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tv   Alex Wagner Tonight  MSNBC  August 7, 2024 6:00pm-7:00pm PDT

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working to build that plant, and your hours as a union member are double what they were in 2019. that's real, that's your pocketbook . i'm not creeding if donald trump comes back into the presidency that somehow he's going to wave a magic wand and fix inflation. if you believe that, i got a bridge i'm going to sell you. so i just think we got to make that argument up front. >> congresswoman elissa slotkin, now the senate candidate in michigan. thank you very much, appreciate it. >> thank you. thank you. >> a quick and fun note before we go. if you have not yet gotten your tickets, scan the qr code on your screen and you can come see me and rachel maddow and a whole bunch of your favorite msnbc hosts in brooklyn. one month from today, saturday, september 7th, for msnbc live democracy 2024. and given what's happened in just the last two week, we will have plenty to talk about. so come join us.
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that is all in on this wednesday night. alex wagner tonight starts right now with ali in for alex. >> it's going to be a fun day to be at. and i think when they planned it, i didn't think we thought that, oh my god, like september 7th is going to be so fully in the middle of everything that's going on in the world and in this country that it'll not be just a great day for people who watch us who we'll emeet for the first time but just for us to all be in the same place talking to each other. because that doesn't happen all that much either. so i'm really looking forward to that event. >> me too. >> i shall see you there. you have a great evening. nice to see you, friend. >> you too. >> all right, check out the crowds for vice president harris and her new running mate, minnesota governor tim walz this afternoon in eau claire, wisconsin. the harris campaign said 12,000 people came out to this eau claire rally today. that would be impressive on its own, but check this out. this is the size of the crowd at harris' rally tonight in
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detroit. the harris campaign says 15,000 people are in attendance at that. today the harris campaign revealed that since announcing minnesota governor tim walz as a running mate in just the past 24 hours since then the campaign has raised a whopping $36 million. the democratic fundraising site actblue said the peak of their fundraising came in at $4 million in a single hour. that was the hour that harris and walz spoke together yesterday evening in philadelphia. the excitement around the harris/walz ticket is palpable, and it's clear the excitement has trump and his running mate, jd vance, scrambling to come up with new ways to counterattack. as far as donald trump has tried to attack kamala harris this week, it hasn't gone that well. she started referring to vice president harris as kamabla. as the daily beast put it, trump's new attack on kamabla harris is literally gibberish. or trump's new nickname for
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kamala shows how desperate he is. >> kamabla not the strongest point of defense, but it seems jd vance and donald trump have found potent lines of attack. the issue with those lines of attack, of course, is that they are entirely false. >> what really bothers me about tim walz, it's not even the positions that he's taken, though certainly he has been a far left radical, you know what bothers me about tim walz as a marine who served his country in uniform? when the united states marine corps, when the united states of america asked me to go to iraq to serve my country, i did it. i'm very proud of that service. when tim walz was asked by his country to go to iraq? you know what he did? he dropped out of the army and allowed his unit to go without him. what bothers me about tim walz is the stolen valor garbage. do not pretend to be something that you're not. >> do not not pretend to be
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something you're not. on its face with no context or fact checking that line of attack, the idea that governor tim walz is lying about his military service, is potent. we saw an incredibly similar fabricated line of attack in 2004 against the then democratic nominee for president, john kerry. and those completely made-up attacks led to nearly 20 president of voters saying they didn't think that kerry deserved his war medals. i should note that the one person who orchestrated that fabricated line of attack against john kerry was chris, donald trump's chief campaign strategist. like in kerry's case back in 2004, this allegation of stolen valor against walz is just wrong. tim walz served in the national guard for 24 years. he responded to floods and tornados and he spent months on active duty overseas doing things like training our nato
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allies in italy. now, walz has never eclaimed that he had a combat role in the military. he's never had one. but that's not the point, because there's an understanding among people who served this country in the military that you have answered a sacred call no matter what you are, whether you're in reserve or you're active duty no matter whether you're a cook or mechanic or fighter pilot, no matter whether you see combat or not. tim walz never saw combat. but you know who else didn't see combat? jd vance. vance was a civil affairs marine who took photo, wrote story, and escorted journalists around iraq. but that doesn't matter because neither of these two men have ever pretended they had combat roles. they had incredibly important noncombat role, and they are both veterans. and we should be grateful to eboth of them for their service to this nation. the only reason walz ultimately left the national guard was to run for congress. i mean, go back and listen to how he presented himself even in
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that very first run for office, doesn't sound like stolen valor to me. >> i am a retired command sergeant major in the minnesota national guard. and after years of firing artillery, i sustained severe inner ear damage. because i have good health insurance provided through my employer, i was able to have surgery on my ear. as my ear healed, my hearing was gradually restored. one morning several weeks after the surgery, i awoke to a sound i couldn't identify. i asked my wife what i was hearing and she told me, tim, that's your 4-year-old daughter, hope. you see, hope wakes up singing every morning, but i had never heard that sound until that day. i am running for congress because i believe we as a country have a moral obligation to ensure that every father can hear his daughter sing, that every citizen receives the best care or medical community has to offer. i am tim walz, and i approve this message because i've heard how important healthcare is to everyone. >> so tim walz went from public
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service in the military to public service in congress. a few years ago minnesota public radio tracked down some of the members of the walz unit who did deploy to iraq. the main thing they wanted to stress to the outlet was that they both dealt with severe mental health issues upon their return and that walz worked to connect struggling guard members with help. he sought to cut the red tape. governor walz is not stealing any valor. he served the country for more than two decades, unlike, say, donald trump, who reportedly avoided the draft for vietnam by claiming he had bone spurs. but like i said, that's just one of the potential potent lies that the trump and vance campaign are pushing about tim walz right now. here's lie number two. >> when the violent mobs of anarchists and looter es and marxists came to burn down minneapolis four years ago, remember me, i couldn't get your governor to act. he's supposed to call in the
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national guard or the army, and he didn't do it. i couldn't get your governor, so i sent in the national guard to save minneapolis. >> trump claims that in the civil unrest that came in the wake of the police killing of george floyd, trump claims that governor walz refused to send in the national guard and that trump himself had to do it. again, that strikes me as the kind of attack that could be incredibly potent with a lot of americans, if only it were true. but again, it's not true. today abc news obtained newly released audio of trump himself four days after governor walz called in the national guard. >> i know governor walz is on the phone and we spoke, and i fully agreed with the way he handled it the last couple of days. tim, it showed the incredible difference between your great state yesterday and the day before compared to the first few
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days, which was just -- >> absolutely. >> and i don't blame you. i blame the mayor. i mean, i've never seen anything like it. where the police were told to abandon the police shous and it was ransacked and really destroyed. millions and millions of dollars are going to have to go back to fix it. i don't know. >> mr. president, if i'm still on, the one thing i'd say is i did 24 years in the guard. the one thing i would say that you could do is, a lot of people don't understand who the national guard is. and you need to get out there from a pr per spective and make sure it's not seen as an occupying force, but it's their neighbors, school teachers, business owners, those types of things. that's a really effective message. >> okay, good, i think that's a good idea. >> okay, good, i think that's a good idea. now, i should note that nbc news has not independently verified that audio and a spokesperson for the trump campaign said trump lauded walz after the governor heeded his advice to
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enlist support from the national guard, end quote. but again, even that's provably false. trump didn't start saying he would call in the national guard himself until the day after the national guard had already been activated by governor walz. those are the lies that trump and vance are pushing about tim walz. when your trumpy uncle tries to tell you those lies, debunk them. or better yet, debunk them and tell him about who governor walz really. is there's been a lot of ink spilled trying to explain why vice president chose governor walz over all of the other incredibly qualified candidates. lots of different democratic elected officials reportedly worked behind the scenes to encourage harris to pick walz. and among that list of officials, one that stuck out to me it was leader of the house progressive caucus, congresswoman jayapal. congratulations, by the way, on
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winning your primary last night. tell me why you wanted governor walz as kamala harris' running mate? >> well, ali, i've gotten to know the governor just a little bit over the last many years, and i have been so impressed on a number of levels. first of all, i think balancing out the ticket was somebody from the midwest who came himself from a rural, red district and has been the governor of a state that has implemented incredibly powerful economic programs that have lifted minnesotans up in red districts and blue districts across the state, like paid leave, like making sure we have gun safety regulation, making sure that we're continuing to provide access to healthcare. these are things that are very popular in places across the country. and certainly in the midwest in states we need to win i think governor walz is going to be able to talk about his record
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there. secondly, he's just a great communicator. you know, he's your everyday guy that people can relate to, and i think that people really feel differently when they talk to him. they feel seen. they feel like they belong. i've heard that from so many people. i've seen it myself. i've seen him operate just out there in the crowds in the way he takes on issues. even with him popularizing the word weird, whey think is interesting about that is what he's saying is, listen. what they're trying to talk about out there, jd vance and donald trump, is just weird. trying to deport illegal, you know, mass deportations of immigrants, talking about people in ways that are so demeaning, childless cat ladies, things that really undermine who people are as human beings. that's weird. and we are not that way. all of us can come together and unify. and so i think those are all
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great reasons. i think the third reason is he is 1,000% behind the biden/harris agenda. and now the harris campaign agenda, the harris/walz agenda, which is an economic, populist, popular agenda that will bring freedom and opportunity to people across this country. >> you know, among all of those groups who've gotten together and done zoom call, there was a childless cat ladies zoom call as well that i thought was kind of fun. tim walz, you heard, as we introduced you, you heard jd vance calling him a far left radical. that we have heard a lot of. he is for higher minimum wages. he, as you said, is for greater medical coverage for everyone, unionization, paid family leave. it's kind of weird calling these things -- and the things that you and the members of the progressive caucus support -- far left, radical stuff. the underlying support among the majority of americans for all of
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these things, including the minimum wage, $15,000 a year if you earn it, this is not radical. it's not far left. it's not even mostly left. >> that's exactly right. we've talked about this so many times. what people call far left ideas, progressive ideas, these are things that the vast majority of americans want. and when you poll, you see this. minimum wage, people want a federal living wage where they can take care of their families. you know, universal healthcare, that's actually something people want and need. paid family leave. these are things that most countries of our stature around the world have. and the united states does not. and americans across the board, republicans as well, but certainly independents and democrats support these ideas. and i think what tim walz is able to do is talk about them in a way that connects to regular folks wanting to take care of
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their families. just want a decent government that takes care of them. and i will also say that tim's -- governor walz's bio is sort of like a poster child for why government matters so much. >> mm-hmm. >> right? when you think about the fact that at 17 years old his dad died and his family made it day to day because they had social security survivor benefits. he went to college on the gi bill. he actually was able to be a public school teacher for so many years in our public education system, which is funded by the government. these are all things that allowed him to be who he is today. and that is the opportunity we want to provide for everyone. and i think that's why it's powerful. because he and kamala harris have real stories of being working class folks who were able to get to where they are today and want other americans to be able to get there as well. >> talk to me about -- you've said that it was a unifying
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pick. what do you mean by that? >> well, i just think it's been so interesting to see across the democratic caucus, right, progressives, moderate, new dems, you know, joe manchin, across the democratic caucus, plus some independents since joe manchin's no longer a democrat, we have seen a real rallying together for tim walz. and the excitement that you're seeing, first for the vice president herself, who was such an incredible force out there. when i was in georgia as one of her first surrogates a few days after she got in the race, it was amazing to see the black, brown, young people communities across georgia coming out. now you're seeing it with -- i heard there were 47,000 requests for tickets to that rally in detroit, which i think had about 20,000 people there. and they had to move locations. the energy from the midwest, from the south, you're going to
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continue to see this, it's just phenomenal. it's because people see themselves in kamala harris and tim walz. they represent all the different parts of america coming together around a working class economic agenda that is going to lift everyone up. not identity politics. everyone should have have a chance at a decent life. these are two decent people who are fighting for americans to have that chance. >> congresswoman, good to talk to you as always. thank you for joining us tonight. the congresswoman, pramila jayapal, we appreciate your time. donald trump says he's never heard of project 2025, but a new photo shows him on a private jet with its leader. on day two, tim walz brings energy and joy to the democratic ticket, but will he bring votes? politico's martin joins me to discuss, that's next. n joins me t discuss, that's next
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this election's going to be a fight. we like a good fight. when you know what you stand for, you know what to fight for. we know what we stand for. >> donald trump, he sees the world differently than we see it. he has no understanding of service. because he's too busy servicing himself. again and again and again. >> vice president kamala harris in detroit tonight and her new running mate tim walz at a rally in eau claire, wisconsin, earlier today. both rallies packed to the rafters with supporters. the rally in wisconsin featured a performance by the indie folk band bon iver. you can see he's sporting a camouflage trucker hat. that's part of the harris
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campaign's new merch. it's a camo harris/walz hat. it was inspired by the hat that tim walz was wearing when he got the call asking him to serve on the ticket. but the young voters were quick to an serve that the hat also bears some resemblance to this midwest princess hat sold by the iconic pop singer chapell roan. fans of the harris/walz ticket and the chapell roan fans did not waste a second snatching them up. sold out in 30 minutes. if you're like me and none of this makes sense to you, that's okay, it's okay. i didn't know either of those two names six minutes ago. but here's a handy guide to the campaign's newfound pop culture residents. kamala harris is brat. and that apparently is a good thing, unlike when i was a child. tim walz is midwest princess. and that's also a good thing. it appears that harris' choice of running mate has added fuel to the campaign's viral internet
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advantage over the trump/vance ticket. the question is, does that energy translate to votes in the critical swing states that are needed to win this election? joining us now is politico senior political columnist jonathan martin. thank you for being here. there are all sorts of words that are being described -- being used to describe tim walz, starting from far left radical with jd vance to all sorts of other things, many of them a lot of fun. you call him the comfort food pick. what do you mean by that? >> well, thanks for having me. look, i think for kamala harris this was not about his liberal accomplishments as the governor of minnesota and it was not about, i don't think, being concerned about gaza and josh shapiro. i think it had everything to do with her comfort level with tim walz and the fact that they hit it off. he's like, eyeah, he's upper
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midwest, generational peer. he's like meatloaf and mac and cheese and put your feet up at home. i think she had an easy vibe with him. and that is so essential in these vp picks, having that essential chemistry. that's the gut issue, i think, when you're running for president you want to have a connection. you want to be able to trust your running mate. i think she hit it off with walz. and you saw last night, you know, i think wyatt works. there is sort a sort of complement thing going on there with the two of them. and so, look, i think this has much more to do with her personal feelings than it does any idealogical project. don't forget, she had a turbulent first couple of years in the white house. what it's like to be a vp, and she knows the importance of forging a good partnership and a healthy one. and frankly, i think she wants to avoid some of the challenges that she had, at least her first year plus in the white house. >> all of these expressions that
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i can't repeat from the top of my head because i've never heard them before, the brat and the princess whatever it is. >> yeah. >> tell me, it is something. there's no question. it's very effective, by the way. every time the trump campaign tries to land a punch on kamala harris it gets turned around into something. he started calling her kamabla now, which i just wish somebody could explain to me what it mean, but talk to me about how all this viral, cool, young stuff translates into where it matters, which is votes in swing states. >> i'm still doing the macarena here, so i'm a little bit outdated there. you go, man, we're going to bring it back in chicago just like 1996. yeah, i'm pretty proud to say that we're now into august and i still haven't figured out what brat is. so i'm still working on that. maybe by fall i'll know it. but in all seriousness, look, one of the huge problems president biden had was there was no affirmative energy for his campaign.
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yes, progressives and democrats were uneasy about trump and were going to vote for him against trump, but there was no positive energy for biden. he was a vehicle against trump. and i think what you see now is, especially with folks who are under 40 or under 30 even, these pop culture memes that are arising reflects an energy that's an affirmative energy for kamala harris. there's an excitement about her. they're thrilled to have somebody to get excited about, and most importantly, there's a sort of cathartic moment here on the left given the last month. there's a feeling of joy that the dark month is finally over, and there's now kind of relief. there's now -- there's now sun. >> talk about that joy for a second. >> yeah. >> it's intriguing. it's different from the approach i take in which i'm warning everybody all the time we have an existential threat to democracy. there's something neat about it, though. there's something neat about the chemistry between -- first of
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all, kamala harris' own ability to react to criticism with a smile and a laugh and it feels like trump can't land something. and then this idea that these two feel like they've got energy that's reminiscent of clinton/gore. >> look, they obviously have a sort of natural connection, and you can see that with them out there on the campaign trail. look, what i'm interested in is how does she handle the first day or the first week where things don't go so well, right? she obviously had a nice start. democrats are so thrilled to have a new lease on political life, and she's obviously riding that wave. and i think right now she may ride it into the convention, but what happens when things aren't going so well and she has a campaign structure that is now basically something that was a joe biden campaign that became overnight a kamala harris campaign, and they've added a handful of senior folks on top of the campaign from the obama
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crowd. what happens when those folks start to clash and when things aren't going well? how does she respond then? i think that's going to be the test of kamala harris' candidacy is, yes, things are going well now. she's enjoying a honeymoon, but can she keep it together for 90 days? >> jonathan, good to see you. as always, thanks for joining us tonight. senior political columnist for politico, jonathan martin. donald trump continues to try to distance himself from project 2025, but tonight new reporting from "the washington post" about a 45-minute flight on a private jet with the guy in charge of project 2025 cuts against trump's efforts. that's next. cut against trump's efforts. that's next. ♪ “billathi askara” by björn jason lindh ♪ [metal creaking] [camera zooming] ♪ [window slamming] woman: [gasps] [dog barking] ♪ woman: [screams] ♪
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for weeks, donald trump has tried to distance himself from project 2025, an ultraconservative policy blue precipitate for a second trump administration organized and written by the heritage foundation. trump has said in the past, though, that he's mod -- and he's moderated his comments since that he has no idea what it was. project 2025 and donald trump are inseparable. at least 140 trump administration alumni helped create this document. trump's running mate, jd vance, wrote the forward of an upcoming book, offered by the architect of project 2025, its new leader kevin roberts. the publication of that book has
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been conveniently delayed until a week after the election. and tonight "the washington post" reports that in april 2022 donald trump shared a 45-minute private flight with roberts on enroute to a heritage foundation conference where trump said in a keynote address, quote, the group's policy proposals are going to lay the ground sxoshg detailed plans for exactly what our movement will do, end quote. our movement. joining me now, angelo, ceo of a nonprofit group doing extensive research on project 2025. angelo, good to see you again my mind went to you because you really studied this thing. there are sections and chapters on literally every part of government. but fundamentally, if you've gone through this document, what you understand is the most important part of it are not necessarily the specific very right wing poll sis therein but
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the idea that it restructures the entire federal government in a way that the next president could not easily fix. >> that's exactly right. and it is designed to be not an aspirational set of ideas or just a, you know, proposals or value structures, it's an actual plan. you know that because the one document that's not public is not the policy, that 900-page policy document, but rather the 180-day agenda document a step-by-step instruction manual for what the first 180 days are going to look like. and then underneath that is this thing called schedule f, identifying thousands of key federal government positions that need to be terminated immediately and firing those individuals. and already they have a database of more than 4,000 people that they prevetted that would immediately be slotted into those roles. so it's both a transition team and a deep plan already baked into one. and the design here, as you noted, is to restructure government and also do it in
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such a way that it can't really be unwound, but rather worse, turn it into an instrument of donald trump's revenge. >> so schedule f, the most boring thing i've ever heard in terms of a name, except that what we don't think about whether you are from the united states or canada or germany or france or any of these places is that you don't know the names of the people in the civil service by design. other than the top person, the minister or something or the secretary of a department, you know no one else's name because they are career people or experts. schedule f and project 2025 changes that. >> as you noted, civil service, the idea is these people are doing public service. they're not doing it for the money. they're not doing it for the hours, right? or the perks. they're doing it because it is actually a service. and one of the things that schedule f does is reclassify what would be civil service positions and sort of reorients them around something that allows them to be treated as
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political appointees. >> we're not talking about 50 jobs or 500 jobs or 5,000 jobs. we're talking about 50,000 positions in the american government that you and i would think of as civil service jobs occupied by people whose names we don't know and will never know reclassified as political jobs. that sounds like countries that we talk about that have unstable governments. >> that's right. and you know, if you think about this in the context of what the right wing has ralded against, not just their ideas but one of the things that we heard over and over and over again was that it was the deep state stopping donald trump from implementing the policies the right wing really wanted. this is a way to go with what the right wing has identified as the deep state. as you noted, it's the civil servants. but that's why they see this as a mechanism. this is the part that's so scary about it. it's not just what's being proposed. unlike last time around when trump got into office and after he lost the last election, this time they actually have a
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resourced plan and the personnel to implement it. and what you're seeing here is sort of this backsliding around project 2025 or attempts to do, that they're not really rejecting the notions or the ideas. there's a wink and nod and dance. even the way they're doing it is kind of lying as this most recent picture illustrates. and that's the part that's so unsettling. they know it's not popular, but they are bent on sort of implementing it. and we should all be deeply concerned about it. >> and kevin roberts, the guy who was in charge of the heritage foundation has come out and said, of course, they're going to disavow it. that's good politics. once they come into government, this is the plan. and everybody involved -- no one involved in it is disavowing it. and these are people who are in trump's inner, inner circle. this is not peripheral people who had minor jobs in the trump administration. >> yeah. that's exactly right. and look, i know why maybe perhaps they wanted to delay the release of this book, especially until after the election. now that there's a spotlight. now that the media is paying attention to excite asking the kinds of questions and looking
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into this, i know why. because they would look into the book. we have a copy. and one of the thing kevin roberts writes about is he describes that having a child should not be considered an individual choice. and there's an entire argument in the book about how you should -- that it's not a personal choice, that it's something society should impose on people, which is why they're opposed to contraception and why that needs to be banned. and part of what that book is is designed to marshal -- >> you should get a free copy of the handmaid's tale when you get kevin roberts' book. read them next to each other. they'll make a lot of sense. feels like the same thing. angelo, thank you for joining us. we appreciate your time tonight. all right, still to come, new actions taken by georgia this week may make it easier for trump allied election officials in that state to refuse to certify november's election. we'll explain how next.
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(fisher investments) at fisher investments we may look like other money managers, but we're different. (other money manager) you can't be that different. (fisher investments) we are. we have a team of specialists not only in investing, but also also in financial and estate planning and more. (other money manager) your clients rely on you for all that? (fisher investments) yes. and as a fiduciary, we always put their interests first. (other money manager) but you still sell commission -based products, right? (fisher investments) no. we have a simple management fee structured so we do better when our clients do better. (other money manager) huh, we're more different than i thought! (fisher investments) at fisher investments, we're clearly different. janice johnson, rick jefferies, and janelle king. three people are all pit bulls fighting for honesty, transparency, and victory. they're fighting. >> donald trump last weekend in
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atlanta name checking three members of georgia's state board of elections, all republicans, and all of whom have questioned the results of the 2020 election. just yesterday three months before the next presidential election in a 3-2 vote those three pit bulls that donald trump talked about approved a rule that threatened to upend how elections are certified in georgia. and this is really important. the new rule empowers county election board members to conduct a, quote, reasonable inquiry, end quote, into whether election results are complete and accurate before they officially certify them. however, the new rule doesn't define what a reasonable inquiry entails, which means officials in georgia's 159 counties can decide for themselves, each of them, what they consider reasonable. and therein lies the problem. democratic elections attorney
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marc elias calls this a new tool. saying, quote, he wants to be able to pick and choose which election results are accepted based solely on the outcome. this rule is a step in that direction. now that was yesterday. today the state board of elections met again. and this time those three pit bulls took another eyebrow raising action, voting to ask the state attorney general to re-open an investigation into how fulton county handled the 2020 election. joining me now is sarah, the sole democratic member of the georgia board of elections, sarah, thank you for being here. this is a bit mind boggling. i want to start with the second part first, the looking into how fulton county handled the 2020 elections. not like this hasn't been litigated before. it's not like we haven't talked about this or thought about it before. the entire country knows where fulton county is and what happened in the elections in fulton county. what are the folks on this board talking about? >> well, thank you for that.
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we've looked into fulton county probably a half a dozen times in different complaints, different issues. the latest complaint was related to a batch of ballots, 3,000 ballots or so, that was double scanned. which fulton county admitted to. ironically, the actual votes on those ballots were disproportionately in favor of the former president, trump, so it did not affect the outcome. there was a mistake made, and they were double scanned. and there were some tabulator tapes missing from some of the skaerns that were used in the -- in early voting. but the issue here is this was investigated exhaustively. >> mm-hmm. >> and we disposed of the case with a letter of reprimand and a -- sort of a gentleman's agreement to try to come up with
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a monitoring team, an independent monitoring team, who would be in place to monitor the 2024 elections to make sure that the sorts of mistakes that we saw in 2020 don't recur in 2024. but this case was disposed of in may, and it -- that is the end of the story under georgia law, under supreme -- georgia supreme court precedent. we can't re-open a case that's been closed, because that just -- that opens a whole can of worms. that means that nothing is -- >> nothing's ever resolved. >> exactly. >> and this other issue, reasonable inquiry. i mean, on one hand, i understand wanting to be as good as you can about this whole thing, but reasonable inquiry is not defined so. what does that mean? that you're ready to certify a county's election results and someone just reasonably doesn't think that's the thing to do? >> well, that's exactly the question. i emean, what does reasonable
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inquiry mean? it would mean something different to you, something different to me. regulations are supposed to provide more clarity and more definition, not less. here georgia's statutory law provides a very, very explicit definition of exactly the steps that a county superintendent is supposed to take to make sure that they're accounting for every vote that's cast. that's what certification is. adding this rule makes it appear that what is very clearly under the state statute and under 100 years of precedent is what's called a ministerial duty. in other words, a mandatory act. this makes it appear that there's some discretion that the counties are able to exercise. the counties are able to exercise. one is side, because we are not looking for more problems, we are looking for fewer problems.
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thank you for joining us tonight. sara tindall ghazal, thank you t for your time. still ahead, tensions continue to rise in the middle east. i will talk to ben rhodes about the risk of a broader regional conflict breaking out, next. ngd the test of time. long-lasting eylea hd could significantly improve your vision. more people on eylea hd had no fluid in the retina, compared to those on eylea at 4 months. eylea hd is the only wet amd therapy that helped 8 out of 10 people go up to 4 months between injections, after 3 initial monthly treatments. if you have an eye infection, eye pain or redness or allergies to eylea hd, don't use. eye injections like eylea hd may cause eye infection, separation of the retina, or rare but severe swelling of blood vessels in the eye. an increase in eye pressure has been seen there is an uncommon risk of heart attack or stroke associated with blood clots. the most commons side effects were blurred vision, cataract, corneal injury and eye floaters.
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noah lyles with another gold medal. in case there was any doubt, who was the breakout star of these world championships. tonight, tensions in the middle east are on a knife's edge as the biden administration along with allies scrambled to prevent all- out war in the region. ever since the hamas leader, ismail haniyeh, was assassinated in tehran last week, iran has threatened broad retaliation against israel, which so far has not taken responsibility for the killing, but is largely considered the perpetrator. president biden reportedly sent strong messages of deterrence to israel and iran. according to the washington post, iran may be heeding those calls. quote, iran may be reconsidering a plan for major
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retaliation. hezbollah is still a wildcard, officials said. joining me now is ben rhodes, former deputy national security advisor. important to talk to about this because there is a lot going on and it is a very dangerous situation. if the wrong thing happens, if it is a miscalculation, we could explode into a regional war and something bigger. for now what we have seen is israel does stuff to another country and another country best of targeted at israel and everyone avoids a major war. why is everyone so worried about this one? >> i think you have to consider this as being a regional war since october 7 and we have seen a full-blown war in gaza. a fairly active war in yemen and sporadic confrontation with proxies across the region and hezbollah in a fairly regular
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exchange of fire with israel across the northern border of israel and a couple of incidents that have struck into iran, most notably the one where the iranians launched a significant number of cruise missiles at israel in response to the bombing of their consulate. i say all of that because they have been able to manage the escalation so that hezbollah and iran directly do not get into a full-scale conflict with israel. that is something the administration has tried to do since october 7. i think the killing right after the inauguration of the iranian president and the killing of a senior hezbollah commander in lebanon raised to the escalatory stakes for both hezbollah and iran. the ball is kind of in the court of both iran and hezbollah to respond and the question is, if they respond in an escalatory nature themselves, we could see that spiral into a broader, regional war. >> in addition to trying to bring the temperature down, you
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had jordan sending an envoy to iran to ask them to cool it. we have had egypt calling the iranian officials. even the saudi's, well sympathizing to iran wanting to retaliate for something that happened inside their country is calling for the escalation. benjamin netanyahu has for many years hoped the united states would get in a confrontation with iran. one of the worst things that happened was when you were serving in the administration and the iran nuclear deal took place which created a dialogue between iran and the united states. that is the danger because when iran and those projectiles into israel it was the u.s. and other countries involved in shooting them down. the u.s. is trying to think at this point not to be directly involved in this. >> and if you look at what netanyahu has done he keeps poking further and further in terms of provocative actions. he knew if you assassinate the leader of hamas in tehran in a
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revolutionary guard guesthouse after the inauguration of the president, you kind of know you are rolling the dice on escalation. in the same way that if you take on hezbollah commanders in lebanon you're risking escalation and he is counting on the u.s. having his back, as we did when we shut down the incoming missiles. the danger of that is do you get dragged into some kind of war? this could destroy lebanon. it could cause the implosion of the lebanese state. it could like to rock on fire. they could target u.s. forces and diplomatic personnel in iraq. we have already seen an attack on a u.s. facility in iraq and worst-case scenario it blows up in iran, major disruptions of the shipments of energy. this is all what the u.s. does not want, but the decision maker in israel is netanyahu and he continues to seem to be pressing to see how far he can go and there are people to his right and his government to have wanted an all-out conflict
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with iran. they think at some point we have to settle this and now is the time to do it. so biden is trying to pull netanyahu back to the reasonable center of policy here, which would be to de- escalate things. right now, though, the decision- making is in tehran and with hezbollah and that is why you have got to work with other countries that have more connections in those places then we do. >> i assume we will see something happen. the issue is how serious it is. good to see you and thank you for joining me, ben rhodes. that is our show tonight. now it is time for "the last word with lawrence o'donnell.". news has been at a velocity that not only is it not normal for it to be, but for it to be in august. >> yes, it has been more than enough to try to keep up with and we are going to show the
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