and so many opportunities for team usa to enkries that medal count. >> it is a bucket list item for me to go to the olympics one day. to hopefully cover it for this network but just to participate as a spectator would be a dream. keir simmons, thank you for joining. and that is it for me today. have a wonderful weekend. see you back here on monday at 10:00 a.m. eastern. "deadline: white house" starts right now. ♪♪ alola and namaste, it is 4:00 p.m. in new york city. i'm john heilemann in for nicolle wallace on a day where history has been made. the harris campaign announcing that the vice president has secured the democratic presidential nomination making her the first black woman to be at the top of the ticket for a major party as a presidential nominee. the results won't be official until the roll call closed on

monday. but this afternoon harris crossed the delegate threshold to clinch the nomination during a virtual roll call. he dialed knee a campaign shortly after that moment and here is what she said. >> here is the bottom line, i say to all of the friends on the call, we are going to win this election, and it is going to take all of us, whether it is making calls, connecting with our communities, engaging online, orrine talking with people where we go every day, whether it be to the grocery store, our church, we are going to talk with people about the fact that we are all in this together, and we stand together. and so let's let folks know that our campaign is about the future, and it's about an expansion of the rights and freedoms and for opportunity of everyone, not just to get by, but to get ahead. >> harris will accept the nomination in chicago at the democratic national convention? just under 3 weeks.

joe biden posted this photo of the two of them together and tweeted, quote, one of the best decisions i've made was picking kamala harris as my vice president. now she will be our party's nominee. i couldn't be prouder. let's win this. vice president clinching the nomination, caps off a remarkable second week for the harris campaign. this morning campaign announced that it had raised a whopping $310 million this month, more than double of the trump campaign raised in that same time. "the washington post" reports this on what is behind the fundraising stats. two-thirds of the $310 million raised in july came from first-time donors, an indication of the momentum that harris built after biden dropped out. some 94% of those donations were under $200 and in a sign of the enthusiasm around her campaign extends beyond just memes online, the post said that her campaign reported having ten times the number of donors in

july as the previous month from gen z and eight times the number of millennial voters and 60% of donors in july were women. and it is a week in which the diplomatic work has paid off in spade. she greets three of the americans detained by the russia government. here she is with evan gershkovich. that prisoner swap, the largest since the cold war, is the culmination of years of work that includes harris personally lobbying european allies. now, team k, preparing for the fight ahead after many speculation about what -- who harris might bring in from the outside to help run her came. and in senior positions, she announced a number of key players from obama's winning campaigns in 2008 and 2012. two of them will be highly familiar to viewers of this network. david plouffe, who was barack obama's campaign manager in 2008, senior adviser in 2012 and as responsible other than barack

obama for putting him in the white house and jennifer palmieri and the communication director for hillary clinton and one of my co-hosts on showtimes the circus. all of this a prelude to the biggest decision, the one that she really has to get right, and as a presidential candidate, that is her choice for vice president. that is going to be coming sometime very soon. and that, that is where we start today. joining us, michael steele, former chairman of the republican national committee and host of the weekend. plus senior vice president of communications emily reynolds and host of politics nation and president of the national action network reverend al sharpton. rev, i want you to start with you. because you are here in front of me. running for president is hard. and if you get into the position

that kamala harris has been put in. it is really hard. and last two weeks, i would say she's been flawless as a candidate. i'm curious if you could talk about what you've seen from her in the two weeks and the team she's built and the momentum that she's summoned, what has impressed you most in that two-week span? >> i think that she has been flawless, which is what has impressed me most. because for your whole world to turn upside down, unexpectedly and without preparation, and she handled it with balance and grace, and that she was prepared shows something that i think none of us expected she could do as well as she's done. i saw her yesterday. we both spoke at the funeral services of congresswoman sheila jackson lee in houston, texas. and you got the sense, as she came on stage and embraced all of us, that she has totally embraced this.

she's in the moment. she's comfortable in her skin. and it takes that to really run this kind of campaign. that you're not being shaped and molded. you own this. and she gave me that kind of air yesterday when she took the campaign, the night that president biden withdrew, i talked to her on the phone. i think she's ready for this. and she has the security to build a team around her, not yes men or women, or not a fan club, but people that will say strategically we need to do, they've been to these battles before and i think by her putting experts on does not necessarily come from an inner circle shows how secure she is in who she is. >> christine reynolds, you now work at emilly's list but we've worked on various presidential campaigns including hillary clinton back there 2016. i wan to play kamala harris this

week, some of the highlights and the sights and sounds of what she's looked like out there including the rally in atlanta on tuesday and talk to you on the other side about what you've seen in terms of his abilities as a political athlete. let's play that now. >> donald trump spoke at the annual meeting of the national association of black journalists. and it was the same old show. the divisiveness, and the disrespect. and let me just say, the american people deserve better. >> donald trump, on the other hand, has been talking a big game about securing our border, but he does not walk the walk, or as my friend kufo would say, he does not walk it like he

talks it. >> so, last week you may have seen, he pulled out of the debate in september he had previously agreed to. well, donald, i do hope you'll reconsider to meet me on the debate stage. because as the saying goes, if you got something to say, say it to my face. >> christina, just for history, certainly the first time a presidential nominee has introduced amigo and one thing that i can't imagine joe biden having done if hes with still the nominee. tell us what you think about

what you've seen from nominee harris over the last week in particular? >> i mean, you said it. she's been flawless. and i'm not shocked by it. but since we're in the middle of the olympics as a political athlete, she's winning the gold. she looks confident and like she's having fun. she's laying out an incredible message, this idea that we're going to move america forward, that we don't want to go back, that we choose freedom. all of those are things that are cameraly compelling to voters. and will continue to be as she lays out further details on her vision and her agenda. she's crushing it. put simply. and i'm not that surprised by it. i think the reality is, as vice president, and particularly since this campaign has started, she's gotten less attention. we never pay attention to the vps. who could tell me what mike pence did as vp. but she has sort of quietly moved around the country without

as much press attention, but she's been talking to young voters, she's been talking about issues like reproductive rights, like gun violence prevention, like democracy and voting rights. and she's been winning voters over. and so i'm not shocked that this has come together. but she's been flawless and think we're going to see that through to election day. >> michael steele, we're going to talk about the harris honeymoon and something you wrote a little bit later in the block. but i want to focus on the staff stuff here. where, you know, there is a lot of, you know, often political insiders talk about political inside stuff. but the reality is that vice president harris had a great advantage here in getting a kind of turn key operation from joe biden. but there were people who were going to step aside like mike donnelly, who is the most important person in joe biden's life for a long time and there was a question about who she would supplement that crew with.

she was going to keep jen o'malley and others in their campaign but who else would come in. to bring in david plouffe where he's a senior role for strategy and the state is focused on winning the electorate college, david is going to be on top of the battle ground states. she's got stephanie cutter, who is right now deep in convention planning. she was deputy campaign manager for obama in 2012. mitch stewart, who is the face of obama's grassroots organizing efforts in 2008 and 2012. david binder, key pollster for obama in 2008 and 2012, mostly as an expert on focus groups. this is an all-star team. i didn't mention jennifer palmieri. these are people who are in our world, are hall of famers. and i wonder what you think it says about kamala harris that she has the wisdom and the confidence to bring those people

in to supplement the existing crew and she has her eyes on the prize and how much confidence that gives democrats that she's really in this to win it. but not that there was much doubt but this is a serious team. >> she recognized she needs to pull together a serious team to orchestrate the various parts of what will be a difficult campaign. and it will be a difficult campaign. and so, to have someone with the vision, to see around the corner before you get to the end of the block, david plouffe, to have someone with the appreciation of the messaging and understanding the dynamics and flows of communication in a campaign, jen palmieri, then you began to see why she wanted to piece together those essential ingredients, particularly around strategy and communication, to make sure that the footing that she's standing on now, not only gets stronger, but that the foundation on which

that footing is based grows as well. and allows had -- allows her to move around the country and to have the conversation that christina noted, she's been having for about a year now with a lot of voters out there who during the process had started to check out because they were getting tripped up over the age of joe biden. now, they're past that. and i think that putting together the team that the obama -- excuse me, the biden team would transition wholistically to kamala harris because there are two din styles and so this makes sense to do what she's starting to do. now they have to do the work of making it work as they announce the vp, move into the convention which offers two real big boosts in the momentum. and then swing into labor day, baby, rocking and rolling and

knocking it out of the park. and because the republicans are still back on their heels a little bit, dealing with, you know, j.d. vance clean-up on aisle 7 as well as they figure out what they're going to do with this black women who they don't think it black running for president. >> rev, i want to play a little bit of trump. he was on fox business this morning talking to maria bartiromo, who once again, not seeming enthusiastic about the idea of debating kamala harris. let's play that. >> right now, i say why should i do a debate. i'm leading in the polls. and everybody knows her and everybody knows me. >> she's trumping you now. saying he doesn't want to debate me and say it to my face. that is what she said the other night. >> look, she's a thirty rate candidate. >> that is the thing. when you are facing a third rate candidate, who wants to debate a third rate candidate. you don't want to do that.

you would think, if you really thought she was a third rate candidate, he would warm to the notion of devastating her and beating her senseless in a debate. but he somehow doesn't. what do you think? do you think he's aphrase of kamala harris. >> i know he's afraid. he's very intimidated about anyone that could go toe to toe with him in terms of policy and content and knows how to work the stage and use the stage. kamala harris, as vice president, and even before that as senator and attorney general, has shown she has sharpened her skills on the platform, which scares him to death. because he cannot deal with someone that can match or even excel beyond his performance, because that is all he has is performance. you take when he was athe national association of black journalists an the question of dei came up and he said how do you define it. and the questioner said

diversity and equity and inclusion. well, because he doesn't know what dei. he's against it because his maga base is against it. but if you name policy things, he has no idea what you're talking about. he didn't even read his briefing papers according to many sources when he was president. so to debate someone like kamala harris who is well honed on the issues and the content, he's running away from her. he's a political punk. when someone calls his bluff, he wouldn't show up to the fight. >> christina is not a political punk. but she is someone who worked for hillary clinton importantly, i think seminoly, as someone who saw up close what the challenges faced by the kind of misogynist attacks that hillary face and that kamala harris is going to face, talk a little bit about the particular challenges, as of now republicans trump -- they're

so crude and so badly executed, that it is easy to kind of laugh them off. what do you anticipate is -- that part of the campaign is going to look like and how the harris team will have to cope. >> well, look, it is going to get worse, is the reality. it is bad now and it is ugly ands unfortunate that she has to deal with this. this is what women candidates have to deal with. and for kamala harris, she is a woman of color. so, she gets the double-whammy of racism and sexism. and we're going to see more of that. and i think you saw her handle what happened at nbj and when she turned black, i should use air quotes there, we heard her handle that incredibly well. down in texas, when she referenced the fact that it was the same old show. i think you showed the quote. it is divisive. she talked about what it was and called it out for what it was and moved the conversation into

why it shows how wrong he is and what she wants to do with the country. it was a phenomenal response and i think we'll continue to see that. the other reality, and i join with a bunch of other women leaders this week in -- in asking the media to be better as calling out what is actually racism and what is actually sexism and i think that since hillary clinton, they have gotten better. i know that the people who support her, and people -- people on social media, i'm told this is happening on tiktok, i'm too old to be on tiktok, but i know that what we're seeing it people online are calling it out and making sure that people see these comments for what they are. and then moving the conversation back to why kamala harris is a great choice. because we can't just live in the outrage. >> christine, you're not too old for tiktok. no one is too old for tiktok. if it wasn't a chinese communist

intelligence operation, i wouldn't be too old for tiktok. but it is, so i stay off. no one is going anywhere. when we come back, more on kamala harris's very, very, very, very good week and how she's been able to stay far and above her opponent's complete meltdown. we'll look at what is in store as she nears the big decision, picking that number two, to make that choice in the next couple of days. and plus the spectacular take your pick for adjectives, kamala harris and joe biden welcoming home three wrongfully detained americans from russia. more on that. and later in the should, a wild told tale of the investigation into $10 million in cash possibly being brought over to donald trump's 2016 campaign only for that investigation to be stopped by his own political appointees in the justice department. the reporter behind that

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governor, j.d. vance just said this about you, and she's are his words, a bad impression of barack obama. what is your response to that? >> is that what he said? that's great. barack obama was probably our most gifted order of my time. so it is kind of a weird insult, i guess. [ applause ] but, look, i'll say this about j.d. vance.

it is real hard being honest with the american people when you're not being honest with yourself. j.d. vance is a total phony bologna. he is the most inorganic candidate i've seen on the national stage. he doesn't know what he believes. and that is why it is impossible for him to articulate a coherent message to the american people. because he doesn't believe it. >> that is pennsylvania governor josh shapiro, dunking hard on j.d. vance without even mentioning couches in any way. and demonstrating why he's on the short list to be kamala harris's running mate. the contest to be the vp, the veep stakes, are reaching the final days with the formal process being concluded putting the decision squarely in the hands of kamala harris to make this choice on her own. she'll take some advice but it is up to her.

the list is reported to be -- short list narrowed to tim walz, and josh shapiro and mark kelly and illinois governor j.b. pritzker and andy bashear and pete buttigieg. harris expected to meet with her top contenders in the next 72 hours. they have an event scheduled tor tuesday. we should know by then. we're back with michael and christine and rev. and michael, the veep stakes is one of the perennial, quadenial ritures, it is tedious, because who cares and we don't know and it takes many months. in this case, it is like a no huddle veep stakes. no time and you have j.d. vance who has become a real liability for donald trump. so it is possible, given the amount of space that vance is taking up and this will be must-see tv between the two

number twos. so i ask you in the language of espn, who you got? >> well, you said it right, my friend. it is sort of an intensive kind of moment where you're sort of focused in on the state of play and you're seeing it in a very different light than in a traditional setting. even when we saw with donald trump, he liked to make it seem like a form of the apprentice. you do have a much more clarifying moment in front of the vice president which will make this must-see tv for sure. >> michael, who you got? who you got? >> well that is my way of saying, does it really matter? no. i think, look, she's got a great crop -- that list that you just put up there, will stand up against anything on the republican side. meaning j.d. vance. >> i don't disagree with that. >> and donald trump himself. >> if she asked you for your

advice, who would you say? >> probably -- probably the governor of pennsylvania, because for me it is about strategic and how you network the pieces together to get you the ultimate goal which is the white house. and what is post important play, it is pennsylvania. the second question, if you don't want to go down that road, is okay, if not him, who gets me pennsylvania. because it is the largest piece in that blue wall puzzle, wisconsin, michigan and pennsylvania. and even when you throw in places like arizona and nevada and georgia. so that is -- that is where the thinking is. i know there are some questions around that. i think those questions are ignorant and not very politically savvy. i think the vice president needs to come out with an asymmetrical play that goes counter to the typical traditional grain in politics, which some people, from what i heard around town, put out there. >> yeah. >> which would move her to

someone like shapiro. i think he's strong and if not him, then i'm going with my man kelly out in arizona. because i think he gets you a little bit of pennsylvania because of who he is and his background. >> christina, michael is here alluding to the notion there is only one of the candidates that has had a campaign of some kind run against him and that is the sort of genocide josh campaign. no genocide josh is what it is called. it is quite small in terms of actual numbers. but in terms of making noise online and other places, it is made some. he's very much in the same place in terms of policy that the biden/harris administration has been on israel, but he has criticized some of the more violent protesters on campuses in a forceful way and that has upset some people. there are those that say in michigan, where there is a large arab american constituency, that it would cost kamala harris votes. that is the debate that is going on out there. i'm not taking a side in it

right now. with that in mind, and everything else in mind, who you got? >> i had roy cooper and he unfortunately dropped out of the race. so i will tell, i worked at emily's list for quite a while. i'm not used to picking men. so i'm just going to say i have whoever the vice president thinks will campaign and govern with her the best. i think, to michael's point, this is a great moment of momentum and we have a stacked bench. i will put any one of those guys up against j.d. vance, bless his heart. they've already shown that they could campaign. they've already done great jobs in their current roles. and so i think any of them would be a great choice. but fundamentally, this excitement that we've seen, the money, all of the zooms, all of the registration of voters, that is come from kamala harris.

and that is who people are going to elect at the end of the day. >> that is always the case -- sorry, i didn't mean to cut you off. >> no. i said how is that for a dodge. >> that is a dodge. i was going to say, artful. even more artful than michael steele. but rev is going to tell me who he really got. and i mentioned the shapiro thing only because two things are true. both campaigns consider pennsylvania their tipping state. there is an enormous amount of attention and money and focused on pennsylvania no matter what. that josh shapiro was in the top tier is clear. but some in the left are putting pressure on kamala harris to not pick him. and you know this pick is as much as anything a reflection of the values and vision of the nominee. who do they think they could govern with, what message are they trying to send. so talk to me about what you think the choices that she faces and again, if you were advising her, what you would tell her to

do. >> if he were advising her, and i've been around the last two or three democratic administrations, is that, one, you have to pick someone with shared vision. secondly, someone that you could work with, that you and them have a chemistry. and thirdly, somebody that could help you win. those three elements are the things she considers. because you could win a state and have somebody that is incongruous, or is going to be arguing and fighting with you on your vision. and no one has to advise her. she was vice president for the last 3 1/2 years. if anyone knows what to look for in a vice president and what the job entails, it is the vice president. so i would not advise her to do anything but think about how you were chosen, think about what you had to do and think about what it was like and then choose somebody that could fit that model that you have to fit. >> the vice presidential debate

is going to be a big moment. j.d. vance has broken out of the normal -- the normal pigeon hole that we put -- that you hope when you pick one, they just disappear. he's not disappeared. and i'll say that you think about political athletes, who do you want to see? shapiro, walz, and pete buttigieg, those are the three that will be for me must-see tv. >> i was in presidential debates when i ran in 2004. i would be something that i'm not known to do. i-f i were debating j.d. vance, i would cede all of my time to him and i would let mim fumble and mumble and show the world how idiotic is it was to pick him. and you could give up your time and there is no way they would vote for trump/vance. >> rev, that is out of character for you, the notion of --

>> i said that. >> no, i love that. it tells you how bad j.d. vance is. michael steele and christina, thank you. rev is going to stick around. coming up, an emotional home coming with evan gershkovich and he was one of the three americans who returned to america from russia. and wrongly imprisoned for quite sometime. being greeted by his mother after almost 500 days in captivity. more on how evan and the others got freed right after this quick break. break. etal creaking] [camera zooming] ♪ [window slamming] woman: [gasps] [dog barking] ♪ woman: [screams] ♪ [explosion] [explosion] ♪ [lock clicks shut]

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it is a long time coming. i was convinced we'd get it done. and i meant what i said. alliances make a difference. stepped up and they took a chance for us and it mattered a lot. i asked them to do two things that were against their immediate self interest. and very difficult for them to do. particularly germany and slovenia. slovenia came in at the last minute, and i'll tell you what, the chancellor was incredible. he was incredible. >> alliances make a difference. that was one of the things that president joe biden said there giving credit where it was due. highlighting the role that our friends abroad played in the historic prisoner swap with russia yesterday. the deal will no doubt have a lasting impact on president

biden's historic legacy. that emogeal home coming celebration was over a year in the making for three of the freed americans when they touched back on u.s. soil and greeted by the president and the vice president and their families and at joint base andrews. here is what "wall street journal" reporter evan gershkovich had to say upon his return home after spending almost 500 days in a russian prison. >> it is one thing i would like to say. it was great to get on that bus today and see a lot of, you know, not just americans and germans, but russian prisoners. today was a touching moment to see all of them. >> joining our conversation, pentagon correspondent for "the new york times" helen cooper. great to see you. we have this rather stunning day yesterday. long awaiting, long pined for by a lot of people, especially people in our business who had free evan and free evan gershkovich on their twitter feeds and elsewhere for many of

the 500 days. talk us through about the back story here that we know and how this came together and how much the roles of president biden and vice president harris were key to it. >> hi, thanks for having me. it is good to see you. it is not often that we get these moments in our profession of just pure joy and i think yesterday certainly was one of them. two days ago, when i first heard in the newsroom that evan was about -- was probably going to be freed along with paul whelan, it was kind of electric and we were all too afraid to even -- i didn't say anything to anybody. i was too afraid that this may not happen. this was quite an extraordinary story of sort of secret negotiations in arab capitals, between cia -- cia officials and

russian spy chiefs as well, that started quite sometime ago when even before the -- before alexi navalny died. one of the interesting things i think is how much vladimir putin wanted his assassin, who was in a german prison, he's there for killing -- he was arrested for killing a chechen fighter in a park in berlin and president biden went to schultz, the german lead tore ask and first he said no, he didn't want to release him as part of this exchange. but he eventually came around. similarly, you had president biden going to the slovenia prime minister for this russian spy couple who had been arrested in slovenia a few years back.

it was sounding like a page out of the americans, that really cool tv show. but they had been in slovenia and they were spying, that were under assumed names. so they were part of the deal, too. and so in addition to releasing some russians who were in american custody, you saw president biden sort of coordinating with american allies and at one point they were talking about going to brazil to get russian spies who were in a brazilian pieces and moving like chess pieces, how to get to the point where we could get enough people that vladimir putin wants and as jamie rubin who is a state department envoy, who came up with, as i understand it, the idea of let's go for a big deal, let's involve many -- many russian people in russian prisons, not just paul

whelan and evan gershkovich. but let's see if we could get some russian prisoners as well. you played the clip with evan nodding to that. that part of the deal included the release of russian political dissidents, who protested against vladimir putin himself. so this was a -- this was like so many different chess pieces at play across this board. that kind of culminated in what, you know, the kind of joyous scenes you saw at andrew's air force base that you played this morning. it did my heart good to see evan -- when you saw him pick up his mom and hugged his mom and he picked her up. and i saw, i kept looking at this video today because it is like, oh, he's strong. he's got strength. that is just like, it is such a good thing to see. >> yeah, i mean, look, it is worth noting that the point you made, helene, about what is so

historic is that it is the first time that russian dissidents have been in a deal like this, and freed and along with people from other countries and the americans that we're seeing here. i want to play joe biden in the oval office with the families of the prisoners as they're on the way and an emotional moment where biden is talking on the phone. let' play that to talk about the emotion. it was emotional for everybody. but no one more emotional here than joe biden. >> on the bus to the airport to get on a plane. we're going to call them. you're going to hear them all. >> everybody, can you hear me, it is joe biden. >> hi, mr. president. >> i'm not as good as your families are feeling. they're all standing around the oval office desk here and we just wanted to say how overwhelmed we are. you've been wrongfully detained for a long time. and we're glad you're home. >> thank you. >> thanks you for bringing us

home. >> it's -- there is no greater job i have than protecting americans and bringing americans home -- wrongfully held home, i really mean it. >> rev, we have to take a quick break but i want to get you to comment real quick on this. because joe biden is mr. alliance. that is from his history in the senate all the way through the role he's played putting together the nato alliance and ukraine. is there anybody else who could have pulled this off? >> not that i think of it. i think it is a crowning achievement for him. like you said, years of work building alliances and had we not had those alliances that would have never happened and i think it is fitting, as he's decided not to run again, that he scores a major victory like this to add to his legacy. >> and joe biden, although no longer the democratic nominee, he's still president of the united states and he could still do things that move the needle. no one is going anywhere. we'll be right back. ight back.

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this is just extraordinary testament to the importance of having a president who understands the power of diplomacy and understands the strength that rests in understanding significance of diplomacy and strengthening alliances. this is an incredible day. you could see it in the families. they're eyes and in their cries. >> we're back with helene and

rev. and i want to ask you about vice president harris and we've seen is this reporting about the active role that she played in making this prisoner swap happen. what could you tell us about that? >> well, she made a point, as you saw in her comments at andrew's air force base, consistently, every time reporters brought her in, stepping back and referring to president biden. and flicking everything back to president biden who, truth be told, had -- was the one behind all of this. president biden, in fact, was making phone calls to both to the slovenia prime minister right at the -- on the the very same day that he came down with covid. so this was going on just as he was -- he was involved in these negotiations and kind of staring a lot of this at the same time that he was also bowing out and accepting that he was not going

to be -- and then eventually announcing that he was not going to be the democratic nominee. so i think kamala harris had a moment at andrew's air force base this morning where she could have attempted or tried to ex pound more on her own role here and she chose not to take it. she instead decided to deflect to president biden and to -- to give him that win. which i thought was kind of interesting. >> rev, you know, all people of a good will and of right mind applaud this deal. which means that donald trump doesn't. let's play donald trump talking about the the prisoner swap. >> well, as usual, it was a win for putin or any other country that deals with us. we got somebody back so i'm never going to be challenging that. it wouldn't have happened with us. we would have gotten him back

west wouldn't have had to pay anything west wouldn't have had to let some of the great killers of the world go. and the deal is complex. it just came out. they make it complex so you can't understand how bad the deal is for us. >> classy as always. my colleague noted last night that this was basically a big middle finger from putin to donald trump. trump said only i can free the prisoners and we'll have to give up nothing. there is a kind of quality to this which is sort of like, maybe that sounds good in the kremlin. tell us about the trump of it all. >> the trump is that trump was trumped. when he heard that putin had made a deal with joe biden, he had to be beside himself because as you said accurately said, he had that he was the only one that could deal with the hostages being released. he was the only one who could deal with ukraine. and now putin just ignored him,

side stepped him and made this deal. and obviously, didn't include him in it or inform him. so i think that, and at a time where not only did biden get the victory, biden did it with allies that donald trump has been trying to in many ways sidestep. so there is a huge win for biden and it is also a gut punch for donald trump. >> as my colleague wrote, remember, putin loves to be opportunity predictable one. the one to whom others react, not vice versa. hearing trump, it was condescending so donald trump got to hear from his master in russia in the form of this prisoner swam. all credit to joe biden. my thanks for explaining it and breaking it down for us. up next, we have an update to one of the -- an update related

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reform protest at the state capitol last april following a school shooting in nashville. johnson and the two justins as we've called them. justin jones and justin pearson face expulsion for speaking out. johnson nearly got kicked out of the tennessee statehouse. she was the only one of the three even old enough to run for senate. yesterday she coasted to victory in her primary, telling supporters after, quote, i have never felt more ready to fight for tennessee. unseating senator marsha blackburn is a long shot but we'll keep an eye on that race for you. it just got a lot more interesting. up next, a reporter with the story about donald trump's justice department and the state of egypt. how they led these efforts to bury the investigation into whether or not the 2016 republican nominee at the time took millions of dollars from

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it's great to be with the president of egypt and i will tell you, he has been somebody very close to me from the first time i met him. it was supposed to be a quick, brief meeting and we were with each other a long period of time. we agree on so many things. i just want to let everybody know, in case there was any doubt, that we are very much behind president assisti. he's done a fantastic job in a difficult situation. we are very much behind egypt and the people of egypt. >> it's 5:00 in new york city. i'm in for nicole wallace. from the beginning of donald trump's time in office, he had a strong relationship with the man he later dubbed, quote, my favorite dictator.

egyptian president abdel fatah al sisi. he led to overthrow just a minute's first freely elected president and has dealt with those who don't agree with him. the close relationship is taking on a different light. the post reports the u.s. government was investigating trump's ties into russia was also investigating whether candidate trump had taken money on the down-low from egypt. that would have been illegal as federal election law bars foreign governments from contributing to candidates for political office. the post reports that just days before trump came into the oval office in january 2017, $10 million was withdrawn from a state-run bank in egypt and the post writes this. quote. the discovery intensified a

secret criminal investigation that had begun two years earlier with classified u.s. intelligence indicating that egyptian president el-sisi sought to boost his 2016 presidential election. he unveiled a withdrawal of $9,998,000, nearly identical to the amount trump had given his campaign weeks earlier. a key theory investigators pursued based on international money transfers was that trump was willing to provide the funds to his campaign in 2016 because he expected to be repaid by el-sisi according to people familiar with the probe. the investigation was underway for years but then suddenly stopped. the post reports, quote, within months of learning of the withdrawal, prosecutors and fbi agents were blocked by top justice department officials from obtaining bank records they

believed might hold critical evidence. the case ground to a last by the fall of 2019 as trump's then attorney general bill barr raised doubts about whether there was sufficient evidence to continue the probe of trump. a spokesman for the trump campaign did not answer a list of questions from the post and instead, they called the story, quote, textbook fake news. that's what they say about everything. according to one of the people who spoke with the post anonymously, quote, every american should be concerned about how this case ended. the justice department is supposed to follow evidence wherever it leads. it does so all the time to determine if a crime occurred or not. end quote. and that is where we start today with national investigative reporter for the "washington post," the one and only, the great carol who was buylined. it is a big piece, an important

piece. i want to hear about what it tell us. >> thank you for that very high compliment, john. i know that you know a good story when you see it. and i think the reason this is a good story is that aaron, my colleague and i, had spent a lot of time researching several episodes at the justice department for a book that we're writing and in the course of that, we learned about this secret probe. we learned that there was sort of jaw-dropping cia intelligence that was passed along to robert mueller's special counsel team. it indicated that el-sisi, the president of egypt, wanted to find a way to get $10 million and inject it into donald trump's then cash-starved campaign. you and readers will likely remember that donald trump didn't want to give any more money to his campaign. he thought he was going to lose. his son-in-law and campaign manager were both begging with

him to write a big check to the campaign. at this time, he met with el-sisi on the sidelines and intelligence indicated that el-sisi was finding a way, his spy network to send $10 million to trump. what we learned was once mueller finished, was about to shut down his investigation, he was able through a secret sealed court fight to get a document, a critical document that matched that jaw-dropping intelligence, helped corroborate and validate the intelligence. it showed the spy network of el-sisi, essentially the agency that is egypt's cia, had a special account. it had withdrawn $10 million in cash. put in it satchels that weighed more than 200 pounds. and someone without recording who they were, walked out of bank in cairo with this $10 million, again, in $100 u.s.

bills. a huge proportion of the u.s. currency then available in the entire egyptian banking system. that withdrawal happened five days before donald trump became president. again, matching the intelligence that made the justice department sit up and say, what in the world is going on? we need to find out. did donald trump take money from a foreign government? was he compromised by a dictator of another government? the u.s. department of justice after mueller was shutting down shop took over this investigation. the prosecutors in d.c. struggled to get permission, essentially, from their superiors, the political appointees chosen by donald trump, struggled to get permission to seek the bank records, donald trump's bank records to find out about this money mysteriously moving out of

an egyptian account just as the intelligence suggested ever landed in donald trump's bank accounts. they were blocked from doing that. the fbi was so angry about it that they gave the u.s. attorney in d.c. an ultimatum and said, if you don't let us get these bank records of drunk's for 2017, there is no point continuing with this investigation. she, jesse lu, turned them down and said they could keep looking but not at trump's bank records yet. she had a conversation with the attorney bill barr, had briefed him on this case, and seemed to have changed her tune about whether or not she was willing to let prosecutors and agents get those records. she did, in their view a 180 and decided, no way. the case was moth-balled for a area. other appointees of donald trump's who ran this u.s. attorney's office put a stop-gap

on an actual order, no more investigative steps on this case, and eventually, another one in june of 2020 shuttered the case for good. the statute of limitations expired about a year into the biden administration so there was no way for anyone to get an answer to this question. did donald trump take the money that u.s. intelligence indicated el-sisi was sending to him. >> i want to -- because i am a political person, a campaign person, i want to just provide one piece of context that's important. if you go back to october of 2016, donald trump had the "access hollywood" tape which put his campaign on its heels. a lot of donors, a lot of donors decided they didn't want to put more money into the campaign. they thought he was doomed. there were a lot of questions about how the campaign could fund itself in the closing days.

trump had put a lot of money into his own campaign, about $20 million. then he stopped. there were weeks in a row where he put about $30,000 in the first three weeks of october. then all of a sudden he dropped $10 million toward the end of october which raised a lot of interesting questions. what was it that made trump decide to suddenly open up? he's known to be a cheap man. suddenly $10 million. this is the $10 million we're talking about. the mystery of where that $10 million came from was that he saw the possibility that he could get that $10 million from egypt. and i want you to talk about how, the most important, one of the most important things is the pro quo, that american policy toward egypt changed after donald trump came in and after, according to this reporting, it raises the suggestions that the reason that the policies changed is that it be changed as a result that this $10 million made its way to trump.

talk about that element. how did american policy change and the potential linkage there. >> first, prps to you. you may be describing yourself as a political person but everything you just outlined is what made investigators, fbi agents and prosecutors who do this for a living chasing down fraud. figuring out if people are tricking us and hiding money and the purpose for it. this is what they were interested in. why did donald trump out of nowhere, after telling everyone on his campaign that he would lose the campaign and he didn't actually believe he could seal the deal at the white house, so why write more of his own checks? why send good money after bad? he never put that it way but that's what they took from his hesitancy. and prosecutors and agents thought, why did he out of nowhere decide to write a check for $10 million? it doesn't prove anything. but it sure was in the words of

one source, smoke and then more smoke and more smoke, and you start to think, there is a fire here. the other thing you mentioned, that i think is so important, is the change in the u.s. government's position on egypt. remember that el-sisi came to power in a military coup in which many of the supporters of his opponent democratically elected, were killed in a melee that he is accused of playing a role and orchestrating. the united states government had always held el-sisi, he's an al eye but at some remove that we had to punish him or at least hold him responsible for human rights abuses on his watch. that did not get any better in the years since he had taken, or risen to power. so we had a, at the u.s. government, had a hold on military aid. $1.2 billion of a hold.

donald trump basically flipped the script entirely after he became president. he insisted despite the opposition of his top advisers, and by these i mean, his diplomatic and national security advisers, he insisted that el-sisi became the first president he met with when he became president. he also insisted despite the opposition of rex tillerson who knew a thing about the world and about ought autocrats, trump insisted they release the military aid to the egyptian government. both of those things gave incredible public relations boost to sisi on the world stage. here i am endorsed by the u.s. government in every which way. it was a huge boost for him. it changed things a lot. that also, just as it interested you as a politics watcher, it interested fbi agents and

federal prosecutors. why? why was this script flipped? did it have anything to do with sisi wanting his private conversations to intimate, i'm going to send $10 million to make sure donald trump gets elected? >> i want to bring in to our conversation, the former acting assistant for national security at the justice department, mary. reading the story that carol has written, it's like if you were trying to explain to people why foreign governments aren't allowed to donate money to presidential campaigns, this would be an object lesson in that. i want to read a tiny bit of the piece here where carol talks about, carol and her colleague talks about the role bill barr played in all of this. when he suddenly personally intervened. here's the quote. attorney general bill barr directed jesse lu to personally

examine the classified intelligence to evaluate a further investigation was warranted. barr later instructed christopher wray to impose adult assume vision on fbi agents that barr described as, quote, hell-bent on pursuing trump's records. it is unclear. i'll tell you what happened, this investigation got shut down. so talk about this from the national security standpoint, there are red flags all over this piece. what stand out to you as the most worrying, the most disturbing, and the things, if they got repeated in a new trump administration, would be. >> it is an extraordinary batch of reporting here. as someone who spent a very lengthy career at the department of justice, both in that u.s. attorney's office where jesse lu was the u.s. attorney as well as

in the national security division, i mean, these are the things being reported and i'm just taking the reporting as it exists. i have no other independent knowledge. he's the are thing not just prosecutors but national security officials would be highly concerned about. for the reasons you indicated. part of the reason we have a bar or campaign contributions by foreign governments is so that incoming, whether a president, a senator, for example, or any other elected official will not be feeling obligated or have actually agreed to be obligated to return any kind of favors. and that would include thing like releasing military aid, it could include tipping off a foreign government about intelligence operations. it could include favorable treatment on trade and other

things like that. it can include some of the things that we saw introduced at the trial of senator menendez involving also from just a minute. so you know, from egypt. these are startling red flags. the other thing i would remark about that is interesting about this reporting, at the same time that it looks like bill barr was inserting himself into this investigation to slow it down or squash it is the same time, of course, that he was criticizing the mueller investigation into potential russian interference into our elections. so, as everyone will recall, even after mr. mueller finished his investigation, bill barr did a preview, a four-page public preview of his conclusions that the investigations had led to nothing that was worth pursuing. no criminal violations. no issues of real concern.

many weeks before the full many hundreds of pages of reporting on became public. therefore, creating in the public's mind a narrative that it was an unfounded investigation, even though the mueller report, for those of houston read it, establishes many, many reasons to have been very concerned about trump's behavior, both during the 2016 election campaign season and after he became the president. so if we think about all of this going on at the same time, it certainly raises a lot of concerns again about bill barr's involvement in this. we know there are other thing, and i think they're concluded in other reporting by carol at the "washington post" about other time that mr. barr injected himself to squash prosecutions including of people like roger stone and michael flynn. so this should concern us about what happened in the past but also about what could happen if

mr. trump wins the 2024 election. >> i'll mention that aaron davis is a name we didn't include before, the byline on this piece. the thing that struck me is a note in the piece which is that on january 15, 2022, five years after the money left the bank in cairo, the deadline for bringing charges under the statute of limitations ended. a little coda to this which is that all this delay, all the foot-dragging, all thing that were done to inhibit this investigation may have worked for donald trump. >> well, with that's absolutely true based on the federal statute of limitations for bribery, for money laundering, for illegal campaign contributions, that the statute of limitations has lapsed. that doesn't mean donald trump was engaged in a crime. it means we'll never probably find out that in a way that if

he did, there could be a prosecution. he deserves, of course, the benefit. doubt. maybe this never happened. maybe sisi tried to give him the money and he told him to stop. we just won't know. there are ways to find this out. there is no way to prosecute anyone for this if this crime did occur. and i wholeheartedly agree. aaron was a great partner in this reporting and i'm flattered to be cited by mary mccord who knows this office inside and out. a very talented prosecutor in chief. if she finds red flag, then i think the story stands. >> thank you to you and your colleague. and mary, thank you for coming on and giving your point of view. spending some important time with us today. when we rush, brand new reporting into the expresident's meltdown in his appearance before the national association

of black journalists convention. i can't even use the word on television. we're learning about why trump almost didn't take the stage and what finally forced his hand. that reporting is next. plus, another day, another example of j.d. vance's weirdness. why his 3-year-old comments about olympic gold medalist simone biles are in the news today. and later, new fears that republican election deniers will mobilize in force and refuse this november. how the fight to make sure every vote counts is already underway as the white house continues. ts e crohn's disease. now, there's skyrizi. ♪ things are looking up ♪ ♪ i've got symptom relief ♪ ♪ control of my crohn's means everything to me ♪ (♪♪) ♪ control is everything to me ♪ feel significant symptom relief

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there's new reporting out about just how close donald trump came to canceling his off the rails appearance at the national association of black journalist conference in chicago this week. according to axios, he threatened to not take the stage after his team requested that he not be fact-checked in real-time. they said trump's refusal to take the stage over the fact-check issue nearly killed the potential appearance saying, quote, i was prepared to go on stage and craft a statement saying that he decided not to go on stage because of fact-checking. we couldn't compromise on that issue. it was only as lemon was preparing that statement that trump strolled out to the stage where he proceeded to question vice president harris's race and ethnicity, among other racist tropes that he unaccording before cutting the interview

short. joining our conversation, the editor at large and hosted the podcast the amendment. erin is here. we talked yesterday. it was awesome. plus, for voters against trump, sarah longwell. we talked earlier this week, too. we have a reunion here with two of my favorite people. erin, you were out there in chicago. i talked to you yesterday from my podcast about what was going on. i'm going to read a little bit from the 19th. trump questions whether harris is black in a combative interview. it said trump went on to accuse scott, one of the moderators, of holding up the event, rachel scott, that is, and blamed her for audio issues despite having no role in the event's sound. trump called her nasty, recalling trump's nasty woman. prompting another moderator of

fox news to exclaim, oh, my goodness. also reminiscent of the oftentimes relationship with black women reporters during his years in the white house. erin, i would say often, not only a tense relationship with black reporters, often rude, derogatory, demeaning, nasty, himself nasty. tell us about the reaction, you're a member, tell us about the reaction to this event this week in chicago. the aftermath of this thing, the organized feels about having invited trump in the first place. >> there were certainly members of the association of black journalists, it felt like it had gotten used by trump coming here and being allowed to tell us, if it were not fact-checked in real-time, and to be able to question the vice president of the united states's racial

identity in front of a room full of black journalists. not to mention going after members of our organization as he has in the past gone after members of black women journalists who he has questioned their intelligence, their integrity, their competency. i think what we know is that this is part of his political strategy. this is part of his play book to attack women, women of color, to attack women journalists of color. to distract west see in the axios story, axios is reporting that it was not in fact an equipment issue that delayed that interview but it was that the former president did not want to be fact-checked in real-time during that interview on stage. so if that is the case, you know, then trying to distract by really trying to demean rachel scott of abc news who conducted a completely professional interview and attempted to ask the former president questions

that were of relevance to the black community, which he is supposed to be trying to make inroads to, allegedly, over the course of the next 90 or so days, she was doing her job. for him to say she wasn't doing her job, wasn't good at doing her job, caused this interview to be delayed, that was a distraction apparently from what was actually happening. it was one of the many false hoods over the course of the interview. >> there was some question about this. one of my least favorite was the question of punt forming. you can think a lot of negative things. he is the republican nominee for president. to have rachel scott interviewing him, you're not platforming him. you're interviewing him. your friends and mine tweeted the following which i think indicates why interviewing the former president is a good idea.

he says, this nabj interview is a great example of why the people who demand that we deplatform trump are wrong. people who should see this. they are having to answer for his track record in an environment outside of his comfort zone. god knows i would not have used one of those words if it was me but i'm happy to quote tim. what do you think the impact is politically? does seeing trump in all of his anti-glory help the cause in keeping him from becoming president of the united states again? >> i think it does. any time you hide trump from the american people, cutting off his mic in a debate, taking him off twitter, not carrying his insane rallies live, all of this has served to hide him from the american people. i think as a result they haven't been able to track his decomposition as clearly as they

would have, i was thrilled. i know there is a debate about whether or not he should have done this. i was so glad it happened. people need to see who he is. one of the thing that happens for donald trump that has been consistent over the years is that when voters see more of donald trump, his approval rating goes down. when they see less of donald trump, his approval rating goes up. we want voters to have exposure to him. most importantly, we want them to have exposure to him outside of interviews that are softball interviews in the context of fox news. laura ingram isn't going to ask him about what happened on january 6th. that i think they're not going to ask him in the ways that these much more sort of professional journalists asked about things like j.d. vance. it's a simple questions. will your vice president be ready on day one if he is needed to become the president of the united states? watching donald trump not be

able to answer that question was extraordinary. and so i think it was a service to journalism for the american people. and i think those who argue that we should keep donald trump, it's not just that he is the nominee for president, although i think that alone is a good reason. it is imperative that americans see who this man is right now. >> you think someone who is a nominee for president should be held accountable and questioned and journal. is are well equipped to do that. i think the fact that what your data slows over and over again interesting more they see him, especially among undecided voters. the more they see him, the less they like him. when we return, we'll talk about the weirdness thing with j.d. vance. my god, he is the gift that keeps on giving. the thing he said three years ago about an olympic gold medalist simone biles is now under new scrutiny today, going

viral. especially after biles' gold medal performance in paris. we'll talk biles, vance, weirdness. that's next. weirdness. that's next. ♪♪ whoa nelly! iphone 15 with tons of storage. i really want one! yo! you've won 14 times on the lpga tour! since when is one enough for you! that is true.. get your head out of the sand trap, switch to t-mobile and get four iphone 15's on them and four lines for just $25 a line. and you can save on every plan versus the other big guys. [glass shattering] swing big at t-mobile. get four iphone 15's on us. and four lines for $25 a line. fore!!! with bugs, the struggle-is-real.

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that he brings. it's that this leads to weird policy. >> it is awkward and it stems from who is asking for this crazy stuff? who is asking to raise the price of insulin? who is asking to get rid of birth control? who is sitting in a bar and racing in wisconsin saying you know what we need? we need to ban animal farms. nobody is. >> as you see there, democrats all over the map of every stripe have been on offense calling out donald trump and especially his running mate j.d. vance for being, that word, weird. very much in unison and it seems to be getting under republicans' skin. >> do you know who is plain weird? she's plain weird. she's a weird person. >> they're the weird ones. nobody has called me weird. i'm a lot of thing but weird i'm not. i'm up front. and he's not either.

i will tell you. j.d. is not at all. they are. >> there's like a cold clip of people calling you weird? did you see that? it was like a clip -- >> i know the kamala campaign wants to call me weird. i'm a pretty normal guy. i have a wife and kids and i like to hang out. >> watching that clip, just the stance there. he's weird. okay? and he is really obsessed with whether or not people have kids. you keep being weird, saying weird stuff and when the stuff that you said is weird keeps resurfacing. case in point. this week, the comments made about simone biles to step back from the games in tokyo four years ago resurfaced. >> we've tried to turn a very tragic moment, simone biles quitting the team, into this act of heroism.

and i think it reflects poorly on our society that we try to praise people for their weakest moments. >> we're back with you. he said this thing about childless americans, childless women and men. they deserve our sympathy and we should pray for them. again, this simone biles is a moment of weakness. we should feel sorry for her what happened four years ago. in addition to the weirdness, there is this incredible condeskrengs that he projects. it doesn't seem to be to be very appealing. how are your undecided votes, how do they see it? >> let me say i watched simone biles yesterday win the gold. and i would like to see j.d. vance do that floor routine. i don't think, it's so easy to sit there and criticize people.

as far as what i hear from swing voters all the time, it is really interesting. they do not like j.d. vance. the number one reason is they think he is a phony. from what people know about him, they really know that he did this about face on trump. that he totally flip flomd. he used to say, trump is america's hitler. then he began sucking up to him. they view him as totally inauthentic. if there is one thing voters can smell, it is when you are a fake, a phony and inauthentic. and i think one of the things that, it was really funny, watching that clip, listening to that clip of donald trump, i'm not weird. they're weird. clearly it is getting under his skin like he's not cool or something. he hates it. i think it goes to the problem of choosing somebody like j.d. vance who was kind of a normal guy. decided to get weird to get good

with maga and the super online maga bros and now has created a toxic profile for himself that is dragging trump down and elevating many of the things about trump, sort of the sailence of things, that for a lot of people were baked in. the mysogyny, the horrible way he talks about women, lots of the other stuff that people find offputting about trump. j.d. vance has reminded people of those things. so swing voters have not been interested in him at all and it is making them even rethink how they're thinking about trump. they can't believe he picked him. >> do no harm is what you're supposed to do with your vice presidential pick. and he is harm. i want to put up something that linked to our last topic, simone biles, talking about black jobs.

here it is. there she is. simone biles holding that medal. that gold medal up and it says i love my black job. it's a good moment to reflect on the greatness of simone biles but to reflect on the weirdness of j.d. vance. we talked about it yesterday. what are you hearing out there in the world? i think it is amazing that donald trump said i've never heard anyone call me weird. it suggests to me he needs to get out more. you're out there all the time. how is this weirdness thing sinking in with voters? >> i have to go back to that nabj interview. he was asked specifically, probably for the first time since he uttered the phrase black job. what is a black job? asking him to explain that on a stage. that's not something he would have been asked in one of the friendlier places he would interview. biles appearing to take this kind of victory lap at the

expense of trump-vance campaign saying i love my black job, record setting olympic gold medalist, that was kind of a dig. you have j.d. vance focused on his past remarks, this time about simone biles. she was out for the 2021 games. what we saw was that this was not a sign of weakness. that was a sign of immense strength. not only for her but it empowered people around the world. saying she was weakering was not reading the room then and he's not reading it now. her win this week could have been an opportunity for him to actually praise biles and get ahead of those past comments. that didn't happen so again he's being dragged for what he said about her back then. it points to this pattern of j.d. vance making derogatory comments about women.

the more they hear from him, they hear these very gender stances. it can inform policy around how he can influence trump as the number two in the future of the maga republican party. >> you guys are both great. i keep thinking about that moment earlier this year when they were on the wrong side of taylor swift. now they're on the wrong side of simone biles. if you are on the wrong side of taylor swift and simone biles, you are doing it wrong. when we return, deadline democracy. certifying the 2024 election. how it is already underway before votes are cast. and new fears of mass chaos this election day. that's next. chaos this election day that's next.

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experiencists are now working as county election officials. at least 20 of them have already refused or delayed certification in recent years. it's part of what mark calls their, quote, election subversion war machine and just the, quote, tip of the iceberg. he writes, quote. they might have tried to subvert the results in a handful of places in 2020 and 2022, this year they will try to subvert them all, setting the stage now for what is to come in november. joining us now, the man with what we were talking about, the founder of the site member of the bold brotherhood. talk about the preparations that are underway that is reporting in rolling stone. just how pervasive these preparations are to try to steal the vote.

>> so republicans have been very honest and outspoken about their plans here. there was a time when they hid their voter suppression and they denied their election denialism. now they vote of about both of them. rhonda was not doing enough to suppress the vote to cleat after the election. in 2020, we saw that donald trump tried to get the, first the michigan board of canvassing certified. it was reported afterwards that rhonda mcdaniel and donald trump, the president of the united states at the time, literally got on the phone with these local officials to try to keep the certification. in 2022, my team and i, we had to sue arizona, in pennsylvania, because election deniers were refusing to certify the mid-term elections. they are clear in their plan.

it is incumbent on all of us to listen to what they're saying. >> i'll read more from the rolling stone article about what republicans are doing to call the election into question. they listed some of the states. the battle ground states where they're at work. efforts include mass voter challenges, implementation of unreliable hand recounts, restriction of voter registration rules, republican takeover of local election boards by a legislation, and certification refusals. certification is seen by republicans as one of the first legal steps to challenging the results of elections and has been, has been since the days immediately following the 2020 election. so mark, like you said, they're doing it all. they're doing all these things out in the open. talk about the wide-ranging strategies that you're using to take it back. >> we are litigating in more than 40 cases across 17 or 18 states. we just had a victory just

before i came on the air. i was told that one of the rnc's lawsuits in nevada was defeated. so like one thing we're doing is litigating. i know that's something the dnc is doing and the department of justice is doing. one thing to do is to fight against this in court. the other thing is to bring it to the public's attention, right? to make sure that people recognize that this is their strategy. in 2021, republicans in georgia challenged the eligibility of 364,000 georgians to vote. they didn't win the two senate races but they were back if 2022 and they challenged another 100,000 voters. and we know that in recent weeks, republicans in georgia have made it harder to defeat voter mass challenges. these are challenges submitted by people who don't know the people they're challenging. they just submit spread sheets of people who don't want to vote. and we saw requesting to remove people voting online.

so part of what i do, what other lawyers do, we fight against this in court. it is an important role for the media to play and important for all citizens to play in calling this out. >> we have 30 seconds before we go to break. i want to ask you a big question because there's some reporting on cnbc about it. elon musk is starting to get into the game in terms of the vote. how worried are you about that guy with that amount of power and money in social media starting to play in the arena you've been fighting in. >> i am very worried. there is a vast right wing network of organizations that are incredibly well funded. before you get to elon musk, they are incredibly well-funded. they are all over the plafrlts trying to put election deniers in office. trying to disrupt elections. and then when you add on top of this, one of the richest people in the world, of course i'm worried. i am also resolved that we won't

let big money or voter suppressors win. we'll fight back and make sure every person eligible to vote is able to cast their vote and have it counted. >> as i always tell you, bald is beautiful. a quick break. we'll take it now and then we'll come back. t now and then we'll come back. ♪ and i am lost and i can't ♪ punch buggy red. ♪ even say why ♪ ♪ i am, i said ♪ ♪ ♪

speaking of tiktok, as we always do, given its importance, today doj and the ftc sued that company tiktok and its parent

company accusing tiktok of knowingly collecting data from millions of children under the ancient 13 and allowing them to interact with adults and adult content on the app. the government alleges that tiktok collected and retained information from children under 13 without notifying or obtaining consent from their parents. and they have not been able to identify and delete accounts created by young children. tiktok has already faced significant pushback from bipartisan officials that the app owned by a chinese country. they said they disagree with these allegations. many of which relate to past events and practices that are factually inaccurate or been addressed. that's not great english but we'll keep an eye on it. after another break, we'll be right back. break, we'll be right back

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