restore it. >> and that's the -- that's what's beautiful if you will, the silver lining on this very dark cloud is that it's pushing people together. it's getting folks to really see what they have in common and unfortunately what they have in common is that the president is creating a situation where all of us feel more persecuted? >> jane eisner, ben jealous. thank you. >> thank you. that's "all in" for this evening, the rachel maddow show starts right now. >> good evening, chris. thanks to you at home. on january 28, eight days after the inauguration, there was a fire at a mosque in victoria, texas, we covered it on the show at the time. victoria, texas, not a huge place, a population of about 60,000 people and there are enough muslims who live in victoria, texas, to support one

islamic center in that community. one mosque. on january 28, this year, somebody burned it down destroyed it completely. one of the things that was very moving in the immediate aftermath of that tragedy, that crime, was when the other religious congregations in victoria, texas came forward and offered the keys to their facilities, the keys to their houses of worship. they offered the keys to the imam from that mosque so his muslim congregation could have somewhere else to meet and pray, victoria, texas, is small enough that it only had enough muslims in town to support that one mosque victoria, texas, only has enough jews in town to support one synagogue for the whole city. the leader of that synagogue came forward to offer his keys to the local imam after the fire and he explained to reporters that sharing the space of the synagogue, sharing the synagogue

with the membership of the mosque made sense, even if you're only talking mathematically. he said "we have probably 25 to 30 jewish people in all of victoria, they probably have 100 muslims. we have a lot of building for a small amount of jews." so they made the offer. we covered that at the time. a lot of churches in town offered their keys to the imam. the local synagogue offered their keys, meet here. let your community meet here. it was interesting, in addition to that local support the mosque received in town, all the other congregations coming forward to say what can we do? use our space. our space is your space. negotiation that, what happened locally, what happened online was almost as overwhelm iing. the mosque -- they put up an online fund-raising page to rebuild after their fire and in two days they received over $900,000 in pledges.

after they hit $1.1 million they knew they had enough to rebuild, they stopped raising funds. but over 23,000 people came forward and donated. they got hundreds of thousands of dollars more than they had asked for. that mosque fire is still not solved. local authorities have declared it an arson. they have put out reward for information leading to an arrest but there is no one in custody. we spoke to the imam today, he told us they are making their plans to rebuild and hoping there will someday be an arrest. this weekend in st. louis, missouri, in the university city neighborhood of st. louis a jewish cemetery that dates to the 1800s was the subject of another attack, nearly 200 headstones were thrown over, broken toppled in the cemetery. local press has been full of these heartbreaking pictures of people turning up at the jewish cemetery to find their granarentsheadston broken and thrown over. this comes on the heels of

jewish community centers around the country facing several waves now of bomb threats and van v.a..en dahlism. the most the most recent spate happened yesterday. in st. louis, local police are investigating but there have been no arrests but look, this was part of the response online after the word got out today about what happened in that cemete cemetery. see the headline? muslims unite to repair jewish cemetery. they set a goal of raising $20,000 by march 21 to contribute to the repair and the replacement if need be of those broken headstones. their goal was $20,000 to be raised by march 21. they raised over $20,000 today in three hours. in this case, they say they're going to continue to raise money, at least for a while longer "any additional funds raised in this campaign will assist vandalized jewish centers

nationwide." that $20,000 they raised today, that will go to the cemetery to repair the headstones. "muslim americans stand in solidarity with the jewish community to condemn this act of desecration." . we are at an unusual time in our history, you might have noticed. national politics has veered and keeps veering in unexpected directions. it's hard to know on any given day what is likely to happen next. that can sometimes be exhilarating. it's mostly exhausting. even in unpredictable times, some principles of human behave your, human reaction, human decency still hold and what we are learning in this new era that we're in, in the trump era, what we're learning already, four weeks into this is no matter how strange things get in national politics you can still count on americans to do some

predictable things. you can count on the principle that in our politics when there is an action there will be a reaction and as radical as these changes feel in washington, the radical changes in washington and things they have made us worry about, they're causing a strong and serious change all over the country outside of washington. in the cities and in the small towns, in rhett states and blue states. it's not as easy to track. but if you start looking for it, it's almost stunning. in just a few minutes, we'll talk in detail about the new mass deportation plans that have been outlined by the new administration as of today and the expectations for the new version of their muslim ban and refugee ban they're expected to roll out. that's what's happening in washington. part of the reaction to those orders and those plans we've

seen in the courts. when the memos about the deportation plan started circulating the aclu said this "president trump does not have the last word on deportations, the courts and the public will not allow this un-american dream to become a reality. so part of the response we're seeing is legal and in the courts. part is out in public and sometimes in surprising places. today someone somehow managed to unfurl a "refugees welcome" banner literally on the statue of liberty. i have no idea how they got out to the statue of liberty and got that banner on to it but that happened today. you see the response in these public protests that we have seen on almost rolling basis since the inauguration, we saw large protests mostly focused on the travel ban. we saw them in new york city and

in atlanta and in los angeles and in chicago, in washington, d.c. but you know what? it's not just in the big cities where you are seeing this stuff. it's also happening in unexpected places. we got in footage today. look at this, this is rehoboth beach, delaware, of all places. "no wall, no ban." rehoboth beach, delaware. look at this one. s from aho, arizona. the name of the town is ajo, arizona, about 40 miles from mexico. the population of the whole town of ajo is 3700 people. look how many people turned out for their protest. 3700 people in the whole town, look how many people are protesting. "no ban, no wall." this big aunt trump protest in this little border town. so we all know what's happening in washington. it's easy to follow if sometimes hard to believe what's happening in washington but the response

is everywhere and it's happening daily in ways large and small and the more you look, the more of it you see. yes it's in the courts. yes it's in some dramatic protests but it's also in the streets. and not just where you might expect it to be in the streets. it's started already to affect straight up american politics. let me give you one solid example. one of the practical consequences of these new deportation orders -- and they don't like to talk about it much yet in washington, but they have to soon -- is that the new administration is going to apparently go back to using private for-profit prisons to lock people up in federal facilities. in the obama administration, the justice department official who wrote an order, wrote the memo explaining the federal government would no longer use private for-profit prisons, who wrote the whole rationale explaining why in the obama administration they were getting

away from that because of the problems with private prisons, the justice official who wrote that directive in the obama administration, who signed her name to that in the last administration was the then deputyattorney general sally yates. she's now famous for her 10 very consequential days as acting attorney general after the obama administration ended and the new administration start ed sally yates warned the white house that national security adviser michael flynn was lying about his interactions with the russian government. a week after that she warned the white house the muslim ban was unconstitutional. she told them she would not direct the justice department to defend it incot. the new president fired sally yates for that but she's been proven right and her assessment of how the courts would see that muslim ban, the muslim ban very quickly proved indefensible in court. the trump administration has now tacitly conceded her point by

withdrawing their muslim ban and planning to draft a new one. so you look at somebody like sally yates before one month ago she had an interesting and accomplished but low profile career as as prosecutor and justice department official. now she's a household name. in moments like this, in moments of political transition you never know who's going to be called to rise to the occasion. you never know who's going to become an overnight hero because of the circumstances they find themselves in or because of actions they feel by conscience they must take. but now look at this. sally yates is from georgia, she's from atlanta, this is sally yates last week, see her in the foreground there? this is an event at the carter center in georgia. she walks into this room, this event at the carter center. she's with former attorney general eric holder and she's embarrassed, she's blushing but she's sort of overwhelmed by the unexpected standing ovation that greets her. sally yates was not even there

to be in the event. she was not there to be on stage or on a panel. she was there to sit in the audience but she walks in the room, no introduction necessary, everybody knows who she is. she gets a sustained and overwhelming standing ovation, eric holder bakts backs up to l soak in the applause, and even though she's not on the panel the audience questions ended up getting directed at her, sally united states, will you please run for congress? sally yates, will you run for senate? sally yates, we know who you are now. georgia democrats say they are lobbying sally yates to run for georgia governor when that seat opens up next year. look at virginia. virginia is a blue state now in many ways. went for obama in '08, went for obama in 2012, went for hillary clinton by more than five points. but a lot of virginia is deep red. the legislature is still republican by a little bit in the senate and a lot in the

house. virginia holds their elections in odd-numbered years so their legislature is up in 2015. they're up again this year, 2017. southern democratic parties, including virginia, have become notorious in recent years for not even bothering to run democratic challengers in a lot of red districts, not even bothering to try. that apparently is no longer going to be the case. virginia democrats have identified 17 districts in the state this year where hillary clinton won the presidential race but the local state legislator is a republican. virginia democrats tell us tonight they have recruited democratic challengers to run for the legislature in every single one of those 17 districts. in fact, they have tell us they have already succeeded in recruits democratic challengers against republican incumbents in 45 districts. they're already -- they've already got candidates to challenge 45 republican incumbents. that's way more democratic challengers than they have ever run in recent years.

it's still a ways off from the deadline. deadline for the primaries isn't until march 30. they already have democratic challengers to 45 republican incumbents. the democratic caucus chair in the virginia house tells us tonight democrats are seeing "unprecedented interest" from potential candidates. she tells us "we have never felt so much energy so early as we are feeling now." the house democratic leader in virginia told us tonight they believe virginia this year will be "the first referendum on the divisive and chaotic presidency of donald trump." . obviously virginia democrats think that that kind of referendum will go their way. apparently it's not just places like georgia and virginia where this is happening. this appears to be the national phenomenon. the leadership of the dccc, the house campaign committee for the democratic party, they did an issue about their recruitment

efforts to find candidates across the country. this is for federal candidates for congress. they say their priorities are to find candidates in districts where right now there is a republican incumbent member of congress but hillary clinton won that district. or hillary clinton only lost by a little, she lost by four points or less that's their priority for finding democratic recruitment for democratic candidates for congress. how are they doing it? the recruitment chair for the dccc tells the "national journal" that actually being recruitment chair is usually kind of hard. he says in years past "getting somebody to run was like pulling eyeteeth each and every time. it was very hard to get people to say i see this as part of public service. i see this as a part of my patriotic duty." now though, "it's not hard to get people to see it that way at all. now, says the recruitment chair for the democratic party trying

to find democratic candidates for congress, now he says "we are raining candidates." this is an unpredictable time in our national life. what has changed in washington has changed the way people spend their time around the country. these indivisible groups that formed around this indivisible guide for practical politics for influencing congress and stopping the trump agenda. that indivisible movement. there's more than 7,000 indivisible groups that have formed in all 50 states. that's just the indivisible groups. what's changed in washington has caused individual people who never wanted to run for congress before, who never wanted to run for office before, it's caused people to change their lives, change their priorities to volunteer to run. districts in virginia where they've never had a democrat run at all in recent years have one, two, three, four democrats

competing in the primary because they want to run. what's happened in washington has changed the lives of people already in politics as well people already in congress, already in the senate. you know this week congress is off for the president's day holiday, they take a week-long recess and they're expected to go home to their districts and meet with constituents. for republican congressman ron desantis of florida, this is what it looks like outside of his district office back home. investigate putingate. these are constituents telling him what they want to do in florida. it's called treason, trump and putin. outside the office of republican congressman mike kelly in massachusetts, "meet with us, congressman kelly." remember congressman john katko, his constituents in new york have been demanding over and over he meet with them to hear their concerns about the administration. after all that pressure on him, the local paper jumped on board yesterday and published this

editorial, "representative katko should meet with his constituents congresswoman kay granger, republican representing fort worth, texas, she went home for a republican lincoln day dinner. this was a scene that greeted her outside. in tennessee, the district office of republican congressman scott dejarles. this is what republican congressman leonard lance is having to deal with in his home district. darn people singing outside his office trying to meet with him all the time. in buffalo, new york, chris collins, look at this, his district is dealing with boisterous crowds who do not appear to agree with his support of donald trump. his down state colleague, republican congressman dan donovan is dealing with much the same thing, constituents standing outside his local district office yesterday yelling "whose side are you on, dan, who side are you on?"

it's getting to the point where it's embarrassing at the grocery store. republican congressman paul cook represents a big rural district in california. these are the milk jugs at the -- you can get at the grocery stores in his district. they say "where is paul cook? pray for paul. congressman paul is missing, he won't meet with his constituents." when members of congress and senators meet with their constituents, we're getting a sense of what that looks like, no matter how red the state is chuck grassley of iowa prides himself on being super available to constituents. he's been doing that for a long time but they don't usually go like they went today. >> why shouldn't the democrats filibuster, obstruct and delay the current president's nominee to the supreme court for a year or even four years g that you set this precedent?

[ applause ] >> we will -- you can clap all you want to. we will get more questions answered and more discussion if i don't stop. >> you don't even know how we feel -- >> do your job. >> i'd like to go down the list here and the person that brought up impeachment, tell me -- i'll listen to you and then answer if you ask a question. who brought up impeachment? >> senator, i did. >> go ahead. >> first of all, i want to apologize for being so outspoken but i do -- i am so unsettled. it feels like we've got a juvenile running our country. >> hear, hear! [ applause ] >> senator chuck grassley of iowa getting an earful from his constituents today.

polite, though, he got off easy compared to his home state colleague senator joni ernst who announced one public forum. it was announced as a veterans' forum. lots of veterans showed up, so did lots of other iowans as well. >> i feel like we all took this oath to defend the nation against enemies foreign and domestic and i wonder if you saw there was overwhelming evidence that a foreign country was m meddling with our elections and meddling with our democracy. [ cheers and applause ] . if you would expect your senator to go to work everyday and work vigilantly to get to the bottom of that. [ cheers and applause ] >> i have business cards up here so if anybody needs our contact information they can come up and get those. that was our last question. [ boos ]

[ yelling ] [ yelling "do your job" ] [ chanting "do your job" ] [ chanting "shame on you." ] >> then she left. that's going to be our last question. no! . she leaves the room, they're screaming "shame on you." very rough meeting of the minds in iowa for senator joni ernst

today. here's the thing to take away from that experience, from just seeing how that went today. that happened in a place called maquoketa, iowa. i've been practicing saying it. maquoketa is population 6,000 people. that's the reception she got in maquoketa today from that mostly older mostly white crowd. it's easy to get bowled over with what's going on in washinon with the radical shift that's happened in our national politics with this new presidency. but there's as radical a shift in the rest of the country in the opposite direction. it's an equal and opposition reaction. it's just everywhere. it's in the courts, it's in the streets, it's in the lives of our elected officials. it's everywhere to the point that even that dynamic is starting to feel unpredictable and starting to feel a little overwhelming as well. but watch this unfold over the course of this week. watch what it's going to be like

for these representatives and senators at home this week. this whole week is going to be like this in the states. keep your eyes open. fees? what did you have in mind? i don't know. $6.95 per trade? uhhh- and i was wondering if your brokerage offers some sort of guarantee? guarantee? where we can get our fees and commissions back if we're not happy. so can you offer me what schwab is offering? what's with all the questions? ask your broker if they're offering $6.95 online equity trades and a satisfaction guarantee. if you don't like their answer, ask again at schwab.

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desjarlais. our three branches of government -- the courts, the executive, the legislative branch -- they are built as equal things, co-equal things. they're supposed to be separate and they're supposed to balance each other out. they're supposed to check each other's power when necessary but there are other checks on political power as well besides just the balance between the three different branches. one of the most uncomfortable checks on political power comes

from inside the government, comes from the people who work inside the government. the people with precious knowledge and experience doing their jobs to make government work, to make the country work. and sometimes, in times of political crisis or political radicali radicalism, one of the most dramatic and uncomfortable checks we have on government is when those people squawk. when those people emerge from the relative anonymity of working inside the government and they blow the whistle or they quit so they can speak their mind and that is starting to happen now. some of these valuable crucial people are opting out, include from some very high-profile jobs because they've decided the government they have committed themselves to is no longer ho holding up their end of the bargain, not in this administration, tonight we have a double header for the interview. we have two people who have just resigned from high profile important influential jobs in the government. they have both resigned for similar reasons. you'll want to hear their

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the day after the inauguration, the new president paid a visit to the cia. the president stood in front of a memorial wall with 117 hand-carved stars on it. each of those stars commemorates a cia officer killed in the line of duty. standing in front of that wall, standing in front of all those stars, the new president bragged about his big win in november,

bragged about the size of the crowd in his inauguration, talked about how much he hates the press and, for one career official who worked at the cia for over a decade, a man named ned price, that presidential bragging in that particular spot hit a nerve. ned price says his mentor at the cia was killed in the line of duty and is one of the people memorialized with a star on that wall. ned price said he thought he would spend his entire career working for the cia but after his years of service, including rising to the spokesman for the national security council, after living through just one month of this new presidency ned price decided he would not be a career cia official because he had to quit. he's written about in the the "washington post," he says "white house advisers, not career professionals, reportedly now have final say over what intelligence reaches the president's desk. as intelligence professionals, we're taught to tune out politics but this administration has flipped that dynamic on its head. the politicians are the ones tuning out the intelligence professionals.

despite working proudly for republican and democratic presidents, i reluctantly concluded i cannot in good faith serve this administration as an intelligence professional." joining us now is ned price, until last week he worked as a spokesman and senior analyst and a spokesman at the national security council. mr. price, thanks for being here, appreciate you making the time for us tonight. >> thanks for having me, rachel. >> did you expect when you saw the election results on november 8 that you might be entering into a period where your tenure at the cia would be untenable? that you might come up with a decision like this or were you truly surprised with the president's behavior once he took office? >> rachel, my resignation which i tendered last week was the culmination in a series of events that took place over the course of many months. as you have reported, i was highly discouraged when as the republican nominee, the now president, called into question the high competence assessment

of all 17 intelligence vie a vie the electoral process. i saw him as a president-elect, call the intelligence community nazis not knowing that the predecessor was critical to the defeat of the third reich and then the visit to the cia headquarters and seeing our new president, the commander in chief visit langley stand in front of stars that represent men and women who fell in the line of duty, that is something i didn't expect to see and i know others at the agency felt similarly, it was demoralizing but there were subsequent steps that led me to the move i led last week. >> you say you feel as you can

do some good outside of the country rather than staying inside the cia. can you tell me what you might do now in terms of what you might do next and how hard the decision was that you had to go? >> as you said, i aspired to be a cia officer for all of my life until i joined the cia in 2006. it was an honor and i was humbled to be called on board earlier that year. but rachel i had two options as i watched these data points over the precedings weeks and monthings. one was to stay on board and accrue a salary at the expense of taxpayers and to write assessments, unbiased unvarnished assessments for an administration that in my estimation has shown little regard for the sort of outside opinion, outside information, the assessments the cia and colleagues throughout the well

into jens community that form our bread and butter so the question was do i continue doing something that i thought was futile and have little impact on policy or should i leave and do something where i thought i could fulfill the same mission that i signed up for in 2006 and that's to serve the american people. i don't know what that entails. this is new to me and i certainly don't have anything i'm running off to but i'm certainly going to attempt to do my best to fill fill the same charge i signed up for 2006. >> i know you can't obviously speak to anything you're supposed to talk about publicly and i won't askou anything you shouldn't go into in a publi forum but we have had weird leaks and contested leaks concerning the cia and concerning the way intelligence is handle led by this new administration and there was a disputed report in the "wall street journal" last week,

disputed by the white house ultimately but what the "wall street journal" reported on the basis of anonymous leaks is that u.s. intelligence officials have been withholding sensitive intelligence information from the white house, keeping stuff from the president because they don't trust him. because they're concerned letting him in on sources and methods might be leaked or compromised to other countries. it's leaked information, no names associated with this stuff, the white house is disputing it but can i ask your opinion about how we should view a leak like that? . whether that's feasible, whether that's hyperbole or something that we should be concerned about? >> i sure hope it's hyperbole. the president of the united states is considered the first customer by the intelligence community. the morning intelligence briefing, the president's daily brief, contains the most sensitive information available to the united states government. it's something that i had the great honor of helping to

compile when i was at cia and the president should be pref sri to everything in our disposal that will help him make better policy to protect the american people. i cannot imagine a scenario in which intelligence professionals would judge the commander in chief is not -- it's not safe to share information with the commander-in-chief. i can't speak to the accuracy of that report but i sure hope it's not true. >> ned price, former spokesman and analyst at the cia, former spokesman at the national security council, recently resigned from the cia because of the direction of this administration. mr. price, thank you for talking with us, stay in touch. >> thanks very much. >> as i mentioned tonight, we are doing a double header, a feature on high-ranking officials who have found they can no longer continue to serve in our government because of the direction of the new administration. up next, our second guest, an official who has just resigned

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dearthere's no other way to say this. it's over. i've found a permanent escape from monotony. together, we are perfectly balanced, our senses awake, our hearts racing as one. i know this is sudden, but they say: if you love something... set it free. see you around, giulia ♪ when she was still in california. ann ravel led the first ever investigation that specifically named the koch brother's network for the way its members moved money around in the shadows. over the ever lasting protests of the koch brother, ann ravel, california regulator, she put in the writing. she called out the "koch

brothers' dark money network" and demanded one of the network members pay a million-dollar fine for violating campaign finance rules. and if that didn't put enough of a target on her back, the week after she announced that decision, ann ravel started her new job in washington. she started work as president obama's new appointee to the federal election commission. and the makeup of that organization is an important thing. it traditionally has six members -- three democrats and three republicans -- and you need four members on it to do anything. and even though the fec is in charge of a really important thing, they're in charge of enforcing our nation's laws about money in politics, in recent years, that makeup of that body, that half democratic half republican setup has meant the fec doesn't do much of anything. they don't do very much enforcing of our laws on politics and must be because they're gridlocked. they're locked in partisan stasis and ann ravel seemed frustrated about that almost from thestart. >> would you say the fec is more

or less useless than men's nipples? >> i would say that the fec and men's nipples are probably comparable. there are things that are done that have some value, just like men's nipples. >> ann ravel gave that heroic dalyle "daily show" interview in 2015. her term goes through april 30. conceivably her time could last well beyond that. it could stay as a holdover until the president appoints somebody new to replace you. all the other members of the fec are holdovers right now. but instead of hanging around for more of the same, ann ravel filed a report on the commission's dysfunction and deadlock -- her words, not mine, dysfunction and deadlock -- and she quit. she submitted her resignation to the new president. she tells the "new york times" now "i think i could be more effective on the outside." we have heard that more than

once today, we've heard that more than once in the last few minutes. joining us is ann ravel, the outgoing democratic member of the federal election commission who has just resigned. commissioner ravel, thank you for joining us, appreciate you being here. >> thank you for inviting me. >> i will not ask you about vestigial organs or anything about nipples. >> i don't have much more to say about them. >> we've covered that material, very good. >> right. >> you're close to finishing your official term, as far as i could tell it would wrap up at the end of april this year. why quit now? why take this stand? >> well, as you indicated, it has been clear to me that the agency is dysfunction al and tht we're unable to perform the functions that congress intended that we would do and really the fec, while it's a little-known agency, it's so important in establishing and maintaining the

fairness of our electoral process so i feel really committed to the work and -- that it needs to be done fairly and rationally. also i've been an elected official -- not an elect official, in public service for most of my career and one of the things that is the hallmark of a public servant is that you are there to do the public's work and if you're not able to, then you can't continue is my view. and so all of those things came together to make me realize that it made no sense for me to continue and that as the previous guest said i could be more effective on the outside. >> in making this exit, you have called on the new president to

prioritize the reform of money in politics. prioritize the reform of campaign finance to fix the political system that he described as broken. do you expect that from him? do you think that this administration, that in this president, could be part of the solution to what you feel is so broken in this system that you're quitting now? >> well, i wouldn't say that i expect it. i always like to be optimistic and hope that because he was so clear about the terrible state of campaign finance when he was a candidate and h he wasn't beholden like all the other candidates that maybe he will take that to heart and do something about campaign finance but obviously after my time in washington i'm also cynical and

so i think it will be unlikely especially given who he has surrounded himself with, for example, who his general council is. >> his general council is somebody who has a past on the fec who served their under george w. bush, don mcgann. he's credited or blamed with bringing about the kind of grid locke that you have named and shamed at that commission. when you think about that, when you look at the appointment this is president has made, are you worried about who he'll replace you with? by tradition, senate democrats would be picking somebody to replace you because there would be another democrat put on the commission. there's no law that says the president has to give that deference to the democratic party. there's no law that says he can't just pick somebody else who he wants to fill your seat,

even somebody who would absolutely not be a choice of any democratic party. do you worry at all he's going to go really off the reservation with his choice to replace you? >> well, i think he may go off with regard to the replacements at the commission, but i don't think that my leaving makes any difference in that. because as you said, all of the commissioners are holdovers. many of them probably on the republican side would like to go into the administration. so the likelihood is that the president will replace, at least, four of the members of the commission. so, my leaving makes no difference. >> i will get back to you on thathen we see who he picks for your seat. >> okay. >> and you know, he doesn't even have to fill my seat. he could remove one of the other commissioners and fill that seat. >> well, we'll see.

at this point, the only thing i know for sure is that we shouldn't expect that previous political norms will be followed. that's the one thing we've learned in the last -- >> i don't disagree. >> outgoing democratic member of the federal election commission, resigned your seat one month into this administration, appreciate your time tonight, do please stay in touch. interested to hear what the next chapter is. >> thank you very much. we'll be right back, stay with us. red lobster's lobsterfest is back with 9 irresistible lobster dishes. yeah, it's a lot. try tender lobster lover's dream and see how sweet a lobster dream can be. or pick two delicious lobster tails with new lobster mix and match. the only thing more tempting than one succulent lobster tail, is two. is your mouth watering yet? good. because there's something for everyone, and everyone's invited. so come in today.

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programming note. tomorrow night on this network, we are doing a thing. my show will be here tomorrow night at 9:00 eastern, then right after the show tomorrow night, there's a thing. it's going to be this. trump, the first month. i'm going to be co-hosting that along with brian williams, chris matthews, the msnbc colleagues. it's an in depth. expect a rollicking look at what has happening this first month. and what it means for what's going to happen next in our country. again, trump the first month. that's tomorrow night, 10:00 p.m. eastern. we'll go until midnight. change your plans. i'll be right back. internet dial up sound hi, i'm the internet. you've got mail!

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so last night we did a story about this vladimir putin-connected, super sketchy, russian-speaking ukrainian person who has connections to paul manafort. he has been stuck in legal limbo in austria for three years now. american prosecutors have been trying to get austrians, the austrians to extradite him to the united states. grand jury in the united states indicted him on bribery charges and federal prosecutors in the united states wanted to bring him to this country to face bribery charges. well today was a test of whether or not the will proceed with that legal effort. today an austrian court said yes, he can be extradited to the united states.

austrian court said this guy, the court in ah strooe ya said he should be extradited to the united states. okay, interesting, right? no. we still don't actually know what's going to happen here. this is where things get nutty. because there's yet another twist to this amazing story. after today's ruling in the courtroom in vienna, he left with his lawyers and supporters, headed to the courthouse elevator, got in, took the elevator down to the first floor, when he got off, watch what happened. when he got off the elevate we are police officers were waiting there to arrest him. what? that was unexpected. police took him away. and what they arrested him for, has nothing to do with the american charges that he was just in a hearing about on the other floor of that courthouse. turns out, spain also made an extradition request for that

same guy for a different case. they want him to be extradited to spain to face charges in that country. and even though the spanish made that request last year, austria decided that today, minutes after his american exthat digs hearing, today that would be good to arrest him on the other european charges. so, frankly, right now it's anybody's guess as to how this effects whether or not this guy gets extradited to the u.s. maybe he'll get extradited to spain instead. we raised this last night, this is worth following from an american perspective because of the open question as to whether the justice department and the trump administration is going to go after putin's friends. whether the trump administration justice department would go after a putin-linked person. would they let it slide? we still still don't know if he's facing charges. it got weird today in the courthouse elevator. we'll stay on it. i don't know. watch thissp