rachel maddow show starts right now. >> the dnc will be so different this year than we thought it was going to be, even one month ago. i think even had people known the former -- then president biden was going to give up that top at the ticket, had people known that, they still would not have expected the dnc to go the way of will go. the way we expected to go. it will be different than anything we have ever seen. >> completely different, and i think they had to change a lot of the planning because it's all about the nominee. you now have kamala harris is the nominee. it changes the whole thing. which i can't wait to talk to them about. that we're all going to hear from it's joe biden it's going to be a barn burner next week. but i'll have a little preview on sunday.

>> i'm super looking forward to that fantastic. fantastic you got that access. having seen the list we have seen of who's going to be speaking, there is nothing i'm looking forward to more at the dnc than president biden's speech, which i'm assuming is go to be on night one but talk about a man in his moment in american history and having made this like george washington level sacrifice for the country and then him getting to receive the accolades from his party for having done it, and thanks of a nation it's like nothing we have ever seen >> looking forward to it i'll see you next week, too. >> thanks to you at home for joining us this hour as well the fbi is confirming tonight they're investigating a hacking attempt allegedly by iran against the presidential campaigns of both major parties. now, news of this first broke over the weekend when first politico then "the washington post" reported that they had

each been offered documents that appeared to be internal, somewhat sensitive, nonpublic facing documents from inside donald trump's campaign. politico described what they were offered as including a dossier essentially on trump's running mate, jd vance what the outlet described as a preliminary version of vance's vetting file two sources told politico that the documents they were offered were authentic, meaning they were legitimate documents somehow taken from inside the trump campaign then "the washington post" soon reported that they, too, had been shopped stuff at least that seemed like it was coming from inside the trump campaign and might have included some of the same materials now, with those two reports out there this weekend, the trump campaign went ballistic, insisting among other things that no news media should report on the content of these hacked, these leaked documents, that a foreign adversary had done this

and nobody in america should do the bidding of that foreign adversary by reporting on the content of those materials and to be fair, that is fair i mean, this is reportedly a foreign adversary who is doing this, and lord knows why, but it's not for a good reason it is to hurt us as a country and our elections are our business foreign interference in any american election is bad and every american and certainly every american campaign should not only be against it, they should insist that no one try to benefit from this. that no one try to engage with this kind of thing at all. that nobody invite this, praise it, reference what has been taken in this kind of a campaign the trump campaign is insisting that nobody should do that which for them is awkward.

>> now, this just came out this just came out wikileaks. i love wikileaks >> the hillary clinton documents released today by wikileaks. >> exposed by wikileaks. >> we don't talk about wikileaks. >> they want to distract us from wikileaks. >> wikileaks >> the wikileaks revelations >> they got it all down, folks wikileaks. wikileaks. >> russia, if you're listening, i hope you're able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing i think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press >> when russia hacked the democratic party and the hillary clinton campaign in 2016, trump first of all blamed the democrats and the clinton campaign for it, as if it was their fault. and then they spent months telling everybody including trump personally, telling

everybody how great this hack was and how everybody should look at the hacked material and he hoped russia would hack and steal and release more that's how he reacted in 2016. this time, with what may be a different foreign adversary hacking him, trump's campaign purports to be very upset and says nobody should look at this material it would just be doing the bidding of a foreign adversary who wishes our country harm. which again, is true as a matter of our national interest and how we frankly should all feel as americans in the face of a hostile foreign power messing with us. trump has just never felt this way before, when he was benefitting from an attack by a hostile foreign power in a previous election. right? it's a good thing when it helps him. it's a bad thing when it hurts him. and the nation's interests just don't factor into it at all. which is as good a summary as any of american political life in the era in which donald trump has taken over the republican

party. if it helps him, it's good if it hurts him, it's bad. and whatever it means for the country is beside the point. but the fbi again confirming this tonight we'll keep an eye on it. again, the story here is "the washington post" is first to report tonight the fbi has opened an investigation into what may be an iranian hacking attack aimed at both trump's campaign and kamala harris' campaign the harris campaign was reportedly attacked with similar types of spear phishing emails but they -- excuse me, the biden campaign was reportedly attacked with similar looking spear phishing emails but they say they don't believe those attacks works. the trump campaign does not appear to be as well situated against this attack, but we shall see. and this of course, you know, in all seriousness, this comes at a time where we have a carrier strike group speeding to the middle east right now along with a guided missile submarine, which is somewhat ominous. israel warning they are expecting an attack from iran, a

military attack from iran some time very soon in that context, iran cyberattacking our elections while they're potentially mixing it up militarily with one of our allies after a hamas leader was assassinated in tehran it's a bit of a tinder box feel. we'll keep eyes on all those stories tonight as all of them continue to develop. in the meantime, though, just for a moment, can we discuss a thing that did not happen at least it did not happen like this >> well, i know willie brown very well. in fact, i went down in a helicopter with him. we thought maybe this is the end. we were in a helicopter going to a certain location together. and there was an emergency landing. this was not a pleasant landing. and willie was -- he was a little concerned so i know him pretty well. >> this was not a pleasant landing. it's true, this whole thing does

not land well in the end here's what's going on there that was from trump's last rambling, i don't mean this in an unkind way, often quite incoherent campaign press conference at the end of last week and trump in that press conference told a lot of porky pies but the weirdest was he had been in an emergency landing near death helicopter crash with a famous person, willie brown, very powerful politician from california the reason the story is so weird is willie brown is around, and able to talk, and frankly, he loves to talk. i grew up in the san francisco bay area when among other things willie brown was san francisco mayor. he is a person who everybody used to call unavoidable for comment. he will talk to any reporter about anything ever. he is a man who likes to talk about everything in the news and himself. and so when trump made this surprise assertion about a death

defying very dramatic helicopter marriage involving willie brown, people are like, hmm, never heard from willie brown about this but also, we never read about this in the news, and it's weird that that might have happened but there would have been no news about it happening. these are two pretty high profile guys right? donald trump and willie brown were in a dramatic near death helicopter crash and willie's never talked about it and it's never -- it was weird. but then, because he's unavoidable for comment, reporters went out in san francisco and found willie brown and asked him about it a local station kron was first to find him, and it was predictably hilarious and fantastic. >> i don't think i'd want to ride on the same helicopter with him because there's too many people that have an agenda

including the people who service helicopters, so i don't want to be in a helicopter with him. >> somehow, i have the impression you were ever in a helicopter that was going down, we would know about it >> the world would have known about it >> so is he making these things up >> he would have to be i said, he's creative. i mean, like, real creative. that's so far fetched, i mean, it's unbelievable. >> so you were not in a helicopter with him that almost crashed? >> no. [ laughter ] >> that's your answer, right okay >> he's dreaming >> okay. >> "the new york times" and other news outlets suggested maybe what happened here is trump confused willie brown he'd just saw with jerry brown, the

former governor of california. after all trump did take a helicopter ride with him once in 2018 two problems with that number one, trump was president at the time of that helicopter ride in california, so we all really would have definitely heard about it had he had a death defying helicopter emergency landing as president we all lived through that. none of us remember that because nothing like that was ever reported because that did not happen second part of that story is jerry brown and willie brown are not the same person, really, truly, not at all the same trump then in response lashed out both online and apparently in a very angry phone call to "the new york times" in which he said wrong, wrong -- they were getting this all the wrong way around he said it wasn't his helicopter ride in california with governor jerry brown, it was a different helicopter ride, this one in new jersey and it definitely was with willie brown

he had a death defying emergency landing helicopter crash it was in new jersey and it involved willie brown, and i am so mad two problems with that willie brown says that wasn't him either like i said, unavoidable for comment. after speaking with local news kron, he then does a cnn interview. i'm going to give you the first questions and responses from the interview. one of my favorite all-time ever watch. >> have you ever been in a helicopter that made an emergency landing with donald trump? >> no. >> have you ever been in a helicopter with trump? >> no. >> that's it he doesn't elaborate no, not me so was it this california thing? what happens next politico was

first to report there was in fact a helicopter ride donald trump was on and it was in new jersey and it did have mechanical problems, but that one was not with willie brown either it was with a totally different man, a man who also a black man and also an old guy, but really again honestly two totally different people form state senator and city counselor telling quote, willie is the short black guy living in san francisco. i'm a tall black guy living in los angeles. quote, i guess we all look like. and by this point trump has not only said this very strange apparently false thing in his press conference but he is insisting on the truthfulness of what he said he is posting about it online multiple times he's kind of losing his mind he's screaming at "the new york times," he's posting he's got records, there are logs, maintenance records, and witnesses to back up his account

he was definitely in that helicopter crash with willie brown. >> so you were not in an helicopter with him that almost crashed? >> no. [ laughter ] >> that's your answer? okay >> when you tells "the new york times" reporter maggie haberman that he has flight records that will prove him right, quote when asked to produce the flight records trump responded mockingly, repeating the request in a sing song voice ooh, flight records. ooh. i mean who among us does not forget things? i have two dogs. i call them by each other's names all the time they both think each of them have both names. okay i'm sorry.

i once confidently listed all the balkan states as if they were all the baltic states we all mess things up. what's different about trump here, though, in what is otherwise an unimportant anecdote that had no consequences is that he is now not only sticking to this, he's losing his mind over this in public repeated statements insisting on this thing that everyone is laughing in his face about people who were there and know it didn't happen are laughing at him about it because it really didn't happen. and he's shouting at reporters about it he's threatening to sue. he's threatening to produce records that will document this thing. and you know, on the one hand, this is concerning because he's not just an average person he is a presidential candidate and if he is not just unable to remember a thing, but he is legitimately confused, he is unable to accept the truth of the thing that he has gotten wrong. he's unable to process information about what is true

and false, even when it is a thing about his own life, i mean, that raises questions. is he okay we all admit that's a relevant question for a presidential candidate, right is he okay on the other hand, though, because this is trump, one real possibility here is that he is so committed now to this made-up story about willie brown being with him on a helicopter that this is going to become the new hurricane map with a sharpie on it showing that hurricane was headed to alabama. remember the little bulge on the side of the storm path, drawn on with a sharpie they had to put that on there because trump said that storm was going to alabama so he said so, so we're sticking with it. the storm was not going to alabama, but he had said it was, so the map had to be changed to reflect that will this now become an article of faith among republicans that they all must salute and pledge fealty to the idea that donald trump once was in a helicopter emergency landing with willie brown? while willie brown laughs uproariously about it. at that same press conference, trump told another not just lie but a strange story about how he

never threatened to lock up hillary clinton. he never asked for that, and when his supporters said lock her up at his rallies he said he told them they needed to stop that because it would be so bad for the country to jail hillary clinton and he never wanted to do that. and that is insane because it's not only blatantly untrue, we were all there it is something we all witnessed. it's something we all lived through out loud that was the exact opposite of what he's saying and i stack these things together because it isn't just like wow, get a load of this guy. it turns out there's a really good new book about this as a tactic not just as a personal tick or a crush for trump personally but a republican tactic of the trump era that they kind of flirted with a bit before he took control of the party but now they do it whole hog all the time the book is called "ministry of truth, democracy, reality, and the republicans wars on the

repeat path" by steve benin, one of my oldest friends and one of the longest term staffers on the rachel maddow show he's influenced by thinking on american politics as much as anybody in the world it's a short book, just seven chapters, less than 200 pages before you get to the copious footnotes but it explains not only that republicans are doing this, it's not you, you're not just noticing this every once in a while. this is a thing they systematically do, and they do it in a way that democrats don't. but he also explains what they're doing it for he says, quote, rewriting events from the recent past requires a different audacity and ambition. at issue are most events most americans saw and remember these aren't just for debate or obscure developments that an average person might have a superficial understanding of rather, at issue are events from the last few years that people lived through and experienced first hand republicans have nevertheless taken on the bold challenge of

convincing people that their eyes have deceived them, their memories are wrong independent sources of information are not to be trusted, and partisan changes to the recent past deserve to be embraced without question. it reflects a radical vision that trump and his allies have imposed on republican politics this is now after all the party of alternative facts and truth isn't truth. as trump's first year in the white house neared an end, billy bush, to whom trump had bragged about assaulting women during the infamous "access hollywood" recording, bush wrote an opinion piece for "the new york times" explaining what he had learned about trump. after noting that he had confronted trump about inflating the ratings of his reality tv show, the apprentice, bush wrote that trump had told him privately, quote, people will just believe you you just tell them, and they believe you. years later, the republican in his party adopted an eerily similar approach to describing the details of key events from our collective recent history. based in part on the expectation that americans, quote, will just believe them steve says, quote, the stakes

couldn't be much higher. the foundation of democracy rests in large part on a shared understanding of current events. when that understanding is deliberately corrupted by brazen partisans, the consequences can be dire. if you're interested in this as a tactic, again, just making stuff up about the very recent past we all lived through, steve writes about how they applied it to everything from the russia investigation in 2016 to the 2020 election to january 6th oh, it was antifa. oh, no, the fbi who did it no, january 6th didn't happen. it was just a normal tourist visit. then what they're settling on now is, yes, it did happen it did happen and they're all patriots for doing it. what about antifa? also, i mean, the one you hear every day from the trump campaign and from republican surrogates trump had the greatest economy ever when he was president, even

though his economy wasn't as good as either the economy of obama or biden even his claims that he completed the wall, which he did not do why are they doing all these things what purpose does it serve steve benen's book is called "ministry of truth." it's out tomorrow. if you're an audio book person, i personally think this thesis and this book is important enough that i voiced the audio book, so if you would like to not just read the book but have me tell you about it, you can also get the book that way but i did that both because i love steve and also because i think the book is brilliant and much needed and well times joining us now is my friend steve benen, editor of the maddow blog and author of the excellent new book, "ministry of truth, democracy, reality, and the republicans' war on the recent past," which comes out tomorrow steve, congratulations on this i know you almost killed yourself writing this thing. thank you for doing it

>> i'm glad to have done it and i'm glad to be here. thank you. >> so you concede from the very first pages of the book that arguments over history are not unusual for politicos of various kinds but you're homing on something qualitatively different, rewriting the recent past, stuff we lived through what is the tactical difference between lying brazenly about the recent past, things we all saw, instead of lying about things that maybe we all can't verify from our lived experience. ancient history or stuff that happened in far away places? >> republicans have targeted both there's a culture war going on right now with republican officials at a variety of levels of government trying to change the history of things from generations past the civil war, the revolutionary war, founding fathers. that's an important thing in terms of the culture, but there's a qualitative difference when republicans target the recent past. it's more audacious. it requires them to try to overpower our memories and bully our memories into submission over things we all saw lived and experienced. for example, we see them trying to tell us now that the trump response to the covid crisis was great.

it was perfection. it couldn't have gone any better we all know better we all saw and experienced it first-hand what the trump administration's response to covid was, but nevertheless, they believe our memories can be bullied into submission and their alternative reality and alternative narratives can replace the ones we all know >> but why -- why do it, then? if as you describe, and i think you make a very good case that it requires a certain level of audacity to do this, because they are asking us to literally disbelieve our own sense memories, the things that we saw and heard and experienced as human beings not just stuff we read about but stuff we observed happen because it takes such audaciousness. that tells you how radical it is, but why is it worth it why are they doing it? >> two things to keep in mind. the first is by and large republicans feel like they don't have a choice. in general when there are controversies that always happen in terms of politics, in general, politicians employ a certain crisis management playbook

they stick to certain pr strategies they take their lumps and move on but when you send an insurrectionist mob to attack your own country's capitol or when you fail to respond to a pandemic or cooperate to a certain degree with an adversary to take office in 2016, you can't just employ the usual tactics. they won't do. these are larger kind of crises. these are existential crises and in large part, the reality is if republicans never win another election, if the public started to understand and embrace these existing narratives the way they happen in reality so i think the first thing is they feel like they have no other choice the second thing to keep in mind is republicans feel as if they can get away with it in fact, when it comes to their base, they have gotten away with it as of right now, there's ample

polling that shows from a great majority of republicans, january 6th was not an insurrectionist riot there was no classified documents taken to mar-a-lago. trump actually won the 2020 election these are not things where a handful of fringe figures believe it this is a situation in which the majority, a clear overwhelming majority of republicans believe this so republicans do this at the highest levels because they feel like they can. they feel like they can get away with it. >> yeah. well, a, it's a really good assemblage of those things when you put it even in the terms you just do, i feel like it starts to fall in place for me i'll tell our viewers, if you are flummoxed by the fact that donald trump both tells his followers that he completed the wall and also that he needs to be re-elected so he can complete the wall, steve explains the psychology of that and its political impact it's both dire and also helpful to have it spelled out so well steve benen's new book "ministry of truth" it comes out tomorrow. the audio book is read by a goofball amateur narrator named rachel maddow, but i think it

came out pretty okay steve, my friend, thank you very much for writing this. it is really important i'm really glad you did it congratulations. >> thank you so much >> much more ahead here tonight. stay with us >> so in a debate situation, who would you put your money on? >> i would think it will probably be unfair for her to debate trump he is so inept at debating. the absence of knowledge is appalling. i'm looking forward to hearing the announcement because i'm going to vegas, and i'm going to put every nickel that i have on the results of that debate and it will all be on kamala harris

introducing a revolution in pain relief. absorbine junior pro, the strongest numbing pain relief available. it's the only solution with two max strength anesthetics for fast penetrating relief absorbine junior pro. nothing numbs pain more. national abortion ban,

cracking down on contraception for some reason, banning pornography, abolishing the department of education, turning medicare into a mostly privatized thing. this playbook written for donald trump for a next trump term in office is filled with really quite radical policy plans for him to use if he is elected to a second term. it is called, say it with me now, project 2025. and it has become a point of central discussion in this presidential election. it's because this playbook was designed for trump, came out of sort of trump world. but it also is because it outlines policies that voters as a general matter really, really, really don't want. so this was created for trump by people associated with trump. trump now realizing how unpopular it is, he keeps trying to distance himself from it, saying he has no idea who these people are who wrote this thing. unfortunately for him, this is a

picture of him with the man who wrote it on a plane. and jd vance, he wrote the foreword for the book. and this at the a.p., former trump administration official teasing the fact he's currently writing the super secret transition playbook that trump will use if he's re-elected in november. this guy planning the transition, you'll notice the headline offers a helpful reminder this isn't the first playbook he's written. the guy planning the trump transition is a, quote, project 2025 architect. six of trump's cabinet officials collaborated on the drafting of the project 2025 playbook. another 140 trump administration staffers had a hand in working on it in some capacity. all of that put together makes it a hard sell for the trump campaign to claim they had no idea who these people are who wrote up this thing. and that was before this happened. propublica has obtained and published 14 hours of training

videos put together by project 2025 that are essentially tutorials for members of the future trump administration. and the videos are interesting to look at in their own right. for the trump campaign, trying to say no trump people have ever had anything to do with this, never heard of anything, any of these people, they don't even know where this thing came from, for the trump campaign trying to make that case, these new videos are not going to help them make that case. >> hello. my name is jeff small. i was a presidential appointee in the trump administration. >> my name is caroline levts and i'm a former political appointee in the donald j. trump administration. >> i served in the trump administration. >> during the trump administration, i had the privilege of serving as the deputy assistant secretary of state for digital strategy. >> i was on the trump campaign team early on, probably one of

the first 15 folks hired. >> during the trump administration, i served as the assistant secretary for public affairs at the department of homeland security. >> during the 2016 presidential transition, i was the director of domestic policy appointments. >> pam, you started on day one of the trump administration. and you stayed until the final hour. >> yeah. shocking that i made it. >> poor pam. they must have really put her through the wringer. of the 36 different people who appear in these videos that are obtained by propublica, 29 of the 36 of them are people who directly worked for the trump administration. or the trump campaign. so yeah, trying to say trump people have nothing to do with this project 2025 thing, we have fresh new polling today from umass amherst painting a very clear portrait of why the trump campaign continues to try to pretend like they have no ties to project 2025, no matter how unsustainable that claim is. part of the findings of this poll are even people who voted for trump in 2020, they by clear majority say they do not support the policies in project 2025. the same poll also took a

snapshot of the electorate since biden dropped out of the presidential race back when this poll was taken in january, trump led biden nationally by four points. with kamala harris now at the top of the ticket, though, she leads trump nationally by three points. so a total turnaround there. and you're starting to see that same turnaround for democrats in important swing states too. late last month after biden dropped out, harris was tied with trump in swing states, the swing states of michigan and pennsylvania. trump was up by one point in wisconsin. if you look at that same poll now, in all three of those states, harris leads trump plus four. it's a turnaround, it really is, and it's nationally and in the important states, and what this means if you're the republican ticket is you're going to need a new strategy. you're either going to need to turn this campaign around to make people like you more or you're going to need to figure out a way to win in a different way.

and i have been talking here on msnbc with some urgency about this since around the time of the rnc. because of what i'm seeing as what clearly appears to be an emerging strategy for republicans this year. which is to mess with the count of the vote. to have local republican officials deny certification of the vote county by county. you'll remember in 2020, when the violent mob was sicced on congress, they were there to block the certification of the vote nationwide. well, this time around, they are professionalizing the effort to block the certification of the vote. they're systematizing it. they're starting with trained republican officials at the local level in states all across the country. so they can make a bigger swing at it this time. and i have been talking a lot about this on msnbc. i hear from you guys a lot, every time i do it, i have gotten a lot of feedback on this, but some real experts in the field are talking about it too. not just about how worrying this

problem is for november, but also what can be done to stop it. and some of those experts have published a brand-new report in a report that's yet to be made public. it's coming out tomorrow, but we're going to reveal it here tonight exclusively for the first time. it's very practical. it's very helpful, and it's on the thing i'm most worried about. that's next. [dog whining] is your dog telling you they may have allergic itch? apoquel is the #1 treatment for allergic itch... that veterinarians have trusted for over 15 million dogs... and it starts working in just 4 hours! do not use in dogs with serious infections... may cause worsening of existing parasitic skin infestations... or preexisting cancers... and serious infections. new neoplasias have been observed. do not use in dogs less than 12 months old. ask your vet for apoquel. now available in a tasty chewable.

here's why you should switch fo to duckduckgo on all your devie duckduckgo comes with a built-n engine, like google, but it's r and doesn't spy on your searchs

and duckduckgo lets you browsel but it blocks cookies and creepy ads that follow youa and other companies. and there's no catch. it's fre. we make money from ads, but they don't follow you aroud join the millions of people taking back their privacy by downloading duckduckgo on all your devices today. so this is something i have been talking about for several

weeks here on msnbc both during our rnc coverage and also here on this show. there's an urgent new report on the subject that i have been talking about for weeks here. we're revealing it here for the first time tonight. it's from crew. citizens for responsibility and ethics in washington. it's called election certification under threat. a legal road map to protect the 2024 election, including from 35 officials who have refused to certify results. the report tracks this sort of burgeoning crisis across eight different states so far where in fact there have been dozens of republican local officials who have been refusing to sign off on proper tallies of lawful votes. is this a republican strategy that holds any promise of essentially hamstringing the electoral count of messing up the election and its -- the administration of the election at the point of the counting of the votes, making official the vote tallies?

do they have any real prospects of messing up the vote in november using these tactics that they have been essentially test driving in states all across the country in lower profile elections? joining us now is noah bookbinder, president and ceo of crew, citizens for responsibility and ethics in washington. thanks for joining us. thanks for the advance look add your report. i found it really interesting. >> thanks so much for having me. >> so, i have been talking about this sort of with increasing concern for the last few weeks because it looks to me like republicans at the county level and now starting to be at the state level are test driving an effort that they're going to try in november to effectively prevent the election from being made official, to prevent the vote tallying to go forward in any sort of normal way. do you think that is what they're trying to do? >> i think it is absolutely a thing that is going to happen.

i think that we have seen these county officials in multiple states attempt to stop the certification of -- of votes in elections of in many cases very little consequence, and they're doing it essentially as a run through for an election of a great deal of consequence, which is the one this fall. so i think there's almost no question that this is going to happen. and it seems to be happening in a way this year that is more systematic than it has in the past. so that's deeply, deeply concerning. i think the good news is it's clearly illegal in all of these states and there are steps that can be taken to effectively halt it in all of these states. >> and you single out some of those in a way that i think is very succinct and helpful. you write about state election

boards, secretaries of state, attorneys general, local prosecutors should in advance of the election explicitly tell county officials that they do not have discretion to refuse to certify the election. warn them in advance they may by treading into criminal law territory if they do this. we have seen that happen in a couple states already. >> that's right. in michigan, the secretary of state and other officials have been very clear that the law provides for legitimate ways to challenge elections if there are questions about fraud or questions about the count. county certification is not one of those ways. it is essentially a ministerial process. it's not a way to challenge results. and in michigan, officials have told these county officials, you can't do this, and if you do, there will be consequences. and i think that both potentially could deter some of these people from trying this, and it also puts them on notice, so that if they do try to

disrupt the election, and they are prosecuted or they are challenged civilly, they won't be able to say they didn't realize they couldn't do this. that's something we would like to see in all of these states. >> and again, we have seen it happen in michigan. but we haven't necessarily seen that happen even in every state where it has already been tried. let alone in states where officials don't yet know if republicans are going to try it. it does seem like there are sort of different tactics legally available to state officials in various states. you can in some cases you could have a court essentially order public officials to do this. in some states you can have the state election board take over the job of a county election official if they're refusing to do their job. in other places you could have a

local official removed. but there isn't the same playbook available legally in every state. it does seem like the one thing that every state could do right now is give advice to every elections board in the state. get it on record to every elections board in the state that they should not do this and it's not within their rights to try it. >> that's absolutely right. i mean, we have seen in different states a number of these different responses work. we have seen in new mexico and nevada where they have gone to court and gotten orders to order these county officials to certify the vote, and that's worked. but the reason why we're putting this report out is to say, here's the law in this state. here's what can be done. so that state officials can get out there and warn these folks and be ready to act. and in a lot of states i think the signs have been positive. in a state like georgia, it's very alarming because you have the state election board going in just the opposite direction and even though the law is very clear, you have the state election board actually trying to say that county officials can refuse to certify.

and that's definitely a place to really keep an eye on. >> yeah. exactly. because not having a certified result out of georgia would be a very bad thing for the election. regardless of who wins in georgia, not having a certified result would be a very bad thing in terms of the way the country comes together. that seems to be what they're aiming at. noah bookbinder, president of crew, we're going to link to this new report when it is live. thank you for doing it, bringing together all these examples, talking about practical things states can be doing now to head it off. it's a really important service. thank you. >> thank you so much for having me. >> we'll be right back. stay with us. voltaren... for long lasting arthritis pain relief. (♪♪)

♪♪ why won't scout play with us anymore? he has something called osteoarthritis pain. it's joint pain that hurts him all the time. come on, scout. now, there's librela. the first and only once-monthly injection to control your dog's oa pain. veterinary professionals administering librela who are pregnant, trying to conceive, or breast feeding, should take extreme care to avoid self-injection, which could cause allergic reactions like anaphylaxis. this is the best day of my life! the last time a democratic

presidential candidate won north carolina was barack obama in 2008. but since kamala harris moved to the top of the democratic ticket three weeks ago, democrats are feeling north carolina might be in reach for them again. a poll just released by ugov yesterday has trump and harris tied in north carolina at 46% each. and some of that is surely, you know, the relative appeal of the two candidates and their campaigns. absolutely. but part of what may be lifting democrats in north carolina this year is that the republican candidate for governor there, i believe the technical term is cuckoo for cocoa puffs. mark robinson is the republican nominee for governor in north carolina. he calls gay people filth. he says school teachers are, quote, wicked people. he has mocked and attacked

survivors of school shootings. he has warned ominously that the music industry is controlled by the illuminati. he said the film black panther was created by satanic marxists and jews. he has perhaps you won't find this surprising, he has engaged in holocaust denial as well. again, he is the republican nominee for governor in a real place called north carolina. that same north carolina poll yesterday which found trump and harris tied in the state found that robinson is losing the governor's race in north carolina to democrat josh stein by double digits. he's losing by ten points. and now there's new reporting highlighting that another state-wide republican candidate in north carolina is probably going to top some of the same charts that mark robinson is. cnn has just found a video from the republican party's nominee for education commissioner, the nominee to run public schools in north carolina. it's a video that she recorded from a d.c. area hotel

apparently the night of january 6th, 2021, because she had gone to washington for that day's events. in the video, she explicitly advocates for a military coup to keep donald trump in power. as long as he invokes the insurrection act, he's going to be put back in. her name is michele morrow, previously, she has called for the killing of joe biden and other prominent democrats. she said the execution of barack obama should be conducted in public and should be pay-per-view. again, she's now the republican nominee to be the superintendent of all k-12 education in north carolina. she calls public schools socialism centers and indoctrination centers. she naturally is endorsed by republican governor candidate mark robinson who said at a recent event with her, quote, we're going to make sure we do everything to get you in office. folks like that leading the republican ticket in north carolina, democrats really do think their presidential ticket

has a good shot there, not to mention other down ticket democrats. the dnc is now putting up 15 new billboards like these ones as part of their first swing state paid advertising blitz since kamala harris chose tim walz to be her running mate. so watch this space. keep an eye on north carolina. i should tell you the very young, very impressive chair of the north carolina democratic party is going to be a guest next hour on the last word. never want to miss the last word, but you particularly will not want to miss that tonight. we'll be right back.

you didn't start a business just to keep the lights on. lucky for you, shopify built the just one-tapping, ridiculously

fast-acting, sky-high sales stacking champion of checkouts. businesses that want to win, win with shopify. an alternative to pills, voltaren is a clinically proven arthritis pain relief gel, which penetrates deep to target the source of pain with nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory medicine directly at the source. voltaren, the joy of movement. dave's company just scored voltaren, the comcast business 5-year price lock guarantee. high five! high five! -i'm in a call... it's 5 years of reliable, gig speed internet... five years of advanced security... five years of a great rate that won't change. yep, dave's feeling it. but it's only for a limited time. five years? -five years? introducing the comcast business 5-year price lock guarantee. powering 5 years of savings. powering possibilities. here's why you should switch fo to duckduckgo on all your devie duckduckgo comes with a built-n engine, like google, but it's r

and doesn't spy on your searchs and duckduckgo lets you browsel but it blocks cookies and creepy ads that follow youa and other companies. and there's no catch. it's fre. we make money from ads, but they don't follow you aroud join the millions of people taking back their privacy by downloading duckduckgo on all your devices today. all right, that's going to do it for us tonight. i want to apologize to my dogs, again, for always calling them each other's names. and i want to thank them for still liking me anyway or at least pretending to. there, we've cleaned up all the mess i've made in my personal life on tonight's show. "way too early" with jonathan lemire is up next. donald trump returns to the platform formerly known as twitter last night