other money managers. fisher investments. clearly better money management. that is a wrap of this hour of msnbc live, but right now i will hand over the show to joy reed. >> when i was a kid growing up, a lot of things were sacred in our country. women were sacred. that's not the case anymore. i just thought the selfless devotion that brings a man or woman to die on the battlefield, i just thought that might be sacred. >> good morning and welcome to "am joy." this week rather than focusing on the loss of four green berets, the trump white house

including john kelly was consumed with the concept of disrespect. specifically disrespect for what kelly said was once undisputebly sacred in america, women. sent out to defend trump, kelly called out an apparent national lack of respect for women, and while doing that smearing a congressional woman, fredricka wilson, and told a story that was not true. somehow wake up to presidential tweets like that one, and despite the president's own history of personal attacks

on women, boasting about groping women, and allegations of sexual harassment about women, which, of course, he denies, the administration would have you believe they consider women to be absolutely sacred. joining me to discuss that and more is democratic leader, nancy pelosi. leader pelosi, i have to get your comments on these attacks on a member of your caucus, frederica wilson, including this morning. what is going on here? what do you think of? >> as you know, the president is the deflector in chief. we would like to talk about what he's doing to the middle class in terms of the tax bill and he wants to deflect the conversation from that. let me say, though, on this sunday morning how sad we are about the four young men that lost their lives in niger. let me say about frederica.

frederica is just a wonderful person, so for the attack to be on anybody inappropriately as wrong, and frederica has had role models of excellence. johnson was one and she was close to him as he was growing up. since the kidnapping of the girls by boko haram, every wednesday we are dressed in red and photographing we are not forgetting our girls. she's really dedicated and devoted to young people. for them to mischaracterize her is really so sad. it really -- it went young the subject, and that was so sad

enough and to mischaracterize her speech at the building of the fbi dedication, they had it all wrong. >> do you think john kelly should apologize to congresswoman wilson? >> i think he has to admit what he did was incorrect in terms of the speech that he mischaracterized. he lost his son. my heart goes out to him. >> sure. >> he's a patriot. i just think that he was either misinformed or accepted something without checking about frederica that was so wrong, so he has to set the record straight. >> yeah, he said she was stunned by what she said, indicating she was in the room. the pictures and the video, it doesn't show the crowd long enough to tell if he was in the room, but he made it sound as if he heard it with his own ears,

and he characterized it as something he heard for himself. do you know whether he was actually at the event? >> i don't know. what is important is we let the young men rest in peace and we find out the circumstances about what happened in niger, and do we need the scoping and timing of it. the senate foreign relations committee is looking into it, and people on both sides of the aisle want to know the facts. >> let's talk about that for a moment. the niger issue and congresswoman wilson has made the point, too, what we want to know is what happened to the troops there. you would be one of the leaders that would get the briefings from the white house about it. senator mccain indicated he doesn't feel congress is getting

enough information in a timely manner from the white house about what went wrong in that operation. do you feel you are being properly informed by the white house? >> we have not been so far, but notice has been served so we will see what they do. >> it's ironic that with benghazi your colleagues on the other side of the aisle, the tr tray gaudy's of the world wanted a hearing. >> i think they would do it, the services committee, and the foreign affairs committee that has jurisdiction over the scope of the authorization of the use of force. i don't see any need for them to go into what they did in benghazi because that was politically motivated and this should not be. >> we are talking about this idea of women and whether women are being held sacred. we know right now whether your call agency on the other side of

the aisle are making a full-scale attempt to take aware planned parent hood and health care, and they had a plan that real real really really involves rolling back some of the things. >> this is about the timing and sizing of a family, and equal pay for equal work, and respect for women, and being a woman is no longer a pre-existing medical condition. we won't go into things about policy but are about behavior. one advantage we have now, is they are clear about their agenda. for years they were subtle, but now it's clear. it not about the full

reproductive rights for women, and it's about family planning and birth control, and they don't want to fund that. they have said to women with the president's recent executive order, it's up to your employer to decide if you can afford contraception. please. i think women -- i always said they had a lot at stake in the election and a lot to lose in the election, donald trump and the republicans in congress, and let's hope women will speak up. look, the march served notice that women are watching and showing up and women are marching and running for office. we have to win. >> this morning i pulled up the national journal, i pulled up this article that shows the fears the house republic house has about a wave, and it was

shown democrats need to turn over a net 24 seats. they are concerned about you coming back at speaker. are democrats really organized and prepared to create the momentum to have a wave election and actually take back the house? >> yes, we are. we have a great chairman from new mexico, and he has commands the respect of our colleagues, and he does the mobilization and messaging and the money, and nothing more important than the candidates. one year, i say tell me where you are in one year prior to the election, because that opens the door for a wave or not, and if the republican president is under 50%, the door is open. >> he's well under that. >> what matters where he is now,

because this is when you see their retirements, because members of congress who formerly had an easy run of it will have a tougher run, and they know they're a prospect of serving in the minority. you will see a number of retirements on their side. we know how to do this. we did it in '06, and we had the message, the congressional democrats, harry reid and i, and in between it was all presidential. >> let's talk about the potential for that. if democrats were to retake the house, there's still a contingent on the left side of the democratic party, and it's ironic because you are a liberal member of the party that would like to see you ousted as leader. if democrats were to retake the house do you foresee a challenge to your leadership? >> with all due respect, i

disagree with yocharacterizatio. i have an overwhelming support from the caucus, and if anything they use the fact that i am a progressive in the ads against me, and they will talk about the fact i am from san francisco, and i am a liberal and the rest of that. it's about other peoples' ambition, and it's a good thing. i have to fight the tax bill and i have to fight the assault on the affordable care account and pass the daca bill. it's not about me. it's about what policy means in the lives of people. >> tom stires, a big supporter of yours, i want to show you what he said. >> he obstructed justice at the fbi and in direct violation of the constitution, and threatened to shut down news organizations that report the truth.

if that's not an a case of impeaching and removing a dangerous president, what have we become. >> that reading is fundamental. tom steyer ran an ad saying donald trump should be impeached. if you become speaker of the house in 2019 will you push for the impeachment of this president? >> i served a long time on the ethics committee in congress, and it's one of my dues to congress, and if he has broken the law you would think there would be a bipartisan move to do that, and because we don't like his policy and attitude -- don't let me go into all the things we don't like about the president on a sunday morning, and that's

why i would like us to have an independent commission. we have an investigation within the justice department, and an investigation within the congress, and we should have an outside investigation as to what happened. >> if robert mueller comes back with a report saying there is evidence of collusion between donald trump's campaign and russia, do you think he should be impeached? >> first of all, where does mueller take that? >> sure. >> his burden of proof is different, and it could go to some criminal investigation, and what we are saying is the measure of the behavior, and in any case we have to fight -- this tax bill is armageddon.

that this hurts the middle class. it's an opportunity to cost our investments in our budget. we are for better deal and better jobs and better pay and a better future and we must reject the republican task plx plan. >> we will have you back. thank you so much. i always appreciate the opportunity. coming up, general john kelly and donald trump have come for congresswoman frederica wilson this week, and she joins me live, next. so that's the idea. what do you think? hate to play devil's advocate but... i kind of feel like it's a game changer. i wouldn't go that far. are you there? he's probably on mute. yeah... gary won't like it. why? because he's gary. (phone ringing) what? keep going! yeah... (laughs) (voice on phone) it's not millennial enough. there are a lot of ways to say no.

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yesterday the family of

sergeant johnson, including his childhood sweetheart, his wife, laid their green beret to rest in a ceremony in cooper city, florida. the 25-year-old was one of four special forces killed in niger, under circumstances still murky and under investigation. he was remembered by friends and family of a young man who loved riding bikes, and who always put his family first. among the speakers at his funeral was congresswoman wilson. trump was tweeting insults at the congresswoman and the democratic party. joining me now is frederica wilson. representative wilson, i want to thank you for being here and ask you how the family of sergeant

johnson is doing? how are they doing? >> they are holding up. they are doing as best can be expected. it's hard. he was so young and so wonderful. so wonderful. but the miami dolphins this morning sent $30,000 to the gold fund. it's trending near $1 million. >> that's the money that is being raised through the 5,000 role models of excellence to make sure his three college get an education. >> yes, it was set up when he died and it has just done wonderful. people all across america, all across the world, really, are contributing to the fund. so that's good. >> meanwhile, congresswoman, the president of the united states is still focusing on you.

he was tweeting about you this morning, and there is his tweets, whacky congresswoman wilson is the gift that keeps on getting. what do you make of the fact that the president is so focused on you and has not tweeted about sergeant johnson? >> well, that's the way he is. i am sick of him giving people nicknames. he doesn't want him to give him a nickname, but today i want to set the record straight and i want people to understand what is actually happening in africa, and try to connect the dots. because i think this is going to be this administration's benghazi. this is going to be trump's benghazi. trump's niger. they need to concentrate on what happened and what is happening. representative hastings and i wrote a letter to general mattis

about this investigation. we have not heard anything. i want to go way back to when i started with this. bring back our girls. every wednesday. this was all about watching what boko haram was doing in nigeria. so there was a multinational task force that was put together that included nigeria, niger, chad. they were put in place to fight boko haram. boko haram broke in half, one-half went with isis. that's the group that is in niger. the other half is in the nigerian area.

so as i am advocating for bring back our girls and advocating against boko haram and going to africa and making sure that the congress watches this, and we're wearing red every wednesday, unbeknownst to me, i have a soldier who is personal to me, who was a member of my 5,000 role models of excellence project in that region fighting or advising troops against boko haram. all of this is going on and i do not know. so here i am in america, advocating against boko haram, fighting for the release of the little girls who they kidnapped from their boarding school 274 of them, going back to nigeria to visit them and let them know the congress of the united states has not forgotten them, and all of this fighting that is

going on in that region of africa, and i don't think we have done enough. in the meantime, i get a call that la david was killed in niger. fighting boko haram. how coincidental can this be? this is very personal to me. it's very personal to me, and it's amazing how these two things locked together. i am just distraught about it, that this has come to this, and i just want somebody to answer the question, why was la david separated from the rest of his battalion? why was la david found almost a mile away. why was he not in an armored

truck? i want to know. representative hastings and i want to know. we're neighboring congress people and we wrote the letter and we want this investigation. i just love, love senator mccain, that he is right on it. but we want to be on it, too. >> yeah. i know that you have known now senator marco rubio for a long time, and miami is a big city that -- a big city with a small town. >> he was right there with me at the funeral. >> i asked leader pelosi a few moments ago if she felt the leadership in the house and like mccain has indicated has not gotten enough information, and she indicated they have not. do you feel the white house is not pursuing those questions about niger? >> i am extremely concerned.

i am extremely concerned because it's a major issue and a major problem. i am hoping when we return tomorrow that everybody will jump on this, because this is a catastrophe. we have four soldiers who died. >> yeah. >> they have been buried. we need to know why and we need to know about the special circumstances surrounding la david johnson. it really strange and it really getting next to me and is causing a lot of concentration in our community, because people want to know, why la david, why was he left? >> you don't want to make this about yourself and you said repeatedly you want it to be about that issue, and i want to ask you, maxine waters indicated

john kelly owes you an apology, and he did get the story wrong about the dedication of the fbi building in your district, and would you like to have an apology from john kelly? >> you know, john kelly is almost -- i guess you could say he was a puppet of the president and what he was trying to do was divert the attention away from the president on to me, and he basically just lied on me. i don't like -- i don't appreciate people lying on me. that's what he did. i have been in politics a long time and most things don't bother me, you know, it just rolls off my back. i have been lied on before, but the character assassination that he went through to call me out of my name, an empty barrel, not

only does he owe me an apology but he owes an apology to the american people, because when he lied on me he lied to them, and yes, he owes the american people an apology for lying on one of their congress women. >> representative frederica wilson, always love talking to you. thank you so much for your time. please convey all of our condolences to la david johnson's family. >> thank you, joy. and next, north korea and the threat of all-out war. stay with us. liberty mutual stood with me

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the united states and the

north korean raw skwraepl, and kaer simmons is inside north korea reporting fr. >> reporter: they call themselves here on a weekend when the tension between the capital where i am now, pyongyang, and washington continues. meanwhile, joint exercises between the u.s. and south korea off the coast of the korean peninsula have just wrapped up, joint exercises, which the north koreans say is an extreme provocation, and they cite those operations as why they need nuclear weapons. we are trying to understand more about north koreans themselves, and of course, this is a country

where descent is frowned upon, but what we found is many people say we want peace but are ready for nuclear war with america. i guess it should not be surprising when you come to a country, you discover that there are mothers and fathers, daughters and sons, people with families, people with lives, and that they are thinking about the same kind of things we are, but there are many differences. many people in the country are simply working to survive, and they see the battle with america in many ways in that framework, they see it as a question of survival of their country. they also will very quickly talk about the supreme leader here, kim jong-un and their alliaegiae to him, and the north koreans writing to australia, and saying

the leadership of north korea could lead to a knanuclear disaster. there's very much a sense of tension here, a sense that we are on a knife edge, that there is a real risk there could be a war, and people are worrying about that, just the same as folks in the u.s. are worrying about the idea that north korea could have a nuclear missile targeted at an american city. but it could be hard to read the north koreans even when you meet them, and honestly they can be prepared for anything. >> joining me now, msnbc contributor, johnny sites, and a former director for korea,

japan, and the oceanic affairs for the national security council. last weekend we heard something frightening and i want to play it for you now and get your reaction. >> i will look at the camera right now and tell every gi out there, soldier, airmen, you had 17 straight years of war and get ready for 17 more. will, he was talking about the possibility of war with iran or with north korea, which would be nuclear. are veterans in your organization that you are talking to becoming concerned that the president, the current president of the united states could land us in a war with north korea? >> absolutely, joy. look, we have the drum beat for war seeming to grow louder every day out of the white house and i think it's really time that people look at -- really begin

to question if donald trump isn't trying to goat kim jong-un and north korea into a first strike situation, thus forcing them to approve a new korean war. we saw a poll came out the other day saying nearly half of republicans are saying they want a war with north korea, and my advice to all military recruiters out there, and find your republican local meeting and get those signed up starting with donald trump, jr., and ivanka, and i don't think president trump would tweet about rocket man if ivanka was standing there. >> 46% of americans said they would support a preemptive strike on north korea.

donald trump, when he ran, i can remember in my twitter feed, you need to vote for president donald trump because he's a peacekeeper. >> in particular, a nuclear war. i mean the catastrophe of a nuclear war ought not to be lost on anybody. look, two things, i find this disturbing and one of the reasons i was a trump skeptic early on was the notion of donald trump with his button on the nuclear button, and i know that's an exaggeration, but the blunder of a war because of a miscommunication, and when you have a president tweeting out erratically, that creates the kind of environment that ought to put everybody on edge. we are talking about casualties in the millions when we talk about the worse case scenario.

it is disturbing. >> you know, analyzing it from the north korea perspective, and donald trump traveling to the region and continuing those kinds of taunts. is there a resistance in that regime to a lot of those taunts, or do they have the fear of getting north korea to prepare itself for war with us? >> this rhetoric is not productive or helpful, and it's feeding the propaganda for the north koreans, and all they have to do is play the tape where donald trump says we are going to totally destroy north korea. it could lead for north koreans to misjudge the situation and lead to catastrophic conditions.

let's talk about conventional war, too. they have over 10,000 conventional artillery zeroed in on seoul, and so it's a very concerning situation. >> not to mention the fact that in february the population inside south korea will grow further because it happens to be the site of the next winter olympics, which will add to the population, 50 miles from the demilitaryized zone. add that about the things to worry about. this is the current cia director this week talking about the posture the u.s. ought to have toward north korea. take a listen. >> and it is the case that they are close enough now in their

capabilities that from a u.s. policy perspective we ought to behave as if we are on the cusp of them achieving that objective. >> i feel like we are having a rerun with the kind of rhetoric we heard when we ended up in iraq. >> i can't echo the sentiments previously made, but i will. at the end of the day we don't want to get into a tit for tat nuclear crisis with north korea, and it would be catastrophic for america as well, and we are ratcheting up the rhetoric and words matter, and misconceptions can occur easily, and when you look back at history and historical crisis, these can happen in a matter of minutes. these can happen in a matter of seconds and these are the situations you want to avoid. you need to look at how we can

contain the situation in the shorter term, and how we bring the chinese and continue to ratchet up the rhetoric on the north koreans, and no crisis in history is every resolved without diplomacy. it's worry some the north koreans continue to launch the missile tests and try to threaten the region and the united states, and history has also shown us these situations can be de-escalate. the director is right to point out this is a worry some situation and the united states should play the role in trying to resolve the situation rather than contribute to the escalation of a potential crisis. >> we have a situation where the press secretary to the united states said we should not question the military, and at the same time one of the points that general kelly made is that most americans are not in direct

service in the military, it's a small percentage of people. where is the concern that we would be putting that small group of americans, who, of course, we all respect, in danger? i don't feel it's there. do you? >> let me just say to two parts of your question, number one, the idea that we shouldn't question military leaders or civilian leaders who were prior service because of their rank is not only just categorically wrong but irresponsible. i would like to thank h.r. mcmaster may have a few copies of "dereliction of duty" lying around to hand out to the white house. and one thing that never needs to be forgotten is when we are talking about a nuclear war, this is not a situation where a battlefield is far away, it is a battlefield that exists where folks watching this program this

morning, it's where their children play, and we are all con scripts in that battle and we should never give up to diplomacy, because literally millions and millions of peoples' lives depend on it, including some of the people sitting at home watching this right now. >> well, thank you all for being here. really appreciate it. important discussion. charlie will be back in our next hour. coming up in the next hour, bill o'reilly's $32 million settlement in a sexual harassment case. president obama is back! more "am joy" after the break.

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story of donald trump's fake renoir, and what it could say about his stability. don't go anywhere. whoooo.

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right now i think we are facing the greatest psychiatric

emergency in the history of america. >> that was the founder of duty to warn, a political action committee made up of psychologists and mental health professionals who believe that donald trump lax the mental stability to be president. the group held events in several cities last weekend calling for trump to be removed under the 25th amendment which requires a majority of the cabinet to declare him unable to discharge the duties of his office. joining me now is someone who knows how trump operates, he's the author of "trump nation, the art of being the donald." i have been incredibly curious, about what you, knowing him, writing about him think about this idea that he may not be stable. >> you know, there's so many clinical definitions of psychological and mental stability and i'm not a professional. as an armchair observer, i think he is an unusual, unusual person on the public stage. i think he's a serial liar, we

know he's a narcissist. he creates these alternate realities for himself. he will say something that is false repeatedly, repeatedly, repeatedly until i think not only is he lying to his audience, to a certain extent he lies to himself in order to get things over on the people around him and also to insulate himself from any sense of responsibility or guilt for the damage he causes when he misrepresents things. >> you know, the interesting thing is that he is a fab ulist. he is living an incredibly luxurious lifestyle, but when you scratch away the gold paint it turns out to be paint, right? >> right. >> you tell the story, you did it recently, about this fake renoir painting. >> when i was at "the new york times" i was working on a biography of trump nation. i spent a lot of time with the president for that. at one point we were on his jet

on a business trip that he asked me to join him on and we were sitting in the back of the jet. this is one of his older jets, a reconfigured 727 and in the back of the plane and he gestured up to the wall where this renoir was hanging. he said, this is an original renoir. >> i said, i don't think it is. >> he said, let me tell you it's an original renoir. >> i went to the art institute and this is hanging on the wall of the art institute. i'm telling you, this is not an original. he said, it's an original. the next day i get on the plane and he goes into it again, you know, that's an original renoir. >> did you get the sense he didn't remember? >> no, it's so desperately important for him to convert people to his point of view. it's not that he doesn't remember, it's that he doesn't hear. then time went on. he got rid of that jet. he got another jet. i went on to other parts of my

career then trump becomes president and shortly after he's president he got elected he and mike pence went on "60 minutes." i'm watching the show with my wife at our home and i just begin laughing because they're sitting on these mini thrones, the kind of furniture trump has in his apartment and there's that renoir hanging on the wall in trump tower. of course he salvaged that thing. he wasn't going to let it go down with the jet. he says, this is an original renoir. >> when you look at it, it is a funny story, but there's something about it that's a little bit dark in the sense that this is the president of the united states with tremendous power. >> yes. >> the power to start a nuclear war. >> yes. >> if he believes he is the greatest president in history as he's been tweeting, taking credit for things he hasn't done, and if he's obsessed with this idea of his own greatness, does that concern that you that narcissism could be dangerous?

>> of course it's dangerous and of course it concerns me. it speaks to a couple of realities about him that are very true and very troubling. one is he'll hang on to his own lies for decades and he will repeat them and repeat them. i think secondly this idea that he creates his own realities. i think when you -- when anyone is leading anything, whether it's a company or the federal government, you want them to be open to facts and new ideas and you want them to use that to make good decisions. this is a man with the nuclear codes. if he is constituted in such a way that he doesn't care what other people say around him and be he lives in his own private idaho, we could be in trouble. >> there is a poll out that shows that trump is thought by a majority of americans not to be fit to serve as president but that was true before he was elected. >> plus he doesn't care. >> he doesn't care. the idea that the american people or congress would act on that, the fact that people won't, what does that say to

you? >> i think there's a lack of political courage in the country right now. it's interesting to me all of the speculation about presidents obama and bush coming out and offering this obvious criticism of the trump era. it's been mccain, corker, and bush essential two people are on their way out of the party, one person is already gone. what is the party itself going to say it stands up for in terms of values in this era. >> indeed. that is the question probably of the year. tim o'brien, i always love talking to you. >> thank you. the latest bombshell report on bill o'reilly, fox news. stay with us. they really appreciate the military family, and it really shows. we've got auto insurance, homeowners insurance. had an accident with a vehicle, i actually called usaa before we called the police. usaa was there hands-on very quick very prompt. i feel like we're being handled as people that actually have a genuine need. we're the webber family and we are usaa members for life.

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>> tech: so you think this chip is nothing to worry about? well at safelite, we know sooner or later every chip will crack. these friends were on a trip when their windshield got chipped. so they scheduled at safelite.com. they didn't have to change their plans or worry about a thing. i'll see you all in a little bit. and i fixed it right away with a strong repair they can trust. plus, with most insurance a safelite repair is no cost to you. >> customer: really?! >> tech: being there whenever you need us that's another safelite advantage. >> singers: safelite repair, safelite replace. on saturday "the new york times" dropped yet another bombshell in the ongoing saga of prominent men accused of sexual harassment or assault. last january bill o'reilly, then the network's top rated host, struck a $32 million agreement with a long-time network analyst

to settle allegations of sexual misconduct. the times lists the allegations as repeated harassment, the sending of pornography and other sexually explicit material and nonconsensual sexual relationship. an attorney says the times has maliciously smeared his client and refuses to print an affidavit. the times further reports that the $32 million was the sixth and the largest payment to settle a harassment claim against o'reilly. even after the settlement, the company renewed his contract at $25 million a year. 21st century fox released a statement saying that the company was aware of a threat of a new sexual harassment lawsuit but had been told by o'reilly he had reached a personal confidential agreement with his

accuser. he was fired and the latest allegations arrived on the heels of news that the los angeles police are investigating harvey weinstein of sexually assaulting her in a hotel in 2013. she is the sixth woman to accuse weinstein of rape. and if you're starting to see a pattern here, whatever right wing media would have you believe, it's because sexual harassment is about abuse of power, not about partisan politics. we await that the host at fox will take an interest in the abuse. michelle goldberg, charles pierce writer at large for "esquire" magazine, and fernando amani, writer anushi elsane and co-author of "one nation after trump." i'm going to start with you, michelle. you had a great column headlined "save the phony out."

it had struck me that the folks at fox news have rightly gone after harvey weinstein. they've talked about the complicity of hollywood and how hollywood enabled him and we have information that their own network rehired bill o'reilly at a $25 million a year clip after he settled for 24 million for nonconsensual relationship. >> we had enough to know that foxx ne fox news was a sexual harassment factory. it had a worst record than the weinstein brothers or merrimacks. the things we already knew about roger ales predation were so shocking, so sick and i think that when i write this i don't want to in any way minimize what weinstein has been accused of. >> of course not, yeah. >> but the fact that the fox news personalities seem to think they have some kind of moral high ground in their obsessive coverage of this is shocking even by their standards. >> absolutely.

anushi, a little bit from "the new york times" article, their decision was to renew bill o'reilly came as the company was trying to convince its employees, its board and its public that it cleaned up the network's workplace culture. at the same time they were determined to hold on to mr. o'reilly whose value increased after the prominent departure of another host, megyn kelly. the times reported on five settlements involving mr. o'reilly leading advertisers to boycott his show. at the same time they arose as an issue in 21st century fox attempt to buy the european satellite company sky. it seemed the priority for fox news was always what they were doing in business whether it was buying sky or trying to convince their investors that they had changed their cultures, it was never the priority to protect the women who worked at fox. >> never. can we just talk about the h word? the sheer hypocrisy of this

network. i mean, just in this past week we saw them go after weinstein and, you know, i want to completely agree with what you and michelle said. we are 23409 reducing or making small what happened with the weinstein allegations. this week fox network tried to act like they are the network that cares more about sexual harassment even dragging hillary clinton's name back in the mix. the fact that the weekended with this bombshell about o'reilly and i don't want us to kind of get immune or hardened to the fact that $32 million was paid. i mean, what did o'reilly do to warrant such a settlement? and it just goes to show that not only does fox network encourage and, you know, had a culture where sexual harassment thrived in their workplace, but they reward it. they reward this kind of behavior because they re-signed o'reilly. >> fran, you've worked in talk radio. on the right you know the outrage machine is a part of the entertainment, but you do have

this glaring hypocrisy that i don't think is being dealt with in right wing media that harvey weinstein is a story they like to talk about it and they are mum on the others. >> hypocrisy is the word, joy. prepare to be shocked for a second because i actually agree with president trump. i think it's time that the fcc look into the license of one of these networks, but it's not nbc and it's not on first amendment grounds. as the panel points out, it's fox news on what is a clearly sanctioned culture of criminal sexual misconduct, joy. you go down the list. eric bolling, bill o'reilly, roger ales who is the god father of the network. when does it stop? i don't think it stops until they stop getting caught. fox has no particular interest in trying to move the debate forward. i think they're trying to continue to minimize damage and public relations hits, but more and more this comes out. this seems akin to me almost to the catholic church scandal with

the moving of the priest. every day every scab you pick at there is more problems. >> bill o'reilly was promoting his book on fox news a month ago. he tweeted out this morning my investigative team has done a superb job in expiecing the liegs and the smears. i will speak with you on monday. i'll speak with you on monday. that could be fox. he's still welcome to go on fox. >> yeah. i mean, i agree that, you know, the $32 million, that's not coming out from change they found in the cell phone, okay? that's covering up something fairly serious, and i think that, you know, that lovely phrase, a nonconsensual sexual relationship probably holds the key to why it's $32 million. the other thing, joy, that -- the only thing that i can see that joins the weinstein and o'reilly stories is power. that these are power relationships, these are not sexual relationships in the

remotest sense. you're talking about powerful men taking advantage of their power in grow tess being and awful ways. >> yeah. >> that being said, they're both pretty sceevy guys and i would rather public liech be rid of them. >> i want to point out to the audience, the team and i when we looked at the story this morning. that whole nonconsensual sexual relations thing, we reached out to the "new york times." this was the language that came out of the settlement and that they actually took the language that was in the story from the settle itself s. they're relying on that. 21st century fox which had knowledge of the draft lawsuit used that language to describe the specific allegation sz in written responses to "the times." this is fox putting forward that language of a nonconsensual sexual relationship. interesting development. e.j., you know, we talk about this idea that there are all of these powerful men being accused

of sexual misconduct. harvey weinstein, you have 58 accused nkts 56 accusers. bill o'reilly with more than seven accusations, bill cosby with more than 7. sitting there is donald trump with 14 at least allegations of sexual misconduct. and there is a story this week, either "the times" or "the post" saying, wait a minute, everyone is listening to women, finally believing women, believing these accusers, what about the women who accused donald trump? >> no, i think that -- i mean, one of the problems with these stories is that somehow people sort of go after the ideological enemy who's accused when as everybody on this panel said this is about the abuse of power and it knows no ideological bounds.

you've got this fact that donald trump basically confessed to assault to the people when you have all of these cases sitting out there. o'reilly falls, ales falls and trump is still there and it's very disconcerting. and i think it is just odd to have folks on the right go after weinstein, and lord knows it's entirely legitimate to go after him, but what about president trump? and these women are very frustrated. i don't think any of us can blame them, that he is sitting there as president almost immune from these charges. >> i feel like, you know, michelle, part of the concurrency of the right is to accuse the left of this sort of, you know, almost moral

totalitarianism. and that the interests that they have is to take down this sort of hollywood elite. there is an exuberance to their attacks as disgraceful and disgusting as he is. it's more about that than the women, right? >> right. it's more about how dare uconn descend to us or lecture us about sexism when look at the monster in your house. i would say the one thing -- as much as there's hypocrisy, the very fact that they have these values, that they have these values that harvey weinstein violated has now allowed him to be drummed out of public life. it's why there's such a reaction. it's why liberal institutions took care of him and there's a soul searching and effort at reform. because you don't have the values on the right evidently by the fact that they elected donald trump president, there's no sense of, you know, kind of pain or anguish or what is this that's happening in our own house, right? i mean, roger ales was finally

dethroned from fox, and what did he do? he became a trump adviser. >> that's right. >> i mean, there is no sense that this is seen among people on the right as anything but a public relations problem as opposed to a genuine like a moral calamity. >> anusha, part of this alt right, it dovetails with this man movement that denies things like date rape are real, right? now you have mike sernovich, a defender to the death of the president of the united states who is also accused of these things threatening to release the names that buzz feed put out of this list of accusations of hollywood men that have done some form of sexual harassment. this is the profile "the new york times" wrote about cernovich. he's a men's self-help writer. his advice to straight men the subject of a book and video, men

should be dominant males and embrace a gorilla mind set. date rape is a liberal fiction in a blog post published last october. he said it's a harmful concept. these are the guys that are now out there attempting to use this potential list of bad hollywood men in defense of donald trump. i guess -- i don't know, my mind is blown. >> the thing is, we have to be really careful, first of all, to make sure sexual harassment and sexual assault don't become a political football. it's not a partisan issue. we all have a role in upholding and feeding rape culture and it's really great that everyone is talking about how women are speaking up and there's been a culture shift where we're taking these accusations really seriously. that's great. the fact of the matter is is that the gop put a self-proclaimed and self-admitted sexual assaulter in the white house. this is something -- i don't understand how our culture can

change when the president of the united states is just as bad as weinstein and o'reilly. that's what we have to talk about. it can't be the left is worse on sexual harassment or the right are hypocrites. we all have a part in this. at the end of the day or president is just as guilty. >> put him in the white house and support him, fern nandand. they want to talk about weinstein's hypocrisy but they don't see trump's pattern. >> absolutely. fernand. >> what does this man have to do? he said shoot somebody on fifth avenue. i guess raping someone on fifth avenue isn't bad enough. if i can get to one of the systematic issues here. i think the panel talked correctly earlier about abuse of power. there's also an abuse of the law. one thing that donald trump and a lot of these other men have done, they've hidden behind nondisclosure agreements and confidentiality settlements as if to suggest that because they signed deals with these women,

it shouldn't be talked about. who is able to do that? the politically powerful and wealthy. i think it's time for this me too movement to breach the confidentiality movements where you have folks like president trump insisting the people that work with him not disclose or say anything as if that's going to hide or tamper away the problems. that's one of the issues, joy. >> thank you to michelle, charlie, fernand, we'll be all back. more "am joy" after the break. don't let these young guys see you fold. ♪ i'm only human ♪ i make mistakes get down! ♪ i'm only human ♪ it's all it takes ♪ don't put the blame on me thank you for looking after my son. we're brothers. we look after each other. thank you for your service. rated r. in theaters friday.

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people -- well, it's about me and representing rich people. >> okay. >> representing -- you know, being representative of rich people. very 2rg to me. bob kraft was down. he's very nice. he owns the patriots.

he gave me a super bowl ring a month ago which was very nice. he left this beautiful ring and i immediately give it to the white house and they put it someplace and that's the way it is. >> how great. >> he's a goodman. he said to me, you have to do us all a favor. give the tax decrease to the middle class. we don't need it. we don't need it. we don't want it. give it to the middle class. >> donald trump is testing a new line in his sales pitch for the gop tax plan. that his tax cuts are a gift from the super rich to you, the american people. back with me now writer and commentator pollster fernand, charlie sykes and charlie pierce of esquire. so, friends, donald trump says that, you know, he just wants to give. he wants to give from the rich. he's sort of like a robin hood, right? this is donald trump elaborating on that and talking about his friend -- remember, he's friend with chuck and nancy. this is him talking about what

chuck really thinks of his tax plan. take a listen. >> here's the thing, schumer, i like schumer. before he knows the plan, oh, this is for the rich. he doesn't even know what the plan is and he's screaming it's for the rich. he did it with health care, too. this is for the rich. everybody is going to go into hospitals, it's goings to be terrible, the world is coming to an end. didn't even know what the plan is. that's okay. we're all learning politics, right? he said that. he says the same thing because i saw him two days ago before he really knew what was happening. he said, oh, no, it's for the rich. >> okay. so the basic outlines of the gop tax plan, at least there will be three income tax brackets, 12% 25%, 35%. it skucuts the corporate tax ra. it eliminates most deductions. charitable benefits wealthier people. the polling on the tax plan from cbs news, 58% of americans believe it favors the rich.

only 18% think it favors the middle class and 19% say it favors everyone equally. charlie pierce, are they going to be able to sell this idea that it's really a tax plan for the middle class? >> you have to establish one thing right here. that is, that the president has no idea what's in the tax plan. i mean, he really doesn't. you could put a chinese menu in front of him. >> but he got a ring. he got a ring from bob kraft. >> he got the one that vladimir putin didn't steal. it's a very important super bowl ring. but, seriously, i mean, you could put a chinese president in front of this president and write tax plan and we'd all get an order of dumplings. he doesn't know what's going on here. >> charlie, i don't know which charlie to go to now. i'm so confused now. charlie sykes, have i to ask you this other thing. we laugh about it. this is a plan that could decimate medicare and medicaid in order to get to the $1.5 million in tax cuts. it could also hurt the deficit.

i thought your former party, the republican party, were deficit hawks. here's nick mulvaney on fox news sunday saying deficits don't matter. don't believe it, here it is. >> it's very, very hard in this environment to lower spending. we're not abandoning fiscal restraint by any measure. we're sitting there going, okay, if we can slow the expenditures, increase the revenues by growing the economy. as america gets wealthier the government gets wealthier, too. that's how we balance the budgets but we need tax reform. >> that's not how they balanced the budget in the '90s. taxes went up. there's an organization, committee for responsible federal government. they say this will blow a $2.2 trillion hole in our revenue. charlie sykes, when did the republican party stop caring about deficits? >> that's an interesting point because you look back and you

kind of wonder whether they actually ever cared about deficits in the past. but they've almost stopped pretending right now. going back to charlie pierce's point. donald trump has no idea what's in this tax bill, but neither do we. >> right. >> he did outline a lot of things we think are in this tax bill. they're talking about getting this done before christmas, yet as we stand here right now, no one knows what's in this tax bill anymore than we know what's in donald trump's tax bill. in order to understand what the question will be on the super sflich wouldn't it be a great day for donald trump to release his tax returns. he's going to be a flawed salesman. the irs code is a scandal. it's a mess. i don't think anybody watching us thinks the status quo is going to be great. it's interesting how they're going about this legislation. we're not able to see it until the final moment. over the weekend we had this

report over the possibility of limiting middle class contributions. fr trust me, if there is a detail like that, it will be absolutely radioactive across the political spectrum, but those are the kinds of details i really want to know about before i come up with any kind of opinion about these taxes. >> you already see the republicans preparing for that by saying we're not going to touch the standard deduction, mortgage interest deduction and to use things that are radioactive. since we doe know what's in the bill we don't know. >> i'm going back to what charlie said. trump is a flawed salesman. i don't think he's a flawed salesman, i think he's a serious con man and it's completely right he doesn't know what's in this bill. we don't know what's in this will. the fact that he's trying to act like a benevolent dictator, the owner of a football team told him we don't need the cuts, give it to the people that need it.

is this supposed to be a gift? what's in the bill, what the details are instead of talking about a gift that the president got from another rich man. >> fernand, it is up to donald trump to sell it based on himself. you're in the polling business, a lot of his base believe that because he is rich he knows what to do best about the economy so that anything he sauce about the economy must be true because he is rich. how can dem kr59s counter that when you do have a lot of people who think businessman, knows the economy, end of story. >> democrats have to go to the mattresses and make sure nerns say we don't trust anything coming out of the mouth of the demented man, donald trump. as charlie sykes said earlier, look at the details of the bill. look how insidious the republican party is acting. they are preventing the details

of this tax plan. they're probably going to wait until the 11th hour just like they did with the obama care repeal and replacement legislation before anybody's had a chance to absorb and digest the details. the other critical one i want to point out and we talked about it, market watch said they want to cap 401k contributions at $2500. joy, you talk about the cuts to medicare and medicaid now. the one retirement nest egg that are now entering retirement, this is political suicide. everything they do is designed to hurt americans. what is the real agenda behind that? >> charlie, you wonder if this will be where the opportunity for the 16 republicans that ran against donald trump to really make the case, you know, that first of all donald trump has

never shoni concern about people who were not rich, right? but also that his own business career has been a wrecking ball. he was at one point $900 million in debt. so even attacking the idea that he's trustworthy at all on matters that are related to the economy, i feel like that case has never really been made. >> yeah, and i think while we don't know the details of this tax plan, we can speculate with some certainty that it will all be shot through with the quasi religious cargo cult that is supply side economics that has failed every time it's been tried, everywhere it's been tried, that tax cuts somehow increase revenue and the way to grow the economy is to shut more upward. this is a cargo cult within republicans. you have newly appointed standup comic paul ryan riding herd on this and he's the high priest of this stuff. >> yeah. >> while we don't know the details, we know the general

outline. we know that we can all live in kansas or not. >> google kansas economy and see what that is. charlie sykes, thank you very much. coming up, trump's pick for a federal judge who fought to make voting even harder, especially for people of color. we'll have more on that next. whoooo.

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hdid you get that email i sente wyou...before you wake up. ... when life keeps you up... zzzquil helps you fall asleep in less than 20 minutes. because sleep is a beautiful thing. up next, a lawyer who relentlessly fought to restrict voting rights may be heading to the federal bench. more on that when we come back. you're being audited.

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the man who fought all the way to the supreme court for one of the country's most restrictive voting measures may receive a lifetime appointment as a federal judge. on thursday the senate judiciary committee will be voting on thomas farr and whether he will be appointed to the federal

bench for the eastern district of north carolina. the vote comes amid the objections of civil rights groups and the congressional black caucus who are arguing that farr's record on voting rights, quote, puts him at the forefront of an extended fight to disenfranchise african-americans in north carolina. ari berman joins me now. tell us about thomas farr? >> tom farr was the go to lawyer when it came to voter suppression in north carolina. he was hired in 2011 to defend their worst in the nation suppression law, cut early voting, eliminated same day registration. it targeted african-americans with almost surgical precision. tom farr defended that law. he defended the racial gerry mannedering which a court just saying was one of the worst racial gerry manneders ever. so this guy has been at the forefront of the effort to restrict voting rights in north

carolina, defending it in court and has been nominated by a federal judge by donald trump. >> you said the fourth circuit, so meaning on the same circuit that overturned the north carolina law. would his nomination or if he gets onto the bench, would it change the composition of that body? >> he's nominated for the eastern district of north carolina. one below the 4th circuit. donald trump is reshaping the federal judiciary with the wall street journal said mini scalias all across the board. trump has already nominated more judges than obama got confirmed his entire first year. this is a very, very important undercover story. >> i'm glad you say it. it's a very under covered story in the fact that the trump administration is seen as a failure by moet americans but it comes to the courts, they are not failing. they are succeeding in getting what they want. they are changing the courts. these are lifetime appointments?

>> absolutely. they've shifted the supreme court for three to four decades because of kneel gorsuch. they're reshaping the federal government. tom farr not only defended voter suppression, he worked for jesse helms. his law partner was a guy who was a huge segregationist, a guy by the name of tom ellis. he told north carolina they should shut down their public schools rather than integrate in the wake of brown versus board of education. a guy that headed a nugenics organization. this is the kind of person donald trump is trying to nominate. it's so obvious what they're trying do. >> it's all over the country. you cannot say it enough. democrats don't typically vote on the issue of judges. you're talking about putting

segregationists all over the country in these circuit courts. your other big story this week was about an instance in your reporting of voter suppression. >> i had a cover story in "mother jones" about the role wisconsin's voter i.d. laws played. 300,000 voters did not have it tip the election of donald trump. there's a huge increase and they found that one and ten people who didn't volt in milwaukee or madison cited the voter i.d. law. up to 45% were suppressed. he only won the state by 22,000 votes. regardless of whether voter suppression impacted wisconsin, it had a big impact i think, the fact that there were people that tried to vote and couldn't was a

huge outrage in 2016. we heard so many stories about people who were not enthusiastic about hillary clinton. i talked to many voters that wanted to vote, that tried to vote, that would have voted democrat but counts vote because they didn't have the right credentials. they had voted in every single past election. that's a huge scandal. and it needs a lot more attention. >> this was the first national election without the full protections of the voting rights act. we have a supreme court that essentially gutted even the possibility of the right to vote fraudly. what is the recourse against these times of restrictive voter i.d. laws? >> that's a very good point. 22 states had new voting restrictions in effect. i think it's going to be critical to organize against these laws and change the composition of the people that are passing these laws in the first place. >> yeah. >> i think that's why groups like the aclu are organizing campaigns to help people get the

ids they need to vote. that's why there's so much focus on state legislative races. it was the state legislature in wisconsin and north carolina that did all of these things. we're so focused on the presidency and the congress. it's so much of the states. yes, they're gerry man derd. it's making it hard to vote the people out of office. the fact that the states are passing so many volter suppression measures, they're feeling vulnerable. >> absolutely. >> are americans concerned enough about loses our fundamental right to vote? >> it doesn't seem like it. the fact this happened in broad daylight. wisconsin on april 5th, the day of wisconsin's primary, a member of congress, they said the voter i.d. law would hand the election to the republican nominee. members said that the law was passed, in their words, to target neighborhoods around

milwaukee and college campuses. all about disenfranchising african-americans, and younger americans. they said it. it was in plain daylight and people did nothing about it. if we don't learn the lesson, history will repeat itself in 2018 and 2020. >> it's chilling but i think you have to actually scare the hell out of people for them to get it. reports matter and only to the far right. ari berman, if you haven't read "give us a bow," it's a very important book. appreciate it. coming up in our next hour, what's with those jfk files anyway. first, more "a.m. joimpt obama's back. stay tuned.

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you notice i've been commenting a lot on politics lately. but here's one thing i know, if you have to win a campaign by dividing people, you're not going to be able to govern them. you won't be able to unite them later if that's how you start. >> he's back. this week brought us the public reemergence of president obama. but not just any president obama, campaign mode president obama. you remember the one. tie off, collar open, and on thursday stumping for democratic gubernatorial candidate and throwing some serious shade at donald trump as only he can. >> what we can't have is the same old politics of division that we have seen so many times

before that dates back centuries. some of the politics we see now, we thought we put that to bed. i mean, that has folks looking 50 years back. it's the 21st century. not the 19th century. come on! >> somehow he looks younger. i don't know why. not to be left out of the ex-president trump stumping was george w. bush who emerged as a media darling. he clearly denounced trumpism even if it never mentioned trump. >> bigotry seems emboldened. our politics seems more vulnerable to conspiracy theories and outright

fabrication. we've seen our discourse with casual cruel at this. at times it can seem the forces pulling us apart are stronger than the forces binding us together. argument turns easily to diszing 45, but last night all the boys got the ex-president's boy band back together for a concert at texas a&m to raise hurricane relief funds for texas, puerto rico and the u.s. virgin islands. the first time all the living presidents have been together since 2013. thankfully after a week when obama and bush told us how they really feel, we were spared having to watch any awkward encounters with trump who appeared in an informal video. >> i have to play one more sound which i might characterize as the understatement of the year. here he is. >> folks don't feel good right now about what they see.

they don't feel as if our public life reflects our best. instead of our politics reflecting our values, we've got politics infecting our communities. >> e.j., i think he can get an amen. >> i think so. i would give one. and it's a reminder of how good he is at that stuff. i think that even if it was accidental on the fact that both former presidents obama and bush said what they said is a sign that we are in some kind of real emergency as a country. and i think the fact that obama came out in virginia is particularly important. that governor's race there in a couple of weeks is going to be what, no matter how important local issues are, is going to be read as a national bellwether.

if republican ed gillespie wins, it will be taken as a confirmation for republicans that, hey, trump isn't really causing us that much trouble and we can go on like this. if that's the message obama was sending and especially if democrats pick up seats in legislature, that's going to be a real sign that republicans have a lot to worry about. it will create pressure on trump. but on bush, i think what he did is really important. you know, for liberals they look at bush and say, wait a minute, a lot of the seeds of what we're seeing were sewn under bush and talk about a real america, versus fake americans who voted democratic. that's the kind of division that trump plays on or the iraq war, obviously, or talk and that's all true and conservatives have to answer for that. but president bush was very consistent in speaking up in favor of immigrants and against nativism. he actually spoke very boldly about muslims, muslim americans

and defended their rights at the islamic center ten days after the election. and, so, i think we should hear all of this and say there is an emergency in the country created by trump and especially to our conservative friends, we should say, welcome aboard to the extent that you really are willing to take on trump. and we can have a conversation about the problems with conservativism as we go along. >> and let me play a little bit of george w. bush to e.j.'s point. talking specifically about white supremacy. >> our identity like a nation unlike many other nations is not determined by ethnicity. it means that people of every race, religion, ethnicity can be fully and equally american. it means that bigotry or white supremacy in any form is bla

blasphemy against the american creed. >> you know, you live in florida, i lived in florida for 14 years. we experienced jeb bush as a politician. we know that the bushes, for all of the flaws in terms of the way george w. bush got into office to help the supreme court and iraq war and the one thing i can speak to and that i think you can, on matters of race and bigotry, the bushes have been quite consistently, you know, on the right side of that. so, how important is it to have that family, the last familial back out and publicly talking athis way in. >> joy, i think it's tremendously important and as you're talking about bush family talking not only the conscious for the party and the country. i say that as someone who thought george bush as president was a historically awful president and until donald trump

came along he was in the running for the worst of all time. who was it that came out just to destroy george bush after those comments where he touched on white supremacy. steve bannon. whose exact quote was george w. bush was so out of line with those comments. again, the issue polarizing here the issue at the heart beat of it all, race. the republican party or the republic clan party, which i call them now which donald trump sanctioned cannot and will not allow any proper discussion to be had because it all unravels after that. that's what george w. bush courageously did. >> you cannot escape the fact that but for the election of a black president of barack obama, with whom donald trump seems to be obsessed, you don't really have the possibility in a lot of ways of a trump presidency. is that inescapable for the republican party? >> i think it is inescapable for the republican party.

but can i just say seeing both bush and obama back this week. first of all, my soul. i forgot how much my soul needed to hear obama, obama's words. you can't beat obama when it comes to his oauditory skills. only trump can make you feel nostalgic for the bush era. but at the same time, seeing both these men back on the public stage and speaking so passionately and forcefully and reinforcing what american values and democracy is about, we should all take this as a serious warning that some very basic principles of our democracy are under threat. >> get an amen on all that. all three of you. wonderful panel, thank you, all. have a wonderful sunday. all right, speaking of families that have given great things to this country. i want to send a huge congratulations to the sargent shriver national center on

poverty and law which celebrated its 50th anniversary this past thursday at a gala in chicago. thank you for 50 years of fighting for equal opportunity and justice for the country's most vulnerable. shri more "am joy" after the break. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ when you've been making delicious natural cheese for over 100 years like kraft has, you learn a lot about what people want. honey, do we have like a super creamy cheese with taco spice already in it? oh, thanks. bon appe-cheese!

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>> that does it for me. "am joy" will be back and alex witt. >> another stellar sunday from my sister, joy. listen, parts of your conversations with frederica wilson, nancy pelosi make way from your show into mine. thank you for that. a good day to all of you. i'm alex witt at msnbc headquarters. 9:00 a.m. out west and here's what's happening right now. a demand for an apaology and comparison to benghazi. what the congresswoman at the center of a controversy