now on the commonwealth. today, virginians have answered and spoken. virginia has told us to end the divisiveness that we will not condone, hatred and bigotry and to end politics that have torn this country apart,. >> democrat ralph northam rode to a nine-point victory over republican ed gillespie in virginia's race last night. he defeated the former rnc chair that attempted to bump up trump space with gangs and confederate monuments, northam will succeed terry mcauliffe in a race with more than 2.6 million cast ballots a. turnup rate up nearly five points from the last gubernatorial election. democrats wiped out a 32-seat republican majority in the house

of delegates and that's just the beginning of the story this morning. good morning, everyone, it's wednesday, november 8th. i think yesterday the discussion was whether or not the democrats had anything going this morning. the story is a little different. with us this morning. we have msnbc john heilemann, chair of the department of african-american studies at princeton university, co-founder and ceo of axios jim vand high and nbc correspondent yes host of casey d.c. on msnpc. casey hunt is with us. good morning. >> good morning. >> joe, wow, something's up for us, a very, very good morning for democrats. >> a very good morning for democrats. they haven't had a good morning like this, probably since barack obama got re-elected in 2012. this has been a long time coming

for the democratic party and they actually, you can sort of see the clouds of doom coming in again a couple days ago, remember we went around the panel monday morning, asked everybody who they thought they were going to win, ed gillespie, ed gillespie, everybody was saying it. by yesterday afternoon, you started hearing sort of order restored, a lot of conservatives were saying, wait a second, you know, northam may end up winning. the same thing with democrats. it was big. this is big. you look at these races, they call these off year races but in virginia they always matter, 1993, george allen's landslide victory replacing doug wilder. >> that led to republicans, foreshadowed them winning a huge landslide. 2009, bob mcdonald's win, another landslide a year after barack obama elected president.

suggested the tea party revolution was coming in 2010. but i think you have to go back to and i wrote the date down here, january 19th, 2010 when scott brown won that special seat for ted kennedy, after bob mcdonald was elected, define one off year election night that's so shifted the landscape of american politics and the expectations of american politics and suggested to the party in power that they were in trouble and mika, we can all look at ed gillespie's loss. we can look at what happened in maine, we can look all across the country. but if you want a microcomes of what we have been talkinging about for years the democratic party's problems with losing a thousand legislative seats nationwide and saying their problem is not just with hillary clinton, their problem was much larger, well, last night, donald trump can try to blame ed

gillespie, a guy he and steve bannon got behind all time. you can blame ed gillespie all you want. guess what? the real problem is what happened in the virginia house of delegates. it was a massive landslide, all agree cross the commonwealth of virginia. nobody expected this. even the smart effort people in politics never saw this coming. this was a repudiation of donald trump that will be heard around virginia, around the nation and, yes, around the world. the whole world is watching. they also saw what happened in virginia yesterday. they may just believe that maybe some equillibrium is returning to american politics. >> and i think there is some forces for gun control. there is some incredible diverse candidates who were elected last night. incredible emotional stories as well, including the boyfriend of the reporter who was jun gunned

down, who won, he was an underdog, we will be getting to that, that story. it was an an incredible night on all levels and a repudiation of donald trump according to republicans. >> the gillespie campaign was whispering to reporters this vote was a repudiation of president trump. president trump weighed in last night from asia to slam ed gillespie after his loss. trump tweeted quote -- . >> u.s. congresspman scott taylor, a republican from virginia beach told the "new york times" he faulted president trump's divisive rhetoric for

propelling the party to defeat. he said i do believe this is a referendum open this administration. democrats turned out tonight. i'm sure there were republicans that spoke loudly and clearly as well, he added down the ballot, quote, i know folks going against candidates i never even heard of. joe, you pointed to this, democrats were shocked by what happened. one democratic operative said, this was not a wave, this was a tsunami, in fact, it has been since 1975 the democrats had any even more than five votes e seats in the house in an election like this. >> unbelievable and john heilemann in a house of delegates, jerry mannederred in such a way not to represent the state and still even going against all those odds, you know, you have to just say and i don't usually we always get paid

to look at candidates and their campaigns. let's face it, ralph northam won. he should be feeling great. but the morning after, let's talk about it. everybody on both sides of the aisle said this guy ran one of the worst closing campaigns they had seen in recent memory and yet, virginia voters stood in the rain. they stood in long lines. i had tweet at me, there was a long line, i do believe that next year may be the year of quote women voters and women candidates because they heard stories of women standing in the rain in northern virginia in long lines and they weren't going to move until they got their vote against donald trump. just like last year, i still say, that i lex wasn't about donald trump as much as it was hillary clinton.

last night wasn't as much about ralph northam as it was voters, republicans, moderates, democrats and women sending a message to donald trump. >> yeah, i mean, you look at, i agree with everything you said, joe, northam ran not a particularly great race. he didn't win by a little bit. i yesterday was on the tv saying i was here for people in the commonwealth saying, you know, gillespie's momentum is overstated. northam may win a little tiert than a year ago. yet he won by nine points having won a not great race, he won by nine points. that's outside, there was no one, republican, democrat, no one was suggesting that kind of a victory for him. you look at where he won the race, ed gillespie managed to turn if trump-like numbers in the southwestern part of the state, which is what he wanted to do. his second goal was to try to limit the damage in northern virginia in those suburbs filled

with women voters and people alien fated by donald trump that you refer to, not only did he limit his advantage there he got slaughtered there by worse tan donald trump got slaughtered there, he performed way worse than -- >> john, this is the thing. this is a warning for republicans in 2017 and 2018. because i know you know the numbers here, touch on this, few will. ed gillespie, who got slaughtered, swamped in northern virginia. >> yep. >> this is a guy when he wasn't pretending to be donald trump shocked everybody in his senate campaign and outperformed what everybody thought he would do across the state of virginia and even northern virginia. >> three years ago, he won a county in northern virginia. he won that three years ago he got beat double digits by

northam. this will send a message, we talk about how these mid-term elections move in waves. i think it's really important. one is on the basis of you started. you teen republican nbc news correspondent retire in the house. on the basis of republican itself, there is probably two dozen republican incumbents who have been contemplating retirement, waiting to see what was going to happen in these off year elections and read the wind and wet more generally. i think most of those people will retire and look at the situation and say, this is hard for us. we will see a bunch of republicans in moderate say its seats and some in safe seats saying we're not getting anything done, we got to get out. secondly, they will be able to recruit candidates. this is such a boost for tom perez, his strategy. you will see now candidate

quality, recruitment is going to go way up. we will see it in the next few months. >> that will make a huge difference, beyond the national move, the national electorate. there will be practical consequences that will narrow a lot who controls congress in 2018 from i mean, the democrats have been on a five-year losing streak. they have lost so many races they should have won casey hunt. now you have people like frank lobiondo who came in with me in 1994 announced he's leaving, put that in the blue column. >> that will be a democratic pickup unless something really dramatic happens in that seat. and talk to -- the impact that this vase going to have on the hill. i know when i was a member and things like this would happen, you would look down in the well and everybody looking at each

other and go holy cow, we shall say, can you believe what happened? there is not a six-month adjustment or nip-month adjustment, it's like, okay, i got to put my head down, i will not say all the crazy things that trump wants me to say. talk about how this changes so much on capitol hill? >> i got to tell you, joe, i'm really excited to go to work today and talk to these members. in virginia, there are suburban members across the country in other places, one member texting me about down ballot races, clerk of the courts, saying philadelphians losing by eight to ten points in races they would normally be picking with 57% of the vote. this is not something confined to virginia. i think that you are absolutely right in that it's going to

drive retirements, potentially. it will make it harder for republican leaders to keep all of their republicans on board to try to pass things. remember the strategy right now on this pig ticket tax reform is still to do it only with republican votes. >> that is suddenly going to get to be a much harder argument to make. because people are going to see, what happened here? this will even i think on the naat side, this has to give claire mccaskill a little assurance, if i stick in the middle i can potentially one u run against this president. it's a different environment. i think the sweeping nature of this, i think, is going to make it feel, is going to make a fundamental difference in the dynamics on capitol hill. >> some of the issues, guns. >> president trump says ed gillespie didn't address his agenda. a few days ago, steve bannon

said gillespie is a changed man. here's bannon just on sunday. >> he's going to embrace the trump agenda. in the washington post, he may be up one or two point, if you looking in virginia. you see the grass roots are fired up. they're coming out to embrace the trump agenda. as gillespie has now articulated, it was up. we when. >> that was on sunday, two days before election day. now abc news say two sources close to bannon say he offered to rally for gillespie, the camp rejected it. he is fuming as he were vept kept out of the race. can you go down, the attorney general, the house, that huge wave in that house of democrats winning in virginia. phil murphy winning as expected. the state of maine voting to

expand medicaid, this was some kind of catharsis for the last year. they feel like they fought and resisted and this is what happened. what lessons can be learned? what happens from here? >> if you look at new jersey, these are states that should win, i'll stipulate that. i don't think we're hyperventilating in over sperpting what happened in these elections with that scott brown reason that joe pointed out earlier imagine the finger pointing, the funk they have been in. somehow that changes, they have a reason to believe money will flow in, momentum will drift their way. they now have a formula that could win them back power. >> let's not get ahead of ourselves. >> there still a funk. look at all the pund u pup ditry

they say he ran a terrible race. he wonpy 24 points by people that made up their mind at the last minute. that tells me maybe it was gillespie's racially tin himmed campaign at the end that back fired that we did not fully appreciate. >> i agree. >> there may be consequences for it. maybe that's why women went by 22 points for northam. women won the election for democra democrats. >> yeah, that's what i was saying. this year the tweets people were saying the messaging when we did our facebook live yesterday afternoon, one of the reasons why we shift ed at 3:00 and sai, wait a second, it looks like northam will win this we heard women, men did, too. but it's the first time i heard people saying women standing in the rain in northern virginia and they're not going to move

women standing in charlottesville, they were not going to move. we were getting these across twitter, across facebook live, there were women that were going to send a image, a strong message to donald trump and they d did. >> and that's a huge reaction to trump. that's not necessarily a galvanization of the democratic party. the opportunity definitely before the democrats, the question is, can they run with it? >> i think there is complex. we have to kind of pars it. up with of the things is the convergence of three factors, against trump t. resistance and organizing on the ground and how it emnates itself in turnout. what we see is there were folks motivated by trump. >> by what they don't like. >> that they saw with health care, what they're seeing with guns with this president. that's great. now we got to find it.

>> we need to find a down ballot. our revolution, bernie sanders folks were getting elected against trump, they were being motivated by a range of other issues, single payer, a whole range of issues, so this will be complex. what's interesting, too, the urban vote turned out high as well in urban centers as well. >> joe. >> you know, though, eddie, though, i think also you have to look back and you have to look at the local angle of this, too, local being charlottesville and i can't believe, i can't believe a lot of virginiaens said not in my state and i also believe something else, too, i believe there are a lot of people, i know a lot of democrats, a lot of moderates, a lot of progressives on every issue except this one that don't want the confederate monuments moved. but you know what, they also don't want a candidate using those monuments as a wedge issue

at the end of the campaign, especially with the backdrop of charlottesville. i just think charlottesville also, not only hung over this race, but i think just like the oklahoma city bombing was a turning point in bill checkpoint's presidency, i'm not so sure that charlottesville is not a moment that historians are going to look back on and see donald trump's reaction to that and say, that is really when republicans, independents, democrats, all became repulsed by what they were seeing happening in front of them and how fascinating that after that, the first big test of trumpism came in that state. >> joe, i think you are absolutely right. i think we can make a general claim. we can see the trap of the culture wars. if you take that tack, it locks you into a specific segment of the population, that third and you can find yourself in some

ways getting trapped in the trap, itself. so. >> charlottesville, southerland springs, texas, days ago. how can we not have that in your mind when you are thinking about the direction this country is taking? still ahead on morning joe, a lot more to cover, interim chair donna brazile joins us with her explosive new book. plus the party's chairman tom perez joins the conversation. also the senate's second ranking democrat dick durbin from the foreign relations committee. senator chris coons and tex man joaquin castro and white house photography pete suza of his new book chronicling the obama presidency. you are watching morning joe. we'll be right back. dad: molly, can you please take out the trash? (sigh) ( ♪ )

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in delaware county, pennsylvania, for centuries had a powerful republican machines. democrats outpulled the county council for the last time ever, to vote november 7th against trump. in nassau county, new york, home to another republican machine, democrat laura curran claimed victory over republican county executive jack martin. senate republican west chester executive lost in another of new york's suburban megacounties. joe, it's all the way down the lean. >> yeah, we're going to go john in a second. astorino, of course, represented you in west chester county. he was unbeatable and his commercials was on non-stop. i was thinking after watching

one after another after another there was no chance he had a chance, he must have had you know so much more money and so much more support and he had been there for quite a while. >> something bigger going on. >> west chester county is the type of county across america where republicans before trump could figure out ways to win, but after trump will lose. >> absolutely. john heilemann, what we are looking at in terms of the races up to the line is, it's a response on a much bigger level. no adds could compete swent imt ever there. >> it's hard to overstate the toxicity that trump represents, that may or may not continue. we asked the question for a year, there seemed to be a lot of energy, anti-trump energy in a lot of places t. question was, will it translate at the ballot box? can democrats take that and do something with it?

last night suggested, you den need more than a message than bashing trump. after last night, it's a good start in a lot of places. >> john. >> go ahead, joe. >> i'm sorry, i was going to say, john, i've always said that you can beat something with nothing in off year elections, you can't beat something with nothing in presidential races. >> sure. but you sure as hell can and the republicans proved it from 2010 to 2016, they said we will run against obamacare. they never had a plan and they're paying for it. i was thinking, you know what, democrats don't need a message. it would help them. >> it sure would. this is what's so shocking to me, john, i don't understand it,

it's shocking to a lot of republicans, too, why does donald trump, why do his political people and why do some republicans think they can ever win nationally with a 33% solution? they have a message. we have said it op this show for then months, that appeals to one-third of the electorate. we saw what happens in elections when you only appeal no a third of voters. >> you know, we've said again, it was really made manifest this notion that what was the fundamental thing donald trump hasn't accomplished during his first ten months, the bicker fail jer that he has not persuaded a single person in the country who didn't foet vote for him on election night in 2016 to be for him now. you look at what happened, yesterday, again, in all of these races, there is not anybody whose mindss are changed

for trumpism who wasn't for it a year ago, in fact, there are a fair number of people who have gone in the other direction, he's managed to worsen his political standing rapper improve it and for someone who came in with the political vulnerabilitys he had, that's an extraordinary weakness, a huge failure and one that will reverberate for the parties the party versus to cope with over the next 12 months for sure. >> this was a test case. this was the first big election sense he became president. the ultimate d.c. insider trying to play as a trump populist, what do you think when he pushed the nfl kneeling controversy, for example, or talked about immigrant gangs, et cetera, et cetera, is the lesson be true to who you are, take what's good about trump and leave the rest to the side or is it you know what, maybe walking arm in arm with donald trump at all isn't

such a good idea when these issues aren't working for trump beyond his base? >> i think the lissson is in the box. there is basically to your point, there is two americans, about 60% anti-trump, 40% strongly pro trump. its white. it's male, it's mostly rural and they like donald trump, 70, 80, 90% of them like donald trump. so you can't run against donald trump and you spent a year being silent on donald trump, so it's almost impossible to suddenly say, hey, i'm not a trump person, well, then, where in the hell were you for the last year? so you are boxed in. the demographics that work for him in pennsylvania in pennsylvania, in michigan and wisconsin, it doesn't work where you more hispanics and more women that vote. they're in a box. i think it's a reason republicans in swing districts

are getting out of congress. >> if you have a turnout. >> black voters and democratic voters turnout. so what we saw in the previous presidential election. we saw a depressed turnout among democratic voters. >> that impacted how certain counties flipped and the like. what we saw in new jersey, for example, with phil murphy, it wasn't simply an anti-trump message, it was also a progressive message. so we begin to see across the board, right, democrats not trying to sound like republicans, but actually beat democrats. >> so democrats may have overlooked the white male middle class guy in middle america, but republican versus completely insulted the african-american community to the point they are marching when trump won and now they are voting. >> you see two latinos in the house of delegates, a transgender woman. >> ace wasn't women. >> so you saw across the board

america rejecting the culture wars. america rejecting this narrow vision of who we take ourselves to be. >> coming up, all indications are that president trump and russian president vladimir putin will meet at the apex summit in vietnam later this week. perhaps they'll have coffee on side. senator chris coons from the foreign relations committee has thoughts on that and the elections as well the delaware democrat joins us next on morning joe. we come into this world needing others. ♪ then we are told it's braver to go it alone. ♪ but there is another way to live. ♪ a way that sees the only path to fulfillment- is through others. ♪

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. >> and korean golfers are some of the best on earth. [ applause ] in fact, and you know what i'm going to say the womens u.s. open was hell at trump golf club in bedminster, new jersey and it

just happened to be won by a great korean golfer sung hyun park. i had heard he had done. that i read the transcript. but it read. >> it hurts. >> it's so much worse when you actually hear it and, boy, that's really going to help republican candidates in swing districts in the future. you have a president that continues to use his position to promote his business. you know what itself so interesting, one of our main criticisms about the clinton, they seem to cash in on public service after bill clinton left the white house. >> right. >> donald trump is trying to cash in on public service while he is delivering speeches

delivering up with of the speeches during the greatest nuclear crisis since the -- he's promoting golf courses in jersey, yeah the lincoln bedroom, that was fundraising. >> i take that. >> that wasn't for personal wealth. so here republicans, myself included, criticized the clintons for turning public service into a money-making machine after bill clinton left the white house, donald trump is doing it now. it is unbecoming. >> that itself the sort of garbage that makes moderate voters, republicans, go, you know what, i'm going to stand in line for a very long time. i'm going to send that guy a message. >> the word is gross. any how, that was president trump speaking last night to the national assembly. he also had tough words for north korea. joining us now, democratic

senator chris coons of delaware, here at the table, columnist and associate editor for the walk post david ignacious the author of the new thriller "the quantum spy." which is out now. >> this is zblat oh my god. it's available for christmas. i bought it in bulk yesterday, bought hundreds of them. i'm just going to hand them out on the street. because david said, it makes a great christmas gift. it does. >> not just in the u.s., it's great in asia, has china themes. we have a billion potential buyers. >> oh good lord, he's shameless. >> i got to say, mika, [ audio interruption ] >> taking a break, you want to start and stay on north korea or

-- >> david, what's your take on the president's speech yesterday other than self promotion -- i thought the state was a little more tempered in tone. you were suffering the economy, your drive is so much powerful it speaks to south koreans. >> i probably was incensed talking about a pathway, these tri trips. [ poor audio ]

. >> the tenor of the trip. obviously, the self promotion notwithstanding to have president trump move towards a more diplomatic tone after some early blufters, now that we have pre-positioned three aircraft carrier groups, the nuclear subs, the personnel and material

in the region, i think president trump is striking the right balance between having previously been overly threatening now pursuing a diplomatic alternative. this has to be an off-ramp for north korea to be consider taking. he has to be strong with xi jinping. the next three days will be crucial. all of us that worry about a potential confrontation with north korea going wrong have to be encouraged by president trump's tone. >> casy hunt, obviously, you are familiar with philadelphia suburbs, moderate republicans. i'm curious what you think the impact of tonight's results are going to be on the united states senate, what kind of impact might it have on susan collins, for example, does this mean the president will have to work more with democrats if he wants to

accomplish things? >> i think that's right, that's a great question. there is a lot of attention paid to the big wins in virginia and new jersey, just across the pennsylvania state line for me are a series of counties, so-called colored counties in philadelphia, at the county level there were big wins for democrats in bucks county in delaware county, in chester county, pennsylvania, there has never been a county elected democrat since the 1,700s and democrats swept the county offices up for election. what does that mean? i think it means members of the house that represent the suburban district who are republicans will have to begin moving towards the middle. i think it will make it clear to the president or at least members of his team that if they don't begin some real outrage to democrats on tax reform and other priorities, they will not get their legislatetive agenda

through. i think the president slowing a sideways grenade back at gillespie after his loss last night isn't very encouraging for republican elected like susan collins who i think will now move forward and say their path towards legislative success will rely on working across the aisle here in congress rather than counting on president trump to necessarily lead them forward as a coherent part. >> jim vand high. >> senator you have states where trump won the demographics are trickier. what itself the formula? what do you say to somebody running in a state where trump won by double digits? how do you thread that nedle if are you a democrat running in that arena in. >> well the democratic senators incumbent up for election this time in the five states are referencing states like indiana, north doeblth, mount, missouri,

west virginia are terrific, active enganld local campaigners, they're very authentic people. they connect well in their home states. i'd say to them, avoid letting your campaign be nationalized. don't really make this about democrats versus republicans, make it about you, your leadership and your capability. these are folks willing to meet with president trump to consider working with him across the aisle where it makes sense, but they've also stood firm in sticking to core principles on things like defending the ada and access to health care in their states. we had a meeting with a group. there were about 12 democratic senators yesterday evening who met with gary cohn, the chief check adviser to president trump. the president called the infor asia. i think it's important they show to continue to try to ljs late responsibly across the aisle. >> are the stories true? talk about that meeting? a lot of reporting including on

our site in that meeting what donald trump said to you about the implications for his own taxes, he went on this rift how the tax bill was actually bad for him? tell us what the president said. >> the president said a number of things and i, frankly, appreciated the opportunity to sit down with some of his chief advisers and that he took the time from his trip to asia to call in. it was an interesting conversation. he touched on a number of different topics, but if there was one theme from our side, it was we should have been included and consulted earlier. we've got ideas, we want to work across the aisle to strengthen the middle class, to support manufacturing, to make our country more competitive and the folks on the other side of the table, including the president calling in from asia said, just wait, you will see a different tax bill in the senate than the house, we're at the beginning of a process, not at the end. >> senator, last week, assistant attorney general for the

national security division resigned. you're submitting a letter to jeff sessions, are you concerned about this. tell us about that. >> well, dana buente is a career federal prosecutor not just running the eastern district of virginia but the acting head of the national security division in the department of justice. i just was troubled that immediately following the relation indictment given reporting that has suggested mr. buente was running a fairly active component of the mueller investigation that he was fairly abruptly asked to resign. i wanted to ask some questions about the timeling go everyone the troubling pattern of the president's personal interventions by interviewing candidates for u.s. attorney in several key jurisdictions and given everything else going on, it makes me concerned. dana buente would have been the fourth in succession in the department of justice.

i think it's an important feat and role that he played that deserves some oversight. >> all right. senator chris coons, thank you so much. we will be following that and looking for a response. coming up, donna brazile insists she never claimed the democratic primary process was rigged. why do so many people get that impression from her? she joins us next hour to talk about that. morning joe is coming right back.

you know, mika, it was not too long ago that bill di blasio had problems with new york city cops, and early on i think he figured out that was not a winning proposition. he adjusted his outlook and view

toward new york city police officers and what a big difference it made. he won easily. i mean, he won so easily that we haven't even talked about it the first hour. it's just shocking. a couple of years ago, everybody was talking about how di blasio was going to be primaried. no, not even close. he absolutely crushed all comers. you have to look at bill de blasio as a guy who is going to be looking forward, looking to become a national, national figur figure. >> it's amazing in terms of how often we're wrong. >> nobody finds that amazing whatsoever. >> we did it after trump, after the race in virginia. one of the lessons is that i don't think anybody knows what's happening in politics right now. it's being disrupted, change bid technology in ways that are just

unknowable to us. the more you can focus on what's happening in the moment, look at the data that's sitting right here today and not assume that that means anything for six months a year. >> and i will say, though, a democrat in new york city, winning re-election with 66% of the vote is not exactly a huge shock. >> the headlines are snarkey for bill de blasio. >> him again. >> there you go. >> and, of course, "the post" stuck with the bill. >> you're excited to go to work today, kasie hunt. what are you most excited about? >> one thing i'm interested to know is what lessons each side is going to take away from their candidates, campaigns they run and what that means for what they need to do next. i think you can't live with

trump but you can't live without him either if you're a republican. that will be a problem clearly in races like in arizona and nevada, if steve bannon gets his way and republicans end up with candidates that are unpalatable. i'm interested to hear donna brazile's take on this race. if you nominate the moderate clintonian democrat that's the safer bet and the way to go. that may end up being productive for them in the mid term elections but there will be real questions whether that translates when they have to run against donald trump, this incredible overwhelming personality, in 2020. >> yeah. >> meika, i want to hold up "th new york times." we'll give bill de blasio a positive headline here. bill de blasio, despite the fact it's new york city, first democratic mayor to be re-elected in a generation since 1985, since ed koch. >> there you go. so kacie d.c., thank you.

looking forward to the shirts. >> should be there by friday. >> i'm waiting for them. >> wait, wait. where is it? no, no, no, no. we go back to kascie we don't leave until we see the thunder bolt. >> kasie dc. that's her name. >> i like that radio voice joe uses. >> laser rock. exactly. we're back. >> my god. what does the democratic party plan to do to capitalize on last night's success? we need to do something. former dnc chair donna brazile has her new book on the 2016 election continues to make waves. plus the senate's number two democrat, dick durbin and joaquin castro of texas, his state still stunned after the horrifying church massacre. "morning joe" coming right back. fresh cinnamon?

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we make sure you're in the loop at every step from the moment you decide to move your money to the instant your new retirement account is funded. ♪ oh and at fidelity, you'll see how all your investments are working together. because when you know where you stand, things are just clearer. ♪ just remember what i said about a little bit o' soul ♪ we live in a diverse state and it's becoming more diverse and as long as i'm governor, our doors will be open.

>> governor ralph northam trumped ed gillespie last night in virginia's race for governor, defeating the former rnc chair who attempted fire up the president's base with ads about violent immigrant gangs and confederate monuments. northam will succeed democrat terry mcauliffe in a race where 2.6 million cast ballots, turnout rate up nearly five points from the last gubernat ocho gubernatorial election and wiped out a 32-seat republican majority in the house of delegates. welcome back to "morning joe." it's the top of the hour wednesday, november 8th. with us on set we have veteran columnist and msnbc contributor mike barnicle, columnist for the washington post, david ignatius. chair for african studies, mark

liebovich and washington bureau chief for usa today, susan paige. what a night, joe. where do we begin? >> it's hard to figure out. i have to say, sitting here over the past hour, we've been focusing a lot on ed gillespie by himself. >> right. >> but looking at the numbers we discussed over the past hour, republic republicans being routed from delaware to parts of pennsylvania where they won for over a century, you just wonder whether ed gillespie could have won as the washington insider or as this confederate loving trumpist. it seems to me that the die was cast regardless. a friend wanted to run for congress in 2006. i said don't do it. you're going to get wiped out. did he and owe did a lot of other republicans. i can't believe that other republicans aren't going to be looking at what happened last night and saying the same thing.

what was your takeaway, mika? >> i think all the way down the line you saw a response to trump, a response to the direction that this country is taking. health care and guns were the top issues that people voted on. we had major, major national events this week that may have affected turnout. >> right. >> the massacre in texas. we have women. the women's march in response to trump. i think that showed its force in the elections. we hear stories, just anectdotally of women standing in line and making sure their vote counted. the question will be how to carry the mantle. >> you're exactly right. and you can march all you want. but if you don't stand in that line in the rain, like so many people did last night in virginia, it doesn't count.

it really counted last night. we always talk about how these gubernatorial races. earlier this morning i started thinking, you really have to go back to january 19th, 2010, to find an election that was not on the night of a presidential race, to find an election that so shifted the momentum of american politics. that, of course, is when scott brown, when the special election in massachusetts to replace ted kennedy and, boy, mika and i were on the phone with the white house that night, the obama white house that night. shock waves ripped through the white house. and they knew they were in for a tough year. just like republicans have to know today that 2018 is going to

be a hard sloth. >> this white house will probably not be as alert to those signals as the white house under president obama was because of the nature of the problems they deal with today. follow the light. follow the light. turn out, turn out, turn out. you had amazing results across the board. not just the big headline results of the virginia governor's race. first democrat elected in new hampshire as a mayor in 15, 16 years. democratic party sees the path to perhaps hopeful results to that party next year. part of that path is what people did yesterday. no matter if you are a trump follower, a trump accolade. i think you are just as concerned about the direction of the country, where the country is headed, the behavior of the president on twitter.

even trump acc krchlt krchacoly >> and donald trump gets away with things that no other candidates get away from. there is no trumpism without trump. for the rest of the republican party, donald trump has put them in a box that we had eddie gloud talk about last hour as well as jim van dehye. it makes you extremely popular in rural america, in southern parts of virginia, but stops you from gaining any traction at all in suburban neighborhoods and among more educated voters. we saw ed gillespie, despite the fact that three years ago he ran a great race as a traditional republican, we saw ed gillespie just getting absolutely obliterated in the suburbs of

d.c. >> he really seemed to have no idea what box to place himself into. this is someone who is a very savvy political operator to begin with. he is obviously not a novice. as you said, a very good candidate three years ago. and, look, washington insider, former rnc chair will not be automatically disqualified in the state of virginia. it's a bad look in a larger sort of populist. there's no specific way forward. do you embrace trump, do you not embrace trump? if you don't embrace trump enough, you have him go ong twitter, saying he didn't embrace me enough. there are messages for the democrats. one, they're still digging themselves out of a really big hole. there's a bit of an overreaction to getting this to one victory,

one night. ralph northam wasn't a model candidate by any stretch. if they can put someone, sort of a do no harm candidate in congressional swing districts across the country, this is an indication that itself can actually get you some real victory. >> susan paige, we're talking about the governor's race for good reason. you can go all the way down the ballot from the lieutenant governor's race, won by a democrat. attorney general, won by a democrat. democrats effectively erasing a giant republican majority in the house of delegates. margins and wins by democrats in that body that shocked even democrat leaders in virginia. then you can go up to the state of maine where they voted for medicaid expansion, end around on republican governor, paul le paige and against donald trump as well. you look at new jersey, too. expected win by phil murphy there. what happened last night and what are the lessons learned for democrats as they go forward in this age of trump? >> one of the most interesting

things, you look at turnout among liberals in virginia, turnout was 8% four years ago, to vote for a gubernatorial candidate who twice cast his ballot for george wncht bush before he got into politics. that doesn't mean that democrats have solved all their problems. you'll be talking to donna brazile shortly. she's illuminating the divisions in the party. democrats delivered for their candidate yesterday and that has all kinds of ripple effects when you look at next year. it helps democratic fund-raising, recruitment and might encourage some republican incumbents to hang it up and retire. >> 2.5 million people turned out to vote. it was a rainy night, cold night. it was way up from four years

ago and way, way up from eight years ago. >> i have a feeling it was a lot of women, too. we'll see. let's bring in tom perez. tom, i'm curious how you're going to play this. how would you characterize what happened last night? >> well, i've learned at least three or four lessons, mika, from this. number one, unity continues to be our greatest strength. we saw that in the virginia primary. everyone came together. i spent a lot of time in virginia. people weren't talking about someone's books. they were talking about health care and the things that mattered. that was lesson number one. lesson number two, organizing matters. this was the most extensive, coordinated ground game in virginia history. more extensive than any presidential. knocked on twice as many doors as the mcauliffe campaign. and terry mcauliffe did a spectacular job four years ago. 33 partners helping ralph northam.

huge issue. it's not just organizing but making sure we have candidates up and down the ballot. 88 candidates running for seats of delegates, they were superb. we just elected the first two latinas in the history, a transgender woman who ran a spirited campaign and no one said she could win and she won. when you lead with those -- when you organize, organize, organize and you are competing in every zip code, you win. when you lead with your values, that makes a difference. ralph northam has been a healer his entire life. phil murphy, he talked about how he's going to have everybody's back. when you put those values on the line -- health care was one of the top issues for voters in virginia. they saw that ralph northam's values were their values and they saw that the politics of division are not what we want in new jersey and elsewhere. >> so, tom, we get a lot of

people on set -- i don't mean to interrupt you. i want everybody to get a chance to get a question in. i'm going to give you a softball. this morning i think it's in order. it's not just -- you're talking about virginia. it wasn't just virginia. manchester, new hampshire, the first democrat win for a mayor since, i think, 1985. you look at long island. democrats winning republican seats there. westchester county. you have an entrenched republican, incumbent, everybody thought was going to win. pennsylvania counties, republicans have dominated for a century wiped away. this was about as expansive as a win for any party in an off year since at least 2010. is it about trump mainly? >> no. do you know what it's about? what every one of those races have in common -- by the way, we flipped two seats in georgia in special elections. the significance of that is that

they no longer have the supermajority necessary to pass constitutional reforms. earlier this year, as you know, we flipped three seats in beat red oklahoma, trump country. the formula for every one of these races was organize, organize, organize, get good candidates. talk about the issues that matter most to people. facts matter right now. what we learned from all these races yesterday is that this tale that the affordable care act is a disaster, that's not the reality on the ground for people. >> eddie? >> chairman, this is eddie gloud. the importance of unity at the top of the list. unity as a practical matter, when we're confronting the disaster that is the trump administration. but what about unity on the basis of trust, building trust among the various ideological wings of the democratic party. there are some who believe that the corporate wing of the democratic party still reigns and there will not be an attempt

to address the most vulnerable in this country hidden behind our attempt to beat trump. how do you build unity based on trust not just as a practical matter? >> i couldn't agree more that trust is what it's all about. we didn't show up in all too many zip codes in this country. how can you expect to earn trust when you don't even show up? that's why trust matters. once again, virginia, you may recall in the primary season the media was writing about how this was going to be a bernie, hillary redo election. what it was was two high-road candidates who ran a spirited campaign. they agree on just about everything and everyone came together. i had a number of experiences over the last few days, i was in virginia, where people came up to me and said tom, i supported bernie sanders in the primary. i worked for him hard. i see what you're trying to do to unite our party.

i support that. we need to keep coming together. keep it up. that's what i saw on the ground, people out in the streets who understood that our unity is our greatest strength, when we come together. ralph northam and tom piriello agree on just about everything. it means what unites us far exceeds what divides us. >> willie geist, chairman. good to see thank you morning. it can't be anti-trump. we have to run strong candidates with a strong message that. 's probably true. the races of a lot of the people you beat last night were aligned with trump, whether you did that or whether they did that themselves, ed gillespie sharing trump's values on confederate statues and nfl kneel iing. donald trump and his administration, his policies ares good business for democrats? >> donald trump was undeniably

on the ballot on a number of races. he is trying to divide america. people are so sick of these twitter tirades. they want leaders they can be proud of. that's why ralph northam and others were able to win. they're speaking to the issues that people care about. they actually care about facts. they actually care about making sure that people have a good job and good opportunity. they're not playing the politics of division. when we do that and when we organize, when we make those relationships, when we're running candidates, then when the false news comes out, if you've organized and built those relationships with people, that false news doesn't penetrate. you saw the ads in virginia and elsewhere. that dog didn't hunt. >> right. >> people understood that ralph northam and others were -- they represented the best of virginia. >> congratulations. dnc chairman tom perez, thank you. very good point. it starts with being sane.

sane is good. thanks for being on the show. >> thanks, chairman. >> sane helps. joe? >> it does. it does. except in my case. so, david ignatius, i want to -- let's talk about the third rail of american politics. it used to be said that social security is a third rail of american politics. it's not anymore. hillary care, as republicans called it in '93, led to massive republican wins in '94. obamacare led to massive republican wins in 2010. now health care. it appears that the republicans' misstep on health care contributed -- look at that. health care 39%, the most important issue. nothing even close. tax policy second. gun policy, i mean, second, which is also a message to republicans. but four in ten voters say health care was the most

important issue. that seems like it's going to be a problem for republicans for some time to come. >> joe, i think you put your finger on the core weakness for republicans. this year on their signature issue of health care, they have failed to make any progress. and i think they really reveal themselves in congress as lacking the ability to be a governing party, controlling both houses, controlling the white house. they were unable to put together even a simple proposal to altar what they call obamacare. i think the country looked at that and people scratched their heads and begun to turn away. inability to make progress on that is important. we now turn to tax reform. and i think a big question for democrats after last night is should they work with republicans? should they try to cooperate and put together tax bill or should they say, listen, this is your problem. you've got both houses. let's let you sort this out, and

confidence they won't be able to. and that republican also sail into next year with essentially nothing done. >> susan page, how does this impact the republican agenda? failed terribly on health care and people responded as well at the voting booth last night. they're supposed to have a lot of power and a lot of impact. and this can't -- i can't imagine this helps. >> you know, not to talk -- first on the state level, big effect on health care. one reason health care was such a big issue in virginia, the state legislature refused to go along with governor mcauliffe's plan to expand medicaid. unexpected gains in the house of delegates. it is entirely possible that the state legislator will be now willing to expand medicaid. the vote in maine against the wishes of the governor. these are messages to republicans. i've got to believe when you look at the congressional level this makes it harder to convince

any democratic senators. lobbying on tax bill to go along with them. democrats will be emboldened to stand their ground. they won't see the percentage in cooperating with the president. >> mark lieb wochlt. owicz, you look at the way that ed gillespie ran his campaign. what are you thinking other than maybe i should retire? what's your new position? what do you feel? what's your posture on donald trump? >> first of all i wouldn't underplay the effect of possible retirements. we could see a few dozen retirements in the next couple of months over this message alone. i do think that the message here, if you're a republican, is to choose. either you are an independent voice, who will work with democrats, who will take on the president if it's appropriate or you're full-on trump. ed gillespie, if nothing else --

even people like luther strange, who was sort of put into the middle of this -- it's not a good place to be. there seems to be a warning for a black or white republican, either you are with trump or against him at this point. if nothing else it's an easier message to convey. >> mark liebowitz and susan page, thank you both. joe? >> i agree, mika, with mark, 100%. if you're a republican and you're in the middle of the road and you're trying to figure out whether you can stay with trump or be a traditional conservative republican, chances are good you're going to get wipe d out unless you're in a really, really safe district. you have to choose, either all-in with donald trump or an independent republican and need to say if donald trump's right on policy then i'm going to be with donald trump. if he's for less tacks, less spending, if he wants to figure out how to try to balance the

budget i'm with him. if he wants a rational foreign policy, i'm with him. but i'm not going to be with him when he tweets, when he insults, when he brings shame to the presidency of the united states, when he actually tries to promote his private business interests, when he's overseas in one of the most important speeches an american president has given on foreign soil in decades. so i'm not going to be with that donald trump. so if you want somebody that's going to enable donald trump, to treat more, to act worse, vote for the other republican in the primary. that's what they have to do. if you're a republican out there and you're trying to figure out how to survive this, stop trying to figure it out. go with your gut. you're either with donald trump and his bad behavior or you're not with donald trump and his bad behavior and you will vote for conservative policies but you will do nothing, nothing to endorse the abhorrent behavior that donald trump exercises in the white house almost every day. >> let me pair it down for you. you don't have to say that lie

something hyperbole. you just don't have to do that. go big or go home. still ahead on "morning joe," donna brazile says her heart broke when she revealed to bernie sanders what she had learned about hillary clinton and the presidential primary. former dnc chair joins us with those details next on "morning joe." ♪ [vo] progress is an unstoppable force. the season of audi sales event is here. audi will cover your first month's lease payment on select models during the season of audi sales event. ...has grown into an enterprise. that's why i switched to the spark cash card from capital one. now, i'm earning unlimited 2% cash back

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joining us now, former dnc chair, donna brazile. she's out with a new book, you may have heard, called "hacks." we'll talk about the book in depth in a moment. we want to talk to you about what we saw last night, state of virginia, maine, new jersey. here in new york city. >> all the seats that were flipped last night. to quote the godfather of soul,

i feel good. james brown. i feel good because for the first time in two election cycles, especially off-year election cycles, democrats are holding their own. this was a blue wave. this was not just a national party invested in down ballot races. this was grassroots democrats and i am taking back my city council. i am taking back my sheriff seat, my state delegate seat. you'll like this, john. i came down from boston, mika, and i went down to northern virginia and said what the hell am i doing with my life? i'm 57. i should be home sleep iing, right? i was out there canvassing with kathy. they said she couldn't win that seat. she was the first asian female to win that seat. grassroots democrats are taking back the party and they're going to take back the country next year. 5% increase in turnout, the big issue for democrats in offseason election, turnout, turnout,

turnout. they invested in down ballot races. >> how much was this, donna, about donald trump? yes, people were organized, yes, people turned out. was this about donald trump? >> yes. he is going to be on the ballot until 2020 unless something happens. people are sick and tired of his divisive politics. >> they're sick and tired of divisive politics and have been. i think this say whole new level with trump. i think people are scared. >> yes, i agree. diversity and inclusion. when you see a black woman winning a mayoral seat in charlotte, north carolina, when you see the kind of support and turnout in maine. the 89,000 people will have access to health care. this is the future. you talked about the suburban county in pennsylvania. the future of the democratic party. grassroots politics invested all

across the country. alabama coming up december 12th. we have to look at all these other special elections and continue to invest in these key race. >> lot of people want to ask you questions about the book. i'll go first. how did this all start? last week with the politico piece that exploded online and got picked up all across the country. in it you wrote, in part, i promised bernie when i took the helm of the democratic national committee after the convention i would get to the bottom of whether hillary clinton's team had rigged the nomination process a cache of e-mails stolen by russian hackers and posted online had suggested. i needed to have solid proof by september 7th i had found my proof and it broke my heart. you said since that you never said that the process was rigged. but if you read that, the premise is that you went out to look and see if it was rigged. >> yeah. >> and later in that paragraph you say i found my proof. did you not find your proof that the process was rigged? >> what i found and what i said in the book, and i stand by what

i wrote in the book. august 19th, the night that donald trump said what the hell do you all have to lose? i was so angry. first of all, he was coming at the black folk. he was coming at the democratic party. and i wanted to fight back. all i could do was write a column. what the hell? i need to do more than write a column. i need to spend some money. donald trump is trying to reach those voters that we need to win on election day. when i was told that there was no money i'm like, wait a minute. i'm the chair. i'm raising money. that's when i found this joint fund-raising agreement. but the adedendum, that disturbd me. i'm an officer of the democratic party. i'm no longer an officer i know y'all are happy. i got the dance party going on. i found this and it disturbed me. it made me mad because i didn't know. i was an officer and didn't know there was a separate memorandum. i felt obligated to go back to bernie. i promised bernie and his supporters -- remember, i was on my apology tour the day i became

chair. i suppose i'm still on an apology tour. i went back and told bernie i found what you wanted me to find. it's a cancer. the process was not rigged. i had to make it clear to him, i found the cancer. do you know what bernie did after we talked about it? he said madam chair, what do you think about the polls? i said honey, i don't trust no polls. i'm afraid there's new enthusiasm. >> do you regret using the word "rigged" then? it's a loaded term. >> yeah. >> it suggests that the process was weighted toward one candidate over another. >> i learned the hard way. i had to go out there on twitter and i had to put i did not say the process was rigged. i said i went to find out. >> but then you came back and called bernie after you found your proof, proof -- >> that there was cancer. >> but you said proof of it being rigged in the piece. >> no. willie, i got to show you -- i said i will get to the bottom of whether or not hillary's team

had rigged the party process in her favor and then i went back and i said by september 7th i found -- the day i was making this call to bernie, i had found my proof and what i had found broke my heart. i thought the party i had given so much of my life to was better than this. >> what did you find proof of? >> the cancer. the cancer was that the dnc had signed the -- the staff of the dnc, not an officer. debbie was the staff, had signed an memorandum of the staff with the clinton campaign to take over certain departments in exchange for bailing us out. also i said in the book that hillary bailed us out. she put us on a starvation diet, that's hillary, but she bailed the party out. >> but then this agreement was -- okay let's say it wasn't rigged. >> it was cancerous. >> which is a bad -- >> because it stopped me from doing my job. it stopped me from doing my job as chair. >> right. >> willie, when you're the chair of the party, just like when you

own anything, you own the house, you got the key, the checkbook. i didn't have the key or the checkbook. meanwhile, we were being hacked by the russians. they were coming after us like you know what. and all i needed was the ability to raise money and to fight, because i wanted hillary to win. i wanted democrats across the country to win. i wanted to motivate and energize this party but i had no -- do you know what they told me? we'll give you two million. i said i need eight. two. i want my money. i wanted to fight. >> clarify one thing because i wanted to fight. in reaction to your piece, the clinton campaign and other democrats have come out and said this joint financial agreement that you've referred to was meant for the general election, not for the primary process. in other words it wouldn't have rigged the primary process. it was meant to defeat -- let me clarify what that was for. >> first of all, let me say this for the record. i was an unpaid officer for eight years. i took this job, given up everything in my life to go over there because i wanted hillary

to win. >> right. >> the attacks on me don't bother me. i've been attacked by the russian and the chinese. i'm so over people trying to threaten folks. i said to them point blank, stop this. i need -- i am a chair of the party. i report to the officers and rank and files of the democratic party. i did not report to the clinton campaign. donna brazile, as an officer of the democratic national committee, did not report to the clinton campaign. i had no fiduciary responsibilities to them. i had fiduciary responsibilities to my party. when the chair of the party cannot sign an s.e.c. report, that is a cancer. i am a fighter, baby. >> we know you're a fighter but i want clarify. >> clarify. >> what's the financial agreement for the general election as the clinton campaign has now claimed or was it for the primary process? >> it was not utilized. let me tell you --

>> general or primary? >> she does not like me to mention her name. amy i said your name. amy and the staff of the democratic party made sure none of those resources went for primary purposes. and i also checked on that. you understand, i did a forensic -- i had no -- what did i have to lose that the point? i had already been, you know, beaten with the hacking. all i wanted to do was get to the bottom of it. i wanted to convince bernie, who said he would go out there and campaign, bernie who said he would raise money, bernie who sent staff over to the dnc. >> bernie, who could have won. >> well, i don't know about that, mika. >> i'll put money on that. >> she won three out of the four contests. i know the democratic party. she won three out of four. i think if the election went on and on, he would have caught up but i don't know if he could have won. >> why is it that you and several other people, who i respect greatly, could not get to the clinton campaign two,

three weeks out before the election with the fact that they were incompetent, that they were depending on algorithms rather than common sense, that they had no sense of scheduling. why is it that so many people were either mute, reluctant or unable to crash into that inner circle and tell them you're going to lose the election? >> mike, everybody knows -- mika, forgive me. i'm a little catholic girl. i cuss and go to church every sunday and say bless me, father, for i have sinned. i try. it was their strategy. it was their plan and i said to them, i understand. but i'm going to colorado. i'm going to florida. i'm in pennsylvania. i'm in these states. i wasn't just sitting in washington, d.c. you could not crack them. if i went back and said i need some pollsters. i need people calling me in little haiti. they want some radio spots.

madam chair, it's okay. it was so con descending. do you know what i did, mika, last week, because i'm this kind of girl i went over and told robby my book is coming out. i text people. i call them. i'm not scared. the book is coming out. it's going to be a little controversial, little hot, because it's dripping with hot sauce. do you know what they did? they did the same thing they did to me last year. they did this. so i wanted hillary to win. i still -- one year ago, i'm sitting here, somewhere in manhattan and i'm hearing from people in the polls are not ope. the machines are down. i'm kauing up to the high command. we've got a problem. we're going to fix it. the night of the election, i'm still on the phone in detroit. turnout is low. i'm still trying to get people to turn out. i'm still trying to get people in flint. don't make me cry because it's too early to cry pause i ain't got nothing that this man has in his cup. let me tell you what made me so

mad. we never had a chance because they didn't compete in places where people didn't get the message. if they would have heard from the campaign, if somebody would have said, mika, i need your help. i need to say one last thing. don't underestimate the russians and what they did. i can tell that story they corrupted our entire data. they corrupted our data bank, our files. they were in our files until october 21st. and they were mean. they took more than our e-mails. they wiped out our files. i had to make a decision. >> so, donna, i want to get down to the core of your criticism. i'm going to use your word, cancer. >> my critique. >> your critique. the cancer you describe it in the book is the financial agreement put in place between the clinton campaign and the dnc. the clinton campaign has said that was intended only for the general election. it was that an agreement about the primary process or just about the general election? >> the paper said the general election. what i found was that they had

already started to make investments in technology, research and communications and by hiring consultants to start doing that, by beginning the general election process before a nominee is chosen, i found that unacceptable and in the book i used the word unethical. >> and that put bernie sanders at a disadvantage? >> i believe it put the democratic process under the spotlight. whether you're martin o'malley, bernie sanders, lincoln chaffe or jim webb, that's not fair. but hillary bailed the campaign out -- the campaign. the political party, the dnc, was broke. >> was it a fair fight, yes or no? >> i believe it was a fair fight. ultimately the voters decided. >> between hillary and bernie, it was a fair fight? >> no shall it was not. i was seeing that in real time. >> what do you mean?

>> you suggested that the financial agreement gave her an advantage. so was it a fair fight in. >> it gave her a strategic advantage on starting the general election internally in terms of putting resources into, what, investigating donald trump, doing research on donald trump. that's what i found. was it a fair fight in terms of the new york primary on april 19th. >> no. >> or the pennsylvania primary? yes. >> but, donna, i think the arrogance the campaign showed you is the arrogance the campaign -- it was the way they conducted themselves throughout the entire process. and debbie wasserman-schultz was no help to this process. joe? >> you saw it time and time again. it wasn't just people on tv talking about how hillary clinton's team wasn't getting it. you had bill clinton being concerned, warning them in august. joe biden warning anybody who would listen. you're going to lose

pennsylvania if you guys don't start figuring out how to run there more effectively. we had ed rendell on during the dnc basically saying hillary was going to lose pennsylvania. and i'm just wondering, how did that bubble, donna? how did they encase themselves in that bubble in brock lynn that stopped them from listening to people like ed rendell, bill cli clinton, you? democrats who had a track record of winning and instead saying we're just doing analytics. we don't need polls. we're going to go to iowa. we don't need to go up to michigan. we're not going to lose wisconsin. she doesn't need to travel there. donald trump is president a year later because of mistakes that the clinton campaign made, as well as james comey, as well as the russians. i'll put it all in there. but it should have never been a

close race. >> i agree with you on that, joe. >> bottom line it for us. why did they lose? was it, at the end of the day, arrogance? >> yes, joe. it was a cult i felt like it was a cult. you could not penetrate them. i mean, i -- look, you can -- i'm a grassroot organizer. i know street politics better than i know sweet politics. i know how to touch people where they live, work, pray and play. i cannot help a candidate, joe, if i don't have the resources, if i cannot spend the resources that the party is raising because there's a blind agreement between -- >> exactly. >> -- a campaign. >> unspoken even. >> and, again, i want my party to come back from this stronger. i like what tom perez is doing. i know he said this is not about my book. baby, i know it's not about my book. it's about making much-needed changes and reform inside the party. i've sat at the table. i want to make room for others

to sit at the table but you have to come into the room knowing you have to change the recipe. yesterday was a wake-up call for the democrats, too. it's coming from the bottom up. it's not top-down anymore. it's bottom-up politics. >> and, mika, we can talk about this agreement all we want to until, as we used to say, until the cows come home. >> right. >> but you remember the iowa caucuses? do you remember the democratic leader out in iowa who was a clinton supporter, rushing out to call the election against bernie sanders for hillary clinton? >> yes. >> do you remember when the debates were scheduled, up against nfl games. do you remember every decision, large and small. >> meetings on a saturday. >> yeah. it was always meant to rig the process against bernie sanders. >> our word, not yours. >> we can have all these legal arguments, all these semantic arguments, go through all these machinations but the democrats

need to stop pretending this didn't happen with debbie wasserman-schultz every step of the way. if they do that and face that reality they'll face 2018 a little bit stronger. but, man, it was rigged in ways large and small from day one. >> the book is "hacks: the inside story of the breakups and breakdowns that put donald trump in the white house." donna brazile, thank you for being on the show. >> thank you, donna. appreciate it. >> i'm going to see you at harvard again. >> of course. >> that was fun. senator dick durbin joins the conversation. david. what's going on? oh hey! ♪ that's it? yeah. ♪ everybody two seconds! ♪

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hellish tlem that democrats have right now, jon heilman is that republicans can't win in primaries in places like virginia without donald trump, but they can't win general elections. that is, for national elections, swing districts, for every election they have to win in 2018 that matters, that is where

republicans find themselves this morning. >> steve baninform on over the weekend saying ed gillespie had gotten religion, was going to get powered by his trumpism to victory. he and others are taking away from that is they're now trashing gillespie and they're not backing off at all. the reason i raise it is not just to say they were wrong but to say that the threat for republican incumbents of getting primaried by the bannon wing of the party is still there, so the box they're in is just still intense. they're not taking the lesson way, we got to back off here. maybe our primary strategy from the trump right isn't going to work. they're going to keep going just as intensely and those republicans therefore face the same even more devilish dilemma than they did before which was pretty devilish. >> yeah. and eddie, just saw somebody tweeting earlier that sean

hannity only talked about virginia loss for the six seconds last night and somebody was bemoaning the fact that this is dangerous because a whole segment of the population is living in an alternate political reality. the danger, actually, is not to the republic, the danger is to republican candidates who are going to continue to be forced to move in a losing direction because they're not getting the news and how ironic, they're being isolated and not seeing the political tsunami come much in the same way liberals didn't see reagan coming because liberals completely dominated the media. so they never saw it coming. conservatives won't see this coming. >> you're absolutely right. there's a caution that we need to put forward here that the sue ma'am my isn't just simply for republicans, that 2016 was a change election and the ripple effects of that are still being felt today.

so the democrats can't see this or read this as simply and embrace of them. the change -- the feeling in the country that something fundamental as to change, that something fundamental is broken, still obtains and democrats need to understand that and republicans have to understand that. >> i think what they're saying right now is something is wrong, but joining us now let's hear from democratic congressman castro of texas. congressman, take a victory lap but also characterize for me what you think happened last night across the board and where we go from here? >> i think it's clear that donald trump has been toxic for the republican party so far. whatever mirks dus touch the president had in the 2016 elections didn't carry over to many elected officials and politicians in his party. it's not uncommon. we've seen that in many midterms, a president's party

get beaten very bad limit this looks like a very strong way of getting ready for 2018. >> mike barnicle? >> i don't know whether it's in your district or not, again, the -- all the talk about gun control and what do we do about the mentally ill who are able to get guns, i don't know whether you're like me and i think a lot of other people sort of giving up the ghost on any talk about gun control. i mean when we're a country that sort of sits back and accepts the fact that two years ago in newtown, connecticut, children were slaughtered in their classrooms and life goes on for the rest of us. where do you we go from here? >> it's hard not to give up hope because we saw what happened in newtown, we've seen what happened in orlando and las vegas and so many other places and then congress does nothing and the news moves on because

the news moves so quickly these days but we can't give up hope. i still believe that we can do something. there has been very positive talk around here, especially since las vegas but certainly now after texas. i think ultimately we will get something done. this is a very thorny issue as you all know and it's one that basically presents all these false choices. the idea that it's either a mental health issue or guns issue for example. it often is a combination of both and i said i think there's two pieces to it, at least. the first say prevention piece, making sure that guns stay out of the wrong hands. that's why i support universal background checks and that's why i also agree with my republican colleagues that we ought to increase funding for mental health. even with those preventive measures, you'll still have people that fall through the cracks the way this guy, this gunman did, people are going to fall through the cracks. that's why the second part of it is you have to make sure that you limit the damage that this

weapon can do. you have to either ban assault rifles as we did in the 1990s or i think you have to ban high capacity magazines. i think it's both those things. >> congressman castro, thank you so much for being on the show this morning. >> thank you. coming up from key governor races to hotly contested down ballot contests and even a ballot measure in maine to expand obamacare, democrats are celebrating major victories this morning. we'll get reaction from the senate's number two democrat dick durbin. plus ever since leaving the obama white house, former photographer has been fact checking president trump with photos whether it's false claim about barack obama and gold star family. pete souzza joins us on set to feature the historic obama presidency. "morning joe" is coming right back. ♪

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you nervous? ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ you know it was said that the eyes of the nation are now on the commonwealth. today virginians have answered and have spoken. virginia has told us to end the divisiveness that we will not condone, hatred and bigotry and to end the politics that have torn this country apart.

>> democrat ralph northam rode to a nine point victory over ed gillespie. the lieutenant governor defeated the tormer rnc chair who attempted to fire up trump space with ads about violent immigrant gangs and confederate monuments. northam will succeed terry mcauliffe where 2.6 million cast ballots, a turnout rate up nearly five points. democrats won the other top offices in the state and wiped out a 32 seat republican majority in the house of delegates and that's just the beginning of the story this morning. good morning, everyone. it's wednesday, november 8th. i think yesterday the discussion was whether or not the democrats had anything going this morning. the story's a little different. with us we have national affairs analyst and john heilman. chair of the department of

african-american american studies at princeton university, eddie flower junior, cofounder and ceo of jim vand high and nbc news capitol hill correspondent and host of kasie d.c. on msnbc, kasie hunt is with us. good morning. joe, wow. something's up for us, a very, very good morning for democrats. >> a very good morning for democrats. they haven't had a good morning like this since barack obama got re-elected in 2012. this has been a long time omming for the democratic party and they actually -- you could sort of see the clouds of doom coming in again, a couple days ago. we went around the panel monday morning asked everybody who they felt was going to win and ed gillespie, ed gillespie. everybody was saying it. by yesterday afternoon, you

started hearing sort of order restored. a lot of conservatives were saying, wait a second, you know, northam may end up winning. the same thing with democrats. it was big. this was big. you look at these races, they call these offyear races but in virginia they always matter. 1993, george allen's land slide victory replacing doug wilder that led to republicans foreshadowing them winning a land slide. a year after barack obama was elected president suggested that the -- the tea party revolution was coming in 2010. i think you have to go back to and i wrote the date down here, january 19th, 2010, when scott brown won that special seat for ted kennedy. after bob mcdonald was elected, to find one offyear election

night that so shifted the landscape of american politics and the expectations of american politics and suggested to the party in power that they were in trouble and meekca, we can all look at ed gillespie's loss, we can look at what happened in maine, we can look all across the country, but if you want to microkozism of what we've been talking about for years, the democratic parties promise with losing 1,000 legislative seats nationwide and saying, their problems not just with hillary clinton, their problem was much larger, well last night donald trump can try to blame ed gillespie, a guy that he and stiefel bannon got behind big time. guess what? the real story here is what happened in the virginia house of delegates. it was a massive land slide all across the commonwealth of virginia. nobody expected this, even the smartest people in politics never saw this coming.

this was a repudiation of donald trump that will be heard around virginia, around the nation and, yes, around the world. >> yep. >> the whole world is watching and they also know what happened in virginia yesterday and they may just believe that maybe some equilibrium is returning to american politics. >> there's some forces for gun control, there's some incredible diverse candidates who are elected last night and incredible emotional stories as well. it was an incredible night on a number of levels and willie, a repudiation of president trump according to a lot of people including some republicans. >> you had this dueling narrative where the gillespie campaign was whispering to reporters. president trump weighed in last night to slam ed gillespie after his loss. trump tweeted, quote, ed gillespie worked hard but did not embrace me or what i stand for. don't forget, republicans won

four out of five house seats. with the economy doing record numbers we will continue to win even bigger than before. according to exit polls, 57% of virginia voters say they disapprove of the way trump shanling the job, 47% disapprove strongly. of the 47% approve, only 22% say they strongly approve. congressman scott taylor a republican from virginia beach, he faulted president trump's divisive rhetoric for proappealing the party to defeat. i do believe that this is a referendum on this administration. democrats turned out tonight but i'm pretty sure there were some republicans who spoke loud little and clearly tonight as well. he added down the ballot, quote, i know folks that lost tonight who were going against candidates i'd never even heard of. joe, you pointed this to democrats, were shock bid what happened last night. one democratic operative said this was not a wave, it was a tsunami. the democrats had taken even

more than five seats since 1975 in an election like this. >> unbelievable and john heilman in a house of delegates, jerry manldser in such a way to not represent the state and still, even -- even going against all those odds, you know, you have to just say, and i don't usually -- we always look at candidates. we get paid to look at candidates and look at their campaigns. let's face it. ralph northam won, congratulations to him. he's got to be feeling great. he should be feeling great. the morning after let's talk about it. everybody on both sides of the aisle said this guy ran one of the worst closing campaigns they had seen in recent memory and yet virginia voters stood in the rain, they stood in long lines. i had somebody tweet at me yesterday, there was a long line

and i do believe, i do believe that next year may be the year of quote, women voters and women candidates because i hear stories of women standing in the rain in northern virginia in long lines and they weren't going to move until they got their vote against donald trump. just like last year. i still say that election wasn't about donald trump as much as it was hillary clinton. last night wasn't as much about ralph northam as it was voters, republicans, moderates, democrats and women sending a message to donald trump. >> yeah. if you look at -- i agree with everything you just said. northam ran a particularly not great race. he didn't win by a little bit. i was on yesterday i was hearing from people in the commonwealth, gillespie's win is overstated.

he won by nine points having run a not great race. he won nine points. there was no one, republican, democratic, independent, no one was suggesting that victory for him. and you look at where he won the race. ed gillespie managed to turn in trump-like numbers in the southwest of the state. his second goal was to try to limit the damage in northern virginia, in those suburbs that are filled with those women voters and those people that are alienated by donald trump. not only did ed gillespie limit his -- he got slaughtered there. he performed way worse than -- >> and john, this is a warning for republicans in 2017 and 2018, because i know you know the numbers here. touch on this if you will. ed gillespie who got slaughtered, swamped in northern virginia, this is a guy when he

wasn't pretending to be donald trump shocked everybody in his senate campaign and outperformed what everybody thought he would do across the state of virginia and even in northern virginia. >> three years ago, ed gillespie won louden count which is an excerpting county. he won that county three years ago and he got beat there by double digits last night. >> wow. >> it's -- this is going to send a message. we talk about how these national -- midterm elections move in waves. there's a very practical consequences that's going to happen right now. one of them is on the basis of you started -- have you seen republican candidates or republican incumbents deciding to retire in the house. on the basis of republicans i talked to on capitol hill, there's two dozen republican incumbents who have been contemplating retiring and waiting to see what was going to happen in these offyear elections and read the wind and

weather for generally. most of those people will retire. they'll look at the situation and say, this is horrible for us. we'll see some republicans that say it's not worth it. secondly, democrats are going to be able to recruit candidates like crazy on the back of this end. there's going to be such -- there's such a boost for tom perez, his strategy, the way it worked across the state. you'll see candidate quality, candidate recruitment. candidate quality is going to go way up. and that's going to make a huge difference. just beyond the national mood and electorate, there's going to be these practical consequences that are going to matter a lot in who control congress in 2018. still ahead on of the most vulnerable governors. nine of them were democrats. can they start breathing a little easier? will ask one of the party's

leaders, senator dick durbin. bill karins with a check on the forecast. >> two rain storms and an arctic outbreak. now as far as the northeast goes, heavy rain yesterday and overnight has exited and in its wake temperatures are in the 20s and 30s. so it's a brisk morning out there. the rain is developing in texas. you go six hours, it dependents look like much and all the bright yellows and oranges. it's going to be a soaking rain through abilene and greenville, ms and jacksonville. that rain's heading for you. the next thing we'll talk about and it's about the time of year it should happen. first big arctic outbreak coming down from canada and today only 18. that's not factoring in the wind or cloud cover and that cold air is mostly going to clip the northern half of the country. it's not going to dive into the southeast. on thursday only 17 in duluth.

chicago on thursday your temperature's will be falling during the day. we'll get heavy lake-effect snow. by friday the cold air's in northern new england. new york city only at 38 and by the time we get to saturday morning, finally the end of the growing season in areas like d.c. and new york as temperatures will drop down into the mid-20s. today's travel map not too bad. anybody traveling out of dallas-ft. worth, that's where we should have delays from that cold rain. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. we'll be right back. clarify we're on a mission to show drip coffee drinkers, it's time to wake up to keurig. wakey! wakey! rise and shine! oh my gosh! how are you? well watch this. i pop that in there. press brew. that's it. look how much coffee's in here? fresh coffee. so rich. i love it. that's why you should be a keurig man! full-bodied. are you sure you're describing the coffee and not me?

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bannon said he's a changed man. >> he's really embraced the trump agenda. he may be up one or two points. if you're looking for virginia to see the grassroots coming out and as gillespie has now articulated it was the grassroots fill up with win. >> that was on sunday two days before election day. abc news reporting two sources close to bannon say he offered to rally for gillespie but the campaign rejected it. quote, bannon camp fuming tonight as they reportedly were kept out of the race. you can go down last night governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, the house that huge wave in that house of democrats winning in virginia. new jersey, phil murphy winning as expected but in a blowout thanks to donald trump and chris christie, some combination there. the state of maine voting to expand medicaid. this was talking to democrats some kind of catharsis for the last year. they feel like they fought and

resisted and this is what happened. what lessons will be learned from democrats? what happens from here? >> what matters most is number one, if you look at virginia and new jersey, these are states democrats should win if you look at the states and look at what happens in historically. i don't think we're hyperventilating in overinterpreting in what happened for these elections for that scott brown reason that joe pointed out earlier. imagine this morning if gillespie had won, imagine the finger pointing, imagine the funk that democrats would be in. suddenly that changes and for the first time in a year they have a reason to smile, reason to believe that money will flow in, that momentum will drift their way and that they now have a formula that could lead them back to power. this doesn't mean they do win -- >> let's not get ahead of ourselves. >> there is still a funk. all the -- northam's running a terrible race in the final weeks. he won by 24 points among people who made up their mind at the last minute and so that tells me

that, well, maybe it was gillespie's racially tinged campaign at the end that backfired that we did not fully appreciate that there would be consequences for, maybe that's why women went by 22 points for northam. women won the election for democrats. >> yep. >> and that's what i was saying. this year, again, the tweets that people were sending and messages they were sending when we did our facebook live yesterday afternoon. one of the reasons why we shifted at about 3:00 yesterday afternoon and said, wait a second, it looks like northam is going to win this is because we heard. again, women, standing -- men did too, but it's a first time i've heard people saying women standing in the rain in northern virginia and they're not going to move. women standing in charlottesville and they're not going to move. we were getting these messages across twitter, across facebook

live that they're were women that were going to send a message, a strong message to donald trump and they did. >> and that's a huge opportunity. that's a huge moment. that's a huge reaction to trump. that's not necessarily a gal have a in aization of the democratic party which is now the opportunity is definitely before the democrats, the question is can they run with it? >> this is really complex and we have to parse it. one of the things we have to see is the convergence of three factors. against trump, the resistance. how that manifests itself in terms of activism and organizing in the ground and how it evidenced itself in turnout. there were folks that were motivated by resist trump. >> by what they don't like like they saw with health care and what they're seeing with guns and this president. that's great. >> our revolution, bernie sanders, folks, they were getting elected. they were being motivated by a

range of other issues that single-payer, range of issues around gun control. a whole range of issues. this is going to be complex. what's interesting too, the urban vote turned out very high as well. there was a higher turnout of black voters in urban centers as well. >> coming up, after melania trump did this, pete souzza posted this, the former chief official white house photographer joins us with his new collections of images some of which he's been using to troll the president. if you move your old 401(k) to a fidelity ira,

we make sure you're in the loop at every step from the moment you decide to move your money to the instant your new retirement account is funded. because when you know where you stand, things are just clearer. -♪ a little bit o' soul, yeah because when you know where you stand, accused of obstructing justice to theat the fbinuclear war, and of violating the constitution by taking money from foreign governments and threatening to shut down news organizations that report the truth. if that isn't a case for impeaching and removing a dangerous president, then what has our government become? i'm tom steyer, and like you, i'm a citizen who knows it's up to us to do something. it's why i'm funding this effort to raise our voices together and demand that elected officials

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so there were notable local losses for republicans around the country last night. delaware county, pennsylvania, which for a century had one of the countries most powerful republican machines, democrats out polled republicans for the county council for the first time ever. after planting yard signs to vote against trump. in nassau county, new york, home to another republican machine, democrat laura curran claimed victory over republican county executive jack martens and republican rob astor reno lost in another of new york's mega

county. all the way down the line? >> yeah, going to go to john in a second. astoreino represented you in west chester county. he was unbeatable and his commercials were on nonstop. he obviously -- i was thinking, one commercial after another after another, that there's no way the democrat had a chance in this race because he must have had, you know, so much more money and so much more support and edelmhe'd been there for qu while. west chester county is the type of county across america where republicans before trump could figure out ways to win but of after trump, mika, they're going to lose. >> yeah, absolutely. and what we're looking at in terms of the races all the way down the line it's is a response

on a much bigger level. no ads could compete with the sentiment out there. >> it's hard to overstate the degree of toxicity that trump represents right now on the basis of what we saw yesterday. that may or may not a year from now continue. we've asked a question for a year, there seems to be a lot of energy out there, anti-trump energy in a lot of places. will it translate at the batlll box? last night suggested that we're looking at the answer to that is yes and no one would ever want to say to democrats you don't need more of a message than just bashing trump but on the basis of last night that's a pretty good start in a lot of places. >> hey, john. >> go ahead, joe. >> i'm sorry. i was just going to say, i've always said that you can beat something with nothing in off-year elections you can't beat something with nothing in presidential races. >> sure. >> but you sure as hell can and

the republicans proved it from 2010 to 2016, they said we're going to run against obamacare, they never had a plan. they -- and they're paying for it now. but you're exactly right. i was thinking at the end of last night, democrats don't need a message. it would help them if they had a message. >> it sure would. >> just if -- and this is what's so shocking to me, john, i don't understand it. why does donald trump, why do his political people and why do some republicans think they can ever win nationally with a 33% solution? they have a message and we have said it on this show for nine months that appeals to one-third of the electorate. we saw what happens in elections when you only appeal to a third of voters. >> something that -- it was made

manifest last night. what is the fundamental thing that donald trump hasn't accomplished in the course of his first ten months in office? it's not that he hasn't accomplished anything on the legislative front. that's a big failure. he's not persuaded a single person in the country who didn't vote for him on election night in 2016 to be for him now and you look at what happened. yesterday in all of these races, there's not anybody whose minds have been changed and is now for trump and trumpism who wasn't for it a year ago. in fact, there are fair number of people who have gone in the other direction. he's managed to worsen his political standing rather than improve it and for someone that came in with the political that he had, it's a huge failure. the party's going to have to cope with over the next 12 months for sure. coming up on morning yoe, few people had closer access to president obama than pete souzza. he has a new collection of

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>> this morning we haven't had a chance to talk about democratic phil murphy literally jumping for joy last night after he was elected governor of new jersey in his first run for political office. he's happy. the retired wall street executive beat chris christie kim guadagno by 13 points and in another election development. democrats captured a majority in the washington state senate last night. the chamber was the last one controlled by republicans on the west coast. democrats lost it in 2012, so what a big night on so many levels. i want to see that jump for joy again. that was like real. that came from the heart.

it wasn't like -- it wasn't cool. but it was okay. yes! >> you know who did that same jump right now, chris christie. he's pretty happy to be out of that office. >> yeah. joining us now is the democratic whip dick durbin of illinois who did that too, senator durbin. >> what an entrance? >> i love it. >> it was human. and sane. a lot of these democrats elected are sane. we had the ahead of the dnc telling us that's where it begins. contrasting to some republicans including the president. how would you characterize what happened last night? >> this was a big deal. i talked to tim kaine and mark warner earlier in the evening and it's about more than virginia. this is about our country and it's about the future of issues in congress. let me be specific. if gillespie had prevailed with his message, talking about illegal immigrants, talking

about northam supporting pedophiles, talking about restoring and saving confederate statues, where would we be this morning? instead i hope more republicans get the message last night that americans are looking for us to work together and solve problems. that's a good message and a timely one for congress. >> joe? >> so let me ask you senator durbin, there's been some talk the president called in talked to democrats yesterday about the tax plan. are you actually asking the question are democrats going to help republicans out on this tax plan that they've offered, i'm a conservative republican. i'm a conservative independent now. i'm an independent because the party ceased being conservative but why would democrats ever help on a tax package that raises the debt so much that senator lankford and say they can't support it. raises the debt and raises

taxes. we've seen a new study out that it raises taxes for a lot of americans and yet benefits some of the richest in america and even exempts the richest in america and hedge fund managers from that state and local tax deduction cut that they're putting in there. so basically they're going to impact working class americans but they're not going to impact the richest of the rich. so why would any democrat support that package? >> i don't know of a single one who does if you ask democrats are we in favor of working with the republicans to come up with a responsible tax reform package, count me in. i'd like to sit down and be in that conversation. >> what does that look like? >> i can tell you, we can help working families. for example, this notion of the republicans to eliminate the deduction for interest on student loans, what are they thinking? these young people and they're families are struggling to get this done. we should be helping them get this debt out of the way so they can have a good life.

we need to look at corporate tax changes that reward companies that stay in america and keep jobs here. sheryl brown and i have a bill together, patriots employers bill. let's reward those companies that pay a good paychecks to americans, keep the jobs here in the united states, good health care, good retirement, veterans preference. the things that should be rewarded. we shouldn't be subsidizing those companies that want to move overseas so count me in for a conversation about that kind of tax reform. >> let me ask you one more question about taxes and then we'll turn it over to everybody else on the panel to talk about last night's momentous elections. you've got a lot of republicans, small business owners across the state of illinois that get crushed every year, paying state and local taxes. why would republicans in the state of illinois, why would republicans in connecticut, why would republicans in new york, why would republicans in california, in any other state

support a tax package that would crush their own republican small business owners and independent small business owners? that doesn't seem to make sense. >> i think it boils down to the fact that the five states hit the hardest are blue states and illinois is certainly one of those. new york, california, but we look at those states within those states there are republican members of congress, seven in illinois who are hearing it back home when they go back home, this notion of paying a tax on a tax, we rejected that idea when we created the federal income tax and now the republicans want to make that part of their package. i had a press conference on monday with the realtors and home builders in the state of illinois. they're opposed to this republican package. they say it's going to really hurt home ownership and the construction of new homes, industries that create good paying jobs in communities that are republican and democratic across our state. i don't think the republicans thought through clearly what they're doing with this tax break for the wealthy.

>> and you bring up a great point about blue state, yes. the five states effected the most are blue states but you know willie, i've got a lot of republican friends that are small business owners who say, man, i'm just getting crushed with taxes and if i had to add this to my tax bill, i got to move to florida. so yes, some of these states may be blue states at the end of the day but they're 40, 45% republicans. a lot of small business owners that are going to get hurt. >> yeah. >> that's exactly right. >> this is the one thing donald trump wants to get done and feels like he needs to get done to have something on the board by the end of the year. we'll see if that takes place. senator, i want to ask you about another issue, the shooting in texas yesterday involving an ar 15. you've been outspoken over gun control and what we can do to better keep guns out of the hands that shouldn't have them. your state of illinois has tough background checks. chicago has a massive gun problem as i need not remind you, approaching 600 homicides again this year.

what can you do differently in the state of illinois? if you've got these background checks that cover so many people. i will know you believe the problem is the flow of guns, how do you stop a criminal from buying a gun out of the trunk of a car that came in from indiana and committing a murder in chicago? >> willie, born in illinois, put his finger right on it, we're next to indiana. if you go to a gun show in indiana you can purchase a gun without a background check and so that's what's happening. the drug gangs and these thugs are filling up the trunks of their cars and heading into chicago and we see these gun violence crimes happening every single day. we're almost at 600 dead this year from gun violence in our city of chicago. so we need to do two things that are obvious. first make sure straw purchasers, the girlfriend with no criminal record who buys the gun for the boyfriend whose a convicted felon. make sure we make that law a tough law worth enforcing. and secondly we've got to close this gun show loophole.

there's no excuse. when i bring out with some hope out of the situation this terrible tragedy in texas is when i hear the texas senator like john coryn talk about we should've known more about this man before he was sold a gun. that's exactly the point before a comprehensive background check. keep guns out of the hands of those who misuse them. >> what do you do with somebody like the shooter in las vegas who went through all those background checks, who passed all those background checks, bought his weapons legally, how would you have stopped that? >> i don't know that i can. i can't imagine any sportsman, hunter or person wanted to defend himself or his family who needs to have a bump stock so they can discharge 100 rounds in seven seconds. for goodness sakes, that is a military assault weapon. it has no business being sold on open market in the united states. >> is it just the bump stock, senator, or the weapon itself? do you believe that assault style weapons ought to be banned? >> i do. and i've supported that.

i think that you can give to any sportsman or hunter the fire a.m. they need to use legal little and responsibly and it shouldn't be a military assault weapon. >> we've been talking about gun control and gun owners for ions of time and when you bile an automobile and put the car on the road you have to prove that you have insurance on that automobile. what about a federal statute applying the insurance idea to gun ownership? that if you buy a shotgun, handgun, no matter what you have to insure it in a fairly substantial insurance cost, do you think that might deter at least the idea of purchasing guns? >> i don't think so. it is a step way beyond our current conversation but i do think that when you look at the polls and find that the overwhelming majority of gun owners in this country support comprehensive background checks then you know you have an issue within the realm of political reality and that's why i'm

hoping that more and more people who do own firearms will step up and say i want to protect my second amendment right, i want to use my gun legally and safely i'm sick and tired of these terrible gun massacres and i will want to do something about it that is sensible. i'll join with people who want to do the same thing. >> all right. david? >> so senator, there's a euphoria as democrats look at yesterday's results but still an awfully dangerous world. i want to ask you whether you think there's any way that leaders of congress can bring any more steadiness to u.s. foreign policy in this very difficult period in the aftermath of this kind of a day of corrective public action? any thoughts about that? >> i hope that it will end up with a foreign policy that recognizes we live in a dangerous world and a president who understands that in this dangerous world we don't need to create new problems. for example, the president announcing that he doesn't

believe the iranians have been in compliance with the nuclear agreement that we have with them. 20 of us and democratic senators met with the iae inspector and the problems they've had with iran are minuscule and they are complying with the treaty. why would we want to provoke that country into building a nuclear weapon? we have north korea that's enough of a real threat and to make the situation worse is unacceptable. we need a president who really focuses on diplomacy, stability and really is careful with what he says in his tweets. >> senator dick durbin, thank you very much for being on the show this morning. >> thank you. up next, emerging from behind the lens. james comey made famous the curtains in the oval office after using them to try and hide from president trump. pete souzza who photographed president obama's white house. he joins us with a new collection of his most memorable images and president obama is

putting that new 280 character limit on twitter to use this morning writing up last night's races, quote, this is what happens when the people vote. "morning joe" is coming right back. p. getting kinda' close to my ride. wow... now, that's how you make a first impression. they're going to love you... that's ford, america's best-selling brand. hurry in today for 0% financing for 72 months across the full line of ford cars, trucks and suvs! and just announced...get 0% apr for 72 months plus $1000 cash back! take advantage of these exclusive holiday offers during the ford year end sales event.

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see how much you can save with sofi. the leader in student loan refinancing. 48 past the hour. joining us former chief official white house photographer pete souzza, his new book, obama, an intimate portrait features more than 300 photo taken by pete

during barack obama's eight years in the white house. thanks for being on. this looks amazing. how you doing? >> i'm doing good. >> i was just flipping through it. this is going to take quite some time. it's kind of given today's news, it's exciting to look at these pictures once again because we've been through such turbulent times. you're using some of these pictures to troll the president himself. tell us about that? >> well i have an instagram feed and i post some throwback photos of president obama and i let the feed speak >> because pictures speak for themselves, obviously and tell the truth. little moments of truth. >> facts matter. >> facts matter. >> pete, over your eight years the two terms of president obama, it seems just looking at your photography like you were in just about every room. you were in just about every meeting. could you describe the kind of access that you had?

did the president ever say, pete, get the hell out of the room? >> it helped that i had a prior relationship with him in that i had been working for the chicago tribune and met him with a senator so i knew him four befo became president. but that was a condition of the job, to truly document the president for history, you really need to be in everything. so i asked for that access and i think he trusted me enough to allow me to be in essentially every meeting that he ever had. >> wow. >> you know, pete, there are so many photos both on your instagram feed and obviously in this book that i think would cause many americans upon seeing them to stop and think, you know, wow, that's a time that we truly miss. there's the iconic photograph that was on the instagram feed just a few days ago sha, the rainbow. the president is at the top of the steps of air force one. the photograph that you posted on halloween of the president with a youngster in a batman

uniform in the oval office. what goes through your mind today as you look back putting these photos together as a collection for this book? >> my goal going into the job was to create the best photographic archive that had ever been done of a president. my goal for the book was to create the best photographic book of a president that had ever been done. and hopefully i've presented the narrative of his eight years, but also tried to include some really cool pictures that occurred during his administration. >> you did. >> john heilemann. >> i'm curious over the time that you shot him, just in the white house, let's take those eight years, how did the challenge and the relationship change over that period of time? you said you knew him before he started becoming president but he changed as president in various ways.

how did the relationship between the two of you evolve? >> as far as the relationship, when you spend that much time with someone, you obviously grow closer to them. so i got to know him quite well and he got to know me quite well. i think in the end we were friends. not the kind of friend that he would invite me over for dinner, but let's play cards while we're on air force one, that kind of friend. >> you were also kind of artist and subject, so that relationship presumably evolved in some ways. speak to that a little bit, if it did change, how did it change? >> i don't know that it changed. i think that after the first few months, he became so accustomed to me being around that i was able to capture much more intimate pictures. i was almost like part of the family. >> and these pictures from newtown. >> yeah. >> you were there for every second of this president receiving the news, processing the news, and then coping with the news. >> well, i mean even today he says that was his worst day as president. and i think he was reacting not just as a president, but as a

fellow parent. >> as a human. joe? >> hey, pete, because you were so close to him and you covered him so long, talk about -- and of course every president is complex. they all have different sides of their personalities. it always struck me that barack obama was constantly criticized from afar for being aloof. and he was -- i mean democratic senators would say that to us off the record all the time. he's so aloof. he's a professor. and yet whenever you met him in person, he was warm, personable. he seemed and likeable. can you talk about the two obamas and where you saw those two obamas coming into conflict? >> there were not two obamas. i mean i think what happens oftentimes is a president -- there's a caricature created of him and that's the way people think about him. he was not aloof. he was from hawaii. he was laid back. he enjoyed the friends that he had had for much of his life.

he didn't circuit the washington cocktail party. that's just who he was. that wasn't aloof. i don't know where that all got started, but i never saw that. >> it was good judgment. >> the book is -- >> certainly doesn't look it in the pictures, does he, mika? >> no, not at all. this is amazing. the book is "obama, an intimate portrait." out now. pete souza, thank you for coming on. it looks great. >> fueling a lot of nostalgia with that book. up next, one of the more emotional stories from last night's elections in virginia. keep it right here on "morning joe." (sigh) ( ♪ ) dad: molly! trash! ( ♪ ) whoo! ( ♪ )

mom: hey, molly? it's time to go! (bell ringing) class, let's turn to page 136, recessive traits skip generations. who would like to read? ( ♪ ) molly: i reprogrammed the robots to do the inspection. it's running much faster now. see? it's amazing, molly. thank you. ( ♪ ) we're on a mission to show drip coffee drinkers, it's time to wake up to keurig. wakey! wakey! rise and shine! oh my gosh! how are you? well watch this. i pop that in there. press brew. that's it. so rich. i love it. that's why you should be a keurig man!

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yesterday for a veirginia delegate seat against an incumbent lawmaker. he's the former news anchor whose girlfriend, the woman he wanted to marry and fellow tv reporter, alison parker, was killed during a live broadcast back in 2015. we spoke to chris hurst on "morning joe" after she was killed. >> we were going to get married. she died at her happiest, i can tell you that. i was talking with her parents last night and we believe that. she celebrated her birthday a week ago on the 19th, she turned 24. for her birthday every year she went down to the river outside nashville and went white water rafting and kayaker. she normally is a kayaker. she's really good at it. i don't know what i'm doing out on the water so we did white water rafting because that was a little easier. it was the best time i ever had. she had a great time too. there was a gazebo and log

cabins and it's beautiful and tranquil. we were in separate rafts. she turned back to me and she said, chris, this is where i want to marry you. >> last night hurst spoke to his old station about alison saying, quote, i think she would have been proud of me. i think knowing alison and how determined and driven she was, she probably would have wanted me to perform even better than we did. on that note, final thoughts now, joe. >> yeah. i'll go to a tweet by charlotte alter from "time." a transwoman beat a guy who had a bathroom bill. a a civil rights lawyer who sued the police department just became the top prosecutor in philadelphia. something is happening here folks. willie, bottom lining this, donald trump's 33% solution is no solution at all for a republican party that now finds

itself boxed in. >> and to republican candidates running one year from now on election night, they might look at ed gillespie and wonder is it worth it to adopt pieces of donald trump's legacy? perhaps not, john. >> something happening here, and in this case i think it's pretty clear what's happening here. we're going to see a lot of kplications of it coming forward. >> mike. >> yeah, i think it's the slow reawakening of america and americans and who we are and what this country is all about. >> long road ahead, though. that does it for us this morning. stephanie ruhle picks up the coverage right now. >> thanks so much, mika. thanks, joe. hi there, i'm stephanie ruhle. this morning, a blue wave. democrats win big across the country sending a clear message just one year after the president's victory. >> virginia has told us to end the divisiveness, that we will not condone hatred and bigotry. >> phone a friend. democrats go to the white house for a call with the president to talk taxes, ando