who you profess to be in public. if you were taking 1,000 milligrams a day. does that make common sense? i submit to you, ladies and gentlemen, it doesn't. i have no doubt that he was taking opiate pills but i think he looked -- i would submit to you to decide whether or not he looked you in the eye and claimed an amount that's inconsistent with whatever else we know about this man. it's really inconsistent with survivability as a matter of common sense. he could never function at the level he's been functioning, keeping up with that's pressures, one step ahead for over a decade if he was taking that much dope. i would submit to you. just one other lie that i would submit to you is a lie that he's trying to get you to believe to

feel sympathetic for him as if the dope was the cause of the money and the cause of his issues when the reality is it wasn't. this had been going on for a long time and the finances prove differently. but what else about this? you have seen the interviews. and we are going to play some clips of these interviews but i'm not going to play them all for you again, you have watched them. but if you have any question, go back and watch them. he talks about being paranoid. watch those interviews when he's with dave owen. he doesn't look like he's withdrawing from any drugs. his responses are appropriate. he's not displaying any paranoia. he's smooth. he's focused on the events,

focused on trying to get information about the case from law enforcement officers, which is interesting in its own right, why is he so focused on that. and in savanah, where supposedly he was detoxing, he sat down as you heard the testimony with a composite sketch artist and went through the whole process to come up with this picture, which i swear is not me. how did he do that? how do you do that if you are on that much dope? so why did he tell you that, ladies and gentlemen? why did he look you in the eye and tell you that as he sat there on that stand to try and explain what was going on. it's interesting also that in

one of the interviews with law enforcement there were three interviews, june 8th, june 10, and august 11th, before we get to the side of the road, that he mentions that paul was a little detective. that's very interesting for him to mention that because you heard from marian prockter, maggie's sister, maggie called paul that, the little detective, specifically in reference to paul paying attention and trying to keep alec from taking pills. why would he bring that up? that's an interesting thing to bring up because that was what that was in reference to, and what do we know, we know that in may, if we talk about all the pressures that are coming upon him, all these financial things we have talked about, this exhausting hamster wheel going on forever, the need to beg, borrow and steal, one step ahead, and running out of options. on top of that, paul sends a

text to him mom found some pills, we need to talk. mom found some pills and we need to talk. another pressure from paul and maggie on him. and if you look at the texts, the weekend of the ball game on june the 7th, and those are in evidence, alec is not at the game and he's texting back and forth and maggie is like don't come if you feel bad, and he's like well, you know, i think i can get a late checkout and then like at 1:00 they made me leave. i submit to you it's a [inaudible] they were watching him like a hawk.

opiates, the most powerful of withdrawals and everything is coming to a head, including this as well. running out of money, running out of options, does not get paid in any significant way until december, already stole the farris fees, spent in two months, expensive pill habit and accountability, undo everything in his life, everything that is his self-identity, everything -- the only things he cares about. he doesn't care about lying to his partners and his family and his friends and his clients if it will delay accountability for him. he'll do it in a heartbeat. and all of that is about to be

undone. >> are we at a good stopping point? >> yes, sir, your honor. >> all right. ladies and gentlemen, we'll take one hour and 15 minutes for lunch. please do not discuss the case. >> john: all right, a break in the closing arguments in the alec murdaugh double murder trial, this after the jury received a firsthand look at the crime scene earlier today where maggie and paul murdaugh were shot and killed nearly two years ago, and we'll be monitoring anything that happens over the break. in the meantime, a lot of news to bring you today. i'm john roberts in washington. good to see you today. >> gillian: gillian turner in for sandra smith, this is "america reports." so jurors there spent over an hour today at the crime scene, they toured the wooded area and the infamous dog kennels.

>> john: jonathan is in the southeast bureau, monitoring the trial and the latest. what have we seen so far on the closing arguments, john? >> prosecution is taking a break in the middle of closing arguments. they are really trying to paint the portrait of a defendant who was a prominent member of the community but who was living a lie. they argue that alec murdaugh's lies were beginning to catch up with him, and so he committed the murders of his wife and son, the prosecution argues, in order to create a distraction and generate sympathy for himself. they brought up again the financial crimes that he is largely admitted to stealing money from some of his most vulnerable clients, some of his closest friends and his own law firm. the prosecution saying that it didn't matter to him that he would lie to anyone just to preserve his reputation and get

away with what he was trying to do. earlier in the day the jury took that tour of the moselle property, the 1700 acre hunting estate, this was at the request of the defense and it appears that they were trying to show how vast this property was. the pool reporter who rode out with the caravan going there talked about how on the way out you could go for several miles without seeing a home. so it appeared that the defense was trying to show not only the vastness of this property, but how remote it was and also how someone who may have gone back to the house might not have heard gunshots or screaming or whatever, other commotion might have taken place down at the actual crime scene near the dog kennel, and that now infamous shed on the property. we'll have to see what the defense does when they deliver their closing arguments, but we

anticipate that it will be perhaps review of something they tried to point out during the witness testimony, which the evidence is largely circumstantial and they are going to try to portray someone who admittedly lied, not the most honest person in the world, but someone who loved his wife and son. that he is a liar, that he is a cheat, but that he is not a murderer. that's what we expect the defense to argue, john. >> john: yeah, but the prosecution has to make the case that he's lied about everything else, why wouldn't he be lying about this. so, we'll keep following it and see where the closing arguments go and then the jury deliberations. john, thanks for the update, appreciate it. gillian. >> gillian: let's bring in criminal defense attorney mark eiglarsh, thanks for being with us. so the judge allowed the jurists to travel about 40 minutes to that colleton county property,

the crime scene where the murdaugh's lived. these kinds of viewings of crime scene properties are always fraught with a lot of risk for the defense. we heard nancy grace on last hour talking about the risks of mistrial, only takes one guy with a sign standing along the roadway to derail this entire thing. how do you think it went today? >> well, visiting the crime scene pales in comparison on the risk factor to putting your client on the stand so they are taking a lot of risk us because they have to. you get caught at the brutal lie like you were not at the criminal scene and then oopsy, you were. you have to take risks. i think it helps the defense. they needed to go out there. whatever the jurors were envisioning, i assure you it was not the same as what they saw. that's just normal trial work. you know, you can only paint a certain picture and then you go out there, even if you have seen photographs.

but wait, this is different, and that helps the defense. the state has the burden of proof. >> john: let's play about what prosecutor creighton waters said earlier today, when you take a look at what happened there and the potential suspect, it really only comes down to one person, that's alec murdaugh. how he put it. >> after an exhaustive investigation there is only one person who had the motive, who had the means, who had the opportunity to commit these crimes, and also whose guilty conduct after the crimes portrays him. defendant is a person where his own storm would mean consequences for maggie and paul, and consequences for those who trusted him. and that person is the defendant, richard alexander murdaugh. >> john: only one person had the motive, means, opportunity, etc., to commit these crimes.

however, there's no blood, there's no dna, there's a little bit of gunshot residue but that would be expected given the circumstances and no murder weapons. so, how do you pin it on him? >> other than -- yeah, there's problems. listen, kudos to the prosecutor for making that necessary and compelling argument. he's the only one. but wait a second, in recent time literally a couple days ago there was an expert for the defense who said the evidence was consistent with two shooters. now, they don't even have to believe that, they just have to entertain it and if it's even possible it blows the state's theory out of the water and like you said, for every action a reaction. they have watched date line murder mystery, studied csi. they know when you shoot a gun at close range you will be covered with items like blood, tissue, etc., and he wasn't. that is a problem they must hammer home on the closing argument to overcome their

challenges. >> gillian: mark, to that point yesterday the jurors saw very dramatic reenactment of the defense's theory or whatever you call it that two people committed the murders with two different murder weapons. was that effective? >> you have to ask the jurors. did i think it was, sure. because i think he's full of it and it's malarky, that's what i think. the jurors are individual free spirits. no one knows what they are really thinking. all the talking heads who say i know how the verdict is going to go, that presupposes they know what they are thinking. i've been doing trial work for 30 years in spite of my youthful appearance n you know he you never know what the jurors are thinking and a lot of them hold back what they are feeling even during jury selection. did it work for them, i don't know. if one of them thinks it resonated, enough to prevent a conviction, a verdict i think in favor of the defense.

>> john: i know that you really can't get inside the minds of the juror, but if you were on a jury yourself, if you heard a defendant say i lied about everything, i lied about not being there, i lied about what i was doing, i lied about not stealing money from all of my clients and my colleagues, but i didn't lie when i said i didn't kill my wife and son. can you separate all of those things or is a liar a liar? >> no, i can. in other words, all right, he start off with two and a half strikes but not three strikes. he is a liar, a thief, a drug addict. but that's not what he's on trial for. what i would hammer, if not him, who are the phantom people that knew they would be in the kennel, didn't show up with weapons, that somehow now are paying them back for something that happened four years ago? is that reasonable? yeah, it's possible, anything is

possible. aliens could have done it. but is it reasonable, and the answer is no. >> gillian: mark, we have to leave it there with you. thanks so much for joining us. appreciate it. >> my pleasure. >> john: hope to see you back later today. so, we are in lunch break now as the prosecutor gets underway. you know, we listen to a little bit of the opening, or the closing arguments there, and you know, i'm not hearing anything that sounded like a fatal blow against alec murdaugh, not at this point. >> gillian: prosecution might say the morning is young, only going for a few minutes, i don't know. but interestingly, and i should have asked mark about this, but i believe that the question you asked him about like can you ever believe a liar, under the law you the jury is permitted to, if they feel somebody lied under oath even in one small ins instant, discount their entire testimony. and any evidence that might be put forward on their behalf. so it's interesting to think about if any of those jurists take advantage of that.

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>> because fentanyl is synthetic, drug cartels don't need to worry about growing and transporting opium. >> where is the department of education, public service announcements. >> one of the last things my friend lori saw of her son archie was him zipped up into a body bag. >> no family is immune to this danger. this could happen to your family. fentanyl does not discriminate. it is a poison. >> gillian: lawmakers hearing

firsthand testimony from americans whose lives have been completely devastated by the fentanyl crisis. among them, that mother, she lost her son after he took just a single fentanyl pill that he thought was a percocet. we are going to talk to that mom as well as wisconsin congressman tom tiffany in a moment. begin first with aishah hasnie who joins us from capitol hill this hour. hi, aishah. >> hey there, gillian. day two of emotional testimony, and the mother, erin rockwell, the second mother to tell lawmakers she didn't even know, had not even heard about fentanyl until she lost her son logan. here is a little part of her testimony today. >> for all of us losing logan was like a bomb going off in the middle of our family that we had built our life around. this explosion killed our son and it killed kayden's brother. >> followed by an e.r. doctor -- fentanyl poisoning looks like.

>> people just stop breathing and then they pass out and then they turn blue and then they die, if not resuscitated. >> almost like they are being smothered? >> it can be the same thing as a chemical execution. >> emotions were running high during this hearing today, leading to this moment. >> i apologize for yelling and screaming but you know what, i've been dealing with the families for many years and there's no action going on in this town. i will tell you this. >> get action. >> now that former dea agent has been begging lawmakers for stricter sentencing for suppliers but democrats and republicans disagree on whether incarceration is the way out of this fentanyl crisis. gillian. >> gillian: aishah hasnie on capitol hill. >> john: wisconsin congressman tom tiffany, and erin rockwell, she testified about the loss of

her 19-year-old son logan to fentanyl poisoning. erin, it's been just a little bit more than a year since logan passed away from fentanyl po poisoning. i'm sure the pain is with you as much as it was back then when you first learned of his passing. what is it you want the nation to know about his death? >> thank you so much, john. i appreciate that, and yes, what i want the nation to know is that this is just like derek said, a crisis. we have a tsunami, public health emergency crisis and every parent and every child needs to understand what's going on in our country. >> and what is it that's going on in our country as far as you see it? >> as far as i see it, i feel like we are being targeted, kids are being targeted. it's the vulnerable population. the fastest growing population that we are losing. we have drugs flooding into this

country from the border. mexican cartels and china and i mean, i truly believe that they are looking for the vulnerable people to kill. >> john: i mean for them it's big business, not quite sure what it is for china, but they really don't care whether or not they are killing people, they want to get people hooked. attorney general, congressman, merrick garland was in the hot seat asked about this particular topic by senator lindsey graham. listen to the exchange here. >> how would you describe the fentanyl problem in america? >> horrible epidemic, but unleashed on purpose by the sinaloa and the new generation jalisco cartels. >> epidemic unleashed on purpose by the sinaloa and other cartels. almost sounds like a declaration of war the way the attorney general is talking about it. yet this administration refuses to declare war on these cartels. what do you think president biden should do? >> yeah, that's exactly right.

and you notice in attorney general garland's comments, he didn't say anything about china and i don't understand why the administration continues to not say the word china because that's where the problem is originating. and you know, john, just set aside, set aside the human trafficking that's going on at an epic scale. people coming in on the terror watch list we have never seen those numbers like that before. just on fentanyl alone, both parties should be in agreement and they should be acting now to secure the border. because that's the major part of this problem. the border is not secured. we could do that tomorrow if the political will was here on capitol hill. >> john: we'll be talking to congressman dan crenshaw in the next hour here on "america reports" about legislation he's working on with democrats that would not declare cartels to be a foreign terrorist organization but would allow the u.s. military to go after them. let me ask you, erin, about china. because as congressman tiffany

points out, the precursor for fentanyl produced in mexico comes directly from china. you have to figure, i'm sorry, that china knows what it's doing here. what do you think china's game is here? to undermine american society? >> absolutely. i think that they are targeting us. i mean there's no doubt about it. put the details and the fabts on the table, we are being targeted. there's no doubt about it. >> john: we heard, congressman, erin's compelling testimony today. yesterday we heard from rebecca keesling who lost both of her sons to fentanyl poisoning. how she described the situation here. >> this is a war! act like it. do something! >> john: she was just distraught yesterday in her testimony proclaiming this is a war. why is it falling on so many deaf ears in congress and at the white house? >> it's the same thing that the dea witness said today you guys

got to start looking at this as a war. we are prepared to act but for whatever reason, and i suspect it's because of the border and president biden cannot acknowledge on january 20th of 2021 when he decided we are going to have a borderless country, he cannot acknowledge that there is other harms that came along with that. i mean there, is fentanyl already coming in. but we saw two sheriffs that have testified before the judiciary committee in the last month who have both said under questioning, there is no doubt the fentanyl is far worse pouring into our country as a result of the open borders policies of the last two years. >> john: erin, last question to you, quickly, in the wake of your son's death, you and your husband started the love logan foundation. what's your goal? >> our goal is to spread the word to call this a national crisis and educate kids and parents. this has not been in parents' tool kits to talk to their kids

about pills and fentanyl. it just wasn't something that was in our, you know, in our tool kit. and so our main goal is to educate and warn kids. if our country is not going to do something, the grieving families are. fighting and funding everything and it's hard but it's got to be done to save other kids. i don't want to see any other family go through this. >> john: we wish you god speed in your endeavors and again, our hearts are with you. erin rockwell, congressman, thank you for being with us. >> thank you, john. >> gillian: last night's house select committee on china hearing is really just the start of congress's probe into beijing's threats against the united states. second hearing is now slated for next week on the origins of covid as more and more government agencies now throw their weight behind that wuhan lab leak theory. congressman ro khanna serves on

the committee. >> john: women's history month. anita vogel. >> admiral grace hopper to thank for computer bugs but not in the way you think. grace hopper received a ph.d. in mathematics from yale in 1934. when world war ii erupted, hopper took a leave of absence from her professorship at vasser college to join the navy women's reserve. 1944, commissioned as a lieutenant junior grade and assigned to a project at harvard university that built one of the world's first computers. hopper stayed at harvard after the war, building two more computers for the navy. and it was there that she popularized the terms bug and debugging to describe computer malfunctions. when she retired in 1986, amazing grace hopper had attained the rank of rear admiral. america together celebrating admiral grace hopper.

>> john: fox news alert, new video that has just come in. this is from the murdaugh family hunting preserve, colleton county, south carolina, the moselle property we have heard so much about during this trial. and this is the jurors, gillian, having a field trip out there at the request of defense attorney

to look at the lay of the land, the murder scene. >> gillian: the judge decided to allow the trip over and above the objections of the prosecution, saying vegetation has changed since 2021, so the scene frankly looks different than it did then, even new trees, no one has lived on the property, it has been vacant since the day of the killings, or the evening of the killings, anyway, the jurors, we understand, john, took about a 40-minute drive to get here, and this is as you say, them arriving on the property. >> yeah, and we were watching this video before this point in the playout, it started in the dog kennels, and this would appear to be the stretch of land between the dog kennels and the main house. and this is where this new stand of trees, you can see very young trees has grown up and the prosecution argued hey, the jury is not going to get an accurate look at the time of the murders

because the landscape has changed but he wanted to show it to the jurors, i'm not sure what he had in mind. there is, i guess, the front of the house where they lived, and we also saw the dog kennels, and it's quite a distance between the dog kennels and the house, and you remember during the trial, alec murdaugh initially said he was in the house while his wife and son were up at the dog kennel, then he said oh, no, no, i was up at the dog kennels and then there's this idea of how much time would it take to get from the house to the dog kennels as well. and did that play into the timeline of the murders. >> gillian: and that point you just raised, john, about the distance between the house and the kennels is one of the key things the jury is going to be taking in on this visit. interestingly, they are allowed to take notes but not ask questions. i don't believe they are allowed

to talk at all while they are on-site here, very tightly controlled visit from start to finish, it's always risky as mark eiglarsh spoke to us a minute ago to bring jurors off site, usually more risky for the defense, excuse me, for the prosecution as things usually, very small things can cause the trial to go to a mistrial. >> john: even if somebody is standing at the side of the road as you pointed out earlier with a sign. one of the most famous field trips in the 1990s, the request of the l.a. prosecutors, the jury in the o.j. simpson trial, along with o.j., went to visit the brentwood property and nicole simpson's condo. marsha clark wanted to prove there was not enough room at nicole simpson's condo for there to be two murderers. the jury did not buy what the prosecution was selling in that case. will the jury buy what defense

attorney is selling in his attempts to implant just the smallest seed of reasonable doubt in the minds of some of these jurors to see if he can get a trial with a hung jury? >> sandra: oh, look, that's a look at a, i don't know if it's a pot or a coffee mug, some kind of decorated ceramic item that says buster, the name of the son, the remaining son who testified at trial. seeing some personal effects there of the murdaugh family. the jurors also, i should mention, john, they are not allowed to go inside the house, they are allowed around the perimeter of the house, they can't even get too close to it. not allowed to take photos, videos, and again, not allowed to talk among themselves about what they are seeing. this is really a time for them to silently observe the scene and that is all. >> john: and they are only going to see a small part of the estate as well, it's 1700 acres and looks like they are just going to the house and the

kennels. creighton waters, the prosecutor in the opening part of his closing arguments was trying to convince the jury only one person who had the motivation and the opportunity and the means to carry out these murders. but the defense has tried to place into the minds of the jurors the doubt that well, could the murderer have acted alone, was there potentially two people there, why are there -- how could one person wield two separate weapons, why, if these murders took place at such close range there was not more blood splatter or dna evidence found on alec murdaugh's person. all of this going into the minds of the jurors and ends up with their deliberations at the end we'll see who made the better case here. mark eiglarsh is still with us. mark, so what do you think was in the defense attorney's mind in terms of bringing the jurors out there. pointed out in the o.j. simpson

trial, marsha clark thought she could prove her point and the case went the other way. >> well, every case is factual sensitive, and it could be different, you know. in this particular case, it doesn't hurt the defense at all. in other words, there's no reason why you are going to have all jurors saying a-ha, this scene is exactly like i envisioned it with the photographs that they showed us limitedly in court. they are all going to have a different perspective, and that could assist in some way in creating reasonable doubt. >> gillian: what about the personal effects of the family outside the house, the jurors are not allowed inside the house, but we see a bike leaning in the grass, we saw that ceramic item with buster's name on the front porch, the rocking chairs. does this tend to humanize the victims more for the jurors,

humanize the accused, how does it play out? >> i think it depends on the individual juror. some may not notice it, some may take it in. it still doesn't prove is there two shooters, is there one, was it him, why wasn't there any blood on him, did he clean up, you know, all the key questions. i hope this case doesn't come down to a little buster written on a rock somewhere. >> john: right. so, the jurors, we have not seen that part of this recording yet, but we did see it in preview as it was beginning to play out, the jurors looked like started their field trip out at the kennels which of course was the scene of the crime, and then much has been made, mark, there is the kennels, there we go, much has been made of the distance between the kennels and the house. initially it was thought oh, they are very close together but a substantial distance between the two, and what's the significance of that? >> critical because why didn't you hear it, if you are there and now you are admitting that

you are there, even though you denied it initially, why didn't you hear it, why didn't you do something, and the answer is wow, look at the distance. i can tell you that i just filed a motion to have jurors visit the scene of a very high profile case i'm litigating here in south florida and it's for that exact purpose, that the distance is key and you can't really tell until you're there. once you are there, wow, it does not look like this in the photographs and that could definitely help the defense. >> gillian: also this very slim time frame here when we look at the actual perpetration of the murders, between 8:45 and 8:49, which is four minutes, that's when that infamous dog kennel video ends, the one where you can actually hear alec's voice and then son paul not responding to texts on his phone after he took that video. does this -- any of this shed

light on that time frame here? that key time frame? >> i don't think so. and most jurors, unfortunately, especially ones who are not even taking notes like these folks, they are not in the weeds. they are looking at the bigger picture. that guy has been sitting in front of us, do we believe him. is he a liar to us, he's a liar to everybody else, but is he lying to us right now, or is he so credible because he's admitting all of his lies, even his personal demons that deal with opioid addiction. so that makes him more credible. we'll call it the anti-amber herd effect. she got her butt crushed because she was not right with the jury. he is doing it because he had to be, that's his best strategy. he knows as a trial lawyer that's what you have to do. >> what we are looking at now is the shed out by the kennels, this is where the murders took

place. my question here, what that is stuck to the wall, looks almost like a bug or something. but showing the jurors -- >> could be like a bullet hole. >> john: maybe it is a bullet hole -- difficult to tell what it is. but showing the jurors the scene here, it's been all cleaned up, obviously, john marvin murdaugh was describing the arguous task he had trying to clean it up. what does the defense attorney hope the jurors take away from seeing this? >> i think that he's going to get up there in a few hours and make it very clear that the distance between where his client was and where this took place is significant. i don't know about the minutia of what we are seeing right now, whether that plays a role. i think it's more about the bigger picture and now that they are there, they see how vast this area is. >> gillian: when it comes to the bigger picture, mark, john and i

were talking about this right after we spoke to you at the beginning of the hour. isn't it true that if a juror feels that a witness on the stand lied at any point during their testimony about anything, no matter how small, they can then discount that entire testimony. is that true? >> absolutely. 100%. they can do that. but it's a personal decision. they can also say well, i understand why the lie was told, i'll discount it or not hold it against him. i'm going to believe a part of what the person is saying, an entire amount. there's no law that tells jurors what facts they assume are true. so with regard to someone's testimony, or police officer's testimony or expert who claims there are two gunmen as opposed to one, they can believe any portion of it or not and when somebody lies in the past that could be definitely something

that hurts them. >> john: you are a defense attorney, mark, let's put you in the position of the defense attorney and jim griffin, set the case that your client is the only one who had the means, motive and the opportunity to carry this out, and therefore the jury has to believe that he perpetrated it. what do you say in your closing argument, given the fact that alec murdaugh is an acknowledged liar? >> i say the prosecution is wrong. what they say is not evidence of anything. it's what they want you to believe. i argue they have to prove this case beyond to the exclusion of reasonable doubt. hopefully you have seen our client is innocent and could have been someone else or other people who did this. but even if it falls short of that proof, your job, if you conclude that he's definitely, 100%, probably guilty, you must

acquit our client. it's not enough under the law. our system works with the premise that nine guilty people walk so one innocent person doesn't suffer. in this case, our client is innocent and they did not prove the case beyond to the exclusion of every reasonable doubt the highest burden under the law. >> john: and what did you make, mark, in terms of what the closing argument will be about what was seen as a very significant statement that alec murdaugh made last week when he said it was almost in passing, don't know if it was legalese or the way a lawyer talks or potentially an admission where he says i would never intentionally hurt maggie or paul. >> because he unintentionally did it for 20 years. his opioid addiction caused them to be harmed. anyone who has lived around an addict knows that's not easy. i thought his words were carefully selected. i would not hold it against him.

he was not saying i would unintentionally shoot them, no, i would not intentionally harm and that's what he's accused of doing. >> gillian: yesterday in cross examination the defense attorney tried to build the case that murdaugh has changed his story and inconsistent on the stand because he has gone through trauma. did you find that compelling? >> it's all right, you know. listen, if you are asking me now and i'm trying to avoid it because i want to stay positive, but i think the prosecution failed in their ability to cross examine effectively alec murdaugh. there was so much fat in this cross examination, you need a lean filet mignon, you hit the high points and get out. go through the list of people he's lied to and now you want the jurors to believe what you are saying, that's a high point. you want this jury to believe that people came into the

kennel, they just happened to know where they would be, this is payback after something that happened four years ago? they didn't bring weapons? they used your weapons? does that make sense, is that what you are telling this jury? and then those high points, you get in and get out and you press on that jugular and you slay him. they allowed him to humanize himself, asked questions that allowed him to explain things and that's not what you do. it's rookie 101. you don't do that. >> john: forgive us, mark, we are seeing this video tape come in as it is being fed, so we don't know what specific order it's in. some close-ups of the kennel, looked almost like they were heading back on the road to go back to the courthouse just a moment ago, but now we are getting some more close-ups of the kennels here, where the infamous video tape with buddy was taken when he had the chicken or the guinea fowl in

his mouth and the three voices on the tape as paul, alec and maggie. >> john, let me ask you a question. ask both of you a question. we have all been envisioning the kennel and idea what it looks like based on the video. but now we are seeing this, not the video introduced at trial, but now seeing this. isn't this different than what you envisioned the kennel looked like? i ask that rhetorically, the answer is yes. no one envisioned the kennel to like this. the jurors -- wait, this is different, how is it different? almost doesn't matter. the fact it's different hurts the prosecution. >> gillian: very interesting. slice either way. mark, we have to leave it there, please stand by. we'll tap you as needed throughout the hour. thanks so much. >> my pleasure. >> john: all right, moving on now, and we are going to be back to the trial in a half hour or so. the growing threat china poses

to the united states is enjoying something very rare on capitol hill, bipartisan agreement. the new house select committee on china held the first primetime hearing last night. warning the u.s. must stand up to beijing's aggressive tactics immediately. this as the foreign affairs committee advances a bill that bans chinese owner tiktok nationwide. let's bring in a member of that committee, democratic congressman from california, ro khanna. thank you for hanging with us, congressman. we appreciate you staying with us as we saw that video tape that was coming in from south carolina. the chairman of the committee, mike gallagher last night gave an assessment of the future of the relations between the u.s. and china. >> it's not a polite tennis match. this is a struggle over what life will look like in the 21st century, and the most fundamental freedoms are at stake. >> john: do you agree with that, if so, what do we do about it. >> he's right, the china

challenge is a generational challenge. two things, one, i was just in taiwan, we need to make sure that taiwan has defense capability. all the parties in taiwan want that. we need to make sure we are getting them the $18 billion of arms so that they can actually help deter china. and second, we need to make sure our manufacturing is coming back here and we are reducing the trade deficits with china. >> john: of course one of the big items yesterday was the assessment from the energy department z division at the national laboratories that the wuhan lab is the likely culprit for the origins of covid. echoed by the fbi director chris wray on special report. >> fbi has assessed origins of the pandemic are likely a potential lab incident in wuhan. >> john: anybody said that three years ago would have been on the

receiving end of ridicule, censorship, outright cancellation. what do you, congressman, say to the media, social media, politicians and the public health experts, anybody who said anything like that dismissed as a tin foil hat conspiracy theorist. >> john, they were wrong. i'm a strong believer in the first amendment. you can't censor legitimate viewpoints even if you may not disagree with them, even if they may be a very minority viewpoint. our country thrives on robust speech and while we don't know for sure what happened, certainly now it's plausible given that the fbi and the department of energy have both said so, that it was caused by an accidental lab leak. let me say one more point here, john. i am for engagement with china with deterring. but makes it very hard for someone like me to advocate engagement on issues like public health when they are totally nontransparent. they have not given any honest information about what happened,

they lied with the world health organization, and you would think on a matter of public health they would be more honest with the world. >> john: all right, i mean you can expect china will live up to your expectations but probably get disappointed every time. so, in the absence of china saying oh, we are going to be transparent, what should the biden administration do about this? i mean, you've now got two federal agencies, the department of energy and the fbi, saying likely this came out of the wuhan laboratory. it has killed 1.3 million americans, shouldn't biden be doing something about it? >> well, i think first we need to have a directive to come to some consensus. other agencies still are questioning that, and so i would make sure within the next few months that we try to get to a consensus opinion and ask for recommendations about what action needs to be taken to make sure these kind of leaks don't happen again and make sure that there are consequences if there

are leaks. >> john: congressman, good to catch up with you again. thanks for hanging with us through the breaking news. we appreciate it. >> thank you, john. >> gillian: new at 2:00, the white house press briefing is slated to start any minute now, this as the covid lab leak theory grows stronger seemingly by the day. we will dip in as soon as the questions begin. plus, republican congressman dan crenshaw is here and talk about his push to work with democrats to take on border cartels. this as "america reports" rolls on. k he's posting about all that ancient roman coinage? no. he's making real-time money moves with merrill. so no matter what the market's doing, he's ready. and that's... how you collect coins. your money never stops working for you with merrill, a bank of america company. this is going to be great. taking the shawl off. ok i did it. is he looking at my hairline? is plaque psoriasis making you rethink your everyday choices? t harp yan. otezla is a pill, not a cream or injection that can help people with plaque psoriasis

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