in a defensive tweet storm over the weekend, president trump denied ever knowing about the alleged bounties russian government placed on u.s. forces in afghanistan. the kremlin has swiftly denied all allegations that it provided cash to tell ban fighters in exchange for the killing of u.s. and ally forces. in an exclusive interview with nbc news, a top spokesman for vladimir putin, called the reports, wait for it, fake news. joining us now is keir simmons. can they pretend not to be reading from the same script,

putin's people and trump? >> reporter: great question. i feel like i want to be really honest going into this, nicolle, going into an interview like this with some trepidation actually because you kind of know the answers you're going to get from the clem bin before you get them. no one watching is going to be surprise that putin's right -- one of right-hand men is fake news. but let me play you some of the interview. what i want you to do is listen closely, very much what the question that was in your question which is, listen to the way that he blames the media for the story and then how he pivots to use president trump's tweets to demonstrate that there's no truth in it. take a listen. >> there is not true and we can completely reject the possibility of it. and we actually -- we're very

sorry that some news agencies that used to be very, very prestigious ones and used to be very precise in choosing proper and double-checked information, now they have started to use information that has no ground beneath. >> one of the news organizations is reporting this is my news organization, nbc news, based on what we're being told by multiple u.s. intelligence sources, are you saying u.s. intelligence has got it wrong or that those officials are lying to us? >> i don't know who those officials are. and also, we've heard some statements coming from the white house, particularly the president of the united states, and those statements indicate -- indicate that those reports actually were not so valuable. and not so trustful.

we better keep to the statements. >> but i asked dmitry specifically whether the russian government had been questioned by any part of the american government, ambassadors, intelligence, military, on this question of what russia alleging was doing in afghan starks, he said there was no communication of that nature. i asked him speckly about a call, was it brought up on that call? he said as far as the kremlin was aware it wasn't. >> keir, i have two -- one thought and one question. i mean, so, i made a list. the people who have corroborated this reporting that the russians offered a bounty for the killing of u.s. soldiers by the taliban, sky news has now confirmed it, "the new york times" broke the story, quickly matched by the wall street journal, the

washington post and as you said in your interview, nbc. people denying rit putin and his spokesperson. and trump and his spokes gal. it speaks for it. why do russians want american soldiers dead? >> reporter: yeah, that's a great question. i think that we haven't gotten time to go into it. in afghanistan, there's long history of america versus russia. in russia there's a feeling of -- there's a deep feeling of anger in some parts of the russia leadership over an attack on a convoy in syria that included allegedly some russians, perhaps some russian military, so, you know, it's grievance for grievance in one sense. but, of course, it also has serious implications for the

relationship between russia and america and it's really good question because you have to ask yourself whether the kremlin is looking forward in a way that really is beneficial for russia's strategic interest in this sense, have they really gained that much in this relationship between president trump and president putin? if you look at for example what john bolton said in his book, he talks about hours after hours of conversations between trump and putin in which nothing was decided. i think historians will tell whether the approach that russia has taken in this past decade, in these past years, really is in russia's interest. that's one for the historians i think. >> we're not going to wait for historians. come back tomorrow and we'll play the rest of your interview. i'm very -- this is the question that i put to three former intelligence officials today,

why do russians want to kill american soldiers? if they force trump to engage them, i mean, everyone came down to because they can. which is bleak. to be continued. >> it's such a good question. it's a great question. because it goes right to the heart not just the politics there but the international geopolitical situation. a great question to be asking, nicolle. >> thank you, keir, for the interview and for spending some time with us. when we come back -- a big decision on abortion rights from the united states supreme court. once again, chief justice john roberts has joined with the lib rals on the court. that's next.

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ready to help. now to that big win for abortion rights activists this morning at the u.s. supreme court. the court struck down 2014 law requiring louisiana doctor offering abortion services to have admitting privileges. the court says the law violates the constitution. siding with two doctors and a medical clinic that sued and argued it would leave one doctor at a single clinic to provide abortion rights for the entire state. the chief justice john roberts joined the liberal judges in the majority. joining us now is kimberly

atkins. kim atkins, first of all, we'll get to the john roberts legacy that he seems to be carving out for himself. but on the matteerits, this cass being closely watched in terms of setting the course for abortion rights for a generation, a really, really important decision around those issues of reproductive health. >> it is. it is a case that's a challenge to a law that's very similar to one of many ways that states have been trying to limit abortion access in this case as you pointed out, it was a law that required a doctor performing abortion to have admitting rights. keep in mind, in louisiana, there are only three open clinics. very few practice tigss have

admitting rights to hospital let alone one in a couple dozen miles of wherever the procedure is performed. another law in texas that the supreme court considered four years ago and that was really the basis for john roberts to join the four more liberal justices to say, you know what, sorry, we already decided that this kind of law cannot stand, it cannot stand under roe. it falls. john roberts was different from the other justices he reiterated the fact that he voted the other way four years ago and he still believes that the jurisprudence is wrong, but at this point there's that institutional doctrine that he must follow. it's a 4-1-1 decision. john roberts is not suddenly a proponent of abortion rights but he chose a very careful way to strike down that law. >> it's such an important

distinction because i know that democrats are frustrated sometimes if they can't use the supreme court to motivate their base the way the right wing does with such tremendous effect. the right wing programs to social conservatives basically ignore how heinous donald trump's conduct is, ignore the debasement the office of the presidency, close your eyes and vote for the supreme court. cases like this should bring into focus for democrats, for anyone, for anyone who cares about reproductive rights and reproductive health for women should be very, very sort of heightened in terms of understanding how precarious this is, you're right, it wasn't a 5-4 decision. it was 4-1-1. did you think it will seep into the political conversation? >> democrats say they try to campaign on this issue and it just hasn't been a motivator the

same way that it's absolutely been a motivator for republicans in key elections including the 2016 election of donald trump once he released this list of very conservative justices that he would choose from, he ended up not using that list, it was a signal to evangelicals and conservatives he would appoint the kind of judges to the supreme court and throughout the federal judiciary they wanted. it really worked. perhaps now that the court is literally as evenly split as an odd-number court can be, as it's taking up big issues like, this more of a motivator for voters to realize what's at stake. even though the chief justice in this case and in some other cases have ruled with the more liberal justices, that doesn't mean that he always will. just day alone, he struck down a part of the cfpb and expanded

the rights of the powers of the executives. it's still a big issue. >> kimberly atkins, always wonderful to see you. thank you for spending some time with us today. when we return more than a month after the death of george floyd, powerful changes are taking place across the country. but not at the white house. for donald trump finds himself very much still on the wrong side of history. this is nothing new. throughout our history any time something bad

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some companies still have hr stuck between employeesentering data.a. changing data. more and more sensitive, personal data. and it doesn't just drag hr down. it drags the entire business down -- with inefficiency, errors and waste. it's ridiculous. so ridiculous. with paycom, employees enter and manage their own data in a single, easy to use software. visit paycom.com, and schedule your demo today. this is just absolutely insane that we are all gathered here to talk about my nephew getting murdered by a damn madman in the middle of the street for what reason? for the color of his skin. >> we're frustrated bass we already know in our mind what happened. we see guilty. we see all of this. but this has to be proven. everybody has to have a trial. >> family members of george floyd, they were outside a

courtroom in minneapolis after the four officers involved in the arrest that led to the death of george floyd appeared in court. since that killing more than a month ago, we have watched a protest movement, a revolution really, to begin affect real change across this country. lawmakers in mississippi voted to remove the confederate symbol from that state's flag and the governor says he intends to sign the bill into law. the confederate battle emblem has flown for 176 years. donald trump is calling if the preservation of confederate statues. he retweeted a video from the villages in one of his supporters yelled and raised his fist while screaming "white power." joining our conversation is the

national deputy of african-american outreach for the '808 obama campaign. also with us, elise jordan. she's now a contributor contrib "time" magazine and an nbc news political analyst. elaine, i want to -- i never want to let that feel normal, that this grieving family, the family of george floyd, manages to always sort of exhibit grace and leadership at what must be the darkest hour for them. can you -- just, we started there and i want to get to the trump video, but i am always amazed by where any grieving family finds strength, but especially this family. >> certainly, nicole. it is a tragic moment in their lives and so often, it is black families, african-american families who have to bear the burden of this tragedy, as well as grieving publicly and trying

to help ensure that the nation heals and that the nation changes. i think what is remarkable, though, about this moment is we really are seeing ourselves being on the cusp of transformation when it comes to racial justice in this country. unlike any other time i've seen in my generation, and i was born in the 1970s, we're seeing that both with police reform and the individuals who are demonstrating in the streets, as well as individuals and corporations and states that are taking down those symbols of hatred and division of confederate icons and saying that this is not the country that we want to be. we want to be a united states of america that recognizes humanity and dignity and equality. and so, george floyd really -- the death, the murder of george floyd sparked a movement.

and i'm so saddened that we had to lose his life, but i am hopeful that we are seeing transformation. >> elise, i think what alaina says is right. we are on the cusp of real change, real breakthroughs in parts of the country where there was, for a long time, a lot of public opinion in the opposite direction. you now have 76% of americans who self-identify as being aligned with the goals of the black lives matter movement. it's up 26 points from 2015, the last time some of those questions were asked. but donald trump is an outlier. i watched this video that he tweeted. it is some of his supporters in a golf cart, streaming "white power" at the top of their lungs to trump protesters. trump tweeted it and tweeted his support for his supporter s yelling "white power." >> i agree with both of y'all

that we're in a moment of transformation with the country's awakening towards racial injustice. and donald trump is completely behind the curve, whereas americans are looking forward. and americans are making strides that i had been hopeful that i would see in my lifetime, but wasn't quite certain. you know, just what happened this weekend in mississippi, i just want to point out, is so historic. and it's even more incredible that it was supported by members of both parties. and it was a two-thirds vote in a mississippi legislature that voted to take down the confederate flag. and that kind of vote doesn't happen even in normal votes. and that it happened for this, a vote that the people of mississippi rejected back when i was a senior in high school in the early 2000s, and that we have come to the point where the men and women, the representatives of our state are saying, let's move on. let's move beyond. that's a really big deal. and then you have donald trump

amplifying the voices of supporters who are preaching racial hate. he's out of step with the mood of the country and i think that we're seeing that reflected right now in his tanking polls. >> you alaina, i guess that is the thing of this. running as a racist polls terribly. >> donald trump is out of step with his time. he knows one strategy and that is to divide and to try to distract. well, you can't divide and distract from american values like dignity and justice, right? there are people on both sides of the aisle that understand that right is right. there are people of all races and all genders, sexuality, orientation, all people

understand that we deserve dignity and humanity. so as mississippi is taking down this confederate flag, there's still a generational stain that is going to require real work to try to ensure healing. so it's not just the symbol. they are also going to have to ensure that there is health care for their residents. that there is investments in employment and investments in economic development for their community. they're still going to have to make sure that there is justice in policing. so it's important that this symbol come down. if you think about all of the generations that were raised under the stigma of this symbol of oppression. there is generational work that's going to have done to ensure justice. but donald trump doesn't even know where to begin with that. and we are seeing voters all across the country saying that he is out of step. >> elise, is it generational in the south or are minds being changed sort of across the spectrum in the south?

what is happening? how did this pass? >> i agree with alaina that it is generational. and you see the younger activists and how after george floyd was murdered, around 3,000 protesters gathered at the mississippi capital. and from that event, from that black lives matter protest, the legislature was pushed into action. you had the leader of the southern baptist convention in the state. you had those leader come out and say, no, we want to get rid of this flag. you had business leaders and the s.e.c. saying, you won't have a baseball championship in your flag as long as you have this reprehensible flag. so it really was a ripple effect that the young activist base energized and brought to the forefront >> allaina and elise, two of my favorite people. i'm sorry, really quick? >> joe biden didn't know when he started his campaign saying this is going to be a battle for the soul of the nation, he didn't realize that battle was going to

be waged in all of these different arenas, in the streets, in corporations, in the state capitol and in congress. >> a perfect place to stop. alaina, elise, thank you both for spending some time with us. great see you. the explosive reporting about russia paying bounties to afghan militants who kill american troops, that's where we start when "deadline white house" starts after this. t whene house" starts after this in just 48 hours... to the university moving hundreds of apps quickly to the cloud... or the city government going digital to keep critical services running. you are creating the future-- on the fly. and we are helping you do it. vmware. realize what's possible. wayfair has way more ways to renovate your home, from inspiration to installation. like way more vanities perfect for you. nice. way more unique fixtures and tiles.

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a scandal of increasingly daunting proportions is bearing down on the trump white house this hour. new reporting on that explosive "new york times" scoop over the weekend that russia offered bounties for the killing of american soldiers in afghanistan. today, "the washington post" is reporting that those russian-paid bounties resulted in, quote, the death of several u.s. service members. and "the new york times" is reporting a timeline that all but gaurnt alerted their superi early as january to a suspected russian plot to pay bounties to the taliban to kill american troops in afghanistan. that's according to officials briefed on the matter. "the times" reports that trump himself was briefed on the intel, and that the national security council met in late march to discuss a response. ranging from a diplomatic

complaint to sanctions and more. yet so far, no response has been initiated, not even so much as a complaint to russia. instead, trump has continued to champion russia's inclusion in the g-8 and has publicly suppressed his, quote, great friendship with russia and its president, vladimir putin. the story has sent shock waves through washington and has the white house scrambling to explain why it did nothing in response to intelligence that russians were paying the taliban to kill american troops. trump has taken to twitter to question the substance of the intel, to deny he was briefed on it at all, and to attack the reporters who wrote the story. though no love lost, of course, for russia in his tweet. the white house this afternoon echoing trump's denials and adding that the national security adviser, the cia director, and white house chief of staff all say trump wasn't briefed on the matter. white house press secretary kayleigh mcennayny insisting there's no consensus in the intelligence community on the substance of the reports, though she did not provide assurances

in today's briefing that the president is at all focused or interested in getting to the bottom of it. all of that leaving us with questions that are among the most vexing of the trump presidency. if reporting on the intel from "the new york times," "the washington post," the associated press and others is true, does covert lethal action by russia suggest we may be entering a new cold war? is russia becoming more brazen in its action with the impression that the american president is in its pocket. is the intelligence committee so broken under trump that it didn't give this threat to u.s. troops the attention it warranted. did the military give the threat the credence it deserves to adequately protect troops. and of course, what happens next? to help us tackle these questions and more, some of our favorite reporters and friends are here. former chief of staff at the cia and the department of defense, jeremy bash is back. plus, former democratic senator, claire mccaskill is here. and senior political reporter for "the washington post," aaron blake is here. aaron, i want to deal with the reporting first. and i want to just have you come

through the timeline with me and just jump in. so friday night, "the times" has this scoop about a russian secret covert lethal program to pay money to taliban militants to murder american soldiers. "the times" follows that scoop with some reporting on the front page of its paper today about how special operations and intelligence use that information in realtime, ostensibly, to protect forces on the ground. your newspaper, i think, was first out with the scoop that u.s. soldiers were killed by people paid these bounties. "the new york times" also has at least one soldier killed and nbc news now is confirming that soldiers died under this program. take me through the timeline and why it matters. >> well, so this is something that really goes back through the early parts of 2018 and even 2017 when u.s. officials first

started noting that it looked like there was evidence that russia was, in fact, arming the taliban. it's been known that russia had some interests in arming the taliban, but it wasn't clear that they were actually actively involved in some of these operations. certainly, the idea of them funding boufund ing bounties when it comes to u.s. troops would be extremely significant. i think an inflection point came here back in 2018. that was when there was an attack in syria on american troops and their syrian allies. and in that attack, there were russian mercenaries on the other side. and the united states responded very forcefully. it turned out that there were russian mercenaries that were part of the people who were killed in that situation, more than a hundred killed according to u.s. military. so that seems to be, at least according to u.s. officials, at least perhaps the precursor to what we're seeing today with

this intelligence that bounties were placed on u.s. troops in afghanistan. certainly, we're learning a lot more today. there are very conflicting signals we're seeing from the white house when it comes to how credible that intelligence was. the president said it wasn't credible and we saw a shift from kayleigh mcennayny saying that there was basically no consensus yet or it wasn't confirmed. but it seems evident from the number of outlets that have confirmed this, that this is something that u.s. intelligence took very seriously and then fact that the white house seems to be watering down its denials certainly lends credence to that. >> okay, jeremy, let's take on this idea of corroborated and credible. i think people that don't understand how an intelligence product comes together and how it's used may think that this is a waveoff and this may work for some of trump's base. but let's do two things. one, after 9/11, there was a

threat, there was a plot that was credible enough that everyone still takes their shoes off before they board a plane. now, credibility is on a spectrum, right? and this plot was credible enough that we briefed our allies, we briefed the military, special operations, we had all of the officials who are high enough up the chain of command to live and work in washington, d.c. sit down in the situationrosituation room in march in the white house to figure pout what to do about it. so to take on this sort of feeble defense that the white house seems to have landed on that, oh, it wasn't credible. and let me ask you to explain this, too. a president who cares about national security and cares about the safety of their troops, a normal president is made ware of any threat to troops on a battlefield. and this president was made aware enough of the threat posed by iran and soleimani to blow him up. this is not a president shielded from threats to troops on the battlefield. >> that's right, nicole.

so we collect intelligence in afghanistan. for example, from detainees. we collect that information. and some of that information is used to form finished analysis, analytic products that the intelligence community produces and gives to the president and other senior policy makers. but a presidential daily brief book and you've seen some and i've seen many, as well. they contain both those finished analytic pieces that explain, hey, we've got some information, here's our view of it. but they also sometimes provide some of the raw reporting, the raw collection. and presidents often are told, hey, we've got this tip or this information from a human source or we've collected this information. we're still working on what it means and what our options are. but it's totally inconceivable and i think frankly an outright lie that the white house would have to wait until everything was buttoned up and verified to present it to the president. i think what's going on here, either they told the president and he forgot, dismissed, or ignored it, and i think that's likely, or maybe they said to

him, look, we're going to work on this, and he now wants to disavow that he knew about it, because hentz taken action against it. because, i think, frankly, he has not wanted to take tough action against russia all along. >> three former intelligence officials said there was no way this wasn't in the pbd. one former intelligence official said, it would have been the first item in the pbd under the headlines along the lines of, threats to american soldiers in afghanistan. do you agree with that assessment? >> i do. and not on that, but this is the exact kind of information that would go up through the defense agency. this would get in the hands of the chairman of the joint chiefs, the secretary of defense, not to mention the cia director and director of national intelligence. all of those people spend a lot of time with the president. it's inconceivable for the last six months, not one of them said, hey, mr. president, we have a direct threat to our

troops. it is just outlandish, ridiculous. the fact that kayleigh mcenany is standing there saying that, i think she's insulting the intelligence of everybody who works in national security. >> claire, let's turn to the idea of oversight. these former intelligence officials say, we're asking the wrong question when we say, why wasn't the gang of eight briefed. this should have been briefed to the intel committees. is congress being cut out because the whole process is so broken? what are your questions? >> maybe even worse than that, nicole. let's look at this. at 1:00 this afternoon, the president's press representative said he still hadn't been briefed. now, let that sink in. he's been playing golf. he's been tweeting stuff, but he hasn't said, hey, i need to get to the bottom of this. this is really important.

our enemy, russia, is putting a price on the heads of our military. now let's think about what's going on this afternoon in addition to that. they're doing a briefing at the white house for republicans only. that is unheard of at moments like this. it's the united states of america and one of the few places that we've managed to keep it united is support for our troops. this should be a bipartisan briefing of -- if you don't want the whole senate, it should certainly be the intelligence committee, with gina haskell answering questions. it should certainly be the armed services committee with esper being answering questions. it should certainly be the foreign relations committee with pompeo answering questions. and it should be republicans and democrats. but the notion that they are asking the republicans to run up to the white house to get their political instructions, to learn how to lie for this president at a moment that putin has the price on the heads of our

military in afghanistan. this is a scandal -- i mean, they wanted to make a big deal about benghazi? this makes benghazi look like playing with toys. this is a big deal and they are not treatying it like it's a big deal. >> let me be as pointed as i can about this question. so trump wins and he likens the american intelligence community to nazis. he's there a few weeks, he asks comey to see to it to let flynn go, comey refuses and he fires comey and he spent the better part of three years smearing him. he sets his eyes on mccabe, smears and fires him a few days short of his pension vesting because his wife had the audacity to run for office. he muse on to robert mueller who srveed george w. bush after the attacks of 9/11 and continued and served. republicans say not one word. not about the intelligence community being compared to nazis, not about jim comey,

appointed george. with bush's deputy attorney general, not about robert mueller, george w. bush's fbi director, not about the mueller vr investigator who is put away a lot of of bad guys, republicans still mum. then ambassador taylor testifies during impeachment and said, ukrainians died while donald trump was diddling around with their military assistance that congress approved, republicans approved. they say nothing. dead ukrainians didn't move them. now you have dead american soldiers and republicans say nothing. what is the -- when do you cease to be a party if you say nothing and what's next? >> and don't forget that trump stood up next to putin in helsinki skpand said wib, instey own intelligence community. i think he's telling the truth, putin, instead of men and d

women -- and these are veterans. there is someone in the intelligence community that is so upset about this that knows what's going on that has leaked this because they are so worried about our troops and realize this president doesn't care. he cares more about a stupid tweet then he cares about the lives of americans risking their lives for us in afghanistan against the taliban. so this is really what's going on here. this is a repeat. we saw what happened to vindman when he did his patriotic duty. the question is, will they now ferret out who this patriot is? will this patriot come forward? and will they do the same thing to him or her? >> claire, it's an important political distinction. fox news was famous for trying to align itself with the military, but they have crossed the transom now of smearing military officials. and i'll be interested to watch tonight to see if difference in tone and tenor. this is now a time of choosing. donald trump -- you're right,

whether or not he was briefed isn't even the question anymore. he knows now. he knows now. >> he knows now. >> did he call putin -- i mean, if you are strong and if you want to continue to represent the country, it doesn't even matter what you did in march, april, may, or june while you were spreading the plague and supporting the confederate memorabilia in this country. what matters is what you do from today forward. i mean, what are the questions for you moving forward, today forward? >> well, this story broke on friday. it is now late in the afternoon on monday and we have heard nothing from the president other than, you know, people are denying it. by that, he means putin is denying it. well, big deal. maybe the only person on the planet who's a bigger liar than trump is putin. so, you know, he still has not expressed concern that there is someone in his intelligence community -- and by the way, this isn't just being reported in "the new york times" or "the washington post."

the washington journal, the ap, european news outlets. this is being reported across the globe. and this would not be reported across the globe if there wasn't confirmation from a lot of different sources that this is going on. the fact that this president has not spoken out about this shows where his allegiances are. and these republicans, they're in bed with him. and their allegiances are showing too, and it's not to america's military. >> all right, jeremy. let's unpack some of this. i have posited this question to three former intelligence officials and i'll give you a run at it. why does russia want american soldiers dead? >> i think there are two things that are driving moscow's intentions here. number one is, i think they have an ambition to sow discord in afghanistan and prevent the peace negotiations between the taliban and the afghan government. because, of course, that's an american project and they want to disrupt for past americana. but more globally, they want us to focus more on

counterterrorism, keep us bogged down in some of these fights in south asia. because otherwise, we would be focusing on great power competition, which includes our efforts to stop what russia's doi doing globally and from a geopolitical perspective. i think back to the question of, what can a president do when he gets information about this. i'm not suggesting that the president had to jump out there immediately and publicly declare this an issue he's going after vladimir putin on. because, for example, we may have wanted to respond quietly, covertly. we may not have wanted to have the fingerprints of the united states on the response. there are many policy responses when you get information like this. but the idea that the president would not be engaged, his advisers would be too scared to tell him about negative information about russia shows you just how distorted our policy has been in favor of pleasing vladimir putin and

being on sebsequiuos to vladimi putin. my heart goes out to those families. and i want to hear from the widows and hear from the kids and this parents. we need to hear from the families. they deserve answers. >> aaron blake, where does the reporting go next? i remember -- i was part of the communications team that helped to declassify the pbd, what bush knew ahead of the 9/11 attacks, and i remember it. i can conjure it up in my head. bin laden intent on attacking in the united states. is there -- theare there foias? what does the effort look like on the press side to understand

what our national security heads knew and what they knew it? >> i think the next thing we're looking for here is how do the people who have been briefed on this, the members of congress who are getting a briefing today respond to it. because while this appears to be a selective group of people, there is considerable concern among the republican side of the aisle, when it comes to something like this. this is something that whatever has happened over the course of trump's presidency, this would be a bridge too far for even many republicans who view this as an example of antagonistic foreign policy, doing something that is beyond the pale. we've seen the comments from lindsey graham and liz cheney was really interesting. we'll start to see what those republicans say about these briefings. my suspicion is that they're going to be a little more serious than the president's tweet last night led us to believe. and at that point, it's really going to be up to congress to

press for more information. whether they actually will or not, of course, we haven't seen a whole lot of that over the course of the last three plus years. >> i can't leave hoping on the republicans to finally wake up as the last word. claire mccaskill, what kind of oversight is necessary now? again, this harkens back to sort of a post-9/11 era, where congress didn't hesitate to haul robert mueller and george tenant and don rumsfeld and condi rice and colin powell up to congress on a minute's notice. what should happen? >> well, there should be a secure briefing for -- at a minimum, the three committees of jurisdiction in the secured portion of the capital for the senators and then for the house. and after those hearings, the leaders of those committees in a bipartisan way need to figure out what are the right sanctions, what is the right thing to speak out about? because this president is not going to do it. he is too beholden, for some

reason to vladimir putin. it is now squarely on the shoulders of the united states' senate and the house of representatives and they better get to work. >> claire mccaskill, jeremy rash, aaron blake, no three people i would rather ask questions to than the three of you. thank you for starting us off. when we come back, the pandemic is raging all across america, once again. or still, we should say. our next guest says the government's mixed message is hurting. prepare for a tough road ahead. and quite the busy weekend for donald trump. a day after retweeting of a video of a supporter shouting white power from his golf course, today trump was busy at work, retweeting of a white couple pointing guns at protesters. plus, the chief justice of the united states supreme court once again siding with precedent on the rule of law and the liberal justices over politics and parties.

isn't that refreshing? all of those story still coming up for us. story still coming up for us.

the coronavirus pandemic passing two grim milestones this weekend. 10 million cases have been confirmed worldwide and the death toll has passed half a million people. the united states accounts for a quarter of those deaths. cases in the u.s. are on the rise in 32 states, as new epicenters have emerged in florida, texas, and arizona. across the country, leadership unable to control the raging virus, and as infectious disease specialist dr. william shaffner tells "the new york times," that's the key to boating it. quote, there has to be a clear, coherent, sustained communication and that has absolutely not happened. we've had just the opposite and now it's hard to unring a whole series of bells. that lack of clear and sustained

communication on full display at the white house. just take the contradictory messages we're hearing from them on mask wearing. >> your second question was, i cannot hear you. >> i'll just speak louder. >> because you want to be politically correct. >> no, sir, i want to wear the mask. >> go ahead, go ahead. >> for anyone, if you can't maintain social distancing, which is that if you're going to be within 6 feet of people for more than 15 minutes, it's just a good idea to wear a mask. it's an important message, we're here to convey it on part of the administration, the white house coronavirus task force and the president. >> wow, file that under better late than never. joining our conversation is dr. william shaffner, aforementioned and quoted in that "new york times" story because he's a professor of preventative medicine and infectious diseases at vanderbilt university medical center. also joining us, rob klain and now an adviser to joe biden. dr. shaffner, i was stopped in my tracks by that whole article

in which you're quoted about how much we've lost. just talk about where we go from here. because i think your conclusion, the conclusion of others is that it's really hard to convince people to stay home for another three months when their government failed them during the first three months. >> well, nicole, where we're going is forward and the question is not whether we're going forward, but how. are we going forward carefully, prudently, in a way to reduce the spread of this infection? or are we going forward in a much more carefree fashion and saying, what the heck, we'll just deal with all of these illnesses that are going on. and we'll just tolerate all of these deaths. that sounds harsh. that sounds severe. but that's the way i'm reading it. i think our mayor just told us last night, the executive order, if you go outside, you must wear

a mask. this ought to be uniform across the country. it's the new normal. it's the only thing we can do to minimize both the public health and the clinical impact of this very serious infection. you know, it's a lot easier to wear a mask than a ventilator. >> how did this little piece of cotton or whatever, fabric, become the political statement of 2020? how broken are we that this connates any political meaning? someone could have a pediatric cancer diagnose. someone could have a diabetic mom. how could this become tainted by politics? >> those of us in medicine and public health don't understand that. we're extremely frustrated by it. the mask has no politics and neither does the virus. the virus doesn't care whether you vote blue, red, green or orange or don't vote at all.

it's an equal opportunity inf infector. its only job is to infect someone else and propagate itself, to continue in the population to survive. and it's very contagious and as we're learning, every-more serious. the more we learn about this virus, the more we learn about the variety of clinical effects it can have. and as you have just told us in the intro, the number of cases is increasing, hospitalizations are increasing. when you have people hospitalized, some of them will die. and that will continue unless we all determine to work together. this is one thing where we can all be together on this to reduce the impact of this virus on our population. the masks protect ourselves and

they protect everyone around us. heck, what's wrong with that? >> ron klain, you had the job of helping the country prepare at a time when the bullhorn from the white house was used to keep people safe. what do we do now? that hasn't been the way it's been used. >> i agree with dr. schaffner that we need clearer and more consistent messaging around things like mask wearing and social distancing. but we also need the government to do its part, nicole. we don't have a national testing strategy. you saw over the weekend this viral video of people bunched up against each other, waiting, literally hours and hours to get tests in texas, spreading the disease while they're waiting to get a test. we don't have a national contact tracing strategy. the countries that have beat this have tested extensively and traced the contacts of those who are positive and isolated those people. we aren't really doing either of

those on a nationwide basis. in fact, we really have no national strategy here at all. we've gone kind of gone to a let every state do it on its own approach. we're losing as many people to covid, even with the reduced death rate now that we lost each month during world war ii. and we didn't tell each state to go fight the enemies on their own. this is why we have a federal government and our federal government just isn't leading on this. it isn't leading in terms of the response, and it isn't leading in terms of the kind of messaging that dr. schaffner's talking about. >> ron, i had this whacky idea that joe biden has really put sort of public health at the center of all of his utterances about covid. what if we handed out biden masks and trump masks? somebody has to break the cycle of partisanship around this issue. and other than a few bright spots, i think it was the

republican governor of south dakota when he was in tears when he said, you don't know why someone's wearing a mask. how do you take politics out of what's to come, which it sounds like from reading dr. schaffner's quotes in "the new york times," the worst may stale stihl still be ahead of us. >> i actually think politics are out of this. trump is in it. >> yeah, that's fair. that's fair. >> to his credit, mitch mcconnell, who i disagree with on a lot of things, made a very strong statement about mask wearing. kevin mccarthy has made a strong statement about mask wearing. so this isn't really a partisan issue. this is a trump, you know, rally his base, stir people up, undermine his own administration thing. so the problem here, nicole is actually, democrats and republicans, people in red states and blue states, most americans in most places believe that they should be wearing their masks. our president doesn't and

because he doesn't, his core followers don't and that level of noncompliance is enough to undermine the effectiveness of the mask wearing. we need to get from 60, 70% up to 80, 90% and donald trump is the obstacle plain and simple. >> ron klain, dr. schaffner, thank you both so much for spending some time with us. a after the break, there are dog whistles and then there are fog horns. the trump administration's bizarre explanation for why the president re-tweeted a racist video over the weekend. that's next. a racist video over the weekend that's next. aren arthritis pain gel, the first and only full prescription strength non-steroidal anti-inflammatory gel available over-the-counter. new voltaren is powerful arthritis pain relief in a gel. voltaren. the joy of movement.

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which he retweeted a video where a man driving a golf koufrs holding a trump campaign sign repeatedly yells "white power" at the protesters. the video was later removed from his page. his aides say that trump couldn't hear the repeated use of the phrase. i suggest a hearing test if that's true. so trump carried on, rage tweeting about monuments, about democrats, about protesters, and of course about us in the meeting. and this morning without context, he re-tweeted video of a st. louis couple waving weapons at protesters. another couple where the president seems interested and intent on inciting violence and unrest. joining us now, john heilemann and "new york times" editorial board member, mara gay. mara, i watched that video that he retweeted and it's obvious what's going on at the very beginning. if you open the video at all,

you heard the trump supporter screaming "white power". >> it's obvious. first of all, it's really disheartening that we have to comment on the president of the united states retweeting these kind of videos. openly racist, white supremacist, and really dangerous. but i have to say in politics, where we all work, you know, we understand that it's about coalition building. that's how you win lerkselectio. and i think this is a reflection of where the president is, which is extremely down in the polls. i think he probably realizes that he's in trouble in terms of his election prospects. and this is really, i think, a little bit desperate. i don't see how this is going to help him build a constituency beyond his hardest core supporters. i think there are a lot of more americans who are very concerned with the economy, concerned about the virus and his lack of

response to it. and frankly, you know, maybe defunding the police isn't number one on their agenda. but they really don't support openly white supremacist president. and they would really like to talk about something else. you have a lot of white evangelical christians for whom i think this could be problematic. you know, he doesn't need to lose a lot of them, is his problem. so i've been joking about this, but sometimes i look at those videos and thinks to myself, i mean, it's really not funny, but are they polling the klan separately. like, what's happening here? who does that appeal to, beyond his hardest core supporters. well, john mileman, you sort of heighten my awareness of his profound political weakness. he is running as a restorer of confederate monuments, a sort of open denier of the coronavirus pandemic and the couple of things we can do to protect

ourselves in the absence of a vaccine or a cure. and now it would appear he's impotent in the face of russian aggression. chris christie said yesterday on tv, he's losing and he's going to lose. >> right, as your -- the guy who was the architect of your former boss's two terms in the white house, karl rove, has been telling everyone in the republican party who will listen to cole for the last two weeks, three weeks, i'm told in my reporting, karl has been talking to the white house itself and to republicans in the senate who are listening very closely top donald trump saying, donald trump is about to get crushed if he doesn't change his message and change his tune. and of course, he can't. it's not only depressing that we're commenting on this tweet, but it's actually boring. he's a racist. he's been a racist his whole life. he was a racist when he ran in 2016, has been a racist the

whole time he's been president. he's the candidate of white nationalist grievance. i don't object to reporting it, but it is not news. there will be more of these kind of direct appeals to white racial resentment and grievance and fear. we will see them all the way through november, was what they have decided and it is a strategy based on desperation, is that he has lost the suburbs now. he has lost respectable, moderate republicans. he obviously has no chance of getting any democrat votes. he has no chance of expanding his coalition. he gets that and sees it very clear. they have decided the only way to win is run base-only strategy and focus on white non-college voters who did not vote for trump in 2016. who did not come out for whatever reason. they think there are millions of them in a handful of state that could put together a coalition that could lead to 260 electoral votes. but he has no effort, to intention to try to broaden his coalition.

does not care about widening that. he's going to try to go deep into the base and find new voters to kind of unearth from the subterranean disgusting guts of the electorate, people who were just too -- who were just too turned off of politics to vote for him three years ago, he's going to try to drag them out with these same kind of r e racist-based, resentment-based appeals. >> i want to know more about those karl rove calls to republican senators, because i think trump is this black box. who knows what's going to happen with trump in the end. he's such a mad manman, such a lunatic, it's hard to bripredic. but i think the senate the in trouble. there's a serious possibility that they could lose their majority. is that the nature of the karl rove calls to mcconnell and

others? >> i think karl very concerned about the state of the party. and when you start to see things like mitch mcconnell putting on a mask, that didn't happen by accident. that's the way mcconnell sends up a warning sign, sends a shot across the bow to donald trump. >> i totally agree with you. the only thing he cares about is keeping the majority in the supreme court. so if he thought that not wearing a mask -- you know, he would run around naked if he thought that would be more helpful to those two aims. you two both need to stay and i need to thank you properly for anchoring last week. don't go anywhere. after the break, so much ruling not going donald trump's way. you could argue it went the country's way, though. that decision, next. y's way, th. that decision, next. i know that every single

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today in the u.s. supreme court's first ruling on reproductive rights since trump appointed two justices to the highest court in the land, trump's side lost. the courts struck down a louisiana law that would have greatly restricted access to abortions and the law imposes an undue burden on a woman's right to choose. john roberts voted against the law based on precedent. john heilemann, i know the legal piece of this is complicated, but the result is profound. is this going to -- i feel like

this could cut both ways. it could sort of wake democrats up the way republicans are always on heightened alert before elections about how important the supreme court is to a woman's right to choose and a woman's health, or could get trump base agitated that they're not there yet on locking down the court around reproductive health. >> yeah, i think it does cut a little bit both ways, nicole. and i think this ruling, i think, is less problematic for, in a way, less problematic for trump than the gorsuch ruling in the gay rights case, however many days ago that was, partly because that was trump's appointment, right? and so the urgency -- trump was going -- among some arguments that he still had, he was going to say, we're going to get two more supreme court appointments. you can trust me to get people to vote our way. and gorsuch siding with the lir liberals was a big blow to trump. because if trump can't be

counted on to appoint reliables judges, it took a big argument away from trump. this case, most conservatives have given up on john roberts. and i think it cuts in both directions. it's not anything as like as clear an issue as it was in 2016, where the court clearly worked to trump's advantage. it's a much harder case for him to make, because the politics do cut in both directions. >> i'm always so exasperated that democrats don't mobilize their voters around just how fragile -- this was so close. and john roberts didn't really vote -- he just didn't vote with the conservatives, it's not like john said, it's not like he aligned himself wholesomely with the liberals. do you think this wakes people up to how fragile and how hard and how republicans are really working state by state, legislature by legislature, to strip away a woman's right to choose? >> no, i would like to say "yes," but i think it's unlikely, unfortunately. i think that democrats have made some headway in recent years in

understanding the importance of state legislatures and of redistricting. so i think that is -- we've seen some progress there. but, you know, really, the roberts vote on this was about process. there will be other ca like this to come before the court, and i do think that the question of who not just is sitting in the oval office but who is in the senate, as we were talking about before, is really important. i'm not sure what it's going to take for democrats to really grasp this. i don't know if -- i do think that republicans have a much larger structure and infrastructure behind these appointments. and helping their voters understand the importance of the court. democrats have a lot of catching up to do. but they have certainly shown that they understand what's at stake in the state legislatures. so i'm hopeful. >> maybe the lincoln project could run some ads. john, thank you for anchoring this program last week.

>> it was my pleasure. the only thing that was wrong about it was that if i'm anchoring, it means you're not on. you know, that's disappointing. but i hope you had a nice little break. you deserved it. >> i did. i had a breaker. i had a bolton interview and a little more break. it was lovely and only possible with friends like you. tell me one more thing i don't know about what karl rove is saying to republican senators. >> well, i think like the alarm is out, right. i think there's no -- if you look at -- i mentioned mcconnell before. don't think that mcconnell putting on a mask isn't a shot at the white house. john thune, republican leadership, gives a public mention, says, look, the white house has to change course. i mean, john thune is not going to read the riot act to the white house. this is how it works. they're so afraid of trump that these are the effective readings of the riot act. and john thune, is john thune not talking to karl rove? what's the chance that he's not

talked to karl rove in the last 14 days? 0% chance. >> i think karl is the architect of the first successful run or big help. john, i could talk to you for the whole two hours. thank you so much for spending time with us. after the break, ending the show with a celebration of two extraordinary lives cut way too short but well lived for sure. short but well lived for sure. sewing, but maybe not for people with certain inflammatory conditions. because there are options. like an "unjection™". xeljanz. the first and only pill of its kind that treats moderate to severe rheumatoid arthritis, psoriatic arthritis, or moderate to severe ulcerative colitis when other medicines have not helped enough. xeljanz can lower your ability to fight infections. before and during treatment, your doctor should check for infections, like tb and do blood tests. tell your doctor if you've had hepatitis b or c, have flu-like symptoms, or are prone to infections. serious, sometimes fatal infections, cancers including lymphoma, and blood clots have happened. taking a higher than recommended dose

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there's nothing to stop you from moving forward. a partner who makes sure every step is clear, ♪ ♪all strength ♪we ain't stoppin' believe me♪ ♪go straight till the morning look like we♪ ♪won't wait♪ ♪we're taking everything we wanted♪ ♪we can do it ♪all strength, no sweat she was just a second grader, so obviously she liked to do kiddo stuff. sneak up on her older sister, scare her just for a giggle, climb a big rock at the playground barefoot, of course, maybe followed by a little dance at the top. she liked to draw and had her favorite disney princesses. they called her yoshi. she was just 8 years old when she died of the coronavirus a few weeks ago. we're thinking especially of her parents today. i told npr that yoshi was their

favorite little star. they gave them light and smiles at every moment. that's how we'll remember her, too. these never get easier. all allie's family is hurting, too. they said she had no underlying health conditions when she came down with the coronavirus. she was pregnant, though, five months pregnant. so imagine what it was like for her fiance last week when allie died. he went to the hospital, and the doctor asked him how he was related to the patient. he said spouse. the doctor responded, no, you're the dad. i have your daughter in the next room. doctors did miracle work, born four months early weighing two pounds, the baby, madeleine, is very much alive. last we heard stable, in the nicu. let's keep them in our thoughts as they prepare for the fight ahead. that's why you wear a mask, people. that's why. does it for our coverage. continues with katy tur after a quick break. continues with katy tur after a quick break. by spreading any missed usaa insurance payments over the next twelve months

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we are already experiencing increased icu utilization, and some areas have basically run out of icu beds. >> this is tinder waiting to explode. i'm thinking that some of that has already been lit, and that is concerning. >> this is real.