the conversation, is that they understand there is a conversation. the conversation isn't going anywhere. that's to say that, at the end of the day, before president biden and vice president kamala harris are certified as the nominees, which could happen possibly as soon as this month, because they have to do it virtually because of ohio, they want to make sure, hey, if there is a plan to get him off the ticket, i want to be a part of the conversation. also, this is also about 2028, right? they want people to think of them as a national figure. maybe beshear isn't saying joe biden or bust, but at the end of the day, there is this waiting in the wings aspect. they're unsure of what is going to be happen. >> too early to be talking about 2028, even on "way too early." white house correspondent eugene daniels for "politico," thank you very, very much. and thank you for getting up "way too early" with us on this tuesday morning. "morning joe" starts right now. president trump is still liable for everything he did while he was in office as an

ordinary citizen, unless the statute of limitations is run, still liable for everything he did while he was in office. didn't get away with anything yet. yet. we have a criminal justice system in this country. we have civil litigation. former presidents are not immune from being accountable by either one. >> that was senate minority leader mitch mcconnell delivering those remarks after donald trump was acquitted in his second impeachment trial. but with the supreme court's decision on presidential immunity yesterday, it is not clear if mcconnell's argument was entirely accurate. our legal experts are standing by to go over what this all means now. also ahead, we're following the continued fallout surrounding president biden's debate performance and new internal polling his team is now

circulating. good morning. welcome to "morning joe." it is tuesday, july 2nd. along with willie and me, we have managing editor at "the bulwark," sam stein. former litigator and msnbc legal correspondent lisa rubin. former u.s. attorney and msnbc contributor chuck rosenberg. and, willie, a perfect group for our top story this morning. >> yeah. a lot to sift through and some different views of where this all shakes out. the landmark decision yesterday, the u.s. supreme court granted former president donald trump partial immunity from criminal prosecution for some of the actions he took while in office. nbc news senior legal correspondent laura jarrett has details. >> reporter: a monumental win at the supreme court for former president trump. the conservative majority finding the presumptive gop nominee must receive sweeping immuity for any official acts taken during his presidency. the 6-3 ruling, a defeat for

special counsel jack smith, with the court bulldozing through the charges against mr. trump for his alleged criminal efforts to stay in power. making the completion of any trial before november virtually impossible. >> today's decision almost certainly means that there are virtually no limits on what a president can do. >> reporter: chief justice john roberts laying out a new sliding scale of what can be prosecuted. saying, a president may not be prosecuted for exercising his core constitutional powers, that he has immunity from prosecution for all his official acts, but that a president has no immunity for private, unofficial acts, while cautioning the president is not above the law. a federal grand jury indicted the former president for orchestrating a conspiracy to retake the white house. alleging he leaned on his doj and state officials to help reverse the election results, mobilizing meetings of fake electors. it all culminating in the violent attack on the capitol on january 6th. mr. trump has pleaded not guilty

to all charges and argued, without immunity, every president could be prosecuted by political opponents. >> if you don't have immunity, you're not going to do anything. you're going to become a ceremonial president. you're not going to take any of the risks. >> reporter: the majority agreeing. the commander in chief must be able to carry out his constitutional duties without risk of political prosecution. writing, without immunity, such types of prosecutions of ex-presidents could quickly become routine. and that would weaken the presidency, which is exactly what the framers intended to avoid. the special counsel had pushed to get the case to trial before november. >> my office will seek a speedy trial. >> reporter: the ruling now dramatically chipping away at parts of smith's case. the justices finding mr. trump's urging the then attorney general to investigate voter fraud now absolutely immune from prosecution. what remains in the indictment, including his pressure on his former vp -- >> mike pence is going to have to come through for us. >> reporter: -- are now entitled to a presumption of immunity.

the liberal justices with a blistering pushback. justice sotomayor writing, "when a president uses his official powers in any way under the majority's reasoning, he will now be insulated from criminal prosecution. orders the navy s.e.a.l. team six to assassinate a rival, immune. organizes a military coup to hold onto power, immune. takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon, immune. even if the nightmare scenarios never play out, the damage has been done." >> laura jarrett reporting for us there. chuck, i'll start with you. the reaction to this as it came down yesterday ranged from, democracy is dead, we have kings instead of presidents, to, it's a little murky. the murkiness comes in the definition of official acts by a president versus personal acts by a president. who gets to define that, how you define that. what's your take? >> once again, willie, i find myself in the rather lonely middle. i think it is logical that some acts are immune. the core constitutional

responsibilities of any president, put mr. trump aside, ought to be immune from prosecution. purely private acts ought not be immune. so the hard part, again, is in the middle, right? what is and what is not an official act? i think we have to avoid the following construction. you know, i don't like mr. trump. this opinion is good for mr. trump. therefore, we are on the brink of a constitutional apocalypse. i don't believe that's true. but part of jack smith's case is now gone, and he's going to have to fight for the rest. his road to prosecution is longer and bumpier and more narrow. all those things are true. i disagree with certain particulars in the case, but in the main, willie, it makes sense to me that there is immunity in some cases and no immunity in others. to your point, we have to figure out the rest. >> so, lisa, let's take the federal election interference case. judge tanya chutkan, a federal

judge, now, it is on her, according to the supreme court, to decide which of these acts, which of this evidence constitute official conduct and which constitute personal conduct. if you are judge chutkan this morning, you're feeling how about that assignment? >> you're feeling very despondent about that assignment. you've just been given 119 pages that lays down some very broad principles without a whole lot of guidance. and you've been told that one of the things you can't consider in determining what's official versus personal is motive or purpose. that was a really big deal at the oral argument here. chief justice roberts giving the example of, what if a president, for example, is charged with bribery? the act of bribery itself is a personal act, accepting the money. but let's say a president is bribed for appointing someone to an ambassadorship? that's an official act. he was trying to untangle the oral argument. is that a personal act or official act? the majority is saying in a

situation like that, the motive or the purpose for which someone does something that arguably could be official can't be considered in untangling what's personal or official. that will mean that a lot of what we consider to be unofficial actions, if taken at the white house, if done with the cooperation, for example, of people at the department of justice or white house counsel's office or other aides, that might fall on the line of official because her hands have been tied. she can't consider what trump's ultimate aim was in making that determination. >> so as we heard in laura's report, president biden weighed in on the supreme court's immunity ruling. in brief remarks from the white house yesterday, the president warned the high court's decision will allow donald trump to do whatever he wants should he be re-elected. biden also criticized the ruling for delaying trump's federal election interference case, calling it a disservice to voters. >> for all, for all practical

purposes, today's decision almost certainly means that there are virtually no limits on what a president can do. this is a fundamentally new principle. it is a dangerous precedent. because the power of the office will no longer be constrained by the law, even including the supreme court of the united states. the only limits will be self-imposed by the president alone. american people must decide if they want to entrust the president once again, the presidency to donald trump, now knowing he'll be even more emboldened to do whatever he pleases, whenever he wants to do it. now, the man who sent that mob to the u.s. capitol is facing potential criminal conviction for what happened that day. the american people deserve to have an answer in the courts before the upcoming election. the public has a right to know the answer about what happened on january 6th before they ask to vote again this year.

now, because of today's decision, that is highly, highly unlikely. it's a terrible disservice to the people of this nation. >> chuck rosenberg, i'm curious, i'd love to hear your response to what the president had to say. also, i'm curious if you thought this 119 page decision, if you thought that the points they made, what they came to was extremely complicated and fraught and time consuming and difficult to get to. i'm just -- i'm wondering if you have any question about the timing of this, on the very last day, basically giving donald trump a win because of the timing, it seems to me, with a case like this. but who am i? it should be dealt with first. are the deductions they made so complicated that it took this long, in your estimate? >> mika, lots of good questions. justice jackson, i think, properly criticized the majority

opinion for its indeterminant standards, and i think that's right. as lisa rubin had remarked earlier, it's a bit of a muddle. it's unclear precisely how she proceeds from here. except that it is going to take a long time. i think mr. biden is quite right, there is no chance, no chance, virtually, for this to be tried before the election. you know -- >> right. >> -- that said, right, sort of like, forgive this simple analogy. remember in the "wizard of oz," dorothy always had the power to get back to kansas. just had to click her heels three times. we always had the power as the nation to make sure mr. trump was never president again. the senate completely abdicated its responsibility there. as mr. mcconnell described, the

courts of the united states, where we thought we'd get some sort of perfect solution, the courts of the united states are very good at what they do but are not perfect. they move slowly. they're designed to move slowly. the notion the supreme court would have expedited the case simply because a bunch of us wanted it to be heard expeditiously, i think, was a bit of a fool's errand. so i'm not surprised by any of this. these things take a long time. if we're looking to the courts for a perfect solution, you're frankly not going to get one, mika. that is not the place to go for a perfect solution. mr. trump is a unique and uniquely vile character, and the notion we can fill in all of the gaps in our laws to account for an actor like him, i think, is foolhardy. this illustrates, right, the difficulty of holding a man like mr. trump accountable in the courts of law. it is really hard to do. it is almost impossible when he is a former president. this opinion makes that clear. >> lisa, in the long run, if

donald trump is re-elected, this gives him the immunity he was seeking. in the short term, in this presidential campaign, it effectively pushes everything past election day. you could ask questions about the georgia case. was the call to brad raffensperger, the infamous call in january 2021, was that an official act? was he checking on the results in georgia? was he asking for a recount? i mean, you see my point. his team can argue every detail of every case. it seems, correct me if i'm wrong, there's no chance that any of these go to trial before election day. >> absolutely not. willie, one of the reasons that it doesn't is because it'll take 32 days just before judge chutkan even gets the case back. that's because, under supreme court rules, they have 32 days to issue the judgment back to the lower court, unless somebody asks for it. the other thing is, judge chutkan has to resolve what is in and out of the case before anything can proceed further. and what's in and out of the case has to go through the appeals process again before the

pretrial proceedings can continue. because immunity isn't just immunity from liability. it's immunity from the whole thing, right? if you're immune from prosecution, you shouldn't have to go through the process to begin with. i think there is no chance we see any trial before the election. and the case is going to disappear if donald trump is re-elected. he'll direct the department of justice to dismiss the case. he will get rid of the special counsel somehow. we should suffer no illusions that this case continues through the courts if donald trump is re-elected. >> the biden campaign continues to say the voters have to decide this. the courts are not going to sweep in and save this. donald trump is trying to use yesterday's supreme court ruling to get his recent felony conviction thrown out in new york. two sources telling nbc news in a letter to judge merchan yesterday, trump's lawyers claim, given the supreme court's decision, some of the evidence presented by prosecutors during the trial now should be inadmissible. they also requested the former president's july 11 sentencing

be postponed. that's a week or so from now. so they can brief the judge on their argument. chuck, do you have a case here? >> on one hand, the letter to judge merchan was entirely predictable. on the other hand, i think it is entirely wrong. i mean, if you look at the supreme court's decision from yesterday, willie, right, the conduct that underlined the new york case seems to me to be purely private. so perhaps judge merchan grants them a hearing, but i have a hard time imagining that they would prevail on it. this seems to me the type of case that a president ought not be immunized from. >> he also, lisa, was not president, right? it was during the campaign of 2016. how does that factor into it? >> first of all, i don't think they're necessarily asking for the case to be dismissed because of presidential immunity. what they're saying is that the trial and the verdicts that arose from it were faulty because merchan admitted evidence that, under this

ruling, no longer can be admitted. what does that evidence look like, willie, given that he was not president for most of it? well, for example, prosecutors relied on a series of tweets that donald trump issued in 2018 after the truth about the stormy daniels payments came forward. those kinds of tweets, my understanding is, donald trump's lawyers are saying, you should never have admitted that evidence. because of that and because of today's ruling, the entire verdict is in question. it is not, he should have been immune because of this ruling. it is more like the verdict is predicated on the admission of evidence that this ruling tells us should never have come into the case. >> yeah. mika, you know donald trump. we know the people around him. they're going to contest every piece of evidence, every tweet, every document, every piece of testimony now in any of these cases based on the ruling from the supreme court yesterday. >> yeah. they will push every envelope. chuck's description of the murky parts, he will go there and try to push whatever he can. >> yeah.

>> we've seen that. this isn't surmising on my part. sam stein, interesting thing is that joe biden says this is in the hands of the voters, which raises questions again about where the state of his campaign is. what are you hearing in circles around the white house, around the campaign about the fallout from the president's debate performance last thursday night? i'm hearing that he's moving forward full steam ahead, but then i get calls saying they're hearing something else. i don't know. i'm not hearing it directly from the inner circle. >> yeah, this is a dynamic situation to say the least. >> yeah. >> the prevailing sentiment from the inner circle is, let's forge forward. we can get through the fog here. biden has been counted out before, and he can power through. but if you talk to the next

concentric circle of donors and operatives in the party, it's panic. i mean, that's just what it is, right? if we're being blunt about it, people who are not comfortable with the state of the campaign have very little to no confidence in biden's own ability to turn it around. are frantically imagining the possibilities for candidates to run in his place. i think it is predicated on a few things, right? one is you get decisions like this from the supreme court which make it very clear what the stakes of the election are. maybe that, in some ways, crystallizes the choices for voters and works to biden's advantage. in other ways, it makes it very clear that the prosecution and donald trump only happens if democrats win this presidential election. on the other hand, i think, and this is the big one, is that there's real doubts about whether biden has the capacity to do what's necessary to turn around his campaign. i mean, what's necessary

essentially is for him to do out there in the public, in unscripted moments, in interviews, press conferences, maybe even another debate, although that's not coming for several months, and prove that he has the vitality, that the thursday night debate was a one-off. so long as he doesn't do that, you'll get these persistent questions and doubts. they're kind of in a catch-22 here unless, in fact, he does have the capacity to do it, and they should put him out right now. >> well, they -- >> let me ask you, chuck, about jack smith. because in the concurrence yesterday, justice clarence thomas took things a little bit of a step further and said, we're not so sure even the appointment of a special counsel named jack smith was legal. we'll leave that to somebody else. are there concerns that even jack smith's being there is in jeopardy at this point? >> perhaps. although it ought not to be. this is an issue that has been litigated many times, and each

time, the courts of the united states have determined, willie, that special counsels like jack smith are constitutionally permitted, that their funding is constitutionally permitted. they still are inferior officers to the attorney general of the united states. basically, no problem with the appointment of a special counsel. but, but this is an issue pending before judge cannon in the southern district of florida. i'm not quite sure why justice thomas did this, but he may have breathed some life into mr. trump's argument in front of judge cannon that jack smith was improperly, unconstitutionally appointed. that is not the law. that is not the case. if she rules that way, i imagine she would be overturned on appeal. but it is a pending issue. it seems to me that justice thomas was trying to give some sustenance to this argument.

i believe it is a faulty argument. every court that has examined it so far has found it to be a faulty argument. >> reading from the concurrence of justice thomas, he writes this, "if there is no law establishing the office that the special counsel occupies, then he cannot proceed with this prosecution." that's from clarence thomas. so let's take one step back, big picture. where does this leave us now, lisa rubin? i think a lot of people were surprised, perhaps by the extent of this holding yesterday. what's your final assessment now after what we've seen yesterday? >> based on yesterday's opinion, a big chunk of the indictment is going to have to come out. that's the allegations having to do with donald trump's interactions with the department of justice. the pressure campaign on mike pence is much at risk. that's the second category of allegations the court says will be a high bar to rebut the presumption of official immunity there. then you've got everything else. that includes the fake elector

scheme. i am heartened to some extent that justice barrett in her concurrence drops a footnote and says, none of that should ever be considered official. not only did you have a concession that it wasn't at oral argument, but, also, the president has no role in the administration of federal elections. it should never have been considered or even thought of as remotely official. we'll see how judge chutkan, when the case comes back to her, whether she schedules hearings or briefings to try to untangle this. the best we can hope for is a hearing where evidence is presented and witnesses are called, so that even if the public doesn't get the satisfaction of a real trial, some of the things the department of justice has been holding back, that clearly they have to justify this prosecution, we will see as a public before november, willie. >> last word to you, chuck. >> lisa is right, prosecutors are going to lose evidence. the question is how much. as a former prosecutor, i hated losing evidence. there is no thing as too much evidence. so, here, the prosecutors are going to need to see where they

stand. at the end of the day, at the end of those hearings, what do they have? what have they lost? can they go forward? we shall see. >> msnbc legal correspondent lisa rubin and former u.s. attorney chuck rosenberg, thank you, both, very much for coming in this morning. >> thanks, guys. still ahead, we're going to expand our political panel. one of our next guests says president biden's 2024 survival requires a lot more than hope. "the washington post"'s eugene robinson joins us with his new piece. and richard haass is out with a warning this morning. the world should prepare for trump. you're watching "morning joe." we're back in 90 seconds. so i hired body doubles. mountain climbing tina at a cabin. or tree climbing tina at a beach resort. nice! booking.com booking.yeah. ah, these bills are crazy. she has no idea she's sitting on a

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welcome back. following last week's debate, president biden's team is circulating new internal poll numbers that show his standing remains unchanged. in an effort to calm some democrats about biden's debate performance, a campaign official suggested the poll numbers indicate the concern over biden's age is something voters have already taken into account. some white house aides tell "the washington post," many who support biden have long recognized he is showing signs of age, and his debate performance did not significantly change the dynamics of the race. meanwhile, as of last night, president biden still has not reached out to top democrats on

capitol hill following his debate performance. five sources tell nbc news the president has yet to personally call senate majority leader chuck schumer or house minority leader hakeem jeffries. the white house chief of staff, jeff sainz, was making calls. four democrats told nbc news they publicly believe biden should drop out now to avoid a lopsided defeat for democrats. joining us now, former white house director of communications for president obama, jen palmieri. pulitzer prize winning columnist and associate editor of "the washington post" and msnbc political analyst, eugene robinson. symone sanders is up with us way too early this morning. and richard haass, author of "home and away," available on

substack. gene, we'll start with you and your new piece entitled "biden's 2024 survival requires a lot more than hope." what does he need to do, and do you think he knows that? >> well, look, i think he needs to do everything he can to reverse the impression, the clear impression that was left by that debate five days ago, that debate on thursday. because, you know, i have been coming on this show for a long time. i am a long-time critic of democratic bedwetting. i don't -- you know, i think it's crazy a lot of the time. i think this is different. >> yeah. >> i think a lot of democrats were shocked by what they saw thursday night. i think the sort of hunkering down and saying, you know, nothing to see here, you know,

the polling is unchanged -- they sent the memo out over the weekend, saying polling is not changing so it didn't hurt us. that is internal polling in the swing states which shows him trailing donald trump by a slight margin. you know, within the margin of error. nonetheless, it shows him behind trump in these states. so sending out a memo saying, look, we're still behind, but we're not behind any worse is not exactly the best ad for your campaign. so why isn't he calling schumer and jeffries? why isn't he doing some sort of unscripted appearance that show s -- that erases the impression that was very clearly left thursday night?

i think this is potentially a really big problem for the democratic party, for biden's re-election campaign, and i think, you know, i think democrats are right to send up the alarm. >> symone sanders, what are you hearing? >> look, what i'm hearing from -- well, it depends on who we're talking to, mika, to be honest. >> right. >> when you talk to strategists and operatives, not folks that work for the biden campaign or in the white house but outside of that, elected officials, right, the political professionals, donors, they are echoing some of the same things that eugene has noted in his piece that we are all hearing. they're concerned. they want to hear more from the white house. they want to see the president do a town hall, do more interviews. they want to see him more. but when i talk to non-political professionals, if you will, as i like to say, everyday, regular folks who don't do this every day, they look at this and say, and melissa murray and i talked

to black women in montgomery county this weekend on sunday, and they all said -- we asked them about the debate. they said, the debate wasn't good for trump or joe biden. but the women who were supportive of the president in that room said, look, at this point, we can't get anyone else. there was someone that noted we should stand by our guy. there was someone else that noted how realistic is this talk of removing him? they were more concerned with the broader picture, and they also, unprompted, brought up democracy and the supreme court. i would just argue that the best way for the biden campaign to really -- they won't be able to stop the talk because the chatter is going to continue. every single thing the president does between now and november is going to be parsed. every single which way. if he stumbles walking, if he walks a little too slow, if he walks a little too fast, you know, if he forgets a word, every single thing is going to be viewed through the prism of what happened on the debate stage. so the chatter will not end, but i think a way to really blunt

some of the criticism is, in fact, to put the president out there in various ways in which, you know, he will shine. again, i think town halls, doing things with voters, real people, where he is answering questions from regular folks will make the difference. i do think the president could rise to that occasion. i will just lastly say that i think we have all heard chatter inside, and i was struck by "the washington post" reporting about concerns that folks said that they had about the president's health. last time i saw the president, he seemed and looked fine to me. yes, on the debate stage, it was not a good performance. so the only way to assuage people's concerns is let them see for themselves. joe biden, i believe, thinks he is his best political consultant. i'm interested to see what the president decides to do this week. >> jen, the campaign releasing those internal polls. other polls tell a little bit different story about what people saw on thursday night.

the argument that some in the campaign and around it are making, that it's just bedwetting democratic donors and insiders just isn't true. it's at the dog park. it is in the barbershop, at camp drop-off and pick-up. people are talking about the performance on thursday night, real voters. by the way, voters who like joe biden. voters who are sympathetic to him, wondering, uh-oh, are we going to lose to donald trump with this guy? how should the campaign -- you worked inside them, obviously, successfully many times. >> sometimes not. >> sometimes. it's always a mixed bag. how should the campaign be looking at this? >> okay. so it is tuesday morning. here's, like, where -- i mean, it's only been a -- it happened thursday night. this is where i think we are. i think the campaign did -- the president did a great job on friday. the campaign did a great job, you know, that first 36 hours. it was critical that they be able to effectively make a case, you know, that this was going to

be okay. i think they have taken that as far as they can. now, it is up to, you know -- now, it's like sort of like two weeks before you really know where the public is on something in public polling. then it's, what is the president doing now, right? i think, you know, he needed to take a couple of days off, sir. like, he's been through a lot in the last month between europe and, you know, hunter's conviction and, you know, the debate. now, i think people want to see more of him. until we -- you know, there's a lot. it's like the base is rallying to his side, grassroots money and, you know, have their internal polls. elites are concerned and have certain bars they want the president to meet. you know, we don't know yet which -- who is right, right,

who is right there, but the president saved america from trump. he ran because he thought he was that right person to beat trump. i think if the moment ever came where he thought, i have taken this as far as i can and now it's up to all of us to continue the fight, i think he will make that choice. but, you know, that's not there now. >> yeah. i think the hope from the campaign is get some distance from this, as you say, show you're up for this. as wes moore said, let's not talk about a debate performance. let's talk about presidential performance. >> right. >> how the two presidents, one former, one current, performed in their job. >> yes. >> richard, your piece is titled after debate performances, "the world should prepare for trump."

elections have consequences, and this one more than most, given that the differences between the candidates exceed similarities. in a debate that appears to have tipped the scales against biden, and with no way of knowing if someone else will be the democratic candidate and how he or she would fare, u.s. friends and allies should prepare for major changes come january. what could be coming down the pike if donald trump is re-elected, richard? >> all sorts of changes in domestic policy, even more of a concern to the rest of the world -- which, by the way, watching this is unnerving for much of the world. this is not the united states they thought they knew. the idea they've got their security in our hands, and they watch things like the other night, that does not make them feel good, shall we say, about the choices they've made. but, you know, look at the foreign policy. we've had a 75 year run in foreign policy. you get up every morning and things were mildly predictable. the united states would play this role, supporting alliances,

institutions, standing up to tyranny. we won the cold war. it stayed cold, didn't go hot. we ended it on our terms. it is impossible to argue over the next 75 years things will be turning out that well where united states plays the same role. what donald trump announces is the arrival of a different united states and a different world. two things real quickly, just sitting here. one, we're looking at a very different united states. if donald trump wins, we're looking at, not just in the white house with the supreme court decision, we know what this supreme court is. it's no longer the arbiter. it has its thumbs on the scale of american politics. you're probably looking at a republican senate and a republican house. that's called a run of the table. that means we become, essentially, a de facto system with no checks and balances. the only thing i disagree with

in the previous conversation, and mika won't like this, is i don't think it is simply enough to say, looking back whether joe biden has been a good president. yes, he has. even whether he is a good president today. he's 81. he's going to be 82 in november. he's going to be 86 if he is re-elected before -- while he is still in the oval office. so when you elect a president, you're basically buying an option. you're buying a four-year option. does anyone seriously think that in four and a half years from now, joe biden is going to be what he needs to be to be an effective president? as he himself would say, come on, man! that's not going to be the case. i hate to say it, but we've got to say it. we have donald trump who is unfit by temperament, character, you name it, to be president, but i really believe that joe biden is no longer positioned that he can be a successful president four and a half years from now. that is why i think we really need to change. he needs to be urged to step down. >> yeah, you're right, i don't

like it. so i think one of the things that you wrote, richard, is the most important thing to look at. that was, you know, we have no idea how another democratic candidate would fare, which would be an argument for joe biden to absolutely stay in the race, especially if he feels up to it. again, i don't think you can take what happened thursday night, which i have said repeatedly was an unmitigated disaster, okay? i go way further than the campaign. i don't try to sugar coat what happened. it was horrible. but i look at all the other things he did in the days leading up to it, which are things donald trump could never even do in his life. he could never even try to be as presidential, to be as respected, to go to normandy and connect with people in the way he did. he literally doesn't have that gene. he doesn't have empathy. he doesn't have -- and many

think that, actually, his goals are only for one person. i don't know anybody else i've ever met in my life who is as self-centered, as completely focused on his own personal gain, in a position of service to the country, but using that position of service for his own personal gain and to destroy the foundation that this country is built on. i've never seen anything like it, and i think i'm not alone. >> mika -- >> i think joe biden has few choices here. go ahead, richard. >> i didn't mean to interrupt. i apologize. i wrote a book about obligations. the tenth obligation, as you said, donald trump vie late violates every day, to put the country before himself and his party. the real question for us to ask, how does joe biden honor that obligation now? it is by running again? does it put self before country? i worked with joe biden 50 years. i like him. i speak with him from time to

time. again, he's been a good president. i just, at this point, think he's reached the point in his trajectory where the best thing he could do for this cuntry is to be a one-term president voluntarily. by the way, the last two one-term presidents, george h.w. bush, jimmy carter, not bad. >> okay. so then we go, sam stein, to let's take richard's concept, which i completely disagree with. let's hash it out. like, exactly then what happens? we go with someone completely untested? completely inexperienced because they seem cool, because they're younger, because they have less experience? like, what does that look like? i'm not willing to walk away from someone who has worked this hard and has performed this well and gotten this much done on every level, more than any president before him, including the ones richard haass worked for. >> right.

well, there is sort of a semi-middle ground here, right? kamala harris. she's been vetted. she's the vice president. she would inherit the campaign structure. she'd inherit the money. anyone else in this hypothetical universe could not. she would be the logical person to take on the mantle. on top of that, she has some experience debating republicans at this level, including making the case against donald trump, right? that would be the logical extension here. i agree with you, the other ones, they're untested. a big sigh there on air. a lot of the other ones are untested, and that would be problematic in its own rights. look, i think this ultimately comes back to biden. richard's point is valid. joe biden is the one who set the standard himself, right? every time there was questions about his age and vitality, his response was, watch me. right? that was his response. we watched him on thursday night, and i think we around the table agree he did not pass the test that he set for himself.

i will say this, there is some indication of what it would, you know, take internally, in his internal thought process, for him to decide to quit the race. i looked at this historical record. he has quit a presidential race before. in 1988, the run for the white house, he quit that presidential race because he was under a cloud of allegations about plagiarism and exaggerating credentials. at the same time, he was overseeing the confirmation hearings of robert bork. he met with jill and decided, if i left the race, would that help me defeat bork? yeah, if he left the race, he could defeat him. you can extrapolate the decision he's going to have to make is, is leaving the race this time around enough to help defeat donald trump? if he concludes that, no, him being in the race is what is necessary to beat him, he stays in. it's simple. if he decides, no, in fact, i need to leave the race in order for trump to be defeated, then he leaves the race. obviously, he's not at the point where he's made that decision,

but that's what the next week, two weeks, whatever it is, is going to be about. >> willie, sam brought up jill. jill just did an interview, saying 90 minutes of joe's life are not going to define his presidency. we are continuing with it. i just wonder, as we question this again and again and again instead of wait for things to play out, including major polling, which may change the course of the race, who knows, you know, are we listening? they don't seem to be budging, and they want to move forward. >> yeah. this is a -- we should be under no illusions, this is a difficult decision. joe biden could decide to stay in the race. he loses, it is viewed as a historic mistake. he can get out, and whoever comes out of him could lose and it'd be viewed as a historic mistake. it's not easy, symone sanders. i'm curious, as you talk to people in the white house, some of your old colleagues there -- you say it depends on who you talk to on how they're feeling right now. some of the stuff coming out the night of the debate, they said

he had a cold. then they went to that it was 9:00. then they went to he was in europe two weeks before that. i don't think any of that is reassuring to voters, meaning to say, the president of the united states can't do anything after 9:00 or if he has a cold? what is the message? what is the strategy? is it he beat donald trump once and still can do it again? >> yeah, willie, i think it boils down to your last point. you know, anita dunn joined our show, "the weekend," this past weekend to talk about the fact that, after that debate, i asked very point, directly, i said, "did you all have a conversation about him dropping out? is that something you talked about?" she said, "no, we discussed how to move forward." by every indication of my conversations, that's what they're focused on. this is something i did ask folks who are very well adept and knowledgeable of dnc and convention rules. because these hypotheticals folks are posing about, you

know, the president has two weeks to make a decision, or it is only him and the two weeks are critical, i hear that. i also know the rules. just so folks at home are aware, there are a little over 4,000 delegates to the democratic national convention. these are people who run and are elected, save about 744 of the folks are super delegates. these are appointed people that are elected officials, you know, folks who have -- dnc chair appointed them, the president appointed them. at one point in time, a previous life, i was a super delegate, one of the 744 folks. joe biden, in this primary that was run, because there were primary elections that happen across the country, democrats, he got a little over 3,600 delegates. in order for -- if joe biden were to decide prior to accepting and confirming the nomination of the democratic nominee for president, he could not dictate where the delegates

go, okay? the best possible scenario, to be clear, as it was explained to me by the people that know well and the numbers, is that joe biden accepts this nomination, and if, for whatever reason, he decides he does not want to be in this race anymore -- again, by any indication, we don't have that indication that any of that is the case. joe biden himself and his closest aides are saying he is in this to win it and is staying in the race -- if he decides, though, he doesn't want to be in the race anymore, the best possible scenario is for him to accept the nomination and wait to decide after. then, instead of 4,000 folks deciding, it is a very small group of people that will pick who will be the democratic nominee. i want to put that on the table for folks. >> that's important. appreciate your explaining that. symone sanders townsend, a super delegate and super host, hosting "way too early," "the weekend," and now "morning joe."

she'll be back "way too early" tomorrow. sam stein, the sighing, thank you. >> that was me. that was all me. >> sam, we love you, buddy. richard, before we let you go, let's talk about the french elections, the first round of snap elections called by macron. marine le pen's party, the far right, doing very well. what happens from here? >> second round is july 7th. the center cannot hold. this turned out to be a colossal mistake by french president macron. the far right's coalition has the plurality of seats. probably can't get an outright majority. you may not be able to form a government after the second round. not clear the three blocks can come together. macron's will come in third out of three, not a great place to be. you could have a french president without essentially a french government in the parliament, trying to work everything out tactically. this could actually create pressures for new french presidential elections sooner. the opposite, by the way, in the

uk. you'll have a blowout victory on july 4th. labor is going to win a landslide. almost unprecedented in british politics. it shows a bad, bad time to be the incumbent. both are a vote against the status quo. center left winning in the uk. you have a far right government on the far left party -- far right and far left parties winning in france. if you are the incumbent, you have real headwinds at this moment in history. >> fascinating in france, this comes a couple weeks before the olympic games taking place right there in paris. >> a week. >> richard haass, thank you so much. good to see you. coming up next, today marks 60 years since the civil rights act was signed into law. doris kearns goodwin joins us with a look at the historic legislation and its lasting impact. "morning joe" is coming right back.

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our most immediate past are here on this hill. first, no eulogy could more eloquently honor president kennedy's memory than the earthiest possible passage of the civil rights bill for which he fought so long. >> that was president lyndon b. johnson just days after president kennedy was assassinated, urging congress to take action on the late

president's civil rights bill. months later, congress passed the 1964 civil rights act. hours after it passed, president johnson signed it into law. 60 years ago today. afterwards, president johnson called on the country to fulfill its founding promise, that all its citizens were created equal. >> tonight, i urge every public official, every religious leader, every business and professional man, every working man, every housewife, i urge every american to join in this effort to bring justice and hope to all our people, and to bring peace to our land. >> joining us now, pulitzer prize winning author and

presidential historian doris kearns goodwin to think about where we are now versus where we were headed back then. gene robinson has the first question for you, doris. >> doris, i remember the impact, the personal impact of the civil rights act of 1964. that's when segregation finally -- jim crow segregation finally started to be dismantled in south carolina. the brown v board didn't integration our schools, but the civil rights act started that process. there were restaurants that would not serve african-americans that started to open their doors. it was more than significant. it was life-changing and world-changing, at least for where i lived. could you talk about the sort of larger impact on the nation and

on our history of that piece of legislation? >> i think it is so important, especially at this disheartening time, to remember there was once a time in this country when something huge went forward, just exactly as you say. at the moment president johnson signed the legislation, the 78 years of jim crow legislation was gone. the next day, minutes afterwards, blacks could walk into hotels, department stores, and all the indignities of daily life would be beginning to be erased. hearing lyndon johnson at the beginning, the joint speech he gave to a session of congress the day after jfk died, it was courageous, to make the number one priority the passage of the bill. the advisors said, you'll never get it through the democratic party, split in two. the filibuster will take two-thirds. you won't get it there. you'll be a failed president. you have to go before the country in 11 months as a failed

president. you only have a certain amount of currency to expend his president. you should not extend it on this. what did he famously say? he said, then what the hell is the presidency for? that was a time when the presidency had huge ambitions for good in this country. immediately, he set to work to get the republicans to go with him, to join the northern democrats. that meant dirkson had to be brought into the fold of minority leader. he said to his democratic leaders on the floor, you drink with dirksen, listen to dirksen, give credit to dirksen, we need a bipartisan legislation. dirksen came around. johnson said, knowing he cared, too, about his legacy, as did lyndon johnson. everett, you bring your democrats to help republicans pass the bill, and 200 years from now, schoolchildren will know two names, abraham lincoln and everett dirksen. they passed the law that changed

the face of this country. we have to remember those moments in this time. >> you see the photographs from the signing ceremony, and it's history. martin luther king jr. is there. attorney general bobby kennedy is there. dirksen, j. edgar hoover is there. can you speak, doris, to how america got to that day 60 years ago? by that, i mean the pressure placed on president johnson by the civil rights movement, by martin luther king, and many, many other people, and the partnership between dr. king and president johnson to get the legislation through. >> it's one of those moments in history when the outside movement, the civil rights movement, comes into the highest counsels of power with lyndon johnson and the congress. starts really back in the 1950s with the montgomery bus boycott, with rosa parks, and martin luther king coming to montgomery to worry about segregation in buses. it takes the freedom riders, takes the sit-ins during the

time with the young people in the '50s and '60s, all the way up to birmingham, which fired the conscious of the country. peaceful civil rights marchers were going through the streets in montgomery to protest the failure of civil rights being still segregated, and what is done? they're met by dogs, high-pressure hoses. young kids are struck down, sent to jail. the conscience of the country is fired. martin luther king brings that to the legislation. that's when kennedy introduces the bill in june. then you have the great civil rights march in august. it took a long time. finally, lyndon johnson gets it passed. i think what it illustrates is that for change to take place, we have to be patient sometimes. it takes a long time. but they kept moving forward, moving forward. without the civil rights movement and the bravery of the freedom riders and the freedom soldiers and all the marches, it would not have happened. they deserve those pens. so did the democrats.

so did the republicans. so did bobby kennedy, who was at the head of the justice department at the time. to see those people getting the pens, knowing they'd make an historic change, we feel we have to remember these moments. we did it before in this country. once upon a time we were a country who did these things. we have to believe we can do it again. >> you can stare at the photographs a long time. go around, see who was in the room. let's bring into the conversation former secretary of homeland security in the obama administration, jeh johnson. mr. secretary, good to have you with us. a lot to talk about. >> yes. >> the 60th anniversary of the civil rights act, the point doris made about getting things done, about bipartisan work, and president biden has done a bunch of that in his first four years, but you think about something like that, the civil rights act, how difficult it might be nowadays given the way our politics is so polarized. >> back then, it took a legislative master like lyndon johnson to push through this syl rights act, to push through the

voting rights act the following year. he was master of the senate and knew how congress worked. i suspect that only lyndon johnson could have done what he did 60 years ago today. we're, of course, in a different place right now. politics is polarized. you look at joe biden's presidency. the most experienced president we've ever had in public life. i think given the numbers, he's done a very good job at getting things done, getting things through congress right now. even though we're working with, like, 50/50 in the senate, thin minority in the house. i think his legislative record is highly commendable. >> okay. so i have a question for doris before we close. that is about july 4th. it's in two days, and you're

part of an initiative that, in two years, will be celebrating 250 years. it's called america 250. i'm just wondering what your thoughts are. >> we lost connection. >> oh, have we lost doris? she can't hear us. doris kearns goodwin, thank you very much. we'll have to get that answer from her maybe tomorrow, another day. her book, "an unfinished love story, a personal history of the 1960s" is out now. moving on now, the u.s. supreme court has handed down a historic ruling in donald trump's presidential immunity case. the high court ruled 6-3 along idealogical lines that trump has immunity for some of his actions as president in his federal election interference case, but possibly not for others. according to the ruling, presidents and ex-presidents have immunity from criminal prosecution for official acts while in office, but they can be

prosecuted for unofficial acts. the case now heads back to the lower court to determine which allegations in trump's indictment are determined to be official versus unofficial acts. joining us now, former u.s. attorney and an msnbc contributor, barbara mcquade. nbc news justice and intelligence correspondent ken dilanian. jen palmieri is still with us, as well, along with jeh johnson. ken dilanian, give us a rundown of exactly what this decision looks like and what questions it raised and if you have questions about how long it took to get here. >> good morning, mika. yeah, there's no doubt, there's no sugar coating it, this decision represents a huge expansion of executive power. it presents some chilling scenarios about how the president can now violate the law in the context of official acts. whether it is as bad as the dissenters are suggesting, a president above the law in all cases, i think that remains to

be seen. there's a lot of ambiguities in this decision written by justice roberts. a 6-3 decision along idealogical lines, although justice amy coney barrett did not agree with how the majority decided it. she would have been far more restrained. for example, she was okay with using evidence from official acts in a prosecution for unofficial acts, but the majority decided that was out of bounds. one of the best ways to understand how this applies is what they said about the trump case. so in the donald trump january 6th indictment, the court has now said that the whole section about donald trump allegedly trying to co-op the justice department into sham investigations of bogus claims of fraud, that has been excised from the case. that is out because the court said the conversations between the president and the attorney general are clearly official acts. now, what does that raise the specter of? any president raising his attorney general to conduct a bogus investigation because of a

bribe or certain motive, that is a troubling scenario. on other issues in the indictment, for example, donald trump's conversations with mike pence, pressuring mike pence to try to stop the certification on january 6th, what this decision says is those conversations are presumed immune because a president's conversation with a vice president is sensibly an official act, when talking about official duties, but it is possible prosecutors can come into court and make a case for why they're not immune. for example, it really wasn't mike pence's official duty to stop the vote, as he said many times. he was actually presiding over the senate. he wasn't acting as vice president at that moment. that's the kind of thing that can be litigated. another example is the president's public statements are deemed to be presumptively official acts in this decision, but there are other aspects of things the president says that could be deemed private acts. in the context of this indictment and otherwise. what's going to happen next in the trump case is that judge chutkan down here in washington is going to have to have a

hearing or a series of hearings or even a mini trial to look at the evidence in this case and decide which of this stuff is official acts and which is unofficial acts, what part of this case can go forward. i know from my reporting that the special counsel's office was very disappointed in this rule, although they didn't issue a statement or comment at all. there's a lot of concern at the justice department that this case can't go forward at all, and it may affect the classified documents case. what we might see is a lot of airing of the evidence before the election in judge tanya chutkan's courtroom in d.c., mika. >> barbara mcquade, i'd love to get your reaction, first of all, to the decisions, but also everything ken just said. don't the justices know that? when they're kicking it back or when they're pushing it to the very last day and doing all these different things, that they're actually giving an outcome to this? it's not that they're leaving this undecided and kicking it back to the lower court.

they're actually making a very clear decision that impacts the way trump would behave as president again or someone else. >> yes. in fact, you may recall, jack smith asked the court to take this up back in january. he said, look, this case is going to the supreme court anyway. there's no reason for us to take a pit stop along the way at the intermediate court of appeals. why don't we go directly to the supreme court and decide this case now? the court said, let's let the court of appeals make its choice. when the court wants to, it can act with urgency. we know in the nixon tapes case during watergate, the court made the decision 16 days after oral argument. here, waited for more than two months. it is a de facto delay and victory for donald trump because the trial most certainly will not take place now before the election. getting back to some of the things that ken said, i think this case is going to survive because there are a number of

unofficial acts alleged in the indictment. the gathering of false slates of electors. the pressure on people like brad raffensperger. the public statements may be in about a stolen election. i think this case will survive. what i'm actually more worried about is the future of the presidency. as ken said, anything that is framed as an official act now is not prosecutable. so as justice sotomayor says, the president could literally order s.e.a.l. team six to assassinate a rival and cannot be prosecuted for that. that does leave some recourse, but the only recourse is impeachment, which requires two thirds of the senate to convict. in our polarized times, as we've seen, that has become a virtual impossible. i really worry now about the weaponization of government. >> yeah, and without a doubt, these have been pushed well past election day now. it will not factor into the campaign, which leaves now the question, secretary johnson, of what it means for a sitting president, any sitting president

right now, in the murky area we've been talking about this morning, a personal act or private act. how do you define that? it is a question now judge chutkan gets to answer as she goes through the evidence in the case. >> it is complicated. my guess is that it will take months if not years to sort out through the district court, through the appellate process. i took constitutional law 45 years ago. i think i must have missed the lesson where my teacher said there's this provision in the constitution that says presidents have criminal immunity from criminal liability. the framers of the constitution knew how to write immunity into the constitution. the speech and debate clause gives immunity to legislators for things that they say. no such provision exists for the president. if this doctrine has existed all along for the last 235 years, then ford didn't need to pardon

nixon. when nixon said to david frost in 1977 in an unguarded moment, when the president does it, it is not illegal, we were all shocked. we were appalled. it was an extreme statement. turns out, five justices of the current supreme court agree with that. you know, people like to cite the lockey case. i was there. i was the senior legal official for the department of defense, september 30, 2011. the executive branch is functioning like it should. you have a legally controversial action, such as the counterterrorism action. the action works its way up through the chain of command. every person in the chain of command has a lawyer. it's signed off by the general counsel of the department of defense, the general counsel of the cia. the office of the department of the legal counsel.

by the time it gets to the lawyer, everyone has signed off on it. therefore, the president is acting consistent with law. there are built-in safeguards for that. it is only because, now, 235 years in, we have a past and possibly future president who engages in criminal conduct that we have to have this debate. at least five justices on the supreme court feel the need to try to protect him. this is, to me, an unbelievable decision. in my view, it is a setback to our constitutional order. >> jen, funny, isn't it, how over the course of 235 years, no president has needed to consider this question. now, with donald trump in front of us, the court has. >> yeah. i mean, it's like there are niceties and details here that really matter, but also, at some level, i think this court is going to do whatever -- this court will never say no to him. i mean, you know, but you were cabinet secretary. you just laid out how sort of

the safeguards keep, ensure the government is operating within the balance of laws. but there are other examples from your time as dhs secretary where you would think, okay, if there are no longer these guardrails, worrying that the president is somehow criminally or somehow legally liable, you know, what might that mean? >> well, first of all, from the perspective of a cabinet officer, how is this supposed to work? suppose the president says to the secretary of homeland security, "i am ordering you to order the border patrol to go shoot at migrants swimming across the rio grande." the cabinet official would rightly say, "well, you have immunity, but i don't. you go do it yourself. i'm not telling the border patrol to do that." how is this supposed to work? it's a -- i don't understand how the implementation of this ruling is going to work. just the process of separating out what's an official act,

what's a quasi official act, what is a non-official act. in the court will be a trial in and of itself, then an appeal following that. this is a real setback. >> yeah. ken dilanian, as the secretary says, every piece of evidence that judge chutkan says, well, that was a private act, donald trump's team is going to challenge that. here comes another hearing and another setback in the case, pushing it down the road. you touched on it briefly earlier, but what's your sense of the implications for georgia, for the case there, a state case, and the other federal case down in florida with judge cannon? >> for georgia, it seems to have the same implications of the january 6th case here. it's the same conduct essentially. they'll make the same claims, and they'll say that almost all of us was official acts. during oral arguments, donald trump's lawyer said he didn't think the january 6th indictment could survive if the court ruled as it did here.

then in the classified documents case, you can see them making an argument, the trump team, that if those documents were taken from the white house while trump was president, which i believe most of them were, then that was an official act. donald trump was simply taking his presidential records. everything that came after that, including the allegations of obstruction of justice and destruction of evidence, all that is moot and can't be part of a prosecution. yeah, it raises a whole ton of complexities. you know, i think back to watergate. a lot of people have been talking about watergate. does this mean what richard nixon did, he would have gotten a pass for? i think it is more complicated. clearly, when nixon ordered the cia to shut down an fbi investigation, he would have argued that was an official act. but covering up a burglary of the democratic national committee by private individuals paid through a slush fund, i don't know. if you read this decision, it does leave some room particularly for presidents acting as a presidential candidate. that, i think, is yet to be

litigated. that's why i think it may not be as extreme as some people are saying. also, with what jeh johnson just said about why a cabinet secretary wouldn't follow a legal order, i'm comforted by that. that's a safeguard for why some of the extreme scenarios perhaps aren't going to come to pass. but nonetheless, it opens a lot of scary doors here, i would say, guys. >> yeah. just imagine what the cabinet -- who the cabinet secretaries are going to be. i wouldn't bank on them having the same values as trump's last administration and some of the people who held the line there. remember when donald trump said he could shoot someone on fifth avenue? barbara mcquade, i'm curious, final thoughts on this, for people who have respect for the law, who believe no man is above the law, is this devastating? >> i think it is, you know, in the concept of official acts. i don't think president trump

can shoot someone on fifth avenue because he'd be acting in an unofficial capacity. maybe there is some comfort in that. i don't think that many of the acts that he allegedly committed in the january 6th case are going to be found to be official acts and immune. i think that should give us some comfort. but i do worry about the debate between the majority and the dissenters in this case who seem to have very different views about the role of presidential power. the majority wants the president to be able to act boldly and fearlessly. what the dissenters say is, um, that's what i'm afraid of. the founding fathers wanted a president who was not a king, who could be checked by other powers. it leaves us only with the power of impeachment for abuse of official acts. i worry that in our highly polarized society, that is -- that's been rendered somewhat meaningless. i guess the most hopeful thing i can say, mika, is that voters a ought to vote for candidates

with good character. >> barbara mcquade and ken dilanian, thank you both very much for being on this morning. still ahead on "morning joe," our next guest is taking a look at how donald trump plans to test the boundaries of presidential and governing power if re-elected this november. co-founder and ceo of "axios," jim vandehei, joins us with that. plus, can president biden still win michigan following his debate performance? what governor gretchen whitmer is saying about that. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. at care.com, it's easy to get a break, even if you're not on summer vacation. join millions of families who've trusted us and find caregivers in your area for kids, seniors, pets, and homes. go to care.com now to find the care you need this summer.

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all your favorites. all in one place. only from xfinity. for more watching and less spending... x marks the spot. do it all on the network made for streaming, and bring on the good stuff. 27 past the hour. welcome back to "morning joe." a beautiful day in washington. democratic governor gretchen whitmer of michigan is responding to a report claiming she issued a stark warning to the biden campaign after thursday's debate. according to "politico," an aide to a potential 2028 whitmer rival said the governor warned biden campaign chair jennifer o'malley dillon michigan is no longer winnable in the wake of the debate.

whitmer also reportedly disavowed chatter she could replace the president if he chose to step down. an aide to the governor tells nbc news the phone call did, in fact, occur, but that any description of whitmer telling o'malley dillon that michigan is not winnable for biden was, quote, b.s. after the article was posted, whitmer issued a statement yesterday that reads, quote, "i am proud to support joe biden as our nominee, and i am behind him 100% in the fight to defeat donald trump. not only do i believe joe can win michigan, i know he can, because he's got the receipts." let's stop right there. jen palmieri, with her own presidential aspirations, i just can't imagine she would say that. that would seem like such a rookie move. with her rival as the source, i'll have to call "politico." >> right. >> what's going on? >> good for "politico" for pointing out it was a whitmer rival that did this.

what gretchen whitmer doesn't do is panic. what gretchen whitmer doesn't do, lose. what she doesn't believe -- she believes in her state. she believes in michigan. this is not something that she would ever say. this isn't a woman that contemplates a lot of losing, particularly when it comes to the state of michigan. >> and she is 100% behind joe biden. >> yeah. >> i guess it gave her the opportunity to make that very clear. meanwhile, another democratic governor, andy beshear of kentucky, was asked by reporters if he would jump into the race should president biden decide to drop out. governor beshear made it clear that biden still has his support and the decision is the president's alone. but he also seemed to add a soft pitch for himself. take a listen. >> well, listen, it's flattering when people mention your name in something like that. i think it is a reflection of all the good things going on in kentucky. as compared to the rest of the country, the temperature has been turned down here. democrats and republicans all

excited about the jobs we're creating, the investment that we're seeing, the record low unemployment, the record low recidivism, decreases in our overdose deaths. those are all really good things. i think the rest of the country turns to us and says, how can a democratic governor, a republican general assembly, create really good results? i think the answer to that is everything is not partisan. people are tired of the clashes day in and day out. when they look at what we have done in kentucky, they see a better future that's beyond some of the back and forth that we see on the federal level. >> governor andy beshear of kentucky there. a guy a lot of people in the democratic party think has a bright future but not maybe right now anyway. secretary johnson, let me ask you your view of what happened on thursday night. joe biden's performance but really the implications. despite all of the sort of public face they're putting on this, the deep concerns within the party about his ability to not just win this election but to serve four more years.

>> so thursday night was not good, but i believe, in politics, a week is a month, month is a year. i suspect he's going to go out and have several strong performances at rallies. i believe joe biden will be the nominee of the democratic party for president. i don't believe he is going anywhere. i think it is important to remember what president biden himself said. don't judge me against the almighty, judge me against th al the alternative. the presidency is more than one man or one woman. it is an administration. i'd take joe biden at his worst day at age 86, as long as he has people like samantha power, gina ramundo supporting him, over donald trump any day with the crowd behind him on january 6th, 2021. >> former secretary of homeland

security jeh johnson, thank you, as always. we appreciate it. mika. joining us now, co-founder and ceo of "axios," jim vandehei. his piece is entitled "the imperial presidency in waiting." jim, given this supreme court ruling, i kind of think your headline is pretty good. how concerned should americans be about the scotus ruling, and is it overstating it, saying that the president could actually do some of the things that were mentioned by some of the justices, including, you know, get s.e.a.l. team six to act? >> listen, think the american people should be clear-eyed about just listening to what the candidates say. trump has been very clear, that whether or not you had the supreme court ruling or not, that he believes he has immunity. now, it looks like he certainly hasity than he had 24 hours ago. that in terms of his power might

be the least of people's concerns who don't like him. he already has a republican party, a congress in waiting, that is extremely pro-trump. all of the restraints, all of the people in positions of power who are his critics, his adversaries, his handcuffs, they're gone. this is a trump congress in the house. it's a trump congress in the senate. and you look at what he said he's going to do with that republican coalition, what he's going to now do with greater immunity. he's been very clear. listen, he is going to use potentially the national guard and the military to round up millions of people and remove them from the united states. he's going to consider using the military to protect the southern border. he's been very clear that he is going to get rid of people that he deems disloyal, that are civil servants in the united states government. he is going to use a unique interpretation of law that he believes he would win in a challenge to get rid of them. they've pre-vetted thousands, potentially tens of thousands of people that they want to bring into the government to do his

will, to do his wishes, so that he can move much more effectively and much faster. and imagine that he does win. if he wins, the two oldest supreme court justices, thomas and alito, 76 and 74, the possibility that they could retire in the next term is real. then you'd have trump being able to put in two supreme court justices, probably in their 50s or 40s, people who would be there for a long time. the end result would be you'd have five justices over the course of his two terms who were appointed by trump. the point of the column is that, love it or hate it, he'd come in as one of the most powerful figures, and he would stress test it immediately. they have very specific plans. this is not the haphazard trump we covered in 2017. this is a much more organized operation, at least the people in the institutions around him. >> so i'd like to dig deeper on that. >> yeah. >> i think this is devastating and absolutely frightening and absolutely could happen.

>> yeah. >> as you said, he came in haphazardly. donald trump didn't even know he was going to win. it was one day out of an entire year where everything fell into place, and he won the presidency. they were, at the last minute, writing a victory speech. you know, scrambling. that's not the case this time. that means every single person that is going to be around him, they're going to plan for that person to make sure that they take the oath. can you explain how, if donald trump even slightly pushes the envelope on this, which we know he will totally push the envelope, what this could look like? in terms of, there aren't going to be people around him saying, i don't have immunity. i can't do that. that's not going to be the reality. >> at all. the way you described him coming into office before is accurate. he didn't think he'd win. he surrounded himself with people that he thought looked the part and might be good at

the job. they turned out to be restraints on his power. the lesson he learned, make sure you only have loyalists working for you at the cabinet level, inside the white house, and also in the bowlbowels of government. make sure a liz cheney, paul ryan, anybody with institutional power that could thwart you, get rid of them. they're gone, all of them. there's going to be no person in a position of power in congress, especially if republicans win the majority in the house and senate, who you would say is a trump critic and would put the brakes on the work he'd do. he won't have those people around him. before, there were people inside of institutions in the government that most people haven't even heard of that could slow things down, gum things up. no. they know where those positions are now. they have all kinds of organizations outside of the campaign that are making sure they have the right people in place. not only that, they're making sure they have the legal argument for when they take these moves, that they can take it to the court and win. the courts have shown a proclivity toward siding with a

lot of the stuff trump has wanted to do, so there won't be restraints. what can he do with it? even the things i outlined there, he's going to think about using the military in a way he hasn't in the past. the justice department. throughout history, it's not necessarily written into the constitution that there has to be this huge level of independence, but through tradition and operation, it has been an independent agency. he has been very clear, there's not going to be an independent agency. he'll have a loyalist as attorney general. the attorney general will get rid of anybody in the justice department that they see as a threat to his power. they're going to get rid of the cases he has. he's going to start cases probably against the biden family. he's been very clear in his own words. he is going to use that to go after his own critics. yesterday on truth social, he's liking and following these social media posts that talk about creating military tribunals for liz cheney, mitch mhyperbole, might not, but it shows the direction he wants to go. again, there's nothing i said in this segment that he hasn't said

or his people haven't said. jd vance, one of the three people most likely to be the next vice presidential nominee for him, he told us on the record, listen, trump is a subject matter expert, a quote he used, in understanding how to use maximal executive power, and he's not going to have any of the restraints. he said on the record exactly what i said. he said, there aren't any of the restraints. all those people are gone. this is trump's party from the white house to congress down to the state level. increasingly inside the courts. again, you might like that, might hate it. it's reality. >> we heard it clearest, perhaps, from steve bannon on his way into federal lockup in danbury, connecticut, the last couple days, saying, we're going to tear down the administrative state, get rid of bureaucracy, and go after our perceived enemies. merrick garland, sitting attorney general among them, steve bannon says, we're going to come after him for coming after trump and put him in jail. those are the things they've been saying. you have some reporting this morning also, jim, in "axios" about biden's salvation plan, as

you put it. >> yup. >> saying that biden has zero interest in stepping aside, so what does it look like over the next couple of weeks and months? >> i mean, listen, you talk to the people we do. you know he's not stepping aside. his wife doesn't want him to step aside. his son doesn't want him to step aside. the people that matter in his life have all said, stick it out. he's going to stick it out unless he can't. what would mean he can't? it would mean that, over the next week, you have a series of polls that show he took a bigger hit than people realize and that you have the congressional leaders who you're talking to off the record, just like we are, who are in a full panic. there are a lot of members of congress who are really, really scared that they're making the gamble, maybe a historic gamble that somewhat his age, after that debate performance, could not only lose but could take a democratic house and a democratic senate with him. all the things we just talked about then become a reality. do i think he steps aside? no. but do i think there is

pervasive fear from the people you're talking about, even the governor you're talking about who didn't say that? i'm sure she was saying similar things to it. almost every person i know that i talk to off the record, on background or after that debate, was really scared. was really scared by that performance. they're worried that, can this really work for the next five years when he is 86, and could this cost us the election and give trump and republicans then the house and the senate? it's real. >> the new pieces are online now for "axios." "axios" co-founder and ceo, jim vandehei, thank you very much. >> thank you. >> recent new book is entitled "just the good stuff." it is wonderful. thank you, jim. a scathing new report in "vanity fair" about robert f. kennedy's history. we'll speak with the writer who uncovered the revelations next on "morning joe."

live picture of an absolutely beautiful morning here in new york city. 7:45 a.m. here on the east coast. a new "vanity fair" investigative report takes a deep dive into the background of robert f. kennedy jr., titled "rfk jr.'s family doesn't want him to run even though they may not know his darkest secrets." several never-before-heard stories about the independent presidential candidate. it features reporting on how some of his family members are

worried about the prospect of rfk jr. causing a, quote, political disaster. joining us with more, the reporter behind the story, "vanity fair" special correspondent joe hagan, who also sat down with robert f. kennedy jr. last summer for an extended interview aboard a ferry to nantucket. go back and read if you haven't done so. great to have you with us, joe. i want to talk about the family dynamics here, the pressure they can or can't put on him at this point. let's get to your story. so much has been made of the, for lack of a better term, the crazy side, the conspiracy theories, everything has, but this gets into a dark past for the man. >> i thought, how did it come to this? 20 years ago, bobby kennedy jr. was a hero, right, of the environment. >> right. >> of democrats. he was carrying the legacy of the kennedy name in a way that people could get behind. then, slowly but surely, he

transformed into somebody else. in fact, as my reporting shows, he basically got a divorce from the environmental movement. all the groups he had been the face of all washed their hands of him because they couldn't cope with his anti-science vaccine views that he insisted on crusading for. there is a darker prehistory. the man's life is full of tragedy and trauma, you know? his father tragically assassinated in '68. brothers, cousins who have died tragically. this trauma, you know, he was a drug addict for many years which a lot of people don't really know the real story behind, but it went on a long time. so he has a certain pathology that his family is very familiar with. they're reluctant to talk about it on the record. part of my mandate here was to figure out what motivates this guy and why he has become the person he has. by the way, they're all worried, especially after last week's debate, that he could become a

viable third option and flip this election. there's a blind terror among some in the kennedy family, and i think probably some people in the democratic party share that. >> as you say, he was for so many years a north star for people in the environmental movement. i know people who worked closely with him. he used his name for good. i mean, new york harbor is cleaned up in many ways because of his efforts. >> that's right, yeah. >> did so much good there. where do you point? is there a moment in time, an era where there was a turn in him? >> yes. >> we talked about the 2004 election where he claimed that was a stolen election. >> mm-hmm. >> sort of beginning a little bit of that kind of talk. >> right. >> where do you put your finger? >> right before that, you know, in the late '90s, a lot of people don't remember a lot of this, but his brother was tragically killed in a ski accident. cousin, john jr., was killed in a plane crash. his cousin, michael skakel, was accused of murder and ended up going to prison for it. there was a lot of really tragic, terrible things happening right in his family

background. he was soon to be in a very dark divorce that i detail in my story. there was just a lot of things conspiring at the time. around that time, he was, you know, kind of looking for a new crusade. the truth is, he had been involved looking at mercury and fish in the water, be he followed the mercury story. then came this conspiracy that mercury and vaccines somehow had to do with autism, as we recall with long memories, remember this. >> yeah. >> he just ran with it. even though it was debunked, he wouldn't let go of as we recall memories, remember this. he ran with it. and even though it was debunked he wouldn't let go of it. he started to surround himself with people who were, frankly, cranks, some whom are in his

campaign today. and his family seems to believe that there is a pathology of a need for attention, that he is now addicted to attention, he is addicted to having people around him telling him he is a hero. i am not a psychologist, but part of my mandate in the story it was to try to figure out that. that's how i see it. and 2014, starting around them, the nrdc, national resource defense council, broke with him and then river keeper, who he was the face of, broke with him. and then he moved to california. what we see since is the kennedy you see today. >> so there is -- we have this confluence happening now. you sort of chronicle damaged, you know, past, you know, family -- this pathology that you talk about. dangerous views and then there is sort of colliding at a thyme where there are platforms for

inhim, sort of the trumpfication. talk about that. >> think about the world of the last 15 years, glenn beck, alex jones, right? trump basically seeded his entire political career dining out on a conspiracy that barack obama's birth certificate was fake. we have all watched the slow evolution of this conspiratorial world. there is mistrust out there in the populous and the internet is there to do your own research and it creates an entire voting block of people that are like, i'm looking for another answer. i don't like, you know, the truth side of things. i am going to go towards an alternate truth. kennedy has followed this. and there is a real critical moment in the story where he goes to trump tower after trump is elected and seeks to, you know, run a commission on

vaccines. and, you know, a lot of people in his orbit, that was the breaking point for a lot of people, including river keeper who said we can't with this anymore. you come out and say don't believe the science on vaccines and then say believe the science on the climate. they didn't see any path forward with them. after that he really embraced more deeply the conspiracy world. along comes the pandemic and by the way, look at this children's defense fund that is his anti-vaccine group. look how much money he has been making since the pandemic. he was making $48,000 a year was his salary in 2016, i believe, no, 2,000 -- yeah, 2016. follow the money. follow what he is following. you will see what happens. >> eye ron kick because he accuses others of having profited from the pandemic and the vaccines and everything else. he didn't talk you to for this

story. >> no. >> you reached out to the campaign for comment. they didn't get back to you on that. >> right. >> in your previous encounters, you are right, he deploys the trump tactics. not just but. he starts you are not going to give me a fair interview. all reported out, checked, he can dismiss out of hand. >> that's right. he said in the past, "new york times," all the media, they are in the, you know, pocket of the cia, the pocket of the pharmaceutical companies. i mean, come on. so, you know, at some point you have to say when is enough, enough, right? read the story and decide for yourself what's at work here. >> rfk jr.'s family doesn't want him to run. even they may not know his darkest secrets. it's online now. joe, thank you. good to see you. ahead, amid growing concerns adult could take advantage. supreme court's immunity ruling if he is re-elected, the presumptive republican nominee is suggesting holding a military

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situations where the president can decide that it's in the best

interest of the nation, or something, and do something illegal? >> well, when the president does it, that means that it is not illegal. >> oh, okay. one of our next guests says if richard nixon had known he had immunity like what the supreme court handed down yesterday, he would not have resigned. former u.s. attorney joyce vance with her takeaways from yesterday's decision. we are back in just 90 seconds. the moment i met him i knew he was my soulmate. "soulmates." soulmate! [giggles] why do you need me? [laughs sarcastically] but then we switched to t-mobile 5g home internet. and now his attention is spent elsewhere.

but i'm thinking of her the whole time. that's so much worse. why is that thing in bed with you? this is where it gets the best signal from the cell tower! i've tried everywhere else in the house! there's always a new excuse. well if we got xfinity you wouldn't have to mess around with the connection. therapy's tough, huh? -mmm. it's like a lot about me. [laughs] a home router should never be a home wrecker. oo this is a good book title.

. president trump is still liable for everything he did while he was in office. as an ordinary citizen, unless the statute of limitations is run, liable for everything he and while he was in office. didn't get away with anything yet. yet. we have a criminal justice system in this country. we have civil litigation. and former presidents are not immune from being accountable by either one. >> that was senate minority leader mitch mcconnell should living remarks before donald trump was acquitted in his second impeachment trial. with the supreme court's decision on presidential immunity yesterday, it is not clear if mcconnell's argument was entirely ac. >> reporter:. our legal experts are standing by to go over what this all means now.

also ahead, we are following the continued fallout running president biden's debate performance and new internal polling. his team is now circulating it. good morning, and welcome to "morning joe." it is tuesday, july 2nd. along with willie and me, we have managing editor at the bulwark, stam stein, former litigator lisa rubin, former u.s. attorney and msnbc contributor chuck rosenberg and, willie, a perfect group for our top story this morning. >> yeah, a lot to sift through. some different views of where this all shakes out. the landmark decision yesterday, the u.s. supreme court granted former president donald trump partial immunity from criminal prosecution for some of the actions he took while in office. nbc news senior legal correspondent laura jarrett has details. >> reporter: a monumental win at the supreme court for former president donald trump. the conservative majority finding the presumptive gop

nominee must receive immunity for official acts taking during his presidency. the 6-3 ruling a defeat for special council jack smith with the court bulldozing through the charges against mr. trump for alleged criminal efforts to stay in power, making the completion of any trial before november virtually impossible. are. >> today's decision means that there are virtually no limits on what a president can do. >> reporter: justice roberts laying out a sliding scale on what could be prosecuted, saying a president may not be prosecuted for exercising his core constitutional powers, that he has immunity from proouks for all official acts, but a president has no immunity for private unofficial acts, while cautioning the president is not above the law. a federal grand jury indicted the former president for orchestrating a conspiracy to retake the white house. prosecutors alleging he leaned on his doj, vp and state officials to help reverse the

election results, mobilizing meetings of fake electors. it all culminating on the violent attack on the capitol january 6th. mr. trump pleaded not flee to all charges and argued without immunity, every president could be prosecuted by political opponents. >> if you don't have immunity, you are not going to do anything. you will become a ceremonial president. you will not take any of the risks. >> reporter: the majority agreeing the commander-in-chief must be able to carry out his constitutional duties without risk of political prosecution writing, without immunity, such types of prosecutions, of ex-presidents could become routine and that would weaken the presidency, which is exactly what the framers intended to avoid. the special counsel pushed to get the case to trial before november. the ruling now dramatically chipping away at parts of smith's cases, finding mr. trump's urging of then attorney general to investigate voter fraud now absolutely immune from

prosecution. what remains in the indictment, including his pressure on his former vp -- >> mike pence is going to have to come through for us. >> are now entitled to a presumption of immunity. the liberal justice was a blistering push back. justice sotomayor writing when a president uses his official powers under the majority's reasoning, he will be insulated from criminal prosecution. orders the navy s.e.a.l. team six to assassinate a political rival, immune. a bribe in exchange for a pardon. immune. even if the nightmare scenarios never play out, the damage has been done. >> nbc's laura jarrett reporting there. so chuck, the reaction to this as it came down yesterday ranged from democracy is dead, we now have kings instead of presidents, to it's a little bit murky. the murkiness comes in the definition of official acts by a president versus personal agents by a president. who gets to define that. how you define that. what's your take?

>> and once again, willie, i find myself in the rather lonely middle. so i think it is logical that some acts are immune. the core constitutional responsibilities of any president, put mr. trump aside, ought to be immune from prosecution. private agents ought not be immune. the hard part is in the middle. i think we have to avoid the following construction. i don't like mr. trump. this opinion is good for mr. trump. therefore, we are on the brink of a constitutional apocalypse. i don't believe that's true. but part of jack smith's case is now gone and he is going to have to fight for the rest. his road to prosecution is longer and bumpier and more narrow. all of those things are true. and i disagree with certain particulars in the case. but in the main, willie, it makes sense to me that there is immunity in some cases and no immunity in others and, to your

point, we have to figure out the rest. >> so let's take the federal election interference case. judge tanya, a federal judge, now it is on her, according to the supreme court, to decide which of these acts, which of this evidence constitute official conduct and which constitutes personal conduct. if you are the judge, you are feeling how about that assignment? >> very despondent because you have just been given 119 pages that lays down very broad principles without a whole lot of guidance and you have been told one of the things you can't consider in determining what's official versus personal is motive or purpose. and that was really big deal at the oral argument here. chief justice roberts giving the example, what if a president is charged with bribery? the act of bribery itself is a personal act, accepting the money. let's say a president is bribed for appointing someone to an

ambassadorship. that's an official act. is that an official act, a personal act? how should we consider it? now we know the majority is saying in a situation like that, the motive or the purpose for which someone does something that arguably could be official can't be considered an untangling what's personal or official. that will mean that a lot of what we consider to be unofficial actions, if taken at the white house, if done with the cooperation, for example, of people at the department of justice or white house counsel's office or other aides, that might fall on the line of official, because her hands have been tied. she can't consider what trump's ultimate aim was in making that determination. >> as we heard in laura's report, president biden weighed in on the ruling. in brief remarks from the white house yesterday, the president warned the high court's decision will allow donald trump to do whatever he wants should he be re-elected. biden also criticized the ruling

for delaying trump's federal election interference case, calling it a disservice to voters. >> for all practical purposes, today's decision almost certainly means there are virtually no limits on what a president can do. this is a fundamentally new principle and it's a dangerous precedent because the power of the office will no longer be constrained by the law, even including the supreme court of the united states. the only limits will be self-imposed by the president alone. the american people must decide if they want to entrust the president once again, the presidency to donald trump. now knowing he will be even more emboldened to do whatever he pleases whenever he wants to do it. now the man who sent that mob to the u.s. capitol is facing potential criminal conviction, what happened that day. the american people deserve to have an answer in the courts before the upcoming election.

the public has a right to know the answer about what happened on january 6th before they are asked to vote again this year. now because of today's decision, that is highly, highly unlikely. it's a terrible disservice to the people of this nation. >> chuck rosenberg, i'd love to hear your response to what the president had to say, and also i'm curious if you thought this 119-page decision, if you thought that the points they made, what they came to was extremely complicated and fraught and time consuming and difficult to get to. i'm just -- i'm wondering if you have any question about the timing of this on the very last day, basically giving donald trump a win because of the timing, it seems to me, a case like this, but who am i? should be dealt with first and are the deductions that they

made so complicated that it took so long in your estimate? >> lots of good questions. justice jackson i think properly criticized the majority opinion for the indeterminate standards. and i think that's right, as lisa rubin remarked earlier. it's a bit of a muddle. it's unclear precisely how she proceeds from here, except it's going to take a long time. i think mr. biden is quite right. there is no chance, no chance virtually for this to be tried before the election. you know, that said, right, sort of like, forgive this simple analogy. remember in "the wizard of oz" dorothy always had the power to get to kansas. all she had to do was click her heels three times. we always had the power as a nation to remove mr. trump from office and make sure he was never president again. the senate completely abdicated its responsibility there and

instead, as mr. mcconnell described, you know, threw this into the courts of the united states where we thought we would request get some sort of perfect solution. the courts of the united states are very good at what they do, but they are not perfect. they move slowly. they are designed to move slowly. the notion that the supreme court would have expedited this case simply because a bunch of us wanted it to be heard expeditiously i think was a bit of a fool's errand. so i am not surprised by any of this. these things take a long time f we are looking to the courts for a perfect solution, you are not going to get one. that is not the place to go for a perfect solution. mr. trump is a unique and uniquely vial character, and the notion that we can fill in all of the gaps in our laws to account for an actor like him, i think it's foolhardy. and this illustrates the difficulty of holding a man like

mr. trump accountable in the courts of law. it's really hard to do. it's almost impossible when he is a former president. and this opinion makes that clear. >> so in the long run, if donald trump is re-elected, this gives him the immunity he was seeking. in the short term in this presidential campaign it pushes everything past election day. you could ask questions about the georgia case. was the call to brad raffensperger in january of 2021, was that an official act? was he checking on the results? georgia? was he asking for a recount? you see my point? his team can argue every detail of every case. it seems there is no chance that any of these are taken up or go to trial anyway before election day? >> absolutely not. one of the reasons that it doesn't is because it will take 32 days just before the judge even gets the case back. that's because under supreme court rules they have 32 days to issue the judgment back to the lower court. the other thing is, the judge

has to resolve what is in and out of the case before anything can proceed further. and what's in and out of the case has to go through the appeals process before the pretrial proceedings can continue because immunity isn't just immunity from liability. it's immunity from the whole thing. right? if you're immune from prosecution, you shouldn't have to go through the process to begin with. i think there is no chance we see any trial before the election and the case is going to disappear if donald trump is re-elected. he will direct the department of justice to dismiss the case. he will get rid of the special counsel somehow. we should suffer no illusions that this case continues through the courts if donald trump is re-elected. >> and the biden campaign continues to say the voters have to decide this. the courts are not going to sweep in and save this. so donald trump is trying to use the ruling to get his felony conviction thrown out in new york. in a letter to the judge yesterday, trump's lawyers claim

given the supreme court's decision some of the evidence presented by prosecutors during the trial now should be inadmissible. they requested the former president's july 11 sentencing be postponed. that's a week or so from now, to brief the judge on their argument. chuck oh, do they have a case here? >> on one hand, i think the letter to judge mer shand was predictable. on the other hand, i think it's wrong. if you look at the supreme court's decision from yesterday, willie, right, the conduct that underlined the new york case seems to be purely private. and so perhaps the judge grants them a hearing. but i have a hard time imagining they would prevail on it. this seems to me the type of case that a president ought not be immunized from. >> he also was not president, right? it was during the campaign of 2016. so how does that factor in? >> first of all, i don't think this their kg for the case to be dismissed because of

presidential immunity. what they are saying is that the trial and the verdicts that arose from it were faulty because merchan admitted evidence that can no longer be admitted. what does that look like? for example, prosecutors relied on a series of tweets that donald trump issued in 2018 after the truth about the stormy daniels payments came forward. those kinds of tweets, my understanding, donald trump's lawyers are saying you should never have admitted that evidence, and because of that, because of today's ruling, the entire verdict is in question. it's not he should have been immune because of this ruling. it's more like the verdict is predicated on the admission of evidence that this ruling tells us should never have come in the case. >> you know donald trump. you know the people around him. they will contest every piece of evidence, every tweet, every document, every piece of testimony now in any of these cases based on the ruling from the supreme court yesterday. >> yeah.

they will push every envelope and chuck's description of the murky parts, he will go there and try to push whatever he can. and we've seen that. this isn't surmising on my part. sam stein, the interesting thing is joe biden says this is in the hands of the voters, which raises questions again about where the state of his campaign is. what are you hearing in circles around the white house, around the campaign about the fallout from the president's debate performance last thursday night? i'm hearing that he is moving forward full steam ahead, but then i get calls saying they are hearing somethin else, but i don't know. i am not hearing it directly from the inner circle. >> yeah. this is dynamic, this situation, to say the least. the prevailing sentiment from the inner circle is let's forge

forward. we can get through the fog here. biden has been through it before and he can power through. if you talk to the next concentric circle of donors and operatives in the party, it's panic. i mean, that's just what it is, if we are being blunt about it. people who are not comfortable with the state of the campaign have very little to no confidence in biden's own ability to turn it around. they are frantically imagining other possibilities for candidates to run in his place. i think it's predicated on a few things, right? one is you get decisions like this from the supreme court, which make it very clear what the stakes of the election are. maybe that in some ways crystallizes the choices for voters and works to biden's advantage. in other ways, the prosecution, donald trump only happens if democrats win this presidential election. on the other hand, i think, and

this is a big one, there is real dialects about whether biden has the capacity to do what's necessary to turn around his campaign. what's necessary is for him to go out in the public in unscripted moments, interviews, press conferences, maybe even another debate, although that's not coming for several months be and prove that he has the vie toolty and the thursday night's debate was a one-off. as long as he doesn't do that, you get questions and doubts. they are in a catch-22 here. unless he has the capacity to do it and put him out right now. >> chuck, jack smith, in the concurrence yesterday, justice clarence thomas took things a little bit of a step further and said we are not sure the appointment of a special counsel named jack smith was legal. we will leave that to somebody else. are there concerns that even jack smith's being there is in

jeopardy at this point? >> perhaps, although it ought not be. this is an issue that has been litigated many times. and each time the courts of the united states have determined, willie, that special counsels like jack smith are constitutionally permitted, that their funding is constitutionally permitted. they still are inferior officers to the attorney general of the united states. basically, no problem with the appointment of a special counsel. but, but this is an issue pending before judge cannon in the southern district of florida. and i am not quite sure why justice thomas did? but he may have breathed some life into mr. trump's argument in front of judge cannon that jack smith was improperly unconstitutionally appointed. that is not the law. that is not the case. if she rules that way, i imagine

she would be overturned on appeal but it is a pending issue. it seems to me justice thomas was trying to give some sustenance to this argument. i believe it's a faulty gruchlt every court that has examined it has found it to be a faulty argument. he writes this. if there is no law established in the office that the special counsel occupies, then he cannot proceed with this prosecution. that's from clarence thomas. let's take one step back. big picture. where does this leave us now? i think a lot of people were surprise bid the extent of this holding yesterday, by the murkiness it left about what's official and what's private. what's your final assessment now after what we seen yesterday? >> based on yesterday's opinion, a big chunk. indictment is going to have to come out. that's the allegations having to do with donald trump's interactions with the department of justice. i think the allegations about the pressure campaign on mike pence are much at risk. that's the sort of second

category of allegations that the court says it will be a high bar to rebut the presumption of official immunity there. and then you have everything else. and that includes the fake electors scheme. i am heartened that justice barrett says none of that should be considered official. not only did you have the concession it wasn't at oral argument, but also the president has no role in the administration of federal elections. it should never have been considered or thought of as remotely official. we'll see how the judge, when the case comes book to her, schedules hearings or briefings to untangle this. the best we can hope for is maybe a hearing where evidence is presented and witnesses are called so that even if the public doesn't get the satisfaction of a real trial, some of the things that the department of justice has been holding back that clearly they have to justify this prosecution, we will see as a public before november, willie. >> last word to you, chuck? >> she is right. the prosecutors are going to

lose evidence. how much? as a former prosecutor, i hated losing evidence. so here the prosecutors need to see where they stand. at the end of the day, at the end of the hearings, what do they have, what have they lost, can they go forward? we shall see. >> msnbc legal correspondent lisa rubin and former u.s. attorney chuck rosenberg, thank you both very much for coming in this morning. still ahead, we are going to expand our political panel. one of our next guests says president biden's 2024 survival requires a lot more than hope. "the washington post" eugene robinson joins us with his new piece. and richard haass is out with a warning this morning. the world should prepare for trump. you're watching "morning joe." we're back in 90 seconds.

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number on your screen, or visit coventrydirect.com. take on the day. with taltz, up to 90% of patients saw a significant improvement of their psoriasis plaques. some even saw 100% clear skin. and for those with psoriatic arthritis, taltz reduces joint pain and stiffness. don't use if you are allergic to taltz. before starting, get checked for tuberculosis. increased risk of infections and lower ability to fight them may occur. tell your doctor about infections, symptoms, or if inflammatory bowel disease symptoms develop, worsen or if you had a vaccine or plan to. serious allergic reactions can occur. ask your doctor about taltz. welcome back. following last week's debate, president biden's team is circulating new internal poll numbers that show his standing remains unchanged. in an effort to calm some

democrats about biden's debate performance, a campaign official suggested the poll numbers indicate the concern over biden's age is something voters have already taken into account. some white house aides tell "the washington post" many who support biden have long recognized he is showing signs of age, and his debate performance did not significantly change the dynamics of the race. meanwhile, as of last night, president biden still has not reached out to top democrats on capitol hill following his debate performance. five sources tell nbc news the president has yet to personally call senate majority leader chuck schumer or house minority leader hakeem jeffries. the white house chief of staff was making calls. while democratic lawmakers are standing by biden publicly, at least four have told nbc news they privately believe biden needs to drop out now to avoid a

lopsided defeat for democrats. joining us now former white house director of communications for president obama jen palmieri, associate editor of the "washington post" and msnbc political analyst eugene robinson, and co-host of msnbc's the weeknd, simone sounders townsend, and president emeritus of the council on foreign relations, rich around haus, the author of home and away available on substack. and gene, we will start with you. your new piece entitled, biden's 2024 survival requires a lot more than hope. what does he need to do, and do you they i knows that? >> well, look, i think he needs to do everything he can to reverse the impression, the clear impression that was left by that debate five days ago, that debate on thursday,

because, you know, i have been coming on the show for a long time. i am a long-time critic of democratic bedwetting. you know, i think it's crazy a lot of the time. i think this is different. i think a lot of democrats were shocked by what they saw thursday night. and i think this sort of hunkering down and saying, you know, nothing to see here, you know, the polling is unchanged, they sent out that memo over the weekend saying the polling is unchanged, so it didn't really hurt us, but that's internal polling focusing on the swing states that actually shows him trailing donald trump by a slight margin, you know, within the margin of error. but nonetheless, it shows him behind trump in these states. and so sending out a memo

saying, look, we're still behind, but we're not behind any worse is not exactly the best ad for your campaign. and so why, you know, why isn't he calling schumer and jeffries and why isn't he doing some sort of unscripted appearance that shows, that erases the impression that was clearly left thursday night? i think this is potentially a really big problem for the democratic party, for biden's re-election campaign, and i think, you know, i think democrats are right to send up the alarm. >> symone sanders, what are you hearing? >> look, what i'm hearing from -- well, depends ho we are talking to, to be honest. when you talk to strategists and operatives, not weeks that work for the biden campaign or the

white house, but outside of that, elected officials, political professionals, donors, they areoccoing the same things that that eugene has noted in his piece that, we are all hearing, that they are concerned, that they want to hear more from the white house, they want to see the president do a town hall, more interviews, see him more. then when i talk to non-political professionals, if you will, as i like to say, everyday regular folks who don't do this every day t they look at this and say, and we talk to black women in montgomery county this weekend, on sunday, and they said -- we asked them about the debate. they said the debate, it wasn't good for trump or joe biden, but the women who were supportive of the president in that room said, look, at this point we can't get anyone else. there was someone we should stand by our guy, there was someone else that noted how realistic is this talk of removing him, and they were concerned about the broader

picture and they also brought up democracy and the supreme court. i would argue the best way for the biden campaign to really -- they won't be able to stop the talk because the chatter is going to continue because every single thing the president does between now and november will be parsed every which way. if he stumbles walking, walks too slow, too fast, if he forgets a word, it will be viewed through the prism of what happened on that debate stage. i think a way to blunt some of the criticism isn't in fact to, you know, let the president -- put the president out there in various ways in way he will shine. again i think town halls, doing things with voters, real people, where he is answering questions from regular folks will make the difference, and i think the president could rise to that occasion. i will lastly say that i think we have all heard chatter inside and i was struck by that

"washington post" reporting about concerns that folks said that they had about the president's health. last time i saw the president, he seemed and looked fine to me. on that debate stage, it was not a good performance. so the only way to assuage people's concerns is let them see for themselves. and joe biden, i believe he thinks he is his best political consultant. i am interested to see what the president decides to do this week. >> the campaign releasing internal polls. other polls tell a different story about what people saw on thursday night. the argument that some in the campaign and around it are making that it's just bedwetting democratic donors and insiders isn't true. it's at the dog park. it's in the barbershop. it's at camp dropoff and pickup. people are talking about that performance on thursday, real voters. by the way, voters who like joe biden. voters who are sympathetic to him wondering are we going to lose to donald trump with this guy? how should the campaign -- you

worked inside them, obviously, successfully, many times. how -- >> sometimes. >> it's always a mixed bag. how should the campaign be looking at this? >> okay. so it's tuesday morning. so here's like where i, you know, it's -- i mean, it's only been -- that happened thursday night. so this is where i think we are. i think the campaign did -- the president did a great job friday. the campaign is a great job, you know, that first 36 hours. it was critical that they be able to effectively make a case, you know, that this was going to be okay. i think they have taken that as far as they can. now it is up to -- now it's sort of like two weeks, you know, before you really know where the public is on something, on public polling. then what does the president do now, right? so i think, you know, he needed, take a couple of days off, sir. he has been through a lot in the last month between europe and, you know, hunter's conviction

and, you know, the debate and now i think people want to see -- they want to see more of him. and until we -- you know, there is a lot -- it's like the base is rallying to his side, grassroots money and, you know, claim their internal polls. elites are continuing to be concerned and have certain bars they want the president to meet. and we don't know yet which -- who is right, right? you know, who is right there. but the president brought -- saved america from trump. he ran because he thought he was that right person to beat trump. and i think if the moment ever came where he thought i have taken this as far as i can and now it's up to all of us to continue the fight, i think he will make that choice. but, you know, that's not there

now. >> we will sneak in a quick break. when we come back, richard haass explains why the world should prepare for donald trump given president biden's debate performance late last week. "morning joe" is back in a moment. rt bed? can it keep me warm when i'm cold? wait, no, i'm always hot. sleep number does that. shop our lowest prices of the season with free home delivery when you add a base. sleep number smart beds starting at $999. learn more at sleepnumber.com

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♪♪ ♪♪ richard, your piece for project syndicate, after biden's debate performance, the world should prepare for trump. in is you write, quote, elections have consequences and this one more than most. given the differences between the candidates' far exceed any similarities. in the wake of the debate that appears to have tipped the scales against biden and no way of knowing if someone else will be the democratic candidate and how they would fair, u.s. friends and allies should prepare themselves for potentially major changes come january.

changes like what, richard? what could be coming down the pike if donald trump is re-elected? >> all sorts of changes in domestic policy. more of a concern to the rest of the world, which watching this is unnerving for much of the world. this is not the united states they thought they knew. the idea they have their security in our hands and they watch things like the other night. they didn't make them feel good about the choices they have made. look at the foreign policy. we have had a 75-year run on foreign policy. you get up every morning and things were mildly predicting. standing up to tyranny, the last i checked we won the cold war, stayed cold, didn't go hot, ended on our terms. it is impossible for anyone to see, hear and argue the next 75 years things will turn out as well where the united states will play that kind of role.

what donald trump does is accelerates the arrival of a very different united states and world. now sitting here, one is we are looking at a very different united states. if donald trump wins, we are looking at him not just in the white house with this new supreme court decision. we know a what the supreme court is. it's no longer the arbiter. and you are probably looking at a republican senate and republican house. that's called a run of the table. that means we become essentially a de facto parliamentary system without checks hand balances. this could be a truly radical moment with all the implications it would have for policy. still ahead, an update on what's called a political earthquake in france. has the far right sweepings to victory in the first round of elections there. the very latest next on "morning joe." e.

♪♪

richard, could we talk before we let you go about the french elections, what happened in the first round, snap elections called by president macron. marine le pen's party, far right party, doing very well. what happens from here? >> well, you have the second round july 7. the center cannot hold. this turned out to be a colossal mistake by french president macron. the far right's coalition has the plurality of seats, probably can't get an outright majority. you could possibly have a situation where you can't form a government after the second round. not clear they can come together. macron's bloc third of three, which ain't a great place to be. you have could have a french president without a french government in the parliament trying to work it out tactically. it could create pressures for french presidential elections. opposite in the uk. a blowout victory on july 4. labor will win a landslide,

almost unprecedented in british politics. what these show together, bad, bad time to be the incumbent. both of these are a vote against the status quo. you have a center left government winning in the uk and you have got a far-right government and far left party, far right parties and far left parties winning in france t shows that if you're the incumbent, you have really headwinds at this moment in history. >> fascinating. this comes a couple of weeks before the olympic games taking place right there in paris. richard haass, thank you. coming up next, today marks 60 years since the civil rights act was signed in law. doris kearns goodwin with a look at the historic legislation and its lasting impact. "morning joe" is coming right back. so i hired body doubles. mountain climbing tina at a cabin. or tree climbing tina at a beach resort. nice!

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our most immediate tasks are

here on this hill. first, no memorialization or eulogy could more eloquently honor president kennedy's memory than the earliest possible passing of the civil rights bill for which he fought so long. >> that was president lyndon b. johnson just days after president kennedy was assassinated, urging congress to take action on the late president's civil rights bill. months later, congress passed the 1964 civil rights act. hours after it passed, president johnson signed it into law, 60 years ago today. afterwards, president johnson called on the country to fulfill its founding promise that all

its citizens were created equal. >> tonight i urge every public official, every religious leader, every business and professional man, every working man, every housewife, i urge every american to join in this effort to bring justice and hope to all our people and to bring peace to our land. >> joining us now, pulitzer prize winning author and presidential historian doris kearns goodwin to think about where we are now and where we were headed back then. >> doris, i remember the impact, the personal impact of the civil

rights act of 1964, because that's when jim crow segregation finally started to be dismantled in orangeburg, south carolina. brown v. board didn't integrate our schools, but the civil rights act started that process. there were restaurants that would not serve african-americans that started to open their doors. it was so more than significant, it was life-changing and world-changing, at least where i lived. can you talk about the sort of larger impact on the nation and on our history of that piece of legislation? >> i think it's so important, especially at this disheartening time, to remember there was once a time in this country when something huge went forward, just exactly as you say.

at the very moment president johnson signed that legislation, all that jim crow segregation was gone. it was interesting just hearing lyndon johnson in the beginning in that first speech he gave to the joint session of congress right after jfk had died, he made the decision to make his number one priority the passage of that bill. his advisors said, you're crazy to do that, you'll be a failed president. you'll have to go before the country in 11 months as a failed president. you only have a certain amount of currency to expend as president. you should not expend it on this. what did he famously say? he said, what the hell is the presidency for? that was a time when the presidency had huge ambitions

for this country. the minority leader said you drink with dirkson, you listen to dirkson, you give credit to dirkson. we need a bipartisan legislation. and dirkson came around, saying he cared too about his legacy, as did lyndon johnson. he said, president you pass this bill and 200 years from now people will only know two names, abraham lyndon and frederick dirksen. coming up, we'll turn back to the supreme court's ruling yesterday that presidents have broad protection from criminal prosecution. joyce vance joins us straight ahead on "morning joe." e joins ahead on "morning joe. thank you. shop our lowest prices of the season with free home delivery when you add a base.

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there's all sorts of

hyperbole tonight and just this fantastical, these hypotheticals they've made up, future presidents are going to turn into assassins and all the rest. it's madness. the president and the vice president are the only two in our constitutional system elected by all the people. no one elected to that office is going to be prone to this kind of crazy criminal activity. >> house speaker mike johnson on fox news yesterday dismissing concerns about the supreme court's decision to give donald trump substantial immunity from prosecution. and that is where we kick off the fourth hour of "morning joe." welcome back, everyone. in a landmark decision yesterday, the u.s. supreme court granted former president trump partial immunity from criminal prosecution for some of the actions that he took while in office. nbc news senior legal correspondent laura jarrett reports. >> reporter: this morning, the supreme court's landmark

decision already being used as new leverage by donald trump and prompting a sharp warning from president biden. >> now the american people have to do what the court should have been willing to do but will not. the american people must decide if trump's embrace of violence to preserve his power is acceptable. >> reporter: the high court's conservative majority refusing to allow federal prosecutors to charge mr. trump for any official acts taken during his presidency, this coming in the case where mr. trump has been criminally indicted for his efforts to stay in power, the decision drawing scathing dissents from the three liberals. justice sotomayor saying the president is now a king above the law. the presumptive gop nominee pleaded not guilty to all charges last year, including that he leaned on his doj, vice president and state officials. the justices deeply divided over

what conduct is official and now immune from prosecution, immunity for, quote, core constitutional powers, but no immunity for purely private conduct, so-called unofficial acts, banning prosecutors from using any evidence or testimony about what happened during his time in the white house, even when prosecuting him for unofficial conduct now as a private citizen. his defense team pouncing on that piece of the ruling monday, looking to postpone the sentencing set for next week in mr. trump's new york hush-money trial, his legal team asking the judge to set aside the jury's verdict, arguing the prosecution used evidence of official acts in a way the supreme court's ruling now prohibits. >> jennifer palmieri is back with us. joining the conversation we have peter baker of the "new york

times." former u.s. attorney and msnbc legal analyst joyce vance. and president of the national constitution center jeff rosen. thank you all very much for joining us this morning. joyce, first of all, your gut reaction to the decisions and the implications? >> well, i think the opinion, when you read justice roberts' opinion, it's a clear approach that talking about consolidating power in the presidency, far more worried about making sure that power remains intact than it is about the potential that a future president might abuse that power. of course, this opinion doesn't happen in a vacuum. the context is the possibility that donald trump could return to the white house.

and so, keeping that context in mind, which is something that the majority simply refuses to do, this notion of removing all of the guardrails from a presidency and immunizing conduct as long as you consider it with fellow members of the executive branch is a very frightening position for the country to be in moving forward. >> from a constitutional perspective, i'm curious how you view this decision yesterday from the supreme court, 6-3 among idealogical lines. this distinction between official conduct of a president, official acts of a sitting united states president versus private or personal conduct, effectively saying you've got free rein under official conduct, but who gets to decide what that is and who makes that distinction? >> that's the crucial question. the dissenters say it's unclear how lower courts are supposed to

distinguish between official and unofficial conduct. as a result, the only clear thing that's immunized are the president's conversations with his former acting attorney general, with vice president, with state election officials, his tweets. it's up for grabs. different courts could disagree about what's official and unofficial. the result in justice sotomayor's dissent is consolidating power in federal courts and ultimately the u.s. supreme court to decide what's official and understood -- unofficial. the majority says this is required by our text and history and by alexander hamilton's desire for a vigorous executive. the dissents say hamilton went onto argue in federalist '77 that the president is amenable to prosecution.

the justices have made up this new untethered principle and distinction between official and unofficial action that has no basis in the constitution. >> well, donald trump, peter baker, is expressing support for holding televised military tribunals against former republican congresswoman liz cheney. the former president reposted this image on his truth social account on sunday. it reads, liz cheney is guilty of treason. re-truth if you want televised military tribunals. in response liz cheney wrote, donald, this is the type of thing that demonstrates yet again that you are not a stable adult and you are not fit for office. of course, we've had that conversation, peter baker, about all of those calling for joe biden to step down, worried about his fitness and just letting all of this go by.

it's not that they let it go by, but they don't make it a call for him to step down and a call for americans to look at his fitness. we'll put that aside for a second. i ask you, should donald trump be taken seriously about his threats? can we look at his first or second campaign and the promises he made and the things that he followed through on and draw to that as knowing that his pattern would be the answer is yes? >> i think we should take donald trump seriously. what we learned in his first term is that he likes to say a lot of things that are provocative that he may not follow up on, but some of the things he does follow up on. and he was surrounded by people who discouraged it, made sure it didn't happen. these are not people who will be

there in a second term. we know that. when he says he's for termination of the constitution in order to return to power, when he says his new term in office would be about retribution, that liz cheney should be put on a military trial, i have to believe he's serious about that and he won't have people around him to try to stop im. the ruling about accountability reenforces the fact that we have not figured out the proper way and effective way -- it's taken four years and we don't have an answer to that. we're at a point where the

system is being rewritten in front of our eyes and donald trump plans to push the boundary as far as he can. >> speaker mike johnson saying, oh, don't be so alarmist, it's crazy that donald trump would do anything to push the boundaries, like we haven't been watching the last ten years of this show and what we saw there, the reposting of the call for military tribunals for treason against liz cheney. the idea that he wouldn't push this as far as he can, that's actually outrageous. >> he'll have a secretary of defense that comes up for justification for a military tribunal that liz cheney will be subjected to. there are some important details and, you know, kind of niceties about the opinion yesterday that

suggest that the court thinks there's some way that he could be reined in. as more of a layperson, this court continues to disappoint us when it comes to upholding norms and standards. yesterday it just felt to me like they will never tell him no. we can never rely on this court to hold him accountable in any way. there just aren't any guardrails. 18 hours after, how are you looking at this court and what we need to brace for with them guarding a trump presidency? >> as someone who studies and teaches about democratic institutions, i just don't have any good news for you in that regard. it's the absence of clear standards for making these decisions about what is and what

is not immune conduct. it's this absolutely crazy notion -- you know, one part of this opinion we haven't talked about -- and this is a part that justice barrett actually does not join, so this is 5-4, but this is the part of the opinion that says prosecutor can't even use evidence of motive or intent. they have to pretend that official conduct never happened. you can only imagine how that plays out across the entirety of these prosecutions. i will tell you that with my prosecutor hat on this looks a little bit different, maybe not any more positive, but prosecutors are used to having courts tell them they can't use some of their evidence and they're going to dismiss some of their charges. and good prosecutors get back up and move forward. i think that's the hope here, that jack smith and his team will find a path forward. but no good news, because what the supreme court does is they have created so much delay in

the process, that this case will not be tried before the next election. voters will go to the polls not knowing what a jury of donald trump's peers might have concluded had they had the opportunity to hear the evidence in this case. >> so jack smith may try to go forward, but it will be a different case, obviously. it will be pared down. some of the evidence may be covered under presidential immunity after yesterday's ruling. how do you see yesterday's decision impacting not just that federal election case, which judge tanya chutkan has to go through and decide, but also the classified documents case down in florida and the state case in georgia? how do you see yesterday impacting everything downstream? >> it will make it very, very hard to proceed with. there's an interesting footnote

yesterday that notes in fisher the u.s. supreme court drove a stake through the heart of two of the charges jack smith is bringing involving violation of the sor baines oxly and decide on a case-by-case basis were the president's communications in office related to official acts? were they on the periphery of those actions, or were they completely private? and judges could disagree in each of those cases, each of those rulings could be appealed up to the u.s. supreme court, and the result is making it very, very difficult to prosecute the president. that brings us back to our central theme, which is accountability. justice ketanji brown jackson mentioned it in her remarkable

dissent where she said the model embraced by the constitution assumed that the president is accountable to law like every other citizen. she insists this is a violation of basic principle at the bedrock of the u.s. constitution, and the result is that courts, in particular the u.s. supreme court, has the final word and that congress can enforce the criminal laws and in practice it will be extraordinarily difficult in the future to prosecute a former president. >> presidency of the national constitution center jeff rosen, thank you so much. his latest book entitled "the pursuit of happiness, how classical writers inspired writers and america." and former u.s. attorney and nbc legal analyst joyce vance, thank

you as well. read her latest piece for substack entitled "actually, presidents are kings." so amid all of the developments surrounding donald trump, the biden campaign is scrambling to calm fears among democratic donors after last week's debate insisting the president is staying in the race. gabe gutierrez has the very latest. >> reporter: this morning, the biden campaign is doubling down as it tries to reassure anxious donors following the president's dismal debate. >> everyone needs to breathe through the nose for a minute and take a deep breath. >> reporter: addressing hundreds of donors on a conference call last night. >> the media have spent a ton of time blowing this out of proportion. >> he's probably in better health than most of us. >> reporter: hoping to calm concerns about his age, the

biden campaign is also out with this new ad. >> i know i'm not a young man, but i know how to do this job! >> reporter: the campaign raised $38 million in just four days after the debate. some campaign advisors are urging the president to hold more unscripted events. >> so you can see what i've seen with our president. >> reporter: but during this past weekend at camp david multiple sources tell nbc news some biden family members expressed deep frustration with some advisors over debate prep. jen psaki writing, it was a bad debate. biden was bad, but if you're directing your ire at prep, you're not talking about the right thing. a source familiar with the president's mood after the debate described him as humiliated, lacking confidence and painfully aware of his performance's impact. former president trump also weighing in on biden's future in the race. >> well, they say he's not

getting out and they say getting him out is very hard because he has the delegates, he has the votes, and that if he doesn't want to get out, there's not a thing they can do about it. >> peter baker, what are your latest reports in your discussions with context with people inside the white house close to president biden are saying about the debate performance and also the talk about whether or not he should bow out? >> yeah. look, obviously right now the biden camp is telling us he's not going to bow out, period. of course, they'll say that up until the moment that he does bow out. if that moment ever comes, it would be silly to reveal if he was thinking about it. a lot of people are saying it depends on the polls that come out in the next few days, particularly for down-ballot races, whether people in competitive districts are feeling vulnerable as a result or whether they people like they

can still hold on. it would depend on the donors, the people on the call you referenced from last night, will the donors bail and drop off the support. one biden person i talked to said, i know what today's decision is, i just don't know what tomorrow's decision is. i think it's likely he tries to gut it through and make the case that donald trump is worse. all the things we talked about in terms of he is a king or dictator are all reasons he should stay in. but i don't think it's a settled issue. >> you worked in politics for a long time. you know people in the white house. what is your sense of things? it still feels unlikely president biden would get out of the race, but is it on the table? >> everything is on the table or there is no table. i don't know what the analogy

is, but there are always options. i think that the campaign is getting a lot of blowback. candidly i said to them, hey y'all, it seems a little harsh. you know what? we've got to create the environment to show there's pushback here. people should consider that when they're thinking about the campaign being too aggressive. they need to create the environment to give the president the room to come back from this. i think what people don't know is -- you know, they need to see right now, you know, it's a much surer bet to have someone who's trusted in the job, has done a good job as president continue, when we have no idea what happens if he's not the nominee. we have no experience. it can seem very west wingy. you just don't know what you're

unleashing into the world. let's see him. also it's a pretty big thing to say the president of the united states isn't up to doing anything fill in the blank. as president of the united states he's done a good job. what does he do? how is he going to show us he's doing great and continuing to do a good job, reassure us about his ability to campaign and what do the polls say. we're still in a holding pattern the next couple weeks at least. >> it's interesting. there's one person who really wants joe biden to drop out, and that would be donald trump. peter baker, thank you very much for coming on this morning. coming up, the nba champion boston celtics are officially for sale. we'll discuss who might be able to afford one of the most storied franchises in pro basketball. plus, pixar's "inside out 2"

has grossed over a billion dollars, but will that be enough to save the summer's struggling box office? and at least 30 people injured by severe turbulence on a flight over the atlantic with one passenger actually thrown into an overhead bin. we'll have the details next for you on "morning joe." next for you on "morning joe. so i hired body doubles. indoorsy tina loves a deluxe suite. ooh! booking.com booking.yeah

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numbing pain relief available. so, do your thing like a pro, pain-free. absorbine pro. a beautiful live picture of dallas at 8:26 in the morning. why are you seeing big d right now? well, because it appears veteran and four-time champion klay thompson is on his way to a new team. it has been reported thompson has agreed to a three-year $50 million contract, breaking up the unit at golden state that

won the championships. steph and klay apparently will be separated. meanwhile, celtics superstar jayson tatum is set to sign the largest contract in league history. espn reports it is five years, $314 million which comes out to about $62 million a year. speaking of nba champions, just weeks after claiming their 18th nba title, the boston celtics are for sale. the storied franchise valued by forbes at $4.7 billion. let's bring in andrew ross sorkin. is this a case of sell high and get top dollar for it? >> i think this is a case of go out on top when you can. by the way, this is a bit of a trend, mark cuban getting out of

the mavs. the original price tag for the celtics group that bought this team was originally only $360 million. now we're talking about $4.7 billion. we could be talking about $5 billion plus ultimately for this team. it also comes at a time the nba is looking to renew its licensing deal, which some people think may go at a high. we'll see. there's a big question mark about what the future valuations of these teams are going to be. i think you're seeing some of these owners say, okay, it's great to get a championship, it's also great to get out while the going is good. >> the phoenix suns were sold for $4 billion. people's eyes popped out of their head. the iconic celtics might go for $5 billion. let's jump to the box office.

there's been a lot of talk about sluggish box office. last summer we had barbie and oppenheimer carrying it. this summer "inside out 2" is carrying it. >> bob iger returned to the company last year to make this a big blockbuster. there's been a lot of concern about what holiday was going to look like, especially after barbie and oppenheimer. what seemed to be a slow summer, the fall guy fell, if you will. it did not have the expected success given the stars that were in that film. if you haven't seen it, it is awesome. i have a 7-year-old, and we had a ball watching this one. later "despicable me 4" is going to be out. hopefully this will bode well

for that. "deadpool" and "the wolverine." >> hoping the minions do some big business. we'll see. andrew ross sorkin, thanks so much as always. mika. more than two dozen passengers were injured during severe turbulence on a flight from spain to uruguay. it happened yesterday. the flight had to make an emergency landing in brazil. nbc news correspondent tom costello has the latest. >> but let's go forward into starliner. >> reporter: on board the international space station, astronaut sunny williams and butch willmore are still waiting to see when they might return

home. >> everything has been fantastic. >> all right. i was actually glad to see that, but that was the wrong report. we'll get to it in just a moment. still ahead on "morning joe," we're going to take a look at a new report from arizona, where a pair of new laws could prohibit 35,000 voters from casting ballots this year. plus, tennis superstar coco gauff won a showdown on wimbledon's center court yesterday. we'll have the latest from the all england club next on "morning joe" and the tom costello report. we'll be right back. 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

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welcome back. the wimbledon tennis tournament is currently under way outside of london. kelly cobiella brings us the

early highlights. >> reporter: wimbledon is already serving up american aces. tommy paul, taylor fritz and young sensation coco gauff all hitting the grass this year. gauff wowed on center court yesterday, winning in straight sets. she's playing in her fifth wimbledon at just 20 years old. >> obviously wimbledon is the place where i wouldn't say where the dream started, but i believed the dream was possible. >> reporter: taking place less than a month before the paris olympics, novack djokovic on the court just weeks after a knee operation. nadal skipping the event to concentrate on the olympics. princess catherine handing out

awards. last year the princess practiced her serve with the king of tennis, roger federer. princess kate's surprise appearance at the king's birthday last month, organizers are hopeful. >> she's a patron of the club. she's a huge tennis supporter. >> reporter: her appearance would be a welcome sight for fans in what has been a difficult year. >> good to see her looking well. time now for a look at some of the morning papers. "the arizona republic" is highlighting two laws that could prohibit an estimated 35,000 voters from casting ballots this year. they argue proving citizenship is necessary to the integrity of

the election. critics say the motion is a form of voter suppression. the indianapolis star reports nearly a dozen state health care workers have been charged with defrauding their patients as part of a broader federal investigation that charged nearly 200 people. the cases involved providers stealing opioids, credit cards and bank information from nursing home residents and other vulnerable patients. the post standard results a federal grant will be used to train workers, expand supply chains and subsidize equipment for small and minority-owned businesses. chuck schumer says the grant is a way of saying the i-90 corridor will be america's semiconductor super highway. and measures for towns that usually have lenient laws on

fireworks, one community issuing restrictions after still rebuilding from the gray fire, which burned nearly 10,000 acres last august. several towns offering alternatives to fireworks like drone shows and live music events. coming up on "morning joe" -- >> she is the first woman speaker of the house. she is the youngest woman ever elected to congress. two congresswomen. >> the first woman speaker of the house named n and the youngest woman ever elected to congress named a. who could they be talking about? we'll speak to the women playing n and a next on "morning joe." a" smile! you found it. the feeling of finding psoriasis can't filter out the real you.

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when i first got here in '87, there were so few women you could fit us all in a van, one van. there wasn't even a ladies' room anywhere near the house floor. we had to petition the speaker to give us a toilet, the only place we could escape the stench of their cigars. >> that's disgusting. >> cigars are an abomination. >> no. that you had to beg for a toilet. >> i don't beg. i became speaker, seized their bathrooms and banned their cigars. >> that's a look at the off broadway play "n/a" about the imagined relationship between two women who closely resemble nancy pelosi and alexandria ocasio-cortez. the characters clash repeatedly over their political identities, their governing philosophies and their vision for the future of the country. joining us now the film's

costars holland taylor and actress ana villafañe. con congratulations. we're so happy to have you here. can we assume n and a are nancy pelosi and aoc? >> that's where the characters take off from, that basic idea of the people. but it's not a realistic play. it's all imagined. it's a wonderful exercise, a really brilliant dialogue that goes through various scenes and takes place in the void of their ideas and conflicting ideas. there are three generations, which is the point too. >> i want to talk about your character and what it's like to work with holland taylor. >> it is a master class every single day. i feel very fortunate. i feel like i am learning. i think it's fun. we have fun. we have a trust. it's like a dance.

i keep describing it as either jazz like it's alive, very much alive, or like a tango-type thing where we're leading and following and listening. >> it's not in a real place. it's a real dialogue that changes. sometimes it's angry, sometimes it's pleasant, sometimes it's neutral. >> correct. >>ic i'm kind of micro. i see the tree. she sees the whole woods. when we were having our early previews, we have blackouts. i'm like, what's next? like i have no idea. the first couple of times, i said help me. [ laughter ] >> i'm happy to oblige. just go that way. >> you're leading the dance sometimes.

>> yes. >> first couple times, oh, i grabbed her. >> yeah. >> jen, you know both of the players here. >> i know the players. i worked for hillary clinton. i'm a big observer of women leaders of all generations. you used them as a jumping-off point. for example, when hillary ran, there were a lot of younger people that thought she was too old and too establishment. i'm like young woman protesting on the campus, she was you, she was the radical. she was on the cover of "life magazine" when she was 22 years old because she had given this very radical commencement speech at wellesley. talk about the conversation between the two women, because you are some mirror image of each other in some ways three generations apart.

with pelosi, it was an older white woman that was the pioneer and now it's young women of color. what's that conversation like when it's something bigger within culture? >> i think the exchange within our context, which is these concepts, these ideas and sharing them and trying to find the commonality, i think exploring this type of dialogue especially right now is hugely important, especially for women. i think we don't have the time or space or luxury -- air quotes -- to be apathetic. it's important to experience this dialogue between two intelligent women. the points of view and perspective from life experience, regardless of how much time that has been, because age obviously is a factor rgs but the experiences that a has,

n does not have. and obviously the life experience n has, a does not have. i think both can learn from each other and right now, especially as a society, we could use that. >> i just want to mention the author has written a movie called "dark waters." this is his first new york production of a play. when i read it, i didn't get past 30 pages when i called my agent up and said i have to do this. it is the most sparkling, brilliantly clever and yet very human dialogue i've ever encount human dialogue i've ever encountered in recent memory, certainly. it is really remarkable. and like a great piano exercise or feud, it is musical, it is lyrical and it is very, very

brilliant intellectually. it is a real challenge to do it actually. >> i was nervous when i first got it because with these themes, with these characters, you know, we live in such polarizing times and i just -- i was nervous that it could have gone a different way. but it did go the human route and it does kind of untangle, like, when a necklace is tangled or something, it untangles things and puts them in a space with, like, very brave choices. like, we're saying some -- a lot of truths and a lot of things that go usually i think unsaid. and i think that's what i love about it. >> the differences between the generations, the resentments between the generations, what are we talking about? >> if you can't have generation between 15 and 20 years, you have three generations apart, that's really illuminating, but also the writing is so elegant that it really lands. and you can actually feel the audience getting some

understanding of the backstage machinations of government that they may not have had. we get that comment from people who come to the show, so fascinated to discover yada, yada, yada. >> without it being this catfight, without it becoming this kind of what i was hoping it wouldn't be, you know, which is what i love, is that it does remain in that space of elegance, it does remain in that space of what are we fighting for, not who are we fighting against. >> it is never a catfight. >> exactly. >> we have a couple of fights, but they're ideological fights. these are people who have passion about principles. passion about ideas and that's what the play is about. >> we have seen that play out in real life between nancy pelosi and sometimes and aoc, sometimes publicly and then meet behind closed doors, they come from different places, but they value each other and they each know that they can learn from the other. >> there is a respect, there is a mutual respect that we

definitely -- >> sort of like ours. >> yes, exactly. which is major. >> and it is at lincoln center, intimate, so well done as you can imagine with these two. the off broadway play "n/a" playing at the lincoln center. >> directed by diane paulus, especially. we were lucky to get her. >> through august 4th at lincoln center. great to see you both. we'll be back with more "morning joe." ee you both. we'll be back with more "morning joe. i have moderate to severe crohn's disease. now, there's skyrizi. ♪ things are looking up ♪ ♪ i've got symptom relief ♪ ♪ control of my crohn's means everything to me ♪ (♪♪) ♪ control is everything to me ♪ feel significant symptom relief at 4 weeks with skyrizi, including less abdominal pain and fewer bowel movements. skyrizi is the first il-23 inhibitor that can deliver remission and visibly improve damage of the intestinal lining.

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okay. so, we have two reports now from tom costello. first, a story from space, where two astronauts are stuck on boeing's starliner. and now nasa wants to understand the problem before the starliner leaves the station.

>> let's go forward into starliner. >> reporter: on board the international space station, astronauts sunny williams and butch willmore are still waiting to learn when they might return home. >> everything's been fantastic. the spacecraft is handled remarkably well. >> reporter: two weeks ago, they provided a tour of their spaceship. >> and liftoff of starliner and atlas 5, carrying two american heroes. >> reporter: built by boeing, starliner launched on june 5th, five years behind schedule, after a series of engineering setbacks. then, once in space, more problems. five helium leaks, which nasa says are not a major concern. but more concerning, five engine thrusters shut down as starliner prepared to dock with the space station. while four came back online, nasa wants to understand the problem before starliner leaves the station. this is their only chance because that section of the ship

that contains the thrusters, the service module, is designed to burn up on re-entry. so astronauts williams and willmore's ten-day visit is turning into a weeks long stay. >> i want to make it very clear that butch and suni are not stranded in space. our plan is to return them on starliner and return them home when -- at the right time. >> there is plenty of food. there is plenty of resources up there. there is plenty of clothing. they will be absolutely fine for an extended period of time. >> reporter: before they launched, i asked the crew if they were confident in their ship. >> does this spaceship feel like it is ready for primetime? >> yes, that's the short answer. absolutely, yes, that's the long answer. >> reporter: for now, engineers will begin replicating the thruster problems, but on the ground in new mexico. that's expected to take at least two weeks, leaving a return date up in the air. >> okay. tom's also reporting on more

than two dozen passengers who were injured during severe turbulence on a flight yesterday from spain to uruguay. here is tom's report for "nightly news" on that. >> this was an air europa boeing 787 with 345 people on board. it hit severe turbulence over the atlantic. so severe, that passengers were thrown into the ceiling panels which were severely damaged. one passenger was actually thrown into an overhead luggage bin. 30 people injured, most of those minor. but witnesses say several people suffered broken bones and head injuries and at least one passenger seat was twisted and broken. the airline says the pilot diverted the plane to brazil where 15 ambulances were standing by on the runway. in may, you may recall a singapore airlines flight made an emergency landing in bangkok after hitting severe turbulence, dozens injured. turbulence is becoming more severe as climate change heats up the planet.

>> okay. wow. frightening. back to politics before we go. we'll get some final thoughts. jen palmieri, where do you think the presidential race goes from here? >> oh, man, i mean, it is so -- you know, it is so minute to minute. and, you know, it is, i think people will -- i think everyone including the president, everybody is approaching this with a lot of integrity. what is the best thing to do here? and until -- it is just an uncomfortable situation, but he is the nominee, he's the president of the united states, and until there's just more information that suggests that either he shouldn't continue or there is polling that suggests it is a problem, just where we are. >> if the polling remains close, mika, the president will stay in. he still believes he's the guy who can beat trump. >> correct. all right. that does it for us this morning. katy tur picks up the coverage right now.