little while. >> before we hand it over to "morning joe" i want to announce that amin will be back tomorrow morning after spending the last couple of months with his newborn son. but with that, we also want to thank geoff bennett who has been getting up early for us for the last three months or so. it's been such a pleasure to sit next to you, geoff. i really appreciate it. good luck with the 112 degree white house on the white house north lawn. we'll be watching. >> thanks to you and the crew for being so welcoming. >> of course. it's been a pleasure to have you. with that being said, that does it for us on this tuesday morning. i'm yasmin vossoughian, alongside geoff bennett who will be back filling in for amin whenever he's on vacation. "morning joe" starts right now. if you're not happy in the u.s., if you're complaining all the time very simply you can leave. what i don't like -- i don't like mosquitos. i don't like her temperament. i don't like the expression you can't do worse because frankly they can do worse. right now, i don't like mosquitos too much. i don't like critics. i don't even like using the "h"

word, you know, the place that's down there. i don't like assad at all. i don't like people leaving a speech early crying. i don't like when i see people burning our flag. i don't like the way that looks. look, i don't like tweeting. i don't like talking about how i feel about people. i don't like the word adjustment. i don't like that, you don't like that. i don't like losing. i don't like losing. i don't like pinocchios. come back if you want, don't come back. if you're not happy, you can leave. >> all right. well, if you're complaining all the time, well, you can simply leave. this is of course the same president who when he ran for president talked about quote, a crippled america. he said america was crippled. do you remember when he went down that gold plated escalator and remember what he said? he said the american dream is

dead. and then -- oh, my gosh, what about his inaugural speech, what did he talk about? despite the fact that the crime rate was at a 50 year low, despite the fact that illegal border crossings were at a 50 year low, the president spoke of quote, american carnage. like he made things up to be angry about with america. he lied about america. lied about america and all of the horrible things that were going on in america. the american dream said, no, american dream is not dead. the american dream has never been dead. but using donald trump's own logic, he should have gone back to scotland. because his mother was an immigrant there. his grandparents were immigrants from germany and now he's saying because the duly elected members of congress are doing what he does every day, criticizing things about the country, they should go home. it's ridiculous. good morning. welcome to "morning joe." today is july 16th.

with us we have msnbc political analyst and former chairman of the republican national committee michael steele. we have politics editor, sam stein. washington anchor for the bbc world news america, katty kay. and associate editor of "the washington post" and msnbc political analyst eugene robinson. and rogers professor of the presidency at vanderbilt university, jon meacham. he is of course an nbc news and msnbc contributor. mika of course went out to iowa yesterday to interview joe biden. we'll be showing you an extended interview today. she caught a late flight back, so she won't be with us today. but we're going to be bringing you the key moments of her sit down with the vice president straight ahead and throughout the morning. but jon meacham, before we get to all the nonsense and the chaos of yesterday, this sort of

reminds me what trump has picked up on here is what we saw as little kids, bumper stickers during the vietnam war, which is america, love it or leave it. and i suppose it might be a more effective coming from donald trump if donald trump didn't build his entire political campaign over false conspiracy theories that lied about the presidents of the united states, that lied about america's crime rate. that lied about our standing in the world, that lied constantly to try to tear this country down. the man has spent his entire political career tearing this country down. so now very odd. he turns his sights on freshmen congresswomen and says basically the same thing we heard in the 1960s and '70s, america, love it or leave it. >> right. and thereby manages yet again to

corrupt and has no understanding of the singular contribution of american values to the idea -- the perennial idea of national identity. the thing about being an american is it's not about blood, and it's not about soil. it's about the ascent to an idea. do you agree with thomas jefferson that all men are created equal or endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights and are you devoted to the journey to if the more perfect union. we didn't apply it when he wrote it and we haven't fully applied it even now, but to be patriotic is to be a protester because you want the union to be more perfect. you might want it to be perfect. but the insight of the founders is more perfect is as good as

we'll get on this side of paradise. i think that's one of the things that has to be confronted here is that i don't believe the president actually understands what i just said. you don't have to take it from me. take it from ronald reagan about whom he's tweeted a fake meme that says ronald reagan said that he met donald trump and was going to be president. i mean, it's just -- you know, it's the truman show. >> a complete lie. >> it's just madness, it's madness. and so reagan said, you know, you can be born -- you have to be born in france to be a frenchmen. you have to be born in britain to be an englishman, but you don't have to be born here to be an american. >> good thing for donald trump because his mother was not born here. his father was the son of german immigrants. and it's so funny, some of these

people that donald trump attacked for coming from other countries actually had parents in america more than donald trump did. but anyway, of course why argue facts with donald trump? that's not what this is about. this is donald trump. of course it's not a dog whistle, it's a bull horn to his most bigoted, racist supporters and we'll just see what happens. so president trump meant most of the day doubling down on those tweets over the weekend. attacking a group of progressive women for being critical of the united states just like the president is constantly critical of the united states. during the event that was supposed to highlight american made products, donald defended his remarks in which he said the four democrats should quote, go back to the crime infested places from which they came. of course when he says that he's

talking about cincinnati, and detroit and new york city. later in the day the four congresswomen that president trump attacked in the tirade stood side by side to denounce the comments. here is a little bit of how the day unfolded. >> as far as i'm concerned, if you hate our country, if you're not happy here, you can leave. >> our squad is big. our squad includes any person committed to building a more equitable and just world. >> if you're complaining all the time very simply, you can leave. you can leave right now. >> this is not the first nor will it be the last time we hear disgusting bigoted language from the president. we know this is who he is. >> they can leave. they can leave. you know what? i'm sure that they'll be -- there will be many people that won't miss them. >> weak minds and leaders challenge loyalty to our country in order to avoid challenging

and debating the policy. >> in one case you have somebody that comes from somalia, which is a failed government, a failed state. who left somalia, who ultimately came here and now is a congresswoman who's never happy. >> he would love nothing more than to divide our country based on race, religion, gender orientation or immigration status. >> they hate our country with a passion. the voter will decide. >> by the way, this is -- it's just pure insanity considering again how negative donald trump has been about america. how critical he has been of american leaders his entire adult life, but katty kay we'll get to republicans not being critical of donald trump in a minute and how shameful so many of them have been. but my gosh, this is sending shock waves across the world because the world has seen

america as a country that has accepted immigrants and is always called the melting pot. even teresa may yesterday came out and condemned rightfully donald trump's remarks. >> not just teresa may, but boris johnson who will take over in all likelihood next week and when you lose piers morgan who has been a staunch defender of this president, an unusual voice defending the president very forcefully in the british media, and yet, piers morgan also came out yesterday and said that what donald trump said was wrong, then the president does have a problem internationally. look, this is what authoritarian regimes do. they say you cannot criticize the leadership. you cannot criticize this country. if you criticize anything about it, it means you're not being patriotic. that's what we hear from authoritarian regimes around the world. not what we hear from democracies, it's not what we're used to hearing from the united states. it is one of the strongest gifts

that a democratic system can give its citizens is the right to point out failures and criticisms and weakness in the systems without being thrown out of the country or being thrown into jail or ostracized from the community. this is the president who in his very first act as president stood up in his inaugural address and spoke about american carnage. how critical is that of this country? i have never heard a president speak in that kind of dark language about america the way that donald trump did when he was inaugurated. >> he slandered america. he lied about this country. he made up things that sounded like it was in the summer of 1968 about american carnage when crime rates were so low in new york city at that time they couldn't compare it to any other time frame when records were

being made. same thing with border crossings. at 50 year lows. and yet, donald trump lied about american carnage. he slandered our country. and he continued to do it. he lied about our president. he lied about barack obama. he lied about george w. bush. he lied time and time again about this country. so just -- it's very curious that suddenly no one's allowed to criticize the united states of america when that has helped donald trump build his political career. again, talking about america being quote, crippled. make america great again, america has always been great. so we talked about the republicans who didn't step forward, a few stepped forward yesterday. responding to questions. you -- they decided to publicly admonish the president's tweets

as wrong or inappropriate. only tim scott the only black senator called them racially offensive and only congressman mike turner and will hurd went so far as to use the term racist. >> i think those tweets are racist and xenophobic and inaccurate. the four women he's referring to are actually citizens of the united states. three of the four were born here. it's also behavior that's unbecoming of the leader of the free world. you should be talking about things that unite us, not divides us. >> as hard as it is to believe, there were some republicans who didn't just run away from the cameras like cowards. they actually embraced the president's tweets. you had gop senator steve daines who faces re-election next year and he wrote that montanans are sick and tired of listening to anti-american, anti-semite

radical democrats trash our country and our ideals. this is america, we're the greatest country in the world. i stand with donald trump. just doesn't all go together. anyway, republican congressman ralph abraham wrote there's no question that members of congress that donald trump called out have absolutely said anti-american and anti-accesemi things. i'll pay for their tick eettes out of the country if they tell where they want to be. it's not racist to tell the natural born citizens to go back to their countries. senator perdue was said to which the georgia republican responded, that's outrageous, of course they're not racist. maybe you should talk to tim scott. senator rick scott of florida said it was not racist. what do we expect? congressman harris of maryland

said they're obviously not racist. in what world there, buddy? senator tim tillis of north carolina tried to dodge the issue saying it literally don't go on twitter. i wonder if he just lives under a rock and doesn't watch the news or read the news or talk to anybody else. what a coward. i'm sure the people of north carolina will take that into consideration. when they vote next year. white house senior adviser ivanka trump declined a request to comment on the tweets and other top white house officials defended those remarks. >> do you find the president's tweets racists and what do you make of white nationalists praising the tweets? >> again, i don't find them racist, the president just went on and clarified his comments. i think he speaks for himself. >> i don't think that the president's intent is racist.

>> mark, how is it not racist to tell women of color to go back to their country when they're born here? >> he has an asian woman of color in his cabinet. >> what, gene, what? you can attack -- you have one asian-american woman of quote color in your cabinet, so you can tell u.s. citizens to go back to their countries because they're black? it's insanity. the republicans, how shameful. how shameful. i never ever imagined it would get this bad. >> you know, i thought it was like 1949 or 1959 all of a sudden. look, we knew that donald trump was racist. i mean, that's not a headline. that's not breaking news, but this isn't country club sort of

not our sort of people racism. this is end of the bar 1:00 a.m., go back to africa kind of racism. >> this is david duke -- i said it yesterday, gene, i'll say it today. this is david duke racists. >> it is. >> i know some trump suckups yesterday that wrote things critical of me saying that. all i said was you lift david duke's words and donald trump's words and i guarantee you can put them together and find duke tweets our quotes that sound just like what donald trump has been saying in the past couple of days. >> absolutely. david duke, go back to george wallace and lester maddux. this is bad, bad stuff. this is the president of the united states who made i think a wrong political calculation. made a political calculation to go flatout racist i guess to

energize his base. his aging white base and draw that line. he seemed to be trying to make more mischief for democrats. he of course had the opposite effect. he managed to bring democrats together who had been squabbling. they're now united and i want to see republicans go on record as -- >> yeah. >> let them vote today. let's hear from them. to completely -- it's a completely disgraceful performance from an organization that used to call itself the party of lincoln has forfeited any right to do so in the future. this is -- this was just appalling, stunning. i guess not shocking because it's donald trump but we know who we're dealing with now. this is just flatout racism. >> well, yeah. and it is and mr. chairman, let

me go to you. you ran the republican party. michael steele, it seems unrecognizable to me. we don't have to go back to 1860s to talk about lincoln. we can go back to ronald reagan in 1989 in his farewell address to america and what did he talk about? he talked about immigrants, that this party would be strong so long as we remained a nation of immigrants and welcomed refugees to our shores and welcomed immigrants to our shores and here we are, a party that loves -- and a president that loves to embrace ronald reagan doing the complete opposite of what reagan said they should do when he was leaving the white house and public service. >> exactly right, joe. even while reagan may have started off at times on the wrong footing, for example, launching his campaign in the heart of mississippi and calling up some of the racist past of

america in that moment, the difference is he learned from that. and corrected and he recognized the greater calling of his office. and the enormous importance of the united states. and i think that that's what's missing here. donald trump doesn't care about any of that. >> yeah. it's -- it is shocking. sam stein, tell me, what happens today? what happens next? are the democrats going to push that resolution condemning donald trump forward and do you expect any republicans to -- other than maybe will hurd to go along with the vote? >> i was literally going to say there may be one republican and it could be will hurd. the resolution will come today from all the indications. we'll see what the vote tally will be. obviously, the context here is the comments, but also

proceeding resolutions condemning representative omar herself for her comments so there is some context here for members voting. and contrasting to those one and al green said he'd bring forward a resolution of impeachment, a date to be determined. that's why i think, you know, gene to a certain degree is right where donald trump has done politically he's unified the democrats, but i think that's only temporary to be honest because i think there are difficult questions that continue to await democratic leadership with respect to the impeachment question that will only be resurfaced because of these and that -- and nancy pelosi will have to deal with down the road when a resolution like representative green's come forward. i will say one thing -- not to go on gene's comments again but he mentioned that trump had made a political calculation to do this. i'm not totally sure that it's a political calculation. i think this is -- at this point

it's fair to say objectively this is a character element for donald trump. his history of saying outrageous things or acting in ways would qualify someone as a racist goes well beyond his presidency. we are talking about someone who has not apologized yet for calling for the execution of the central park five who was sued for discriminatory housing policies. he said a judge with mexican roots could not be impartial in a case. so there's enough evidence at this point to say maybe this isn't politically calculated but this is something that's deep embedded in his character. we should be -- >> yeah. i think it can be both. i think it can be deeply embedded in his character and at the same time, i think you read maureen dowd's column on sunday morning an said, oh, wait a

second, democrats are fighting each other, let me drive a wedge between the two sides and i'll attack the four people that nancy pelosi is attacking and yes, he's shrewd enough to know if he attacks the four women and says the things that he says that some people will predictably blame nancy pelosi for that. which of course as maureen dowd pointed out is about the stupidest take you could have. but it's happened. jon meacham, finally, i think -- i want to follow-up with something that gene said as well which is i have always told people because it's true that politics is a game of addition. and not subtraction. you want to make friends. you want to get more people voting for you. not less. donald trump and his approach over the past three years in office has made no sense to me because he has been playing a game of subtraction. he has boiled down his support. he continues to boil down his support to the most hard core people. and this does not seem to be the

workings of a shrewd politician. it seems to be the workings of a one trick pony who can only do one thing and that one thing has made him the only president to never cross the 50% threshold in approval ratings. what do you think? >> yeah. it's sort of -- remember the last scene of "scar face." he's up there, by himself and -- i'm making light of it a little bit, but you know, i don't mean to. because what he's doing to go to your point and to go to something gene said is what he's doing is absolutely trying to -- i use this word advisedly he's purifying his support. i know that's a contentious thing to say, but that's -- let's be honest here. what else is it? he was actually quite clear and coherent yesterday. this -- to senator tillis' point, this wasn't a tweet.

this was a president of the united states standing on what i think it was the north lawn of the white house going on at great length about how duly elected constitutional officers should leave. that's not a passing thing. and the one thing -- the one thing we know he understands is ongoing survival in terms of attention getting which is now late in his life turned into power getting. and the one thing i would say to him if we had any opportunity here and what i would say to the folks -- because one thing he said was right is the voters will decide is we don't build monuments to people who close doors. we build monuments to people who open them. and because to go to a phrase you have used, because he's a political day trader and he's become now a racial day trader, they're not going to build monuments to him. >> yeah. they're not doing to vote for him. i mean, he's not going to --

he'll never get to 50%. this is -- this is a bad political move and of course nobody is advising him to do this. he's doing it himself. so anyway we'll see what happens throughout the week and when we come back, we'll have mika's interview with joe biden. she questioned the former vp about his lackluster debate performance and asked what it might mean for a potential match-up against donald trump. plus, biden weighs in on some of his democratic opponents and details for his plan for american health care. all that and much more, straight ahead. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. johnson & johnson is a baby company. but we're also a company that controls hiv, fights cancer, repairs shattered bones, relieves depression, restores heart rhythms, helps you back from strokes,

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ranging interview with former vice president joe biden. he's a democratic front-runner for the democratic nomination and he's facing a long list of challengers for his party's nomination. mika asked the white house contender about the primary race for president and the potential for going head to head against donald trump. >> if i told joe biden of 1987 just starting his first campaign for president that he would be running for president in 2020 what would he tell me? >> i would have told you i wouldn't be. i fully expected that hillary would win and when beau was dying and we decided we couldn't run, i had planned on running in '16. but, you know, i couldn't let anybody know how sick he was. he didn't want me to. so i fully -- i did a lot of events for hillary, over 80. and i fully expected i'd be available to help any democratic

president, but that i wouldn't be running. >> well, it's certainly a different time. i want to ask you about president donald trump's behavior and how it impacts america's role in the worldment i wonder if voters consider that because they're trying to get through the week, but his tweets, for example, and these comments about these four congresswomen. it's racist and awful and outrageous. what's the impact on our standing? >> it's not only shameful, but it's incredibly damaging. >> how? >> look, we have led the world by the power of our example. and what presidents say, they're the face of america, like it or not. you know, the face of america. and the idea that donald trump says and does the things he does is just absolutely despicable. embracing thugs and dictators, standing at the g 8 and then the g20 with putin and saying i believe him over my entire

intelligence community. he has interfered in america and he continues to do it and saying he would accept information if it was given to him. when he found out that was a federal crime, no, i wouldn't do that. then at the g20 saying you -- something to the effect, you're not going to eavesdrop anymore, you're not going to get engaged. >> explain how that impacts america. >> it's impossible to lead the world in the 21st century alone. we are the indispensable power, to use madeleine albright's words, and the rest of the world is saying what in god's name is going on? when i spoke at the munich conference just before i spoke, the former chancellor -- well, she's the chancellor of germany, stood up and said to you -- to the european brothers and sisters we have to go it alone.

look, everything that was done post world war ii was designed to cabin the abuse of power including nato so no one nation would act out and look at what's happening. if we have eight years of this guy i literally predict there will not be an alliance. you know, it sounds corny to say it, but you know we the people -- we hold these truths self-evident. we have never lived up to the ideas but we never wholesale given up on them. this guy has absolutely just thrown it overboard. you know, the idea -- the only way you can stay in power is to divide america. pit black against white. immigrants against citizens. i mean, it goes down the line and it is dangerous. here's the thing, mika. i know it sounds -- i don't know what it sounds like. our children are listening. they're listening. what's going to happen this semester when a 6-year-old kid has an immigrant kid or a kid from another background speaking

with an accent in the room and making fun of him. what is the teacher going to do? the president says it. it's disgraceful. >> how would you project america's image differently than donald trump? >> my father used to say don't compare me to the almighty, compare me to the opponent. i hope the issues have been in my wheelhouse. i have been dealing with these issues for a long time. i know the vast majority of the world leaders personally and i have kept in contact? this. i have been engaged. i hope i can reassure them that their alliances matter to us. we need them. they need us. i mean, everything from the national security to the ultimate security, climate change. here we walked out of the paris agreement and the paris agreement called for the administration to keep up with the -- to higher and higher standards. well, who's got -- you have to

bring the folks back together. begin to move in a direction that we can actually do something concrete. and i think they're the things that -- by the way, i think the american people, they don't think in terms of whether it's, you know, china or russia or -- but they do -- they're uneasy. they're uneasy about our place in the world. they know we're not very well respected. >> so is your argument that compared to your democratic counterparts you know these people, you have been around the block. and you can bring us back. >> well -- >> how do you convince voters there's a problem internationally? because they're thinking about kitchen table issues. >> by the way, they're kitchen table. that's why the most recent speech i did on foreign policy i talked about we needed a middle class foreign policy. i will equip our people with a foreign policy for the middle class. by that, i mean, we have a foreign policy that brings everybody along where they

realize their future depends on how we conduct ourselves internationally and we're picking all the wrong fights. we're in the wrong place at the wrong time. and the public knows it. they intuitively know that we're in a different -- there's a recent poll showing that china's more respected and we are respected about even with -- with russia. i mean, people get it. they understand. they know it's not good. >> let's talk about the fight at hand. are you ready for the next debate, mr. vice president? >> well, you know i find it difficult to call them debates when you have one minute and it's so easy to take out of context, but look -- >> well, your performance was panned. >> yeah. >> did you do something differently? >> well, i didn't expect the particular attack and the questions starting off -- i know you're not a racist, i mean, it

did catch me off guard and quite frankly i have respect for the candidate who said that about me and i'm not sure her position is any different on busing than mine. >> kamala harris. >> yeah. and look, i want to talk about the future. public is looking to talk about the future. >> so i think the public is interested in how you're going to fight donald trump and kamala harris if you weren't ready for her are you ready to fight this guy who doesn't play fair. let's just say he lies. fact. he bullies, fact. he has a very, very loose respect for the law, that's putting it kindly. >> i'm used to bullies and my strategy is to go out -- remember that famous expression my grand pap used to say -- to harry truman give them hell, harry, now i'm going to tell them the truth and they'll think it's hell.

that's all you have -- not all but that's what you have to do with this guy. i know it will be an ugly campaign. not an honorable campaign he'll run, but i'm not backing down from him. very different than turning to someone on the stage who says something so off the wall to me that -- and it's -- because i don't want to attack anyone on a stage. it's not what i intend to do but i realize that some have concluded because i didn't respond very tough back to her that -- how can i take on trump. i have never had any trouble taking on anyone from trump to putin to xi jinping or anyone else. >> but what do you do, you make it to the general, you're on the debate stage. he's lying. he's saying we're doing great. that's his brand. we're stronger than ever. he starts making fun of your age. your mental state.

starts going after you in ways -- >> i would say come on donald, come on, man. how many push-ups do you want to do here, pal? jokingly. you know, come on, run with me, man. like i was in a parade in independence, missouri. i was running parades, that's the way i go back and forth. and i -- and a fellow from independence, who was a trump supporter, hey, shely jleepy, j. i said, run with me. i won't get down in the dirt with him. that's the only place he knows how to fight. i'll continue to talk about what he's doing. why it's so damaging to america. and as my mother would say i won't take any guff from him. >> talking to people getting ready for this interview, what should i ask the vice president, a lot of people want to know about your relationship with president obama. are you in contact? you worked with him for eight years. you're buds. why no endorsement? >> because i have asked him not

to do that. i don't want to put him in that spot and i want to earn this on my own. this is not a -- this is not a third term of obama. this -- the world has changed. it's different. we have the same value set, he and i. and, you know, i don't think we gave him enough credit. he's a guy that our kids could look up to and they did look up to. but it's a different world. the same things don't apply. but i do keep in contact with him. i see him. our daughters -- my granddaughter and his daughters are best friends. one with me today i introduced you to, is friends with his oldest daughter and number two granddaughter with his younger daughter. we're friends. it's family. >> we have a lot more ahead with joe biden and mika. but jon meacham, i'm curious about your initial thoughts about the part of the interview you had seen so far.

>> i think that the contrast couldn't be sharper. we started today watching a man in his 70's tell duly elected constitutional officers to leave the country and you just saw a man in his 70s talk about our better angels. not our worst instincts. the capacity of america to grow and be stronger as opposed to simply saying you're strong no matter what. and the politics of it, i have no idea. again, donald trump is president, so what the hell do i know? i don't know what will happen in 2020. i think anybody who says they do is wrong but it's very clear to me from what mika is eliciting is that we will be able to make a choice between someone who is part of the vernacular, the best part of the vernacular of american life and politics versus someone who plays to

fear. the incumbent plays to fear, biden is talking in the language of hope. and that's going to be a very sharp contrast. >> katty kay, what are your thoughts? do you think joe biden's ready for the next debate? >> that was exactly the right question, when mika asked him, look, you weren't ready for kamala harris. how do your supporters know that you're going to be ready for donald trump, that come on, let's do push-ups, man, i'm not sure that's a robust enough action against donald trump. will that be again? i think joe biden has to sharpen it up. he couldn't have gone into the interview without knowing that question will come up, that jokey stuff it has to be stronger than that. >> so much is riding on joe biden next debate and you're right. he has to be sharp and he has to prove to his supporters and

other people that he wants to get on board, that that first debate was a fluke. so we shall see. mika has a lot more with joe biden. plus you can read some very touching moments that we'll show you between joe biden and a very close friend of mika's. also, we'll get his take on congresswoman alexandria ocasio-cortez and nancy pelosi. also ahead, police find cash, diamonds, expired foreign passports in the safe belonging to wealthy sex offender jeffrey epstein. what it means for his chances of getting bail. "morning joe" is back in a moment. tting bail "morning joe" is back in a moment we call it the mother standard of care. it's how we care for our cancer patients- like job.

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you know, there was really no mistaking what president trump was talking about when he said four congressional women of color should go back to the countries they came from. now, the president and enablers are suggesting he was calling out the progressive politics rather than their heritage and mika asked about the hate tweets to vice president joe biden and

asked about the influence of aoc on the democratic caucus. let's take a look. >> what do you think of how nancy pelosi is handling the caucus, especially the young freshmen and all of the controversy? >> i think nancy is masterful. that doesn't mean i don't respect, i do. i think the freshmen, particularly aoc, is smart as hell. really bright. and really a value added to the party in terms of her pushing the edges and pushing and pushing. but nancy knows what she's doing. nancy understands that it is -- you know, there's a sum total in the congress of 535 folks. you have to get them all moving in the right direction and no one -- i mean it's ironic, i heard someone criticize nancy for not being liberal enough. >> well, hello. >> so i just think she's doing a masterful job. i have great respect for her. >> watching young people coming into the business, when you

watch the new young freshmen coming in specially aoc, if you could give her one piece of advice, what would it be? >> i would not presume to give her advice. i'm not being a wise guy. i campaigned in the states for 69 people and i campaigned for everyone to beat a republican to win back the house. they have come to me, please, keep us moving forward. i didn't run saying i would never talk to the republican. so the vast majority -- aoc is brilliant. the other three women are really smart. but they the exception rather than the rule. if you listen to the guys and women in your business they say, that's the majority of people who got elected. we need that kind of energy, but that's not the majority of democrats who got elected last time. >> so gene robinson -- or sam stein, i've said this before,

you know, maybe aoc and some of the people -- other people that support her won't like what joe biden just said. but it's amazing what we could do in 1995 and 1996. it would drive gingrich crazy. four or five of us would say things, leak something to "the washington post." leak something to roll call and suddenly it would be blown up that newt gingrich is going to be taken out of town the next week. i mean, we loved conflict in the press. especially when you have rank and file members going after leaders but to a certain respect, joe biden is right. therefore, these are four very strong women who are very important to the future of the caucus, but at the same time, it seems a majority of the caucus is still overwhelmingly for nancy. >> well, he's completely right. the four women who he's talking about are the attention grabbers

but the democrats won the house in 2018 largely by flipping what had been republican held suburban districts which is not what these four members have -- did or what they represent. that being said, i would quibble with one element of what biden talked about which was that pelosi knows that you need a movement in order to do the types of things that these freshmen members want. in fact these members are the ones building the movement. they're the ones forcing the hand of pelosi and biden and so you can't discount the work they're doing in that respect and biden is a remarkable illustration of that. i look back at the health care plan that he ran on in 2008. and it's incredible for the incrementalism. the minor tweaks to the health care system here and there, nothing close to universal coverage but today he's considered a moderate for talking about merely pushing a pub -- a robust public option as

opposed to medicare for all and the reason he's being framed that way is precisely because of the work that the four congress members have done, which is demanded more progressism from the lawmakers and he's living in the reality. he's right about the political realities of the democratic party. >> gene robinson, what this sort of requires is a synthesis. get everybody going in the right direction. the synthesis between nancy pelosi and the mainstream democratic party and these four women and the millions they represent who provide a lot of the real energy to the democratic party. we have seen the great politicians whether it's barack obama or whether it's bill clinton or whether it's ronald reagan, we have seen them being able to provide that synthesis to their party.

it seems that's what's needed now more than ever for this democratic party going after donald trump. >> yeah. i mean, i have never seen a majority caucus in either house of congress that didn't have some divisions, some differences of opinion. you know, the poor john boehner and paul ryan had to deal with the freedom caucus. they were rather less than successful, freedom caucus was a bigger force. nancy pelosi is a more skillful speaker of the house and so far i think has been -- you know, despite the sort of sharpness of the rhetoric at times i think she has walked the tight rope well. donald trump just helped her a lot by going after the squad. that will actually i think serve her much better than it will

serve donald trump. but they're going to be -- there are going to be divisions and divisions don't mean that you can't be successful politically. >> right. so certainly doesn't. michael steele, think about it. nancy pelosi her entire life has been attacked for being too progressive, being too liberal. people -- you know, members in modern districts have been asked for years, will you vote for nancy pelosi as speaker of the house and now nancy is the middle ground. she's the one that's bringing people back because she understands she's speaker of the house. because a lot of moderate democrats in virginia, in california, in georgia, in michigan -- across the country a lot of moderates barely won their races against republicans. and that's what made nancy pelosi speaker of the house. >> well, it's very interesting, joe. this was almost a flash back back to the chairmanship of howard dean who broadened the reach of the party, recognized

that heck, we have democrats who can be competitive and win in places like north carolina and virginia and south carolina and elsewhere. and so she sort of latched on to that. she let her candidates run the races they needed to run in the districts where she found them. she didn't impose upon them a one size fits all liberal progressive agenda that they had to carry. much of what we see republicans do in latter years on the conservative side and quite honestly what the progressives are trying to do going forward with the democrats. she understands that in this moment with the 21 seat possible flip to lose the house next year that not only does she need to hold that line but she needs to allow the party to build on that with the center left democrats in these very competitive districts. >> all right. eugene robinson, we want to thank you for coming on and

we'll be reading your latest column as always in "the washington post." still ahead, donald trump defends his racially charged tweets with the help of some handwritten notes. "the washington post'" philip bump has new reports on what it says, typos and all. plus the trump administration moves to end asylum protections for most central american migrants. we'll be talking to one democratic lawmaker who went to the border to witness the immigration crisis first hand. keep it here on "morning joe." we'll be right back. hmm. exactly.

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we all know that aoc and this crowd are a bunch of communists. they hate israel. they hate our own country. they're calling the guards along our border the border patrol agents concentration camp guards. they accuse people who support israel of doing it for the benjamins.

they're anti-semitic. they're anti-america. don't get that, aim higher. we don't need to know about them personally, but talk about their policies. >> aim higher? lindsey, you're -- you call americans in congress communists? and you say they hate america? and then your punch line to that is aim higher? jon meacham, the term mccarthyism has been thrown around recklessly for 70 or so years. 60, 65 years. >> yeah. >> but just like donald trump's

language was lifted directly from something that david duke might say, that -- there's not even a stretch here. lindsey graham led with the mccarthyism charge of these four americans, these four people of color, duly elected people, he called them communists. he said they hated america. >> yeah. >> it might be a good time to remind people watching that lindsey graham is not a back bencher in the house like he was when i knew him and he pretended to be conservative. lindsey graham is now the chairman of the senate judiciary committee. i have got to say -- i have to say, jon, that tirade yesterday,

that's not just a new low point for lindsey graham. that may be a new low point for the republican party under donald trump. >> and it cries out, doesn't it, for the joseph welch moment which was the turning point in 1954 after mccarthy had launched his campaign against communism on lincoln's birthday in wheeling, west virginia. in 1953 he said i have the name of 205 communists in the pocket, it turned out he didn't have any. but it was a moment of fear, a moment of anxiety. and i must say when i saw that sort of flash by yesterday, i thought it was a joke at first. because i thought surely senator graham is not actually saying that. one of the things that does tell us, doesn't it, the demographic to which trump and senator

graham and the other enablers are speaking. because there hasn't been a communist as a live threat to the united states since the presidency of george herbert walker bush nearly 30 years ago. and so -- exactly 30 years ago. the berlin wall fell 30 years ago this year. and we won the cold war and we won it because of republicans, we won it because of democrats and because of our allies, and we won it because we were not isolationists and not xenophobic and we made the case for an idea. not for the fascistic combination of blood and soil. it was an idea that we are created equal and as lincoln said in august of 1864 in a speech i don't think is as well known as it should be, he said that the civil war was being fought not least for there to be a fair chance for americans

intelligence, enterprise and industry to rise as far as they can. that's not an idea that requires a particular skin color. in fact, it's entirely predicated as we have come to understand it on its universality. that's the america that won the cold war. so this is not some soft, liberal, pinko conversation. this is not some lefty aclu caricature. it's simply history that we have grown stronger the more widely we have opened our arms. why that can't -- why we can't tell that story, we have to tell that -- sorry. i just think that's the story joe biden needs to tell. that's the story that the democrats need to tell. because it has the virtue as dr. kissinger used to say of being true. >> well, you know, michael

steele we have known lindsey for a long time. i have known him since '94. don't recognize this person. i know he has a primary coming up. i keep wondering how much lower he's going to go. yesterday was a real -- >> pretty low. >> low point. but this is a guy -- this is a guy who said that the election -- in may of 2016 said if donald trump were nominated to the republican party nomination for president, he would destroy the republican party and the republican party would deserve it. this is what lindsey wrote in june of 2015. to my friends in the other party, our differences are real and we will debate them. but you are not my enemy. you are my fellow countrymen and we see the absolute corruption of lindsey graham with the absolute power of donald trump.

he goes from saying you are not my enemy, you are my friend, to saying that four women of color are communists. are communists. who hate america. i mean, is there a better description, michael steele, of just how much donald trump corrupts people that are around him? >> well, let's start with the truth that hypocrisy has no greater friend than graham and i think he's proven that more and more. certainly since the passing of john mccain. that he needed something to latch on to and he's latched on to trumpism and all of its ilk and forms. and so it also does, joe, to your point clarify the moment for us. as our great historian friend jon meacham often does in sort of relating history to the

present day. these present moments are clarifying for us in a real way. we know now where the lines of demarcation are between a proper american society that's looking forward and one that wants to retrench and sit in fear and disengage. not only from the world, but from communities within our own space, within our american family. i dare say that lindsey graham in walking across the street to the house would not say what he said to the face of those four women. because he doesn't have what it takes to do that in the main. in real life, he would never say it to their face. and that tells you everything you need to know about the cowardice of this moment and the cheap political thrills they get from sitting at donald trump's

knee. >> katty kay, donald trump retweeted lindsey's comments, of course. and many of our allies in europe during the height of mccarthyism were horrified but what was going on in the united states. they thought the united states had lost their mind. of course, many are thinking the same thing now. but here you have one of the most powerful members of the united states senate accusing four women of color of being communists. just out of thin air. again, the charge is every bit as baseless as mccarthy's charges in the 1950s. saying they hate america, i mean, my god, not exactly the image we want to be projecting across the world right now. >> there is no communist threat in the united states. lindsey graham needs a quick lesson in political theory on what communism actually means. i'm not sure he could define it as a concept but it's simply not

there in the united states congress. these people did not get elected as communists and the idea they can't say that there are flaws in the american system, that makes them unpatriotic, is an absurdity. it's chilling when you think about the countries around the world where it's not possible to criticize. where we see the erosion of democracy happening before our eyes. in countries like poland, countries like hungary, where democratic norms and freedoms are being chipped away at and people are being told they cannot criticize the country. that is somehow unpatriotic. is that the way that america wants to go right now? right now we're at a moment where liberal western democracy t the notion we have understood for the last 70 years is under threat and we need the united states to lead the charge, not be the country that's leading it in the opposite direction towards more authoritarianism. and we need people like -- like john thune, senator from north dakota, has stood up. but it's two days late. why did it take two days for john thune to criticize the

president's comments? did he need to go to history books or spend 48 hours studying whether this was okay or not? it's pretty clear straight up whether it's okay or not. it's late now for republicans to step in. >> i will -- sam, i'll thank god for small favors. i'm glad that john did that and i hope lindsey graham will back off of his comment of accusing the women being quote communists. go ahead. >> well, in in moment i'm reminded of a famous john mccain moment. not the one that everyone thinks about which is him correcting the woman who thought barack obama was not born in america. it's a different one. it was in 2012, john mccain went to the floor of the u.s. senate to defend huma abedin, who was then being accused of being associated with the muslim brotherhood by michele bachmann. he denounced that and that's what john mccain liked to do and god knows we lie nonize john

mccain but it was in those moments that he really deserved his lionization. all of this to me has really sparked a question -- joe, i'd be curious on your thoughts on this. which is that trumpism is obviously taking hold of the republican party. and my question for you is does -- you know, does it survive trump? is this the type of republican party that exists after trump is gone? >> no no no. >> it's only trump. >> and that's -- that's the stupidity of all of this for lindsey and for all of these other people. we have seen what happened to sean spicer. what do you think is going to happen to sarah huckabee sanders? the people who come into the white house for donald trump they do not understand. what i told a top person in george w. bush's administration in 2005 i said you think he's going to be around here forever. he's not.

protect yourself because he's going to go. and he'll take care of himself. but you're going to be left holding the bag on katrina. holding the bag on all of these other things. donald trump will not survive. the trumpism will not survive donald trump and mike barnicle if nikki haley is the next nominee of the republican party, you watch. the people that debase themselves for donald trump will be left running for the hills. they will have no future in washington, d.c., because you know what? if they lied for donald trump as much as they lied for donald trump, and nikki haley, by the way, she didn't, she stood up to trump and his aides time and time again. she stood up to vladimir putin, time and time again. but nikki haley can't have people around her that were lying constantly for donald trump. it is -- trumpism will not survive. that is why the day trading of lindsey graham and the day

trading of kellyanne conway and the day trading of sarah huckabee sanders and of sean spicer was so short sighted. >> yeah, joe, lindsey is rather a pathetic, friendless figure in washington. but what he was saying yesterday it seems, you are seeing now the outlines of the trump campaign. the re-election campaign. and the outline is based on fear, it's based on race and basically what they're saying is -- what donald trump is saying is they hate me. they hate the united states of america. they hate you. they hate us. that's the derivative. that's the formulation, the foundation of his campaign. yesterday philip bump -- philip bump is here today and yesterday donald trump's appearance and his notes -- you have some revealing facts on that. >> yeah. it was fascinating. he was at the event which is supposed to be about manufacturing in america.

he's prepared and he pulls notes out of his pocket because he knows the issue of the tweets is coming up. it's amazing he has to have the talking points and what's fascinating about the notes he came prepared with notes that were untrue. to your point, accusing the four congressional democrats of being anti-american which you're right, essentially means they disagree with him on policy and disagree with him as a politician. he at the top added handwritten notes saying al qaeda and some people -- he spelled al qaeda a-l-k-a-d-i-a and he wanted to attack ilhan omar, he wanted to bring that out as well. so he takes these notes and he just launches into the tirade and he calls them dangerous. he lumps them all together, accuses them of being anti-american, broadly anti-semitic and he calls them dangerous to america.

this is what he came prepared to say. this is isn't off the cuff donald trump. this is what he intended to say. that's exactly right, this is what he's trying to do he's trying to raise the specter. at a rally earlier this month he said there was some communism at play, this predates lindsey's comments from yesterday. this is something he's prepared to do as 2020 approaches. >> so i guess i would be interested in the terms of a raw political calculation, forget for a second the morality, the standing of america in the world. what america stands for. he's clearly making the political calculation that this is what gets him back into the white house next year. >> right. >> is he right on that? or are there enough people sitting in the middle in wisconsin, in michigan, in florida, who say you know what? i just find this too much, this makes me uneasy? it raises again the issue of character of donald trump which

is are he fall down. >> he's beating he can have a repeat of 2016 that he can energize enough people about the anger of america at fox news and get enough of the people energized to come out to the polls they can sort of overwhelm in enough places to win. what people forget is in 2016 there were 4.4 million obama 2012 voters who stayed home. they didn't come out to vote because they thought that hillary clinton was going to win and of that group, half were nonwhite. if you think about who can actually come to the polls in 2020 there's a good piece in "the times" yesterday looking at where the turnout advantage will be, and he can't get enough votes to get across the finish line. it's strategy he's tried before. it worked last time and like so many politicians think i can run that same playbook again. >> michael steele, it's why i have said for quite some time this is just a stupid strategy. i mean, again, i'm -- i'm saying that as the guy that got

ridiculed and mocked for saying that donald trump could win the white house in 2016. i was right. almost everybody else was wrong. well, let me tell you what he's doing right now is a stupid strategy because all he's doing is he's boiling down his own support to his base. he's exhausting a lot of people who voted for him last time who will not go out and vote. and man, he is ginning up the support of black voters, of hispanic voters, of all the quote others that he mocks and ridicules and attacks every single day. i mean, you talk about a great turnout operation, the democratic party. i mean, they're going to have people standing in lines for hours going to the polls to do one thing and one thing alone. vote this racist out of office. that's what they'll be thinking and that's what they'll do.

it's so stupid of him. i don't get the stupidity. >> well, joe, i appreciate your point about the stupidity, but you know we could be pretty stupid too. and so i take to heart what you're saying but at this point i'm not convinced. i'm looking at polls just out this week that show the president sitting at 45% approval, job approval. you know, he won his election with 47%. it is hard for trump to get 2% more going into next year, you're right. he's not going to be a 50% plus re-elect president, but donald trump knows that already. i think what donald trump has done successfully and as i listen to this conversation this morning it really hones in the point, we dance around this bright shining object called donald trump because he wants us to. and we willingly do it. but at some point we have to stop the dancing and go this is stupid. this is not us.

this is not who we are. and then take that energy and protest. take that energy and stake our claim about what we think america is. because there are no consequences at this point. what are the consequences to what the president did yesterday? how do they play out, joe? >> that's where i disagree with you. there are consequences. >> what are they? >> well, guess what, nancy pelosi is speaker of the house because of all the things he did for the first two years when people said there are no consequences. yes, there were consequences and i'd follow up on what philip bump said, please tell me who voted for donald trump or who did not vote for donald trump? in 2016. that's going to vote for him in 2020. i can't find those people. i can find a lot of people that voted for him the first time that are not going to vote for him the second time and i can find a lot of people who stayed home and didn't vote the first

time that will be the first ones in line this time. >> they may be. look, i'm with you on the side of the angels here hoping that what you're saying is the case. >> i know that. >> but what i'm also looking at is some other realities. 53% of educated white women voted for donald trump after everything they saw and knew and learned about him in 2016. follow that up in 2018 with 49% voting for a trump backed candidate or republican candidate in 2018. so i don't know just how angry and how responsive people are going to be that go out and say, not trump. i just don't see that necessarily building. i think right now and we have heard this conversation that all things being equal, donald trump has a stronger hand right now to get re-elected than not. and the test for us is how we change that hand. >> hey, joe, i would suggest that the seeds of what you're

talking about are located in suburban detroit, suburban milwaukee, suburban philadelphia, suburban pittsburgh. a lot of women out there. a lot of people who voted for donald trump four years ago and who have lived uncomfortably for two or three years now in the trump presidency with the idea that, you know, well, yeah, he is embarrassing. yeah, he does stupid things, yeah, i wish he'd stop tweeting but the regulations are pretty good he's gotten rid of and the economy is pretty good, why rattle the cage. but now we're at a tipping point and now it's the time for joe biden or any other democrat who gets the nomination to go to the suburbs and tell the story of america. who we really are. because that's what people want. they want a nice living. they want good educations for their children. but they don't want to be embarrassed by the president of the united states if they're in the suburbs. >> amen. let's bring in a member of the house ways and means committee. he is the vice chair of the congressional problem solvers

caucus. democratic congressman tom suozzi of new york. the congressman traveled to texas over the weekend for a firsthand look at the conditions at migrant detention centers. thank you so much for doing that. what a great service to this country. i heard mike pence said that all americans would be proud of the conditions that he saw and you saw. do you disagree? >> mike pence is completely wrong. and the president is wrong with what he did yesterday. look at what we're doing today. we're supposed to be talking about immigration. all the images we saw on television over the past week were of kids in cages. about people suffering these long lines, broken system. we spent the past 25 minutes talking about the president's racist and un-american comments. this is the problem of what donald trump does. he completely shifts the focus away from important policy issues to this racial divide in our country. i don't agree with all of the politics of the squad. i'm a democrat. i don't agree with a lot of their politics but today i want

to be an honorary member of the squad because i want to fight against this un-american racist type of behavior. this is not what our country wants. i'm from one of those suburbs. i'm in a d-plus one district. it can go either way. the people in my district don't like this. my father is an italian immigrant. he was treated with complete discrimination, he was an italian in world war ii. can you imagine how they were treated in america when mussolini teamed one hitler and people are sick of this behavior. it's un-american. >> so congressman suozzi, tell me what you saw at the border and it certainly was i'm sure far different than what pence claimed to see at the border when he said you and me and every american would be proud of how the children are being treated. >> i'm not proud at all. i remember walking into the holding area, we're behind a cinder block wall and i can hear kids' voices and i can hear children crying. then i hear the coughing. then you walk inside and you see all these kids. you see the other places where

the single male adults lined up, sleeping on concrete next to each other, hundreds and hundreds of people. it's un-american. no american would stand for this. yet, the president has changed the topic away from these conditions that his administration helped create and stopped us from trying to come to a solution on this problem to instead talk about one of his other big distractions. >> congressman, sam stein here. one of the big debates within your party especially in the house caucus is whether or not there should have been strings attached to the funding for the border bill. looking now at these images, looking at what mike pence said and he continued to blame democrats for not funding these detention centers. do you have any regrets about the bill that passed in the house that did not include more stringent strings on what the administration can do from the immigration perspective on the recently passed border bill? >> i'm convinced more than ever that we had to get the money down there. what people don't talk about is that the money was running out.

completely running out by june 30th. they weren't going to have money for food or have money for regular basic services so we had to get that money down there. and we couldn't have a political food fight over getting the money down there. now we have to continue to fight to change these conditions and put conditions on the administration. i'm on three different bills some of which we're taking up this week to try and address the issues. look at how the conversation has changed because of the president's behavior yesterday. we need democrats and republicans to work together to actually solve this problem. to make the humanitarian crisis priority one. to deal with border security. to deal with the northern triangle and to deal with the millions of people playing by the rules, give them a path to citizenship and give them protections. we are not even getting to the conversations because of anger and fear and complexity are stopping people from having normal conversations. most people want to solve problems. they just can't in this environment where everything is hyped up and amped up and everything is about these crazy

topics that we're distracted from actually governing. the president is hurting himself. he's hurting the country. and he's hurting millions of people throughout this country and the world with the type of behavior he's conducting right now. >> congressman, the numbers of people coming across from the border in june fell pretty dramatically and now some of the detention centers along if border have started emptying out. the white house would say that's because they have put pressure on the mexicans and the mexicans are doing a tougher enforcement job on their side of the border and point to the fact as of today they're going to implement a new rule which means that if you come across it the southern border but you pass through mexico you have to apply for asylum first in mexico before you do in the united states. do you give the white house any credit for reducing the numbers of people coming across the border? >> the only credit i give them is bringing attention to the issue. the reason you have a problem at

the border is because i.c.e. and hhs which is where people are supposed to go from the boarder are clogged up. and so people cannot be transferred from -- they're not detention centers but only holding and processing centers at the border. they are supposed to be transferred from there to detention centers but they're so backed up that they can't make that processing. they're backed because of the policies of the administration and the asylum idea is unamerican. it will fail in court. everybody knows it will fail in court. i don't know why we're wasting our time on a crazy idea. so i'll give the administration credit for bringing attention to this issue and focusing on this issue but i give them total discredit for mismanaging this process. made it much, much worse than it's been. there was many more people coming over the boarder in 2000 and we didn't see this type of problem back then because it's been mismanaged. >> it's been mismanaged and they have actually created the

crisis. congressman tom suozzi, and thank you going for the going to the border. still ahead, a few issues defined the obama administration more than the fight over health care. now a joe biden runs for the white house, health care is the leading topic on the campaign trail and mika asked the presidential contender about his plan to provide coverage and whether it goes far enough. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. k. johnson & johnson is a baby company. but we're also a company that controls hiv, fights cancer, repairs shattered bones,

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vice president joe biden is just out with a plan to revamp his health care system. mika caught up with the presidential candidate yesterday in iowa to talk about that and so much more. take a look. >> you unveiled your health care plan today. here's my question because you were trying to give some straight talk on medicare for all. but does your health care plan go far enough for a party that supports predominantly medicare for all? >> i think so. i don't think it's conservative at all.

it will pick up the vast majority of almost 100% of the american people. it's available immediately and it will be able to be moved. we can pass it. it costs a lot of money. costs $750 billion, not $3 trillion. it can be done quickly. and it will in fact allow people to make the choice of staying on their own -- if their employer based plan if they like it better, it will pick up everyone who is not covered now. so i think it will -- it is open. it is straight forward. there's nothing -- as my mother would say missed between the cup and the lip. you know, it's going to take time to set up the other. it is much more -- how can i say it? there's a lot of people that don't want to give up their private insurance, employer based insurance and they have a chance to keep it. that's a legitimate difference between me and where apparently everyone from kamala to bernie to elizabeth are. >> yeah, they have some -- bernie's people are coming after

you. >> sure. >> for misinformation they say. but your plan is based on the aca. what if it is ruled unconstitutional? what's your backup? >> well, the backup is we have to start from scratch again and get to the place that the court says it. look, this is a court that's ruled it constitutional twice. we'll see. >> but there's the possibility -- >> well, there's a possibility but i'm not going to go down that route and speculate what's going to happen and in a negative sense. >> but you have a plan if that happens? you do? >> yeah. >> you care to share? >> no. because we'll get this one done. >> okay. kamala harris says she is supports medicare for all and then seemed to back off. what's your understanding of her proposal? >> well, i'll let her speak for herself. >> do you think she needs to clarify a tad bit? >> look, i don't want to be taking on other people in terms

of whether or not they're -- what they're saying and how they're saying it. i just know that i don't agree with the proposal that she says she supports. i don't know how you can have that proposal and still keep your private insurance as i understand -- employer based insurance. so there seems to be a bit of a dichotomy between what she says she wants to do and what she intends on doing. and that's for her to explain. i'm going to explain my position and look, i think that a lot of people are making judgments that are -- of how many 20 some candidates, making judgments some of the times not bernie and not elizabeth, on things that they think need to be said now. i have a bad habit of saying what i mean and meaning what i say. and so i think it's part of an

education process for some of the people running. >> in the first debate you've raised your hand when asked -- >> raise your hand if your government plan would provide coverage for undocumented immigrants. >> is that your exact answer? >> no, because look, you know the raise -- there are two pieces to this. one, i do think if you're just like now there are 11 million undocumented people in the united states of america. a lot of them are employed. a lot of them are paying into social security. i mean, they have increased the solvency of the social security system by a decade. now, if you're employed, you have the money to be able to invest in and buy into the plan, my plan, you should be able to buy into it in my view. but what most people are thinking about is the poor folks crossing the border, with just nothing but who's on their back. the second piece of this is if somebody god forbid is crossing the border and they get hit by a

truck or something happens to them, they have a heart attack, you're going to let them die there? you can't do that. you have to provide. that's why we need in my view more community health centers. they won't have insurance but you take care of their needs. it would be unhumane to let that happen. you can't let that happen. >> speaking of immigration you raised your hand -- >> raise your hand if you think it should be a civil offense rather than a crime to cross the border without documentation. >> no, if i did, i didn't -- look, i have been clear. what i think is that if it is and still a minimum of a misdemeanor. crossing the border in and of itself is -- you have to either wait in line or seek asylum. >> right. >> so that's what it should be. some people crossing the border are convicted felons. some people crossing the border are traffickers and some crossing the border are engaged in drug deals, et cetera, and

they should be immediately thrown out. they should not be allowed to cross the border. but look, one of the things we have to do is surge significant resources to the border. no need to separate families. we're in a situation where when we didn't separate families they still showed up for their hearings and the higher percentage. the biggest thing i would do, mika, is make sure that i reinvested in something i negotiated with the republicans. a $750 million meeting with the three states in question, el salvador, honduras and people are leaving because they can't turn on a light switch, because there's gangs, no education, et cetera. and the deal we did in great detail laid out if you do, a, b and c if you increase safety in your town or you city, we will provide you money to do that. if you do boom boom boom. he wiped that out and when we did it, if you notice the

immigration slowed up considerably. >> right. >> considerably. >> but we're talking about crossing the border and not coming to a port of entry. i'm just worried that if you change -- i mean, it might be playing into donald trump's hands in terms of saying democrats won't open borders. >> no no. that's not what i'm saying. i'm saying you shouldn't be able to just cross the border. you have to get in line. now, if you're crossing the border and seeking asylum even at a port of entry, you should have an asylum hearing. if you're crossing the border and doing it for a purely economic reason, then in fact you have to get in line. what about the folks from asia or africa, what about the folks from around the world who want to come? you have to get in line. we have a right to protect the border. that's why i think that we should be investing money wisely on the border by dealing with the check points that are the ports of entry where the drugs are coming through. where the criminals are coming through. where the gangs are coming through, weapons are coming

through. we have a lot of modern machinery. for example, you can drop an x-ray machine on a tractor-trailer and find out what's inside without ripping it apart. that's where we should be investing the money. >> how would you characterize how this administration is handling those seeking asylum? being held. >> a pure and total attempt to scare the living a hell out of the american people, to make them into what he calls them criminals and terrorists and drug dealers and they're all bad. and just to appeal to his base, his base which says not -- not in what my house. not in my backyard. look, i look -- one of the reasons that we are a nation as we are, i had this discussion with the former president of singapore a long time ago when i was vice president and he said -- i was asking him, i won't go through the whole story, but the bottom line the

reason that america is the nation we are, is because we have been able to cherry pick the best of each culture. it took a hell of a courage, your family came from wherever, poland, someone sitting down there, take us to the country, won't this be fun. they have resilience, optimism. they have absolute determination. >> they believe in america. >> they believe. they believe. that's why we should immediately make sure every dreamer is here and provide a direct path to citizenship for the 11 million. can you imagine, when you're 4 years old, i'm not going anywhere, mom. it flies in the face of everything we believe we are. send me your poor, your rich, what are we? what have we become?

this is not the united states of america. the vast majority of the world looks to. >> we'll have more with mika and joe biden next hour. but philip bump, i'm curious your initial reaction to that part of the interview. >> i think it's sort of fascinating how joe biden is able to carefully walk the line he's been walking the whole time which is essentially running as a barack obama's third term. he's in -- the positions he's advocating and the push back on the opponents is primarily hey, look, let's make sure we're staying in the lanes of we know what's worked which ties back to the administration that he served. you know, i think that he has two main advantages in the race. the first is that he basically owns the lane on moderates at this point. there are some others can make a play on that, but a lot of moderates say, we agree. we don't want a bernie sanders/elizabeth warren style of nominee and the other push, people who want to see trump lose. i think the challenge that he's

going to have is that position of hey, i'm running as barack obama's third term. i think that will work for a lot of democrats and moderates in particular but if he starts to fumble and people say, i'm not sure this guy can beat trump those who don't agree with the sanders/warren more progressive view will still go to that nominee because beating trump trumps everything if you'll pardon the pun. >> well, you know, i think, mike barnicle, several times he moved off some of the positions that the democratic candidates took on the debate stage whether you're talking about health care plans for illegal immigrants or also the decriminalization of crossing the border illegally. he sounded an awful lot like barack obama. he also sounded like a lot of moderate americans who said, hey, you have to stand in line. you have got to wait in line, not fair to jump to the head of the line if you want to become a citizen of this country. but he also talked about dreamers and making them

american citizens. so a lot there that explained his debate performance. >> yeah. there was a whole lot there, joe. in all of the segments we have shown of mika's interview with joe biden this morning. it's interesting the democratic party seemingly has to do one thing over and over and over again stronger than ever. and that's to state that they're not for open borders because that has been branded on them i think quite successfully by president trump. and the other aspect of what the vice president has been talking about in this interview, jon meacham alluded to it earlier in morning, we have talked about it nearly every day, is the course of this campaign is going to be really ugly and a lot of it has to do with culture. trump is focusing on culture more than he is politics and fear. the fear of emerging cultures within the country, the fear of the other. as we said early it's trump

saying they hate me and they hate you out there. you know, the deplorables. they hate you, they hate the united states of america. and that's what joe biden or any other democrat is going to have to contend with and again, back to what we're talking about earlier. that is ripe for converting former trump voters out in the suburbs of this country where people have been exhausted by this man's tweets and now his behavior. his reprehensible, racist behavior. go get them. >> yeah. completely exhausted. it is certainly hard to claim that a guy from scranton, pennsylvania, that's dedicated his entire life to the united states, to serving the united states through one personal tragedy after another doesn't love this country with all his heart. philip bump, thank you so much for being with us. we appreciate it. great reporting as always. when we come back, we'll be

going over fund-raising numbers. they're all in and there's some winners but boy, there are some losers too. when you look at the numbers and you wonder how some of these candidates -- some high profile candidates can continue their presidential campaign. "morning joe" will be right back. ampaign. "morning joe" will be right back i don't keep track of regrets. and i don't add up the years. but what i do count on... is boost® delicious boost® high protein nutritional drink has 20 grams of protein, along with 26 essential vitamins and minerals. boost® high protein. be up for life.

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how'd he get out?! a camera might figure it out. that was easy! glad i could help. at xfinity, we're here to make life simple. easy. awesome. so come ask, shop, discover at your xfinity store today. the stories of how hackers are targeting the cities ransoming their computer systems for thousands of dollars in may. in florida, ransom wear attackers demanded nearly $600,000 in bitcoin to restore the city's computer network. in the surprising move, the city's leaders quietly voted to pay to regain access. other cities have taken different approaches. officials in baltimore refused to pay to gain access.

they expect the attack will cost them over $18 million. atlanta refused to pay attackers $50,000 in bitcoin and expect their attack to cost taxpayers as much as $17 million. let's bring in former white house counterterrorism coordinators under president bill clinton and president bush. coauthors of the new book "the fifth domain. defending our countries, our companies and ourselves in the age of cyber threats." good to have you here. saturday night, the grid goes down in new york city and immediately, everybody thinks it is not an old style new york

city shut down. it wasn't but tell us how vulnerable we are. >> the truth is, we don't know what happened yet. we are awaiting an iranian response to our hacking them a few weeks ago. there is a grid that lays out how vulnerable the grid is. stan coats said the russians are in our power grid. the white house leaked that u.s. cyber command got into the russian power grid. we have these swords over each other's heads. i would rather spend money defending our grid rather than getting into theirs. >> i wanted to ask you this. we saw the cables hacked into. you might say some of the content of those cables was not particularly surprising, others have said similar things to me in public. does this change the way

american diplomats around the world will have to do diplomacy after what they send back to washington on cables. >> it did. lots of american ambassadors had their cables leaked in wikileak. they were pretty good. a lot of officials looked efficient and smart. i don't worry about american diplomats having their cables leaked. >> how easily could a hacker shut down the american financial system? atms shut down and are we engaged in negligence anymore that we are not paying attention to this stuff. >> our financial system is one of the more secure systems. if you take jp morgan, they are

spending between $600 to $1 billion in security. that's more than the homeland security spends. the banks have taken this very seriously. what we worry about more than the banks is the power grid, the natural graphs, chemical plants. these are the things that aren't as well protected or regulated. we know they are being targeted. >> is it negligence? >> 20 years ago when i started doing this, we didn't know about it. we had an excuse. 20 years on, tens of special commissions and hearings later. we know what the problem is. we know as we read in the book what the solutions are. the technology exists to defend companies. many are successfully defending themselves. we've been asking a lot of specifics. i could ask you next about my

mlb app but let's go to 30,000 feet and ask you why you wrote the book and what is the thesis of this book? what is the big idea that americans need to understand about the fifth domain? >> ten years ago, rob and i wrote the book cyber war in which we said basically, you can't defend yourself. ten years on, we look at what's going on and there are companies successfully defending themselves. the last chapter is, it is all over but the coding. which means, we know what the solutions are. it is no secret that only rob and i know. companies know what technologies do. we have to implement it. those companies that don't are going to be hit by this darwinian controls. if you don't spend enough money to defend yourself, you will be hacked. >> the new book "the fifth

domain, defending our companies." robert, thank you. richard clark, always an honor. please come back. still ahead, president trump amplifies his attacks on four democratic congresswomen. the party is hitting back but many republicans are defending the president's comments in the most deplorable of terms. plus more from mika's sit down with joe biden. how he's doing four years after his son beau passed away and how he's helping other families push through their own profound losses. "morning joe," back in a moment. . lease the 2019 rx 350 for $389 a month, for 36 months, and we'll make your first month's payment. experience amazing.

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now, at the lexus golden opportunity sales event. get 0.9% apr for 60 months on all 2019 models. experience amazing at your lexus dealer. if you are not happy in the u.s., if you are complaining all the time, very simply, you can leave. >> what i don't like. i don't like mosquitos. i don't like her temperament. right now, i don't like mosquitos too much. i don't like critics. i don't like using the h word, the place down there. >> i don't like has add at all. >> i don't like people leaving a speech early. i don't like people burning our flags. i don't like tweeting. i don't like talking about how i feel about people. i don't like that.

you don't like that. i don't like losing. i don't like pin okayios. come back. don't come back. but fur not happy, you can leave. >> if you are complaining all the time, you can simply leave. this is the same president when he ran for president talked about, quote, a crippled america. he said america was crippled. do you remember when he went down that gold plated escalator. do you remember what he said. he said the american dream is dead. oh, my gosh. his inaugural speech. what did he talk about? despite the fact that crime rate was at a 50-year low and despite that illegal border crossings were at a 50-year low, the president spoke of, quote

american carnage. he made things up. he lied about america and all the horrible things going on. they said, no. the american dream is not dead. using his own logic, he should have gone back to scotland because his mother was an immigrant there. his grandparents were immigrant germans. saying what these members of congress are doing what he does every day criticizing congress, they should go home. good morning. today is july 16. with us former chairman of the republican national committee. washington anchor for bbc world news, and pull izer prize winning column imany of the and

historian and author of "restoring the soul of america," john meechum, also msnbc contributor. mika went out to do an extended interview. we'll be bringing you the key moments of her sit down with the vice president straight ahead. john, before we get to all the nonsense and chaos of yesterday, what trump has picked up here as what we saw as little kids bumper stickers during the vietnam war, america, love it or leave it. it might be more effective from donald trump if he didn't build his whole entire political

campaign over false conspiracy theories that lied about the crime rate and our standings in the world and lied constantly to try to tear this country down. the man has spent his entire political career tearing this country down. now very odd, he turns his sights on freshman congresswomen saying basically the same thing we heard in 1960s and '70s, which is american, love it or leave it. >> and there by, manages yet again to corrupt and bring no understanding to the contribution of american values to the idea of national identity. the thing about being an american is it is not about blood or soil, it is about the assent to the idea.

do you agree with thomas jefferson that all men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights? we didn't apply that fully then and haven't fully applied it even now. to be patriotic is to be a protester because you want the union to be more perfect. you want it to be perfect but the insight of the founders is that more perfect is as good as it is going to get on this side of paradise. that is one of the things that has to be confronted here. i don't believe the president actually understands what i just said. you don't have to take it from me. take it from ronald reagan about whom he has tweeted a meme where

he said he met donald trump and he's going to be president. it is the truman show. it is madness. reagan said, you have to be born in france to be a fenchman or born in britain to be an englishman but you don't have to be born here to be an american. >> good thing for donald trump because his mother was not born here. his father was the son of german immigrants. it is so funny, some of these people that donald trump attacked for coming from other countries actually had parents in america more than donald trump did but why argue facts with donald trump. that's not what this is about. this is donald trump -- it is not a dog whistle.

it is a bull horn to his most bigoted racist supporters. president trump spent most of the day doubling down on those tweets over the weekend attacking a group of progressive women for being critical of the united states, just like the president is constantly critical of the united states during an event that was supposed to highlight american-made products. donald defended his remarks in which he said the four democrats should, quote, go back to the crime infested places they came from. he's talking about cincinnati and detroit and new york city. later in the day, the four congresswomen that he attack stood side by side to denounce his comments. here is a little about how the day unfolded. >> as far as i'm concerned, if you hate our country, if you are not happy here, can you leave.

>> our squad is big. our squad includes any person committed to building a more equitable and just world. >> if you are complaining all the time, you can leave right now. >> this will not be the first nor the last time we hear disgusting bigoted language from the president. >> they can leave. you know what, i'm sure there will be many people that won't miss them. >> weak minds and leaders challenge loyalty to our country in order to avoid challenging and debating the policy. >> in one case, you have somebody who comes from somalia, which is a failed government, failed state. left and came here and now is a congresswoman who is never happy. >> he would love nothing more than to divide our country based on race, religion, gender,

orientation or immigration status. >> they hate our country. they hate it, i think, with a passion. now it is possible i'm wrong. the voter will decide. >> by the way, it is pure insanity considering how negative donald trump has been about america. how critical he's been about american leaders his entire adult life. we are going to get to republicans not being critical of donald trump in a minute and how shameful so many of them have been but my gosh, this is sending shock waves across the world because the world has seen america as a country that's has accepted immigrants and has been, always called the melting pot. even theresa may came out and condemned right fully donald trump's remarks. >> not just theresa may but

boris johnson and when you lose pierce morgan like donald trump did yesterday who has been a staunch defender of the president an unusual voice in the british media. he came out and said what donald trump said was wrong, then the president does have a problem. this is whatta author cannian regimes do. they say you cannot criticize. that's what we hear from authoritarian regimes around the world. it is not what we hear from democracies or the united states. one of the strongest gifts a m democratic system is the right to point out weaknesses or failures without being thrown out of the country or into jail. as you say, this is the president who in his very first act as president stood up and

spoke about american carnage. how critical is that of this country? i've never heard a president speak in the dark language the way he did when he was inaugurated. >> still ahead, some republicans were willing to break with the president's racism. many more are remaining radio silence. we run through those next on "morning joe." but we're also a company that controls hiv, fights cancer, repairs shattered bones, relieves depression, restores heart rhythms, helps you back from strokes, and keeps you healthy your whole life. from the day you're born we never stop taking care of you.

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we talked yesterday about republicans that didn't step forward. a few stepped forward responding to questions. they decided to publicly admonish the president's tweets as wrong or inappropriate. tim scott, the only black senator called them racially

offensive and only congressman mike turner and hill heard went so far as to use the term racist. >> i think those tweets are racist and xenophobic and inaccurate. those women three of them were born here and all are citizens of the united states. you should be talking about things that unite us not divide us. >> as hard as there is to believe, there were republicans that didn't just run away but actually embraced the president's tweets. gop senator steve daines who faces reelection. he wrote, monday tan ans are sick and tired of listening to anti-americans and anti-semite,

democrats trash our country and ideals. i stand with president trump. republican congressman of louisiana wrote, no question that members of congress donald trump has called out have said anti-american things. i'll pay for their tickets if they tell me where they'd rather be. >> others say, it is not racist to tell people of color to go back to their countries. some people have called the president's comments racist to which he responded, that's o outrageous. of course they are not racist. senator rick scott of florida said of course they are not racist. represent harris said, they're obviously not racist.

anden senator from north carolina said, i literally don't go on twitter. i wonder if he just lives under a rock and doesn't watch the news or read the news or talk to anybody else. what a coward. i'm sure the people of north carolina will take that into consideration when they vote next year. white house senior advisor ivanka trump declined to comment while other top white house officials defended those remarks. >> do you find the president's tweets racists? >> i don't find them racist. the president went on and clarified his comments. i think he speaks for himself. >> i don't think the president's intent in any way is racist. >> marc, how is it not racist to tell women of color to go back to their countries when most of

them were born here. >> he has an asian woman of color in his cabinet. >> what? you have one asian-american woman of quote, color in your cabinet so you can tell u.s. citizens to go back to their countries because they are black? the republicans, how shameful. i never, ever imagined it would get this bad. >> you know, i thought it was like 1949 or 1959 all of a sudden. look, we knew that donald trump was racist. that's not a headline. donald trump is a racist. that's not breaking news. this isn't country club sort of not our sort of people racism. this is end of the bar, 1:00 a.m., go back to africa type of

racism. >> this as david duke writes it. this is david duke racist. i know there was some trump suck ups yesterday that wrote things critical of me saying that. all i said is, you lift david duke's words and donald trump's words. you could find them together and they sound just like donald trump has been saying the last couple of days. >> david duke, go back to george wallace and lester maddox. this is bad, bad stuff. this is the president of the united states who made, i think, a wrong political calculation to go flat out racist, i guess to advantagize his base. his aging white base and draw

that line. he seemed to be trying to make more misceif together. i want to see republicans go on record. let them vote today to the completely disgraceful performance from an organization that used to call themselves the party of lincoln has forfeited any right to do so in the future. this was just appalling. stunning. i guess not shocking. we know who we are dealing with. this is just flat out racism. >> coming up on "morning joe" joe biden said kamala harris caught him off guard. what does he expect from donald

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>> a wide-ranging interview with joe biden, the democratic front runner for nomination. he's facing a long list of challengers. he asked about the primary race for president and the potential foregoi for going head to head with donald trump. >> if i told joe biden of 1997 he would be running for president in 2020, what would he tell me? >> i would tell you i wouldn't be. i fully expected hillary would win. when beau was dying. i had planned to run in 2016. i corporate let anybody know how sick he was.

he didn't want me to. he fully expected i'd be available to help any democratic president but that i wouldn't be running. >> let's talk about the fight at hand. are you ready for the next debate, mr. vice president? >> i find it difficult to call it a debate when you have one minute. it is so easy to take things out of context. >> your performance was panned. did you do something differently? >> i didn't expect the attack. it started off, i know you you are not a racist. i have respect for the candidate that said that about me. turns out, i'm not sure her position is any different on bussing than mine. >> kamala harris. >> look. i want to talk about the future. >> so i think the public is

interested in how you are going to fight donald trump. kamala harris, if you weren't ready for her. are you ready for this guy that doesn't play fair. he lies, fact. he bullies, fact. he has a loose respect for the law to put it kindly. >> i'm used to bullies. my strategy is just to go out and remember that famous expression my grand pop used to use. he said to truman, give them hell. he said, no, i'm going to tell them the truth, they'll think it is hell. i know it will be not an honorable campaign but i'm not backing down from him. it is very different to turning to someone on the stage who says something so off the wall to me that -- i don't want to attack

anyone on a stage, it is not what i intend do but i realize that some have concluded because i didn't respond have tough to her how could i take on trump. i never had any trouble taking on trump to putin to xi jinping to anyone else. >> what do you do when he takes it to the debate stage and he's lying. starts making fun of your age, your mental state. >> i'll say, come on, donald. come on, man. how many pushups, do you want do here. come on, run with me, man. i was in a parade in independence, missouri. i always run in parades. it is the way i do. a fellow from independence said

to me, hey, sleepy joe. i said, come on, run with me. he said, oh, no. i'm not going to get down in the dirt with him. that's the only place he knows how to fight. i'm going to continue to talk about what he's doing and as my mother would say, i'm not going to take any guff from him. >> a lot of people want to know about your relationship with president obama. you worked together for eight years. you are buds. why no endorsement? >> i've asked him not do that. i don't want to put him in that spot. i want to do this on my own. this is not a third term for obama. the world has changed. it is different. we have the same value set. we don't give him a lot of

credit. he's a guy our kids should look up to and do look up to. i do keep in contact with him. our daughters. my granddaughter and his daughters are best friends. one is with me today. my number two granddaughter is with his daughter. we are friends. we are family. >> do you think he's ready for the next debate. >> that's exactly the right question, look, you weren't ready for kamala harris, do you think you are ready for donald trump. that kind of, come on, let's do pushups man isn't the robust come back to president trump. i think joe biden will have to sharp enth sharpen that up.

he could not go into that interview with mika knowing that question was not going to come up. >> coming up, part four of mika's sit down with joe biden. he gets personal about his family's fight with cancer. we'll be right back. don't miss your golden opportunity to experience our most advanced safety technology on a full line of vehicles. now, at the lexus golden opportunity sales event. lease the 2019 es 350 for $379 a month, for 36 months, and we'll make your first month's payment. experience amazing.

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>> earlier in the show, we played you a clip of joe biden talking about the death of his son beau in 2015. the former vice president is a leading champion in the fight against cancer and that issue impacts so many of us including mika who lost her best friend tia to the disease. joe biden was there to comfort mika's teenaged daughter. something mika reflected on yesterday with the presidential candidate. >> thank you for your kind words to emily.

my girl. you gave so much courage to her. she came to the bar where we were doing the show. her mother was in the grip of the battle with pancreatic. you gave her so much courage. she's writing her college essay about you. >> she knows now, a lot of kids come to her too. i watched what my boys went through when they lost their mom. she's tough. incredible kid. >> she is. she's special. you made a speech in 2012 at the national cemetery in virginia. you were speaking to families who lost loved one its in action. >> there will come a day, i promise you, when the thought of your son or daughter or husband or wife, brings a smile to your lips before it brings a tear to your eye. it will happen.

my prayer for you is that day will come sooner or later but the only thing i have more experience in you in is this, i'm telling you, it will come. >> my question to you is, has that come? >> it has. it catches me off guard at times. i was at this candidate forum here with the aarp talking about long-term care. i was talking about my boy. kind of caught me. i got caught. >> you are talking about care givers. >> and about people lying in pain for a long, long time. >> if you need the help, i promise you, there is nobody more important than you. that person there will help you do anything from help you with the bed pan to when they get really scared, hold their hands,

you know. >> i get up every morning, jill and i, no joke. i ask myself, is he proud of me? he was my heart. hunter is my soul. i still have my hunter and i still have my daughter. but he's part of everything i think. when i do think of him, i smile. more people here than i in new hampshire when i campaigned said, i knew beau. like president obama said. he was joe 2.0. my dad said, you know success when you look at your son or daughter when they turned out better than you. he turned out better than me. >> so moving. what humanity. extraordinary humanity. we still have mike barnicle

with us and sam stien and republican strategist political analyst. susan, when you see that clip, you are reminded what joe has been through not just with beau but losing his first wife and his daughter. his life has been a life of loss. he knows all too well the awful grace of god. he keeps moving forward and actually uses these tragedies as sources of strength. it is. you opened up saying the humanity. i really think it is important that when we look at what could potentially be a trump/biden matchup how much is beyond one of us appealing to working

families. he can appeal to people on a human and emotional level. that is something that is so lacking in the president who shows no empathy at any time. i think seeing this side of joe biden is so important. we have to remember who we are as a people and we are beyond one family. when he speaks to a group of people like he just did and gets moved, it shows us we need a leader who understands our loss. that is so important right now. >> mike, how moving when he was sitting there talking about his son yesterday afternoon in des moines in front of the aarp and got choked up and fought through it. like when he was talking to that group in 2012 about their loss and about the time in a their memory will bring a smile to their face before it brings a

tear to their eyes. that is joe biden. that is the consoler in chief. he knows what he's talking about because he's had to be consoled so many times in his life. >> you know, joe, if you are going to single out one specific aspect that would separate the president of the united states to the former vice president of the united states, i think it would be this. that one of them, one of them understands something that every american understands and deals with. he understands loss. he's filled with empathy for the vulnerable. there are many vul ner people in this country. people who have lost sons and daughters. he lives with it still. i could tell you personally a story about joe biden's empathy from someone suffering from cancer, my brother paul.

when joe found out about paul, he flew up. didn't have to do it. flew to boston, spent the day with him. he called him every week of paul's remaining life. paul died of brain cancer. the same cancer that took beau biden. joe biden called him every single week until his death. he understands things normal human beings live with each and every day. it won't be played out. he won't articulate it. he has lived it. he lives it still. >> it has been his life. you know, sam, if you read the book "what it takes," when he called his boys to his bedside and the doctor said, there is a 50/50 chance he wouldn't survive

the operation, he called his boys to his bedside and said, you don't have to ask after i'm gone whether i would be proud of you. i am proud of you now. how remarkable that circle has turned. nows now it is joe biden before his feet hit the ground asking is beau proud of what i'm doing? so moving. >> it is an extremely difficult conversation. all of us know or someone who has been affected by cancer. mike, i'm sorry about your brother and what he went through. i'm hesitant to bring politics into such a personal conversation. all i'll say is -- the difference -- the unique element hereof biden, these moments of intense vulnerability he's had to deal with, these moments of

intense emotional duress he's had to deal with, he's allowed voters and the public to see that. he's talked about it openly in a way that is not just unique for a politician but for a humanbeing, i would argue, often times, we would close off and not talk about the low points of our lives because they hurt so much. what biden has done is make himself accessible in that regard. i think there is an emenimmense public service to doing that. i wish more people in public office would be that way. we can't takele things like this unless we talk about them first. that is one of the defining differences between joe biden and donald trump, who

undoubtedly has had to deal with his own difficult circumstances. his brother died of alcoholism. he doesn't talk about it. for good reason. but there is value to bringing these stories up front and talk about them and debating in an honest way what to do about them. joe biden to his credit has done that. i wish and i hope we can continue having that conversation. >> so, sam, we are about to good to business before the bell. let's talk about the numbers. all the numbers were released for the second quarter. we certainly know about who did well but there are some candidates that didn't do so well. we are looking at them right there. it will be hard to continue deep into the third quarter. >> what has happened, we have a

two-tiered feel. one is those raising good money and the rest you see up there. that is the fear of 20-plus democrats going into iowa. that is becoming more confounded now. a lot of them are spending more than they are bringing in. eventually, they'll be faced with a choice do they continue on or do they stop. if i'm a beto o'rourke or other, i have to face fundraising or do i let go of staff and scale down or do i stop the campaign all together. those questions are not going to happen right now but if it continues in the next couple of

months, those campaigns will all be faced with those difficult questions. >> you look at a lot of these numbers and a lot of these are not going to qualify for future debates. at that point, i suspect many of them will realize it is time to drop out of the race. >> let's go to the bell now. >> we've got tesla facing the harsh reality of highing to meet high customer demand. some employees say they felt pressure to take short cuts to hit aggressive targets in production of those vehicles. some anecdotes about using electrical tape to seal cracks. a spokesperson did respond saying some of these stories are, quote, misleading and do not reflect our manufacturing practices or what it is like to work at tesla. >> can i ask you a quick

question. most people would love to have the problem tesla has, which is greater demand than supply. explain to us the layman that haven't followed fes law that closely, why can't they expand their work force or production facilities to meet the demand? >> it is a capacity issue. you hit it on the head. you are trying to find enough skilled labor and capacity to build facilities to build these vehicles. the reason tesla is in such a big spot is because the market value of the company is pricing such an aggressive goal. they have to make so many thousands of vehicles per year or they do not justify the current market value. musk is in this very difficult spot of not only having to produce quality vehicles but enough to meet demand and meet

revenue and cash to hire more people or build more cars. that's a lot of reason people are focusing on this story. for many, he's seen as a visionary, elon musk, who is auto industry. electric vehicles are a big part of that story. if he can continue to do this, tesla will be a massive success but there are skeptics who believe that he has a long, long road to travel before he can get those production targets that will make tesla the big car company that many hope it will be. >> what a fascinating story. thank you so much. >> sure. >> we appreciate you being with us to the. we have more "morning joe" ahead but as we go to break a quick look at headlines in papers in the early voting states. let's start in iowa, "the quad city times" leads with, "trump digs in on racist tweets." in south carolina, "the post and courier" goes with, graham, scott differ on trump's fiery tweets. and in nevada, the "las vegas

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relieves depression, restores heart rhythms, helps you back from strokes, and keeps you healthy your whole life. from the day you're born we never stop taking care of you. a decorated u.s. army special forces soldier is the latest casualty. the military says the 40-year-old sergeant major who went by the name of ryan of teague, texas, died during combat operations by enemy small arms fire in afghanistan. he joined the army in june, 2001, and deployed to iraq as an fra infantryman back in 2002 and

four times as a green beret he served in afghanistan twice, in 2017 and again this year. he earned more than 20 awards and decorations and will posthumously receive a purple heart and bronze star. more than 2400 u.s. service members have been killed in the war in afghanistan, which is now in its 18th year. 12 have been killed this year. with us now let's bring former army intelligence officer and former secretary of state of missouri jason candor. he also served a tour of duty in afghanistan and now he is helping lead the fight against veterans' homelessness. thanks for being with us. another tragic story, yet one more we've been hearing for almost 20 years. >> thank you for having me, joe. one thing, when i saw the news about sergeant major sartor the other day, this is an individual

who had obviously given so much and then was killed on a seventh deployment. what it made me think about was just how great the civil military divide is now. how true it is that our military goes to war and our country doesn't go to a war time footing. then what that translates to here at home is folks really are desperate to do more for our veterans. they want to do more than stand up at a ball game and applaud. they want to do more than say thank you for your service in the airport. and it's why i'm so grateful for the opportunity to, as you mentioned, lead the expansion of veterans community project, because what we do is we really say to folks, look. you can be more than thankful you can be involved. it's about filling the gaps in veterans services, ending veterans' homelessness, and since i have the floor i'll tell you folks can go to veterans community project.org and we are a donations based organization. >> you know, 18 years at war, jason, largely fought, multiple tours, takes a terrific toll on the families as well as the

service member. less than 1% of us serve. you bump into no one who has no one serving. too many are homeless and suffer from ptsd in the shadows. you are attacking specifically the homeless issue. tell us what you're doing. >> sure. a disproportionate amount of our homeless in this country are veterans. when you think about the traditional solutions for homelessness, you really have to approach veterans' homelessness differently. for example folks with post traumatic stress are a lot less likely to come in and sleep in a homeless shelter. right? nobody wants to really sleep in a homeless shelter but i have post traumatic stress. i can't sleep on an airplane. the idea of going and sleeping in a shelter where it's an open room surrounded by people that i don't know, homeless veterans are very unlikely to take advantage of that service. what we do at veterans community project is create veterans villages of tiny houses. in kansas city, which is the

first place we've done it and we are expanding now, by the end of the year 49 tiny houses. it is a village that truly rem kats the sort of network and support system folks had before they left the military with on site wrap-around services. it is transitional housing. >> what is the website? >> thank you. veteranscommunityproject.org. >> when you look at the community you build as you look to expand it is not just the community of these veterans but the community beyond it. can you talk a little bit besides the support that they may be able to do and help and literally build a house or a financial source, can you talk about the importance of support from the community and what that means to a veteran? >> i tell you just my own story. i'm a person who i have a phone full of influential contacts, a lot of grief from georgetown, pretty good government experience and i very publicly said i'm going to the v.a. about eight months ago i made that announcement and quickly realized after going to the v.a.

as they handed me a pile of paperwork, now, anybody who needs it should go to the v.a. it is a system you can navigate. but a lot of folks do feel, you know, if you're dealing with stuff you can feel a little overwhelmed by that. i did. i'm somebody who should have been perfectly positioned to navigate that but, fortunately for me, veterans community project is in kansas city where i live. so i turned to my folks at vcp and they helped me navigate the process. that made a huge difference for me. veterans community project has done that for over 4,000 veterans, that sort of stuff, in kansas city and just to your point, by working with the community. so it is not just about connecting folks with services at the v.a. it's about there is a dentist who wants to do more for veterans. well, we have an opportunity for you to come in here and provide free dental services. you name it, we connect folks with community services. >> is there a good way or a better way than we are seemingly involved with right now to convince people who have ptsd to admit it and go seek services? >> well, i can only speak for, you know, what i've tried to

contribute to that, which is i try and talk a lot about post traumatic growth. you know, some folks may have noticed that i made this big announcement about eight months ago and then i kind of disappeared for a while. i think a lot of people assumed, oh, he is in a really bad place. the truth was, as soon as i said to myself and to the world that i was dealing with post traumatic stress i started to feel better because i started to get treatment. and i wanted to wait until i knew i had completed that process before i would try and put on any kind of face for the world. i didn't want to put on a front. but my point is, post traumatic growth is a real thing. it is achievable. it's within your reach. it's happened for me. it's a game changer. i feel better than i felt in over a decade. i sleep at night, which is, by the way, underrated and totally incredible. and i have this great opportunity now to work with veterans community project, which is veterans community project.org. >> all right. jason, thank you so much. we can't thank you enough for

coming in and talking about this critical, critical issue. >> thank you, joe. >> we'll have all the information for his organization on our website, joe.msnbc.com. and we'll have it up this morning. that does it for us. now let's pass it over to stephanie ruhle. >> thank you so much, joe. hi there. i'm stephanie ruhle. you ready? we have got to start with the president. today taking his attacks on four democratic congresswomen to a whole new low calling them anti-american and making it clear he has no problem fueling cultural and racial division to play to his political base. >> as far as i'm concerned, if you hate our country, if you're not happy here, you can leave. that's what i say all the time. now, you can say what you want. but get a list of all of the statements they've made. all i'm saying, if they're not happy here, they can leave. they can leave. you know what?

i'm sure thathe