your brand with your own custom store. scale faster with tools that let you manage every sale from every channel. and sell more with the best converting checkout on the planet. a lot more. take your business to the next stage when you switch to shopify.

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. we take care of our children, our parents, our everybody. we do it all. and, yet, we don't ask for more. it's not built in. we -- it didn't sit right with me. in fact, in some ways, i think women still feel like it's untoward to speak about money for them. they feel shame.

shame, can you imagine? it doesn't make any sense, right? and now, with our rights and our access to health care being ripped from us, 50 years of rights, this passion of mine, it's really a mission for all of us. >> what i want to go to is, explain then how somebody that is antithetical to your roots, my mother's roots, could appeal to that base of whites and blacks and the person of donald trump. what are we looking at here? >> listen, if they voted for trump in '16, whatever. they votd for trump in '20, they knew exactly what they were doing. if they vote for donald trump in 2024, they're knowingly voting for a fascist. they're voting for a racist. they're voting for somebody that

wants to pull this country 200 years in the back. [ applause ] so i'm not trying to figure them out. i'm trying to figure out how we get people out who love democracy, who love freedom, who love the rights of all americans, how to get them to the voting booth. because that's how we save our country. [ applause ] >> joe preaching at yesterday's annual national action network convention to a standing ovation. mika honored during the conference's women empowerment lunch. along with stacey abrams, planned parenthood founder. and, as we mentioned, alicia keys, as well. that was reverend al talking about the crucial role black men and women will play at the ballot box in november. rev, i understand today president biden will address the

convention. first, that was some conversation with joe, huh? >> absolutely. i'm glad you showed it. i can't describe the reaction of the crowd. you had to see it. you couldn't even -- they were covering the cameras, they were jumping up so. joe was a bit hit. mika also preached at the women's luncheon. i thought it was important because it showed that this is not just some people on tv. they have real feelings and real identity with people across the board. it was great to have joe and mika, as well as the rest with us at national action network. the president will speak virally, straight from the white house. he says, i don't want to do a video tape. i want to talk live to the delegates of national action network. he is going to do it this afternoon. we're looking forward to what he has to say. >> you had great speakers there. stacey abrams was really moving. that was a moving speech and just a call to action, wasn't

it? >> absolutely. she's one of the best. she was in rare form yesterday. we had her. i was very glad, even on the first day, as we brought in people like the head of planned parenthood, alexis mcgill johnson, and it goes on and on. i think we will have had a great convention by the time we finish tomorrow. let's bring in the president and ceo of the naacp derrick johnson. thanks so much for being with us, derrick. you know, it is interesting. we're talking about a lot of different issues, yet, for the people you represent, for so many americans, we can talk about social issues. we can talk about a lot of different issues, but you say so many people that you're talking to are worried about costs, worried about inflation, woried

about how much groceries and gas are costing them every month. >> so we're doing front porch surveys. we've hit on about 6,500 doors in two states. we're doing several states. we're hearing, one, the cost of things. regardless of what you say about inflation or how well the economy is doing, what is the price of bread, the price of gas, and how people feel economically in terms of their future. secondly, access to health care. with the ten states that have not expanded, they're majority in the south. texas, florida, georgia, mississippi, you name it. access to health care is a problem. i'll speak to the medical association, a group of black doctors, who are also concerned. third -- >> on the second one, there are some states, some governors who said, no, we don't want an expansion of medicaid. we don't want -- >> which makes no sense, joe. >> we don't want to help the truly disadvantaged in our own states. >> listen, i live in

mississippi, from detroit. you're familiar with mississippi. hospitals are closing. access to health care for black citizens, white citizens, for people in need are closing down. individuals have to drive 40 miles or an hour just to get access to quality health care. finally, education. what is the future of work? are we preparing our young people for a future where they are included, or are we relying on a.i. technology, which some reports are saying will displace up to 40% of the workers? we have a real issue, but we also have an opportunity. let's expand health care. let's adjust the price of things so people can have economic freedom. let's define what to do about education. >> rev, when we talk about health care and not expanding medicaid, make no mistake about it, this is not a black issue. this is not a brown issue. this is a white issue. like, rural hospitals are closing down because of

decisions these governors have made. when those rural hospitals shut down, that hurts everybody. in fact, you look at where donald trump is the strongest. those are the americans who are in those rural areas that are hurt the most by these cuts. >> no, they are the ones that are hurt the most, but the messaging must connect that where you're hurting is being advocated, policies that cause your hurt is being advocated by trump and them. i don't think the connection has been made. i think that those of us that have a different kind of social standing need to make those connections. nobody is better at that than derrick johnson. thanks for coming to the convention. you said you have your lane and i have mine, but we're on the same highway. you've always operated like that. talk about how we are both hearing from segments of black

america, a sort of apathy in terms of coming out to vote. they're very, very involved in what the problems are. they're very concerned. but talk about the challenge we have of getting people to really understand, voting an issue. you methodically -- you being the naacp -- try to poll them and get the scientific data, so it's not just the pops and whistles that we do in marches, but it's, wait a minute, this is what people are feeling on the ground. talk about that. >> the reason we do the front porch surveys is so we're not chasing headlines. we're talking to individuals impacted by policies they actually have control to make an outcome through their vote. as we lead up to this election, we're making sure people see their power to make a difference in their quality of life. give you an example. shelby county, tennessee, during the primary election in a d.a. race, one of the worst d.a.s in the country, eight-year term, we

hit the doors, invested in the community, hired local individuals to work, and we changed the trajectory of the election. we didn't pick a candidate. we said, are you concerned about the criminal justice in your community? here's how you can have an impact because of the discretion of the d.a. is so important. when people see themselves as a part of the solution, you get action. >> president johnson, let's talk about the vilification of dei, which was really put on display in recent weeks. the mayor of baltimore came under racist attacks for a bridge that collapsed that, of course, he had nothing to do with. yet, because it was the color of his skin. the right has seized on this. there has been an unraveling of programs. talk about what your organization sees as the sinister effects. >> diversity, equity, and inclusion, we must save the words so we understand the meaning and not allow issues that mean something else. diversity, equity, and inclusion is the reality of the future.

it is the reality of today. we will rob ourselves of opportunities in this nation and in a global economy if we don't lean into the most talented individuals in this country. >> all right. alex, did we just have a -- >> the studio shook to where it felt like an earthquake. it is still going. >> feeling a little -- >> yeah, we're all feeling it right now. >> we're feeling it in here. >> at 30 rock. >> kind of like a train going underneath. >> there is a train that runs under this building, but it is several floors below where we are. we don't normally feel the train. >> it is still shaking. >> you don't feel it in there? we are right now. >> is it potentially construction in the building? >> you guys feeling that? >> i thought it was derrick talking. >> i was moved by it. >> the words, right? >> if you fall from the floor, i'll be moved by going down the stairs. president and ceo of naacp, derrick johnson, we'll see what's going on here. we shall return.

coming up, the former nfl star acquitted of murder, o.j. simpson, died of cancer. we'll look at the case that gripped the nation and the impact it had on tv news business nearly 30 years later. rev, we're going to figure out what's happening. >> absolutely. >> we'll be right back.

she runs and plays like a puppy again. his #2s are perfect! he's a brand new dog, all in less than a year.

when people switch their dog's food from kibble to the farmer's dog, they often say that it feels like magic. but there's no magic involved. (dog bark) it's simply fresh meat and vegetables, with all the nutrients dogs need— instead of dried pellets. just food made for the health of dogs. delivered in packs portioned for your dog. it's amazing what real food can do.

welcome back to "morning joe." we're sorting through whether it was reverend al's preaching or brother john's preaching. i'm not sure. we've been doing this for 17 years in the building, never felt that. the cameras shook. we're not getting any reports of anything at all. some people are saying, could it be construction? we've had construction here before. >> yeah. >> t.j., you said the camera was shaking from where you were? >> yeah. yeah, it was shaking. it's weird, we didn't feel it in the control room, though. >> didn't feel it in the control

room and didn't feel it in the hallway. >> i've been here 13 years and never felt it. >> the studio really shook. it was reminisce end of the earthquake we had a week or so back, but we're not seeing other reports for confirmation. we're trying to sort out what it is. >> other than people watching us. >> people freaking out because there is an earthquake in "morning joe" because we started shaking. >> exactly. we'll stay on it. see what's going on. maybe they rerouted the subway to the second floor perhaps. who knows? willie, i talked to steve bataglio and asked where he was during the car chase in '94. he was "the hollywood reporter's" bureau reporter, l.a. bureau reporter there. >> new york bureau chief. >> still, he was in the middle. he was in the middle of the epicenter then of the biggest media story, my gosh, in our time. >> by the way, i'm on remote

today so i did not feel the shaking, but i can tell you, we've never had the studio shake for construction. certainly not for the subway. >> yeah. >> there's nothing on the u.s. geological survey, doesn't have any report of an earthquake? there have been the aftershocks from the earthquake last week. we'll try to figure out what happened there. yeah, i'm a knicks fan. in 1994, we were hoping and praying we might get our first title in a long time. we're watching the knicks play the rockets. as i said earlier, ewing and olajuwon, a great series. nbc cut away from game five of the '94 finals between the rockets and knicks to take coverage of the o.j. simpson ford bronco chase. >> not only in the cva, back at his days in ohio state, he'll give up his body, taking the hard hit from mason. >> 6:39 remaining in the first half. knicks by two. we are looking at live

pictures of interstate 5 in los angeles. we believe that that white vehicle, which is being trailed by california highway patrol cars and helicopters, belongs to al, who disappeared with o.j. simpson after he was charged he'd be charged for the murder of his wife and the young man with her at the time. it is the latest bizarre development in a string of bizarre and shocking developments that have been going on all day long. >> that's the voice of the great tom brokaw nearly 30 years ago, june of 1994. nbc continued to dip in and out of the coverage of that chase. at times showed the game and the police pursuit simultaneously. joining us now, steven who works for the "l.a. times." and the first journalist to interview simpson after his

acquittal, gordon. great to have you with us. we're talking about this because o.j. simpson died from cancer at 76 yesterday. my father who was a correspondent for cbs news at the time had flown into lax on a reporting trip and got word that o.j. was on a slow-speed chase when he was in his taxi, hearing that o.j. was a couple miles behind him. he saw all the people on the overpasses. he witnessed the spectacle. they pulled the taxi to the side. my dad points out the guy kept the meter running the whole time, and my dad watched as o.j. and this sort of comet, as he called it, with the in a bizarre spectacle that was the beginning of something i think it's fair to say in cable news and our media culture. >> it was truly a where-were-you tv moment. if you went through the kennedy assassination or the challenger explosion in 1986, you can tell a story similar to what you just

told, and i think it also showed that the public was really just taking control of the story. they wanted to know everything about it. at this time in 1994, you know, the -- the evening newscast had over 30 million viewers a night. peter jennings, and dan rather really dictated the news agenda. i think it stopped on this day because the networks -- the network news was still pretty buttoned down as an institution at the time. this was kind of a tawdry story, something that you would not cover every night normally. you didn't see trials like that covered, and -- but the public was so interested in all the aspects of this case, and there were places where they could see it when they wanted it, 24-hour cable news on cnn, court tv.

there was already an appetite for this type of thing. you saw it with the menendez trial the year before, and the william smith kennedy rape case. this just amped that up by a multitude, just the -- the celebrity, race, sex. it had so many elements in it and incredible that the public was sitting there transfixed by dna tests. i mean, it was almost an education of the legal system at the same time. >> and a few years later, of course, it would shift from los angeles to washington, d.c. and bill clinton, monica lewinsky 24/7 as well. >> and it created a new class of journalists, the legal expert, the legal commentator, and the law became something that was talked about in a pretty sophisticated degree on television after this. >> this morning, "the times" was talking about how there were many tragedies here. one of the tragedies was there were two americas on vivid

display. i was on an airplane when the verdict was announced and, you know, everybody screamed in shock and horror, and yet that was where white america was. >> absolutely. i remember that day because it was october 3rd, my birthday, and jesse jackson and i had done an interview at a local station in new york. we walked outside, and the verdict had come in, and a guy was driving by, a white guy driving a truck and saying, we'll get even with you guys. >> happy birthday! right? happy birthday, rev. >> i thought he was saying happy birthday, and i'm, like, what is he talking about? the verdict was that, but nobody knew this better than ed gordon who got the first interview with o.j., and ed gordon was, and remains one of the premier black journalists in our country, and ed talked about how a lot of black america was not necessarily for o.j., but was for johnny cochran and being

able to show that we could make the system work our way because we didn't feel that there was enough evidence for o.j. i remember johnny cochran asked me to visit in jail and i said, this is not a civil rights issue. i wouldn't go, and we were torn between that. we were not necessarily pro-o.j., but we were for johnny and showing that he could defeat those that were ill-prepared to prove their case. >> yeah, i think you're right, rev, and thank you for allowing me this time talk about something it's hard to believe sometimes that it's been 30 years. i think you hit the nail on the head. the idea that this was not about o.j. simpson -- people forget o.j. had been a beloved football star, but as his time went on as a celebrity, his time in black american had waned frankly by the time all of this happened, and it really was about the idea of finally seeing an african american male in particular beat

a system that had beat us down for so very long. that coupled with the idea of the relationship that the lapd had with the black community all of those years. so it was kind of like a david beats goliath for the first time moment, and i think that we have to understand that this trial was really not only about the trial, but it was about america and race. that was the personification of the division that has become so vivid that we see today. so it was one of those touchtone moments that we can look back on and say it was as much about o.j. simpson and those murders it has it was about america. >> this was a day-to-day drama. americans hooked each and every moment that the attorneys, the judge, they all became

celebrities, and we're having this debate again because donald trump's about to go on trial and the federal courts don't allow cameras. georgia does. what do we think? is this a good or a bad thing? >> i think it depends on your perspective, especially from a legal perspective. look at the menendez brothers. there was a mistrial. the second trial not televised, there was a conviction. you would have to think there was some sort of correlation there. so i think a lot of it has the point of view of the parties involved at this point. i will tell you that with a phenomenon of cameras in the courtroom was that they provided sort of an inexpensive way to present a saga that gripped viewers, that you could see it play out in realtime, and i think the demand for that type of thing among the consumer has only intensified, and if any of these trials get -- are

televised, you're going to see them streamed on multiple outlets. there were just a few places to go 30 years ago. now it will be everywhere. you'll have tiktok hot takes. i mean, it's going to -- it will be very interesting to see how this current, much more fragmented and much more unruly media environment will play a role in a similar case like this. >> and ed, we are so fragmented when it comes to media, where we get our media from generation to generation, where we were showing the graphic at the bottom of the screen where 150 million americans saw that white bronco chase. hard to believe that many americans were in front of a television set at one time. it shows just how big that moment was. >> yeah, certainly a different day than we live in now, and if you think about the idea from the murders to the acquittal and then the thereafter in the

streets, america was transfixed on this case. this was real reality television. this was not "the housewihousew" this was something that we really viewed in the same way that we did "the bachelor" and all these things. we got know the characters and if you were old enough back then, you could still recite the names. >> johnny cochran was a true social media superstar. people would ask for his autograf. >> -- autograph. >> yeah. >> dan abrams, his career was launched by this. he said his presence was more powerful than a former president or rock star. it was just -- it's hard to describe is what it was. >> that's amazing. >> broadcast journalist ed gordon and steven battaglia, thank you so much. we appreciate it. coming up next here, next

hour we'll speak with democratic congressman henry cuellar of texas about the growing crisis at the border. plus, donald trump is set to appear at a manhattan courthouse on monday for the beginning of his hush money trial. we'll talk about who is set to testify. also ahead, grammy-winning singer, songwriter, and actress, say is a bareilles will be live in our studio talk about the new netflix series "girls 5eva." "morning joe" is back in two minutes. 5eva." "morning joe" is back in two minutes.

my name is oluseyi and some of my favorite moments throughout my life are watching sports with my dad.

now, i work at comcast as part of the team that created our ai highlights technology, which uses ai to detect the major plays in a sports game. giving millions of fans, like my dad and me, new ways of catching up on their favorite sport. let's get to vice president kamala harris traveling to arizona today just three days after the state supreme court ruled an 1864 law criminalizing nearly all abortions can be enforced. while in arizona, harris expected to underscore the stakes of the 2024 election for health care and reproductive freedom. she's also expected to emphasize

that tuesday's ruling was made possible by donald trump. the campaign released some excerpts from her prepared remarks including this. quote, we all must understand who is to blame. it is the former president, donald trump. it is donald trump who during his campaign in 2016 said, women should be punished for seeking an abortion. donald trump, she goes on, is the architect of this health care crisis, and that's not a fact he hides. in fact, he brags about it. here's what a second trump term looks like, more bans, more suffering, less freedom, but we are not going to let that happen. that's an advanced look at prepared remarks today in arizona for vice president kamala harris, and joe, she's right. just a couple of days ago, donald trump stood on that tarmac and said it was an incredible achievement to get rid of roe and saying, quote, we did that. he's now living with the consequences. >> living with the consequences. a senatorial candidate also living with the consequences of what she said a couple of years ago, though she is trying to sound as moderate as humanly

possible and picking up the phone, calling around, people like kari lake, of course, going to spend the rest of this campaign outrunning earlier comments. "the new york times" headline, democrats hammer a simple attack on abortion. donald trump did this, and he did, and the consequences are absolutely terrible for women and also for republican candidates. >> yeah. while willie was bringing in the story, i wrote four words on my paper, donald trump did this. >> that's the message. >> that's the message. it's simple and powerful. i think we'll hear donald trump did this about a lot of issues that go on including this and january 6th. >> also donald trump, and we're going to be talking about this too. he's desperately trying to run away from all the times he said he wanted to do away with obamacare. >> yes. >> now saying, oh, no, no. obamacare -- forget what i said about john mccain going like

this. i -- maybe i like obamacare. so he's flip-flopping, flip-flopping. he just looks so weak and desperate right now. >> that truth social video right now, he said, i'm for obamacare. let's change it and we can fact check it about a thousand times he said he wanted to overturn it. donald trump did this, and as much as the biden administration knows they have to put forward a positive message, so much of what they're going to say between now and november is, like, look. this is what trump did. he has changed your life and taken away your freedoms and threatening to do more. we can't have this again, and donald trump did this, is adrian, squarely going to be about abortion, and the vice president, who is this administration's best messenger on this issue heads to arizona which is now trying to enforce a civil war-era near total ban on the procedure very much putting a step out of one state, but one that seemed like it was slipping away from the president, now firmly up for grabs again. tell us about that message we're hear from the vice president. donald trump did that. is that going to work? >> yeah.

i think sometimes, lemire, the simplest words are the most effective message. i think you're going to see the campaign really playing up not only donald trump did on this abortion, but as joe was saying on a number of other issues, but look. the vice president is an incredibly effective messenger on protecting women's right to choose, to make her own decisions not only about her own health care, but financial decisions and economic decisions. obviously you'll see the vice president continue to travel across the country, but i'm also very proud of the campaign and the white house for getting on top of this, for going to arizona immediately which of course, meant that the vice president had a sort of change around her schedule, but they jumped on top of this because there is so much at stake. arizona, of course, is a top battleground state in this campaign cycle, and, you know, we narrowly won -- the campaign narrowly won arizona in 2020. it'll be a close race this time around, but they want to make sure every single voter -- the vice president wants to make sure every single voter, the entire american electorate is

squarely aware of who is responsible for this decision for putting three supreme court justices on the court that were against a woman's right to choose, that made it very clear before they joined the court where they stood on this issue and like you said, donald trump is flip-flopping around. he can't really figure out what the right message is right now. he's not going to be able to run away from what he did, and this campaign is not going to let them forget this. >> you know, rev, i've talked for some time about how pro-life conservatives have seen the extremes of 10-year-old girls who have been rape victims having to flee states, of mothers, of children being denied treatment and having, you know, possibly being sterilized or having their very lives put at risk, changing the viewpoints -- i found it fascinating talking to people yesterday, and hearing you talking about how your

organization is -- you've got a lot of churches from across america coming together. some of them fundamentalists, and even -- even people from that church who are traditionally pro-life, from those churches are saying, this is too extreme. we want no part of this. this is too much, especially for our -- for our daughters, for our wives, for our children, for our communities. >> and that's exactly the attitude and opinion i get even from those who are pro-lifers that are part of the civil rights movement generally are part of that network, is that many of them say, what i would guide myself by, or advise by -- my daughter by does not mean you should criminalize it. we're talking about criminalizing people's choices or i thought to force government to make that choice. you have a choice in religion. you can do good or evil, go to

heaven or hell as we believe, but that's your choice, but you can't force people to do what you think is right, and you can't make them criminal if they don't, and that's what you saw yesterday, and i think what the right wing and the trumpsteres have done is they've gone too far, where they're criminalizing it, where they're robbing women of the dignity of making their own choice and that's why even some pro-lifers are saying, wait a minute. i can be for life, and at the same time, say, it is up to a woman to make her own choice. >> we're seeing it it in christian community, the jewish community, the muslim community. we're seeing it in the secular communities where people who may have had a position closer to traditional pro-life position being pushed away by the extreme positions of, well, you look at what's going on in arizona. you look at what happened up in wisconsin when they were still

clinging onto an 1849 abortion law. you look all across the country, places like kansas, kentucky, ohio, really conservative states just saying, enough. we are not signing up for this extremist maga approach to women's health. >> yeah. i mean, there are many people in this country who on moral religious grounds, whatever they may be, think maybe a 16-week ban, 15-week ban, something like that would be appropriate, but once you get below that and you start talking about six weeks in florida, arizona -- excuse me. alabama starts talking about getting rid of ivf, and now you're talking about no exceptions except for the health of the mother and putting doctors in jail for 2 to 5 years based on a law from the civil war era. even people who don't like abortion are going, whoa, whoa, whoa. that's a bridge way, way too far. adrienne elrod, i suspect we'll hear much, much more about this because as you have been saying,

this could be the beginning of what we in these states. now that roe has been gone for almost two years, we've seen some of the trigger laws go into effect, and they seem to be just getting more extreme as we go along with the process here. >> that's exactly right, willie. what's coming next, right? what's the next shoe that's going to drop on this? that's why again, going back to donald trump's strategy is not effective because he says, well, you know, we'll leave it up to the states. that's where it should be, but every time he says that, and something happens in a state that affects a woman's right to choose, it's disastrous for him, and, you know, if you are the average voter looking out there and saying, you know, man, how do we stop this? obviously every measure that's put on the ballot to allow women to have access to their own reproductive health decisions that has passed overwhelmingly by both democrats, republicans, and independents, but it still is a herculean effort to get something on the ballot and to get it passed. it's not an easy feat. donald trump can stay this is left to the states, you know, if you are an average voter trying

to figure out who to vote for in this election cycle and maybe you're teetering back and forth, not quite decided yet, you're looking at this and saying, man. i don't think it should be left to the states because it's such a disastrous consequence when you look at what happened to alabama, when you look at the fact that arizona's going back to an 1864 law, before women even had the right to vote since arizona state, it's crazy. so, you know, the contrast could not be more clear, and again, president biden and vice president harris are going to make sure that every single voter in america knows who is responsible for putting us in the position that we're in today, and who's responsible for giving women these very difficult decisions they have to make about their own health because the government is not protecting them. >> again, the biden campaign only has to play video tape of donald trump as recently as two days ago saying, quote, we did that. vice president harris saying, yes, you sure did that. we'll have more coming up this

minute. also ahead, barring jury selection in the hush money trial is set to begin monday. we'll talk to michael cohen who will be a likely key witness for prosecutors about what to expect in court. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. watching "" we'll be right back.

my mental health was better. but uncontrollable movements called td, tardive dyskinesia, started disrupting my day. td felt embarrassing. i felt like disconnecting. i asked my doctor about treating my td, and learned about ingrezza. ♪ ingrezza ♪ ingrezza is clinically proven for reducing td.

most people saw results in just two weeks. people taking ingrezza can stay on most mental health meds. only number-one prescribed ingrezza has simple dosing for td: always one pill, once daily. ingrezza can cause depression, suicidal thoughts, or actions in patients with huntington's disease. pay close attention to and call your doctor if you become depressed, have sudden changes in mood, behaviors, feelings, or have thoughts of suicide. don't take ingrezza if you're allergic to its ingredients. ingrezza may cause serious side effects, including angioedema, potential heart rhythm problems, and abnormal movements. report fevers, stiff muscles, or problems thinking as these may be life threatening. sleepiness is the most common side effect. take control by asking your doctor about ingrezza. ♪ ingrezza ♪ before my doctor and i chose breztri for my copd, i had bad days. [cough] flare-ups that could permanently damage my lungs. with breztri, things changed for me. breztri gave me better breathing. starting within 5 minutes, i noticed my lung function improved. it helped improve my symptoms,

and breztri was even proven to reduce flare-ups, including those that could send me to the hospital. so now i look forward to more good days. breztri won't replace a rescue inhaler for sudden breathing problems. it is not for asthma. tell your doctor if you have a heart condition or high blood pressure before taking it. don't take breztri more than prescribed. breztri may increase your risk of thrush, pneumonia, and osteoporosis. call your doctor if worsened breathing, chest pain, mouth or tongue swelling, problems urinating, vision changes, or eye pain occur. can't afford your medication? astrazeneca may be able to help. ask your doctor about breztri.

mr. trump is a con man. he asked me to pay off an adult film star with whom he had an affair and to lie about it to his wife, which i did.

mr. trump directed me to use my own personal funds from a home equity line of credit to avoid any money being traced back to him that could negatively impact his campaign, and i did that too without bothering to consider whether that was improper, much less whether it was the right thing to do or how would it impact me, my family, or the public, and i am going to jail in part, because of my decision to help mr. trump hide that payment from the american people before they voted a few days later. >> that is donald trump's former personal attorney and fixer, michael cohen, testifying before the house oversight committee in february of 2019, and taking responsibility for the things he did on behalf of donald trump. nbc news has learned cohen is on the list of witnesses expected to be called to testify in the

former president's hush money criminal trial with jury selection set to begin on monday in new york. cohen, you'll remember pleaded guilty in 2018 to campaign finance charges related to hush money payments made to two women just before the 2016 election, including adult film actress stormy daniels. joining us now is legal adviser to michael cohen, lanny davis and state attorney for palm beach county, florida, dave aaron berg. lenny, let's start with you. can you confirm that michael cohen will be a witness in this trial? >> uh, yes. >> he will be a witness in this trial, so we should remind people that michael cohen went to jail for over a year for charges related to this. he served home confinement for another year and a half or so, almost three years of time served. so as you look at this, lanny, what is this trial about, exactly? there's some distance from it, about eight years since these payments were made in

october 2016, just before election day. what is this a trial about, the way you see it? >> let me quote donald trump's justice department's prosecutors and public, when they made the charge that donald trump and they wrote this, directed michael cohen to pay this money to miss daniels, they said this case is about the impairment of democracy by allowing wealthy people such as mr. trump to buy silence a few days before the election to prevent the american people from gaining information they need. they describe this case as about democracy. that's the federal district of new york, southern district of new york prosecutors and a public document hiding in plain sight. every time someone describes this in a disparaging way as about sex or something else, quote, donald trump's prosecutors describing this case as seriously about the undermining of democracy. >> lanny, can -- can alvin bragg

in a state court in new york, make that connection? can he go beyond the -- >> yes. >> -- the narrower violations of, you know, falsifying business records and how that became a felony, can he go beyond that? >> not too narrow. he has charged mr. trump for 34 felony counts, and those involve 34 times that he booked as expenses for legal services. what federal prosecutors working for his administration described as payments to silence somebody right before an election which made them illegal. so the answer is yes. he can connect the federal violation of fraud to new york state crimes, at least three of them, and he laid them out in the indictment, but yes, eugene, that is definitely part of the case. >> so dave, you are a

prosecutor, and we can figure out what the trump defense is going to be about michael cohen. they're going to pay him as an untrustworthy witness. they're going to say he pleaded guilty, to lying to congress. they're going to say, you shouldn't believe a word this man says. so how do you then, as the prosecution, how do you use cohen effectively with that as the backdrop? >> yeah, jonathan, the reason why michael cohen went to prison for lying and for other felonies is because he was lying for donald trump, and it was as lanny said, the felonies that are at issue here. so he's going to try to attack michael cohen, but he will have corroboration, and that's in terms of stormy daniels herself, and hope hicks, a former ally of donald trump. also i think that trump will try to use the john edwards offense which is that these at the same time -- payments were not for campaign reasons, but to protect his family. that can be easily debunked. he can say, i was trying to protect melania from finding

out, but cohen and stormy daniels' lawyers first spoke about this in 2011. this was known for years within team trump and yet no money changed hands until two weeks before the election and that is really damaging. as far as falsification of business records, why do that if you are trying to protect information from melania? she was not likely to pore over the books of the trump organization which is a private company. why falsify these internal records just to keep it secret from her unless you knew it was a campaign election crime? but also trump allegedly directed michael cohen to delay paying stormy daniels until after the election because he didn't want to pay her at all, and after the election, it wouldn't matter. why? because trump knew this was about the campaign. a lot of good facts and the prosecution, and in the end, this was headed towards a conviction. >> you've seen some of the names, dave aronberg, is there anybody in particular that you would call, that you would be interested in their testimony?

>> hope hicks. hope hicks gave some different testimony when she appeared before congress, joe, and i'm interested in seeing what she says now. she did testify before the grand jury, and she is a trump loyalist. she was the one who was, like, steaming his pants on air force one, and now she's going to be there to corroborate michael cohen, and we'll see what happens there, but that will be a powerful witness. trump will try to bring in politics in this, trying to say that, you know, joe biden is behind this, but the judge is not going to allow this to become a circus. coming up, donald trump now says he only wants to make obamacare better after spending years promising to repeal it. we'll show you his latest reversal when "morning joe" comes right back. oe" comes right back

moving forward with node-positive breast cancer is overwhelming. but i never just found my way; i made it. and did all i could to prevent recurrence. verzenio reduces the risk of recurrence of hr-positive, her2-negative, node-positive, early breast cancer with a high chance of returning as determined by your doctor when added to hormone therapy. diarrhea is common, may be severe, or cause dehydration or infection. at the first sign, call your doctor, start an anti-diarrheal , and drink fluids. before taking verzenio, tell your doctor about any fever, chills, or other signs of infection. verzenio may cause low white blood cell counts, which may cause serious infection that can lead to death. life-threatening lung inflammation can occur. tell your doctor about any new or worsening trouble breathing, cough, or chest pain. serious liver problems can happen. symptoms include fatigue, appetite loss, stomach pain, and bleeding or bruising. blood clots that can lead to death have occurred. tell your doctor if you have pain or swelling in your arms or legs, shortness of breath, chest pain, and rapid breathing or heart rate, or if you are nursing, pregnant, or plan to be. i'm making my own way forward. talk to your doctor about reducing your risk.

(♪♪ ) why did i keep missing out on this? before you were preventing migraine with qulipta? do you remember the pain, the worry, the canceled plans? and look at me now. you'll never truly forget migraine but qulipta reduces attacks making zero-migraine days possible. it's the only pill of its kind that blocks cgrp and is approved to prevent migraine of any frequency. to help give you that forget you get migraine feeling. don't take if allergic to qulipta. most common side effects are nausea, constipation and sleepiness. learn how abbvie could help you save. qulipta, the forget-you-get migraine medicine. (vo) in two seconds, eric will realize qulipta, the they're gonna need more space... (man) gotta sell the house. (vo) oh...open houses. or, skip the hassles and sell directly to opendoor. (man) wow. (vo) when life's doors open, we'll handle the house.

voices of people with cidp: cidp disrupts. cidp derails. let's be honest... all: cidp sucks! voices of people with cidp: but living with cidp doesn't have to. when you sign up at shiningthroughcidp.com, you'll find inspiration in real patient stories, helpful tips, reliable information, and more. cidp can be tough. but finding hope just got a little easier. sign up at shiningthroughcidp.com.

all: be heard. be hopeful. be you.

after eight years of vowing to repeal the affordable care act without offering a viable replacement, donald trump says he only wants to make obamacare better. yesterday on truth social, he said biden is misrepresenting the plan used by about 40 million americans, but last year, trump was looking at, quote, the alternatives to the aca and bemoaning the senate vote to repeal it. here is what trump said yesterday following his many comments over the years. >> i'm not running to terminate the aca as crooked joe biden says all over the place. i'm running to close the borders, stop inflation, make our economy great, strengthen our military, and make the aca or obamacare as it's sometimes

known, much stronger and far less expensive because it's much too expensive now and it's not very good. >> we're going to create great health care. we're going to get rid of obamacare. we're going to terminate it. >> we're going to win by knocking the hell out of obamacare, terminaing it. >> with obamacare, getting back to the boring subject. it's almost a waste of time talking about it because when we terminate it, all we'll do is say, it was a bad experience for the american people. >> we are decimating obamacare. we got a bad vote. we got a bad vote the evening that we were going to terminate obamacare. >> hopefully we'll win at the appellate division and go to the supreme court to terminate obamacare. >> we want to terminate obamacare because it's bad. we're running it really bad, but we know defective. >> we want to terminate obamacare because it's bad. >> we almost got it done, but john mccain voted against it. that was a bad day. remember that?

thumbs down after campaigning for ten years. thumbs down, everybody. >> donald trump through the years saying, joe, he wants to terminate obamacare, which is very, very popular in this country, and by the way, it's only getting more popular as the years go on. there were questions around how it was going to work, how much it costs in the original stages when it was implemented and now it's more popular than ever. 40 million americans use it, people with preexisting conditions get coverage and now even polling republicans say, eh. let's stay away from that one. he seems to want to drill down and now in that statement yesterday just like with abortion rights, he's scrambling to cover himself, but he can't run from all that tape we just showed. >> no. gene, way too much tape, and -- >> mm-hmm. sure. >> -- you have starting in 2016, he's going to terminate obamacare. in 2018, decimate obamacare, and even in 2023, talking about terminating obamacare, and then

as you see, he at one point gets carried away and he says we're going to terminate health care. he's focused on this. >> yeah. >> let's be clear. in that recent post, he said, it's not good health care. there's no running away from this. >> yeah. >> he's even recently said, it's not good health care and wants to get rid of it. >> yeah. i mean, what's the saying in politics? if you are exploiting, you're losing. i mean, he's exploiting all over the place, right? he's now trying to back off of what he said a zillion times about obamacare. he wants to get rid of it, and he's very, very clear and now he's saying, i didn't mean get rid of it and now he's doing the same thing with, you know, roe v. wade. he's doing the same thing with abortion and trying to back away from what he said very clearly, and what he did, and he's trying

to have everything both ways. that's really hard to do, and he knows he's in danger of either losing some of this space, or loing independents and others who disagree with these radical positions, and that's where he is. it's not been a good few weeks for donald trump. coming up, some of the nation's top schools are failing when it comes to protecting jewish students on campus. jonathan greenblatt joins us with new findings from the anti-defamation league. that's next on "morning joe." te anti-defamation league that's next on "morning joe.

♪♪ hey what's going on? i switched to h&r block this year and had one of their experts do my taxes for me. kind of a big win. oh yeah? yeah they're so on top of it, they guaranteed my taxes were 100% accurate. and my maximum refund or i get my money back. wow! nice. i don't know if my guy's got any guarantees. you should definitely switch it up. —we're gonna go do a victory lap now. get a 100% accurate return and your max refund or your money back. it's better with block.

former cornell university students pleaded guilty to making online threats against jewish students in the weeks that followed hamas' attack on israel. on wednesday, 21-year-old patrick day admitted to writing the messages that sparked security concerns on campus in october, and one post in the

student form he threatened to quote, bring an assault rifle to campus and shoot all you jews , unquote. jonathan greenblatt is here, and his group is out with a new report. 86 colleges including cornell have responded to anti-semitic incidents on campus. i noticed in these gradings, you do have -- you do have schools of interest here. >> we do. >> you have williams, vandy, cornell. >> harvard. >> you left alabama out of there, but we know we would have graded about a plus on that anyways. >> sure. sure. >> i want to talk first of all about something we were discussing, and that is -- that is that iran, a country since 1979 that's been the epicenter of terrorism across the world,

that has considered the united states the great satan since 1969, i'm so glad to see we're sending our top general in the region to israel and sending a very strong message to the iranians. >> yeah. >> don't mistake friends having heated arguments -- >> mm-hmm. >> -- with friends not backing friends in times of trouble. we're going to be there for israel, especially when it deals with iran. >> yeah, look. iran is israel's enemy. iran is america's enemy. iran is the enemy of all liberal-minded people in the world. this is a fascist theocracy. we've seen what they've done to their own people, shooting protesters dead in the streets, right? we've seen what they've done around the region, destabilizing countries, weakening economies. no one is happier -- no one is happier about the rise of anti-semitism here in the united states, about the rise of extremism everywhere, about things unfolding in our streets

than those in tehran. they love this chaos, and let's be clear. there are no real supporters of the palestinian people. they support hamas and jihad. they want violence, and they, you know -- >> john, i'll just say here. i'll just say here. not only are the iranians not supporters of the palestinian people, very few arab countries across the region are supporters of the palestinian people, and never have been. that's why we -- i think we do have an opportunity right now with the jordanians, with the emirates, with the saudis and groups saying, we want to help in gaza. >> yes. >> we want to figure out a way to come in and help out if the united states is there with us. i think that is -- that is a hopeful and positive development after the hell of this war comes to a conclusion. >> yeah. >> i want to talk about this

report card, but before we get into the report card which we know is going to be bad. i had this conversation with you in 2003 in scarborough country, and i could name 15 incidents that have happened over the past couple of months. >> yep. >> unfortunately it's just happened with the left-wing professors for a very long time, but now it's affecting the rest of -- i'm afraid, too many administrations and also the students. i'm curious though, from october forward to now, have you noticed some some universities re-aligning and being more responsible and supporting free speech at the same time supporting the rights of jewish students who at many times, have fled to their dorm rooms in fear for their safety? >> oh, yeah. look. i spent the day at harvard lieu school yesterday, and the stories there were shocking. this is harvard law school, and to hear how so many of the students there don't seem to understand the first amendment, think freedom of assembly means

the freedom to assemble around your jewish students and intimidate and terrorize them, and i've heard stories not just about stories retreating to the hill, but treating to their dorms and leaving campuses altogether, joe, because the environment is so uncomfortable. but look. to your point, there are some good stories here. ron leibowitz, the president shutting down this group called justice for palestine. herr the main generaor of this chaos. at elon university, dartmouth, the president has been really, really important. >> can we talk about dartmouth really quickly? >> sure. >> from the very start, it wasn't an us or them. you had professors, one who sympathized with the palestinian people, even in those -- even in the days after the attack. he was not afraid to stand up and do that, and then you had an israeli professor, and these two

people were friends before october 7th. they were friends after october 7th. >> yes. >> and they came together, and they brought the student body together. the president brought the student body together and said, listen. we disagree with each other, couldn't disagree with each other any more, but we're going to have a conversation, and we're going to talk through this. >> i entirely agree. >> isn't that incredible what they did? >> yeah. look. i mean, there are maybe things that dartmouth could do better, but the way those professors stepped up and the president knew she had to do something. president julio frank at the university of miami has been a stalwart. ben sasse, you have seen these people and presidents, and that's a good point. leadership is the difference between an a and an f, demonstrating you don't just have academic standards, but you also have moral standards, and all the students on the campus,

irrespective of how they pray or what they believe, deserve the treatment of respect and to feel deeply supported. these are schools talking about diversity and inclusion when that involves the exclusion of jewish students. >> you heard about campuses, where you have palestinian and israeli professors coming together. you not only protect jewish students from hate. you attack -- you stop attacks against muslim students and you send a message. this is not acceptable. we will talk to each other, but muslim students will talk and walk around the campus in peace, and jewish student wills do the same. >> absolutely. in fact, you can't protect muslims or others if you don't protect jewish students as well as vice versa, and, you know, jonathan, you and i, adl national action network urban league, and we got the first

hate summit at the white house with president biden year before last around these things. >> yep. >> i think one, what i'm asking you is a lot of the anti-semitic attacks we saw happened even before when we're seeing now going on, and has only been exploited by many haters on what is going on in gaza and in israel, and you and i have had frank discussions. i disagree with netanyahu. i think netanyahu is bad for everything, but at the same time, you can be anti-netanyahu and not anti-israel. >> of course. >> you can be anti-hamas and not be anti-gaza. talk about how we must have the kind of situation where we can unite even if we disagree on some things and disagree openly, but we unite around stopping the hate that this report brings out about what's happening to jews? because even though you and i

may have different views on terms of some things and netanyahu's leadership, we still may work together, talk together on how we stop the hate. >> of course. >> and the hate attacks. >> of course. just because you don't like a politician doesn't mean you can't find common ground in so much else, and the jewish and black communities have so much in common including the vast majority of american jews want dignity and decency for palestinians, but the anti-zionism that's coming out, rev, that exploded on october the 7th here in america, to your point, with slander and intimidation and attacks, clearly that's not okay. so i think what we really need to see in this report card is designed to create a conversation, to create like an objective baseline so universities, colleges, all of them will realize. again, if you want to support all your students, you need to make sure they all feel equally protected, including your jewish students. what's the this is about, and let's be entirely clear.

just because you don't agree on politics or every single issue doesn't mean you shouldn't agree on the decency of people. >> jonathan greenblatt, thank you. before we let you go, tell us about the dog tag you're wearing. >> the dog tag is for the hostages including five americans, 130-some-odd people, men, women, elderly, sick and disabled, being held in tunnels, in cages below gaza. this war will end tomorrow if hamas would commit to handing over the hostages. that's what this dog tag is for. it's almost 190 days. >> over six months held in caves beneath gaza. thank you so much for being with us. >> thank you. coming up, our next guest represents a district that spans about 200 miles of the u.s./mexico border. congressman henry cuellar reacts to new reporting that president biden is eyeing an executive order to slash the number of asylum seekers who can cross

into america. merica

♪ ♪ relax into a caribbean state of mind. visit sandals.com or call 1-800 sandals.

♪♪ outside rockefeller plaza at about ten minutes before 9:00 on the east coast. it rained earlier both here in new york and in georgia. that rain delayed opening round of the 88th masters, bryson dechambeau is the early leader in augusta for a one-stroke advantage over scottie scheffler. play was suspended about 8:00

p.m. eastern because of darkness with 27 golfers on the course, including five-time champion tiger woods who was one under par after 13 holes. but woods faces a 23-hole test today as the first round has now resumed, with some golfers already teeing off in round two. meanwhile, tom brady might be having second thoughts, again, about his retirement from football. the seven-time super bowl champion quarterback appeared to open the door to another potential nfl return. >> let's say one day there's a situation, maybe with the 49ers -- >> patriots, raiders. you never know. >> god forbid somebody goes down, would you pick up that phone? >> i'm not opposed to it.

i don't know if they're going to let me if i became an owner of an nfl team. i'm always in shape. i don't know if they'd let me, but i wouldn't be opposed to it. >> tom brady would be 47 years old at the start of the next season. investigators say the former interpreter of shohei ohtani stole $47 million to pay off an illegal bookmaker. >> mr. ohtani is a victim in this case. >> reporter: authorities are calling it fraud on a massive scale. the former interpreter of shohei ohtani accused of stealing $16 million in order to pay for

mounting illegal sports bets. >> he used and abused that position of trust in order to take advantage of mr. ohtani. >> reporter: prosecutors said he used a bank account he helped ohtani set up when he first moved to the u.s. >> he spoke with bank employees, lied to them about being mr. ohtani. >> reporter: according to the criminal complaint, from december 2021 to january 2024, he placed 19,000 bets, averaging 25 a day with an illegal bookmaker. the wagers, which were never placed on baseball, ranged from 10 to $160,000. >> occasionally he would win. that money did not go to any account owned by mr. ohtani.

>> reporter: the stunning allegations stem from an ongoing investigation into an illegal gambling operation, where ohtani's name surfaced. he told reporters through a new interpreter that he was duped by a friend. >> i'm sad and shocked that someone has done this. >> reporter: referring to ohtani, the bookmaker says, obviously you didn't steal from him, to which he says, technically i did steal from him. it's all over for me. >> donny deutsch has joined us. let's talk about mr. ohtani here. this is a staggering amount of money, $16 million. you may say how did ohtani know this money was missing?

the interpreter did not bet on baseball. >> when it initially came out looked like ohtani might have his hands dirty, but he seems not to be involved. >> ohtani is the biggest star baseball has had in a number of years. i know he's not going to pitch this year, but he's a two-way star. there were real fears this could tarnish his image. but now the case seems to be open and shut. do we think ohtani's image perseveres here? >> i think he's fine. i'm surprised he hasn't doing more endorsements. i don't know if that's because there's a language barrier, but for some reason i don't think he's had the endorsements that

are commensurate with his talent. >> new balance sneakers are the big one, but i suspect there will be many more. we're going to turn back to politics. u.s. border patrol is reporting that the number of migrant crossings at both the northern and southern borders have been going down during the first of this year. despite the drop, the biden administration is now exploring whether the president has the authority to shut down the southern border without authorization from congress. that's according to new comments president biden made earlier this week during an interview with univision. joining us now, the cochair of democrats for the border security task force congressman henry cuellar of texas. is it your understanding the president does have the authority to do this, and do you think he should? >> yes, he has the authority,

and yes, he should. when trump did title 42 he signed an executive order based on a statute entitled title 42. for years we've had title 8 expedite removals that president obama used. there are things he can do on an executive order. if somebody files a lawsuit, we'll see what happens at that time. >> you obviously represent a border state. give us an assessment of the situation at the border, which the numbers show crossings going down, but the administration still believes perhaps too high. we know it's a political hot button issue with donald trump and the republicans hammering at it every day. how are things really there? >> in december it was 10,000 or 12,000 individuals a day.

in the last two weeks the numbers have been 3,000 per day. the numbers have gone down. we added a couple of billion dollars to homeland security. we ought to make sure that we don't stop. now that the numbers are going down, let's continue using resources. the ones that are supposed to come in, let them come in. but the ones that are not supposed to come in, you detain them and deport them back to their countries. >> anand giridharadas joins us. you just heard the congressman give us the reality check as to what's going on, but republicans will use this as a wedge issue. >> how do you think democrats

can deal with the fact that people are anxious about it, that there is a perception, sometimes rooted in reality, sometimes untethered from reality of chaos and ungovernability on the border. how can democrats respond to that without becoming a b-minus mimicry of republicans on the border and tie it into the fact that this is a country of immigrants and people move and immigrants are actually good? >> i've been doing this for many years, since 2013, when we saw the first surge of folks at the border. i think we saw the special election in new york tom suozzi also carry this message. we as democrats can be strong on border security, but at the same time respect the immigrant values. my father was born in mexico. he became a legal resident and

naturalized citizen. i know the importance of immigration. as long as we're fair on the endorsement and border security and still respectful, i think americans would dog that. as democrats, we cannot ignore it. we've got to talk about it. i've been doing this since 2013. as long as you know what's important to people and you talk about those issues, i think democrats will be fine. you cannot ignore it. you've got to talk about it. >> congressman henry cuellar of texas, thank you for joining us. americans really care about this issue. polls also suggest it's an effective one for republicans even though the gop is the one with the border bill. >> i wouldn't let them forget that any day of the week.

i would show people clips of ronald reagan. reagan warned about a nation that didn't embrace its immigrant past. you know, i don't usually read comments, but people say when did you go to the border and see where the migrants are? i mean, everywhere. that's what we are. we are a nation of immigrants. i think it's one of the reasons that in 2018 immigration was

going to be the key issue. it was the caravan, people with leprosy coming over the borders. it had no impact in 2018 or 2020. it's an important issue to me. at the same time, it's not an issue that's going to move voters like abortion, like democracy, like inflation, like jobs. it's just not. >> it's not an intractable problem. i think more and more americans are criticizing republicans for torpedoing the compromise on

immigration. you have the governor of utah begging for more immigrants to fill empty jobs. america needs immigrants. this is a situation that is very solvable if republicans would come to the table in good faith. we need to confront the reality that there is some strain in that republican base. i don't believe it's a majority, for whom this is an issue about the great replacement and the idea we have non-white immigration to the united states and that's a threat somehow to this country. i don't think that's the majority of americans, by any stretch. i think most persons want a

secure border and they want to know their jobs and communities are safe. that's all reasonable. but there is something nefarious at the heart of this as well, and i don't think we should ignore that either. >> donald trump hammers on it just constantly. it's so bizarre. again, i talked about reagan. even when i was in washington, i was more conservative than most republicans. i'd be like, if you come to america, you need to come to america the legal way. the "wall street journal" editorial page and newt gingrich and everybody else was saying, it's good for jobs, the more immigrants the better. so republicans don't really know where they stand on this. i think another reason why this isn't -- it's very potent for certain networks to talk about it all day. first of all, we're a nation of immigrants. secondly, if you run a family

restaurant, you need more workers. if you run a hardware store on main street, you need more workers. if you're an entrepreneur, you need more workers. our economy is fuelled by immigrants up and down the employment chain. >> yeah. i think for democrats, there's often this situation when republicans are fanning fear around immigration and crime. democrats are sometimes torn between an approach of providing a real alternative to that fear mongering or trying to copy half of it and the urge to not lose moderates or empathize with the fear, but be different. sometimes what happens is democrats on this issue sound to the right of ronald reagan in his farewell feature. i think that's a mistake. it's important to be able to talk about the border, make people not feel afraid about

chaos and ungovernability. but every time you talk about this, to channel what ronald reagan said in that farewell address, which is that this is what has also made america an extraordinary country. >> i have no problem with anybody who says we need more immigrants, we need more refugees here. there's a way to do it. the thing that bugged me when i was in congress -- and i use this example time and again because it's burned in my head. there's a guy from pakistan who's trying in my four terms in congress trying to get his family to america, trying to do it the right way, trying to do it the legal way. i'm telling you immigration

services is just a total nightmare. it's still happening. it's a total nightmare to do it the right way, to do it the legal way. i want to know where's the equity in letting people walk across the border and come in here illegally while the guy in pakistan can't do that, isn't doing that and is getting the stiff arm from immigration services. >> i actually think immigration is a guttural issue. it's not quite democracy or abortion, but i do think it's the place democrats are vulnerable. i hear a lot and it makes my skin crawl from suburban, white, wealthy people who are nowhere near the city, immigration and they're coming to the border and the cities and crime. >> why don't you tell donald

trump that? why don't you tell republicans that that have killed the most conservative border bill in 30 years? >> that's the response. it's still a guttural issue. i still wish biden would do some executive order. i think that solidifies the rank. it's not right or moral, but i do think it's an issue and biden can take a proactive stance here. that's the kind of hysteria that i hear. >> you talk about democrats doing wrong. first of all, they ignore the issue. don't wait until you have democratic governors and mayors telling you, you've got to do something about this. democrats will ignore an issue or they'll pretend that crime is not impacting people. when they say, oh, well, the

crime rates are going lower, that's kind of like me lecturing people on the economy. the economy is doing great. don't tell me the economy is doing great. i can't afford a home. i can't afford a used car. i can't afford to go to the grocery store like i used to. the things my parents were able to do 30 years ago, i don't have a shot at. it's the same thing with crime. it's easy for me to say crime's fine, but a lot of people don't feel that way. i do think it's important for democrats not to be afraid of their shadow and say, yeah, we get it. >> the white house acknowledges they were slow to respond to the migrant issue. i think the two biggest vulnerabilities would be the inflation -- >> the head of the ncaa was here

and said that, said people i'm talking to, people i'm surveying, the ncaa, what we're hearing is primarily they're concerned about the cost of things. >> that is the single biggest issue facing this white house. the other, of course, is migration. they feel like because republicans killed that bill, they can play that one to a draw. they think they can negate some of the vulnerabilities there unlike perhaps with the economy where they're going to have to be far more aggressive. they're also being very aggressive on abortion. kamala harris will travel to as arizona today. >> is kari lake going to be at the kamala harris event? she says she's always been against this abortion law.

>> ckari lake has contacted stae lawmakers in an effort to repeal the abortion ban. that's according to a republican legislature who told nbc news they received a call from lake earlier this week. on wednesday, the gop-controlled house shut down discussion on a proposal to overturn the law. lawmakers now will not meet again until next wednesday. lake has decidedly flip-flopped on the issue and is now trying to project a more moderate stance. >> is that like trump flip-flopping on abortion and obamacare. >> we have a lengthy list of trump flip-flops. here's what kari lake said two years ago. >> i don't believe in abortion. i think the older law is going to go into effect. that's what i believe will happen. i don't think abortion pills should be legal. >> we have a great law on the

books right now. if that happens, we will be a state where we will not be taking the lives of our unborn anymore. >> i'm incredibly thrilled we are going to have a great law that's already on the books. it will prohibit abortion in arizona. i think we're going to be paving the way and setting the course for other states to follow. >> this total ban on abortion that the arizona supreme court just ruled on is out of line with where the people of this state are. the issue is less about banning abortion and more about saving babies. i agree with president trump. this is such a personal and private issue. i chose life, but i'm not every woman. i want to make sure that every woman who finds herself pregnant has more choices so that she can make that choice that i made. >> i don't know what you would do if you were running the ad

campaign against either kari lake or donald trump. >> use their words. >> there's nothing i would love more if i were a democrat than to run against these people, nothing. it would be so fun. i love when people start flip-flopping. wait, hold on a second. i got it written down somewhere. then you read it and now you're saying what? hold on, and then you read the three or four quotes. i mean, come on, shooting catfish in a barrel as we used to say in the redneck riviera. >> people are not stupid. they can put these pieces together. one thing voters hate, they hate

flip-floppers. they're also losing them because who are you? forget that i disagree with you on this issue. you have no soul, you have no ideology. the best ads is just using their words. >> this week abortion, trump's flipping and flopping on abortion. the affordable care act, obamacare, he suddenly has seen the light after saying he was going to terminate it. and at one point he said we're going to terminate health care. yeah, this should be a pretty easy target. >> the problem that folks like kari lake and obviously donald trump are going to have on an issue like abortion is, if you are a woman in america who believes in a woman's right to choose, you're not going to go

and pause and listen to flip-flopping and say, oh, maybe actually he supports a woman's right to choose. this is the president that got roe v wade overturned. the issue is lost, it's gone. democratic voters and independents who care about these issues are not going to suddenly change their mind and say that donald trump and the republican party are going to be great proponents of women's right. that's a joke. >> you guys touched on this earlier in the show. donald trump did it, those words. those are magical words. donald trump did it. >> every child in america knows that. people who aren't even of voting age know that. this is on his tombstone. it's insulting to think they're going to convince voters. let them try. >> we've run two focus groups on this show over the past couple years that really spoke to how

this issue also cuts for republicans. one was a couple of years ago, the trumpiest guy ever who believed in all the conspiracy theories and then elise asks about abortion. he says, i have no right to talk about what a woman does with her body. and then one we showed this past week of swing voters where a guy who was really conservative, libertarian said, i don't trust the government to do anything effectively. now they're taking control of our bodies? sure, it's a woman's body today. it will be my body tomorrow. it's not just democrats and independents. a lot of republicans and people who have long identified themselves as pro life say, i'm ready to get off the train.

>> i don't often quote the group focus on the family, but i was looking at a couple of research points, one from focus on the family, one from a similar evangelical institute. focus on the family found that 4 in 10 women who have had an abortion were churchgoers when they ended a pregnancy. they wrote many go silently from the church pew to the abortion clinic. women in their own churches finding more support in abortion clinics than in their own churches. 54% of people who get abortions including 13% are evangelical protestants.

i don't think they know who's in their own movement. >> it is a pet peeve of mine when people claim that abortion is the singular testing ground for what kind of christian you are, when, as i've said, that evangelicals were pro-choice. pro-choice from the time of jesus' birth through the break up of the eagles, through 1980. >> that's a long run. i'm not a mathematician. >> speaking of the eagles "the long run" it's the album that came out then. >> wow. >> you have no idea. think about this. it's crazy. i talk to my friends who have no idea what i'm talking about. i say, you do understand that our parents were in a southern baptist church that was pro-choice. they passed resolutions at the

southern baptist convention that were pro choice resolutions. then jerry falwell and others got together and said, if we're going to beat this southern baptist democrat, we're going to have to come up with an issue that will pry evangelicals away and also conservative catholics away. so they came up with abortion. then they added the religious element to it and said this is a great skin against god. i'm not saying there aren't people of faith who are pro life. take the death penalty. let the bible inform you on war, on the death penalty, on

abortion. but don't tell me after "the long run" was released, suddenly the southern baptist church figured out what jesus was really trying to say 2,000 years earlier. >> former democrat donald trump may not, in fact, know what is going on in his base, that women in communities on the political right actually want to be free and want control over their bodies also. >> if you look at polling, it's black evangelicals who show up at church every sunday. yet, they're not voting against women's reproductive freedom. why? because that has to do with beliefs about freedom, about

democracy and maybe saying that the government that once supported jim crow shouldn't be in charge of women's bodies and shouldn't come between a women and her doctor. i would also say one of the other ways republicans have essentially owned themselves over this issue, for many years there was this sense of, well, it's kind of a welfare queen that goes and gets abortions like candy. okay. turns out, as we know over the past year and a half that dobbs has fallen that women's health care is a very complex issue. while i believe a woman should have the right to choose an abortion if that's best for her in whatever circumstance up until a reasonable point in pregnancy, it turns out it's more complicated than that. there are ten-year-olds who get

raped. we don't support women's health care in general. it turns out many women have wanted pregnancies that have to end in abortion to save their lives when that pregnancy is not viable. we're not treating women as people. we're treating them as political pawns through that view. that's what americans are rejecting. the story of abortion is a story of health care and rights, not a story of welfare queens using it like candy. that was a massive republican miscalculation. americans understand that, because we're living in the real world, not some washington think tank. >> alex has been telling me to go to break for 18 minutes. i'm very sorry, alex. i can't think of an issue going back in my lifetime that has

moved voters more dramatically over the past couple years. i know 1978, everybody talked about prop 13 in california, the anti-tax movement in california that led to the reagan revolution two years later. but other than 9/11 and prop 13 in california, this issue continues to surprise and will continue to have a disproportionate impact on elections. by the way, republicans still can't get it right. there's an 1864 law in the most important state for donald trump right now. he needs to take arizona back. they're now defending an 1864 abortion ban that says if you're raped or a victim of incest, the state is going to force you to the end of the pregnancy. >> make no mistake about it,

abortion is the issue and women are going to be the deciding factor in this election. women are going to save this country, because women have more of a primal instinct of protection. i think women have a certain core that men don't have. there's this primal thing of, no, you're not going to take away my health care or my right to choose or mess with my body. they're going to turn to their husbands and brothers and fathers and sons and go, uh-uh, don't come back in this house if you're not going to vote the right way. >> if you want to know why a lot of these rich guys are not

contributing to donald trump, ask their wives, ask their daughters. i know of several examples where the daughter said i'm not coming home if you support that guy and what he wants to do with my body. you know what, good luck with your red hat? you can have your red hat or your daughter. pick. i will say also, you know, don't piss off a father as well or a husband as well. there are a lot of men out there that -- >> on this issue alone, i have daughters. i am not going to allow them to be put in the position where anybody on this planet can tell them what to do with their bodies. >> we are what our experiences

are. having a daughter, you know, as a dad and a mom has an impact. this is a massive issue. have we run afoul of anything here, mara? >> no. >> i promised i was going to go to break. i'm going to ask for the floor. >> look up this beautiful article in the "new york times" today, "the man who kept the times' lights on." he was an electrician who rose up to be a foreman in the electrical department, kept the presses running for the last 33 years, passed away last month. he was an avid "morning joe" viewer. when he retired from the "new york times," he spent time watching this show. he had to replace his testify at one point because the msnbc logo had burned into the tv.

we lost donald last month, but a really beautiful article about the people, who in this case quite literally, powered the news. >> the art director who took the times through all these remarkable changes. >> it's a special place to work. people have all kinds of things to say about legacy media, but you walk in that newsroom and you learn from the best. it's not just star reporters you may have heard of. it's art directors, it's also a union shop. it's a real treat. it's a pleasure. >> thank you so much. thank you for bringing up the article. coming up, a hotter than expected inflation report

continues to raise questions on when or if the fed is going to lower interest rates. is a rate cut out of the question? you'll never guess what's flying off the shelves at your local costco. andrew ross sorkin explains next. hi, i'm kevin, and i've lost 152 pounds on golo. (uplifting music) my biggest concern when i started golo was food. i'm a big guy and, shockingly, i like to eat. i was worried it was gonna be like other diets that were bland and restrictive. but with golo, my meals are great, and i'm no longer hungry like i was before. i'm so pleased i gave golo a shot. don't wait, go to golo.com.

when you have chronic kidney disease, there are places you'd like to be. like here. and here. not so much here. farxiga reduces the risk of kidney failure which can lead to dialysis. ♪ far-xi-ga ♪ ♪♪ farxiga can cause serious side effects, including ketoacidosis that may be fatal, dehydration, urinary tract or genital yeast infections and low blood sugar. a rare, life-threatening bacterial infection in the skin of the perineum could occur. stop taking farxiga and call your doctor right away if you have symptoms of this infection, an allergic reaction, or ketoacidosis. when you have chronic kidney disease, it's time to ask your doctor for farxiga. because there are places you want to be. if you can't afford your medication, astrazeneca may be able to help. ♪ far-xi-ga ♪

(psst! psst!) ahhh! with flonase, allergies don't have to be scary. spraying flonase daily gives you long lasting non-drowsy relief. flonase all good. also, try our allergy headache and nighttime pills. i brought in ensure max protein with 30 grams of protein! those who tried me felt more energy in just two weeks. -ugh. -here, i'll take that. woo hoo! ensure max protein, 30 grams protein, 1 gram sugar, 25 vitamins and minerals. and a new fiber blend with a prebiotic. (♪♪) the virus that causes shingles is sleeping... in 99% of people over 50. and it could strike at any time. think you're not at risk? wake up. because shingles could wake up in you. if you're over 50, talk to your doctor or pharmacist

about shingles prevention.

that was amazon ceo andy jas

see telling andrew ross sorkin how inflation is affecting retail customers. it is awesome to see. by the way, there's just no way powell is going to be able to cut interest rates this summer. >> this summer? i think it's possible there's no cut this is calendar year. as you get closer to the presidential election, i think it gets harder for him to do almost anything. it's going to be interesting to see interest rates come down meaningfully at this point in the ball game. >> that inflation report was

really bad a couple days ago. politically bad on so many levels. >> it's bad on so many levels because the trend line is in the wrong direction. the conundrum for the biden administration when it comes to the inflation story, it is almost impossible at this point in the election cycle for somehow wages to somehow outpace inflation by so much that people say to themselves over the last 3 1/2 years that they are somehow better economically than they were before. i think that train has left the station. you're not going to get it back at this point. >> the polls say the economy sucks, but they're better than they were. >> if you have a 401 k plan or you're in the market, sure,

you're doing a lot better than you were. but unfortunately for 50% of americans, they don't have those benefits. at the top or bottom, you're doing better. in the middle it gets complicated. nobody was given credit for the trend line. >> none. prices continue to rise. at the same time, wages are also going up. >> that's not a bad thing. the in fact jay powell is not going to lower interest rates to some level is an argument that if there's still a good economy. it's not a bad economy, this is a great economy. you could say it's not measured with the inflation piece. >> but the economy is hot.

when you talk to people they don't say -- we had derrick johnson, head of the ncaa, today. he said they're talking about costs when they go to the grocery store. >> your mortgage, if you want to buy a house, you can't. >> for younger voters this whole idea -- i certainly understand gaza as a moral issue for a lot of younger voters. but people vote their self-interest. if people are not lining up with what we're hearing from the economy, it's because their lives economically are not comfortable. >> one of the questions i have and i have absolutely no research to back this up. >> welcome to "morning joe."

[ laughter ] >> it's how much of this consumer angst from the middle is about not just prices, but about the fact that housing specifically, because we aren't building enough housing in the united states, if you're a renter trying to buy your first house, your rent is skyrocketing. do you have any sense of that? >> the housing piece is a huge piece of it for those who want in. that's a very specific and select group. the much bigger piece is food prices, everything prices. oil goes up and down, but you're seeing airline fares up, everything up, up, up, up. that's ultimately the issue. even if your wages went up, you're going oh my god i can't believe i just spent this much

at the supermarket. >> how old were you when you could afford your first house? >> mid 30s. >> you're a new yorker. i was 26. my parents are middle class, working class. they probably were 25. kids in their late 30s -- i say kids. no. my kids can't afford a house. wait a second. my parents were able to do that. my parents said they had to scrounge around on sunday for a nickel to afford a newspaper. >> mortgage rates are going to be 7%. we're not used to that. we're used to 2 or 3%. >> is it the sense of i couldn't

go on summer vacation last year? >> no. i still think it's the supermarket. bill clinton would always freak out when gas prices went up because he said that was an advertisement you drive past every day. what's flying off the shelves in costco? >> gold bars. people are walking out of costco -- no joke. >> costco sells gold bars? >> this is a new thing. it is a reflection of a whole bunch of things. it's a reelection of inflation and costco sells gold bars. >> costco can sell anything. >> it says something about the country in a sort of guns and gold kind of -- >> i'm going to say that's 90%

red purchasing. i think they are branded kirkland, for what it's worth. there's like a deal on gold bars. >> and hot dogs. >> and people are walking out with their push cart. >> how much does a gold bar run you? >> gold, i think, is $2300. for the bar, it depends on the weight. >> by the way commemorative plates also very big. andrew, we need to get you back, of course. let's talk about the nfl draft. it's such big business. >> the nfl is the business of testify media.

>> thank you. coming up next on "morning joe" -- ♪♪ >> it's "baby shark" backwards. >> you could go with joe scarborough's funk album, anything by the stones. ♪♪ >> give it to lemire. i can't even read after that. >> that's joe scarborough, who was apparently name checked. up next, we're joined by sara bareilles. we'll talk about the new season and have some fun at joe's

expense when we come straight back. ♪♪ ♪♪ no. ♪♪ -no. -nuh-uh. ♪♪ yeah. oh. yes. ♪♪ oh yeah. yes. isn't this great? yeeaahhhh!! ♪♪ yeah, i could do a cartwheel in here. oh hey! would you like to join us? no. we would love to join you. ♪♪ h&r block's tax pros average 10 years of experience.

and we'll do your taxes for you- from start to finish. you know, for nearly 70 years we've prepared more than nearly 800 million tax returns worldwide. i should know, i'm h&r block's chief tax officer, kathy pickering. for us, expert help isn't new. so, when every dollar matters, get your max refund guaranteed with an h&r block tax pro. i have moderate to severe plaque psoriasis. thanks to skyrizi i'm playing with clearer skin. 3 out of 4 people achieved 90% clearer skin at 4 months. and skyrizi is just 4 doses a year after 2 starter doses. serious allergic reactions and an increased risk of infections or a lower ability to fight them may occur. tell your doctor if you have an infection or symptoms, had a vaccine, or plan to. with skyrizi, nothing on my skin means everything! ♪ nothing is everything ♪ ask your dermatologist about skyrizi. learn how abbvie could help you save.

okay everyone, our mission is to provide complete, balanced nutrition for strength and energy. yay - woo hoo! ensure, with 27 vitamins and minerals, nutrients for immune health. and ensure complete with 30 grams of protein. (♪♪)

i love your dress. oh thanks! i splurged a little because liberty mutual customized my car insurance and i saved hundreds. that's great. i know, right? i've been telling everyone. baby: liberty. did you hear that? ty just said her first word. can you say “mama”?

baby: liberty. can you say “auntie”? baby: liberty. how many people did you tell? only pay for what you need. jingle: ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ baby: ♪ liberty. ♪ i thought we were meeting early to work on the set. i was all ready to go, and no one ever came. >> five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, 11, 12. >> did the plan change? >> usually someone else responds to you. is this the first time you and i have ever been alone together? >> feels like it, but no. there was one other time, october 28th, 2021. >> okay, stalker. >> i used too much moisturizer.

[indiscernible] >> sorry i'm late. i had to put a little cheese in the rat trap. it's going to be no strings. if i was a tampon, i'd be lost forever. >> you know what else is lost? we didn't rehearse. >> you're up next. >> that is a clip of the new season. >> come on, i want to see it all. >> the comedy series on netflix centers around four members of a '90s girl group who meet decades later and try to recapture what slipped through their fingers. joining us is sara bareilles.

>> she's a strange one. we have discussed this. she said i'm the weirdo. >> new season. where do things pick up? >> they reunited in season one. season two, they recorded their own album. in season three, they kind of hit the road for their own d.i.y. tour. she takes this huge swing and puts a down payment on booking radio city music hall. this season is sort of like can they fill it, or do they owe $570,000? >> there's so much brilliant television today, and this is an example. where did it come from?

>> i really wanted to write a show about starring like hilarious ladies in their 40s. in a lazy way i can write what i know. then i had the idea of setting it against a girl group. you can look at the past. they can be in the present. they can figure out how to unpack the past. so many lights went off. you can do fun culture. it's just like someone described it as the show as like 30 rock meets danity cane and i thought that was a very appropriate description of the show. >> sara, i was going to ask what drew you to it, but now we know. you've done so much. talk about this. >> this was a total no-brainer. when i got the call in the height of the pandemic, middle

of 2020 when the show was coming back and -- or i mean was going to come to fruition. no one was working. we were all kind of freaking out, but the idea of getting to work with meredith, work with tina fey, to work with jeff richmond and also renee was also attached to the project when i came on, we didn't know who the other ladies were going to be. and it has just bloomed into one of my favorite things that i've ever done. it's the most fun to make. it's the most fun to receive a script. it's like christmas morning. the writing is so brilliant, and the people that have been assembled to make the show, lots of them have long relationships, but it's just -- it's the best set. it's the best crew. it's just a really, really -- >> and those relationships, talk about how that makes everything so much better. i won't say easier, wrong word, but so much more rewarding. >> well, like i started working

on kimmy schmidt, unbreakable kimmy schmidt was kind of how i started with the group, started working with tina fey and robert carlock and their crew that's very loyal. i just kind of just dragged a little bit on their coat tails. okay, it's my turn? okay great. >> you were there from the beginning, right? you were through the entire run of kimmy schmidt. >> i was, the whole run, the whole run. and so there was so much already kind of set up that set me up for success just learning from tina and robert, and then i had come from late night. i wrote for colbert, so i was used to taking on the news and satirizing it. >> there's a question that everybody at home wants to know. take us inside the writer room, with who have came up with the joe scarborough pop culture reference. >> we're good. >> no, no. >> we are all -- i -- this is a big moment for me to be on this

show. i'm a big fan of this show. >> no way. so you're used to people making fun of me. >> but also i would -- can you do a cover of one of our songs? that would be a dream come true. >> i would love to do that. >> i have a better idea. why don't -- so why don't we go over to like the power station sometime, right? it's just right around the corner, and we'll film the group singing something. how's that? >> that's great. i love this. >> i love it. >> it's done, alex, t.j., boom. there you go. >> we're getting -- i'm getting a thumbs up from my ear piece here, so we're good. yeah. >> i like it. that's fantastic. >> so let's take a look at another clip from the new season where your character, sara, is grappling with being pregnant while touring with the group. >> you guys, does the macaroni rascal look like me? >> god. >> okay, what's our next move? >> we need heat. >> we still haven't revealed your baby bump.

that's always good for a bump. see, i'm fun. >> people do love that, rihanna at the super bowl, bao bao with the panda wards. >> i have been trying. >> i'm pregnant. >> i'll try again at tonight's show. >> but don't elaborate and tell people how it happened. >> i won't. >> hey, gloria, do you want to join our conversation? >> oh, i'm listening. i'm just a little behind on my spreadsheet. that waitress over there is a female pop eye. keep your eye peeled for the ever elusive cigar momm. >> you guys are just laughing while you're watching this. it seems like this would be so much fun to make. >> it's so fun. >> we're crying laughing on set most of the time. sometimes it's actually very hard to get through takes because i just also think the other women are so hysterically funny. >> oh, my god, they're great. we're just having the best time, and this is my first time on a

tv show like this, so i felt like i was very nervous season one, and getting so quickly all the women and i like bonded, you know, trauma bonded a little bit. we were in the middle of a pandemic and just how on earth are we going to make it through and now we're such close friends, and i feel like they're all such brilliant comedic actresses. it's so much fun to watch them work and learn. >> we've had sleepovers. >> we're genuinely hang out. we're friends. >> awesome. >> so talk about the adjustment. you talk to actors who do the stage. you go, wow, and they learn it. it's immediate, and it's moving all the time, and you're responding. it's just sort of this moving organism. but then you go from that to tv where it's like go. stop, do it again. >> mm-hmm. >> yeah, that was great. oh, my god that was awesome. all right, do it again. you know.

>> yeah, totally. >> 12 times. >> totally. >> so talk about that adjustment for you. >> i mean, i think to me the biggest adjustment coming from, you know, life on the stage as a concert artist and relating to an audience in realtime, and then moving on to broadway stages, again, relating to audiences in realtime, the biggest adjustment to me is letting the mechanism of the cameras become a creative -- a piece of the creativity, and we have incredible camera crews, but there's a pretty steep learning curve. like sara, you can't actually stand in front of the lens when it's someone else's coverage. >> i don't remember you doing that. >> because dave -- >> you were a pro from day one. >> i was not a pro from day one. i would stand in lighting, you know, i'm just getting in the way. but i'm a quick learner. >> she's also like -- it's so -- i think it's so fun for audiences to know someone one way that, you know, they know sara as this amazing recording

artist, they know renee from "hamilton" and then realize they're hilarious. sara has some of the best timing and can kind of make any really absurd bizarre joke grounded and feel like it's coming from like a three dimensional person. i'm so impressed. >> how rewarding is that for you? it's one thing to write it and then to have her deliver. >> it's so -- i mean, i really pinch myself to be able to work with this cast. and then also, you know, the show's not a musical. it's not like people singing their feelings. you know, there's snippets of songs that you see kind of here and there, and just to kind of hear sara's karmal beautiful voice sing these absurd lines. i feel like it does a really weird thing to your brain where you're like she's saying something insane, but it's so beautiful. >> in that beautiful voice. >> that you're like laughing and you're almost like crying at the same time. your brain goes into like a --

>> a potent and hysterical combination. season three of "girls5eva" is streaming now on netflix. sara bareilles and meredith scar dee know, thank you both very, very much, and that does it -- >> by the way, best outfit of the week. >> edged out barnacle. >> just don't like orange sherbet. >> edged out by barnicle for that award. that does it for us. we'll see you monday morning. ana cabrera picks up the coverage here after a quick final break. and i'm ready for a rematch. game on. i've been practicing. what the cello? you want me to lower the hoop? foul! what? you going to tell on me again? foul yah? foul bro! here take a free shot go ahead knock yourself out. your about to get served. seriously? get allstate, save money, and be better protected from mayhem, like me. love you mom!

wait till your father gets home. ♪♪ with fastsigns, signage that gets you noticed turns hot lots into homes. ♪♪ fastsigns. make your statement. i don't want you to move. i'm gonna miss you so much. you realize we'll have internet waiting for us at the new place, right? oh, we know. we just like making a scene. transferring your services has never been easier. get connected on the day of your move with the xfinity app. can i sleep over at your new place? can katie sleep over tonight? sure, honey! this generation is so dramatic! move with xfinity.

right now on "ana cabrera reports," the trials of donald trump, a hearing today in florida at the mar-a-lago documents case. how trump's co-defendants are aiming to have their charges thrown out. plus, the countdown to trump's hush money case. it starts on monday, and we got our hands on the list of potential prosecution witnesses. also ahead, a meeting at mar-a-lago, why the house speaker