change. this is the story of washington. people go to washington to make change often. it's not just filled with people cynical to begin with. but when you go there, sometimes you have a boss that acts a certain way or you see how the levers of power work and you become cynical. for a lot of the people, they're in that fight right now. they're like am i making more change or is this place changing me more than i'm changing it? >> it's just -- am i doing this right? is in a how we do it? >> yeah. >> it's a he really great book. there are 15 characters. it's just great reporting. gives you a really good inside view into a town that seems difficult to understand. maybe after this it is still difficult to understand. you'll be very entertained while reading it. congratulations on the book, my friend. >> thanks, man. appreciate it. >> "cnn this morning" continues right now. >> orange hazardous smokey clouds descending upon the city.

>> the poor air quality is caused by 150 active wildfires burning in canada. more than 40 million people across the northeast, midwest and mid-atlantic under air quality alerts. >> this is a lot worse than what we've seen in many, many years. >> mark meadows, testifying to a federal grand jury. >> also unclear when he testified or which line of inquiry the special counsel is pursuing. documents or january 6 or perhaps both. >> he's our number one witness. if he testified truthfully which i assume he did, he'll be front and senter in the case they bring. >> -- center in the case they bring. >> a gunman opened fire after a high school graduation ceremony. >> every started running. just chaos from there. you just kept hearing shots. this should not be happening anywhere. a child should be tibl go to the graduation and enjoy the accomplishment with their friends and their family. >> today before god and my family, i'm announcing i'm running for president of the united states. >> governor chris christie is

entering a large and growing republican field. he took clear aim at the man who soundly defeated him though in 2016, donald trump. the republican base is largely with donald trump. he has a hard hill to climb. >> pga tour and liv tour announced they were now in business together. >> one year ago, they attacked saudi backed liv golf. >> i think you have to be living under a rock to know that there are significant implications. >> what we're talking about today is coming together to unify the game of golf. >> he sold out every one of us. >> there's a lot going on. we'll get to that story that you just heard there at the end between the pga and liv and saudi and what all of this means ahead with bob costas. we have a lot to get to this morning including this, heavy smoke from canadian wildfires pouring into the united states,

shrouding cities across the northeast and midwest. take a live look here at new york city. the air quality is terrible. it is among the worst in the entire world. tens of millions of americans from minnesota to new england, all the way down to north carolina are at risk of breathing really unhealthy air today. >> so that is new york. here's what it looks like in philadelphia this morning. forecasters say we're going to see more and more rounds of smoke through tomorrow. wildfires continue to rage out of control in quebec and canada from coast to coast. athena jones is live in manhattan. people are being urged to stay inside. the limit outdoor activity. you're wearing a mask now. what is the reality right now? >> good morning, phil. the reality is you can still see the smoke certainly here along the hudson river where we are. it's not just the morning haze. the smoke from 100 wildfires burning in quebec. still having very much an impact here. we have our drone up in the air.

should be able to give you a few more shots of what it looks like here along the hudson. but as you mentioned, new york city is among the top five worst polluted cities in the world right now. at one point last night it was number one. now it's second to new delhi in india which is known for having very polluted air. and this air quality index is considered very unhealthy. it's majrl particularly difficult for those with asthma, elderly, young children, pregnant people. these are folks that should take special care and take precautions to stay healthy. this stuff is extremitily tiny and dangerous. it can enter the lungs, enter the bloodstream. kit lead to all sorts of blood problems. that is really the safety issue,

top of mind for new york officials. here in new york city, public schools will remain open but all outdoor activities have been canceled. and upstate or in central new york and on into other counties, ten school districts canceled outdoor activities. the mayor in new york city is urging folks to pay attention to any symptoms and stay out of -- stay inside as much as possible. he'll be having a briefing around 10:00 a.m. to give us an update on just how long this is expected to take place. we understand there is a cold front coming through that could push more smoke south and east. so, this may not be over for a few days. >> we appreciate you and your team being out there. we're glad you're masked up. phil? >> also this morning, a major development in special counsel jack smith's investigation into former president donald trump. we learned that donald trump's

former chief of staff testified before a federal grand jury. now it's unclear whether his testimony was part of smith's classified documents probe or his january six investigation. maybe both. he could prove to be a critical witness. asked about this development, a lawyer representing meadows said in a statement, quote, without commenting on whether or not mr. meadows testified before the grand jury or in any other proceeding, mr. meadows maintained a commitment to tell the truth. i want to turn now to our cnn senior legal analyst who is former assistant u.s. attorney for the southern district of new york and a former new jersey state prosecutor. >> mark meadows could be the most important witness in this whole case. he is everywhere. meadows was donald trump's chief of staff for the last ten months or so. meaning, he was there through

the election. he was there through january 6. he was there up until the final day. now just as one indicator of how important mark meadows was, as the january 6 attack was happening that, afternoon, dozens of powerful people were texting mark meadows, desperately trying to get him to get donald trump to call off the rioters. cassidy hutchison was one of mark meadows senior aides. oen on that day, there were several conversations that mark meadows had with donald trump. she doesn't know what was said. you know who does? mark meadows. also, one more place that mark meadows pops up, we remember the infamous phone call he made to the georgia secretary of state. trump asked him to just find votes for him. guess who else was on that phone call?

mark meadows. he introduces the participants. we don't know what he testified about. let's remember, meadows was the chief of staff when the white house was being packed up and he was a key laiaison between the white house and the archives. he knows what was packed, classified and declassified. >> he's like the forest gump of every investigation going on. along the lines though, the justice department had to fight for this testimony, right? >> they sure did. donald trump tried to block this testimony. he claimed executive privilege. he said, wait a second, these are conversations when i was president with my chief of staff, you don't get that. doj went to court. they went to the district court. they won. the court said, no, this is part of a criminal grand jury subpoena. then it got appealed by donald trump up to the court of appeals. doj won there. and only then were they able to get that testimony from mark meadows. >> all right. >> our colleague who i text every time i have questions about this stuff. there is another grand jury.

what do we know about another grand jury? little bit of a twist here. >> we knew about the d.c. federal grand jury. now there is action at a federal grand jury. it could be just miadministrati. you can read it to the main grand jury in d.c. or it could be something bigger. there is a constant thing that says federal prosecutors have to charge a crime in the federal geographic district where the crime happened if there are some people that work at mar-a-lago, who may have criminal liability. it may be that thoey only did things in florida and not d.c. it could than doj, the special counsel, might try to charge donald trump florida instead of d.c.? there is a stronger case for venue in florida.

94.6 people veoted against him n d.c. >> can you remind us, talk about what a jury pool would imply potential indictment. the we're not gauging one way or another. i will bother you every day to make predictions about what is coming. we'll try to avoid that question as best you can. >> i'll give you a laurly answer. >> right. >> where are we right no you? >> meadows is one of the big missing pieces. we know that is in place. we know he has testified. another big indicator earlier this week, trump's legal team went in and met with doj jack smith. that is the kind of meeting that happens towards the very end of an investigation. >> i'm going to say, you're good at the magic wall. >> the one you do is way more complicated. one other thing to note, we that talk about the special counsel, he has two investigations mar-a-lago and january 6.

jack smith will make the first call. but ultimately, merrick garland has to review and sign off. he does have to defer to jack smith. taking it out one more level. there are four pending criminal investigations or cases now. we have the two doj investigations. we have mar-a-lago. we have january 6. of course, donald trump has been indicted. let's remember that. he has a trial date for march of next year. then we have the fulton county d.a. case which fawny willis has telegraphed she is likely to indict on sometime later this summer. we have a busy summer ahead, phil. >> that's a great run down. thank you. that check is sloppy for the record. the. >> you can dock a point for that. >> magic wall. i don't ever want to have to stand up there with you guys and compete with that. that was super helpful. thank you very much. now to rome. the vatican says pope francis is set to have abdominal surgery today. he'll stay in the hospital for several days. that is what they're saying. it comes after a scheduled

checkup at the same hospital in rome. he faced a series of health issues in recent year. everyone wants to know, how serious is this? >> well, we don't know how serious it is. we know that he attended his -- held his wednesday audience this morning. he came to this hospital, the hospital where the popes have been coming for years, yesterday for a checkup. it is something that vatican said was scheduled. he was here for about an hour. and then sort of out of the blue, we're told he came back here to have this surgery to repair a hernia. this is related to colon surgery he had a couple years ago. he will be going under a general an thetic. that is always, of course, dangerous for someone his age. we don't know. we're expecting we'll get a bulletin later this afternoon. this is an 86-year-old man with a history of health problems.

if there were any elderly person in your life, you'd be worried. i think the general catholic faith is concerned for the pope. >> we appreciate you being there. keep us posted. i know it will be there for several days recovering. thank you. >> also happening this morning, busy day of news. former have many mike pence announced he is ready to run for the nation's top job. >> we can turn this country around. different times call for different leadership. today our party and our country need a leader that will appeal as lincoln said, to the bitter angels of our nature. i have long believed to whom much is given much will be required. my family and i have been blessedon measure with opportunities to serve this nation. it is easy to stay on the sidelines. but that's not how i was raised. that's why today, before god and my family, 50i'm announcing i'm running for president of the united states. >> pence joins a growing field

of republicans trying to make donald trump a one-term president. and he's not the only republican jumping in the race today. the. >> cnn is on the trail this morning. we're following the pence campaign in iowa. and we're following north dakota's governor. >> good morning to you. so pence is going to hold a rally in iowa. what is his message? >> his message is simply this morning, this race isn't over. there are many months ahead. and mike pence is the person who they believe is the person for iowa. this is a place where pence has almost universal name id. republicans all know him.

he was in congress as a conservative member. it's here in the living rooms and diners of iowa that retail politics, winning votes, hand shake by hand shake where pence will excel. and it is here with the midwestern values and deep faith they believe that mike pence will align with the caucus members in iowa. they say that won't be the case for mike pence. he drifted into i will relevant vancy since the 2022 campaign. there are iowans that are persuadable, 75 to 80%, and that persuasion begins for mike pence today. he's not the only one jumping into the race. and now joining my colleague in north dakota. >> yeah, good morning to you from fargo, north dakota. two-term conservative governor doug bergam will ent they are

crowded republican primary. arguing that this race could use someone from this part of the country. his pitch will focus on the economy, energy policy, and national security. he's not inclined to fight these cultural battles. he released a video earlier this week. take a listen to how he will pitch himself to voters. >> anger, yelling, infighting, that's not going to cut it anymore. let's get things done. in north dakota, we listen with respect and we talk things out. that's how we can get america back on track. >> now, a lock time businessman before becoming governor of this state, talking about how he bet

the family farm on a software company. that company eventually bought by microsoft for a billion dollars. if you travel downtown fargo, you see that his presence looms large in all of the projects that he has his hands in. and then he is over in arthur, his hometown, conservatives really proud that he is entering this contest. >> he laid out the foundation. he said the country has a choice, getting bigger or smaller. they went back to the revolutionary war. he said the country chose to go bigger and he feels we're at a similar poin t now.

>> a lonely self-consumed self-serving man is not a leader. >> the reason i'm going after trump is two-fold. one, he deserves it. >> now, of course, those two, christie and trump, work together at points in their relationship. but any path to victory for christie is going to be an uphill journey. polls showing him around the bottom of the candidates.

that said, i'm told the campaign will focus on him or look like, i should say, him being a happy warrior who is not afraid to stand up to donald trump. not afraid to take risk ands not afraid to speak his mind. >> so interesting, guys. he you have a lot on your plate. thank you for bringing us the reporting from iowa, north dakota, and new hampshire. >> i love it when it's, like, no longer speculation. >> happening. >> yep. >> a long way to go. it looks like ukraine's counter offensive may be under way. the destruction of a major dam near the front lines could complicate some of ukraine's plans. mark esper will join us live to weigh in. like here. and here. not so much h here. if you h have chronic kidney disease, farxiga can help you keep living life.

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but then he got us t-mobile home internet. i was just trying to improve our signal, so some of the trees had to go. i might've taken it a step too far. (chainsaw revs) (tree crashes) (chainsaw continues) (daughter screams) let's pretend for a second that you didn't let down your entire family. what would that reality look like? well i guess i would've gotten us xfinity... and we'd have a better view. do you need mulch? what, we have a ton of mulch. welcome back. officials are seeing that ukraine's counter offense jivend way. military intelligence officials tell cnn that ukrainian forces have begun testing russian positions. artillery strikes and ground attacks searching for

vulnerabilities. this long awaited counter offense offensive is expected to be carried out. this is 16 months after russia's invasion of ukraine. secretary esper, good morning and thank you. >> good morning. >> what needs to happen for this counter offensive to be successful? >> i think what needs to happen is what seems to be under way right now. they've been conducting shaping operations for the last couple weeks or so. bombing refineries, knocking out rail lines, et cetera. now we're in the part of the phase of resconnaissance in fore where they probe this 600 mile front line to try to find the weaknesses and strong points. once they figure that out, you'll start seeing the main effort emerge very quickly along with supporting efforts to really push the russians back in both the east and the south. it will be quite dramatic, i expect. >> mr. secretary, one thing that i picked up over the course of the last several months here and in the u.s. and also talking to european counterparts, i think

captured by "the washington post" this morning. he says, if ukraine can drive back an already shaky russian army, it stands a chance to bargain for an end to the failed invasion. but if ukraine fails, it will be a bitter blow to the country's weary population and cone danger support from some restless nato members. the question i've had leading up to this moment is this kind of a do or die moment to use a poor cliche for the ukrainian forces for ukraine in this conflict right now? >> it's a very significant moment. everybody is looking to ukraine to be very successful. i was in europe two weeks ago for about two weeks. the number one question over there is where is u.s. support? and everybody fairly thinks that if ukraine does well, u.s. support will continue. if not, it could wirther. it's very important, i think ukraine understands this politically, not just militarily. but they have a very successful

counter offensive that shows people return on investment and the ukrainian military. >> we know that groups of ukrainian pilots started traveling to the uk to get trained on the fighter jets. there were a lot. there were lawmakers in the u.s. who said we should have been training the pilots before we even made the decision to allow the f-16s to go. it takes months. are they necessary in this counter offensive at the front end? >> i think it will be very important to have them onboard now. clearly, it won't happen. when you conduct forces and mechanic anized infantry, artillery, et cetera, it is helpful to have a long-range strike aircraft that can hit targets deep. tactical air support from those units as well. and then help clear the skies of russian aircraft. but that won't be available. i think, look, the administration is to blame for being laid in terms of the delivering the most vital items, whether it is abrams tanks or f-16 aircraft. >> mr. secretary, to poorly

paraphrase a predecessor, you go to war with the army you have, not necessarily the one you want. officials have been saying about the readiness of ukraine in this moment versus what the reality is behind the effort to kind of surge equipment. do you think ukrainian forces are ready to have a successful counter offensive? >> you know, from what i can read in between the lines and i talked to a lot of folks in europe recently this he have enough but they could do better if they had far more particularly, again, f-16 aircraft to support them. they have to move forward on the counter offensive. they have to push the russians back. they have to show success. it will help them on the battlefield but help them again with the western allies. >> there is an interesting piece in the journal where he takes on the biden administration on iran. what is interesting i think is how he ties together what we're seeing in terms of alliances and

changing alliances and close relationship that we're seeing between china and rush yachlt how they play into it. giving increasing concerns about iran. here's what he writes. uae and others are more open to russia and china. the developments are pending strategic failure from america and the key allies. do you agree? >> well, look, we need to shift toward a focus on china as the greatest strategic threat we face. the we have to do so in a way that doesn't create a vacuum in the middle east. it is a net energy importer which is why they want access to middle east and to russia, by the way. and so we have to maintain a presence. i think the administration needs to work on relationship with saudi arabia and others in the region. we also see iran emerging. you see the block kind of shaping up out there in the global environment. what do you mean by administration needs to work on its relationship with saudi

arabia? president biden went there to the consternation of many. fist pumped and then opec just slashed production. >> tony blink season there now. >> they're having meetings with a statement that came out yesterday. >> i think work on is tony blinken's visit. i think that is important. clearly, the relationship is not where it needs to be. and that was not a good development. i think it just requires work not just with the saudis but the uae kuwait and bahrain. >> such a fascinating situation. thank you so much, sir. >> thanks. former vice president mike pence now and former new jersey governor chris christie both officially in the race for the white house. how they plan to take on their

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so a live look at smokey new york city. this is smoke from canadian

wildfires making the skies hazy here along the east coast, all through the midwest. we just learned that all new york city public schools are open today. >> mike pence announced his candidacy a short time ago. >> different times call for different leadership. today our party and country need a leader that will appeal, as lincoln said, to the bitter angels our nature. >> his announcement comes hours after former new jersey governor chris christie also joined the race. he told his audience in new hampshire that unlike other candidates, he's not afraid to name names or name. >> he never admits a mistake. he never admits a fault.

and who always finds someone else and something else to blame for whatever goes wrong. but finds every reason to take credit for anything that goes right. that is donald trump. >> joining us now, our cnn political commentator and special visor to obama, van jones and the myth and legend behind the very serious podcast and newsletter. i feel like i ask the same question every single day in temperatures of, like, well, trump's legal liabilities be a problem in the -- can i just ask you, what are you seeing right now? >> i don't think they'll stop him from winning a primary. one thing about this primary is ron desantis is rerunning the

ted cruz playbook. he has much of the ted cruz team working on this. that didn't work last tight. he lost. i think what trump showed you was that a lot of the republican primary voters, it's very few of them are going in with a checklist saying here are all of the ideological positions i have. i don't think that anyone put together a campaign that really address that's concern about what it is on a gut level that these primary voters are looking for. >> to be fair in iowa, there are people that actually -- >> there are. and ted cruz won iowa. >> he did. >> he may be smarter. >> of all the legal jeopardies and prosecutors are looking at him, the most dangerous prosecutor for him right now is chris christie. chris christie can say whatever he wants to. he has nothing to lose. he is, like, zero percent chance of winning. he is a household name. so, if he continues to do what he's doing, he's not going to

get a nomination. but you finally have somebody in this race that is not scared of donald trump. you have somebody in this race that is willing to not attack him based on his rhetoric. he is going to attack on the results and his record. that is not been done in a consistent way. pointing out that he didn't build a wall. pointing out that he left the economy in shambles. pointing out he didn't show real leadership. so, i am munching my popcorn. i'm a democrat. this is all fun for me. but -- >> is it fun for you if john corn an is right, senator corncorn cornan. >> i'm not betting that biden is winning the nomination. who took that bet? >> i'm just saying, you're eating popcorn and all these people get trump the nomination. >> here's what i think. the best hope for republicans is they don't want to have to deal with donald trump going forward. you get people in there to throw the best punches.

in this case, somebody's got to beat trump some place. and the rest of them have to drop out. in the meantime, you don't know who that's going to be. and, so, you may have a big kamikaze candidate right now who is, what i would say that chris christie is likely to be. chris kamikaze christie. he is going to produce this guy. he is a topnotch prosecutor. and so trump is a prosecutor on stage with him at smoome point, would imagine. chris christie is not going to win the nomination but i'm glad he's in the race. >> i like that he'll call van 15 minutes after the show. here's why you're wrong. the question that was, is that what republican voters want at this point in time? are they open to alternative?

so i think if he's going to be beat be, somebody has to make the case. you have a majority of republican voters who didn't want trump as the nominee. and you had that fragmented field. now he won over the voters. he has -- he is over 50% in the polls. there is a clear majority of the voters who trump is acceptable. i think he is a good president. he could be a good president again. if you beat him this time, it it's different from 2016. you have to make a case for yourself and a case about why they should change their mind about donald trump. it's important that chris christie is out there doing that even though i don't think -- if he succeeds in convincing voters that the trump was not the winner they thought, i don't think that means voters are going to go to christie himself. i think it's right that someone

needs to prosecute that case. if you're running against a front-runner, you can't talk about yourself and talk about them. you have to explain why that person should not be president. >> what about mike pence? he just dropped the ad this morning. sounds very optimistic, right? but then, obviously, what is interesting is he is in iowa. he'll lean a lot on the evangelical vote. in this fox news poll, he is ho only at 6%. trump is at 59%. >> that's interesting. the evangelical voter had a reason to go with trump earlier because you need the supreme court. >> you got it now. >> you got them now. you have the supreme court 6-3. you have a bunch of judges, i don't know where they came from. but you got them all now.

trump's personal behavior is a stench in the nostrils of gand you have no reason to justify supporting him. >> can you imagine mike pence saying something like that? in every interview leading up to this in particular, he constantly demurs when it comes to insulting and checking his former, you know, the former president. >> i think it is a political position. i think that is him. >> that's what i'm wondering:can he change into a fighter? >> it's not sure who he is a candidate for. if you're a socially conservative vote other who doesn't care for donald trump and put off by his personal behavior, you have other options in this case. that is part of the dedemographic that ron desantis is running against. that's why he is preparing for that checklist and pushing this through the legislature in florida so he can go to those sorts of voters and say i'm your socially conservative champion. i think mike pence, you know, liberals have always hated mike pence. lots of republicans came to hate mike pence because of the events around january 6. and, so, i -- frankly, i don't

understand why he's in this race. i don't see who the constituency is. >> well, i'm glad he's running. you know? i will say a couple things about mike pence. this is somebody that actually believes in something. i don't agree with him. but he's a conviction politician. and i think that's important. i respect mike pence. but i think it's healthy for the party and healthy for the country. >> you're just covering for the momentum. that's what you want to call it. >> we're not going to talk about

that. >> i love that point. appreciate that. >> we'll speak with the brother of former president mike pence, greg pence in, our next hour. and tonight dana bash will moderate the town hall with mike pence. that is at 9:00 p.m. eastern. >> another mass shooting in america. this one at a high school graduation in richmond, virginia. two people are dead including an 18-year-old graduate. several more were injured including a 9-year-old little girl who was hit by a car as she was trying to flee the scene. we have live report ahead. ground breaking new discoveries that can change our understanding of human evolution. it turns out that our human relatives, they've been more similar to us than we imagine. the explorer whose expedition led to the discoveries. dr. lee berger is here in studio. checking my fico® score. i got a new credit card, and i'm even finding ways t to save. finally gegetting smart about money feels really good. see e all you can do with the free experian app. download it now.

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the new discovery suggests this species may have intentionally buried the dead and carved symbols off the graves of the cave walls before burials by modern humans. working in incredibly tight spaces in the rising star case in south africa, a team of researchers last year made these and many other discoveries about this ancient species. our next guest is part of that expedition. he was describing one of the engravings after he discovered it. >> i can't believe what we're seeing. we're seeing scratch marks, sort of, pictures of carvings or carving the rock. look at the scale of these things. >> i'm so happy that we're joined bittermy the man you jus. exploring residence and world

renowned -- okay, how do i say this? paleoanthropologist. he joins us now. he authored it book that comes out in august. >> august. >> "cave of bones." >> i get ptsd looking at that image. >> that is very claustrophobic to begin with. >> to get in there, you go down about a 40-foot shaft that is -- gets down to 7 1/2 inches. average is 9 inches. >> absolutely not. >> guess how much weight you lost to do it? >> 55 pounds. >> because you wanted to see this so much. >> i had to test it. we discovered these burials. we realized there were burials in 2018 on this "national geographic" expedition. i had only seen this thing through video. and we had the questions over covid. and we could not get them answered. there are only 47 humans that had ever been in there.

we started making discoveries. our missions were focused. we saw the symbols. it blew my mind. >> do you know what they mean? >> no. and in essence -- >> how did you conclude what you think they are? >> this is not a human species. they have a brain the third the size of ours. it's about the size of a chimpanzee. and they're carving symbols, 150,000 before even humans think of doing that. they look familiar to us. crosses, boxes, triangles, hash tags. they don't have twitter. >> i know that. >> and, yet, we may never know what they mean. they were made for other species, not us. >> one thing that i know that i took away from what i read about the work that you've done on this is that what you discovered erases the belief in human conceptionalism because of the size of our brain. >> we told this story since -- for thousands of years. why are we different? we want to make ourselves

different. one of the last things we had is this big brain. that just died just that with this evidence. we're not exceptional. >> can you explain that? >> yeah. so humans have got this narrative that our big brain is super charged us. made us different. let's do culture and symbols, music, art, all the things we like to separate ourselves from the animal kingdom. animal studies have shown us that is not true. whales do incredible things. crows, they're brilliant. but now we know that neither were we exceptional in our brain, the brain doesn't make us whatever it is we are. we now 250,000 years ago. >> your energy and passion tells me that you are not but any means done. what's next in terms of your research? >> firstly, we are bringing this to the world.

we are going to engage the entire scientific community how to test he's hypotheses. it's science. it's ongoing. also asking the world, what do we do with this? what do we do with discovering the first non-human species that had our capabilities? this is a special place for them. they took the dead of their kin into remote areas and buried them. do we destroy it in the way we humans tend to, or do we take care here? i think it's a special -- it's almost our first contact moment, the real first contact moment. >> yeah. paleo anthropologist, dr. lee berger, thank you so much. >> thank you. fascinating. congrats on the book. okay. now this. >> also the s.e.c. cracking down on the crypto market, suing of the largest trading platforms. an outspoken critic of the crypto industry, you may know him from the o.c., appointment

television for me in college, but brilliant on economics and this crypto stuff. ben mckenzie live in studio next. me and i'll catch you darling♪ ♪we'll dance in the streetet♪ ♪ i think this is it guys? when the martins booooked their vrbo vacation home, they really weren't looking for much: a patcof grass for bruno, a pool for first-timers, and time with each oer. d when they needed support, someone was right there. i got you. because what's unique about a vrbo is you can reach a real person in about a minute. ♪

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lawsuits against two of the world's biggest crypto enterprises shaking up the digital market. the s.e.c. accusing coinbase of acting -- they sued binance, accusing of it of running an illegal exchange. a spokesperson says they are being targeted day to size and name recognition. coinbase ceo said we are finally getting some clarity around crypto rules. good quotes those complaints that probably didn't want public. joining us now -- >> there is a pro thing there. >> actor ben mckenzie you know him from his star role as ryan at wood on the teen drama "the

o.c." but also an outspoken cryptocurrency skeptic. his new book coming out. if i were betting based on watching your testimony and some things you said, you probably felt this was an inevitability some degree? >> yes. >> why? >> because the cryptocurrency market has heretofore been unregulated. cryptocurrencies are not currencies by any reasonable economic devin anything. they are more like securities. we have a history of this. before the 1930s and '20s we had, you know, hundreds if not thousands of unregistered unlicensed securities, no securities laws. the crash of 1929, led to the great depression and millions of americans lost money. it's ironic, but a century later

we are effectively revisiting those times. these cryptocurrencies and there are some 20,000 of them, are securities or ought to be under american law. so we are sort of seeing the rubber hitting the road here with cryptocurrency. >> securities and exchange commission. these companies think we are not securities, we are different, and therein lies the problem. >> yes. >> i thought it was very interesting yesterday this interview that gary gensler the top cop of the s.e.c. he gave the cnbc. here is a scclip of it. >> we don't need more digital currency. we already have digital currency. it's called the u.s. dollar, the euro, the yen. they are digital right now. we already have digital investments. >> but the companies, i will take coinbase as an example, push back and say you didn't give us a framework. by the way, you allowed us to go public. you allowed us to. so what gives now? >> okay. so one fun fact.

coinbase whent public april 14t of 2021. gary gensler assumed office on april 17th of 2021. he literally wasn't in charge when they went public. that even misses the bigger point. anyone is allowed to go public if you file the right paperwork. so the defense that we were allowed to go public is really not an defense. it's not a defense in the court of law, even coinbase's own disclosures if you read the filings say that. that's a pr move. what we will see is what the courts think of this. that an open question at this point. how do we classify securities. the law is pretty clear. it's securities are defined under the howie test whhas four parts. investment of money. common enterprise with expectation of profit. bitcoin has been classified as a commodity, a whole other story, these other cryptos look like securities to me. >> i love the regulatory turf match elements.

there is, obviously, lawmakers trying to set up a legal framework which has been a cluster. fascinating thing, look, i understand that the s.e.c. officials that bring cases do this intentionally, plug in damning quotes, including the one a top official we are operating an unregulated exchange inside this country at this point in time. >> that's right. >> bro, we are -- >> we are in an f-ing unlicensed securities exchange in the united states, bro. >> they knew. >> the bro -- >> they could have edited that out. they could have dropped it. props to the legal operations at the s.e.c. we are good. let this go. >> the lawsuit against binance, of course, in that one there is a quote from one of their officials, binance guy that says, relate to their russian customers, come on, like come on, they are here for crime. >> oh, my god.

>> seems -- >> bad to do the climbing if you are going to talk about the crime'ing. >> if we learned nothing else from '08, guys, don't write it down. >> what about regular folks waking up this morning or woke up to headlines yesterday and they are like, oh, my god, what does this mean for me? >> matt levine, bloomberg columnist, is it all cryptocurrency exchanges are doing crimes and if you are lucky your exchange is only doing a process crime? >> that's right. hopefully, you are only facilitating the deeper crimes that other people are committing. but you might be doing more than that. so, yeah, i mean, look, i feel terrible for the people that have lost money. that's why i wrote the book. i wrote the book for the 40 million americans who bought cryptocurrency. the vast majority of whom have lost money. if cryptocurrency resembles a multi-level marketing scheme, which i argue in the book that it does, studies of mlms have

shown that 99% of people lose money and 1% goes to the top. who is the top in crypto? the exchanges, the whales, it's the vc. >> firms and high frequency trading firms that manipulate the prices of these kcurrencies >> crypto folks are not subtle with their views. what's it been like to be in your position? we have 20 seconds left. >> sure. twitter has a mute button which is my favorite thing in the world. i wish it existed in real life. people scream at you, have no idea you can't hear them. >> i am going try that. thank you very much. i should note brian armstrong had at coinbase, any folks join us on the program, they are always welcome. you are always welcome back. thank you. "cnn this morning" continues right now. >> today our party and our country need a leader that will appeal, as lincoln