>> yeah, i just kind of ran into him, he is actually the brother of the anesthetist and it is just sad. i haven't, she is the only one that got back to me. i haven't been able to reach anyone i worked with, any of my friends who i worked with, any of the doctors or nurses. she was the only one. she sent me a voicemail today. i asked her about her brother but she never responded and she seemed to be in a lot of distress. so i think about him a lot, too. because he is just trying to provide for his wife and his daughter. but that last shot was right when you look behind them, that is the hospital. so i don't know if that garden is even there anymore. i don't know what happened to her. >> thank you very much for your time. >> thank you. >> that is all in on this third.

good evening, alex. >> good evening. okay. what would it look like if a republican president took office and then immediately set about replacing all the career officials with right-wing ideologues seeking to upend the way the federal government works? there has recently been a lot of speculation about just that kind of scenario. but we don't actually have to imagine because something like that has happened before. in july of 1981, here is the headline. reagan, reversing many u.s. policies. the new york times reported the reagan administration has quietly set about accomplishing a sweeping reversal of policy and practice in the way the government deals with illness and individual citizens. key cabinet and regulatory posts, the reagan administration, the reagan transformation amounts to a resolution of attitude involving the appointment of officials, who had in previous

administrations my have been ruled out over concerns of lack of conflict of interest or open hostility to the mission of the agencies they now lead. sounds familiar. president reagan embarked on what you might call the first modern purge of the administrative state, filling the federal government with young conservative zealots who are looking to carry out radical new agenda. and nowhere was that more evident than at the department of justice. as politico magazine reported, the doj was the nerve center of the reagan revolution, the most intellectually vibrant and ideologically conservative agency of the federal government . among the battalion of conservatives who entered reagan's justice department, were these guys pick a pair of young lawyers named john roberts and sam alito. the two would become much more famous for playing in a different band many years later , during the reagan revolution, alito and roberts laid the

foundation for what would become their judicial legacy. they spent their time in the reagan justice department work shopping a bunch of hard right conservative positions like ending affirmative action and curbing voting rights. john roberts was actually working in the civil rights division at the justice department, writing memos about how to restrict key provisions of the voting rights act at one point, samuel alito's job was to help ronald reagan solicitor general craft arguments against affirmative action for the supreme court. alito came up with some choice lines, such as hank aaron would not be regarded as the all-time home run king and he would not be a model for youth if the fences had been moved in whenever he came to the plate. that trite baseball metaphor did not do it, though. and the reagan administration lost its court battle to curb affirmative action.

reagan's efforts to rollback voting rights also hit some roadblocks. when the time came for president reagan to reauthorize the voting rights act, his administration ultimately caved to political pressure and renewed the landmark legislation. nonetheless, this group of conservative warriors represented the first front and a decade-long effort to try to erode voting rights bit by bit. governor reagan just issued a statement. he supported a 10 year extension of the voting rights act but told reporters making it easier for states and communities that they allow the act, to show they are no longer discriminating and thus no longer needed to comply. >> after all this time, there could be a possibility of a better day of opportunity for those who have abided by the election law. >> that may anger black groups but it pleased conservative southerners who say the law is unfair. >> i think it shows a

willingness on the part of the administration to encourage the judiciary committee as a whole to look very carefully at this whole question of the extension of the voting rights act, 1965. >> so began the long journey to reverse america's hard-won progress on civil rights. now that we are in the year 2024, you probably know how this story ends. those two plucky young reagan department of justice officials eventually made their way to the u.s. supreme court, where they got the chance to get voting rights, to end affirmative action, and in sam alito's case, to write the opinion that would and have a century of reproductive freedom. all of which rings us to today. went justice alito has penned the court latest 6-3 decision, once again attacking civil rights and in this case, voting rights. last year, a federal court unanimously ruled that the republican legislator in south carolina had engaged in illegal racial gerrymandering.

diluting the power of the states black voters. but today the supreme court reversed that decision. writing for the majority, justice alito argued that the court must give south carolina republicans the benefit of the doubt when they say that race had nothing to do with how they drew the congressional maps. quoting from alito's opinion. when a federal court finds that race drove a distressing decision, it is declared that the legislator engaged in offensive and demeaning conduct that bears an uncomfortable resemblance to political apartheid. we should not be quick to hurl such accusations at the political branches. in other words, it is pretty offensive to accuse south carolina republicans of racism. so let's not. there is no racism, then there is nothing to see her, folks. but if it seemed absurd and also extreme, another reagan administration alum, a man by the name of clarence thomas, took this all one step further.

in his concurring opinion, thomas argued that the federal judiciary should have no rule in settling disputes about any election maps and then he called into question a half century of precedent falling from the court landmark decision in brown the board of education. hey, why not? abortion, affirmative action, voting rights, all of them already on the chopping block. why not go for desegregation, too? >> this is what it looks like when you fill government with political zealots. the administration may end but the people do not necessarily go away. they just become the next generation of serious people. experienced enough for a confirmation hearing and young enough for a lifetime appointment. joining me now is ari berman, national voting rights correspondent, also the author of the new book minority rule, the right wing attack, also joining me is dahlia live?, sr.

editor with the court and the law, thank you both for joining me on this. well, monumental day. and gravely so. the first, just let's talk about the project here. we did not get to this moment by chance. and there is a reason i wanted to retrace everything happening in the reagan 80s. this is a multi-decade project. >> i was having ptsd from reliving my last book. and my new one this is history that is very familiar to me, which is that the conservative movements specifically put people that were opposed to the civil rights movement, opposed to voting rights, opposed to these policies and positions of power to do things through the course, they do they cannot do through the normal political process. they would not have been able to get rid of the voting rights act, overturn roe v wade through the normal political process, so they say let's stack the courts, let's construct an anti-democratic court that will then do all of these anti-democratic things

that we can't do through the normal political process and we are seeing this decade-long strategy play out today, where they are accomplishing all the things they wanted. they are overturning roe v wade, they are getting the voting rights act to such a point that it is barely effective and this didn't happen by chance basically the conservative movement has made the courts they are test case for minority rule because they know that the court, at least in their hopes, will be insulated from accountability and certainly the way the justices are acting they feel like they are insulated. >> i mean, on this week of all weeks, when i find out that justice alito has flags bearing the hallmark of the insurrectionist movement flying above more than one of his homes, here he is again, again going against the will of the people, the will of our democratic process to undermine voting rights. what is your reaction to the decision today? >> yeah, i mean, i think your point is the right one, alex, which is these are both stories of minority rule and complete

lack of accountability. and i really want to make one more pitch to folks who are listening that these are the same story, that we tend to sort of talk about alito malfeasance, weird behavior, upside down flags as kind of a one story and then the doctrine that comes out of the court is another, and they are so intrinsically connected because they are both stories of what it is to create a judiciary that is so utterly utterly protect did from public disdain , public displeasure, from the sense that they are subverting democracy as we know it and i think both the decision today and just this alito's public conduct, where he is just flouting every single ethics and appearance constraint, they are of a piece, they're both stories of what it is to be utterly untouchable in this moment. >> this is going to have

implications beyond the conservative project there is the immediate impact on our elections and how we have a representative democracy or not, this is happening in south carolina but how do you see this decision echoing across other states. >> you're right, what it does is it gives republicans another house seat in the house is going to be very close so every seat matters and they also ran out the clock in this case in the way that they are doing the community case because a lower court was already forced to basically say republicans can keep this district even though they called it gerrymandering. the supreme court, of course, went further and now they're making it very difficult to challenge racial gerrymandering in the future. if i could conceptualize this for a second, they already gutted the voting rights act twice severity ripped the heart of the voting rights act. he also said that partisan gerrymandering cannot be challenged in federal court which is absolutely insane. you could draw a map where one party gets 30% of the votes, 70% of the seats, and they will say, can't even challenge it,

let alone strike it down. the racial gerrymandering is one of the only things you can still challenge in federal court. now they are saying basically racial gerrymandering is going to be a lot harder to challenge, too. essentially what alito was saying, let's give the benefit of the doubt to the people who are doing the discriminating as opposed to those who are fighting it. this is a very consistent theme from the court. their sympathies lie with people that are suppressing votes, diluting votes, making it harder to vote as opposed to those people that are facing those obstacles to vote. >> would you say, dahlia, that there is, i'm not asking this rhetorically, i am actually asking this. in saying that race has nothing to do with this, they are also just revealing the racial agenda they operate within and under. is that unfair? because nine times out of 10 these justices, with the exception of one ruling earlier this year are always going with the white people. >> right, this is like a layer cake of gas lighting, alex. there are so many levels of we are just trying to be fair, we are just going to defer to the

legislature, we are just going to say that whatever the rules are for finding error in the district court finding, there is extensive, extensive findings from the lower court, the three-judge panel. you know, alito just bats away. i don't find any of this to be indicative of a racial gerrymander. so there is just layers and layers and layers of the nihilism and maybe the cherry on top, although there is some new cherries on top of the cake is when justice alito literally tells justice kagan that an opinion that she wrote that stands for the opposite proposition in 2017, that his opinion is actually truer to that than hers and when she says in her dissent, no, you have just completely subverted everything i wrote he is like oh, honey, listen to me. so there is just, every single check that was supposed to protect disadvantaged racial minorities from having their

power suppressed over centuries , every one of those checks is batted away under the theory that this was never a problem, it is certainly not a problem right now. >> asked chilling as all of the writing in this opinion is, there is clarence thomas's. yeah, exactly. that, as if anyone needed to be more fearful of where we are headed as a country, he is basically suggesting brown v board of education, there is nothing that should really follow from that, it has no teeth, we shouldn't be involved. the court should not be involved in this business. i mean, reminder, clarence thomas was put on the court to replace thurgood marshall. the irony and the sort of democratic alarm bells that should be ringing, how did you read that opinion? >> we were joking about what is the civil silver lining here, at least nobody joined thomas's concurrence because he literally wants to repeal the 20th century and that is what

you trying to do here. throwing shade at brown versus board of education on the 70th anniversary of that decision, saying he wants to overturn the one person one vote rulings, which were the most important rulings of that court, saying that you can't challenge racial gerrymandering ever, which are basically got all the 14th and 15th amendments so he is basically saying from reconstruction onward, from the 1860s and 70s onwards, we should repeal all of that and we should go back to the day, ironically, when black people have no rights. and other racially disenfranchised minorities have no rights. and it is just the fact that yes, the fact that he is even putting this out there. what we see is a lot of times these radical concurrences, they then become the thing that the lower court pick up on and that goes back. so don't ignore this because this will be coming back later. >> it reminds me of the dobbs

decision where thomas is suggesting gay marriage will be the next. it is moving the overturn window. that might not be the immediate impact but it does sort of set a new goal for the right, does it not? >> does, and it olden's, as ari says, lower court judges who are trying out constantly for the supreme court to be like, i am going to read that thomas dissent as the majority opinion and i'm going to write it into law and just take a big swing and see what happens and we have got case after case this term at the supreme court that are born of that kind of zealotry and i think the really important thing that ari is saying that we shouldn't miss is that today it is easy to get hyper focused on the flags and hyper focused on the sort of intramural crazy happening at the court. with the court just eviscerated the reconstruction amendments for all intents and purposes, the court said that the amendments that promised a freer, fuller participatory democracy are essentially

unenforceable. and for us to sit around and be like, this can't go any farther, clarence thomas is pretty much telling us he is willing to take it further , just jump on and enjoy the ride. >> repeal the 20th century, clarence thompson is on the supreme court. thank you for your time and your wisdom. i'm not going to say coleman words because i am more alarmed than i ever have been but thank you for your time tonight. i appreciate you. we thank you. coming up, ronald reagan, once again, it is a reaganite here. ronald reagan visited the heavily democratic borough of the bronx in 1980 and tonight donald trump tried the same thing. he will tell you what happened when the circus came to town. but first, an appeals court today shut down trump hail mary to get judge juan merchan get thrown off his case. the latest on the hush money trail denials is next.

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it was one of many attempts to derail his new york city criminal trial and it failed again. today, a new york appellate court rejected donald trump's bid to have judge juan merchan accused from the case, citing his daughter's work consulting for democratic lines. the judges ruled that trump's defense team failed to prove

that judge mershon overstepped his authority by refusing to recuse himself. he also upheld mershon's decision denying trump's argument that some of trump's social media post's were covered by presidential immunity. now these denials are all happening as we await a consequential ruling from judge mershon on jury instructions, which will guide the jury as it tries to reach a verdict. joining me now is former u.s. acting solicitor general and now msnbc legal analyst, it is great to see you i have a lot of questions here. pertaining, first, to the appeals court ruling. there have been so many denials throughout this trial. i assume that is the throw the spaghetti at the wall and see what sticks school of defense strategy. does it have any kind of meaningful impact in the bigger picture here? please, so it is a spaghetti strategy at the wall, it is also trumps m.o., being a loser, he lost once again, as

he does time and again in the new york court system. so the idea that this judge should be recuse, i think is laughable. this is a judge who is, if anything, bending over backwards to accommodate trump and his antics, like just take all of trumps defiance of the gag order, i will just tell you, alex, if you're i did that, we would be going straight to jail but trump got off from that because this judge has given him the benefit of every doubt. today, also, the judge ruled against trumps motion to try and say then you, the place where the trial is occurring in manhattan, was not permissible because there was too much pretrial publicity and he could not get a fair trial. it is true, there's a lot of pretrial publicity. a lot of publicity that he has drummed up legally that has always been a loser because in order to change venue you have to show some other place that doesn't have as much pretrial publicity and of course, everywhere is following this case. it is the same argument when i prosecuted george floyd, special prosecutor, when i

prosecuted the george lloyd murder, derek chauvin said change of venue and the trial judge there said absolute not, it is the same trail you would get anywhere else so none of this is surprising. that we are going to move to the main event, as you say, jury instructions, summation next week and ultimately the jury verdict. >> what are your, what are your biggest questions around the jury instructions? we went through some of them earlier this week but i wonder if there is a particular looming question about the guidance that is going to be given to the jury that you are going to be focusing on as we get those instructions? , so for our viewers, like the n jury instructions are actually the legal standards that the judge tells the jury, what are the elements that they are going to need to find as a jury in order to conduct trump. and the money trail here, this trial is so intense, frankly, even the jury instructions are going to be needing an attorney at some point but the major point of contention, i think,

is the level of criminal mens rea, criminal intent. arguing for very specific language that would require the jury to find that trump specifically intended to commit a campaign finance violation in the prosecution, by contrast, is arguing for something more lenient. that is really important because that is one of the key ways in which this crime becomes not just a misdemeanor or falsifying business records, but rather a very serious campaign finance violation, a felony with the possibility of jail time. please you know, and we talk about what the jury is going to be guided towards, what kind of instructions they are going to get, trump did not testify in this case despite the suggestion and explicit assertion that he was going to testify. he explained why he didn't take the stand to abc, i believe it was yesterday. let us take a listen to his explanation.

it is a full screen. okay, i'm going to read it. anything i did, he said. anything i did in the past, they can bring everything up, and you know what? i had a great past but anything, the other reason is because they have no case. in other words, why testify when they have no case? i don't do a great donald trump, neil. but you get the gist of things which is anything but saying i can't take the stand because i would be my worst possible witness, in my own defense. is that going to be something, is the jury going to find out why trump didn't take the stand? we know that there are couple of key witnesses in all this and i would assume the jury is asked to be told why he didn't take the stand. >> yeah, so i called this, i think, on your show, more than a month ago. i said look, trump is going to testify. but of course, he is not going to testify. and he is not going to testify for two simple reasons, number one, he is a chicken. number two, his attorneys would never let him testify because there is too great of a risk that he is going to perjure himself on the stand. i further said, of course he is going to blame it on someone

else. limit on the fact that there is no case or something like that. that is, of course, exact we what he did. all the things that he was saying about there being no case he said a month ago. but at that point, of course, he was a bloviating by testifying. the jury is going to be instructed where they can't infer anything negative about donald trump from his decision not to take the stand and that is absolutely his right. they're going to be told that expressly in the jury instructions. that doesn't say anything about the court of public opinion where there is no fifth amendment and of course, politicians act in a public environment and if they don't take the stand, there is usually a good reason for that. which is not oh, there's no case. it is because they are worried about showing up on the stand and having to tell the truth. and so i think we can make a certain inference from that, the fact that there is witness after witness who said trump did it and he is just sitting there silently sitting on his hands. that tells us i think, what we

need to know. >> when you talk about drawing inferences, neil, i wonder how you think the closing arguments are going to go based on what we saw on the last day of testimony, bob castillo having quite a time on the stand with judge marchand and others. where do you think they, where do you think they go from here? and what are your expectations? >> so the trump defense is really simple. this is not a case about donald trump is not a case about michael cohen and his credibility. this is a guy who they're going to say has lied, lied repeatedly, lied to the point where he had to go to jail. and you can't trust him. and the prosecution is going to say hey, there are a lot of reasons to trust him now but b, you don't have to trust him because there's all sorts of corroborating documentary evidence. and someone like trump who, there's testimony that says he meticulously counted every cent going out of his account, the idea that he would have tolerated his attorney spending hundreds of thousands of dollars

without his permission is just so against the trump modus operandi is to make it unbelievable. so i think that is going to be the debate. remembering our system, the jury , all 12 of them have to find trump guilty in order for him to be convicted. if one person says he did not do it, then he can't be convicted. there may be a mistrial. and at that point he will have perhaps another trial can i do think some of trump's defense tactics in the case, particularly over costello, would give the prosecution ample grounds to have a retrial. so it could be back here again if trump doesn't get convicted next week. >> this had to say another trial, didn't you, neil? we are not ready for that talk, yet. sir, it is great to talk with you and get your expertise on all of this. really appreciate you, thanks for making the time. >> thank you. coming up donald trump and

ronald reagan both went to the bronx. who had a better visit? we will have more on that right after the break.

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those were residents of the south bronx here responding to a visit from presidential candidate, ronald reagan, 1980. as the headline for the new york times story for the next day, reagan went to the south bronx to urge blacks to look past labels and to vote for him. three years earlier, in 1977, president jimmy carter had visited that same neighborhood in the bronx and promised more social services for its residents. so reagan thought it would be a good idea to take a limo, surrounded by police, and give a speech about tax cuts and deregulation as the answer to everyone's problems and not, say, i don't know, a social safety net. it is what we now think of as classic reagan. but at the time, it was a fresh, new brand of conservatism. and during his actual speech when he was just speaking to a relatively friendly audience made up of members of the press, well, the campaign stop went well. but when reagan was done using the south bronx as a backdrop, he made the mistake of actually interacting with the residents of the neighborhood he claimed he was there to speak to. and here is how that went.

>> what are you going to do for us? >> i'm trying to tell you! i am trying to tell you! if you will listen for a minute, what i'm trying to tell you is, i can't do a thing for you if i can't get elected. >> today donald trump held his own rally, just yards from where ronald reagan spoke in 1980. again, the headline say at all. trump to hold south bronx campaign rally to court black latino voters. >> it doesn't matter whether you are black or brown or white or whatever the color you are, doesn't matter. we are all americans and we are going to pull together as americans. >> trump appears to have learned from reagan's mistake. congressman ritchie torres

represents the area of the bronx were trump gave his remarks today and here is how he described them. trump's rally may be in the south bronx but it is not of the south bronx. bluntly put, the trump transplants are much wider than the locals of the south bronx, which is almost entirely latino and black. sort of a weird way to court black and latino voters but also if you are donald trump, i get it. faking campaign stops decide how is trump actually doing when it comes to black and latino voters? and how does that compare to joe biden? i will speak with the president and ceo for the center of american progress, patrick gas card, coming up next. >> speak to the people, not the press! impossible. we're solving the meat problem with more meat. liberty mutual customized my car insurance and i saved hundreds. that's great. i know, i've bee telling everyone.

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♪as you go with austedo♪ ask your doctor for austedo xr. ♪austedo xr♪ are sub boys are unsafe, the ceiling tiles are falling down, and they look worse than a third world country. the medians of our highways are crumbling, the sidewalks are littered with garbage, bottles of trash, but worst of all, the discarded needles from people that so desperately are in need of help. and we have mobs of migrants fighting are police officers and giving america the middle finger. >> oh would what subway line donald trump took to get to that rally. anyway, today trump took advantage of a break in his criminal hush money trial to do what he does best, paint enter

cities as hellscape's. his rally in crotona park, and attempt to reach out to black and latino voters might best be described as fraught. first of all, new york city has not voted for a republican since ronald reagan, which was more than four decades ago. and then there was trump's problem attic history with the city's residence of color, like the whole page as he ran in the local newspapers calling for the death penalty for five black and latino teens who were wrongly convicted of rape in 1989 and who are today known as the exonerated five. the well-documented allegations that trump denied housing to potential black tenants in the city. despite this history, trump appears to be making inroads with voters of color. the recent new york times pole that found in a hypothetical matchup with joe biden, trump would win 23% of black voters. the times notes that that would be the highest level of black support for any republican presidential candidate since the enactment of the civil rights act of 1964.

joining me now is patrick gas card, ceo of the center for american progress action fund. thank you for being here. >> thanks for having me on. you described that rally as fraught. i would describe it as fraud. >> just because of the man or because of the setting or both? >> all of it, right? it was astroturf. they imported a whole bunch of people into the bronx. let's be clear here, donald trump ain't winning the bronx. those of us from new york know him best and that is why hillary clinton won the bronx by i think 70 points and joe biden did even better from that in 2020. so he is not competitive in new york but more importantly, he is just towing a completely false story. it was wonderful to hear his endorsement of the biden infrastructure bill when he was talking about --

>> crumbling infrastructure, exactly. >> he promised to take care of and fail to and joe biden has. he also is doing this divide and conquer thing with the african-american and latino community. when we all know that when he is in other states, like the battleground states he promises to launch the largest deportation program in the history of america. he is talking to folks who actually be residing in the bronx as to >> your point it associate like he is actually planting a flag in the bronx and if he's going to win it but to make a point more broadly about how he can and should and will appear to committees of color. he is getting more support than he did last time by double digits. >> really, how the election happened and i missed it already? >> fair enough. >> that is interesting because if it is actually the case that donald trump really has 20, 20 tight percent of black and brown voters he would be winning those poles, running away nationally and that is clearly not the case in their own mats so we have seen data like this before in 2012, we

were trailing all the national polls by three or four points to mitt romney and we were being told that romney is making historical votes with black and brown voters that never panned out an actual election days. >> it seems, though, that the biden campaign is considering these numbers, if not capitulating to them, right? there is a new ad that came out, i believe today, about trump and his relationship to the black community. let's take a listen to it. >> i am joe biden, and i approve this message. >> of course i hate these people. >> donald trump disrespecting black folks is nothing new, he was sued to refusing to rent his apartments to black families and called for the execution of five innocent black and brown teenagers. >> it is more than anger, it is hatred. >> warned of a bloodbath if he loses the next election, and if he is president again, bowed to be a dictator who wants revenge on his enemies.

now, who do you think that is? we of course i hate these people. that is not capitulation to donald trump's message. >> no, i think it is capitulation. i'm not saying it is capitulation. i am saying it is acknowledgment that note reminding needs to be done about donald trump's policy position. >> correct and it is a ultimates that we are in an environment reactive pertained folks folks to participate. we have loads of distraction, lots of people are paying close attention yet. i just came back from philadelphia talking to two african-american voters in that city and they understand exactly they are dealing with all kinds of things in their lives with education, with safety, the things that are approximate, the election seems far off to them, it is different from you and i and i think the biden campaign is wisely reminding folks what the stakes are and persuading them to purchase paid in the here and now and driving that hard contrast and also reminding people for detroit, milwaukee, that

african-american latino unemployment rates are at historic lows, doing the trump era. all these things >> do you feel like the inflation piece is an important thing for this community, as well? that ultimately, when you're talking about tangible issues that people vote on, is that -- could that explain? fully it is terribly important, that is a great question. folks are concerned about price gouging. i think that they are beginning to understand that they have one candidate, and joe biden who is wrestling with the corporations on greed and price gouging and another guy who has a of laissez-faire attitude and they are also going to appreciate that the terrorist that donald trump wants to impose will include a $1500 tax across the board on all families in this country, including and especially the very same black and brown families that he pretends to be making an appeal to today. >> there is total cognitive

dissonance. trump is anything but consistent in terms of policy and who he is trying to reach out to. and even a platform. it is all over the place. on one hand he is saying my dalliances with the criminal justice system make me more appealing to communities of color because they know how unjust the system is. they know that systemic bias that is inherent to our criminal justice system. on the other hand, earlier this month in wisconsin. >> the man with the golden toilet. the serious systemic violence. >> he is vulnerable. in wisconsin trump says he would get the lease more power and immunity. does he pay a price for the cognitive dissonance here? does he pay a price for the hypocrisy ever? >> he does ultimately will. let's not just look at this issue, alex. let's look at the flip-flop that he is executing on abortion right now. we had from early today.

donald trump has, within the last two days, come out and said that he is going to institute some kind of national restrictions on birth control. away from that. he's flip-flopping on that issue every minute and you have 40% of suburban women saying that is the single most important issue for them in november so you can trust that they're going to hold him to account and that and recognize that joe biden has beenemth a protector of reproductive freedom in this country. >> we are going to talk more about that in the break. please hang with me for a few more minutes. we will be right back. we will be right back. "9 out of 10 people don't get enough fiber" benefiber is the easy, gentle solution for every day. its plant-based prebiotic fiber nourishes good bacteria in your gut working with your body to promote digestive health.

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the state of louisiana is poised to become the first state in the nation criminalize the possession of abortion pills come which account for

nearly two thirds of all abortions in this country. today, the senate passed a bill to reclassify abortion pills as dangerous controlled substances. that means the women in louisiana could face five years in jail and face thousands of dollars in fines for having us pills without a prescription. louisiana already bourns nearly all abortions but conservative lawmakers need to make doubly sure no woman in the state could exercise bodily autonomy. their governor is expected to sign the bill into law shortly. i'm back with patrick. there is reporting from nbc that the truck team is working behind the scenes to ensure the republican platform on abortion doesn't shift too far right. good luck to them. >> that ship has sailed. >> yes, that ship has sailed and i think back to trump's statement that the should all be left to the states. how do democrats best highlight what happens in the states when the decision is left to them? >> trump's statement that it

should be left to the state after he ran around the country declaring, i did this, pointing to the supreme court, i think there is a way we have to get out of their way and let trump only maga extremists speak for themselves on this issue. it's just not a question in the presidential contest. it matters in places like arizona where republicans have two congressional seats they are likely to lose as a consequence of passing restrictive measures that come from a bill that was passed in the 1800s and doubling down on it in this moment. there is an authoritarian blueprint called project 2025 that i'm sure you've talked to your viewers about that lays out a path for exactly how they will lift up executive authority over agencies like the fda to precisely use things like the come stack -- comstock act to restrict rights.

we will see this across the country, women were visited by the ghost of maga past, present and future. they've been working on this for decades, the president of louisiana, arizona, arkansas with these kinds of bills in the future for they have a clear plan in 2025 to expand abortion restrictions. it is a story that tells itself, but you can trust team biden, that they are exceptionally smart at all of this. they are going to be using the advantage they have and resources to push the story, particularly in places like montana, arizona, nevada, where there are abortion referendums on the ballot. >> i would assume the accounts of the women themselves who are affected by these bands and the criminalization of basic reproductive freedom are very key interlocutors. i was speaking with cecile richards earlier this week and she said you know, it is the women's' stories that cut across

partisan lines. these are republican women who want to have children in camp. these are republican women who need life-saving abortions. in some ways it seems like their voices are even more important than biden's on the issue. >> 100%. cecile is my hero and i can't say it better than her but i will at this one piece. in 2020, joe biden one independent women by 19 points. right now he is currently leading about 16, 17 points with that cohort and ask a full third of suburban women are saying they're undecided or not fully committed to biden or trump. that story, told by women themselves, will assure that joe biden has that kind of advantage and cushion. suburban women, 40% of them are saying this is the single most important issue for them and 59% of that cohort believe donald trump is an absolute extremist. >> do they believe he wants to restrict conception?

>> yes. they hurt him loud and clear and as my aunt says, if somebody tells you who they are, believe them, so folks are believing donald trump on conception, on abortion, on the authoritarian power grab that he and his maga extremists who control congress and state legislatures intend to enact. were going to tell that story and win as a result of that story. >> the confidence, i can feel it. patrick gaspar, president of the center for american progress action fund. it's great to see you. thanks for your time tonight and your enthusiasm. that is our show for this evening. now, it is time for the last word with my friend, lawrence o'donnell. >> good evening. we are going to be joined by harvard law school professor, lawrence tribe, to get his notion of what those flags flying tell us about samuel alito. >> i'm eager to hear his assessment. >> he's been thinking about it. i'm sure he has but i will be