clear something israel can do when is on high alert and by itself. those, those elements are pressuring netanyahu to respond more proactively. netanyahu , as a matter of character, is somewhat more hesitant. he tends to put hard decisions off. and the external pressure is helping here. it seems like, as we're moving further away from the event, while israeli leaders are still talking about responding, the weight, or the scale against a response is, is tipping a little heavier. both because of the allied pressure, concerns over regional war that israel itself sees. so those powers in government that are more moderate would prefer to avoid that, even if they would still like to respond against iran . and finally, the israeli public itself is not in it. this is a pull from this week showing israelis are not keen on this. >> all right, thank you both.

appreciate it. that is all in on this wednesday night. alex starts right now. >> thank you, my friend. as always. joe biden was sworn in as president of the united states at 12:00 p.m. on january 20th, 2021. just one day and four hours later, this happened. >> found articles of impeachment on president joe biden. we'll see how this goes. >> we'll see how this goes. >> biden had been president for less than 30 hours, but house conservatives decided that he had already committed high crimes and misdemeanors and needed to be removed from office. since the very start of his administration, republicans have been desperate to try and obscure and minimize the two impeachment trials of former president donald trump. and to do that, they aim for joe biden to be the next american president to face the same humiliation.

but that effort failed, and it failed in spectacular fashion. for three years, we have watched republicans reach desperately for something, anything that had even a hint of corruption they might pin on president biden. but their efforts failed to turn up any convincing evidence that biden or his family had engaged in corruption. republicans did manage to wrangle one star witness, who accused president biden and his family of all sorts of wrongdoing, but it turned out that guy was just a dupe passing along provably false information from people with ties to russian intelligence. and he has since been arrested twice for lying to the fbi. watching republicans try to impeach biden has been a lot like watching someone try to boil soup in a paper bag. just a huge, embarrassing mess that accomplished nothing. and so republicans then decided that they would try the next best thing. they would, if they could not impeach joe biden, they would

impeach a member of joe biden's cabinet. and who better to be the victim then homeland security secretary alejandro mayorkas? >> get rid of mayorkas. he's derelict in his duty. this guy needs to go. >> he deserved to lose his job, simply because he is not followed the law. >> my view is that he needs to be impeached. >> secretary mayorkas is in charge of the southern border. republicans wanted the southern border to be a key issue in this next election so what could go wrong? impeach him. well, for starters, republicans had the same problem that they always had. they didn't actually have any crimes to charge. eventually, they settled on two made-up charges. the first was that mayorkas failed to enforce the laws at the southern border, which simply wasn't true. in fact, under secretary mayorkas, there have been more deportations, returns, and expulsions then there were during the entire trump administration.

republicans second charge was that secretary mayorkas had lied to congress when he said that the border was under control, which is exactly what it sounds like. an argument about the semantics of what the word control means, and very clearly not a high crime or misdemeanor. so these were not real charges. but republicans decided to move forward with them anyway. yesterday, house republicans brought their two sham impeachment articles to the senate, and today, senate democrats killed both of them. after a few hours of procedural wrangling, a majority of senators voted that neither of the two articles of impeachment was a high crime or a misdemeanor, and therefore, the articles were unconstitutional. and that was it. here was senate minority leader mitch mcconnell just after that vote. >> madam president, we've set a very unfortunate precedent here. this means that the senate can

ignore, in effect, the house's impeachment. this is a day that's not a proud day in the history of the senate. >> republicans, including mitch mcconnell, are angry today because they spent the better part of this year on this impeachment, and for what? they could have spent that time actually trying to fix our immigration system. democrats negotiated one of the strictest bipartisan border bills in decades, something that would have been unthinkable just a few years prior. it gave republicans almost everything they wanted on border security. but donald trump forced republicans to kill that bill because he thought it might help president biden. so instead of legislation, republicans made a failed attempt to impeach someone who committed no crime on an issue they themselves refused to solve. it would be one thing if this was the only area where our government is breaking down

because of the hollowed out husk of what was once the republican party. but it is not. because at the same time that all of this was happening in the senate today, republicans in the house of representatives were also tripping all over themselves to benefit a strongman. only this time, the strongman wasn't donald trump. right now, speaker mike johnson is facing a revolt from inside his own party over his decision to finally put aid to ukraine up for a vote in the house. johnson had resisted doing that for months, but this week, he finally relented. here he was explaining the reality of what he is facing just a few hours ago. >> i'm operating with the smallest margin in u.s. history. i have a one-vote margin. listen, we're not going to get 100% of what we run right now, as we have the smallest majority in history, and we only have the majority in one chamber. >> despite what speaker johnson understands here, far right members of his party are now

saying they will call a vote to oust johnson over his decision to bring up ukraine aid, and that's going to go to the floor for a vote. that is how much the far right does not want to help ukraine combat russia's war of aggression. and this is not just a problem for the republican party. it is a problem for ukraine and america, and the rest of the world. because ukraine, and the vote on ukraine funding, has become a leverage point for russia. the washington post has some explosive reporting today on newly revealed documents from inside vladimir putin's government. documents which show how russia is seeking to subvert western support for ukraine and disrupt the domestic politics of the united states and european countries through propaganda campaigns and supporting isolationist and extremist policies. russia is fomenting division over ukraine because it wants to weaken america's role in the

world. in particular, one russian policy expert cited in one of these documents specifically calls on russia to continue to facilitate the coming to power of isolationist right-wing forces in america. just to put a finer point on this, russia very much wants the marjorie taylor greene's of the world to continue doing exactly what they're doing, because it serves russia's interests. this is not the only piece of evidence we have of that. last week, two top house republicans warned that pro- russian propaganda had infiltrated the republican party, and was being repeated by republican members of congress in debates about ukraine. earlier this week, marjorie taylor greene parroted vladimir putin's central life, justifying his invasion of ukraine by calling the ukrainian government nazis. ukraine, for the record, is the only nation in the world, other

than israel, to have a jewish head of state, zelenskyy. but marjorie taylor greene wants to blockade to that country because she says it is run by nazis. so who knows where this vote on ukraine aid will be? republicans could vote to remove speaker johnson and once again through the house of representatives, and therefore much of our american government, again into chaos, something that would directly serve russia's ends. and maybe that is the whole point. joining me now is senator chris murphy, democrat from connecticut. he is a member of the senate appropriations committee and the senate foreign relations committee. senator murphy, it's great to see you. thank you so much for being here. first, let me just get your reaction to the reporting we have out of the post about the way in which russia is delighted to see the inviting over ukraine aid unfolding in the u.s. congress. >> well, of course they are, because the only way that they can win in ukraine is if the united states withdraws its support for ukraine.

and, let's be clear about why we care so much about stopping russia from taking over ukraine. it's not just because we have sympathy and they can ship for the ukrainian people. it's because putin has made clear that he's not going to stop at ukraine, and if he is given the entire country, very quickly he could be moving onto a nato ally. that will be u.s. troops, that'll be u.s. men and women, americans, fighting and dying in europe. that'll be a green light to china to invade taiwan, potentially erupting a regional war in southeast asia. this is cataclysmic for u.s. interests. the triggers that could be set off by putin winning so expeditiously in ukraine, only because the united states abandons them there. so there is no doubt that putin is spending a lot of money here in the united states, and in europe, trying to undermine support for ukraine, trying to

support individuals who are trying to argue against ukraine funding, and listen, there's no doubt that he is rooting very badly for donald trump. there's no doubt that he will likely play a big role in this upcoming election, because if we get this bill across the finish line, alex, if we do fund ukraine, it'll only be through the beginning of next year. at a donald trump is elected, that's a pretty clear guarantee that this would be the last ukraine funding bill that whatever clear the house-senate and get past, signed into law by the president. >> i just want to draw everyone's attention to a quote from a russian opposition figure, and he says the americans consider that insofar as they are not directly participating in the war in ukraine, then any loss is not very lost. this is an absolute misunderstanding. a defeat for ukraine, he says, means that many will stop fearing challenging the u.s., and the costs for the united states will only increase. it feels like some people in the senate, in the republican party, understand the importance here of not empowering the isolationists,

both as a matter of sort of republican functionality, and also in terms of the calls of western-style liberal democracy around the world. do you think the fact that speaker johnson is willing to bring up this ukraine aid funding to the chagrin of the far right members of his caucus is a signal that house republicans are finally beginning to realize that they have been employed as useful idiots for the kremlin? >> no. i would not go that far. it seems as if speaker johnson has made an individual decision that it would be a disaster for the united states to abandon ukraine, and i think he knows that this would be his legacy, right? his political obituary would lead with his abandonment of ukraine, because he has a coalition of democrats and republicans that support ukraine. the senate is already voted 70- 30, with a big bipartisan majority for ukraine. so he knows it would be him and him only that would get the blame for handing ukraine to vladimir putin. so i don't think this suggests

any conversion inside the republican party to understand the weight that is influenced by russia. i think it's speaker johnson making the right decision in the here and now, and for today, at least, we should celebrate that. >> do you have an expectation that we're going to be looking for a new speaker of the house, and if we are, what your expectation for the u.s. congress and what happens next? >> so, you know, my sense is is that there are some democrats who will oppose a motion to vacate in the house of representatives should speaker johnson go through with his proposal to bring aid to ukraine, aid to israel, and humanitarian assistance before the house, and should that be successful. he needs to get enough republicans to support it so that, alongside democrats, it passes the house and moves to the senate. so it's possible that he will survive a motion to vacate, because there will be a handful of democrats who will support

him. and the reality is, is right now, the only way to pass anything through the house of representatives is a coalition of mostly democrats, because the majority of republicans in the house are just full-time arsonists. they are inside government to destroy government, to destroy the legitimacy of government, to try to burn down the government. and so, you know, whether it's votes for the next speaker, whether it's votes to pass ukraine aid, boats to pass a budget, it's really still democrats that are the only thing that keeps that place functional, and johnson has finally realized that. >> yeah. i mean, in terms of burning down the government, i have to ask you about what happened in your chamber today. democrats effectively killed off the impeachment trial. senator mitch mcconnell, who likes to be in institutionalist when it suits him, suggested that an unfortunate president had been set, and that the senate effectively is ignoring the will of the house. what's your reaction to that? >> well, the, the dangerous

precedent that we could've set was to legitimize and endorse this sham impeachment process. i mean, those articles of impeachment are laughable on their face. there is not a sliver, there's not a hint of a high crime or misdemeanor. this is just 40 pages of complaints about what's happening at the border today. what really stands for is a pretty simple premise. republicans do not want to fix the border, right? as you mentioned in your opening, they had a chance to do that. i negotiated. the toughest set of changes in board a lot in 40 years that would've brought order to the southwest border. republicans rejected that bill because they actually want the border to be out of control. what they want is for there to be headlines every day about how chaotic the border is so that they can score political points, and so that it will help them in this election. that's what the articles of impeachment are, just a mechanism to keep the conversation about the border in the headlines.

and i think the american people are catching on. i think all of this evidence that republicans are just interested in politics and are allergic when given the chance to actually vote for changes that would get the border under control is starting, slowly, to sink in with the public. >> they're definitely keeping the border in the headlines through their own political chicanery. good job. senator chris murphy, thanks so much for making the time tonight. really appreciate it. >> thank you. we have lots more ahead tonight, including republicans wasting no time to turn a congressional hearing on anti- semitism on college campuses into a broad against woke is him. but first, day three of jury selection resumes tomorrow morning in the criminal hush money trial of donald trump. george conway was in the courthouse this week, and he joins me right here after the break. break.

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donald trump was not in court today, but his criminal hush money trial was clearly top of mind this morning. he took to truth social to rent about what he considered unfairness during jury selection yesterday. specifically that his lawyers were not allowed unlimited opportunities to strike prospective jurors. nevermind the fact that trumps legal team was allotted the same number of so-called challenges as prosecutors, and they've used the same number of those challenges to weed out people they believe would not be impartial jurors. it appears what donald trump is actually upset about is that he is being treated, so far, mostly like any other criminal defendant. trump has had to sit through the groundhog day like tedium of jury selection and its repetitive questions, and after trump spoke and gestured in the direction of a juror, he was reprimanded, as any other defendant would be, by judge

juan merchan, who said he would not have jurors intimidated in his courtroom. this process is proceeding so normally that judge merchan believes that a jury will be seated in time for opening statements to begin on monday, which is way ahead of the two week timeline he estimated earlier this week. joining me now is george conway, attorney and contributor to the atlantic. george, thank you for being here. i know you were, you were in the vicinity, you were in the zone, and i want to hear about what that was like. but first, what do you make of the dissonance between trump asserting that this is all such an unfair jury selection process, and the fact that seven jurors have already been selected? >> he's going to say everything is unfair, no matter how it comes out. you know, he thinks he's going to get unlimited challenges, i mean, that's just -- >> that doesn't happen. >> it does not happen. if it did happen, then this trial could take forever. we would strike everybody in manhattan. it's crazy, when you think about it. he would be happy to do that. it would take the entire year, next year, and the year after

that. but he had to sit there. but he, but that's classic donald trump. donald trump thinks the rules don't apply to him, and if they do apply to him, then it's unfair, and that's, that's his whole shtick. >> i mean, so far, it really feels like, and you wrote to this in the atlantic, that this is kind of proceeding at pace, and an almost humdrum fashion, with the exception of these outbursts, and i do have to ask you about this, because judge merchan has not been playing around with this gag order, right? and we know that, i think it was a few hours ago, trump shared, reposted on truth social this claim from jesse watters of the fox. they are catching undercover liberal activists lying to the judge in order to get on the trump jury, so sayest jesse watters. does that run up to the line of, of violating the gag order? does that flirt with it, or is that fair game? >> it's not fair game, because it's a lie. i mean, there's no evidence to support it. and if he were referring to

specific individuals and trying to intimidate them, it would violate the gag order. i just think he's just trying to poison the well in the public domain to say that nothing here is fair. it can't be there. people in manhattan can't be fair to me, even though he spent his entire, you know, he spent his entire life in new york, until relatively recently. >> independent of just trying to poison the well, which is no small thing, it also could be, i mean, at some point, could be construed as this goes on and the jury is finally selected, as a form of intimidation that puts the jurors life in danger if they're to be liberal suitors out there to get trump. my passion to you is, is merchan, i mean, he has uttered, i believe, at some point, that they suggested that jail time could be a part of this if trump violates the gag order. do you think there is any universe in which that happened? >> yeah. i think it's possible. i think it's possible, because i think he does not know boundaries, and boundaries had to be explained to him, and he had to actually believe that the boundaries are going to be applied to them. and i think before that happens, i think merchan's going to be very, very explicit

about it, like, okay, that's it, you've done this, you've done this, this is it. next time, bring your toothbrush. >> wow. i mean, you've seen merchan in action. do you feel, like, that is going to take an extraordinary amount of fortitude to even consider doing something like that to a former president of the united states with a current candidate for president. i mean, what is the impression you've gotten of the judge? >> he's a very straight, businesslike, very straightforward, and serious jurists. i think he is very competent. i think he's very, very conscious of what he's doing and what he's projecting in the courtroom. i think he's, and i think he's going to protect the jurors, because that's the most important thing. he, his job is to ensure a fair trial, and that means protecting the people who are going to be deciding the facts of the case, which is the members of the jury.

members of the public. >> when you talk about trumps inability to control himself, there is something happening, i believe, tomorrow afternoon called a sandoval hearing. i'm really, my law degree and television law school is, i'm getting closer to taking the bar. but a sandoval hearing is going to determine, basically, which of trumps misconduct and criminal act could be used if trump or to take the witness stand and were to undergo cross- examination, is that right? >> that's basically it, yes. >> so crump is going to be presented with a litany of wrongdoing, and is that, like, can you explain that process, and what the likelihood is that trump absolutely freaks out during it? >> he's not going to enjoy it, because he's going to hear about all of the things that, you know, all the bad things that have been attributed to him. and i don't know how he's going to react, but it's going to be everything from, you know, all the things that he's done, the light in the public domain, including to, you know, including about e. jean

carroll, all that stuff, i mean, if he, if he goes on the stand, he's going to open a lot of that up, and i think the, the issue is whether or not it's sufficiently probative of his credibility for the prosecution to cross-examine him on it, and it probably will be. so it, you know, he's not somebody who should go -- >> on the witness stand. >> that being said, you know, he's, he's a narcissistic sociopath. he is impulsive, and he, if he feels, on a given day, that he had to do it, and he's, he could just, he could decide to do it and overrule his lawyers. but, you know, other times, he followed his lawyers advice. i mean, he followed his lawyers advice during the first e. jean carroll trial, basically not to show up. and then he showed up for the second one, and they couldn't contain himself in front of the

jury. that cost him tens of millions of dollars, because he basically behaved exactly as the plaintiff was describing him, as somebody who's remorseless, who was ready to say anything, who had contempt for the court's rulings and contempt for the truth, and he just, you know, he acted out right in front of the jury. and it's going to be a lot harder for him this time, because this is a lot more, if this is about his own people are going to be testifying and describing things that he did, people who were loyal to him from, you know, david packer, we've never actually heard from david packer. hope hicks, we've never really heard from her about this. and he's going to have to sit there and listen to it, and he's not going to enjoy himself, and he's, i can't, you can't guarantee that he'll be able to control himself. >> yeah, and he's going to have to listen to it a day in and day out. he has to be there for all of this. he gets a break on wednesdays.

he's going to be accosted with a lot of material, a lot of tedium, and, you know, what does that do to a man who, as you call it, is a psychopathic narcissist? >> is a narcissistic sociopath. >> sorry. >> he's a psychopath, also. >> tomato, tomato. what has it been like, i mean, as you have watched this proceeding unfold, you describe the place, the building in which it is unfolding as kind of a beehive of activity, and it is also incredibly mundane, right? >> right. it's a standard issue office building built during the work projects administration, 1938 to 1941. it is, as one pool reporter put it, drab. it's plain. it's ordinary. it's spartan. and it's very functional. and it's not, you know, there are no goldplated toilets, there are no, there's nothing fancy about it, and, i mean, it's sort of, it's very not trump like. and it's, it's not an environment that he would want to be associated with, even if

it were something he would've want. so it's just the juxtaposition of him and his, his unwillingness to accede to the rules and norms of society, and his, and his, his dress contempt for the legal process is lined up against this building and institution that does this every day to hundreds, with hundreds of people involved. and it, it was just the juxtaposition, as i wrote today, of the ordinary and the extraordinary was just quite amazing. and the fact that it was kind of mundane, to the point where even i kind of nodded off on day one, is just, it was a tribute to the system, actually. >> well, you're allowed to nod off, because you're not running a presidential campaign where your chief line of attack is calling someone sleepy, right? there's the rub.

>> sleepy george. >> george, i look forward to more dispatches from the front line thanks for joining the onset tonight. coming up, republican lawmakers, republican lawmakers in arizona today once again locked in an attempt to repeal a 160-year-old abortion law set to go into effect in their state. jointly to discuss that. but first, house republicans held a hearing on anti-semitism at columbia university today, or at least that was supposed to be the topic. more on that coming up next. n. >> tech: at safelite, we'll take care of fixing your windshield. but did you know we can take care of your insurance claim? that means less stress for you. >> woman: thanks. >> tech: my pleasure. have a good one. >> woman: you too. >> tech: schedule today at safelite.com. >> singers: ♪ safelite repair, safelite replace. ♪

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in case you missed it, this is how most of the day was spent in the house education committee hearing on anti- semitism at columbia university. >> i have your answer. let me, let me move on here. >> republicans in congress brought columbia university president minouche shafik down to washington, less to hear her answers and more to pointedly say questions at her. now, if the republicans in the committee were actually listening, president shafik was quite clear. here was a response to a question about whether anti- semitic speech is tolerated at columbia. >> it's abhorrent, and has has no place in our community.

i think one of the issues that we are actively debating now, and which david shows her, i hope, is part of the anti- semitism task force, will help us find solutions, as you've asked for, congresswoman, is to actually clarify where language crosses the line from protected speech to discriminatory or harassing speech. >> president shafik was very precise there. the debate that should be happening on college campuses right now is the one about where the line is between first amendment speech and discriminatory speech. that is a very worthwhile conversation. but that is not the conversation we saw in the house today. instead, we sauced off like this. >> how many, could you rattle off, like, 10 republican faculty out of your 4000 off the top of your head? >> yeah, i could, actually, but we have two of our fellows from

our institute for global politics who are former trump administration officials -- but let me ask another question. >> what is the number of republicans on the faculty at columbia have to do with anti- semitism? we're going to get to that. the congressman asking the question there clearly did not like that president shafik could answer his question. it didn't fit the narrative that he was trying to establish. a narrative of the republicans tried to cement with questions like these. >> can you explain why the worth -- word folks is spelled folx throughout this guidebook and in other places at the school social work? >> this is how colonial university spoke the word folks? >> no. >> what is a student group spelling the word folks within x to be gender inclusive, what does that have to do with anti- semitism? well, both that question, and the one asking president shafik how many republicans are on the columbia faculty, both of those

questions have a lot to do with the conversation republicans were actually trying to have in the house today. a week ago, a group of jewish faculty members at columbia published this open letter to president shafik , imploring her not to fall for the exact republican campaign we saw in that committee hearing room today. rather than being concerned with the safety and well-being of jewish students on campuses, the committee is leveraging anti-semitism in a wider effort to caricature and demonize universities as hotbeds of woke indoctrination. we are going to talk with the dean of the columbia school of journalism about what is actually happening on columbia's campus , and what republicans are really trying to do here, right after the break. break. s you love. some things should stand the test of time. long lasting eylea hd could significantly improve your vision

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in december, republicans on the house education committee questioned the president of harvard, m.i.t., and the university of pennsylvania about anti-semitism. days later, the president of the university of pennsylvania, elizabeth magill, resigned. and then, after enduring a month of additional personal and professional attacks, the president of harvard, claudine gay, also resigned. and now, today, it was the president of columbia university, minouche shafik, who republicans had in the hot seat. joining me now to help unpack what is actually happening on columbia's campus, and what these hearings are really about , is jelani cobb, dean of the

columbia university school of journalism. dean cobb, it is great to see you. i know it has been a busy time on campus. can you give me a sense of, of what is happening on, on your campus? there was a hearing today where i feel like we didn't actually really get an accurate picture of how deep the battle lines run and what the fundamental arguments are about. >> well, it's contested, you know? there are, you know, debates, there are heated debates happening. there are protests and demonstrations and counter protests and counter demonstrations. and, you know, just as this has become, you know, a hugely polarizing issue in lots of different avenues of american life, you know, we're seeing that play out on the university campus, where people are supposed to engage with ideas, are supposed to debate, they're supposed to think about these things critically, and so on. so we are seeing a lot of that happening. and in addition, on the day today, people are going to class, learning, you know, reading, preparing to graduate,

and all the other things that happen in a normal academic year. >> is there a conversation about, i mean, president shafik got at this in the hearing today, that the conversation needs to be about what is free speech and was discriminatory speech. is that a debate that is happening to any and at this point? at the columbia university campus? >> so the irony of this, and this is the debate that we've had she really, you know, long before this conflict began. this was a debate, a robust issue that we should be debating on college campuses. now, of course, the irony of this is that, you know, the president was being questioned by congress, which actually has purview over this, that makes legislation, laws, and, you know, the supreme court, which determines, you know, by precedence what is acceptable and what's not acceptable. and so, really, universities are being beaten up, you know, in columbia in particular being beaten up over things that we have really no control over. we're following the guidance of the people who are actually doing the questioning there. >> well, it seems like, to that

end, what was happening in congress today wasn't really about columbia , it wasn't necessarily about anti- semitism. it seemed like it was very clearly an opportunity for republicans to go after what they perceive to be a group of liberal elites, and the wokeism that has penetrated america's college campus system. did you think that they were successful in maligning columbia university today? >> i mean, they set all kind of things about columbia university, and that's not the institution that i think, you know, most of us experience. even though, you know, there have been incidents of anti- semitism, no question, and those incidents have been announced, you know, broadly by that community. but what we've seen in place of this has been a kind of disingenuous caricature of what the university is, what the university stands for, who our students are, who our faculty are, you know, what's going on. and that's going to, you know, not simply, you know, today, that's been going on for weeks

before this. and so, you know, listening to that hearing, you would not think that there was anything redeemable, you know, happening at columbia university. >> do you, do you think, i mean, it seems that the war in gaza, and the absolute schism that has been created in its aftermath, and some would say predating the war in gaza, has been a political opportunity for republicans and conservatives in particular to kind of get the culture of wokeism and the culture of liberal elites, not to be repetitive, but i do wonder how effective they have been in turning some part of the country against what is perceived as, you know, higher institutions. >> sure, but i think that one of the, like, more pernicious things, and one of the more disingenuous things here is the presentation of this as if this were a kind of matter of principle. what this is really about is the perception that universities, especially elite institutions, are too liberal.

so this is, you know, part of, is on par with the attacks on dei. it's on par with the attacks on affirmative action. it's, you know, kind of following the playbook of what we've seen happen at new college in florida, for instance. so the idea is supposed to be that we are, that laying the ground for these institutions to be something other than what they are perceived to be. now, these are also heterogeneous institutions. i teach opinion writing. i have students whose views are all across the spectrum. as you will find at this university, at the institution. >> republicans attend columbia too, in other words. >> shockingly enough, they do, yeah. and i've actually taught a few, amazingly. but, but that's not what, you know, none of these issues of substance were on display there. this was a kind of theater, in order to caricature the university, to further an agenda of kind of making it more difficult for our institutions to function the way that they have great

>> yeah. i will say, if we have time, i would love to play an exchange between president shafik and representative rick allen, who was asking if you wanted columbia to be cursed by god. can we play that? >> are you familiar with genesis 12:3? if you bless israel, i will bless you. if you curse israel, i will curse you. do you consider that a serious issue? i mean, do you want columbia university to be cursed by god? of the bible? >> definitely not. >> okay. well, that's good. >> it's, it's like a very curious logic to somehow bring in white christian nationalism in a conversation that's supposed to be and that is the fight.

>> i also thought it was, the person who is of egyptian origin, i think it was a dig in that direction, so it was thinly veiled, the most pernicious parts of what we've seen, particularly given the proliferation of anti-semitism that we've seen in the right wing of that party itself, and so, -- >> so maybe the mirror should be turned upon the party and the line of questioning. i've got to ask you, you know, we talk about this as a kind of an exercise in politics but it's had real consequences, the number of university heads who have had to step down, that have, you know, have had to leave their posts or been otherwise you know, seriously professionally wounded in the course of this, does this make you worry, do you think we are turning a corner when the goals

of at least one side of this has revealed to be not pure. >> i think the real concern is that we are in a moment of democratic crisis, so this goes back to the 1950s when we are talking about the cold war. how do you handle challenges to democracy, the way you handle changes -- challenges to your democracy is being more democratic. you have to double and triple down on your principles. so to see these kind of assault on free speech and on academic freedom at a point when we are also seeing other parts of our democratic tradition being assailed is chilling, deeply chilling. >> dean of the columbia university school of journalism, thank you for bringing much-needed perspective to us on a night like this. thank you. still to come, arizona democrats fight to repeal a civil war era law criminalizing most abortions while republicans do everything they can to stop democrats.

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there are so many people who are watching right now and watching what arizona is doing. >> since 1864 we've had to repeal this law and for the past six years, democrats have introduced this bill. they have introduced this bill for six years and been ignored every single one of them. including this one . >> that was there is on house floor today after republican state legislators for the second time in less than two weeks rejected democrats efforts to repeal an abortion band from 1864 which was reinstated last week by arizona's top court.

erin, what do you make of the discrepancy between what national republicans are calling for in terms of getting rid of this ban and with the republicans in arizona are actually doing? >> i mean what happened is the supreme court handed them a gift that has proven to be a curse for republicans. republicans, some of them are true believers such as the speaker of the arizona state house who says, some of us believe that killing children is wrong or that abortion is killing children and people like trump who will say whatever it takes for them to win, now i think up until the supreme court made it possible for these zombie laws to go into effect, these two sides could be in alliance, they could be in coalition unfortunately for them, americans have actually seen the true real-life consequences of abortion being bad when it's not just a debate tactic or a political move and they found

out that they really don't like the reality of how women are being treated across the country, so hence, this conflict with people like kari lake and donald trump would like to say that they are against something that they in fact either champion or in the case of trump, directly enabled, suddenly, they are acting shocked, will why? they are in tough races, contrast that with the legislators in arizona that the house and the senate are controlled by republicans, there were one in each chamber crossover votes, when the motion to begin debate on the repeal failed when it was blocked by republicans, they cheered, so on the one hand you have kari lake working the phones but when push comes to shove there are plenty of republicans who are thrilled that the 19th century is coming back to rule the women of arizona. >> republicans won't do it and

democrats can't do it, it feels like the voters of arizona will do it. we now know that republicans are concerned a ballot referendum might enshrine the right to an abortion in the arizona state constitution overwriting the band and this seems to be some chicanery a foot. i wonder if you think they could be successful in that our weather arizonans are paying close enough attention here that it won't work? >> i was on the phone today with the spokeswoman for the campaign and she at least does not believe that arizonans will be full. we are seeing this sustained voter outrage and interest in seeing past the kinds of obfuscation that republicans are putting forward. remember what happened in ohio when they tried to change the rules, voters didn't fall for that even though abortion wasn't directly on issue and went on to pass that overwhelmingly. i think what you are hearing in arizona is people kind of scrambling, notice you know, that what the republicans are

offering to put on the ballot directly relies on trying to confuse people and to be clear, some of the confusion is actually harming patients, because all of these kind of dueling laws and which one is in effect have actually prevented people from getting abortions in arizona, even when it's legal and allowed. as real-life consequences but the politics of it, there's no reason to think that arizona is going to be tremendously different from many of these red states where when the democratic process at the supreme court said they wanted to allow in dobbs, actually happens, voters are going to say, actually, we want abortion to be legal and safe and accessible. >> thank you for your great reporting on this, i appreciate your time tonight. that's our show for tonight, now it's time for the last word with lawrence o'donnell, good evening, lawrence. >> we have andrew wiseman joining us tonight and adam who used to work in the attorney general's office in new york