are thrilled that in certain ways even the attempted assassination has all kind of paused the conversation with the democrats and what they want is for joe biden to be the nominee because they see a very clear binary between two old guys, one who's kind of strong and survived, now strong and survived a bullet, survived an assassination attempt and one who as they've shown videos here falls up stairs, is weak. >> you've seen they're showing a picture of donald trump standing up with his fist, bloody face after getting shot in the air, and they're showing it against -- >> at the convention. >> joe biden falling down the stargs. it's what they want to campaign on, and now they have the gift to do that. i'm going to have to leave it here because i am out of time. ashley parker, sam stein, thank you guys so much. that's going to do it for this edition of "andrea mitchell reports." follow the show on social media @andreamitchellreports. i will be back here at 3:00 p.m. eastern. "chris jansing reports" starts right now.

♪♪ good day. i'm chris jansing live at msnbc headquarters in new york city. working class hero or far right fire brand? what we're learning about how j.d. vance will introduce himself to america when he makes his big debut at the rnc. can a man known for ruthlessly tearing into his political opponents fit into a convention that one columnist described as a joyful fellowship of patriots. plus, frustrated and fed up, president biden says he's done answering questions about whether or not he'll stick as the democratic nominee. we'll tell you about a new poll that now shows nearly two-thirds of his fellow democrats want him to drop out. and moments ago, with a critical senate seat on the line, a big name democrat in the race just called for the president to quit the 2024 campaign. and after a series of ethics complaints and controversial rulings, the president is poised to call for sweeping reforms in the nation's highest court.

but what are the chances anything changes. so much to get to, but we start with j.d. vance's big mt the rnc tonight. a golden opportunity to make a first impression on millions of americans who may know little or nothing about donald trump's new running mate. to do it, nbc news has learned that 39-year-old ohio senator will lean heavily into its extraordinarily personal story detailed in "hillbilly elegy," a life that began in rural ohio where he says poverty was a family tradition. the strategy, to connect with working class voters, even those traditionally on the other side of the aisle. >> you have people, i mean, people in my family who are ancestral democrats, patriotic, socially moderate to conservative, they love their country. they just want a good chance, right? if you work hard you play by the rules, you ought to be able to pay for a house, put food on the

table. a lot of people feel abandoned by the democrats. they feel looked down on. they feel like democrats don't care about their priorities and president trump listens to people. president trump loves these people. they know it, and i think that nexus is the source of this whole movement. >> apart from his personal history, democrats are homing in on vance's politics, calling him a trump clone and attacking his far right views on everything from abortion to january 6th, and it raises an obvious question. how does a man so well-known as a maga bomb thrower fit into the theme of unity at the rnc that they've been pushing all week long. i want to bring in nbc's garrett haake at the convention in milwaukee, brendan buck is former aide to republican house speakers paul ryan and john boehner as well as an msnbc political analyst. so garrett, what more do we know about how j.d. vance plans to introduce himself to a big swath of america tonight? >> well, chris, you touched on it. he's got a lot of work to do here. the trump campaign understands

while j.d. vance is something of a maga world rock star, he's almost totally unknown to the rest of the country. they're going to start from scratch with those elements of his biography that you were just laying out. then i think they want to begin the process of making him kind of a pied piper for primarily white men who are skeptical of donald trump and basically use his own past trump skepticism as a road map for those voters, again, primarily men, primarily white, to say j.d. vance doesn't like donald trump at the beginning either, and look where he is on him now and try to use that as a way to get those kind of voters back in the fold. they don't need many of them, particularly in places like wisconsin and michigan and pennsylvania where i'm told vance will be spending the majority of his time between now and election day. >> and brendan, when it comes to a personal story, vance does check a lot of boxes for all the reasons that garrett just pointed out, but beyond the kind of pull yourself up by the boot straps mentality, he's got military experience. that could be a big deal, right? first veteran on a major party

ticket since john mccain 20 years ago. how much do you think his personal story will matter to voters. >> the personal story is important to get people, i think, on board listening to you. that's the number one job is to introduce yourself to the country, but from there, it's important to remember that the job of the vp is to promote the top of the ticket, and i think that's -- his message there, i think, is much more important. there's been a lot of conversation about how perhaps j.d. vance was a riskier pick, and there may be something to that. i actually think he's a smart pick. if your job of the vp is to promote the top of the ticket, there are few people who do a better job of trying to articulate what donald trump world's view is than j.d. vance. the runners up were a little more of a difficult fit. they aren't natural trumpist. j.d. vance, this is very fluent for him. he can make this case and make it sound a little more thoughtful than donald trump does. i think he has a good story to

tell. i'm much more interested to see how he tells the story of why donald trump is the right person to be voting for. >> and also, the big theme of the convention has been unity, brendan. we heard it again from people like lara trump and nikki haley last night. let me play a little bit of that. >> now, to my fellow republicans, we must not only be a unified party, we must also expand our party. [ applause ] we are so much better when we are bigger. >> there is more that unites us than divides us. we all want this country to be great, even if we don't always agree on the best way of doing that. >> i mean, j.d. vance arguably, brendan, is not that kind of guy

naturally. the guy who's going to bring everybody together back in march, "politico" did a profile and said, quote, in certain conservative circles vance has emerged as the standard bearer of the new right, a loose movement of young, edgy and elite conservatives trying to take the ideological revolution that began under trump in an even more radical direction. so does that just go away now that they're pitching a vision of unity? what happens with that? >> it might go away tonight. i imagine he will. he'll have some hard edge to get the base fired up. i imagine he will present an image of unity. i'll say this, it's a lot easier to be united and go positive this way when you feel like you're winning. that's clearly what's going on here. it's a lot easier to be less angry when you're winning. i remember back in 2016 right after donald trump won the election, there was a lot of tension and friction between my boss at the time paul ryan, and donald trump. the second he won that melted away. everyone in that convention hall

is just feeling good right now, and especially compared to the disorder going on in the democratic party, it's very easy to feel unified and feel happy and do all of this happy talk. i would imagine he's going to continue riding that train, that's the theme of the convention, and i imagine he'll carry that long himself. >> i also want to bring in my colleague katy tur who long with garrett is there at the site of the republican national convention, and katy, i want to play a little more about what j.d. vance had to say both about democrats and president biden. >> the entire democratic apparatus lied about this guy, and look, being dishonest, that's a problem in and of itself, but it was in the service of ensuring that america effectively had an empty vessel as president for three years. my message to the american people, sean, is we can either reward or punish that behavior. the only way to punish the democrats for lying about joe biden's health and saddling us with an incapacitated president is to vote him out of office in every level come november.

>> reportedly saying -- well, we heard him say that democrats are liars and that joe biden is an empty vessel, it's a fine line to walk, isn't it, between attacking your opponent and trying to keep to this theme of unity, so i wonder what you're hearing about what they want from j.d. vance tonight, what we should hear and will it kind of be a through line to former president trump on thursday? >> i don't think it's that fine a line. i think you can attack your opponent on policy without putting them down physically and without getting into name calling and personal insults, but that being said, j.d. vance has got an origin story that the trump team really likes. he's a man that's come from poverty in ohio. he's risen up through the ranks, shown that with perseverance you can do this too, perseverance and of course the right policies, and he's going to come out here, and he's going to argue that donald trump's

policies are the policies that will unify the country. forget about the rhetoric. it's the policies that will make this country better, that will give people jobs, make them feel like they have standing on the world stage again. this is their argument, not mine. democrats disagree with it. this is what they believe they can do, and by, as garrett said a moment ago, putting j.d. vance in michigan and wisconsin, ohio, obviously, in pennsylvania, what you're doing is you're trying to focus on that set of voters that enabled donald trump to win in 2016, the same voters who enabled joe biden to win in 2020. you're going to use vance as a person to motivate them, to excite them, to tell them that they can do this too and to speak to them in their own language. is that going to be effective? does donald trump need that? donald trump has been speaking effectively to voters in these battleground states. the polling shows that he's doing pretty well and the conventional wisdom has been that by picking j.d. vance, he's

not trying to find somebody that's going to help him with voters, he's just doubling down on who he is and what this movement is and also projecting this movement into the future beyond himself, beyond donald trump. the next generation of maga. >> katy tur, it's great to see you once again at the convention, thank you for that. which leads me, brendan, to one more thing that j.d. vance said last night about the convention itself and the political atmosphere there. take a listen. . >> it is really the contrast between republicans and democrats. democrats are trying to throw their nominee under the bus. this party out here is really united behind president trump. it's a really good feeling and that momentum is something you can almost reach out and touch, it's so powerful. >> well, should democrats be nervous? i mean, one thing you have to say, brendan, is that if you read the reviews so far so good for the republicans at their convention. >> yeah, i mean, keep in mind a

convention by its nature is propaganda. every candidate typically gets a bump out of it. and if you're not telling a positive story of your candidate, you've done a pretty bad job. now, democrats are handing republicans an absolute gift. you know, we talk about uniting the party. very little has done more to unite republicans like nikki haley coming into the fold than joe biden, and particularly since the debate. there are a lot of republicans who probably uncomfortable with donald trump but look at joe biden and get the permission to say, i can't vote for this person because i don't trust that he can do the job for four years. it's a very easy contrast. again, things are going incredibly well for donald trump. he's on an incredible winning streak right now with his legal cases, obviously surviving an assassination, but everything seems to be going his way. that's good enough on its own, while democrats are burning their own house down right now. this race will probably normalize at some point, and democrats will get to have their

own convention. if you're not telling a really positive story right now, donald trump in his two previous conventions did a pretty good job of humanizing him, which is the element that tends to be missing from his day-to-day rants. >> thank you both so much. before we go for the top of the show, i want to bring in nbc chief foreign affairs correspondent andrea mitchell from the aspen security forum because the rnc focus today is foreign policy and china, so andrea at a convention that has been so focused on this country, what's happening here. does the trump campaign need to put more meat on the bone when it comes to their plans for how to handle crises overseas in general, and i would think ukraine in particular. >> what you're going to hear tonight are broad strokes, this is foreign policy day in milwaukee, and what you're going to hear is not going to be very pleasing to ukraine. already it isn't. they're very concerned. we were just here listening to the ukrainian defense minister who is projecting that they will

try to go after russia and go into, as far as moscow, if there's a legitimate military target, they want to go after those military bases. there's a lot of pressure on this administration to remove the handcuffs, if you will, and let them be more aggressive and go after those jet bombers that are hammering ukraine, not just, you know, kyiv but most particularly the northern area. they're very concerned about j.d. vance who is -- you'd have to describe him as an isolationist. he voted against the supplemental, against the leadership of his own party, and this is a party that's now completely united, as you know, and it is the trump foreign policy, and it's notable that zelenskyy last week at the nato summit went to the reagan institute, appealing to republicans, trying to persuade them that the support for ukraine should go across administrations because they clearly think that there's a very good chance of president

trump being elected in this close election, and now they're very concerned about the vice presidential choice. >> andrea mitchell, thank you so much. appreciate it. and in 90 seconds, president biden sending a stark new message to democrats behind closed doors amid growing pressure to step aside. and the party's unity on the line. that nbc news reporting after this. at nbc news reporting afte this (intercom) t minus 10... (janet) so much space! that open kitchen! (tanya) ...definitely the one! (ethan) but how can you sell your house when we're stuck on a space station for months???!!! (brian) opendoor gives you the flexibility to sell and buy on your timeline. (janet) nice! (intercom) flightdeck, see you at the house warming.

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we're back with some breaking news. one of the leading democrats on the hill is now calling on president biden to drop out of the race. in an exclusive statement to the "l.a. times," california congressman and senate candidate adam schiff says he believes it is time for biden to pass the torch and secure his legacy of leadership by allowing another democrat to beat trump. that new call comes just as nbc news learns that the president has had enough with the questions about his mental acuity and whether he should stay in the race as he privately conveys the conversations about his future being over. a senior biden aide tell us they've got a good plan to fight through this, but that fight is coming up against brand new polling from "associated press" that shows nearly two-thirds of democrats want biden to withdraw from the race. nbc's mike memoli is reporting from las vegas. also with us, eugene daniels "politico" white house correspondent and an msnbc

political contributor. mike, as biden's patience wears thin, we're learning his inner circle is shrinking and now we're hearing yet another member of congress is saying it's time for him to drop out. put all of that in perspective for us. >> reporter: this new call from adam schiff who of course is running for the senate in california is significant for a number of reasons. he's one of the most strongest fundraisers in the party, also very close with the former house speaker nancy pelosi. so he can be seen as sort of a bellwether for what other senior democrats might also be thinking. and as part of this comprehensive snapshot of biden's thinking at the moment led by carol lee and monica alba, we unpack a number of things, including the frustration on the part of the president that's been becoming more evident as he's been reaching out to members, especially in these different house caucuses. at first these calls were largely conciliatory. the president acknowledging him poor debate performance and asking for and getting some feedback, but that feedback has become more blunt, more direct

as those calls have continued, and the president has responded in kind during some of the calls that took place last weekend. we're also learning that the president is relying increasingly on a -- he has a large circle of advisers that's grown since he's reached the white house, but in this moment of sort of political crisis, he's leaning especially heavily on those who have been with him the longest, who have guided him since his days as vice president. you've heard some of the president's energy, some of his fight during a conference he spoke at here in las vegas yesterday to the naacp, even invoking biblical verses. let's take a listen to what the president said yesterday. >> i've been young, and now i'm old. and i've not seen the righteous forsaken. i have not seen the righteous forsaken. and i will not see the righteous forsaken. hopefully with age i've

demonstrated a little bit of wisdom. >> reporter: that tone of defiance from the president as he is speaking here in las vegas to some of the -- what the campaign calls the backbones of the democratic party and of biden's coalition. black voters yesterday, latino voters today, we expect over 1,500 people in attendance on the day after we saw at the rnc quite a focus on illegal immigration. the president going to speaking to an important latino audience here in vegas, chris. >> so eugene, this is big news about adam schiff, right? for any number of reasons because he represents a lot of those folks who are in really tough races. he won a hard-fought primary. now he's in a very hard-fought general election race, but also there is a lot of questions, would the democrats wait a while after the assassination to attempt to go back to this call. would they wait until the end of the republican national convention? clearly at least for adam schiff, the answer is no.

i wonder whether this is going to open the door for others. where do you think this whole process that joe biden says isn't going to go anywhere stands right now to get him to step down? >> yeah, i mean, the thing that's so important to remember and really zero in on about adam schiff is that he is so close to former speaker nancy pelosi, and we know and we've reported in "politico" playbook and others have followed as well, is she has been taking phone calls and talking to members of congress, especially front liners about what they should do and about her own concerns about the possibility of president biden staying in and tanking not only his own race, right, but also having a down ballot impact. so it's really important when you think about adam schiff doing this, what people are going to take from this, members of congress who haven't -- who haven't publicly said anything but feel the same thing adam schiff is talking about today is that nancy pelosi has endorsed

this. this is a wink and a nod from one of the nancy pelosi allies that we can all say what we want to say. i will say if they were waiting, they are continuing to run out of time, right, and this is something that biden folks, when you talk to them, they talk about the time that it would take for this to actually kick off, and they are right. there wasn't really a plan when members of congress came back after that really terrible debate performance that president biden did. they came into town and thought they'd just have some meetings secretly and we wouldn't find out those meetings, that's not the case. if they're going to want to do this, they're going to have to do it faster. the key is they have to convince president biden and that small inner circle to do it. they're his delegates at this point, and there's no evidence that they could kick him off, right? they'd have to somehow convince the delegates to vote their conscious, that's the dnc rules that they not vote for him on the first ballot whenever that

actually is, even though they're supposed to. all of the mechanics of actually doing that are going to have to also strongly include president biden himself signing off on whatever they want to do and him also probably wanting to choose a successor to this as well, right? he has his own legacy to think about here and how much time there is in this race overall. >> so many moving parts, mike memoli and eugene daniels, thanks for helping us get up to speed. up next, steve kornacki breaking down the mounting pressure on must-win senate races in critical battleground states. plus, what voters in key states think about biden's defiance. >> nothing personal against the guy. he just is completely too old and out of touch and not cognitively there. >> would you like to see someone other than biden on the democratic ticket? >> i'd like to see anybody but trump. ut trump. s to beating these two every thursday. help fuel today with boost high protein,

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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. today president biden is taking his campaign message to latino voters in nevada, a key battleground state. it's his second day in a row there, all while the drum bet of calls for him to step down have not abated and close attention to polls in those swing states are being watched very, very closely. nbc's steve kornacki is at the big board for us. what's the latest on the state of the race, steve? >> yeah, all right, chris, so the democrats do have that very narrow senate majority.

the problem for them is the map here. these are the seats that are up for the senate this year. you see the democratic seats in blue, the republican seats in red. the first thing to ask here just looking at this is from the democratic stand point, are there some obvious states here where they could build on that 51. are any of the republican-held seats up this year in blue states? we'll take a look at where you see the red. there aren't any blue states there. those are all states that voted for donald trump back in 2020. so there's no obvious opportunity for the democrats to play offense. it would be an upset if they picked off a republican seat. flip that question around, though, are there any blue seats, democratic-held seats in red states, and the answer is yes. there, in fact, are three of them. democrats have a seat in west virginia, ohio, montana, all three of those democratic-held senate seats are up this year, all three of those states voted for donald trump in 2020, by 40 points in west virginia, more than 20 in montana, and eight in

ohio so from the democratic standpoint, if they're not picking off any new republican seats, here's the reality. they've got to protect all three of those seats to stay at 51 if donald trump becomes president. because remember, as president, the white house party would control a 50/50 senate by the vice president casting the tie breaking vote. if biden is reelected, democrats could afford to lose one of those three seats in republican states. and again, west virginia here most folks in both parties are already saying is essentially a republican pickup. so you know, if the democrats win the presidential race, they could lose west virginia, and then nothing else, and then there's a second layer here i'll just take you through quickly. there are a bunch of battleground states, you see five of them here. these are all battlegrounds in the presidential election. all five of these are currently democratic-held seats. here's recent polling in the last month or two in there, and you do see the democrats leading in the recent polling in all

five of those battleground seats. that is good news for democrats, but here's the ominous sign for them. polling in those same states shows donald trump ahead in four of them and tied in a fifth. so for democrats, they need to kind of defy political gravity, if trump continues to lead these states, to hang onto these senate seats. if the presidential race and the senate races start to sync up in polling, if these go from blue to red, that's when democrats are looking at big losses. you hear about scenarios for republicans to have a big majority, it would be by flipping these in addition to the three we started with, chris. >> thanks so much, steve. let me take it over to david noriega, he is in las vegas, obviously nevada a key battleground state. i wonder what voters there are telling you. >> reporter: chris, so i've been talking to a number of voters in henderson. it's a suburb of las vegas which leans a little bit republican, but is still pretty up in the air. this is the kind of place that

is in play this year. and what i'm hearing primarily from voters who are either democrats who are planning to vote for biden or are considering a vote for biden, or another democrat is that nothing of the really major events that have happened in the last few days or weeks has moved the needle yet. a lot of people are still on the fence. i want to play you a few clips of interviews, people who are for biden or considering a vote for biden or another democrat. take a listen. >> what do you make of the efforts to get him to step aside after the debate? >> understandable. understandable from a political perspective. >> i'm sure behind the scenes he is awesome. i'm sure when he's sitting in the oval office, he knows how to use the tools, you know, and he's going to make it happen. he's made it happen up until now. >> i still struggle with voting for biden because i also don't feel like he's a competent candidate. i don't necessarily believe his

policy or the things that he's done, but at least i feel like he's somewhat admirable and honest man and surrounds himself with decent human beings. >> everything's in chaos right now, so is biden staying in is biden not staying in? are they going to put kamala harris in? they don't seem to want to put kamala harris in. >> reporter: i've been talking to voters in nevada and other swing states for months. on the one hand i'm hearing outright positive enthusiasm for biden before the debate debacle, which comes from this defensive loyal place, people who want him to stay in place. those last two voters are people who are not sold on biden. they're not convinced they're going to vote for biden, but they want to vote against trump, and they say that the one thing that might actually move the needle for them, that might actually push them to cast that vote for the democratic ticket is a change at the top of the ticket. they would need to see who that

replacement is. that's kind of the one thing that might push people solidly in that direction at this point, chris. >> david noriega, thank you. and breaking news, new details about what police saw before the assassination attempt on former president trump. plus, the nbc news reporting on the device found on the shooters's body afterwards. i'll speak to a former secret service special agent after a quick break. you're watching "chris jansing reports" only on msnbc. ching "cg report os"nly on msnbc

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the homeland security inspector general is now launching an investigation into the secret service's handling of the security at former president trump's rally. there are still a lot of unanswered questions around how the attempted assassination could happen, and while publicly donald trump has nbted his trust in the secret service, this is what eric trump told my colleague, katy tur. >> there was some breakdown outside of his ecosystem, there was some breakdown, and they better get to the bottom of it. >> the agency will be briefing both members of the house and senate. speaker johnson said just this morning he's creating a task force to investigate. and nbc news is now reporting that the secret service director misspoke when she said local police were inside the building from where the gunman fired securing it from there, that instead they were actually in another building in the same complex. i want to bring in nbc's tom winter, also with us former

secret service special agent and msnbc law enforcement analyst, ev vi pom pure ras. in addition to all that new reporting, a lot of it about the numerous investigations looking into this. new reports the shooter was carrying a range finder and we have some details about the transmitter that he was carrying. bring us up to speed. >> that's generous of you, we have a big team and julia ainsley is part of that team, so her reporting is that apparently crooks, who's the alleged shooter, the person who fired at trump at the stage. he has a range finder on his person, and that's one of the things that was picked up by law enforcement and one of the reasons why he was deemed to be suspicious. so just to give people a sense of what that is, picture a set of binoculars, it's very similar to that, and that's something that you would use to determine the distance between where you are and something else is, and there's all sorts of different ones that are out there on the market. some are used for purposes of shooting. some are used for purposes of

trying to figure out how far you are from the green when you're playing golf, and so there's all sorts of various versions of it. >> let's say you're a hunter and you go out and have a particular type of gun and you want to see where the deer is, how far away. >> 100% would be the reason for that. if you're trying to do what he was trying to do that day, it would be helpful on a number of fronts. don't want to give people a lot of ideas on that. it would have been helpful on a number of different ways for him. our affiliate in pittsburgh, wpxi is doing some great reporting. they published some photos last night as part of their evening broadcast, and there was what appears to be a transmitter next to crooks and we're told the senior u.s. law enforcement official that that's a type of commercial transmitter for fireworks. so in other words if had a big fireworks array set up and you wanted to set off a certain number at a certain time, that's the type of thing you would use.

why would it be used here? of course as we've previously reported the fbi is now on the record saying there are rudimentary devices that were found in the vehicle, probably something along the lines of an incendiary device, so something that would have created fire, smoke, perhaps some minor explosion, not a car bomb, but that's what was found inside of his car. those are being examined at the fbi's laboratory in quantico. probably more along the lines of a distraction for law enforcement or to injure law enforcement. it's not something that would have likely have impacted former president trump on stage, but he might have used it for that. that's the photo that's sitting next to him on the ground. >> so they might not have known, evi what the transmitter was, but surely they recognized what the range finder was. in addition to that, you have the head of the secret service who is confused, misspoke, we don't know. they're saying she misspoke about even where the security was. what does that mean for the

agency at a time when there are so many different investigations that look to be getting underway? >> over time they're going to investigate and one of the best ways to actually really get to the heart of what's going on is when you do these advances, you do a lot of preparation and, quite honestly, paperwork. there's logs, site advances. i would sit there and painstakingly create diagrams, and you literally put your stars are where your agents go and other symbols for where your local law enforcement go. when they pull all that paperwork, which they should, that will really reveal the true plan. all that stuff as a ground agent, you put it together, and it gets sent to headquarters. there's always that connection. it's not i'm in the field and i randomly put my own thing together and i don't communicate it. it goes from you in the field to headquarters to the intelligence -- excuse me the protection operations. i need this, this is what i'm getting. local p.d. is giving me x amount of officers and i build my plan.

that's going to reveal a lot. and then based off of that, you are correspond to what actually happened. so if i'm supposed to have a local counter sniper unit on x property or x building, were they actually there, or did they show up? i'm not saying that did or did not happen. what resources were allocated with the plan that was put in place. now, the other part of what you're saying is communication. where's the breakdown in communication happening. i suspect because i've done these, you're talking to so many people, there was state police there. there was the butler county police there, maybe there were other law enforcement entities there to supplement, and so when you're dealing with all these entities and it seems like information's coming from this angle, then that angle, then that angle, there might be a funnel -- the way this information is being funneled to her is not accurate. >> but the head of the secret service exactly to your point, would have been able to look at documentation to say at least who should have been there.

>> yes. absolutely. she should have access to that immediately, but i think the issue is the on the ground elements were people where they were supposed to be. how many were designated and did they actually execute. i've done advances before. especially when there's distance, i would physically go to each point and check them. your site advance agent, that's the person who's going to know the most. they are the conductor of the whole thing, and that's the person who should be giving information and that site advance agent's counterparts, their leads. >> we have much more to talk about, but thank you both. a lot going on in that investigation. president biden is set to announce support for sweeping changes to the supreme court. what exactly would that look like? and what is the president trying to pull off politically? f politl 'g better with age. here's to beating these two every thursday. help fuel today with boost high protein, complete nutrition you need... ...without the stuff you don't. so, here's to now.

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it's amazing what real food can do. (♪♪) dad is a legend. and his legendary moves might be passed down to you. dancing is just one of the many inherited traits you can discover with ancestrydna. see which unique traits you inherited, the places where they started, and the people you share them with. get movin' and try ancestrydna you might learn what makes you legendary, too. president biden is now gearing up to propose major reforms to limit the power of

the nation's highest court, according to behind the scenes reporting from nbc news. and "the washington post" reports that biden told progressive lawmakers, quote, i've been working with constitutional scholars for the last three months, and i need some help. and in a new interview, he stressed the stakes for the supreme court under a second trump term. >> there are probably going to be two more appointments to the court. just imagine if he has two more appointments, what that means. >> nbc's kelly o'donnell is at the white house for us, and democratic strategist, adam gentleson, former chief of staff or senator john fetterman is here with us as well. kelly, you've been reporting on this for a bit. what do we know about what joe biden might propose? propose? >> reporter: well at election time, the issue of the supreme court is always on the ballot, and so this is a way for the president to be talking about that issue, which important to the campaign, but also to the white house side, the policy

side of this. and when you look at it in the context of the president needing the support of progressives in his party, perhaps now more than ever, this makes a lot of sense in terms of the timing. we've also seen the immunity decision from the court and the president expressing publicly frustrations with some of the decisions that the court has made. so based on our reporting, what we understand is there has been a policy approach to this. what kinds of things, looking at term limits for sitting justices who currently under the federal code have a lifetime appointment, looking at ethics rules that would have a piece that doesn't exist now, which is a way to compel the enforcement of ethics rules, and looking at ways to consider how the court would have to in some ways be more responsive. so these are ideas that are in the works. there is not a formal policy ready yet. but our reporting suggests that could be coming soon.

the president talked to lawmakers over the weekend about it, and he's hinted at it, in some of his interviews. so obviously this is huge, if you're talking about changes that would require some congressional support, and that would mean a high threshold, a constitutional amendment piece is an even higher threshold, but from sources i talked to, these are principles the president is working on that he believes have merit, and even if they cannot be achieved immediately given the landscape of congress right now, that it is worth talking about for the future and making it a part of the election conversation even more so than it has been in the past. notably, when there have been attempts in years past for people who said maybe the court should have more members than nine, president biden was not on board with that. so this is in some ways, a refocusing of his interest in the court and maybe pushing some new policy ideas that poll very

well. and many in the country have expressed some concern about the credibility of the court at the moment, and could this be a way to try to address that. politically and then maybe from a policy point of view as well, chris. >> kelly o'donnell, thank you for that. so adam, we know realistically, biden's push for reform won't make it through a republican house, but strategically, does it make sense? >> i think it does. i mean, look, this court has placed itself at the center of this campaign. kelly mentioned some of the reasons why, but another one is the dobbs decision, which put abortion front and center. and i think there are legitimate concerns about the public's faith in this court. polls show faith in the supreme court hitting all time lows, which is a dangerous dynamic for the country. so things like ethics codes, term limits are broadly supported by the public, and i think are necessary to fix some of these underlying problems. there's also an interesting little bit of history here. when president biden was in the senate, he was for a long time

chair of the senate judiciary committee, and in that role, he oversaw the confirmation process of clarence thomas, somewhat famously, and controversially. it's interesting that this is coming back full circle. there are substantiative reasons to do this, and i also think politically for the president, we have seen him align himself with the left of the party, these are big asks from that wing of the party. what he's trying to do is align hims with the wing as part of his strategy for surviving this push against replacing him on the ticket. >> there's another take on this, and my colleague, political director chuck todd said it could be read as a sign of desperation for biden, playing to the left, putting time and effort into what the white house knows is a lost cause, is that

possible? >> it's interesting, a lot of the calls for biden to step down have come from the more moderate members of the party, members of congress in front line districts where they're the ones with the most competitive districts, and the most competitive races in this cycle. so how this move is going to play with that wing of the party, with the moderates, with the front liners, with the new democrats who have been the most aggressive so far in calling for the president to step down, i think remains to be seen, but it's hard to see them being reassured by this. >> we talked about last week about congressional democrats' efforts to limit the court. this is a shift by this president, right? as senate judiciary committee chair, he long resisted calls to make significant changes to the high court. but politics aside, you have trust in the institution taking a lot of hits, there are lots of ethical questions being raised. there are questions about decisions that have been made. is it time to reconsider at

least on some level, broadly reconsider not just by the democrats? >> i think there should be a bipartisan push here. i mean, look, having the american people have faith in the supreme court is something that all politicians should want. it's a critical part of the basic fabric of our democracy, and it's not a democratic or republican issue. and the decline in faith has been precipitous, and so you would hope that republicans and democrats could come together to try to do something about that because this is an issue for our civic society, not just one party or the other. the reason that might not happen of course is that the decisions that have caused people to lose faith in this court have broadly benefitted conservative causes like trying to outlaw abortion, and so they may just like the results they're getting and not want to make any changes which i think would be to the detriment of, you know, our broader civic society, and problems we have of faith in the institutions.

>> adam jentleson, thank you. coming up, from prison to the rnc, trump's former white house aide peter navarro set to make a big appearance tonight. stay close. more "chris jansing reports" reports after this. reports after this

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