this sunday, a shot in the arm. >> we now have a booster plan for all three of our covid-19 vaccines. >> the cdc approves moderna and johnson & johnson boss center shots for millions. >> the cdc now will allow new recommendations to mix and match. >> the government also preparing to vaccinate younger children later this fall, but many parents are hesitant. >> we're not anti-vax. that's not what we're saying. we're saying this is a new science, quote, unquote, and you it needs to be proven. >> my guest this morning, the

cdc director, dr. to agreement on that big social spending bill. >> if we're down to four or five issues, i think we can get there. >> but they worry about the political cost of this very public debate. >> it's hurding biden, hurting the democrats. >> i'll talk to senator angus king, independent of maine, republican senator roy blunt of ms. sorry and chuck todd talks to california governor gavin newsom. >> this political death march of who is up, who's down, manchin, sinema. i can't take it anymore. >> also, the battle over voting rights. republicans again -- >> the same rotten core is all still there. president biden agrees the filibuster may have to go because of republican intransigents. joining me for in analysis are maria teresa kumar, president of voto latino, republican strategist brendan buck, ayesha rasco, white house

correspondent for npr and politico white house correspondent and politico skoe author, eugene daniels. welcome to sunday, it's "meet the press." >> announcer: from nbc news in washington, the longest running show in television history, this is "meet the press" with chuck todd. good sunday morning. chuck todd is off today. i'm andrea mitchell. a lot happened in washington this week. whether a lot got accomplished, that's another mat trer. for the third time democrats put up voting rights legislation, and for the third time it went nowhere because of the republican flib. >> today the rule of law are under relentless assault from republican governors, secretary of state, state legislators, and they're following my predecessor, the last president into a deep, deep black hole and abyss. >> there were many hopeful reports of progress on president biden's social spending plans

and just as many pess mystic reports of stalemate. there was even one report that a principle democratic holdout, senator joe manchin of west virginia was thinking of leaving the party. by week's end democrats were closer to a deal but not close enough as republicans sat back and enjoyed the very public sausage making. house democrats joined by just nine republicans voted to recommend trump ally steve bannon be prosecuted for criminal contempt of congress. at issue, his refusal to obey a subpoena regarding january 6th. we'll get to all of those stories in a moment, but we ooh ear going to begin with covid. on friday the cdc approved johnson & johnson and moderna booster shots, meaning americans can choose from all three vaccines incluing pfizer. >> the vast majority of people willth probably select the one they originally seed. there may be some people who

prefer a different vaccine or if you go to a pharmacy and they don't have the original vaccine you got, it really is fine to get a different vaccine. >> joining me is cdc director dr. rochelle walensky. welcome back to "meet the press." >> thank you. good morning, andrea. >> good morning to you. it's good to see you. let's talk about the boosters. the approval for booster shots this week makes a big difference. there's a lot of confusion, first of all, for johnson & johnson recipients. why is it so important that they consider boosters, and do you recommend themrna boosters, getting moderna or pfizer for them? >> this has been a really important next step in our booster campaign across america because we now have a boosz center plan for all three of our vaccines, from moderna and pfizer if you're more than six months out; you may be eligible for a booster. what we said for j&j, if you're two months out from your last shot, you are eligible for a

booster. finally this plan to have recommendations towards mix and matching. the fda and the cdc saw a lester holt lot of data over the last week. we saw data from the nih oons on mix and match that antibody levels for tb mrna vaccines boosting the j&j were high. we saw that if you're boosted with j&j, you do quite well as well. which is why we've really left it open and said any one of these vaccines can really be used to boost any one of the others. >> i've speak en to a couple doctors, some of our experts that say confusion is actually good for the body. that if you have moderna, two shots of moderna, try the pfizer booster and vice versa. is it good for people to get something that does have a different kind of antibody for that covid spike? >> that's an important question, and it's not necessarily one we have definitive science on right

now. we will absolutely be studying that. but what we do know is it looks very effective. it looks effective in the clinical studies, looks effective in the antibody studies, and it looks very safe as well. is there an absolute preference for one or another if you get an mrna vaccine versus a johnson & johnson vaccine? we really do see great clinical benefit for both. >> the other problem that begins to develop is just during the last couple weeks, we're seeing more people getting boosters than getting their first shots. is all the focus on boosters going to take away from the bigger problem which is to get more people vaccinated at least with their first doses? >> andrea, this is such an important point. we have 64 million americans who have still not yet rolled up their sleeves for an initial booster shot, and we are vaccinating them at about 250,000 a day. we are continuing active out reach, active communication, active discussions with trusted messengers to really work to

scale that up. in the meantime, in parallel and without losing of that effort in getting people vaccinated for the first time, we are rolling out this booster plan, and people are coming. they are interested in getting their boosters. >> let's talk about kids, 5 to 11. the initial data certainly reporting that the fda, in fact, believes there's a positive effect and very low risk. you're going to have the advisory, the fda advisory on tuesday. just when do you think, all things being equal and no big surprises that these children, these little children could get vaccinated? >> right. between the ages of 5 to 11, the fda will be reviewing those data this week. they will have a lot of science to review and over the coming week, we're hopeful to hear from them by the beginning of the following week. that's when the cdc will have their meeting. i will be ready to take action if all of that goes smoothly as

soon as possible. in the meantime, the administration is working on the operations and the logistics. so as soon as we have both the fda authorization and the cdc recommendations, there will be vaccine out there. so children can start rolling up their sleeves. >> according to the latest data from kaiser, you have one-fourth of the american parents saying under no circumstances would they let their kids get vaccinated. a third would. a third want to wait and see. but one in four do not want to have vaccinations even though for decades children have been vaccinated. how do you reach those? and if you don't reach those people, that's a big number -- can you get the herd immunity in schools that you really need? >> right. this is critical important, and we know we have a lot of work to do. in fact, those survey data look very much consistent with where we were with adults last december when we rolled out vaccines for add durlts. we have done a huge amount of hard work over the last ten

months. education, communication, providing information, get vaccines to really convenient places, trusted messenger, making sure those vaccines are in pediatricians' offices and children's hospitals and pharmacies where parents trust vaccines being given. so we're doing obviously all of that hard work now, and we have that hard work to come for both our children as well as our parts and for the 64 million people who have yet to roll up their sleeves themselves. >> what's your advice to parents regarding lifting mask mandates in schools once children are vaccinated? >> our case numbers are coming down and that's so encouraging. we still have 75,000 new cases a day of covid and still having death rates of 1,200 to 1,500 deaths per day. as we roll out these vaccines for our children, and we have hopeful we will be able to, it's also critically important that

our kids are able to stay in school. we saw a couple weeks ago new science that demonstrated that schools that masked had 3.5 times less likelihood of having outbreaks than schools that didn't. in my mind, the most important thing right now as we work to get our cases down, as we work to get our children vaccinated, is that we continue the masking to keep our kids in school. >> i want to play something, last time you were on "meet the press" last may, this is what you had to say about lifting mask mandates. >> we are asking people to be honest with themselves. if they are vaccinated and they are not wearing a mask, they are safe. >> did you move too soon on that? was that a mistake? >> you know, that was at a time of the alpha variant when vaccinated people, if they were a breakthrough infection, could not transmit the alpha variant to someone else. this is really an opportunity to understand that we have have to be humble with the science and to move with the science as we

have learned with this delta variant, it's a different variant, a more transmissible variant oopsz and it behaves different li in the con tegt of breakthrough infections. we are in a very different moment with a very different variant. >> how worried are you about this delta plus surging in the uk, about it coming here. we don't have enough testing to really know how much is out there. >> we absolutely are following the genomic sequencing of this very carefully. i think you're referring to the ay 4.2 sub lineage. it's a variant of the delta variant. it has several mutations on the spike protein that we have not yet seen implicated in increased trance missability or in our vaccines or therapeutics to work. we're watching it very carefully. we have had a handful of cases in the united states, but hasn't taken off the way it has in the

u knchs. >> could there be a point where we have to stop flights coming into the uk because of this? >> we are not anticipating that now. we're following the science very carefully, but we're not anticipating or looking into that right now. >> dr. rochelle walensky, thank you for being with us on "meet the press." >> thanks for having me, andrea. turning to two big issues in wash. on president biden's social spending plan, democrats are reportedly near an agreement on a billionaire's tax rather than on people making over $400,000 a year because of operations by kyrsten sinema. the president says he may be willing to overhaul the filibuster. one senator moving in the same direction on that score is independent senator angus king of maine. senator king is here with us. welcome back to "meet the press." >> great to be with you, andrea. good morning. >> good morning to you.

it want to talk to you first about the flibs, you were one of the resistors against the filibuster. for the third time republicans blocked even any debate on voting rights, you began to change and say you might consider alterations to the filibuster. what are you willing to consider? getting rid of it altogether? or having a talking filibuster which is what they used to do? where are you now? >> i'm not really ready to say let's get rid of it altogether, because i think there are circumstances where it makes sense. i prefer some alternative to what the present rule is. i'd like to restore the senate to what it was, where we actually had debates and people had to hold the floor. so i think some kind of talking filibuster, perhaps a rule that, instead of having to have 60 votes to pass something, you'd have to have 41 votes to stop it. so that way the minority would at least have to show up. we've got to do something about this. at least when it comes to

something as usual as democracy itself, as voting rights. >> do you think you can get 50 rules to get that rule? would senators manchin and sinema go along with it? >> i've talked to both of them. i can't say for sure. i don't want to read minds here. i know both of them have resisted it, as have i because once you monkey with the rule, it's going to work both ways. it's going to come back and could come back to bite those who want to move things forward right now. today's obnoxious obstruction, tomorrow could be a precious shield. when it comes to democracy, i think joe and kerstin will listen. joe believes in people's right to vote. he helped negotiate the bill we brought to the floor the other day that they wouldn't even let us get to a debate on. it was a filibuster of a motion to just bring the bill to the floor, and i think joe might be

ready to listen to not an abolition of the filibuster, but some modification to make it -- to allow us to move forward to give the minority all the rights in the world to speak, to debate, to make their points, but at some point we've got to be able to make decisions. the trick, andrea, is respecting minority rights while at the same time not empowering the minority with an effective veto. that's the needle that we're trying to threat here. >> talking about trying to thread the needle, let's talk about the so-called reconciliation, the social spending bills. so much focus has been on the trillions of dollars that are being spent and not on what is -- what is being cut and not on what is still in there. how do you feel right now, for instance, about the billionaire's tax that apparently is one of the things that's being considered to get around senator sinema's opposition to raising rates on

the wealthy? >> you know, number one, i think you're right. i think one of the mistakes in this is all the intention has been on what the number is, $3.5 billion, 2.8, 2.2, whatever it is, rather than what's in the bill, why are we doing this. i think back, andrea, to the '50s. the two most important federal policies of the '50s that propelled us into prosperity, there were two, one was the interstate highway system and the other was the gi bill. i talked to a guy just the other day, 89d 6 years old, enlisted in the navy during world war ii, the gi bill changed his life. he didn't even finish high school when he enlisted. he came back, finished high school, went to college. really what we're talking about is a gi bill for the 21st century. >> let me ask you about senator joe manchin and the climate.

right now the climate process is out of the bill. the president is going to try to do things by executive order we're told. but that can be overturned, chal lengds in the court. senator manchin is talking about even at one point becoming an independent like you. how do you feel about senator manchin becoming an independent, still voting with democrats, and losing so much of climate which is so important to mainers. >> of course, i welcome an expansion of my caucus by a third. on the other hand, i think joe had a rather colorful response to that that started with the word bull. i don't really think that's going to happen. joe is the chairman of the energy and natural resources committee. i'm on that committee. we've done a lot under his leadership on climate this year, on things like energy efficiency, energy storage, which by the way i think is the real key to a clean energy future. he's facilitated that.

he's worked through it. he didn't like the provisions that were in the president's proposal. but i don't think that necessarily means he's deaf on climate legislation. i think there are other ways to approach this problem to get to the same result. clearly we've got to get there. it's one of mie major priorities in congress. i used to carry a card around that shows the gross expansion of co2 in our atmosphere and what it's doing to the planet. i'm all in on this subject. i think there are still going to be paths we can find to solve the problem, or at least -- i shouldn't have said solve the problem -- to begin to solve the problem because it is a crisis facing this country and the world. the other piece, andrea, we've got to remember is we can't do it alone. i think the most important part about losing the provisions of the reconciliation bill is it

weakens joe biden's hands in glasgow, the climate meeting coming up. if we're going to get the rest of the world to take serious steps to remedy this problem, we've got to do it ourselves. i'm disappointed we won't be able to move forward with those provisions. i think there will be other alternatives and i think joe manchin will be there. >> in fact, he's going to be in wilmington today negotiating with the president one-on-one. we'll wait to see what comes out of that. so great to see you senator angus king. thank you very much for joining us to today. >> thank you, andrea. . joining me now, senator roy blunt of missouri. welcome back to "meet the press.". >> great to be with you. >> i want to ask you something about statements that former president trump said just this week. he said the insurrection took place on november 3rd, election day. january 6th was the protest.n? >> i thip the election was what

it was. there's a process that you go through that determines whether or not the early reports were the right reports. we went through that process. i'm of the view that the best thing president trump could do to help us win majority in 2022 is talk about the future, and he can be an important part of that, this 22 effort, but i think better off to talk about the future than to focus on the past in every election. every election should be about the future, and i think that's what this next one is going to be about. >> he still this week was making these false election claims. on thursday, arizona should decertify their fake election results immediately. also thursday, they, the biden administration, are only really good at two things. rigging elections and misinformation. so he's still talking about the past, and a lot of republicans, a lot of republican leaders in the house, other members of the senate, are standing with him on this. doesn't the party have to

disavow the challenge to the election in order to go forward? >> i think president biden and the democrats are giving us we don't need to keep focusing on the past. >> but republicans keep talking about the past. >> well, i'm not. i don't think many republicans in the senate are. i think we're talking about bad tax policy, bad environmental policies, national takeover of the election process. there are plenty of things for us to talk about. i'm there every day, and i hear republicans concerned, as they should be, about the process the democrats are going through. >> they're also denying the reality of january 6th. republicans refusing the commission, not joining the house select committee. steve bannon -- only nine republican laos votes to punish him for violating a house subpoena. >> i think a lot of this discussion is obviously driven like the media just like this is

here today. we could be talking about senate rules. we could be talking about tax policy. we could be talking about these new entitlement policies. >> it's not the media going against the reality of what happened on january 6th. it was the worst attack on our government, on our democracy since the civil war. >> i agree with that. on january 0th i was at the podium at the capitol chairing the inauguration and the peaceful transition of power we saw that day is one of the most important things we do. i was able to chair the inauguration four years earlier, and four years later it was the same important message we sent to the world. i think we effectively did that. >> to that point, if the former president keeps denying the reality of the election and of joe biden being the president, should that disqualify him from being a candidate as he suggests he wants to be in 2024? >> there are constitutional provisions about being a

candidate. having opinions that other people may not agree with is not one of those provisions. he can be a candidate if he wants to be. again, i think what president trump could do that would be most helpful right now would be focus on the policies that aren't working. his policies at the border were working, regulatory policies were working, tax policies were working. we see those policies for democrats with these narrow majorities aren't working. i hope that's where he focuses. i don't manage his time -- >> but if he doesn't concede the election, would you support him in 2024? >> well, the election for 2020 is over. i'm focused on 2022, and it's a long time between now and 2024. >> he has basically excommunicated liz cheney from the party as has kevin mccarthy just for trying to investigate what really happened, what was the conspiracy behind january

6th? do you think there is a place in the republican party for liz cheney? >> i think wyoming volters will decide if there's a place in the house for her or not. there's a lot of things we should be focusing on. i think, again, what defines the future of the republican party is how we react to the debate going on right now. democrats are having an incredibly hard time getting where they'd like to be. they've decided that they've got a mandate, and there's clearly no mandate. the senate couldn't possibly be closer. the house majority is the closest democrats have had in 170 years. frankly, the only thing that joe biden and donald trump agreed upon in 2020 was they both wanted the election to be all about donald trump. there is no mandate. pretending you do is going to have real consequences in both '22 and '24. >> let me ask you about voting

rights. you talked to joe manchin about some of the ballot protection issues. yet, the joe manchin comprise trying to get to the floor, not even letting it get to the floor. how do you feel about voting rights? you supported reenacting the voting rights bill when you were a house member in 2006. >> i did, and i would again, extend the voting rights bill. the voting rights bill hasn't been repealed. 14th and 15th andment haven't been revealed. >> but the supreme court decision in 2013 basically gutted it. >> i was both a local election official and the chief election official for our state for a kbierned total of about 20 years. there are 10,000 election jurisdictions out there in america. the federal government deciding how elections should be run in all 10,000 of those jurisdictions is a bad idea, and i don't think senator manchin was surely fully on board with the supposed compromise. it was a compromise between the left and the far left.

you still had matching funding of six dollars for every dollar raised for house members. i like joe manchin, but i'm not driven by the joe manchin standard of whether something is a good deal or not. this was clearly a federal takeover of elections. it was not doing things around the edges of elections that direct the country in a more significant way and i'm opposed to it. there's no right way to do the wrong thing. federal government taking over elections is the wrong thing to do. one o of the strengths of our system is the diversity of the system itself and the state and local responsibility to conduct an election that people have confidence in. >> we'll have to leave it there. thank you very much, senator roy blunt. with. when we come back, democrats when we come back, democrats are worried the ♪ ♪

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welcome back rchlt the panel is here. republican strategist brendan buck, ayesha rasco, white house correspondent for npr, maria teresa kumar, president of voto latino and politico white house correspondent and playbook co-author eugene daniels. welcome all. it's great to see you all. we've had this endless negotiation, what seems like endless negotiating, party infighting. ayesha, let's talk about this. we know joe manchin and chuck schumer are going to wilmington as we speak? >> they are getting closer. as the white house likes to say, there's urgency now. they're feeling the urgency. look, making the sausage, getting everything together is not always pretty. it seems like the white house has been too clever for its own good. they've been so disciplined about not putting forward exactly where they stand and exactly what they want to do because they don't want to mess up the negotiations. but now you don't know where they stand, and they have not

defined this bill. >> maria teresa, let's talk about that. the dollar figures and what's being cut out, they haven't focused on what's in it? and have they lost the progressive caucus? >> no one knows what's in the bill including the administration. what we're going to see is whether or not is whether or not they have to give people a little on climate. the reason i say that, we haven't heard yet from the squad. the squad recognizes their supporters, their most extreme progressive base, that's what they care about. so how ever those chips fall, that's going to be an indicator. i also believe the democrats, the president, they recognize this is an existential threat. if they don't pass something on the most important comprehensive package for our generation, for the 21st century, not only is it going to question whether or not we'll come out and vote for them again, but also the people that

get left behind are the american people. that's this ambitious plan and what they need to communicate at this point. >> desperation is a real motivator. that's what you're seeing right now. thafd eve been drifting for a long time. one of the most interesting things that happened last week, obviously the biden administration getting engaged, but progressives signaling they're going to be much more pragmatic. they went to the white house and said here is what's out, this bill is going to be cut in half. instead of a no, they were leaning into it. there's still so many issues unresolved. taxes, medicare, prescription drugs, state and local tax. all of these things are up in the air. they can purt it together quickly if they need to, but there's still so many unanswered questions, how can you sell it, and eventually they have to get to that point. >> to brendan's point on messaging, they started to message it was 3.5, it was so important, it had to have everything in there. they're saying this is still the most money we've spent on any of

these issues. you see that messaging changing in the white house -- >> but is it too late. when you talk about the base, eugene, let's see what we heard at the town hall meeting. this is a young man, thaddeus price, asking a really tough question of the president. >> you received overwhelming support from the black community, and rightfully so, rightfully so. but now many of us are disheartened as we watch a congress fail to support police reform. we watch our voting rights vanish before our very eyes. >> he doesn't really have an answer to that. voting rights and police reform, neither are getting done. >> all of those things that black people talked about so much during the election, president biden said he'd have their back. they're saying where are you? we're nine, ten months into your administration, and now you're hearing and we've been hearing for months, activists and people

who get people out to vote, you have to give us something to have us go back to black people and say you did this for them. that's what they're hoping to see. that haven't seen it. frustration that i think the white house has not paid as much attention to as black voters want them to. >> the president certainly indicated, brandon, on the filibuster, that he's willing to concede, especially a carveout for voting rights. what's the pitfall there? if they lose the midterms and it comes back to bite them? that's happened before with mitch mcconnell. >> it's not only possible, but likely that republicans are in control of congress next year. it's not just joe manchin, it's john tester, kyrsten sinema. the reality is, this could turn around on them very quickly. >> i do think they have a very limited time to pass the freedom to vote act. what we're seeing coming out of texas, out of georgia, it was

what you were asking senator blunt. the fact that they gutted the voting rights act, the congressional redistricting that just came out of texas that basically gave communities of color zero democratic seats, basically -- districts. >> would have been black districts. >> black and latino districts. 95% of the growth in texas was because of the people of color. now the local states no longer have pre clearance from the department of justice, they're doing their own shenanigans and writing their own rights. when people say why don't we pass the freedom to vote act, that's what they need to suspend the filibuster. i deeply believe that once people can vote their values and have access to the voting booth we will have police reform. >> ayesha, it's also nullification. it's not just access to voting. it's being able to, in all these states, going legislature to legislature being able to nullify the votes with the secretary of states they

appointed. >> that's why you have all these activists at the white house and protesting and saying they want change. it's interesting because the white house is saying go to congress, we're doing what we can do, and not putting as much -- they say this is a make-or-break issue. that's not the way the white house has been acting. >> we're going to have to leave it. there we'll be back eighter. when we come back, chuck todd when we come back, chuck todd talks in 2016, i was working at the amazon warehouse when my brother passed away. and a couple of years later, my mother passed away. after taking care of them, i knew that i really wanted to become a nurse. amazon helped me with training and tuition. today, i'm a medical assistant and i'm studying to become a registered nurse. in filipino: you'll always be in my heart. age before beauty?

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welcome back. this past week chuck todd salt down with california governor chuck newsom in los angeles. they spoke about the failed recall election and the difficult decision that lies ahead, whether to approve parole for robert kennedy's killer sirhan sirhan. they also talked about the current deadlock in washington and what advice the governor might give president biden. >> i have reverence and respect for the president. i'm not here to offer advice unless it's sought. i will observe, as a taxpayer, that it's covid stupid. look at the poll numbers --

>> you mean focusing on these other issues -- they're not unimportant. >> they're all important. but this political death march of who is up, who is down, manchin this, sinema, i can't take it anymore. no one can take it anymore. just enough. stop. get something done. it looks like they're finally going to get something done. watch, miraculously numbers will start going up. they actually deliver. you can go out and say what you did. no one even remembers what was in the original $1 trillion package and all the good frskt investment. now they get to talk about that again, not just the $3.5 trillion reconciliation that's over ten years. people don't know what a trillion is, what reconciliation is. they just know no one is getting a damn thing done. they're going to blame whoever is in the executive branch. i think all that changes as long as the focus reverts immediately back to the reason why he was elected in the first place, and that was to get covid behind us.

every question you ask me has that connective tissue. >> let's talk about your political situation. in some ways you're stronger politically in the state. they went at you. you didn't just win, you win in some ways by a bigger margin than you did the first time. this changed you a little bit. how did it change you? there's an interesting -- you describe it. >> for me it's rather existential. it's humbling beyond words, i mean beyond words. >> you took it pretty personally at first, didn't you? >> i work hard. i really care. i care about trump supporters. i worked with president trump. i went out of my way. i love this country. i lofr this state. i love my neighborhood. i can't stand that my neighbor, if he could, he'd put a confederate flag up. he's put pretty much every other flag up. he didn't want to talk to my

daughter when my daughter brought him an egg. we share a neighborhood. maybe our politics are a little different. politics are so damn weaponized. i know we say we worry about our kids. i worry about our kids, not when they grow up, but in school now. they're not even getting along with their damn friends. i am concerned about all that. it changed me in this respect. there's just a sense of determination, intentionality. time is completely refocused. i'm more energetic and more willing to take risks -- it's not as if i've had a career where i have not leaned in. quite the contrary. i don't want to be reckless. but i'm willing to take risk and mark a moment of accountability and responsibility and i'll close on that. it's about time these damn pundits on tv and politicians start taking responsibility and stop acting like swrik tims.

i don't know what's happened in this country. stop acting like a victim. you have agency. let's take responsibility. >> the sirhan sirhan decision. >> it's a tough one. >> what makes it tough? >> it's interesting you ask the question. i don't laugh to be dismissive. i laugh because that's a hard one for me. >> it's all on you. >> bobby kennedy is my political hero. you look at my house, it's a shrine to the kennedy family. >> you wonder why some of us ask if you're interested in running for president. >> i tap in to the '60s, service, contribution, something that we need to attach ourselves oorps to again. that said, this is hard because i believe in redemption. i believe in second chances. at the same time, he took away dreams. he took away a lot of hope. this country, this world has radically changed as a consequence. i have to factor that in.

>> what about the family? you could say they're not -- they're not divided evenly. does that matter to you? >> profoundly. bobby's wife, if i want to preview a pint of view, that's going to be profoundly -- >> if eegtal kennedy calls me up and expressing her point of view, there's weight and there's a different level and weightiness of weight. that's a call from eegtal kennedy. i'm not looking for that call. but i'm very desire yous to get a sense of where she is. >> when do you have to make the decision? >> it hasn't been formally brought to my desk. it's a matter of months. it's coming up. it's generated a lot of interest. i'll tell you. you ask this question, i've gotten emails and text messages from folks that are some of the most heartfelt and deep and emotional. >> on both sides of the issue? >> on both sides of the issue.

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welcome back. we'll take a look at a controversial subject, critical race theory or crt. it's a graduate level framework asserting that historical patterns of rationism are engrained in institutions. it's become central in the debate over race in the u.s. this week, antonio hilton reports on an african-american principal in dallas suspended over accusations he was pushing crt on his students. >> reporter: dr. james wlit field has become one of the most prominent casualties in a national war over race, history and diversity. >> psychologically, what's that like? >> yeah. i go from -- different extremes. there's a part of me that goes, as any human, why me? why is this -- i didn't sign up for this. >> reporter: texas is one of eight states with new broad laws banning the teaching of critical race theory, a decades-old

graduate level5l9■ study diffic examining the relationship between raw and racial equality. reporters and parents have seized on the phrase turning it into shorthand for lessons or programs they feel are un-american and can make white students feel guilt. >> right now it's very trendy, i know that. it's very unpopular for me to be against it. >> we should be teaching america pride, not to hate our country and hate each other. >> reporter: there's no evidence that colleyville heritage high taught critical race theory. senate bill 3 is the second and most stringent of the anti crt laws in texas. >> when you look at some of what's happening around the state, you don't think any of this has gone off the rails? >> i think folks need to focus on what's in the bill, not what's in other states or what they've heard. if we were to tell little white children they are inherently oppress sers, that's not good. if we tell little children of color they're victims, neither

of those is good. >> is that the primary motivation of these laws, to make sure white kids don't feel guilty? >> the bill is clear. it will be wrong to tell white kids or children that they're limited based on the color of their skin or they're guilty because of what people of their race did in the past. >> what about teachers who say they're closing their classroom libraries or dr. whitfield? >> i say look at the words of the bill. the words of the bill matter, not the facebook memes. >> is there something you can clarify at a statewide level? >> what we said -- i want to make sure this is clear. what we do not teach in texas public schools is not one race is inferior or superior. >> i understand that. i want to know what you think people are living in their lives as a result of this movement? >> i can't speak about the national movement of crt and what other states are doing. all i can say is what's in senate bill 3. when we come back, why what happens in

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because we're building a better network every single day. when your supporters hold a rally where they pledge allegiance to a flag that was flown in the insurrection at the

capitol on january 6th, the biggest threat to our democracy in my lifetime, when you don't separate yourselves from them, that's a problem. >> welcome back. the panel is here. eugene, virginia can be a microcosm of issues. this was a smallish crowd for the former president last night, campaigning there as well as new jersey. this is such a tight race. is this a precursor of the midterms? >> i think absolutely because most importantly virginia looks more like the rest of the country, right? it's blacker and browner, there's more highly educated people there. so how they end up voting, whether or not they're able to get excited about a moderate democratic like terry mcauliffe is one thing. history is not on the democratic side here. since 1977, only one person has won the gubernatorial race with their president in office. it's terry mcauliffe, actually,

not good for them. >> ayesha, can he repeat? you have a real fatigue with politics right now nationally, and he needs a big turnout. >> he needs a big turnout. unfortunately he doesn't have a lot that is animating his base right now. glenn youngkin has things. he can talk about critical race theory, masks in schools, things like that. that's what's really animating people and people who feel like they don't -- they're not happy with what's happening in washington. right now mcauliffe doesn't have that. >> for glenn youngkin, a lot of money, self-financing, also raising a lot of money. trying to run away from donald trump in person but certainly welcoming his endorsement. >> glenn young kin is taking advantage of the problem that democrats have nationally, obviously there's a lack of motivation. it's because they're not really getting anything done. glenn youngkin is focusing on issues important to people right now, inflation, gas prices,

these things that are front and center in their everyday life, whereas national democrats are trying to pass a bill that nobody can really define. it gives him an advantage. >> what about motivating democrats, maria teresa? >> i think we have to take a step back and say what's going to motivate independent republicans to go and vote for biden. yes, biden's numbers may be down. if we remember the toxicity of what trump represented, he's trying to say 178 million people that voted on november 3rd was a farce. what he represents and the toxicity, the tribalism, that's what's at stake in virginia. it's not the big d democrat, it's little d democracy. where are republicans going to lie their hat. i want to talk about colin powell. we lost a military man, a statesman, a diplomat. someone who spoke out in favor of education and against the tribalism.

i want to play what he said. this is his warning. >> i want us to understand the cynicism that exists in the black community, the kind of cynicism that is created when some in our party miss no opportunity to loudly support affirmative action that help a few thousand get an education -- >> i was on the floor there, brendan. a lot of the delegates booed him when he talked about affirmative action. has the republican party lost the ability to represent majority of americans? >> the moment when colin powell shifted politics is when he endorsed barack obama in 2008. i think there's a lot of reasons for that. one of the things he cited is john mccain's selection of sarah palin. it's really when the party became a place of ideas and

policy to more what ultimately i like to call the entertainment wing of the party, where it's all about who can be louder and say the more outlandish thing. it's become a place that's less serious. i don't think that anybody is sfrefr in politics, but i understand why colin powell over his life shifted away from the party because it's become much less substantive. i hope we can get back to the kind of party he was a part of for so long. >> ayesha, that does show the polarization. >> the party left colin powell behind. there was not an emphasis on that broad umbrella and it just left him behind. >> great conversation. thank you all so very much for being here. that's all for today. thanks for watching. chuck todd will be back next week because if it's sunday, it's plets.

only on nbc. motogp returns to the world circuit in italy for the second time in the last three races but this time around it's more than just a race so many riders call this home but no bigger than valentino rossi. the nine-time world champion hopes to give the fans one last show on his fina