kadia goba, thank you for coming? >> thanks for having me. thank you for getting up ""way too early" with us on this monday morning. "morning joe" starts right about now. it's true, these guys are weird. >> yes, it is. >> they are running for he-man women haters club or something. that's not what people are interested in. >> this is not our living room. but we're using this fake living room to talk to you about a super weird idea from jd vance. >> yeah, i mean, it is quite weird. >> i think donald trump, i know him, and he's probably sitting and watching the tv. every day, it comes out vance has done something more extreme, more weird, more erratic. >> you may have noticed donald trump has been resorting to some wild lies about my record and some of what he and his running mate are saying, well, it's just plain weird. >> democrats describing

republicans with what was the word of the week, weird. both candidates were on the campaign trail over the weekend with donald trump making an pitch to voters. we'll play the comments. meanwhile, trump's running mate defends his remarks on childless cat ladies. we'll show how jd vance decided to double down. and we'll bring you the latest from the middle east, where there are growing fears of a wider conflict following a deadly attack in israel by hezbollah. also ahead, an update on the paris games, including an injury scare for one of team usa's most decorated athletes. good morning. welcome to "morning joe." it is monday, july 29th. i'm jonathan lemire. joe and mika continue their vacation this week. they'll pop back on, though, in the event of any big, breaking news. willie, that lucky guy, is on assignment at the olympics in paris. we will check in with him at

various points during the week. but with us this morning, we do have msnbc political analyst elise jordan. she is a former aide to the george w bush white house and state department. former white house director of communications to president obama, jennifer palmieri. president of the national action network and host of "politics nation," reverend al sharpton. and managing editor at "the bulwark," sam stein. you just saw him on "way too early." let's get started. a lot to get to. busy news morning. we have now passed the 100 day mark until the november election. and the kamala harris campaign says it raised over $200 million in its first week with the majority of donations coming from first-time donors. there was also a surge of volunteers, with over 170,000 signing up in a single week. the campaign held what it called a weekend of action, sending its top surrogates, like vp

contender and pennsylvania governor josh shapiro, out on the campaign trail. as for donald trump, well, on friday night, he addressed christian voters at the turning point action believers summit in west palm beach, florida, where he tried out some new attacks on vice president harris. >> she was a bum three weeks ago. she was a bum. a failed vice president and a failed administration with millions of people crossing, and she was the border czar. now, they're trying to say she never was the border czar. she had nothing to do with the border. she was the border czar. but if radical, liberal kamala harris gets in -- by the way, there are numerous ways of saying her name. they were explaining to me, you can say kamala, kamala. i said, don't worry about it. i couldn't care less if i mispronounce it or not. i couldn't care less.

some people think i mispronounced it on purpose, but i've heard it said seven different ways. there are a lot of ways, a lot of ways. >> trump then held a rally in st. cloud, minnesota, the next day, saturday, where he is already claiming election fraud, months before any americans have even cast their votes. >> if they don't cheat, we win this state easily. they have no shame. they cheat. do you understand that, you crooked people? they cheat. they cheated in the last election and will wheat in this election, but we're going to get them. >> so, jen, obvious, it's inherently offensive to not bother to learn how to pronounce someone's name, and trump and many allies could do this consistently. but that right there, that's dangerous. we have seen this before. he has laid the groundwork months in advance of any voting to suggest that the only way he could lose would be if it were rigged. >> yeah. i mean, he does seem pretty nervous, right, when he is

saying -- you know, he's always projecting. when he's saying it doesn't matter how you pronounce her name, you know, he's actually pretty worried about her. there was those comments about saying that if he -- you know, the only way he's going to lose is if it's rigged. we know what that brought us last time around. then, also, if i were the harris campaign, the comments that he made a few days ago where he said to addressing christians, so presumably these are, you know, politically conservative evangelical voters, that after four years they're not going to have to vote again because he's going to do everything they could imagine to want to happen. talk about doubling down on an extremist agenda, doubling down on project 2025. i think that that is a big opening for the harris campaign, and that's what i would drive this week. >> sam, let's talk about what we're seeing there, that anxiety from republicans. it does seem like for the first time in a long time, donald trump is not the central news

story in a campaign. >> right. >> obviously, we spent a lot time talking about president biden and his age, whether he could continue. here we are one-on-one, and trump seems overshadowed by democratic good news, by the enthusiasm on the other side. there seems to be a lot of anxiety from his campaign, from other republicans, about just how they're responding. truthfully, at this point, how they're faltering in their response. >> yeah, i think a few things are happening here. one is he is being overshadowed, which i don't think sits particularly well with trump, who likes to be the center of attention. two is the money, i think, can't be overstated. raising $200 million in grassroots donations over the course of the week is unheard of. i think that if you're the trump people and if you're republicans, that's something to be very concerned about. because that money is just going to keep going. third is i think the rollout of jd vance has been rough. i just think objectively, it has

not been what they've wanted. he's kind of become meme fied already. then i think the fourth thing is, and this is something my colleague, marc caputo, captured in his piece, looking at how they're responding to this kamala harris boomlet, is trump's views, politics is downstream from culture. he, obviously, is a product of tv, and he was able to manipulate that and use that to become a political figure. what he sees in harris's rise is she's becoming a cultural phenomenon. i think that's very difficult for him to process and deal with because it can be very politically potent. it's causing him to have difficulty adjusting. you know, they've planned this campaign around biden. now, they have to revamp it around harris. it's not like you can just attack her sort of as a traditional liberal, which they're going to do. you have to attack on a variety of fronts. she's becoming a cultural phenomenon, too. >> yeah. to say that jd vance's rollout

has been rough is pretty kind there, sam. we'll have much more on that in a little bit. >> i'm trying to be kind, okay? >> very generous way to start the week, i suppose. we're going to get more to that in a minute. first, the moment jen referenced, where trump told the group of religious conservatives in florida that if he were to be elected president this november, they will never need to vote again. >> again, christians, get out and vote! just this time. [ applause ] you won't have to do it anymore. four more years. you know what? it'll be fixed. it'll be fine. you won't have to vote anymore, my beautiful christians. i love you, christians. i'm a christian. i love you. get out. you've got to get out and vote. in four years, you don't have to vote again. we'll have it fixed so good, you're not going to have to vote. >> a spokesperson for trump's campaign released a statement saturday, trying to clarify the comments. writing, the former president was talking about uniting this

country and bringing prosperity to every american. we can sure fact-check that. reverend sharpton, let's get you on this. there are a couple interpretations here about what trump meant. one is what we floated, this idea that, you know, because i'm going to give you everything you need the next four years, don't bother showing up. for many, it sets off alarm bells. or this idea of, well, maybe we won't have elections four years hence. democrats warn that's what trump meant. his campaign pushed back against that idea, as well. talk to us about what you saw there and how worried are you? >> i'm very concerned. first of all, if you take either interpretation, their justification, which doesn't really land well, or those of us who fear he meant what he said and said what he meant. either way, it's a danger to this country. if he's saying he's going to give the far-right christians what they want, it is

frightening at best. and if, in fact, let's remember, he said twice, jonathan, "we're going to fix it." well, if you are dealing in a climate where they're trying in some states to stop a drop-box for voting, trying to limit early voting, i mean, fix it can mean exactly what they're doing in many states. changing a lot of the voting regulations, changing a lot of the voting access. i think that he said out loud what he intends to do. he intends to set a situation, working with the right-wing governors, to where voting will not matter. he will have it fixed. he said it. i see where his campaign is trying to clean it up. they didn't address him saying, we're going to fix it. he said it twice. >> elise, let's talk about this split screen, where on the democratic side right now, no doubt, a lot of enthusiasm. sure, some of this could be the honeymoon phase. vice president harris has been

the presumptive nominee now for a week, but the money is rolling in. volunteers are there. it's everyone. it's all anybody is talking about right now, vice president harris and how democrats feel good about this campaign. we have a faltering republican side at the moment. at the same time, pretty dark, ominous warnings about how they still think they could win. >> well, president biden's decision to drop out of the race completely shook up what should have been the glow from the republican national convention. while donald trump does have the bump among his supporters that you normally see after a convention, it was not a story line last week about things that were discussed at the convention. it was about the future. it was about the prospect of kamala harris as the new president for the democrats. so we were in wisconsin for "morning joe" focus groups, and it really was just staggering how different the vibe was from when i'd been there previously, six weeks earlier. six weeks ago, voters were

really depressed, democratic voters. now, they are energized. they might have some qualms about vice president harris. she might not have been the first choice, but she is now. they're activated. it'll be interesting to measure. at the rnc, it was quite the fervent. trump's supporters are always enthusiasm. can democrats match it this go-around is the question? >> we'll have more on your focus groups later in the morning. by dropping out when biden did, after the republican convention, that really did blunt some momentum that trump would have had from the rnc. talk object now making the harris campaign the centerpiece. instead, what are we talking about from republicans? his running mate and the rollout not going all that well. senator jd vance of ohio is standing by his past comments about childless cat ladies. as a reminder, here's what the republican nominee for vp said back in 2021 when he was running

for senate. >> we're effectively run in this country via the democrats, via our corporate oligarchs by a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices they've made, so they wantmiserable, too. kamala harris, pete buttigieg, aoc, the future of the democrats is controlled by people without children. >> so on friday, senator vance appeared on the "megyn kelly show" to try to defend his comments. >> obviously, it was a sarcastic comment. i have nothing against cats, nothing against dogs. i have one at home, and i love them, megyn. this is not -- people are focusing so much on the sarcasm and not on the substance of what i actually said. is substance of what i said, i'm sorry, it's true. it is true that we've become anti-family. it is true that the left has become anti-child. it is simply true that it's become way too hard to raise a

family. >> not much of a cleanup there. vance also appeared last night on fox news, where ahead of the interview, this was how he was introduced by host trey gowdy. >> when that interview surfaced, two things leapt to my mind. those of us who talk for a living make mistakes. we say things that, in hindsight, we might phrase differently or better or not at all. then i thought about a stormy day at reagan national airport where i met two women desperately trying to get home to south america. i was trying to get home to south carolina. we spent the whole day together, finally making it to charlotte. somehow, we got them on a flight to houston. they were headed to visit family in south america before returning to their new home called america. when we parted ways, they said they'd like to pray for me as their way of saying thanks for the day spent together. assured them, it's too late to help me. but i do have a friend who is

expecting. she got some tough news about her unborn child. would they please pray for her instead? and they did. they still do to this day. they're catholic nuns, childless, dedicated to god, love this country, living lives of service to others. it's not just catholic nuns. some of the finest people i know don't have children. teachers and guidance counselors, lawyers and doctors. they love all their people's children enough to teach, guide, and protect, and minister to them. some people choose not to have children. others desperately want them but they can't. in a moment, we'll speak with senator jd vance. we have never met before, but we have many friends in common who tell me that he is smart and he is talented and he is more than capable. none is perfect, no not one. that's what the good book says. the american people are forgiving if we ask.

>> that is a jaw-dropping introduction of jd vance on fox news. so when vance came on, here's how he responded to the criticism of his comments. >> do you agree that there are people who very much love this country and are invested in its future but they also happen to be childless? >> oh, of course i believe that, trey. if you look at the full context of what i said, it's very clear the democrats have tried to take this thing out of context and blow it out of proportion, which is what they always do, trey. because they don't have an agenda to run on themselves. really what i'm trying to get at here, trey, is that it is important for us to be pro-family as a country. of course, for a whole host of reasons, it's not going to work out for some people. we should pray for those people and, of course, have sympathy for them. i still think that that means we should be pro-family generally speaking as a party. i think that our country has become particularly hard for parents, especially under the

policies of kamala harris. >> jen, efforts to clean that up have failed to this point. to put it mildly. i think the evidence, the fact this became a thing on fox news last night, shows this has broken through. this is a real thing that trump and vance have to deal with. >> it does strike me when vance decided to go on "megyn kelly." megyn kelly is persuasive in pitches, come on my show and clean this up. it's something trump never would have done. trump never would have apologized or tried to explain, but vance keeps digger deeper and deeper into this hole. it's the kind -- i mean, look at trey's own response to it. what's he conveying to us in that -- in what he said? first of all, it is a moving thing about what he said about the nuns. it also suggests to me he does not think this is a winning ticket, right? when a fox anchor is going out of their way to distance themselves from the running

mate, it does not suggest to me that they think this is a winning message. and he keeps -- you know, he basically apologizes to the cats, is what vance does, right, but then not -- >> which i like cats but -- >> -- to the women. i like cats, then doubling down on the underlying comment that childless women are ruining the country. does he support child care tax credits when that was up in the -- talk about -- did he support that when it was up in the senate? i don't believe he voted for that. he's not acting on anything like this. it is -- you know, this kind of stuff, this organic wildfire that, like, this is what fuels campaigns. everyone gets it. it punctures through politics. it's what, you know -- this is the kind of lightning in a bottle that campaigns home for. >> i think you nailed it, though. organic wildfire, lightning in a bottle. what happened last week with the

liberal memes about jd vance went mainstream. outside of jd vance's base, outside of the republican base, he has been branded, he has been defined as weird. whether they like it or not, recovering from that is going to be next to impossible with most americans, after what went down last week. then he just kept piling it on by not really showing an ounce of empathy and just saying, "i'm really sorry. i never would have wanted to hurt people who struggled with fertility issues. that's not what i meant. i meant i want to support families." but no, he has those sarcastic remarks that aren't even funny. he shows he can't really deliver a one-liner. >> sam, weird is the word here in terms of initial impressions from vance to the american public. >> right. >> we know why he was picked. there were some republicans who, at the time, warned trump, maybe this is not the right decision. but for trump, it was like, look, this could help me in the pennsylvania, michigan,

wisconsin trio. vance from next door in ohio. also the idea of white working class voters, populism, and perhaps that vance was going to be the maga heir apparent, as trump and his team made that pick thinking they were winning and winning big. this was their effort to run up the score. that race now has totally changed. what are you hearing? what are you and your reporters hearing in terms of second thoughts that the gop might be having? >> well, the republican party writ large, there are portions of it that look now at the pick and say, man, maybe we should have gone in a different direction. we have not heard that from the trump operation. frankly, i wouldn't totally expect it until maybe later, if things keep going this way. because it's not their position to ever sort of admit fault or doubt. often, their position is to whack back harder. they tried this week desperately. you saw all the trump surrogates and operatives trying to

redeploy the weird moiker back op democrats in a forced way. you're right, this pick was made from a sense that they were going to win. now, trump wanted to, and his operation wanted to jack up the white male vote because they felt that's how they lost in 2020 to biden. they also felt like they were going to win. one of the perils you see now is not just that jd vance has these positions that, you know, are offensive to women, although i think that's a huge peril, but in a larger sense, that he, you know, is from a different generation where you say a lot of weird things. you go into your media echo chambers. all these clips that surfaced have come from conservative media, conservative podcasts. also, he's 39. like, you know, that age of which i am part of, you know, we wrote a lot of stuff online we appropriate regret. ultimately, you know, that's hampering him. he said a lot of things, wrote a lot of stuff online, that is now

coming back to bite him. that simply would not have been the case for some of the other nominees. i sincerely doubt, for instance, that doug burgum had, like, a secret blogger vast in his file. i just don't see that happening. anyway, i think that's part of the problem here. >> sam, don't worry, you've been carefully vetting. you will not be my running mate. >> i would definitely not pass a vet. don't vet me. don't waste your time. >> no one in the party is calling for you. [ laughter ] we should note, this is how john bolton, long-time republican, how he responded to the vance comments. >> i think these comments by vance are really the 2024 the israelis have begun strikin targets. counterpart of hillary clinton's the last word i saw said that famous statement in the 2016 two people had died in those election where she called attacks. more attacks may be coming as trump's supporters deplorables. israel tries to drive home that if politicians can't learn, it's this is unacceptable. one thing to attack your we had a lower level border opponent. another thing to attack your opponent's supporters. squirmish since the day after that's not a way to win friends the october 7th strike when and influence people. i don't think vance learned the

lesson that hillary clinton, unfortunately for herself, learned in 2016. that's going to hurt trump as you get closer to the election. >> reverend sharpton, there are two things here, right, this is hezbollah began hitting israeli targets. that's been continuous. it's driven -- doing. one, this is further firing up the left, who are already enthusiasm this last week about harris. it's another thing they can point to and memeify. the thing that's so painful about this latest attack is that u.s. officials believe that it risks for republicans alien there is a settlement of the lebanon conflict, a deal that hezbollah and israel would agree to, once the gaza war ends. alienating the thin slice of voters who could go for trump. there's been a u.s. proposal on they now see a new choice. the table now for many weeks that supported, to my knowledge they see comments like this and could be really turned off by by the israeli military and them. >> they can really be turned security establishment the off, that thin slice of voters israeli defense ministry yoav that could go either way. and i think that it shows that gallant, his policies align with you're looking at a person who what president biden has been says it's sarcastic to say saying. netanyahu continues to resist. something that is outright he was in washington, rushed home after this attack on the misogynist and offensive.

to not only women but to men in druze village to be part of the this country. there's nothing car sastsarcast security discussions. that. he is the principal person who what i think it also shows is that he is really not a good is seen as on the israeli side political athlete. if you get caught saying waiting, not yet prepared to do something that is indefensible, this deal. you say, i was wrong. we'll have to see over the next i shouldn't have said that, and you try to deal with it and move few days whether there is an on. you don't try to justify it or attempt to really get the deal, act like it was just some the rest of the way. sarcastic comment that you know secretary blinken said within the 10 yard line, ten days ago, is very injurious to people. can they get the rest of that way, get the deal closed and get i think donald trump seriously the hostages home. has got a problem because this the pressure inside israel to guy is going to keep doing it. complete this and get a release when you can't own that you've of hostages is enormous. made a grievous error, you're i think president netanyahu has going to have a long three to deal with that pressure. months, donald trump, with this guy. can you imagine this guy being a as you began the segment, here foot away, a step away from we are again, at a moment when the war could become much wider being president of the united states? and he has said things like this and what it needs is a kind of and doesn't even know how to deal with it. >> really good political discussion to start us off this morning.

we will have much more as diplomatic solution the u.s. has "morning joe" rolls on. laid out and endorsed by the next, we're going to bring you the latest from israel as authorities blame hezbollah for united nations security council a missile strike that killed 12 endorsed by the g7 it needs to help and get the rest of the children and teens on a soccer distance and we'll see. field. we'll talk about the growing fears of a wider war in the the middle east adviser is traveling to the region trying region. to pin down last details of this you are watching "morning joe." we're back in just 90 seconds with that. deal. so we'll see in the next few days where he can make progress. >> coming up the third full day of olympic competition is under way at the paris games. a look at the triumphs for team usa. "morning joe" back in just a ♪♪ i have type 2 diabetes, but i manage it well. ♪♪ moment. a. "morning joe" back in just a moment ♪♪ jardiance! -it's a little pill with a ♪♪ ♪♪ big story to tell. ♪♪ ♪♪ i take once-daily jardiance ♪♪ ♪♪ at each day's staaart. ♪♪ ♪♪ as time went on it was easy to seeee, ♪♪ ♪♪ i'm lowering my a1c! ♪♪ jardiance works twenty-four seven in your body to flush out some sugar. and for adults with type 2 diabetes and known heart disease, jardiance can lower the risk of cardiovascular death, too.

serious side effects may include ketoacidosis that may be fatal, dehydration that can lead to sudden worsening of kidney function, and genital yeast or urinary tract infections. a rare, life-threatening bacterial infection in the skin of the perineum could occur. stop taking jardiance and call your doctor right away if you have symptoms of this infection, ketoacidosis, or an allergic reaction. you may have an increased risk for lower limb loss. call your doctor right away if you have symptoms of infection in your legs or feet. taking jardiance with a sulfonylurea or insulin may cause low blood sugar. ♪♪ jardiance is really swell ♪♪ ♪♪ the little pill with a big story to tell! ♪♪ welcome back. there are renewed concerns this morning of a wider war in the

middle east. as israel begins to respond to a strike on a soccer field saturday that killed 12 people, mostly children and teenagers. israel blamed the attack on the iran-backed group hezbollah. hezbollah, meanwhile, denied responsibility for the strike, which hit an israeli-controlled town in the golan heights. israel's defense forces said they hit targets deep inside lebanese territory in response. secretary of state antony blinken said at a press conference earlier today that there is every indication that the rocket used on saturday was from hezbollah and that he was deeply saddened by the loss of life there. joining us now, columnist and associate editor for "the washington post," david ignatius. david, thank you so much for being with us this morning. we know that since october 7th and those hamas terror attacks, there has been great fears that the war would widen. as terrible as things were in

gaza, that it could spread throughout the region. this seems to be now, for many, to be the moment where those fears seem to be on the brink of realization. >> so as you say, jonathan, we're again at a moment where it seems like the war, as horrific as it's been in gaza, might expand. the attack saturday on the muslim village, golan heights, killed 12 young people. the u.s. has said, both secretary blinken and the ncs, there's no question this was a hezbollah rocket, although pez hezbollah has denied it. the israelis have already begun retaliating, striking military targets. the latest report i saw said that two people had died in those attacks. i think more attacks may be coming. as israel tries to drive home

that this is unacceptable. we've had a lower level of border skirmish since the day after the october 7 strike when hezbollah began hitting israeli targets. that's been continuous. it's driven, estimates i hear, are 100,000 israelis who were living in the north from their homes. they're living other places in israel. they want to go back home, and they can't until this violence kids love summer break, but parents? well... care.com makes it easy to find background checked childcare that fits your summer schedule. from long term to short notice. give yourself a break this summer. go to care.com now. >> no application fee if you apply by august 29th at university of maryland global campus, an accredited university that's transformed adult lives for 75 years. you're not waiting to win, you're ready to succeed again at umgc.edu. exhausted. you know who else is exhausted every single player at halftime stops. the thing that's so painful of the super bowl. about this latest attack is that every one of them is exhausted. what do they do? they go out there and they do it u.s. officials believe that there is a settlement of the again. this is halftime and the contest lebanon conflict, a deal that for the future. and there's a second half coming hezbollah and israel would agree up and yeah, you have to play in to once the gaza war ends. both halves. play in both halves. there has been a u.s. proposal on the table now for many weeks that's supported, to my knowledge, by the israel military and security establishment. israel defense ministry, gallant, his policies align it is the third full day of pretty much exactly with what

olympic competition and it's president biden has been saying. under way at the paris games. prime minister netanyahu it was a scary start yesterday continues to resist. for simone biles in her paris he was just in washington. he rushed home after this attack debut. appearing to injure her calf warming up on the floor exercise on the village to be part of the during the women's gymnastics security discussions. qualifying round. despite some discomfort it did not stop her from competing. but he is the principal person who is seen as, on the israeli the seven-time olympic medalist side, waiting, not yet prepared finished atop leaderboard in the to do this deal. all around vault and floor. we'll have to see over the next few days whether there is an meanwhile, suni lee delivered a attempt to really get the deal stellar routine on the uneven the rest of the way. bars to secure her a spot in the secretary blinken had said all-around final as well. within the 10 yard line ten days elsewhere, the u.s. men's basketball team opened its run to a fifth straight gold medal ago, to get the rest of the way, get the deal closed, get the with a dominant group stage win hostages home. the pressure inside israel to over serbia. kevin durant led the scoring complete this and get a release of hostages is enormous. with 23 points in the 110-84 i think prime minister netanyahu victory. team usa added some more hardware yesterday with hailie has to deal with that pressure. but as you began this segment, here we are again at a moment

when war could become much wider. what it needs is the kind of batten in the mountain biking final since a bronze in 2012. diplomatic solution the u.s. has to the pool now the u.s. went laid out, that's been endorsed one and two in the women's by the united nations security council, that's been endorsed by 100-meter butterfly for the the g7. third time in history. it just needs to happen. american torri huske won her they need to get the rest of the first individual gold medal and distance, we'll see. gretchen walsh a close second for silver. the women's individual foil the middle east adviser is final saw lee kiefer and lauren traveling there, trying to pin down the details of this deal. scruggs become the first we'll see in the next few days americans to compete against each other in the gold medal whether he can make progress. >> david, you had a recent match with kiefer becoming the column that was fascinating, not third woman to successfully just, you know, going beyond a defend her gold medal in that cease-fire, but looking at post war planning. event. elsewhere, american tennis star you called it abraham redux. coco gauff earned a second -- a straight set victory in the first round. at the same time, you know, familiar clay courts there. the u.s. women's national soccer benjamin netanyahu has team remained undefeated completely publicly rejected any deals with the palestinian clinching a quarterfinal spot authority, you have diplomats, with a 4-1 win over germany. emiratis behind the scenes the team will play its final

working with americans and group stage match against australia coming up on trying to negotiate a palestinian authority in the wednesday. joining us now the host of pablo aftermath. can you talk about the column and what you reported? tori finds out is pablo torre, >> so it's just a truth, at least in the middle east, people are almost always going in two an olympic sized fan of these directions at once. games. >> that's right. this is a good example of that. >> let's start with a few, some noteworthy -- >> so much has happened. >> can we start with lebron james. the top adviser to prime >> i thought we were going to start with fencing? minister netanyahu, ron dermer >> i have a lot of fencing takes. saber fencing. that's on peacock. of the united states, went to >> yeah. >> fascinating. talk in detail with the emiratis and mcgurk, president biden's arguably, i digress. lebron james for people not familiar with what's been happening in basketball in the chief middle eastern adviser, world, 92, the dream team about a specific set of ideas for the day after the conflict summoned to save the u.s.'s pride because, of course, our ends. this has been the thing that college kids are being destroyed netanyahu has been least by all these international willing, really, to discuss powers. they're pros. since the war began october 7th. what's happened since then the world, we have needed a hero. there has been the pressure, where is this ending up? we've needed a hero to catch up, where are we going? a hero who may or may not be

netanyahu has generally resisted that discussion. doing a george washington crossing the delaware impression as the flag bearer leading team with the emirati's help, he was usa across the seine. discussing a plan to stabilize gaza, moving from the north to lebron james has been in the nba domestically the oldest player the south, having the in the league, and he is the best player in the world palestinian authority invite a definitively right now. series of foreign countries, you mentioned kevin durant perfect from the field. european countries, arab lebron james has been the guy saving the u.s. against south countries in the middle east, such as the uae, such as egypt, sudan in warmups. south sudan, by the way, has to take part in an international been a threat. force that would stabilize gaza, they're that good at basketball. germany and serbia against the begin to restore order and reigning arguably the best player in the world, jokic. normal life there. so the fact that he has in the uae, the country that israel he's 40 and we rely on him to be signed the abraham accords with the flag bearer and literally in 2020 under president trump, holding everybody on his back. perhaps a partner, is one of the >> the world has caught up to basketball. i didn't understand. what is going on? few hopeful things i've seen in is the u.s. team mailing it in? recent weeks and generally still >> no. >> the world is that competitive so painful, the conflict in now. >> this team -- >> did we propel them to do gaza. >> "the washington post"'s david that? what's happened? ignatius, thank you. >> with -- we did because we we, of course, will be following the latest developments out of

the middle east all morning exported basketball when all the kids were watching the dream long. coming up, the third full team, i want to compete against day of olympic competition is them. under way at the paris games. right now there are president we'll have the latest triumphs non-american nba players that for team usa. plus, new reporting on the u.s. is going to be facing. there were just nine in '92. growing tension between this is a direct effect of the international sports authorities united states in '92, michael and the u.s. over the handling jordan, magic johnson, charles of doping allegations abroad. we'll be right back with that. barkley, all those guys inspiring the next generation. it's a good problem to have except you might get embarrassed by victor wham bay yama in moving forward with node- positive breast cancer... france or jokic yesterday. ...my fear of recurrence could've held me back. lebron has been the key holding but i'm staying focused. the line the way we remember. and doing more to prevent recurrence. the u.s. beating up other verzenio is specifically for hr-positive, countries, it wasn't this way in previous cycles in between '92 her2-negative, node-positive early breast cancer... and now. >> remarkable how lebron would ...with a high chance of returning, not be considered the best as determined by your doctor player in the nba but the team when added to hormone therapy. defers to him and he's the verzenio reduces the risk of recurrence leader here. other prominent americans, versus hormone therapy alone. simone biles has a shaky diarrhea is common, olympics a couple years ago. may be severe, well documented her open about or cause dehydration or infection. at the first sign, call your doctor, her mental health challenges and start an antidiarrheal, and drink fluids. before taking verzenio, i think everyone held their

tell your doctor about any fever, chills, breath when she suffered this or other signs of infection. injury in warmups. verzenio may cause low white blood cell counts, which may cause serious infection >> let me explain what's that can lead to death. happening here. life-threatening lung inflammation can occur. simone biles is the lebron james tell your doctor about any new or worsening trouble breathing, cough, or chest pain. of gymnastics. she suffers the twisties in the serious liver problems can happen. 2021 tokyo olympics she lost her symptoms include fatigue, appetite loss, stomach pain, and bleeding or bruising. blood clots that can lead to death have occurred. sense of self in an actual like tell your doctor if you have pain or swelling physics context. in your arms or legs, shortness of breath, she would get up in the air and chest pain and rapid breathing or heart rate, lose her ability to land. or if you are nursing, pregnant, or plan to be. her confidence. so this is about as damaging as i'm focusing on what counts. talk to your doctor you can have with a about reducing your risk. psychological condition in the sport of gymnastics. what do you do when you're simone biles. you increase the difficulty. gymnastics graded not just on excuse but degree of difficulty. if you want to know how good simone biles is she's going for her sixth maneuver, sixth move to be named after her in the olympic scorebook. so this is something that no one has done in all four of the events in vault, bar, and all these things, and beam.

so for her, her ability to not subway is offering 20% off any sub, any size whooo! just pull these things off but 20% off subs is fun to say actually ratchet up how hard it 20% off subs are fun to eat is to do is what makes her you'll love 20% off subs special. so she could do things where she the point is, any sub any size. does not pull off the trick but 20% off at subway because of the degree of difficulty is so high she is not someone you can even compete with. it's an insane thing by virtue of the sport and the rules that she has dominated. it's only going higher. >> coming up, we'll bring you new reporting on the growing tension between international sports authorities and the united states over the handling of doping allegations abroad. we'll be right back with that.

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a live shot on paris. 12:38 p.m. there. 6:38 a.m. here. it is the third full day of olympic competition, and it is under way at those paris games. it was a scary start yesterday for simone biles in her paris debut, appearing to injure her calf warming up on the floor exercise during the women's gymnastics qualifying round. but despite some discomfort, it did not stop her from competing. the seven-time olympic medalist finished atop the leaderboard in the all-around, as well as number one on vault and floor. meanwhile, defending all-around champion suni lee delivered a stellar routine on the uneven bars to secure her a spot in the all-around final, as well. elsewhere, the u.s. men's

basketball team opened its run to a fifth straight gold medal with a dominant group stage win over serbia. kevin durant led the scoring with 23 points in the 110-84 victory. team usa added more hardware yesterday with hailey batten winning silver in the women's mountain biking final. this is the best ever finish in mountain biking for the u.s. and the nation's first medal in the sport since a bronze in 2012. to the pool now. the u.s. went one and two in the 100 meter butterfly for the third time in history. tori huske won her first individual gold medal, and teammate gretchen walsh finished a close second for silver. the women's individual foil final saw kiefer and scruggs ja there's controversy become the first americans to surrounding the to 23 wint -- compete against each other in the gold medal match, with 2034 games. kiefer being the third woman to the committee awarded the

successfully defend her gold convenient to salt lake city, medal in the event. elsewhere, american tennis utah. some global groups have accused star coco gauff earned a the united states government of straight set victory in the first round of the paris games. overreach citing a 2020 law that allows the justice department to familiar clay courts there. and the u.s. women's national prosecute those involved in doping scandals even for events soccer team remained undefeated taking place outside the u.s. at the olympics, clinching a we should note the next summer olympics 2028 also the u.s. in quarterfinal spot with a 4-1 win los angeles. over germany. for more, let's bring in "new the team will play the final york times" investigative group stage match against reporter michael schmidt. australia coming up on tell us a little bit more about this doping controversy. wednesday. the united states currently leads the overall medal count, >> so basically the justice but japan, so far, has won the department and fbi are most gold. joining us now, the host of investigating how the positive "pablo torre finds out" on tests of 20 chinese swimmers were handled in the lead up to meadowlark media, espn's pablo the last olympics. these swimmers tested positive torre. an olympic-sized fans of the for a heart medication and the games, pablo. >> that's right. chinese blamed the tests on >> let's start with noteworthy -- saying that this medicine had >> so much has happened. been mixed in and contaminated >> you pick where to begin. >> can we start with lebron james? >> i thought we were starting kitchen, and that's why these with fencing, no? athletes tested positive and >> i have a lot of fencing they were cleared of wrongdoing takes, jen. >> good. and secretly allowed to go to >> two hot for television, i think. >> fair enough. the olympics, even though no one that's on peacock. knew about this.

>> yeah, yeah. fascinating, arguably corrupt this is at the last olympics. there's a criminal investigation fencing is. into this. i digress. the ioc, the international lebron james, for people not familiar with what has been olympic committee, and the world happening in basketball in the world, '92, the dream team is anti-doping agency do not like this investigation. they're deeply unnerved by it. summoned to save the u.s. pride. they're trying any way they can to get leverage on the united our college kids are being destroyed by all the states and the american congress international powers and their which controls the budget for pros. wada, not the entire budget, but what's happened since then, the a significant portion of it. world has caught up. we have needed a hero. so when they have been we have needed a hero to catch up. negotiating recently with salt a hero who might or might not be lake city in giving them the bid doing a george washington for the 2034 games, they crossing the delaware impression as the flag bearer here, lebron basically convinced the local james, leading team usa across officials to work with them to help push back on these the seine. lebron james has been in the nba domestically, the oldest player congressional and justice department and fbi in the league. he is the best player in the investigations, and to try to world definitively right now. mentioned kevin durant being help them, you know, move past them in some sort of way. it was a highly unusual basically perfect from the field. lebron james saved the u.s. from maneuver, certainly one that i south suban in the warm-ups. talked to a bunch of people that germany in warm-ups. are in the anti-doping and legal now serbia against arguably the worlds had never really seen

best player in the world, nikola before, and have sort of raised the stakes of this justice jokic, the mvp. department and fbi for me, lebron james turning investigation. back the clock. 11 of the swimmers who tested he is 40. we rely on him to be the flag positive back in 2021 for this bearer metaphorically and drug are on the chinese olympic figuratively holding the world on his back. >> i didn't understand it, what team this year and are competing is going on? is the u.s. team mailing it in? and will be swimming in the pool this week. the world is actually that >> michael, the idea that there competitive now. >> yeah. this team -- is a contractual clause in the >> did we propel them to do agreement to bring the olympics that? what's happened? >> we exported basketball. to salt lake city contingent on we globalized the sport. this doping finding basically also, because when all these kids were watching the dream being repudiated or being team, they grew up and realized, i want to compete against them. potentially rebuked in a formal right now, there are 39 way, where is the accountability non-american nba players that for people wondering why is this the u.s. is going to be facing. there were just 9 of them in okay? why is the u.s. interest in '92. >> wow. >> this is a direct effect of anti-doping in such obvious the united states in '92, conflict with wada, which you michael jordan, magic johnson, would think, based on the name, charles barkley, larry bird, is also on the same page with the same set of incentives? inspiring the next generation. it is a good problem to have. >> so it's not really clear how except you might get embarrassed by someone, you know, like it's going to play out and what's going to happen in terms of who is even going to respond to the fact that this deal was

victor wembanyama in france. nikola jokic. made. congress riz -- has been sort of lebron has been holding the line in the way we remember. at the forefront ofioc for thei this is my childhood, the u.s. these positive tests. beating up on other countries. it wasn't that way in between they have already held at least one hearing to look into how the cycles. >> lebron wouldn't be considered the best in the nba, but here's tests were handled. the leader here. michael phelps testified before >> yeah. >> simone biles had a shaky olympics couple years ago. this hearing about how the -- there's a lack of confidence among athletes about the world well documented, very open about her mental health challenges. anti-doping agency, which is you know, i think everyone held supposed to ensure there's a their breath when she suffered level playing field in sports. this injury in warmups. but this deal was cut and but persevered. >> let me exchange what is announced just a few days ago. happening here. this justice department simone biles is the lebron james investigation has been going on for just a few months. of gymnastics, right? we're in the early stages of it. she suffers what's called the twisties in the 2021 tokyo and, you know, a lot of times, olympics where she lost her people that try to nest with a sense of self in an actual, justice department investigation like, physics context. in any sort of way, the justice department does not like that. she'd get up in the air and they see that as some sort of would lose her ability to land, her confidence. interference, at times. this is about as damaging as you and what the ioc and wada are can have a psychological condition in the sport of trying to do is they're trying gymnastics. so what do you do when you're to basically put the united simone biles, coming back for

the first time? states in the position of having you increase the degree of difficulty. these games, the 2034 games gymnastics is graded on not just execution but degree of difficulty. if you want to know how good taken away from the united states if the attempts to hold simone biles is, she is going for her sixth, her sixth them accountable for these positive tests and how they were maneuver, her sixth move to be handled goes forward. so, it's a -- it could be a real named after her in the olympic scorebook. so this is something that no one interesting standoff in the has done in all four of the months and certainly years to come. coming up, the governor of events, in vault, in bar, you michigan, gretchen whitmer, will be our guest. we'll talk more about her recent know, in all of these things, beam. so for her, her ability to not book and whether we might see just pull these things off but two women on the democrats' actually ratchet up how hard it ticket for the presidential is to do is what makes her nomination this fall. "morning joe" will be right back. on this fall "morning joe" will be right back special. so she could do things where she does not pull off the trick, but because the degree of difficulty is so high, she is not someone switch to shopify and sell smarter at every stage of who you can even compete with. your business. take full it is an insane thing by virtue control of your brand with your own custom store. scale faster with tools of the sport and rules, she's that let you manage every sale from every channel. dominated.

>> we opened the show on how weird is appropriate to the and sell more with the politics right now. best converting checkout some say the opening ceremony on the planet. a lot more. was weird. it struck us was french. some decided to make it a take your business to the political issue here. next stage when you switch you know, we're hearing certainly from the right, to shopify. suggesting it was even borderline blasphemous. >> any opening ceremony that culminates in celine dion performing for the first time since she was diagnosed with all of these health issues, her illnesses, i wept. i don't know if anyone else in america is brave enough to admit that i wept upon seeing celine dion singing in front of the olympic torch at the eiffel tower. look, if we want to just wag our finger at france for being super french, for having marine antoinette being played while holding her own head, followed by, you know, a heavy metal. >> it was a history lesson. >> it's like, guys, this is france. it's one thing to be, like, america, we're getting out of control. the woks are taking over. this is france! this is what they do!

i'm surprised no one was literally nude in that. we brought the olympics to paris. thank god we got celine, the catwalks, a guy in a mask running across roofs. this is kind of the best-case scenario for artistic depiction of what it means to be super french. i appreciated it as a man of, of course, great culture and also, yeah, i like escargot sometimes. i'm weird, so be it. >> french fries. >> freedom fries, jen. >> yeah. >> it's what they're called now. >> limit to how far you go there. despite the olympics only having just started, there is controversy surrounding the 2034 winter games. on wednesday, the international olympics committee formally awarded the event to salt lake city, utah. the decision sparked anger among global groups who accused the united states government of overreach. citing a 2020 law that allows the justice department to prosecute those involved in doping scandals, even for events

taking place outside the u.s. we should also note, the next summer olympics, 2028, also in the u.s., in los angeles. for more, let's bring in "new york times" investigative reporter michael schmidt. michael, tell us a little more about this doping controversy. >> basically, the justice department and fbi are investigating how the positive tests of 20 chinese swimmers were handled in the lead-up to the last olympics. they tested positive for a heart medication, and the chinese blamed the tests on saying that this medicine had been mixed in in a contaminated kitchen, and that's why the athletes tested positive. that's why they were cleared of wrongdoing and secretly allowed to go to the olympics though no one knew about it. this was the last olympics. there is a criminal investigation into this. the ioc, the international olympic committee and the world antidoping agency do not like this investigation. they're deeply unnerved by it.

they're trying any way they can to get leverage on the united states and the american congress, which controls the budget for wada. not all of it but a significant portion. while they've been negotiating with salt lake city, giving them the bid for the 2034 games, they basically convinced the local officials to work with them to help push back on these congressional and justice department and fbi investigations. to try and help them, you know, move past them in some sort of way. it was a highly unusual maneuver, certainly one that i talked to a bunch of people that are in the antidoping and legal words, had never really seen before and sort of raised the stakes of this justice department and fbi investigation. with dexcom g7, managing your diabetes just got easier. so, what's your glucose number right now? good thing you don't need a fingerstick. how's all that food affect your glucose? oh, the answers on your phone. what if you're heading low at night? wow, it can alert you?! and you can even track your goals. manage your diabetes with confidence with dexcom g7. the most accurate cgm. learn more at dexcom.com. subway is offering 20% off any sub, any size whooo! 20% off subs is fun to say 20% off subs are fun to eat you'll love 20% off subs the point is, any sub any size. 20% off at subway introducing togo's new barbecue beef sandwich. it's piled high with tender beef that's slow cooked and smothered 11 of the swimmers who tested in tangy memphis style barbecue sauce. it's no fuss, no muss. just tons of flavor. the best barbecue beef is only a togo's. introducing togo's new barbecue try one beef sandwich. it's piled high with tender beef that's slow cooked and smothered in tangy memphis style barbecue sauce. it's no fuss, no muss. just tons of flavor. the best barbecue beef is only a togo's. try one today. coming up, senator cory booker is standing by. we'll talk to him about the race positive back in 2021 for this to november and where he stands drug are on the chinese olympic on president biden's plans to dramatically reshape the supreme

team this year and are competing court. and will be swimming in the pool that conversation is straight ahead on "morning joe." at conve this week. ahead on "morning joe. >> michael, the idea that there i clause on this doping finding being repudiated or being potentially rebuked in a formal way, where is the accountability for people who are wondering why is this okay? why is the u.s. interest in antidoping in such obvious conflict with wada, which you would think, based on the name, is also on the same page with the same set of incentives? >> so it's not really clear how it's going to play out and what's going to happen in terms of who is even going to respond to the fact that this deal was made. congress has been sort of at the forefront of criticizing the world antidoping agency and the ioc for their handling of these positive tests. they have already held at least

one hearing to look into how the tests were handled. michael phelps testified before this hearing about how there is a lack of confidence among athletes with the world antidoping agency, which is supposed to ensure there is a level playing field in sports. but this deal was cut and announced just a few days ago. this justice department investigation has been going on for just a few months. we're in the early stages of it. you know, a lot of times, people that try to mess with a justice department investigation in any sort of way, the justice department does not like that. they see that as some sort of interference at times. what the ioc and wada are trying to do is they're trying to basically put the united states in the position of having these games, the 2034 games, taken away from the united states if the attempts to hold them

accountable for these positive tests and how they were handled goes forward. so it could be a real interesting standoff in the months and certainly years to come. >> we'll certainly be following it all along. "new york times" investigative reporter michael schmidt, thank you for joining us this morning. pablo, against my better judgment, let's talk baseball for a minute. >> finally. neither the yankees nor red sox playing well at the moment. credit where it is due, yankees take two out of three at fenway this weekend. >> i've been reading different back pages than you, john. seems the yankees have been pretty good. >> won two in a row. >> two in a row. basically tied in the win column with the baltimore orioles, atop the a.l. east. >> the eraser of the baltimore orioles on this television show. >> should have put them away when the yankees slumped. >> it is outrageous. >> jen, clinging to just a slim one-game lead -- >> it's a lead, pablo!

they're in first place i. don't understand that. >> it is very good. except i believe is america is healing. yes, we have olympic scandals with salt lake city. yes, we have all sorts of corruption everywhere else. yes, things are weird in lots of ways. but, to me, this is my childhood. the yankees climbing back into a position of leadership. pulling off big trades. jazz chisholm, john, i like him. could use the help. >> there has been a flurry of -- >> he played in this game. >> he did play in the game. that's what we'll say about his contribution. >> that's right. >> he played in this game. sam stein, i'm going to -- throw me a lifeline as a fellow red sox fan. >> come on, your backup now? >> let's talk about, look, the sox have come out of the all-star break, i believe losing six out of eight. they're very much in the wild card race but trending in the wrong direction quickly. what can be done? >> well, the front office needs to do something. i mean, we're kind of sitting on our hands. we need bullpen help badly, a

bat badly. last couple seasons we've done nothing at the trade deadline. seems ownership doesn't want to spend too much money. they have long-term ambitions for the prospects. look, i mean, we didn't expect much from the season from the red sox. yankees may be right there, but they've not played inspiring ball. let's be honest about it. they're probably dusting for a first round exit from the playoffs again, which is how this is going to go. we probably won't make the playoffs. i'm feeling dedespondent, i hav to be honest. >> the front office doomed the team. see if they do it again. >> pablo torre, despite the yankee talk, thank you for joining us. >> pleasure, as always. we'll hear how swing voters in wisconsin, of course a key state in november's election, feel about a range of issues, including abortion rights. we'll have the latest from elise jordan's focus groups ahead on "morning joe."

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i want to be nice. they all say, i think he's changed. i think he's changed since two week ago. something affected him. no, i haven't changed. maybe i've gotten worse, actually, because i get angry at the incompetence i witness every single day. welcome back to "morning joe." it is monday, july 29th. i'm jonathan lemire in for joe,

mika, and willie. elise jordan, jen palmieri, and the reverend al sharpton also with us as we come up on 7:00 a.m. on the east coast. reverend sharpton, there is nothing more predictable than some of the media coverage after the assassination attempt, saying that donald trump was going to change. this would be a kinder, softer, gentler trump. those of us like you who has known him and covered him a long time scoffed at the idea. donald trump now scoffing at that idea. >> he isclearly scoffing at it, and he is living up to him being unchangeable. he has definitely not only not changed, i think in some ways, he's gotten worse. worse in the sense of his kind of statements that are divisive, that are misogynistic in terms of the vice president who is now his opponent, and in terms of his acting bizarre. i mean, some of the things that

he is saying just really doesn't make sense. i think that there should be real concern by those in the republican party about what he's going to say when he walks out on the stage. we have no idea. here's a party that tried to act as though president biden is some way out of touch with reality. donald trump has made a far more convincing case he's not only out of touch with reality, he is incapable of trying to return to it. >> also deeply frustrated by the changing nature of this race. on that point, vice president kamala harris's popularity appears to be on the rise. according to an ipsos poll, 43% view harris favorably, compared to 42% who view her unfavorably. last week, that same poll had

her favorability at 35%. that's a big jump. meanwhile, donald trump's favorability stands at 36% at 40% the week before. 52% view trump unfavorable. a week after biden dropped his re-election bid, trump continues to focus a large portion of his public comments on his former opponent. >> you know, we lost a candidate recently, crooked joe biden. and i thought we lost this wonderful person. you know, he is actually a terrible human being if you want to know the truth, so don't feel sorry. he's the worst human being. i sort of made an analogy last night. think of this. i was speaking in front of a very powerful and very strong, very religious group, christian group, christians, evangelicals, christians. then today, i come in front of

bitcoin. now, i'm going to minnesota to do a rally. you think my life is so great, don't you, huh? but i cover a lot of territory. i go from religion to bitcoin to a rally. and i don't get it mixed up like other people do. six days ago, we officially defeated the worst president in the history of the united states. i believe he was the worst president in the history of the united states. we're beating them, beating them badly, and we have to make sure that we do. we need to do it for our country. you can't just be a fighter and have your man lose the fight, or woman. in this case, a man. he is losing the fight. he is down by 15, 16, 17 points. they say that, you're not going to win, joe. you have to get out. he didn't want to get out. he said, i'm not getting out. said, you're getting out. he said, i'm not getting out. i have 14 million votes. i'm not getting out. they said, if you're not getting

out, we're going to institute the 25th amendment on your mental competence. he said, like i said before, i think i'm going to get out. okay? they got him out. >> we'll note that there has been no confirmation whatsoever of any discussions using the 25th amendment to remove president biden, but there were, however, reported discussions about using that amendment against former president trump after the 2020 election. joining us now, special correspondent at "vanity fair," gabriel sherman. his piece has the title, "how trump world is coping with the kamala harris boom." gabriel, good to see you. there's no doubt that, at least in this first week or so, trump world seems off balance, not quite sure what to make of facing a new opponent. >> yeah. >> tell us more about what you learned. >> thank you, jonathan. really what i found striking is the campaign made it very clear to me that, internally, they had been planning for weeks for joe biden to exit this race, that

they were trying to play this that it wasn't a surprise. yet, when joe biden did exit the race, they really had no playbook for how to go on the offensive against kamala harris. i think that really speaks to the fact that trump world did not expect the democratic party to rally around kamala harris with the speed and loyalty that they did. really, by kamala locking up the party's support, left trump, the trump campaign, flat footed. i keep getting word from sources close to the president that say, just wait, we haven't defined her yet. we're now more than a week into this two-person race now, and i'm thinking to myself, why haven't you rolled out that plan if you're going to define your opponent? you'd think they'd be doing it aggressively. as you showed in the last clip, here's donald trump contining to talk about joe biden who is no longer in this race. >> gabe, what i see happening is they are -- you know, the republicans are putting memes

out about her. they're launching videos about her. but they are finding that they're not making democrats nervous and they're not landing with the same -- you know, even maybe six weeks ago, i think, memes about the vice president talking about what her mom said, did you fall out of a coconut tree, they were received in a different way. oh, it's a little odd. we're not sure about that. it was like not -- it was not embraced the way it is now. what i see happening that's different is that democrats so much have her back, it's almost the same kind of response you'd get, like in 2015 when other republicans would attack trump, and his base would be like, we like that about him, right? >> yeah. >> you see that democrats are having her back. so do you think that it's not that they don't have a plan, it's just that it's not working? >> well, i think clearly, that is, you know, that is clearly partly the case.

you know, they expect some of jd vance's attacks to land, and his rollout has been rocky. there's been reporting of private grumbling amongst republicans that maybe his pick was not the right choice. really, i think the trump campaign is banking on one thing. they're trying to run the 2016 playbook, which is they want to turn out working class, unlikely voters, white voters, rust belt state voters. they keep telling me, the campaign stresses to me that jd vance is part of this plan to run up the count in these midwestern industrial states. all of this talk about kamala harris, you know, the favorability, the little kamala harris boomlet we're seeing, they're trying to spin it that they're not worried about that. clearly, these new polls this morning show that they should be worried. this is a fundamentally different presidential campaign. >> gabe, i mean, jd vance's numbers -- >> good morning. >> -- his favorability in ohio is lower there than in other

parts of the country. what are you hearing from trump world? are they regretting the decision to have jd vance attached to donald trump? you look at what happened last week. kamala harris wasn't defined. jd vance was defined. >> yeah. it's funny. the intensity of the pushback i've gotten to this conversation about was jd vance a mistake, should he be replaced, you know, the campaign called it fake news of the highest order. they really pushed back on that reporting when i looked into it. i'd heard private grumbling from my sources about it. i think that's the case of one doth protest too much. they're trying to say, no, no, everything is fine. nothing to see here. but if everything was fine, we wouldn't be having this conversation. i don't think this was how the first week of jd vance's rollout was supposed to go. clearly, it's a long campaign. i think also, guys, this speaks to a larger point. jd vance was really created inside of the right-wing media echo chamber.

he has not been exposed to a broad national audience. so within trump world, he was this rising star, this celebrity candidate. when you expose him to the daylight of a national campaign, people say, wait a minute, this stuff is weird. i mean, this is right-wing meme talk. this is not how to bring a country together. i think that's partly what you're seeing here, is that he is now exposed to a very different media environment than he has been as a senator and as a celebrity author. >> lots of worry on the right so far. as for harris, pick of running mate expected to come in the next ten days or so. the new piece is online for "vanity fair," special correspondent gabe sherman. thank you for joining us this morning. the republican party has long been the party of choice for america's evangelicals. since the emergence of donald trump, the blending of religion and politics has reached new heights. a new piece in "the atlantic"

headlined, "lord, help us make america great again," takes a deep dive into the prayers given at the beginning of trump rallies and analyzing why america's religious right is firmly behind donald trump. joining us now, the author of the piece, staff writer at "the atlantic," mckay coppins. you've covered this so expensively throughout your career, and you write in this new piece, "trump supporters attribute america's fall from grace to a variety of national sins, old and new, prayer bans in public schools, illegal immigration, pro-transgender policies, the purported rigging of a certain recent election. whatever the specifics, the picture of america they paint is almost universally, biblically, bleak. the premise of all of these prayers is that america's covenant can be reestablished, and its special place in god's kingdom restored if the nation repents and turns back to him.

ryan burge, a baptist minister and political scientist, told me that these ideas have long percolated on the religious right. what's new is how many christians now seem convinced that god has anointed a specific leader who, like those prophets of old, is prepared to defeat the forces of evil and redeem the country. and that leader is running for president." mckay, that's an excerpt from your piece. it remains the unlikeliest of marriages, the evangelicals and donald trump. those bonds, though, seem to have only grown stronger. tell us where we are in the middle of 2024. >> yeah, you know, like you said, i have been covering the trump campaign for a long time. i've attended more than 100 trump rallies over the course of my career. and the premise of this piece was that the prayers that are given at the beginning of these campaign events don't often get that much journalist ache

attention. we focus on what trump is saying. but they provide an interesting and revealing insight into the religious right's attitude toward trump. one of the evolutions that you see in these prayers, and we ended up compiling 58 of them since trump launched his most recent campaign, and the idea was to kind of examine the theological motifs. one of the things you really see is that in 2016, the way that you heard conservative evangelicals talk about trump was that he was like cyrus the great, who was a 6th century b.c. persian king who liberated the israelites from babylonian captivity. the idea was he was an unlikely vessel. he is not a believer himself, but he is going to help us do god's will. you don't see that language in these prayers anymore. you see him being compared to righteous, prophetic heros. that he is not only somebody who

is kind of a tool in god's hand, but that he is godly and righteous himself. in fact, in many of these prayers, the stakes of the election are really ratcheted up to the point where trump is considered, you know, the representative of the forces of good, and joe biden, kamala harris, are the forces of evil. so you really see the way that the election is being framed in these prayers as an example of how the stakes of the election have come to feel so kind of biblically, apocalyptically high for so many americans. >> mckay, what caught my eye about your article is exactly what you just talked about. because we saw 20, 25 years ago, the moral majority, and many right-wing candidates would be shaped by the moral majority and adjust themselves to that. then you saw trump earlier, this

was a sinner but that god was going to use. how did we get from there to now, where he is the incarnation of what god wants right now? it's like the whole christian right has almost abandoned what they are standing for to make it fit trump, rather than make trump fit them. >> yeah. >> how did that happen? >> it's such an important distinction. you know, i will say, i came into this piece as person of faith. i say prayers every day. i pray for our government leaders. i think it is totally appropriate to pray for political leaders of both parties. but the distinction you just made is important. praying our political leaders will be guided by god, that they will have character and make wise and righteous decisions is different from the premise that a lot of these prayers start from. which is that trump is already righteous. i shared these prayers with a handful of scholars and theologians. one of them said to me, you know, nobody in these prayers

seems to pray that trump will do right by god. everybody prays that god will do right by trump. i think that the evolution that's happened is that a lot of these people who is donald trump's most devout religious supporters are, you know, living not only inside of their faith, they're not only going to church, they're living inside this kind of right-wing media ecosystem where donald trump is presented as an infallible hero, right? if you believe that, if you believe that trump is righteous, that everything he does is de facto good, it is impossible to see anything that happens in this campaign that goes the wrong way as anything other than the work of the devil. >> mckay, i have been to a lot of -- not 100, but a lot of trump rallies, and i'm glad you did this because i had the same reaction about the prayers at the beginning are apocalyptic.

in north charleston, "we're fighting the enemy from the gates of hell, led by the leaders, joe biden and kamala harris." saying the other ticket is coming from the gates of hell and it is this holy war. just to paint the picture, you hear that followed probably by the january 6th choir, right, singing the national anthem. then the former president of the united states talking about pardoning jan 6th prisoners. what is, if you imagine a loss for this ticket, you know, what do these rallies and the religious and the prayers sort of sowing in the crowd of the supporters. >> what you're getting at, i think, is what was rattling around in my mind studying the prayers. of course, if you believe this

election is a battle between good and evil and that god is on your side, if your side loses, you have to believe that something is amiss, right? it plants the seeds of conspiracy theory. it plants the seeds of election denialism. you know, certainly, i was thinking about that as i was reviewing these prayers. but i'll say that i'm almost just as concerned as what happens if trump wins. i quote toward the end of the piece from a prayer that was given in iowa, where the pastor who is praying promises righteous retribution if donald trump is re-elected against those who would seek to do evil. again, you know, i think that both sides can be guilty of ratcheting up the stakes of any given election to be too high, but this is an example of where if you believe that, again, god is on your side, it becomes very risky that you believe that a win is not only an electoral

mandate, but a divine mandate to do whatever you want. so i do think that we need to think about that and keep that in the back of our minds as we're looking at some of the rhetoric coming out of the trump campaign. >> yeah, it is really important reporting. it's online now for "the atlantic." staff writer mckay coppins, thank you for joining us this morning. >> thank you. still ahead here on "morning joe," michigan governor gretchen whitmer will be our guest ahead of an event in pennsylvania this morning. she'll be campaigning for vice president kamala harris amid speculation that she's being considered as a possible running mate. but first, we'll have more from elise jordan's focus groups in battleground wisconsin. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. no, my denture's uncomfortable!

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sharing some of the audio on social media. >> okay, look. here's the situation. let's say roe versus wade is overruled. ohio bans abortion, you know, in 2022. let's say 2024. then, you know, every day, george soros sends a 747 to columbus, loading up disproportionately black women to have abortions in california. the left will celebrate this as a victory for diversity. >> how is -- >> yes. >> working to extort working class black people. >> it could be a weird turn of events that could happen, yes. >> if that happens, do you need some federal response to prevent it from happening? it's really creepy. and, you know, i'm pretty sympathetic to that, actually. >> so many dog whistles there. nbc news reached out to the vance campaign earlier this month about the remark, but it

declined to comment. now, since being nominated for vice president, the ohio senator has aligned himself more closely with donald trump on the issue, saying that abortion rights should be left up to the states to decide. elise, you have more from the focus groups you conducted in wisconsin and on this issue, in particular. tell us more about what they said. >> to set the scene, i'd like to point out the importance of focus groups, using the candidates's policies, messages, to win elections, you have to understand the voters. the goal isn't to argue with the participants and get them to think how you think, but it is to create an environment where they can air their views honestly. and so wisconsin, swing state central, purple state, equally divided, dems, republicans. it's often decided by fewer than 30,000 votes in the last six elections. we did extensive research to find sample sets of voters, including right-leaning, undecided voters in green bay.

so this subset, it's likely that the presidential candidate who wins, 60% of this group will win the state. among them, abortion rights are critical and potentially decisive issue. let's hear part of that conversation now with right-leaning undecided voters in wisconsin. >> abortion rights as something that's very important for you. how much does that weigh in on your vote, on the rest of your vote when you're considering who to vote for? >> it weighs in a lot. i mean, just because my daughters are very concerned about their rights. as they're getting older and of child-bearing age, it really concerns them. my youngest daughter is very concerned about that. >> so i have quite a few years in women's health care background. i would not be here if it wasn't for a medical abortion that was needed, but that conversation happened between myself and a provider. now that roe verse wade isn't

necessarily here, is that something that would be available for me? i think about that very, very heavily now that i have a daughter. if she's ever in that same situation, is she going to die? that weighs super heavy. it isn't just your, this is my choice, and they took that away. >> donald trump chose a running mate, jd vance, who is very anti-reproductive rights. does that selection make you less likely to vote for donald trump? >> yes and no. i don't know. i will say because i haven't done my due diligence to truly know about him, about jd vance. everything looks great on paper until i think i've heard more about him speaking. i think he was a wild curveball out of the side. i was like, let's listen to him speak some more. yes, it definitely impacts it to where i'm like, oh.

>> jen, you're a political campaign pro. what do you make of what you just heard from those undecided voters? >> i mean, these are not undecided voters, right? you said they were right-leaning. >> well, they voted for biden in 2020. >> but had voted republican in the past. >> mm-hmm. >> it's so rare that you have a political issue that gets to, like, that is truly existential. you know, that woman herself said she had a medical abortion that saved her life. then when you have jd vance saying, not just saying that, you know, he opposes abortion rights, but that they need to consider federal legislation to ban women from being able to travel outside of their own state to get this kind of care, you know, that is -- this is like a true existential health issue for women. then when you have -- you know, all these things are happening at once.

you have jd vance. you have the footage of him saying we can't be concerned -- we need federal legislation to deal with women who want to, you know, control their own lives and leave their state to get the health care their need. that's coming along at the same time he is talking about childless cat ladies. >> yes. >> at the same time that the democrats have put forward an incredible, strong, female candidate, right? it's like, we had the two older white men on top of the ticket. you know, the abortion rights sort of, like, simmering as a major issue. then when one, you know -- when the democrats changed their candidate to this younger woman and you have, still have from the right all of, you know, trump and vance piling on about abortion rights, i just -- i think it's the combination of the two things that makes it -- that makes the abortion rights issue, i think, all the more

potent. like, we do not need to put up with this. >> harris, of course, a younger woman, but also someone who speaks very forcefully on this issue, in a way that president biden simply never could. >> right. she calls them trump abortion bans, which is what we should call them. 6-week ban in texas or florida. they're trump-abortion bans because he made it possible, and he is proud he did it. >> after the dobbs decision, abortion rights basically undefeated on the ballot, including in deep red states, not just battleground. we'll have more from elise's focus groups later this morning. up next, democratic congresswoman abigail spanberger of virginia joins us on the heels of jd vance visiting her state. "morning joe" will be right back. 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. why do couples choose a sleep number smart bed? can it keep me warm when i'm cold? go to care.com now to find

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trump the trying to paint kamala harris as a liberal. of her potential running mates, you might have the most progressive record as governor. i know you were more of a moderate when you were in the house, but you've legalized recreational marijuana, lgbtq protections expanded, low income minnesotans have been helped, free lunch and breakfast for students. does it fuel trump's attacks as you being a big government liberal? >> what a monster. kids are eating and having full bellies to learn. women are making their own health care decisions. we're a top five business state.

and we also rank in the top three of happiness. look, they're going to label whatever their going to label. he's going to roll it out, mispronounce names, you know, to try to make the case. the fact of the matter is, where you see the policies that vice president harris was a part of making, democratic governors across the country executed those policies and quality of life is higher. the economies are better. all of those things, educational attainment is better. yeah, my kids are going to eat here, and you'll have a chance to go to college. you're going to have an opportunity to live where we're working on reducing carbon emissions. oh, and by the way, you're going to have personal incomes that are higher. you're going to have health insurance. if that's where they want to label me, i'm more than happy to take the label. >> minnesota governor tim walz who passed progressive reforms in his state, defending his record amid reports he's a potential running mate for harris. meanwhile, polling from

pennsylvania shows a dead heat between vice president harris and former president trump. according to the latest numbers from fox news, both candidates have the support of 49% of registered voters in the keystone state. the previous fox poll dating back from april also showed the race tied between trump and president biden. in terms of favorability, the josh shapiro is significantly more popular than any other political figure in pennsylvania. 61% have a favorable view of shapiro, considered for harris's running mate. 49% for harris. 41% view biden favorability. jd vance is at the bottom of the list with 38%, saying they have a favorable view of him. part of the trump campaign's thinking was vance is from neighboring ohio and would do well, particularly in western pennsylvania. those numbers anyway aren't bearing that out.

if pennsylvania is the most important state on the map, this certainly adds to josh shapiro's case to be harris's running mate. joining us now, democratic congresswoman abigail spanberger of virginia. she is a member of the house intelligence committee, former cia officer, and candidate for governor there. thank you for joining us. the person who had the lowest favorability numbers on that list, jd vance, just paid a visit to your state. the trump campaign, at least when president biden was top the ticket, thought virginia could be in place. they think that still is the case. give us your sense of where things stand. >> thank you so much for having me on. i've been out and about across my district and across the greater commonwealth. what i'm hearing on the ground is a lot of excitement. excitement about a future. excitement about the harris candidacy. excitement about taking affirm

ty st affirmative steps forward to protect things like abortion rights, to ensure protections of our health care systems, to avoid ever coming close to enacting the dangerous and terrible policies that the trump/vance administration would push through project 2025. and so i think virginians know what's at stake. we're going to get out to the polls, and we're going to vote here in the commonwealth for vice president harris to become president. and the reality is that, you know, with so many federal employees, we know what's at stake when it comes to the proposals, the detrimental proposals within project 2025. across virginia, we are the last bastion of abortion access in the south. we know what's at stake when women's rights are under attack. i think for so many of us who heard senator vance's egregious statements related to access to

abortion rights, certainly his egregious attacks on women who don't have children, the contrast is a clear one. we know what it was like under a trump presidency, and we can go back there when our health care was under attack, pre-existing conditions protections were under attack, or we can go forward, where we have a presidential candidate with an affirmative vision, a strong record of getting things done, but an affirmative vision for protecting our rights and for enacting good policy moving into the future. >> congresswoman, i've been in a lot of discussions with former richmond mayor dwight jones about how even those that may have a different view on abortion as their personal choice, feel that people should have the choice. but they're frightened by this, what you talked about already, project 2025. talk about how the threat even among those that may be more

conservative, the threat they feel when they feel like we're going into an undemocratic, states rights kind of model that we thought was resolved in the civil war, which really has -- is where project 2025 would bring us back to. >> absolutely. on the issue of abortion, you know, i'm a mother with three daughters. recognizing that i had more rights in the event that, you know, i had faced difficult pregnancies or my life had been endangered, as is the case with far too many women during the course of their pregnancy. the idea that women who are facing true health care risks, risks to their health and safety, risks to their pregnancy, are forced to go to other states and, you know, frankly, many are coming to virginia, to be able to have conversations with medical

providers about their future, about their ability to, you know, certainly continue a pregnancy that might have problems along the way, or to protect their fertility into the future. when we look at this, you know, 900-page road map that is project 2025, for all of the ways that a trump/vance campaign and ultimately administration would degrade the very function of government, i mean, everything from taking the folks who work in the federal government, right, experts, scientists, people who have devoted their lives to understanding agriculture across the country, right, under usda, the fact that they would take these public servants with significant expertise, who work in non-partisan roles, and transfer those jobs to appointment positions, basically taking them out of that non-partisan expertise realm and jeopardizing the livelihoods of,

you know, thousands and thousands of virginians. when we look at the fact that project 2025 outlines the desire to just do away with the department of education, you know, i think people across the political spectrum, and certainly i represent a toss-up district, represent a lot of folks across the idealogical spectrum, many who voted for many, many who did not, i'm hearing a great nervousness, concern about what project 2025 would do. because the upheaval is significant and the plans in terms of how this road map would just change the very function of our government is clear to so many voters wherever they are across the political spectrum. >> democratic congresswoman ab igalil spanberger, thank you for joining us this morning. >> thank you for having me. president biden is out with a new op-ed in "the washington post" that outlines his plan to reform the supreme court and

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d.c., 7:48 a.m. there. president biden is pushing forward with his plans to reform the supreme court in the wake of several controversial decisions and rock bottom approval ratings for the highest court in the land. later today, the president will travel and then speak at the lyndon b. johnson presidential library in austin, texas, to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the civil rights act. during the speech, biden is expected to call for three reforms to the supreme court. they include no immunity for crimes a former president committed in office, term limits for supreme court justices, and a binding code of conduct for the court. reverend al sharpton, you're going to be traveling with the president today, heading to texas to attend that event at the lbj library. there has been appetite on the left for many years to have supreme court reform in the wake of some of its controversial decisions, and then it really

broke through just in the last month or so with this ruling on immunity. the president calling for 18-year terms for supreme court justices, saying that every president should get to appoint them. what do you make of this proposal, which certainly a long shot to be enacted, but could start perhaps building momentum toward something? >> i think it will definitely give momentum to many of us that wanted to see supreme court reform. i think him doing it at the lbj library and dealing with it on the 60th anniversary of the civil rights act, at a time that we are dealing with project 2025 that would undercut a lot of those acts, it makes it a historic day. and i think that it will become an issue, supreme court reform, in thiselection. and i'm honored to be invited to go with the president, along with the head of the congressional black caucus to accompany him on air force one

to this speech as well as he's going to go and view the congresswoman sheila jackson lee, laying in state in houston, texas, starting today. i think it's a historic trip and i think joe biden, given his civil rights records, the things he stood up for as president as the george floyd executive order to his fighting against making sure that with the inflation reduction act and infrastructure act, included those blacks that had not been given contract, not had their areas considered with infrastructure redevelopment, i think he's the president that ought to be doing it at the lbj library. it's the right place, right time, right president. >> certainly an appropriate for this president and his legacy, comes at the backdrop of a black woman atop, the head of the democratic ticket, and vice president kamala harris, on another matter, she called the family of sonya massey on friday.

massey, you recall, was fatally shot by police in her illinois home after she called them for fear there was a prowler outside. body camera footage released last week shows deputy shawn grayson opening fire after massey moved a pot off her stove. grayson has been fired and indicted on charges of first-degree murder. he has pleaded not guilty. massey's family tells nbc news that the call from harris was welcomed and emotional. it's made me feel a lot better today, said james will byrne, massey's father. she gave us her heartfelt condolences and let us know she is with us 100% that this senseless killing must stop. a cousin of sonya massey said harris' call moved her deeply. that call meant the world to my family right now, she said. i mean, it definitely broke every last one of us down. out of all the phone calls, all

the thousands and thousands of messages and phone calls and inboxes, this one here really meant the world to our family. reverend sharpton, you have been in touch with the family. what more can you tell us about how they're doing and the state of this investigation? >> well, i can tell you that they are outraged and i think that i talked to the father, and the father and attorney ben crump and i are having a rally for the family in chicago tomorrow night. reverend marshal hatch at the new -- at the church in -- on the west side. i think it is important to understand that this officer was in his sixth assignment. had gone to six different jobs in law enforcement. which if we passed the george floyd act he couldn't have done. he had been complained. he did this in four years. to have six different

jurisdictions and departments you work for, six in four years, is outrageous. he's been charged, but that does not mean he will be convicted and the reforms that need to be had. i think this president -- this family wants to have a justice that would be also reforming how we do policing. they met with the governor there and we're going to be there with them tomorrow night in chicago. she left two children. we want to make sure those children are cared for. we want to show that the whole slogan of it takes a village to raise a child, it takes a village to help save some children and we're going to start that with that family tomorrow night in chicago. >> reverend al sharpton we appreciate it. thank you for being with us today. safe travels. >> thank you. turning to another important story secretary of state antony blinken says the united states has, quote, serious concerns regarding the announced result out of venezuela that long-time president nicolas maduro has won

re-election with 51% of the vote. that announcement made by venezuela's electoral commission came six hours after the polls were supposed to close and the opposition had already said they'd secured an overwhelming victim. speaking in tokyo secretary blinken said the united states is concerned that the result announced does not reflect the will or the votes of the venezuelan people. elise jordan, certainly an important moment here. what do you think happens next? >> well that is not a free and fair election result, okay. we should just note that for all the discussion in our country, that's what it really looks like. what happens next is going to be more unrest and turmoil and interesting to see what the international community led by secretary blinken can do to, you know, try to right track this. i'm not that optimistic. >> a lot of expectations many venezuelans will try to flee the country in the wake of what's happening here now. we'll bring you the latest on

israel's retaliatory strikes following hezbollah's deadly attacks on civilians. "morning joe" is coming right back. t back anything with a th? they threw three thick things. sixth, like fourth, fifth, and then sixth. or you mean what's really hard emotionally to say? yeah, like that. oh... um... goodbye. i forgive you. i was wrong. for me, it's saying i love you, but that's tough to say in any language. why do couples choose a sleep number smart bed? i need help with her snoring. sleep number does that. thank you. save 40% on the sleep number limited edition smart bed. plus free home delivery on select smart beds when you add an adjustable base. shop now

i. it's true these guys are just weird. >> it is. >> they're running for he man women haters club or something. that's not what people are interested in. >> this is not our living room, but we're using this fake living room to talk to you about a

super weird idea from jd vance. >> it's quite weird. >> i think donald trump, i know him, and he's probably sitting and watching the tv and every day vance comes out vance has done something more extreme, more weird, more erratic. >> you may have noticed donald trump has been resorting to some wild lies about my record and some of what his running mate is saying is just plain weird. >> democrats describing republicans with what was the word of the week, weird. both candidates were ons on the campaign trail over the weekend with donald trump making a pitch to a crowd of conservative voters. meanwhile, trump's running mate continues to defend his remarks on childless cat ladies. we'll show you how jd vance decided to double down. and we'll bring you the latest from the middle east where there

are growing fears of a wider conflict following a deadly attack in israel by hezbollah. and also ahead, an update on the paris games including injury scare for one of team usa's most decorated athletes. good morning. welcome to "morning joe." it is monday, july 29th. i'm jonathan lemire. joe and mika continue their vacation this week and they'll pop back on in the event of any breaking news. willie that lucky guy is on assignment at the olympics in paris and we will check in with him at various points during the week. but with us this morning, we do have msnbc political analyst elise jordan, she is a former aid to the george w. bush white house and state department, former white house director of communications to president obama jennifer palmieri, president of the national action network and host of msnbc's "politics nation" the reverend al sharpton, managing editor at the bulwark, sam stein. so let's get started.

a lot to get to. busy news morning. we have now passed the 100-day mark until the november election, and the kamala harris campaign says it raised over $200 million in its first week with the majority of donations coming from first-time donors. there is a real surge of volunteers with over 170,000 signing up in a single week. the campaign held what it called a weekend of action, sending its top surrogates like vp contender and pennsylvania governor josh shapiro out on the campaign trail. as for donald trump, well, on friday night, he addressed christian voters at the turning point action believer summit in west palm beach, florida, where he tried out some new attacks on vice president harris. >> she was a bum three weeks ago. she was a bum. a failed vice president and a failed administration with millions of people crossing and

she was the border czar. now they're trying to say she never was the border czar, had nothing to do with the border. she was the border czar. but if radical liberal kamala harris gets in -- and by the way there are numerous ways of saying her name -- they were splaining to me you can say kamala. doesn't matter what i say. i couldn't care less if i mispronounce it or not i couldn't care less. some people think i mispronounce it on purpose but actually i've heard it said about seven ways. there are a lot of ways. there are a lot of ways. >> trump then held a rally in saint cloud, minnesota, the next day, saturday, where he is already claiming election fraud months before any americans have even cast their votes. >> if they don't cheat we win this state easily. okay. they cheat. they have no shame. they cheat. do you understand that you crooked people? the most crooked. they cheat.

they cheated in the last election. they're going to cheat in this election. we're going to get them. >> so jen, obviously it's inherently offensive to not bother to learn how to pronounce someone's name and trump and many of his allies do this consistently, but that right there, that's dangerous. we have seen this before. he has laid the groundwork months in advance of any voting to suggest that the only way he can lose will be that if it were rigged. >> he does seem pretty nervous, right. when he's saying it isn't -- he's always projecting doesn't matter how you pronounce her name, you know he's pretty worried about her. there was -- there was those comments about saying that the only way he's going to lose is if it's rigged and we know what that brought us last time around. also, if i were the harris campaign, the comments he made a few days ago where he said to -- before to addressing christians, so presumably these are, you

know, politically conservative evangelical voters that after four years not going to have to vote again because he's going to have done everything they could have imagine to want to have happened, talk about doubling down on an extreme test agenda, project 2025, i think that that is a big opening for the harris campaign and that's what i would drive this week. >> so sam, let's talk about what we're seeing, that anxiety from republicans. it does seem like for the first time in a long time donald trump's not the central news story in a campaign. obviously, we spent a long time talking about president biden and his age, whether he could continue, but here we are, one on one, trump seems overshadowed by democratic good news, by the enthusiasm on the other side and there seems to be a lot of anxiety from his campaign, from other republicans, about just how they're responding. at this point in how they're faltering in their response. >> i think a few things are happening here.

one is, he's being overshadowed which i don't think sits particularly well with trump who likes to be the center of attention. two is, the money can't be overstated. raising $200 million in grassroots donations over the course of the week is unheard of. i think that if you're the trump people and if you're republicans, that's something to be very concerned about because that money is just going to keep going. third is i think the rollout of jd vance has been rough. i just think objectively it has not been what they've wanted. he's kind of become meme ified already and my colleague captured in his piece, look at how they're responding to this kamala harris boom is that trump's kind of used politics as downstream from culture. he, obviously, is a product of tv, and he was able to manipulate that and use that to become a political figure.

i think what he sees in harris' rise is she's become agricultural phenomenon and that's difficult for him to process and deal with because it can be very politically potent and it's causing them to have difficulty adjusting. you know, they plan the whole campaign around biden and now they have to revampp it around harris. it's not like you can just attack her as a traditional liberal, which they're going to do, you have to attack her on a variety of fronts because she's becoming a cultural phenomenon too. >> to say that jd vance's rollout has been rough is kind there, sam. we'll have much more on that in a little bit. >> kind, okay. >> it's a very generous way to start the week, i suppose. we're going to get more to that in a minute. we want to bring you the moment that jen referenced where trump told that group of religious conservatives in florida that if he were to be elected president this november they will never need to vote again. >> and again, christians, get out and vote! just this time.

you won't have to do it anymore. four more years, you know what, it will be fixed. it will be fine. you won't have to vote any more my beautiful christians. i love you christians. i love you. get out. you got to get out and vote. in four years you don't have to vote again. we'll have it fixed so good you're not going to have to vote. >> a spokesperson for trump's campaign released a statement on saturday trying to clarify the comments, providing that former president was talking about uniting this country and bringing prosperity to every american. we can fact check that. reverend sharpton, let's get you on this. there are a couple interpretations of what trump meant. one is what we floated the idea that because i'm going to give you everything you need the next four years, don't bother showing up. that for many sets off alarm bells. or this idea that maybe we won't have any more elections four years. there's some democrats who warn that's what trump meant.

his campaign pushed back against that idea as well. talk to us about what you saw there, and how worried are you? >> i'm very concerned. first of all, if you take either interpretation, there are justification which doesn't really land well, or those that fear what he meant what he said and said what he meant, it's a danger to this country. if he's saying he's going to give the far right christians what they want, it is frightening at best. and if, in fact -- let's remember, he said twice, jonathan, we're going to fix it. well, if you are dealing in a climate where they're trying in some states to stop drop-off -- dropbox for voting, where they're trying to limit early voting, i mean, fix it can mean exactly what they're doing in many states. changing a lot of the voting regulations, changing a lot of the voting access, and i think

that he said out loud what he intends to do. he intends to set a situation working with the right wing governors to where voting will not matter. he will have it fixed. he said it. i see where his campaign is trying to clean it up. they didn't address him saying fix it. we're going to fix it. he said it twice. >> elise, let's talking about the split screen. on the democratic side no doubt a lot of enthusiasm. some of this could be the honeymoon phase. vice president harris only on the ticket the presumptive nominee for a week, but the money rolling in, volunteers is there. everyone, all anybody is talking about right now is vice president harris and how they feel good. democrats feel good about this campaign. we have a faltering republican side at the moment, but at the same time, pretty dark ominous warnings here about how they think they could win. >> and president biden's decision to drop out of the race completely shook up the post of what should have been the glow from the republican national convention, so while donald

trump does have the bump among his supporters that you normally see after a convention, it was not a story line last week about things that were discussed at the convention. it was about the future, the prospect of kamala harris as the new president for the democrats and so we were -- we were in this "morning joe" focus groups and it was just staggering how different the vibe was from when i had been there previously six weeks earlier. six weeks ago, voters were really depressed, democratic voters, and now they are energized. they might have some qualms about vice president harris. she might not have been their first choice, but she is now and they are in and activated and it's going to be interesting to measure. trump had, obviously, at the rnc that was quite a fervor interest. his supporters are always enthusiastic. can democrats match that this go around. >> we'll have more on your focus groups later in the morning.

it should be noted the timing was inadvertent because president biden was trying to stay in the race, dropping out when he did after the republican convention did blunt momentum trump would have had from the rnc and talk about now making the harris campaign the centerpiece, what are we talking about from republicans, his running mate and that rollout not going all that well. senator jd vance of ohio is standing by his past comments about childless cat ladies. as a reminder here's what the republican nominee for vp said in 2021 when he was running for senate. >> we're effectively run in this country via the democrats, via our corporate oligarchs but a bunch of childless cat ladies miserable at their own lives and the choices they made and want to make the rest of the country miserable too. it's a basic fact. look at kamala harris, piece buttigieg, aoc the democrats are controlled by people without children. >> on friday, senator vance appeared on the megyn kelly show

to try to defend his comments. >>, obviously, it was a sarcastic comment. i have nothing against cats or dogs. i have one dog at home and love him, meghan. people are focusing on the sarcasm and not the substance of what i said. the substance, i'm sorry, it is true. it's true we've become anti-family, true that left has become anti-child. it is simply true it's way too hard to raise a family. >> not much of a cleanup there. and then vance also appeared last night on fox news where ahead of the interview, this was how he was introduced by host trey gowdy. >> when that interview surfaced, two things leapt to my mind. those of us who talk for a living make mistakes. we say things that in hindsight we might phrase differently or better or not at all. and then i thought about a stormy day at reagan national

airport where i met two women desperately trying to get home to south america. i was trying to get home to south carolina. we spent the whole day together. finally making it to charlotte and then somehow we got them on a flight to houston. they were headed to visit family in south america before returning to their new home called america. and when we parted ways, they said they would like to pray for me as their way of saying thanks for the day spent together. and i assured them it's too late to help me, but i do have a friend who's expecting and she got tough news about her unborn child. would they please pray for her instead. they did. and they still do. to this day. they're catholic nuns, childless, dedicated to god, love this country, living lives of service to others, and it's not just catholic nuns. some of the finest people i know don't have children. teachers and guidance counselors

and lawyers and doctors and love other people's children enough to teach and guide and protect and minister to them. some people choose not to have children. others desperately want them, but they can't. and in a moment we'll speak with senator jd vance. we have never met before. but we have many friends in common who tell me that he is smart, and he is talented, and he is more than capable. none is perfect. not one. that's what the good book says. the american people are forgiving. if we ask. >> that is a jaw-dropping introduction of jd vance on fox news. so when vance came on, here's how he responded to the criticism of his comments. >> do you agree that there are people who very much love this country and are invested in its future, but they also happen to be childless? >> oh, of course i believe that, trey. if you look at the full context of what i said it's clear the

democrats have tried to take this thing out of context and blow it out of proportion, which they always do, trey, because they don't have an agenda to run on themselves. really what i'm trying to get at here, it's important for us to be pro-family as a country. of course for a whole host of reasons, it's not going to work out for some people. we should pray for those people and, of course, have sympathy for them. i still think that that means we should be pro-family generally speaking as a party, and i think that our country has become particularly hard for parents, especially under the policies of kamala harris. >> so jen, efforts to clean that up have failed to this point. to put it mildly. the fact that this became a thing on fox news shows this has broken through. this is a real thing that trump-vance have to deal with. >> it does strike me when vance decided to go on megyn kelly, i'm sure megyn kelly is very persuasive in her pitches, come on my show and clean it up, something trump would have never

done. trump would never apologize or try to explain, he would have moved on. vance keeps digging deeper into this hole, and it is -- it's the kind -- look at trey's own response to it, to talk about -- what's he conveying to us in what he said. it's a moving thing about what he said about the nuns, but it also suggests to me he does not think this is a winning ticket. when a fox anchor is going out of their way to distance themselves from the running mate, it does not suggest to me they think this is a winning message. and he keeps, you know, he -- you know, basically apologizes to the cats is what vance does, right, but then -- >> i like cats, but -- apologize to the cats, doubles down on the underlying comment that childless women are ruining the country, and does he support child care tax cuts when that was in -- did he support that

when that was up in the senate? i don't believe he voted for that. he's not acting on anything like this. it is -- this kind of stuff, this organic wildfire, this is what fuels campaigns and everyone gets it, and it punctures through politics and it's what, you know, this is what you -- this is the kind of lightening in a bottle that campaigns hope for. i think you nailed it, organic wild fire, lightening in a bottle. what happened last week with the liberal memes about jd vance went mainstream and outside of jd vance's base, outside of the republican base, he has been branded, he has been defined as weird. whether they like it or not, recovering from that is going to be next to impossible with most americans after what went down last week. then he just kept piling it on by not really showing an ounce of empathy and just saying, i'm really sorry. i never would have wanted to

hurt people who have struggled with fertility issues. that's not what i meant. i meant i want to support families. but no! he has the sarcastic remarks that aren't even funny and show s he can't really deliver one liner. >> sam, weird is the initial impression of vance to the american public. we know why he was picked. some republicans at the time warned trump this is -- maybe this is not the right decision. for trump it was like this could help ne in the pennsylvania, wisconsin, michigan trio. vance next door in ohio. also the idea of white working class voters, populism and the, perhaps, that vance was going to be the maga heir apparent as trump and his team made the pick thinking they were winning big and this was their effort to run up the score. the race has changed. what are you hearing? what are you and your reporters hearing in terms of second thoughts that the gop might be having? >> well the republican party

writ large, there are portions of it that look at the pick and say, man, maybe we should have gone in a different direction. we have not heard that from the trump operation, and, frankly, i wouldn't totally expect it until maybe later if things keep going this way because it's not their position to ever sort of admit fault or doubt. often their position is to whack backrd harder and they tried this week. you can see it online all the vance surrogates and operatives trying to redeploy the weird moniker on democrats in a forced way. look, yes, you're right. i think this pick was made from a sense that they were going to win. now trump wanted to and his operation wanted to jack up the white male vote because they felt like that's how they lost in 2020 to biden. but they also felt like they were going to win. and i think one of the perils you've seen now is not just that jd vance, you know, has these positions that, you know, are

offensive to women, although i think that's a huge peril, but in a larger sense, that he, you know, is from a different generation where you say a lot of weird things, go into your media echo chambers, all these clips have come from conservative media, podcasts. he's 39, like, you know, that able of which i'm part of, you know, we wrote a lot of stuff online that we probably regret. i think ultimately that's hampering him. he said lot of things, wrote a lot of stuff online that are now coming back to bite him. that would not have been the case for some of the other nominees. i just sincerely doubt, for instance, that doug burg gum had a secret blogger past in his file. i don't see that happening. anyways, i think that's part of the problem here. >> sam, don't worry, you have been carefully vetted and you would not be my running mate. >> don't even waste your time. not worth it. >> no chance. no one in the party is calling for you.

we should note this is how john boldin who served for the trump administration, long-time republican responded to these vance comments. >> i think these comments by vance are really the 2024 counterpart of hillary clinton's famous statement in the 2016 election where she called trump supporters deplorables. i mean, if politicians can't learn -- one thing to attack your opponent, another thing to attack your opponent's supporters. that's just not a way to win friends and influence people. i don't think vance learned the lesson that hillary clinton unfortunately for herself learned in 2016. that's going to hurt trump as you get closer to the election. >> reverend sharpton two things this is doing, one, further firing up the left, who are already so enthusiastic in the last week about harris. this is another thing they can point to and memefy and fund raise from, but it does risk for the republicans, alienating that thin slice of voters who are

gettable in this race. maybe suburban women or families who have gone for biden or trump and not sure where to go this time around. now see a new choice and then see comments like this and could be turned off by them. >> they can really be turned off. that thin slice of voters that could go either way. and i think that it shows that eye your looking at a person who says it's sarcastic to say something that is misogamist and offensive, to not only women but men in this country. there's nothing sarcastic about that. what i think it also shows is that he is really not a good political athlete. if you get caught saying something that is indefensible, you say i was wrong. i shouldn't have said that. and you try to deal with it and move on. you don't try to justify it or act like it was some sarcastic comment that you know is very

injurious to people. i think that donald trump is seriously got a problem because this guy is going to keep doing it. when you can't own that you've made a grievous error, you're going to have a long three months, donald trump, with this guy. can you imagine this guy being a foot away, a step away from being president of the united states, and he has said things like this and doesn't even know how to deal with it? >> really good political discussion to start us off this morning. we will have much more as "morning joe" rolls on. but next we're going to bring you the latest from israel as authorities blame hezbollah for a missile strike that killed 12 children and teens on a soccer field. we'll talk about the growing fears of a wider war in the region. you are watching "morning joe." we're back in just 90 seconds with that. 0 seconds with that.

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there are renewed concerns this morning of a wider war in the middle east. as israel begins to respond to a strike on a soccer field saturday that killed 12 people, mostly children and teenagers. israel blamed the attack on the iran-backed group hezbollah. hezbollah, meanwhile, denied responsibility for the strike which hit an israeli controlled town in the golan heights. israel's defense forces said yesterday they hit seven targets deep inside lebanese territory in response. secretary of state antony blinken said at press conference

earlier today that there is every indication that the rocket used on saturday was from hezbollah and that he was deeply saddened by the loss of life there. joining us now, columnist and associate editor for the "washington post" david ignatius. thank you so much for being with us this morning. we know that since october 7th, and those hamas terror attacks, there has been great fears that the war would widen, as terrible as things were in gaza, it could spread throughout the region. this seems to be now, for many, to be the moment where those fears sort of seem to be on the brink of relization. >> so as you say, jonathan, we're again at a moment where it seems like the war, as horrific as it's been in gaza, might expand. the attack saturday on the muslim druze village in the

golan heights killed 12 young people. the u.s. has said and secretary blinken, there's no question this was a hezbollah rocket although hezbollah has denied it.

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democrat party for%ing anti-family and anti-child. it was a sarcastic comment. i've got nothing against cats. >> the gop vice presidential nominee also responding to attacks against his wife, usha. >> i love her because she's who she is. obviously, she's not a white person, and we've been attacked by some white supremacists over that. but i love usha, she's such a good mom and such a brilliant lawyer. >> all while former president trump campaigned in minnesota, discussing the assassination attempt against him. >> they all say, i think he's changed. i haven't changed. maybe i've gotten worse. i get angry at the incompetence i witness every single day. >> reporter: former president trump now on defense for what he said friday about voting. >> christians, get out and vote! just this time! you won't have to do it anymore. four more years, you know what, it will be fixed, it will be fine. you won't have to vote anymore. >> reporter: the harris camp

saying the former president is promising the end of our elections if he wins. a concern that echos what trump critic and former gop congressman liz cheney told savannah last year. >> do you believe if donald trump were elected next year, that he would try to stay in office beyond a second term? that he would never leave office? >> there's no question. >> you think he would try to stay in power forever? >> absolutely. i mean, he's already done it once. >> reporter: the trump campaign saying that the former president was talking about the importance of faith and uniting this country. >> that was nbc's hallie jackson with that report. and we heard in hallie's report there that critics of donald trump and j.d. vance have taken to calling them "weird." that's actually something our own joe scarborough has been calling maga republicans for well over a year now. >> this is what i've been saying until i'm blue in the face! since 2017. you keep narrowing down your base, until you have

insurrectionists, weirdos and freaks! and that's what we are. we are the majority and we will stay the majority as long as these insurrectionists, weirdos and freaks continue to say it's okay for donald trump to do whatever he wants to do. >> insurrectionists, weirdos, and freaks, courtesy of joe. joining us now here on set, michigan's democratic governor, gretchen whitmer. she is the author of the new book, which bears the title, "true gretch: what i've learned about life, leadership, and everything in between." governor, thanks for being here. you are later out heading out on to the campaign trail, you have been mentioned as a possible running mate for vice president harris. let's just start there. has the campaign reached out to you about that possibility? >> i have communicated with everyone, including the campaign, that i've made a commitment to serve out my term as governor in michigan. i can be an excellent ally to a

president harris and i can be a great co-chair of the harris campaign from my place as governor. so i am not a part of the vetting. >> well, thank you for clarifying that once and for all this morning. let's talk about this new race and that new talking point, weird or weirdos, however you want to put it. tell us, do you agree with that assessment and why do you think it's breaking through? >> it's quite a jarring segue, weirdos and freaks, here's governor whitmer. you know, i think that my colleagues are pointing out the obvious. that the agenda, the way they talk to people, the way they address people, it is bizarre. it's weird. it is weird. i also don't want to diminish the fact, though, that it also presents a very real risk for us as a country. and weird is kind of a funny phrase to use, because it's bizarre. but at the same moment, we've got to say, this is a serious moment in this country. i am proud to be a co-chair of the harris campaign because my candidate is offering us a brighter future, a focus on how

she's going to make people's lives better. this perpetual, i think, aim to divide us and to inflame us and to anger us and just stoke hate is what's so dangerous in this country right now. and so, i want to focus on what does the future look like for my kids, for your kids, for the next generation of americans, for all of us. >> the book, among the things in the -- i thought i knew a lot about you, and i read this book, and i was like, oh, there's a lot that i didn't know. and in particular, when you talked about -- you talked about just now about the divisions that we have. you talked about how women leaders can sort of help with that division. but also, how women leaders can run into -- run to the fire, right? and that this is something that you did as -- when you were trying to battle covid. obviously, vice president harris is running into the fire now.

but based on what you've written on the book, kind of, that particular aspect of leadership. why it's important and what's required to happen. >> well, i think, you know, one of the things that i have learned is that problems just don't get better with time. you've got to get right in there, understand what the situation is, and get to work on fixing it. and you might not be as successful in day one, but you're learning you're getting better and smarter. whether it is addressing the flynt water crisis or it is getting to the scene of where there's been a mass shooting and putting your arms around a community that's hurting. i talk about the oxford high school shooting in the book. you know, it's important to get right in. and i do think that women leaders get that. there certainly are some men leaders who do as well. i don't want to suggest otherwise. but to have the humility to say, all right, i might not have all the answers right now, but i'll surround myself with good people, i'll take the best

counsel i can find, make a decision and move us forward. >> otherwise, it can be scary. but it's not just you, it's like you leading a team. >> governor whitmer, i spoke to plenty of democratic voters last week in wisconsin, who were really excited about the prospect of having you on a democratic ticket with kamala harris, so you're going to disappoint a lot of people. do you think that the country is ready for two women on a ticket? i frankly am disappointed. we never have had two women on a presidential ticket. and couldn't this be your moment? >> you know what, i think that two women on a ticket would be really exciting. in michigan, i can tell you, my attorney general, dana nestle, my secretary of state, jenna benison, we're the three top elected officers in the state of michigan. every one of us were told, you can't have too many women on the ticket. we all ignored that. we were bold, we moved forward, and we've given one another a platform and a space to own the offices which we were elected

to. so i do think that, you know, it would be exciting to have two women on the ticket? but guess what, there are a lot of great women in this country who are leading and we've got a deep bench right now. i'm excited to be among our high water mark of eight strong democratic women governors in this country, who every one of them could add something to a ticket. >> governor, when you were on our show a few weeks ago when you were talking about the book, president biden was still in the race and you were very supportive of his decision to do so. he, obviously, eventually, stepped aside. tell us about what you're seeing, how that changes impacted the race. how are you feeling from folks in your dissipate elsewhere, as you're traveling. how are they responding to the vice president at the top of the ticket? >> i think people are excited. i want to always mention, president biden served our country with dignity and honor for decades. and he's made huge personal sacrifices to do that. i'm grateful in this moment, he is -- should get credit for all of that, but is also passing the

torch and uplifting a new generation of leaders. i think that's fantastic. it's also gotten a lot of energy. i can see it on the ground in michigan. i saw it in new hampshire when i was there at the end of last week. we're seeing more people volunteering, more people contributing to the success of this campaign. it is still going to be a close race. and coming from the state of michigan, where polls are showing, it's a neck and neck race, we've got important work yet to do, but i do think that she's going to inspire a lot of people to get activated, who maybe were not yet. >> polls over the weekend show a complete dead heat in your state. you write in your book about how you became a target of donald trump's. he was very critical of you, called you by name, called you names, and his rhetoric also inspired threats against you. now, vice president harris is stepping in that limelight. what would your advice be to her, as someone who has been the subject of so many trump attacks, what would your advice to her be knew she is going to be his primary focus? >> well, there's no question. i talk a little bit at dealing with bullies in my book.

i know a little something about that. and it's a lesson i learned early in life, but it's certainly used when the former president would single me out and every time he did that, or even mentioned michigan on twitter, we saw more threats. we saw more activity, we saw more people on my front lawn with their lawn guns. i talk about that. but one of the things that i also know is that when you get called "that woman from michigan" and wear it on a t-shirt and you laugh, you actually take the weapon away from the bully and use it as your shield. and to this day people up to events with "that woman from michigan" t-shirts. it is a joyful thing and we have built a community around us. every one of us deals with bullies on occasion. our vice president has dealt with a lot of unfair stuff that's come her way. she's done it with class and humor and strength. and that's exactly what you need to do when you're dealing with someone like that. >> all right. i'm going to use my communication skills here to make a question about a book,

but work it into also a question about the election in true white house correspondents' form. a multi-part question. so i think that there are great lessons in this book for young women, because one of the things that i love about it -- it's explained in the book, but also just in watching you, armor -- your leather armor, when you have on, on the cover of this book, and i know that when you had to announce the plot against you in october of 2020, you told me you chose to wear a leather jacket because that was your armor, but when you were re-elected, you wore a bright fuchsia coat to celebrate your inauguration. and i know people might think the fuchsia is about barbie, but i know it's something to do with your mom. i want you to tell that story, and it's a story of female empowerment, and now so many women are fired up and empowered and want to participate in this election. so you know, tell us about the leather to fuchsia, but what you

think women -- and all people who want to volunteer, how would you harness that energy now for the harris campaign? >> well, you know, i do wear leather a lot. i've got a lot of leather jackets. we did a funny tiktok naming them, which was a trend a few years ago. but, you know, i think that how you show up has a lot to do with how -- you know, your attitude and your confidence and so, pink has had an interesting through-line in my life. my mother's favorite color was fuchsia. she was a bad-ass lawyer, kind of glass ceiling breaker herself as one of the top women in the michigan's attorney general's office. and she was wearing pink to work one day and she had to go make an argument in court, and they said, you can't wear pink to court, and she said, fuchsia is my power color, and she went into court and killed it that day. i dedicated this book to my daughters. the greatest compliment i got about this book, a woman roughly my age said she loved it, but she bought it for all the young

people in her family. because she thought it was practical, easy, short, quick to read, but also, humorous and gave some life lessons that might help anybody. but also, maybe we can get young people to get into this election. running away from it and burying your head in the sand is an understandable instinct, right, like, this is heavy and hard. but i find showing up, engaging, pulling others into the conversation gives me positivity and energy. and i think that's what i'm trying to do with "true gretch," but also what i'm trying to do every single day as governor, and also surrogate for the campaign. >> you have a very positive message and you were talking about unity and how the vice president -- how vice president harris has stressed unity, which is almost turning on the head what donald trump promised to do at the rnc, and then now she is taking over that mantle. how can we actually unify the

country in this era of extreme polarization, which you know better than anyone, serving as governor of michigan. >> well, i think we've got to make a seat at the table for everybody. especially people you don't agree with. that's who you're learning the most from, right? that's why i love to see this combination sitting around this table. and why i'm always striving to replicate what i learned in my household from a dad who was the commerce director under republican governor romney and millikan, and my mom, who was a longtime attorney general under our democrat, frank kelly, longest serving attorney general in the country. we are better when we are having robust debates that don't get personal, but are based on the facts. this is, i think, the core of the foundation of our country, but it's harder and harder when rhetoric is so hot. i'm glad that speaker mike johnson now says, let's turn down the heat on political rhetoric. i've been calling for that for three years. he needs to use that same

philosophy and hold people in his own party accountable. as i mentioned moments ago, every time that the former president comes to michigan or even talks about michigan, i get more threats. it's not okay to only say, let's bring down the heat when they're against yourself. we need to hold one another accountable. and that means republicans holding republicans accountable and democrats holding democrats accountable, too. >> governor, lastly, today. the six-week abortion ban in the state of iowa goes into effect. i want to get your reaction to that and how you feel like the issue of abortion rights will shape the campaign to come? >> well, we know that that right that we thought was codified for 50 years, that three trump appointees said were settled law of the land then went and did an about-face. the third of american women who have very little in terms of reproductive freedom, but for every one of us, another trump

presidency, another supreme court appointee, a congress that is republican dominated, right now, if you look at the platform, you look at project 2025, they are going to go much further when it comes to taking a woman's reproductive rights away, taking our economic rights, our right to make a living and make our own choices and access the health care we need. all of this is in jeopardy. no one will be better to prosecute that case than a candidate in our vice president harris. but as president harris, i know, she's going to expand women's rights, never reel 'em back. >> the new book is titled "true gretch: what i have learned about life, leadership, and everything in between." democratic governor of michigan, gretchen whitmer, thank you. governor, thank you for being with us this morning. >> thank you. coming up here on "morning joe," president biden is now calling for an overhaul of the supreme court, unveiling his proposal this morning for changes that include term

limits, an ethics code, and an amendment that would limit presidential immunity. democratic member of the judiciary committee, senator cory booker, joins us next to discuss the president's call to change the high court. that's straight ahead here on "morning joe" h court. that's straight ahead here on "morning joe (bell ringing) someone needs to customize and save hundreds with liberty mutual! (inaudible sounds) (elevator doors opening) wait, there's an elevator? only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty, liberty, liberty, ♪ ♪ liberty. ♪ (vo) kate made progress with her mental health, but her medication caused unintentional movements in her face, hands, and feet called tardive dyskinesia, or td. so her doctor prescribed austedo xr— a once-daily, extended-release td treatment for adults.

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. was she aware of how he's doing? >> we're all aware of how he's doing. our country has watched our president lead, and yes, we've also seen the fact that he's ten years older than he was ten years ago. but unlike republicans, who in trump's personality cult, will take a look at donald trump and say he's perfectly fine, even though he seemed unable to tell the difference between nikki haley and nancy pelosi, even though he's rambling about electrocuting sharks and hannibal lecter, even though he's clearly older and stranger

than he is when america first got to know him, they say he's strong as an ox and leaps tall buildings in a single bounds. we don't have that warped reality on our side. in the contrast, our president confronted that reality in what must have been one of the most difficult decisions that an american president had to make ever. and he did something which i don't think donald trump could even conceive of doing, which is putting his own interests aside for the country. >> he's very good at that. transportation secretary pete buttigieg on fox news on saturday. our next guest campaigned in nevada over the weekend, saying he knows what it's like to fight with kamala harris in the trenches after working with her in the senate and during her time as vice president. joining us now, democratic senator cory booker of new jersey. he's a member of the foreign relations and judiciary committees. and senator, we'll get to the campaign trail in a moment. but first, from your perch on the judiciary committee, let's get your reaction to what you heard from president biden this morning, calling for a pretty sweeping overhaul of the supreme court, instituting a code of

ethics, instituting a term limits for justices who currently do not have any, and suggesting that presidents should not have immunity, calling for a constitutional amendment to basically overturn what the court ruled a few weeks ago. how important is this, what we're hearing from the president today? >> first of all, i don't see it as so sweeping, it's actually very pragmatic reforms to the court that most americans and both sides of the aisle agree with. think about this for a second. number one, the highest court in the land should not have the lowest ethics laws. and the institution is being undermined as a far right-wing billionaire extremists are lavishing millions of dollars worth of gifts on supreme court members. and they have interests in matters that are before those courts. that is wrong, and we should have high ethics rules. and we all know that. number two, the term limit is actually in line with every other major constitutional

democracy. we're this outlier. in many ways, we corrected that with the presidency, by putting term limits, but now we have lifetime appointments, which creates a system in which a president who appoints someone only when that person decides to resign. and you create this arbitrary system where you often are incentivizing people sty on far too long. giving term limits gives some regularity and predictability to our courts and has people involved in the presidency and their elections knowing if we elect a president, they're going to have two appointments to the highest courts in the land, and prevents one president from having an outsized influence on the court, but actually making it a system that makes sense. and so these are things that i support. me, senator whitehouse, who's been a leader on supreme court issues, senator padilla, as well as senator blumenthal, all have a bill that reflects what the president has put forward today. >> senator, there's little-to-no

chance this could pass this year, given the current makeup of the congress, but do you think given your private conversations with republicans, whether it's some time down the road, do we think they would ever engage on something like this? >> i certainly hope so. these are ideas that don't come from one side of the aisle. people were talking about term limits on both sides of the aisle for a very long time. this is common sense. if we want to preserve the strength of our institutions, if we want to really make our democracy, not something that's politicized, but really make sure that our supreme court takes back that ideal of the highest standards in our society, these are steps that we are going to have to take, because what's happening to the court right now is it's being delelegitimatized by the kind of politics and partisanship of our era. we need predictable, we need to end this arbitrary nature of appointments and people deciding whether they want to step down or not.

these are common sense things that will restore a lot of legitimacy to the court and i'm glad the president came forward in a very thoughtful manner on this. >> one more thing on this topic, of the three reforms that the president proposed, which do you think would be most important? if you could only have one, what's the most vital? >> again, our courts should not be for sale. we should not have a situation where supreme court members could take millions of dollars of gifts from people who have matters or interests before the court. that is just so wrong. and again, it's going to undermine our democracy, delegitimize the institutions, so that me is very important. but i will tell you, the idea of term limits, like they were for the presidency, i think is very common sense. having an 18-year term, putting us in line with most constitutional democracies, and something that is very popular with people on both sides of the political aisle, writ large. >> senator, i'm supposed to be on vacation this week, and like so many americans, i'm spending it at the jersey shore in asbury park, which is one of america's

best cities. i just want to thank jersey for that. i just love it so much. but i got to talk to you and governor whitmer, so i'm happy to be here. tell me about -- you were just in nevada, i believe, for the harris campaign. tell me about how, you know, how you're seeing the race, what people are saying to you in nevada, how they're feeling about things, what's on their mind, how they're feeling about the ticket? >> i'm literally just flying in on a red eye and still energized by the feeling i got on the ground in nevada. i will tell you right now, the youth enthusiasm is through the charts. volunteers coming forward. we had packed campaign headquarters, going out on hot, hot days to still knock on doors and do the works of campaigns. and people are donating at record numbers. we have the big mo, as they say in sports. we have the big momentum right now. and in a race that has about 99 days or so left, we have got to continue to press that effort. and remember, this is not just the presidential race.

in nevada, like a handful of states, there's a contested senate race, where we have an extraordinary candidate, jacky rosen, who will need every vote that she can get. and we have a lot of key house races that will determine which way the house of representatives is going. so this momentum around the harris campaign is so important for our other races here in congress. >> senator booker, you work closely with the vice president, when she was in the senate. there's no chance that you're being vetted, potentially, for vice president? >> there is no chance that i am being vetted for the vice president. i was smiling about that. it would be what a wonderful day that we would have in our country where that might be a possibility in the future, but right now, i don't think there's going to be two african-americans on this ticket. i actually think that the vice president has extraordinary people to choose from, some people that really excited me, that i've had chances to work with, whether it's pritzker or shapiro, but obviously, i am in the senate with somebody that is an american hero in mark kelly,

literally landing fighter planes on aircraft carriers, a nasa astronaut, he's out of this world, for crying out loud! and he did something that he's going to have to teach me how to do, he married up with gabby giffords, who is herself an american hero. so she has great choices, something that i know really well, and know that they would help to carry the ticket, even to a higher level of enthusiasm and excitement and ultimately service in the white house. >> senator, we will forgive this "how far this world" line and we appreciate -- >> he's got the right stuff, come on! >> you're making it work! you're making it worse. >> more dad jokes. >> we appreciate you greatly for being with us this morning. democratic senator cory booker of new jersey. thank you, again. >> thank you. all right, coming up next here, we shift gears. israel launched retaliatory strikes against hezbollah, as israeli authorities say the iranian-backed militant group is responsible for an attack that killed at least 12 children and teenagers on a soccer field. we're going to get a report from

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welcome back. there are renewed concerns this morning of a possible wider war in the middle east, as israel begins to respond to a strike on a soccer field on saturday that killed at least 12 people, who were mostly children and teenagers. nbc news international correspondent raf sanchez has the latest from the scene of the attack. >> reporter: this morning, rising fears of all-out war as israel vows massive retaliation against iranian-backed hezbollah militants, after this rocket attack on saturday. 12 children killed playing on a soccer field. israel says it's the worst attack against its civilians since october 7th. hezbollah denying responsibility, but the idf says the group fired from lebanon into the israeli-held golan

heights. the u.s. condemning the attack, but urging restraint. >> we stand by israel's right to defend its citizens from terrorist attacks. we also don't want to see the conflict escalate. the victims from the drews religious majority, buried in an emotional has funeral, including 13-year-old john ebrahim. his cousin mourning him while also caring for her badly wounded younger brother. >> i was going to come to play and will meet you at my grandma's house. i said, okay, don't be late and something. i closed the phone and boom, it happened. >> everywhere, signs of a children's game cut brutally short. the kids' bikes, their 4x 4s are exactly where they left them, and you can see there's a bomb shelter just feet away from the soccer field, but there wasn't enough time to get to it. and it is riddled with shrapnel. a mountain village in mourning today for more young lives lost on all sides of this unforgiving

war. >> truly heartbreaking. that was nbc's raf sanchez with that report. and elise, you have more from the focus groups that you conducted recently in wisconsin about issues like these. >> so we are going to hear now from progressive democrats about how they feel about the biden administration's policy towards israel and the war in gaza and unsurprisingly, they haven't been happy with the policy, but they're hoping that perhaps the vice president, their new candidate, will steer israel policy in a different direction. so we'll hear from those voters right now. >> bibi netanyahu was in washington and made an address to congress and there were huge protests and vice president kamala harris didn't attend his speech. do you think that was the right choice? >> yeah. >> absolutely. >> yeah. >> i love israel and i hate bibi netanyahu. >> what's opinion your satisfaction with american foreign policy as relating to

israel? >> for me, it's been highly dissatisfied in that he has -- to the extent that we use support as the framing, but like -- but far too supportive, i suppose. but again, i would -- for me, i think that's not a helpful thing for israel. you know, this is needing to take the keys away from your drunk friend type situation. and it is just one of the most sort of calamitous, destructive acts of sort of warfare in the modern age. i mean, in this century. >> the level of destruction and just the sheer, like, beyond the pale war crimes and atrocities that are being committed and with unquestioning u.s. help, not only does it -- i think it damages our country's reputation. >> i would say foreign policy needs to be looked at on a much

grander scale and for a longer period of time. because we went into afghanistan and iraq when i was in college, and most of my peers, in my core group, a handful of them have served. and so that very much makes up how we look at those things. >> anthony, how do you feel about american foreign policy these days? >> i think it's important that we look at ourselves, because i think we're losing ourselves morally. because you mentioned how the rest of the world are looking at us, the way that we're responding to what's happened in gaza. i think we also have to look at ourselves. >> i think it's important to note that despite -- whatever your opinions about his policies, trump's would be worse. >> that is true! >> in terms of this vote, bibi netanyahu is very clearly hoping that trump wins, because trump would allow him whatever tiny leashes that biden has put on beebee, trump would just let them go.

and that's scary. >> so, those were progressive democrats, predictably, they weren't completely happy, as you heard want the biden/israel policy, but then, i was surprised by the next group, they were traditional liberal democrats. and they, too, were unhappy with the biden administration's policy. how do democrats navigate this fault line among their base of voters and hold their support, but also, listen to their concerns? >> well, it's interesting. what you said is this comes up organically, right? i mean, they volunteer these concerns. and i think that with the coverage of, you know, there was so much coverage of president biden, post-debate, now there's coverage of harris, that we have forgotten that this issue remains -- i mean, continues to be very troubling for a lot of people who would otherwise vote for democrats. you know, i do think it was interesting that the vice president, she didn't go to the speech. she did note, i can't -- i'm

going to paraphrase it, but i did note that her positions towards gaza were going to be a little different. i think that, you know, in the next 99 days that we have left, that you'll probably hear more of her talk about that in those states. but it's clear that even though it's not in the political headlines, it's definitely on voters' minds. >> yeah, we heard from the vice president this week. her policy, that much different than president biden's. she certainly says that israel has a right -- she's committed to its security, but spoke about the human toll in gaza very differently than what we have heard. and there's certainly an expectation that protests over the war would be part of the experience of the democratic convention in chicago in a few weeks. coming up here next on "morning joe, "-- >> i'm james patterson. >> i'm mike lupica. >> when we're done talking here, you'll immediately order "hard to kill." >> are we hypnotizing people? >> we've written a novel that's

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all for just $15 a month. get the fastest connection to paris with xfinity. >> who are you? >> alex. >> oh, i know who you are. lead investigator on the gary sinici case. >> you can call me, detective alex cross. >> and that was a look at the upcoming amazon prime series titled "cross." it's based on detective alex cross, the beloved character from the series of books from the best-selling books, james patterson. earlier this month, variety reported that another book by

patterson and mike lupica titled "12 months to live" is also getting the television treatment with renee zellweger slated to play the lead role. today, their much-anticipated seque to "12 months to live" is out and it's entitled, "hard to kill." thank you for being here. james, thank you for putting up with mike lupica for yet another television appearance. let's start with the become. we can get to the tv in a minute. tell us a little bit about the new thriller. >> mike? >> well, jade smith, who he actually says it's his favorite character. and by the way, if it's his favorite character, it's my favorite character. she's got some health challenges, hence, 12 months to live. but she's on the comeback trail. he's still representing one of the worst people ever created in fiction, a guy named rob jacobson, who she had gotten acquitted from a triple homicide out in eastern ohio. >> and we would like harvey from

"suits" to play jacobson. he would be perfect. >> ever since we got renee zellweger -- by the way, jim gets what he wants. so he insisted on someone who had not just won academy award, but someone who had won two. >> but you know, renee is actually -- she grabbed on to this early, because in mind, these characters that jump off the page are rare and cross is obviously one of those. and i think jade smith is that way. she just jumps off the page and renee and her producer, they read the book and she said, i want to play this character. >> it was the cancer diagnosis and the biggest case of her life, she gets the guy acquitted and he gets charged with another triple homicide. >> yeah, he's a good guy. >> the only problem is, someone's trying to kill him and her. >> the hamptons will never be the same after this book. >> it sounds like there are plenty of plot twists. i have a question about your process. i'm just fascinated.

>> you want in? >> if i could get in, of course. you both have written so many books yourselves in solitude. what is it like working together? >> it's like a writer's room. every show on television, they'll have a writer's room and six, seven, whatever, this is our writer's room. mike and i literally talk -- we talk six times a day. and we'll go back and forth, you know, mostly about the book. and i get e-mails and whatever. and that's kind of the way it works. we go back and forth. >> we met at a bar. we're not proud of it, john. >> we are proud of it. >> we met at a bar -- >> yeah, how did it come about? >> we met at a bar. >> really? >> we started talking about, we started talking about kids' books and went to an adult book and now we're with jade smith. >> i thought to myself, it's time -- >> how can i help. >> it's time to give back. so what -- >> that's pretty much what he

told me. what writer could i give a little boost to. >> right, right? >> you know, paying it forward was my -- >> you wanted to mentor james patterson. that was how you looked at it. >> how can i help out the guy who sells more books than anybody on the planet. >> so james, we talk a little bit about casting, these are characters that are obviously near and dear to your heart. you created them. how involved are you in the process and what is it like to see your characters -- >> it depends. you know, when they put "woman's murder club" originally on abc, i thought it was all wrong, not the casting so much, but the script. and that was painful to go through and to watch. with the "cross" really good actor, a really, really good actor. renee, obviously, is spectacular. you thif about the parts she's done. i can't wait to see what she'll do with this part. we have our show runner.

>> a guy named david kelly and mickey johnson. >> another guy you're helping out, right, mike? >> yeah. mickey johnson from ozark. it's a really nice -- >> i thought they needed a boost, too. >> we're helping people. >> just reach out. by the way, jane smith, this is someone who will make you cheer. this is a woman -- >> it's a fun read. >> funny, resilient. if you read the first one, you'll love the second one. >> let's end right there. the new book "hard to kill" on sale now. best-selling authors james patterson and mike lupica. great to see you. coming up on "morning joe," the largest wildfire burning in california has grown to more than 350,000 acres. we'll have an update on the progress to contain it. and take a look at the morning papers when "morning joe" comes right back. papers when "morning joe" comes

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welcome back as we turn to some of the morning's other top headlines. the park fire, which is california's largest burning wildfire, has now topped 350,000 acres. thousands of firefighters are working around the clock to try to battle the flames. nbc news correspondent steve patterson has the latest. >> reporter: this morning, crews scrambling to gain the upper hand on a rapidly expanding firefight. the park fire has already blackenedover 360,000 acres, quickly becoming one of the largest in california's history. the size and intensity of the flames generating so-called fire tornadoes, destroying dozens of homes in mountain communities of northern california that are all too familiar with disasters like this. >> there's so much trauma in our community. it wears on our first responders, firefighters, law enforcement. >> reporter: new satellite images showing how a small fire

sparked by a suspected ars nift burned through thousands of acres across multiple counties. firefighters working around the clock. the line, of course, is the highway. they're trying to push the flames back as far as they can away from community centers. >> reporter: it's more than 110 active fires burning across the west. wildfire smoke seen as far as new england with other extreme weather in the south. severe flooding in tennessee even reaching dolly wood, a road outside the park collapsing and guests wading through water inside. a local flash flood warning. authorities say the park will reopen later today. now for a look at the morning papers, we'll begin in florida where the tampa bay times reports the state leads the country in heat-related hospitalizations. according to cdc data there are more than 26,000 emergency room visits and 5,000 hospitalizations between 2018

and 2022. florida ranks also sixth in the nation in heat-related deaths with arizona having the most fatalities. to minnesota the star tribune is reporting on a study that shows a link between the success of stem cell transplants and the socioeconomic status of the donor. a study from the university of minnesota found that patients whose donors lived in low-income areas had a 6% higher chance of death than those who had donors living in more wealthy areas. and to north carolina, the news and record is highlighting a report on new blood tests that could help doctors diagnose alzheimer's faster and more accurately. the test can detect a certain protein commonly associated with the disease, but the tests aren't widely used yet because there's little data to guide doctors and they have not been formally approved by the fda. earlier we played some of the appearance by pete buttigieg

on fox news. here is a little bit more now on how the issue of abortion will impact kamala harris' campaign for president. >> that's the real reason i think she's going to win, is that most americans already agree with her on the issues that they care about the most, that affect them the most, whether we're talking about choice and her stance on defending a woman's right to choose, versus donald trump who eliminated the right to choose in this country. >> he sent it back to the states to be fair. >> let's be very clear. he's proud of the fact that he demolished the national right to choose in this country, period. >> but there are states that are figuring this out. there are some that are -- it's nearly possible, a six-week ban or less. there are states in this country that allow no restrictions up until the due date -- >> there was a national right to choose in this country, law of the land for 50 years which the vast majority of americans believe was the right thing to do. donald trump made a promise, one of the few promises he actually

kept, by the way. he didn't keep his promise of 6% economic growth, didn't keep his promise to drain the swamp. >> -- >> even before the pandemic, america went into a manufacturing recession which really hurt places like where i come from, the industrial midwest. >> unemployment was low. >> he broke his promise for that kind of economic growth. he broke his promise to pass an enter rest juncture bill. he failed to do that. the biden/harris administration got it done. he broke his promise to the january 6th people when he said he'd be their side. he kept his mrom miss to destroy the right too choose and kept the promise on tax cuts for the risk. if you want to know what a second trump term would be like, i would start to look at the rare promises he mentioned to keep. >> he did say he wanted to get rid of roe v. wade. >> to eliminate women's access to abortion.

as you know, the republican party continues to be interested in a national abortion ban. i don't believe him because he lies all the time. >> you think his pledge that he would not pass a national ban is one that -- >> it's one that's going to go down with most of the promises he's made and broken. >> jen, a great communicator on an important issue. >> the way he can weave so many issues into one answer. the most important one, he's right about this, there's one issue that matters that will help determine this election. it's women's reproductive rights. >> we should not lose sight of that each and ef dae day. that does it for us on "morning joe." jose diaz-balart picks up the msnbc coverage right now. and right now on msnbc just 99 days left in the 2024 campaign. the veepstakes heating up for vice president harris. we'll tell youch