trying to do virtual learning. they're not paying for online classes. instead, we're seeing a lot of gap years. harvard reported that 20% of their freshmen are going to defer. and that seems to be the number that sort of holds off. the other, in addition to just taking a gap year, deferring for a year, we have a lot of students who are staying home to work. so, college changing? they're just not showing. >> tough reality to accept as a freshman to go online. mike allen, thank you, as always. >> thanks for your coverage. >> i'll be reading axios in a little bit. sign up for the newsletter. that does it for me this morning. i'm yasmin vossoughian. "morning joe" starts right now. do you agree that seemed like a campaign speech and less of a eulogy? >> i thought it was a terrible speech. it was an angry speech. it showed his anger there that people don't see. he lost control.

and he's been really hit very hard by both sides for that speech. that speech was ridiculous. >> do you have a response to michelle obama's speech last night where she said that you're in over your head and the wrong president for the country? >> yeah, no, she was over her head. and frankly, she should have made the speech live, which she didn't do. she taped it. and not only was it taped, but it was taped a long time ago because she had the wrong deaths. he didn't even mention the vice presidential candidate in the speech. and you know, she gets these fawning reviews. if you gave a real review, it wouldn't be so fawning. i thought it was a divisive speech, extremely divisive. >> mm -- >> well, there's just something about the obamas that just gets under the president's skin. >> something about the obamas, yeah. >> two weeks after taking issue with former president obama's eulogy of john lewis, president trump spent time yesterday smarting over michelle obama's speech from night one of the democratic national convention. >> yesterday was a bad day. i mean -- >> usually, joe, he deflects. usually he distracts. usually he does something, like

some big, shiny object to distract from something like the incredible speech by michelle obama. but instead, those distractions came from the senate and from the head of the postal service. two major developments with blows to the president's narrative. the release of a new bipartisan senate report concludes that the 2016 trump campaign eagerly embraced russia's help in the election. as the "washington examiner" put it, the senate report on russia blows a hole in trump's hoax claims. plus, the head of the u.s. postal service says he's going to suspend the changes that democrats say are meant to sabotage the mail-in vote. he's pulling it all back. it's usually not a good sign politically when you're already warning about two elections. >> absentee is great, but universal is going to be a disaster, the likes of which our

country has never seen. it will end up being a rigged election or they will never come out with an outcome. they'll have to do it again. and nobody wants that. and i don't want that. >> and by the way, i, as president of the united states, i've already, like, decided i'm mailing in my ballots. >> okay. so, that's what he's doing. >> along with my family and everybody else, but it's okay, of course, for the trumps to do that, but it would be an absolute disaster if a senior citizen in florida who had health problems, or a senior citizen in arizona tried to do the same thing the president of the united states did. >> correct. we're also going to get the big moments from last night's democratic national convention. it was pretty amazing. where joe biden formally secured the democratic presidential nomination with a virtual convention roll call like no noe other. among our guests this morning will be the woman who closed out the night with a deeply personal speech about her husband's

character, dr. jill biden. >> how do you make a broken family whole? the same way you make a nation whole, with love and understanding and with small acts of kindness, with bravery, with unwavering faith. you show up for each other in big ways and small ones, again and again. it's what so many of you are doing right now for your loved ones, for complete strangers, for your communities. we are seeing that our differences are precious and our similarities infinite. we have shown that the heart of this nation still beats with kindness and courage. that's the soul of america joe biden is fighting for now. >> dr. biden will be our guest

this morning, along with former national security adviser susan rice, former acting attorney general sally yates, and senator cory booker. >> this is a huge -- i mean, this is huge! i mean, he's like, willie, it's like night of a thousand stars, with bert reynolds and dom dellous. we have everybody that you would want to have. but you know, yesterday was was a huge -- >> it was a huge day. >> -- was a genuinely bad day for donald trump. i mean, you know, willie and i are writing our own history book after my truman book comes out on the great routes of all time. and let's see, we've got a chapter, willie, of course, on napoleon at waterloo. >> waterloo, yeah. >> the germans at stalingrad. >> yeah. that's willie's favorite. >> the red sox at yankee stadium. and of course, donald trump in

the white house yesterday. i mean, you had this russian report that came out, and the language was just hard. republicans concluded that trump's coordination with russia proved a, quote, grave counterintelligence threat. a grave threat to american democracy. and we're going to go through the report. but just looking at some of it here, you know, "despite trump's recollection," the senate republican report said, "the committee assesses that trump did, in fact, speak with" -- they say trump lied. trump committed perjury there and that donald trump knowingly pushed russian material the last month of the campaign, even after the intelligence committee warned him not to, that it was stolen material from russia. and then, of course, you had dejoy at the post office going, never mind. >> oh, my god it was a bad day. >> never mind.

listen, i know the president wants me to help him rig the election, but upon further consultation with my lawyers, my wife, and my family, i don't want to go to jail. >> thanks. >> so, never mind, y'all. so, all in all, quite a day for the president, who, of course, you've got to -- i've just got to say, chided michelle obama for getting the death count wrong because michelle obama was being conservative and said only 150,000 americans died because of his incompetence, instead of 170,000, so -- >> that we know of. >> so, if that's his, you know -- did he really need the other 22,000 added on that badly? again, just a miserable day for a miserable man who sees his political fortunes going in just a terrible direction. >> yeah, his big criticisms of michelle obama's speech were, number one, that it was taped. that's the best he could do.

and then number two, i think we call that, joe, a self-own, when you say, she got the deaths wrong, actually on my watch. since she taped that, there have been 22,000 more deaths from coronavirus in this country. so, yeah, it was not a good day for him. we're going to comb through the details of the report in just a moment, the postal service. and meanwhile, you had the democratic party putting on their show and pulling it off, despite all this digital madness that we're having to go through right now. and you have jill biden telling a story of humanity, the story of her husband, but also her own story. and i think what came through to a lot of people was decency, good people. >> yes. >> you know? and i think there's going to be policy, of course, on the ballot, but also, i think character and decency will be on the ballot. we'll see how people respond to that. but i was thinking, joe and mika, of february 11th, when the three of us and mike barnicle were sitting in a restaurant in new hampshire, and joe biden came in on primary day and sat with us. and when he walked out, i think we all looked at each other and

said, wow, that sounded a lot like a political funeral. the room was quiet. he was quiet. he ended up finishing fifth place after having finished in fourth place in iowa, went on a distant second in nevada. it, frankly, felt like it was over. and i think he thought it was over. and then last night, he was nominated. he's the nominee to become president of the united states. so, it was an extraordinary night, and we'll get into that. but let's talk -- go ahead, joe. >> i was just going to say, that was an incredible day. and i didn't remember, so february 11th. and when he walked in on our set in new hampshire, after having yet another bad, bad performance, he quietly asked, hey, guys, do you mind if i sit next to mike? because he and mike had been friends for a long time. and i remember joe biden sitting in the middle chair, mike to one

side. i was on the other side. and i've got to say, i've never been around him and mike barnicle, where all three of us weren't talking 100 miles an hour, laughing, joking. and he just sat there in silence. and we were trying to think of something to say to him. we just couldn't do it, because a lot of white democrats in iowa and then a lot of white democrats in new hampshire had, in effect, decided that he was not worthy to be the nominee. and we had been complaining all along that, you know, the democratic primary was too white in those first two races. and then a lot of black democrats, mika, in south carolina said, hold my beer. >> right. >> now it's our turn. we're the backbone of this party. >> yeah.

>> let's get this done. and they put joe biden on, really, one of the most unlikely paths to presidential nomination that we've seen in modern history. >> just one final point about that moment in new hampshire. it was dead quiet. i think none of us knew what to say, but i was looking at his face, and this is a man who's been down before, and he just gets up. he seemed most okay in the room. like, it was awkward for his friends and for members of the media around him, his friend, mike, because we kind of felt it was over. just the numbers seemed to be looking that way. >> yeah. >> and joe was good, but it was quiet. it was an interesting moment. >> well, and we feel that way, willie, by the way -- it must be said -- we feel that way about anybody that comes in -- >> yeah, oh, for sure. >> -- and they have a bad loss, and you see how hard campaigning is. >> you feel it. >> for all of them. and it's just a difficult position.

and here you have a guy who had been trying this since 1988 and hadn't won a single primary. in fact, i think a lot of people were saying he had never finished better than, like, fourth or fifth in a democratic primary, since 1988. and again, then, man, the turnaround. and then the race to the nomination. the most unlikely of nominations that we've seen in quite some time. >> extraordinary, yeah. >> let's get to everybody else in just a moment. but first, the story we touched on here. the senate intelligence committee yesterday released a nearly 1,000-page report on the 2016 trump campaign's ties to russia. the bipartisan report goes further than special counsel robert mueller's report, in detailing the extent to which the trump campaign sought help from a foreign power to win the 2016 presidential election. approved by the committee's

republican majority, the senate report found that president trump had discussed hacked emails with roger stone, despite the president telling mueller that he didn't recall doing so. >> under oath. >> really? >> under oath. he lied under oath. >> last month, the president -- >> where i come from in the redneck riviera, we call that perjury. >> yeah. last month, the president commuted roger stone's sentence after he was convicted of seven felony crimes. the report also cited testimony and other information provided by several witnesses referring to the possible existence of compromising tapes and witness accounts of trump's conduct with women during past visits to moscow, but the allegations were not confirmed and the report stressed that it could not establish that russia had collected compromising material on trump. the senate intelligence committee affirmed mueller's investigation and stone's prosecution on the subject of

wikileaks, saying in part, quote, staff on the trump campaign sought advance notice about wikileaks releases, created messaging strategies to promote and share the materials in anticipation of and following their release and encouraged further leaks. so, to talk about all this -- >> let me go to willie on this for a second, because we need to underline that. >> yeah. >> willie, so -- >> blaring headline. >> donald trump -- and i'm going to speak slowly, because some of his hacks on capitol hill and some of his hacks off capitol hill love to say, no collusion, that this is a hoax. donald trump openly accepted what he knew to be russian help. he was told by the intel communities in august -- in august -- that russia had stolen

material and that they were going -- the russian gru was going to use wikileaks to launder their stolen information. what did donald trump do with that information? he used it. and not only did he use it, knowing that he was promoting an asset of russia's spy agency, he went around saying, "we love wikileaks," "i love wikileaks." and he used that information over the last month of the campaign, knowing, again, that this was all in coordination with russia. and that was in the senate report. that's well known to everyone. likewise, of course, i just have to say this, too -- trump's foreign policy adviser, his national security adviser, his campaign chairman, his deputy campaign chairman, his personal

lawyer, his political consultant, and his attorney general were all busted for lying to the feds or congress about their contacts with russia. this republican report lays all of it out in the starkest of terms. >> it does. and the argument from president trump, from roger stone, anyone else swept up in the mueller report, has been that we were passive observers. that, yes, maybe russia interfered in the election, but we were just watching. what this report says again -- and you said it at the top, but it's worth underlining -- this is a republican-led committee. of course, republicans are in the majority in the senate. richard burr of north carolina leads the senate intel committee. this is a republican-led, bipartisan report, exhaustive report, almost 600 pages. it shows that not only did russia interfere, but that the campaign willingly accepted what they dug up in their interference and that roger stone actively worked to get

those wikileaks emails that, as you said, donald trump went out and touted those emails on the campaign trail, saying, we love wikileaks, cited information from those emails on the campaign trail. the senate report also talks about paul manafort helping, working alongside russians to get information, to get these wikileaks emails out. it is clear, once again, we get another report showing, not only did russia interfere, but that the trump campaign in 2016, make no mistake, willingly accepted and used that information. >> well, and also, mika, it was coordinated. you had stone coordinating it. you had stone talking to wikileaks. you had stone talking to trump. they knew when all of this was coming out. you had stone on the day of the "access hollywood" tape coming out pushing to get the wikileaks information out there because he wanted to stir the pot up and

have a distracting headline. so, again, anybody that talks about a russian hoax, as i've said weeks ago, as i wrote in a "washington post" column a few weeks ago, they're just going to look like absolute fools and useful idiots throughout history. >> americans may be worn down by the onslaught, but this is a moment where leaders in washington better get on the same page. with us, we have msnbc national affairs analyst, co-host of showtime's "the circus" and executive editor of "the recount," john heilemann, former u.s. senator, now an nbc news and msnbc political analyst, claire mccaskill, and our legal panel. nbc news and msnbc law analyst and editor in chief of "law fair," benjamin wittis, and former u.s. attorney for the northern district of alabama and an msnbc legal analyst, joyce vance. >> how devastating is this report for donald trump and the

administration? >> you know, if people read it, it is devastating. as you just described, it shows a degree of involvement on the part of the trump campaign and donald trump himself that even the mueller report did not quite describe, partly because the report is, you know, it's not a criminal report on an investigation, the way the mueller report is. it's actually a little bit more of -- you know, it's almost more journalistic report based on a congressional investigation of counterintelligence risk. and so, it can be a little freer than mueller could. the most important thing about it, however, is not the facts that it contained, it's the names who were on it. it's the fact that this was a

bipartisan report by the senate intelligence committee, which actually, unlike the house intelligence committee under devin nunes, actually did its job, did a full and complete investigation, produced the kind of information that you could write up at 1,000 pages that answers a whole lot of questions and identifies the ones you can't answer. and the fact that it is as devastating as it is, is particularly clear by the fact that even the authors of it on the republican side were yesterday busy issuing statements suggesting that it didn't say what, in fact, it says. >> which was, of course, humiliating for those who tried to do that for political reasons. again, they presented mountains of evidence that donald trump and his campaign worked with the russians and were aided and

abetted by the russians, that it was an ongoing, aggressive attempt. and instead, they did what idiots, useful idiots for vladimir putin have been doing now for several years, and that is, clinging to the most lurid tales in the steele dossier and said you didn't prove that, so the whole thing is a hoax, acting, claire mccaskill, as if that one part of this investigation would somehow distract from the mountains and the mountains of damning evidence. and i just have to say it again, from the mountains and mountains of devastating evidence that donald trump lied to robert mueller, committed perjury under oath, written. i mean, he had time to think through it and still committed that. and then again, that you go through all of these people -- trump's foreign policy adviser lied about contacts with russia.

his national security adviser lied about contacts with russia. his campaign chairman lied about contacts with russia. his deputy campaign chairman lied under oath, all of them under oath, about contacts with russia. his personal lawyer lied about contacts with russia under oath. his political consultant lied about contacts with russia under oath. and his attorney general lied before congress under oath. and of course -- and yesterday, republicans concluded -- republicans concluded that the president of the united states lied under oath to federal investigators about his campaign's contacts with russia. boy, that's some hoax, claire. >> yeah. you know what, i really wish we would refer to this report a different way. i would like to say, tom cotton says that the trump campaign manager was working with a

russian agent. ben sasse says, of course, the government should have been investigating what was going on in the trump campaign. john cornyn says, yes, carter page was doing suspicious things that warranted him being looked at by the people in our government because of his activities with russia. this is a damning report. if it was issued in isolation, without all of the other noise that trump creates, with all of his scandal, it would blow the lid off washington, d.c. but because of when it's being issued and everything that's come before it, my fear is people won't realize that this was marco rubio and tom cotton and ben sasse and john cornyn saying, yes, the trump campaign worked with russia and they should have been investigated. >> yeah. another way to put it, willie,

is that marco rubio said that donald trump's coordination with russia, his campaign's coordination with russia posed, quote, a grave counterintelligence threat. another way to say that -- it posed a grave threat to american democracy. >> it also, joe, shed some new light on the timing of wikileaks' release of emails that belonged to clinton campaign chairman john podesta. the report finds this -- "at approximately 4:00 p.m. on october 7, the "washington post" released the "access hollywood" tape. witnesses involved in trump's debate preparation recalled that the team first heard of the tape about an hour prior to its public release. news of the release also made its way to roger stone." the report goes on -- "stone wanted the podesta stuff to balance the news cycle, either

right then, or at least coincident," even telling his confidante, "have wikileaks drop the podesta emails immediately." 30 minutes after the "access hollywood" tape was released, wikileaks released the emails. so there you go, john heilemann, a timeline we basically knew from the mueller report, but again, a senate intel committee confirming a lot of what's in the mueller report, but as ben wittes says, even going further in some places. >> right. and we're doing the thing this morning of, like, how we'd like to talk about this. i mean, i think one of the things in the ideal world, one of the things that this report illustrates really vividly is how much this conversation over time has been polluted by the use of words like collusion, words that don't have any legal consequence but have, particularly when they've been deployed for political purposes by people like bill barr and others. and yesterday, marco rubio did the same thing, you know, did a

video. and after releasing this devastating report that has his name on it, releases a video that says, this report proves conclusively that there was no collusion between the trump campaign and the russians. and the only way to think about that -- the only way to think about that is, like, dude, you obviously don't know what either of these -- either these words are meaningless, or you don't know what these words mean, because -- >> this is crazy. >> by any layman's definition, by any webster's definition, collusion is exactly what this report has demonstrated. and so, you know, i think that we are -- i have some visitors here -- i think that we're looking at this thing saying that this report is -- oh, i know. guys, good morning. >> jonathan hileman, that is the cutest -- that just made me like you. that dog is adorable. >> i know. i know. >> finish your thought, please. >> listen, i think --

>> the class is waiting. >> what this report -- what -- i know, look. here, that's the point. the point is that collusion has been put to political purposes. that word has been mangled and this demonstrates it to the largest degree possible. >> yes. >> and i want to just point my finger again at marco rubio, right? you still have republicans engaged in this incredibly absurd, but obviously, what has been a successful effort on the part of republicans, and again, particularly bill barr, to redefine what this thing was, because by any standard definition, what this report shows is donald trump is guilty of what everybody has -- donald trump and his campaign were guilty of what common english language would call, maybe not legal conspiracy -- i don't know what the word collusion means -- but guilty. >> mm-hmm. lying every step of the way. >> coordination. >> cooperation, coordination, that russia posed a, quote, grave counterintelligence threat. >> yes. >> i mean, that is -- again, you

just go -- you go through all of this. and again, mika, it's -- cold warriors back during the cold war had an expression for people that would go on tv in america and parrot the lines that the soviets wanted them to parrot. they were called useful idiots. that's exactly what these people in the media are now. they're useful idiots. people on capitol hill, republicans, useful idiots. you have kevin mccarthy who said four years ago that donald trump, he was sure that donald trump and dana rohrabacher were on the payroll of vladimir putin. he has turned into a useful idiot. is he going to come out today and condemn this? and again, this is for history. you look back at all of the people -- >> this is for history. >> -- that were useful idiots for the soviet union, they don't look so good right now. >> no. >> three, four, five months from now, how are all the people that are trying to paper over this and calling this a russian hoax going to look?

bill barr? bill barr lied through his teeth, saying that this mueller investigation started with a steele dossier. he knows that's a lie. he knows it's a lie! and yet, he says it anyway. so, these lies -- it's not just confined to the outer reaches of, you know, the gutters of the internet or twittersphere. people in the trump administration are parroting the president, despite the fact, again, the evidence is overwhelming, there was a coordination. there was, yes, whatever, however you want to define collusion. if you don't like that word, okay. but the coordination posed a grave counterintelligence threat to the united states of america. >> listen, the stupidity of a republican senator who would stand up for the president's corruption now, after he just proved that he would run over their chances of re-election by

destroying the post office. i mean, you know, everyone can try -- wives at home or husbands at home can try and explain, this man won't be there for you, this man will crush you, no matter how much you do for him. and maybe you won't listen to those smart people, but you can see it with your eyes, with what he did with the post office. you can see he doesn't care about your damn re-election -- >> what he did with russia! forget the post office. >> i've got to get to joyce. >> what he did with vladimir putin -- >> well, that's my point. >> -- when he was warned by the intel communities that putin was running a spy operation for russia through wikileaks, and he got information from stone from wikileaks, according to republican senators like marco rubio and ben sasse and tom cotton on this committee, and then went around spreading that russian information that they

had stolen and went around saying, i love wikileaks. >> my god. so, joyce vance, then there's paul manafort, who, now we know, was just completely dealing. and tell us about that angle. i mean, this was way back before trump even became president. this manafort, who's one of, you know, several who went to jail, paying the price, but we're learning so much more about exactly how deep into this he was. >> it's just another piece in this puzzle of lies that we've been talking about this morning, mika. we've always known a lot of the information around paul manafort, that he had debts worth millions of dollars to russian oligarchs, that he was working with a man named konstantin kilimnik, who was widely believed to be affiliated with the gru. the senate subcommittee actually goes a little bit further and

actually i'dentifies him as someone who was working with russian intelligence. so what we see here is just this patina of lie upon lie upon lie being told by desperate people close to the president. and folks don't go in front of the senate select committee on intelligence and commit lies under oath unless they have something to hide up. that's, i think, the big picture, the forest that we need to take away as we read this new report in conjunction with the mueller report. there were so many lies that were told on so many different subjects, and people don't subject themselves to the risk of perjury unless the truth is so bad that if the truth comes out, it will destroy everything. that's why paul manafort matters here. he's that first piece of connection to russia. it's out of his relationships that this ukraine story, the fake ukraine story, is put into circulation by some of the folks that he was involved with on the russian side.

and that's disinformation straight from moscow that the president, among other people, picks up and starts to put into public circulation here. so, the trump folks, the trump camp has all too often called perjury a process crime. oh, these obstruction of justice crimes, they don't really matter, they're just process crimes. but what they are here is really the most important piece that we need to keep our eye on, because the line is hiding up something. the senate, i think, has now told us very clearly what it is that they were so desperate to hide up. and of course, we know that the president himself lied. i remember when we were told that the president wouldn't sit for an in-person interview with bob mueller because everybody knew he couldn't sit for that interview without committing perjury. so, he submitted written answers that were very carefully crafted by his lawyers. now the republicans in the senate have told us that even in that carefully controlled process, this president committed perjury. joe, i'm from a little bit north

of the redneck riviera where you're come, but i know perjury when i see it, too. >> well, you know, as i said -- >> can i comment on that? >> sure. >> so you know, you and senator mccaskill, i think, in honor of your point earlier, we should all start calling this the rubio report. and i just want to foot stomp a point that joyce made about the rubio report, which is, you know, one of the central issues that it identifies is that the president's campaign chairman had a long-term business relationship throughout the -- including throughout the campaign -- in which he is feeding him internal campaign polling and information, who is a russian intelligence officer. that is the fundamental claim of the first section of this report. and konstantin kilimnik, yes, he shows up in a significant way in

the mueller report. but as joyce notes, mueller stops just short of saying he is actually a gru intelligence officer, sort of describes him as having been somebody the fbi assesses as having intelligence ties in russia. the rubio report identifies him as a russian intelligence officer and describes a long pattern of business dealings that manafort has with him, including confidential campaign information, running right through the period of the campaign. and so, you know, rather than getting focused on the question of, you know, collusion, no collusion, just ask yourself the question that the rubio report asks, which is, is that safe from a counterintelligence perspective? is it an okay thing for a candidate for president to have as a campaign manager somebody

with an ongoing business relationship with an officer of russian intelligence? >> and feeding that officer of russian intelligence, polling information from u.s. states and other information that the russians could use in targeting their misinformation campaigns to help donald trump get elected president. you know, what's interesting here -- and there's so much interesting here -- you could talk about -- we could talk about the meeting at trump tower where links between the kremlin and one of the lawyers were, quote, far more extensive and concerning than had been publicly known. that was with don junior and jared kushner and manafort all meeting in the office to get, quote, dirt on hillary clinton. i forget the exact words that don junior said. "that's awesome, dude!" or something along those lines.

if what you say is true, i love it! >> god. >> sounds like an arby's commercial. but what i find so interesting, claire mccaskill, is that the rubio/cotton report came to the same conclusion as the mueller report, and you can read the reports. i'm not being ugly when i say this. they come to the same conclusion, that the only reason there wasn't a great conspiracy was because trump's campaign team was too stupid to pull it off. let me find -- let me see if i can find the exact language here. well, here we go. "the two sides shared the same objective" -- this is the "washington post" reporting on the report -- "the defeat of the democratic nominee, hillary clinton, and basked in one another's admiration, but more because of ineptitude than any principled commitment to the sanctity of american democracy,

the partnership was never consummated, the committee determined," which is what robert mueller also concluded, that the trump team was just too stupid to pull this off and the russians didn't trust them because they were idiots, basically. >> yeah. this really puts more meat on the bone from the mueller report. there is more here than was in the mueller report. i almost wish this came first. i think it would have, perhaps, shored up the mueller report in important ways. but you know, the thing is, i've got to blame the democrats a little bit back in 2016, because the people who knew this was going on didn't bring it to the attention of the american people like they should have. and you know, we were in charge, and we should have done that. on the other hand, it's going on now. just days ago, we learned from our intelligence community, once again, russia is messing around

in our election. and everyone needs to use that as the takeaway here. we cannot let russia get away with it again. they're playing footsie with him again, and putin knows he's got trump exactly where he wants him and he wants to keep him there. >> my god. all right, joyce vance and ben wittes, thank you so much for being on this morning. a very big news morning. still ahead on "morning joe," a big lineup. dr. jill biden, after her dnc speech last night. plus, former national security adviser susan rice, former acting attorney general sally yates, who also spoke last night, and senator cory booker. you're watching "morning joe." we will be right back. back. ♪ book two separate qualifying stays and earn a free night. the open road is open again.

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welcome back to "morning

joe." postmaster general louis dejoy announced yesterday he will suspend the controversial cost-cutting reforms at the united states postal service until after the election. dejoy halted the initiatives that have led to delays in delivery and concerns over timeliness of the handling of election ballots after mounting pressure from lawmakers and public protests. the decision to cancel service reductions, suspend the removal of sorting machines and collection mailboxes, and to reauthorize overtime pay came as more than 20 states announced the intent to sue the administration and dejoy over the disruption in service and the rise in costs for ballot processing. dejoy will testify before the senate homeland security and governmental affairs committee on friday and the house oversight committee on monday. so, claire, if you're sitting in that hearing on friday as a member of the united states senate, what exactly do you want to know from mr. dejoy? i've talked to people who have worked in the postal service. they say it's routine, every

year we do take mailboxes out of circulation. it's not evidence of some grand conspiracy if you see a mailbox being pulled off the street. but the idea that a trump-hand-picked guy, a big donor, would be put in this position in june of an election year and then roll out all these initiatives with three months to go before election day undoubtedly and clearly causing disruptions, is preposterous. now he's stepped back from that. so, what would you like to ask him, if you were there friday? >> well, seven minutes wouldn't be enough, but i would try to keep it very factual. i would say, how many mailboxes were removed in the exact same time period last year compared to the last 30 days? where are the mail sorting machines? what did you replace them with? are they being replaced? i would stay very close to the facts. so often, senators and members of the house want to make a big splash, and you know. instead, i think what we really

need to do here is lay out the factual case of what's going on. and i certainly would get a commitment that he would produce emails between the white house and his office around his appointment and around what's gone on since he took the job. and i am hoping they'll have witnesses that are mail carriers, that are members of the postal unions. we have very strong organizations that are involved in the workers at the post office. we need to hear from them. what is it like on the front lines right now? what happens when somebody cuts off the overtime and people don't get their medicine on time? i think that is also another big piece of this. i just am hoping that the senators and the members of the house on monday don't see this as an opportunity -- what i call an old-fashioned perry mason moment -- thinking he's going to break down on the stand and say, "yes, i colluded with donald trump to screw this election." i want them to stay on the facts

and don't ask open-ended questions. >> hear hear. i wish they'd get a lawyer, give the lawyer questions, let the lawyer ask the questions in a meticulous manner, not just about what happened in the past, but what we can expect to happen between today and election day, to make sure that every american's vote, republican and democrat alike, independent, every vote gets counted, instead of, again, posing for the cameras and yelling and screaming at the postmaster general. so, john heilemann, what caused dejoy's reversal? it was extraordinarily dramatic. >> well, joe, i would just want to -- i mean, look, he is under a lot of public pressure, obviously, and under a lot of political pressure, and he's been hauled up before congress. i am not yet convinced on the basis of what happened yesterday that there is as much to this as we've -- i mean, this could be of great consequence, if followed through on. and i think that's got to be the

point of these hearings sequentially on friday and on monday. i think it's incumbent on democrats to understand that this is literally the most important issue in terms of -- as a building block towards having a free and fair election in november, particularly given the president that we have and his stated intentions over and over again now to try to corrupt this process. i think that we have to make sure that what the post master said yesterday was not a tactical pr climbdown -- >> yep. >> -- to try to get himself -- to try to remove the political pressure from himself and create the cosmetic appearance that he has backed away and that everything is fine, while he continues to undermine the postal service. so, i think that not only claire is right, that there needs to be a very hard-core, factually based set of questions asked of him about what has happened, what the intent of what he has previously done -- >> yes. >> but more important is to get him to ensure various -- to make commitments about how the postal service will be run, hard commitments about how the postal

service will be run between now and election day, because maybe you could call me a cynic, but the thing that he said yesterday sounded great, but i want to make sure that, i think it's important for all americans, republican and democrat alike, to make sure that this is going to be a time when the postal service -- we all know the postal service is going to matter more in this election than ever before. >> that's right. >> and given the president's stated intention and the purposes he's laid bare in these last few months, i don't think there's literally anything more important than to make sure that this guy not only does his job but makes sure that the postal service rises to the challenge, which is a genuine challenge of being so central to this election in november. >> yeah. and it's so important. i just want to underline what claire said, mika. it's so important that the democratic committee does its job, that there's not grandstanding, that they quietly, thoughtfully figure out what challenges we face between

now and election day. we've got reports that pennsylvania and other states were told that they may not be able to count all of the votes that millions of people could be disenfranchised. they need to thoughtfully and deliberately go through each one of those states and say, okay, pennsylvania, what's the problem there? >> right. >> is there a problem with dates that pennsylvania has put out there? what do we do to alleviate those issues that you say might disenfranchise millions of voters? and go through the list one by one by one. again, to ensure that republicans that want to vote by mail because they don't want to die of coronavirus -- >> that's right. >> -- democrats that want to vote by mail because they don't want to die of coronavirus, independents that want to vote by mail because they don't want to die of coronavirus -- and i'm talking mainly of seniors or people who are shut-ins. how can we make sure that, let's say a veteran, a world war ii veteran that fought in world war ii and korea, or fought in korea

in vietnam or fought in any of the wars, isn't going to be disenfranchised because of the united states post office. >> i think you -- >> those are the questions that need to be answered. >> yeah. we need to know why this happened in the first place, and we need concrete, clear questions that will draw out exactly how it happened and if there was corruption along the way, which we all suspect, and actually, the president said out loud. but beyond that, i would almost suggest that they treat this as if it is what it is, that we're in a pandemic. the post office actually needs to be shored up beyond its basic abilities before they were torn down by dejoy and overtime was pulled back. i think it needs to be shored up. they need to add either personnel or whatever it is that's needed to make sure the people can vote in the middle of a pandemic, because scientists

are say iing, because this pandemic hasn't been handled well, we're going to have these superspreader schools and superspreader events and surges all over again. so the post office needs to function for our election in a pandemic. wall street, by the way, saw another day of all-time highs after the s&p 500 hit its first record since february. let's bring in cnbc's dominic chu for that. dom? >> all right, so, mika, what that means is that all of the market plunge during the covid-19 pandemic, like you pointed out, that's been recovered and then some. it was, by the way, the fastest recovery from a so-called bear market in u.s. history. of course, we have trillions of dollars worth of money supply being put in the u.s. financial system by the fed, $1 trillion worth of federal aid being deployed, but those stock market moves highlight this massive growing gap between it and the economy, as millions of americans remain out of work and millions more are unsure, to

your point, about whether their jobs are secure, whether the trajectory of the virus is going to move in one way or the other. all of that's going to be an issue for the markets going forward. and yes, another record high. >> and dom -- >> yes. >> dom, you have leading the charge were the tech stocks, the stocks, the so-called, you know, monopoly stocks, like amazon, like facebook, like -- you can go down the list. and so, there's that separation between wall street and main street with these giant, almost monopolistic tech companies making the great gains that are fueling this push. meanwhile, that disconnect from main street and wall street seems to be getting bigger by the day, especially in the middle of this pandemic. >> so, yes. and one of the driving forces, joe, to your point about this whole process, is that many of these large tech companies can be seen, as much as you want to call it that -- can be seen as possible beneficiaries of what's

happening with the covid pandemic. nobody's benefiting, per se. but when a company like microsoft creates software and platforms to allow people to work from home more, to allow people to collaborate on their businesses, that's the kind of thing that's getting more of an aid these days, right? and by the way, it's not just the mega cap ones there. think about how much more we're using video communications. think about how many guests are coming to your show video zoom or skype. skype, by the way, owned by microsoft. zoom communications. peloton, right? at-home bikes. those types of companies and stocks are the ones that are doing well. but i would say this, there is one bigger barometer of what's happening right now, guys, and that's walmart. because everybody -- well, everybody i know, including myself, shops there. government aid is going it be a massive factor behind retail spending going forward. the reason why, right, is because many retailers, like walmart, got help from the federal stimulus payments that went out and enhanced unemployment benefits that were paid out.

that resulted in blowout financial results for walmart, by the way. and many of those blowout results were driven in part by massive growth in e-commerce. so it just goes to show you, people are changing the way that they shop, they're changing the way that they spend. it's going to be a huge key going forward, guys. >> all right, dominic chu of cnbc. thank you so much. >> thanks, dom. >> you know, small business owners we've been talking to have been warning us, especially over the past couple of weeks, that even though the stock market's doing well, that we're in for rough waters ahead, regardless of who gets elected president, because you have, of course, people right now who aren't paying rent. they're not paying their leases. that's going to, of course, impact landlords, who are not going to be able to pay on their buildings. and so, you're going to have a domino effect of all of this collapse, and that's going to

end up where? impacting the banks, as these huge commercial property companies go under. it's going to be the banks that are going to be hit by that, which i've got to believe is one of the reasons why warren buffett and berkshire hathaway disinvested from all their banking stocks earlier this week, because you know, hard rain's gonna fall. i understand we're writing the stimulus checks, and we need to write the stimulus checks. but man, there is going to be -- >> long road ahead. >> there is going to be a lot of pain going well into 2021, even as the economy starts to awaken a bit. >> hopefully. still ahead, former second lady of the united states jill biden will be our guest. plus, former national security adviser susan rice joins us on the heels of the bipartisan senate intelligence report that found the 2016 trump campaign embraced russia's help in the election.

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we charge you less so you have more to invest. ♪ the playgrounds are still, but if you listen closely, you can hear the sparks of change in the air. we haven't given up. we just need leadership worthy of our nation, worthy of you, honest leadership to bring us back together, to recover from this pandemic and prepare for whatever else is next. >> dr. jill biden last night. we'll be joined by her soon. welcome back to "morning joe." it is wednesday, august 19th. former u.s. senator claire mccaskill is still with us. and the senate intelligence

committee yesterday released a nearly 1,000-page report on the 2016 trump campaign's ties to russia. the bipartisan report goes further than special counsel robert mueller's report in detailing the extent to which the trump campaign sought help from a foreign power to win the 2016 presidential election, approved by the committee's republican majority. the senate report found that president trump discussed hacked emails with roger stone, despite the president telling robert mueller that he didn't recall doing so. last month, the president commuted stone's sentence after he was convicted of seven felony crimes. the report also cited testimony and other information provided by several witnesses, referring to the possible existence of compromising tapes and witnesses' accounts of trump's

conduct with women during past visits to moscow. but the allegations were not confirmed and the report stressed that it could not establish that russia had collected compromising material on trump. the senate intelligence committee affirmed mueller's investigation and stone's prosecution on the subject of wikileaks, saying in part, "staff on the trump campaign sought advance notice about wikileaks releases, created messaging strategies to promote and share the materials in anticipation of and following their release, and encouraged further leaks." this is big. let's bring in nbc news correspondent covering national security and intelligence, ken dilanian, and msnbc political analyst and former republican strategist, steve schmidt. >> so, ken, a pretty shocking report, considering that it was a republican-led report. what were your takeaways?

>> good morning, joe. yeah, i think, absolutely, the most remarkable thing about this report was the fact that republican senators who are trump allies signed off on it. i mean, a lot of what was in this report had already come out in the roger stone trial. there was some new information. but much of it we knew. but republicans had never called trump out for it, and he's never answered for this. the idea that he embraced the fruits of a foreign intelligence operation to help him get elected. and among the new revelations, the biggest one, of course, was that paul manafort's sidekick, konstantin kilimnik, was a russian intelligence officer. that was not in the mueller report. we knew he had ties to russian intelligence. the implications of that, joe, are breathtaking. the chairman of the trump campaign was regularly meeting and sharing information with a russian spy! had we known that in 2016, i venture to say the result of the election may have been very different. no one has ever accounted for

that. and the report makes clear that neither robert mueller, nor the senate investigators, ever really got to the bottom of what paul manafort and this russian spy were doing because they used encrypted communications and because paul manafort lied to investigators and never fully cooperated. so, that's the biggest thing. the other, i think, huge revelation out of this is that while donald trump told robert mueller under penalty of law that he never talked to anybody in his campaign, particularly roger stone, about wikileaks, these senators, including these republicans, assess that in fact, he did talk to roger stone about wikileaks on multiple occasions. they don't accuse trump directly of lying because had he can't get to his state of mind. he said, "i don't recall." but they paint so much traffic on this that it's strange credulity that trump didn't know. so it's essentially calling out trump as a liar, joe. >> steve schmidt, i can hear a lot of people saying, now, what is this report? didn't we go through this already with the mueller report?

this is the senate intel committee's report. it's at least as exhaustive as the mueller report. it's almost 1,000 pages. it took the committee three years to conduct its investigation and to produce the report that came out yesterday, led by republicans. marco rubio is the acting chair of that committee after richard burr recused himself. and if you look inside it, in some ways, it goes a little bit further than the mueller report. it is impossible not as a political question but as a clear-eyed observer, to read through this report and not conclude that the trump campaign did something wrong. if marco rubio wants to come out of that report and say, technically, there was no collusion and i have questions about the way the fbi conducted it, he's spinning for the president. but if you read through those reports, or even just read a summary of that report, you can't come away with anything other than thinking, the campaign worked with russia to get donald trump elected. >> well, willie, good morning. and joe and mika. that's exactly what the report

says, despite marco rubio's protestations that it said the opposite of what it clearly says when you read it. look, the campaign was compromised. it colluded with the russian government, with russian intelligence services. it was stocked top to bottom with useful idiots. and the russians are doing the same exact thing in this election cycle, spreading misinformation, t misinformation. the misinformation is routinely repeated by united states senators like lindsey graham and ron johnson, poisoning the discourse in this country. and it says nothing about trump's behavior over these recent years as president of the united states, his fetish for putin, the insistence that there not be interpreters in the room. it's incredibly suspicious behavior. but the question about whether there was collusion between the campaign and the russian government has been settled for a long time. look, the word collusion has a meaning in the english language,

and the actions that the campaign made fit the meaning of that word. they colluded, period, end of discussion. >> and claire mccaskill, marco rubio, tom cotton, susan collins, roy blunt, john cornyn, and ben sasse to your point earlier, all said this -- "despite trump's recollection, the committee assesses that trump did, in fact, speak with stone about wikileaks and with members of his campaign about stone's access to wikileaks on multiple occasions," which means that rubio, cotton, collins, blunt, cornyn, and sasse, told the american people that the president of the united states committed perjury in his written responses to robert mueller. >> yeah. this is a quite startling that they signed off on that part. i was surprised by that.

one of the things we haven't talked about is the determination in the report by john cornyn and tom cotton and other republicans, is this idea that ukraine was interfering in the election was a russian effort, it was russian talking points. russia is the one. kilimnik, the russian agent, is the one who started spouting this theory and tried to push it on thaut ukraine was involved. and we remember during impeachment when fiona hill said to lawmakers, please, don't repeat russian talking points. now we've got tom cotton and all of these conservative republicans agreeing that it was never ukraine that was doing anything in the election and somebody needs to message over to ron johnson, who is busy in the i love putin fan club.

>> so, ken dilanian, one of the other headlines we haven't talked about yet is that this committee actually made criminal referrals in june of last year, in 2019, to federal prosecutors. on the list of referrals, steve bannon, jared kushner, and donald trump jr. >> that's right. and eric prince of blackwater fame and sam clovis, who was a campaign official, willie. these were kept secret for a long time. i've been working to try to confirm this. i had heard about it. these referrals were made in a letter to the u.s. attorney in washington, and it's unclear that any investigation whatsoever has resulted. but clearly, these were -- this was, again, a bipartisan communication to the justice department that these senators believed that these witnesses, including donald trump family members, either misled or lied under oath to the committee. that's a huge deal, and i think we should all be asking why

there has been no investigation, or at least that we're aware of, of any of this. because again, my senate sources are not aware of any criminal investigation into this whatsoever. another huge and interesting aspect of this report, willie, is that while it criticizes the conduct of the fbi -- and we've all heard about these fisa abuses and the fbi perhaps not acting correctly in applying for warrants on trump campaign aide carter page -- the report makes clear that the fbi was right to be suspicious of page, who had all kinds of connections to russians and who had traveled to russia. so, while the right has held page out as kind of a sacrificial lamb of this whole thing, the report comes down pretty clearly and says that he was not clear in his answers to the committee and the fbi was right to suspect him. >> so, steve schmidt, again, marco rubio, susan collins, ron blunt, john cornyn, ben sasse all did what they really needed

to do as americans, and that is, allow a full and fair report about donald trump and his family and his campaign's just treacherous behavior towards a foreign country that considers themselves our sworn enemy, told the truth about it. but you just sit and wonder, these people voted against the impeachment of donald trump, despite the fact last year they sent criminal referrals out for three members of his team -- steve bannon, jared kushner, and don junior, two family members. this committee also said, again, let's see -- rubio, cotton, collins, blunt, cornyn, ben sasse all told the truth -- all told the truth and said that donald trump committed perjury in the robert mueller investigation in his answers to robert mueller, that he lied regarding his contacts with a

man whose sentence he ultimately commuted and then said that donald trump and his campaign's behavior posed a grave risk -- a grave risk -- let me get this right. i want to make sure i get this language right. trump campaign's coordination with russians posed a, quote, grave counterintelligence threat to the united states of america. mind you, those two men that you're seeing right there, who, donald trump and his campaign coordinated with, apparently, if you believe these republicans. donald trump still hasn't talked to vladimir putin about the bounties that have been put on the head of young american servicemen and women in afghanistan, despite the fact people in this white house have been panicked since march about the need for him to take action.

so, steve schmidt, with them having all of this information, i'm sorry, it just seems astounding that they continue to run cover for donald trump publicly. >> it sure does, and it completely contradicts the findings in the report. now, i do think one thing, joe, is that chairman burr, who had to step down because of his insider trading difficulties, is the person who most directly shaped the outcome of the report. marco rubio came into this like an eighth-inning relief pitcher. and so, maybe all of these members were cornered by the accumulation of reality and facts, but every one of those members is going to vote for donald trump, has endorsed donald trump. none of those members has stood up and condemned donald trump for this terrible behavior. none of them has talked about, apart from the report, verbally, on television, communicate directly to their voters and to

the american people the dangers this type of conduct poses to the security of the country. and lastly, this is still happening. it's happening right now. it's happening as we speak, and none of these senators are out there condemning the president for doing what george washington warned the country about as he left office, which was conspiring with a foreign power to influence politics in this country, sovereign nation of the people, by the people, for the people. so, it's just reprehensible conduct. and even yesterday, marco rubio was out there spinning the findings of this, trying to cover for trump, asserting that what was said in the report was, in fact, not what was said in the report. it's really remarkable. >> again, though, the language here is that the campaign's coordination with russians posed, quote, a grave counterintelligence threat, and that, despite trump's

recollection, the committee assesses that trump did, in fact, speak to stone about wikileaks and with members of his campaign about stone's access to wikileaks on multiple occasions. that, of course, are the members of the committee, all signing off on the same conclusion, and that is, that the president of the united states committed perjury. and that is why the republican congress voted twice to impeach bill clinton, because he committed perjury. >> yeah. >> and yet, these republicans who have signed this report, signed off on the report, just sat quietly during impeachment proceedings, despite the fact they had already sent criminal referrals over -- >> geez. >> -- the two trump family members, for meeting that they had had and lied about. >> how do they live with themselves? steve schmidt and ken dilanian,

thank you both. joining us now, former national security adviser for president obama, susan rice. her recent book "tough love: my story of the things worth fighting for" is now out in paperback. it's a great book. so, susan, just having probably been able to just hear the coverage of this report and glance through it, it's a bipartisan report, saying things like "grave counterintelligence threat." what is your takeaway, just from what you've seen so far? and i'm also interested in your touching on just how much this country and also republicans, it appears, have been so worn down that nothing shocks them anymore. >> well, good morning, mika. it's good to be with you. i think this is an extraordinary report in all of its detail, almost 1,000 pages now when you put all five volumes together. and what we've learned is in

much greater detail in some respects than we had coming out of the mueller report, the various ways in which it appears that the trump campaign was in contact with and coordinated with russian intelligence. and it's quite shocking. now, what i think is important is to fast-forward and recognize, okay, now it's 2020, and many of these very same people are not in a campaign, they're in power, with all of the reins of power that that entails. and now, again, we know donald trump has welcomed a foreign interference. he said, if somebody wants to help me, i'm fine with that, and he's asked not only ukraine, working with his folks, he's asked rudy giuliani. he's asked the chinese to all interfere in our election on his behalf. and just within the last couple weeks, the director of national intelligence has issued what

should be a very alarming report, reminding americans that now, in 2020, the russians uniquely, they're posing yet again a very grave threat to the integrity of our democracy. and so, we need to be vigilant and recognize that the very same people who we now know in great detail because of the senate report, were engaging with the russians to benefit donald trump in 2016 are now in a position to be doing the very same in 2020. >> and how fascinating that during the impeachment hearing -- not fascinating, pathetic, really -- so many congressmen and senators tried to push a conspiracy theory on the ukrainian government, suggesting that they had been the ones trying to interfere in the 2016 election. and the report, the republican report that came out yesterday, concluded there was no reliable evidence. "during the course of the

investigation, the committee identified no reliable evidence that the ukrainian government interfered in the 2016 u.s. election." so, there you have, susan rice, again, the conclusion of the republican intel committee. and despite that conclusion and despite the fact that intel agencies warned republican senators back in 2016 not to spread that lie, they have continued to spread that putin pushed conspiracy theory. >> why? >> yes, joe. and worse, we have ron johnson and other members of the senate currently working with russian-backed ukrainian elements, and perhaps the russians themselves directly, to try now in 2020 to generate false dirt on joe biden to tar him and his family in the very same way that they tried to tar hillary clinton and her associates.

so, this is a rerun of the same play. and what's concerning even more so this time is that donald trump has in the senate allies and backers who are doing the very dirty work that we're all so concerned about, that the republican-led senate intelligence committee is so worried about, and rightly so. so, i think what's important here is that the american people understand what this is. this is a rerun with enhancements of a very similar play that we're now seeing executed in 2020, probably new and improved over 2016. >> and to remind our viewers, less than two weeks ago, russian intelligence said yes, russia is meddling again and is, yes, putting its foot on the scale for donald trump. ambassador rice, i wanted to ask you about a potential biden administration and foreign policy in that administration. if you were secretary of state or some other person were

secretary of state, what is the first thing you have to do? joe biden has talked a lot about having to sort of unravel what donald trump has done and go back and re-engage with the world. what does that look like to you? that's an awfully big task. where would you begin? >> willie, there's so much that needs to be done and so much that's urgent, but it all begins with re-establishing and renewing the trust of our allies and partners in the leadership of the united states. >> mm-hmm. >> right now, our allies look at us and see a president who rarely tells the truth on many consequential things, who has made these close relationships with our allies that should be based on mutual interests and shared values, cheap transactions that he relies on only when it's convenient. he's elevated our adversaries like vladimir putin and kim jong-un to best friend status and left the rest of the world wondering what's going on here.

we've lost our minds. so, the critical thing, whether we're fighting a pandemic or dealing with climate change or dealing with non-proliferation issues or russian aggression or a rising and more aggressive china, is that we are together with our allies and partners in confronting those challenges. so, from canada to europe to asia, that's job one. we've got to repair those relationships and restore confidence in our leadership. >> and those relationships have a lot to do with the stability of this country, with the strength of this country, with our exceptionalism. and i would ask you, amidst this pandemic and how it's been handled and our growing record-breaking numbers compared to other countries, as well as the recent news items pertaining to the u.s. postal service. i'll put it kindly. how does that impact our national security or our relationships, if it does at all?

>> it absolutely does. first of all, mika, our national security is gravely affected any time large numbers of americans are killed by a threat. and in this case, the threat is disease, it's a pandemic. that in itself is a national security problem. but then you look at how we have handled it, with utter incompetence and indifference to the lives and the well-being of americans. and that's the leadership we've seen -- or the failed leadership we've seen of donald trump. and the world looks to us and thinks, my goodness, the united states is a country with enormous resources, great scientific and medical expertise, huge infrastructure and capacity to deal with a threat like this, and we failed. we have not only failed, we failed worse than any other country in the world in terms of per-capita infections, per-capita deaths, and we're still on the rise! so, it's an extraordinary damage that has been done to the

perception of our competence, our capacity to lead, and our claim to be an effective leader that others can work with to tackle a problem that is, in fact, a global problem. and if we don't have a global, concerted solution, it's not going to be resolved. we can't just put up walls here and shut our borders and vaccinate every american, even if that were possible, which, of course, it isn't, and expect that we'll be safe. we're not going to be safe here in the united states in a lasting way until that vaccine is widely disseminated around the world and the virus can't mutate and come back in a different form to hit us here at home again. >> former national security adviser susan rice, thank you so much for being on the show this morning. >> thanks a lot. and still ahead on "morning joe," with her husband now the official democratic nominee for president, former second lady, dr. jill biden joins the conversation, straight ahead on "morning joe." , straight ahead "morning joe."

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four days after beau's funeral, i watched joe shave and put on his suit. i saw him steel himself in the mirror, take a breath, put his shoulders back, and walk out into a world empty of our son. he went back to work. that's just who he is. there are times when i couldn't even imagine how he did it, how he put one foot in front of the other and kept going. he does it for you. joe's purpose has always driven him forward. his strength of will is unstoppable and his faith is unshakeable, because it's not in politicians or political parties or even in himself.

it's in the providence of god. his faith is in you, in us. >> that was dr. jill biden, of course, delivering a deeply personal speech to close out the second night of the democratic convention. and dr. biden joins us now. jill, thank you so much for being with us. so, we all, of course, know the story of your husband. you talked about one of the most painful parts of his life. and my god, he's had so many painful moments, having to go through one tragedy after another. could you talk about that faith, his faith in god that you mentioned? can you talk about growing up in the church and how that helped him, even beyon one tragedy after another to just keep putting one step in front of another and moving on to help others in pain?

>> sure. you know, joe grew up in a very religious family. his mother was very religious. and faith means a lot to joe, and that's one of the things that has gotten him through all this tragedy and loss. and beau was very religious as well. and i think that helped us all in trying to heal and go forward. >> your speech last night was really moving and really personal. and we've gotten to know each other over the years, and i've always been -- >> yes, we have. >> -- great sort of admirer of you and what you have done with your husband's time -- >> thank you. >> -- serving as vice president. and i remember saying to joe after interviewing you in philadelphia -- i came back and i said, i can't believe they want to go back to washington, after eight years there as vice

president and so many decades serving in the senate. but you do. and you found a way to maintain your sense of self. i believe you shared with me -- >> yes. >> -- it was through working as a community college professor. and you did it even when he was in the white house. if your husband is elected to president of the united states, what will be the way you keep it real? and will you bring your work with you? >> you know, mika, i will take my work with me, because i'm a teacher. that's who i am. and i think you saw that last night. and so, if we're elected on november 3rd, i hope to be back in the classroom spring semester. so, i've already taken the training to have the certificate to teach online. so, i'll be there. i'm a working girl. >> i love it. >> dr. biden, it's willie.

it's good to see you. i wanted to ask you about -- >> hi! >> -- a date we were talking about at the top of our show, which was february 11th of this year in new hampshire, when we had vice president biden on the set with us. it was the day of the primary. he knew it wasn't going to go well. he finished in fifth place after finishing fourth in iowa. things didn't look good, quite frankly. and i think people around the campaign would tell us that privately. and we saw it on his face a little bit. can you take us back to that day and that time and how you and the vice president were feeling about his prospects? and then jump ahead to last night when he officially became six months later the nominee of the party. >> well, i have to tell you, you know, that was a tough time, but joe is always optimistic, and he said to me, "jill, hold on, hold on, wait until we get to south carolina," and then we went into south carolina, and south carolina gave us wings. and now, i feel like we're

flying. so, it all turned out. but you're right, it was pretty tough. it was a little bit bumpy in iowa and new hampshire. >> so, tonight, kamala harris will speak. she will become the vice presidential nominee. most of the reporting from people who talked to members of the campaign say that you had a good hand in helping the vice president arrive at his decision. was kamala harris your choice to be the vice president's running mate, and if so, why? >> you know what, kamala was both of our choices, because i admire strong women, and kamala's fierce and she's strong and she's tough. she'll be a good debater. and more than that, she'll be a good partner for joe. and that's what he needs, a partner to help him govern. and he always said that he and barack had a really tight relationship and that they had this -- shared the same values, and that is what he has with

kamala. >> so, jill, this morning we get word that not only notre dame, but also michigan state now is going to be suspending in-person classes. we heard unc a few days ago making that decision. >> yeah. >> we all have kids, and we all have kids that want to get back to school, that want to see their friends. we have reports of depression and thoughts of suicide rising to record levels among young adolescents. >> yep. >> what message do you have for your students? what message do you have to children across the country? and how do we encourage our children and others to get through this terrible time? >> you know, we will go back. i mean, eventually, we will be back in our classrooms. but right now, we have to listen to the experts and the scientists. and the one thing about my husband, joe, is his different style of leadership.

and he has a strategy going forward. we have to get this pandemic under control so that we can go back to school. and i hear you, because i'm an educator, and i cannot wait to get back into the classroom. and i know that kids all across america, the only thing they want to do is go back to school. so, but we have to wait. we have to wait until it's safe. >> yeah, it has to be done right. dr. jill biden, thank you so much for coming on the show this morning. we hope to see you again very, very soon. >> thanks, mika. >> thank you. >> love you. thanks. so, claire mccaskill, we've gotten through two nights so far. colin powell speaking last night, continuing of former republican officials speaking, as well as, obviously, a lot of democratic stars. how is the dnc going so far? >> i am so pleasantly surprised. i found most of it compelling.

i think the technological challenges i think they have mastered. i really think we will never go back to those clumsy, expensive conventions that we're all used to. and by the way, i think one of the things, was jill biden amazing last night? yeah, she made me cry. was michelle obama amazing the night before? of course. but you know, there were two women that i thought were really unbelievable. the first was the young woman who talked about her father dying from covid, saying the only pre-existing conversation her father had was trusting donald trump. >> yes. >> and the other one was the elevator operator last night, jacquelin britney, who said so eloquently, you know, joe biden has room in his heart for someone other than himself. and what a great summation of the difference between these two men. there is no room in donald trump's heart for anybody but donald trump. and joe biden is the opposite. so, i think they've really done a good job of putting real

people in the convention in an important way. >> there's no question. and one of the ways they did that, guys, was with that roll call last night, which i think a lot of people agree should become the new standard for how they do the roll call. if you've got the guy holding the calamari up in rhode island, you've got to do that every year. now there's going to be a competition to get their food in the roll call. but you know, as we end our interview there with jill biden, i'll just say again and again, this isn't a political comment, this is just a feel comment that joe biden has tapped into something visceral, was do you want to feel this way every day when you wake up in the morning and you see the latest thing that the president has said or done or tweeted? or do you want to have a little sense of calm? do you want to have a little sense of decency in the country? and i think as you watched jill biden, a school teacher, deliver that speech from her classroom, and you watch her story and the story of the loss that that family has suffered and how they've responded to it and talked about it over the years,

there's just no question -- again, politics aside, policy aside -- that these are decent people. and i think that will play into some people's decision. >> yeah, and you know, i want to talk about, really quickly, what claire said and what you were saying about the way this convention is going off. and right now it seems unusual. but the question is, why would we ever go back to those other conventions that were created at a time when you needed to have a mass of people coming together because they couldn't get together online, because they couldn't get together and communicate the way we can now? it just -- you know, i had said yesterday, talking about w.d. childers, the bandy rooster from northwest florida. he said he wanted all the money and all the votes. what i always told people was, based on something that i learned very early on, is -- i had a guy on capitol hill tell me when i went up to say, "hey, what's the secret to winning?" one of the things he said was, raise a lot of money and don't spend it.

and i remember my first event where i was supposed to be raising money, i walked in, and everybody's having crab claws at this, like -- and there was this, like, ice sculpture in the middle. and i turned to the person that put on the event. i go, "what the hell is that?" he goes, "it's an ice sculpture. i thought it would impress." i said, no ice sculpture! don't spend money on ice sculptures! we've got to save this money ten months from now to put up 30-second ads on local news! so, we ended up losing money on my first fund-raiser and called it for ever the fund-loser. but everybody knew after that moment, you don't spend money on ice sculptures. you don't spend money on anything. you get people's money, you hold people's money, and you have it to spend when you can see the whites in their eyes at the end of the campaign. so, willie, why would a national party waste tens of millions of dollars on conventions when you could probably run it better,

faster, more efficiently, the was. that it's being done this year? >> well, it's one of the many outcomes of this pandemic in our lives. i think businesses have seen that. schools have seen that. and you're right, now a convention has seen it. you can do it a different way and much less expensive. although now i do have to quickly cancel something i had just sent to your house. it's a swan and it's probably dripping right now outside your driveway. >> damn it! >> yeah, i think this was in northwest florida. we were in destin. i think it probably was a mullet. probably the great white mullet ice sculpture, which was melting. but the steam coming off the top of my head probably melted whatever it was much faster. >> okay. coming up -- >> so, kids, when you run for office, you want all their money. you want all their votes. if you go 90 miles an hour, nobody stops you. and raise money, don't spend it. there you go. now you know how to win a

campaign. coming up, where the nation stands in its pandemic response. we're going to check in with former fda commissioner dr. scott gottlieb. "morning joe" is back in a moment. >> i take powerful people in my elevator all the time. when they get off, they go to their meetings. me, i just head back to the lobby. but in the short time i spent with joe biden, i could tell he really saw me, that he actually cared, that my life meant something to him. and i knew, even when he went into his important meeting, he'd take my story in there with him. that's because joe biden has room in his heart for more than just himself.

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result back. if it's five to seven days, it almost obviates the purpose of contact tracing, because that means someone was out there for five to seven days potentially spreading the infection. >> that's dr. anthony fauci during a medical town hall yesterday. and with us now, former fda commissioner dr. scott gottlieb. doctor, would you care to respond to that? i hear that complaint from so many people, telling me i took a test, i didn't get it back from the health department for ten days. what good does that do me? >> well, tony's exactly right. when this becomes epidemic in some parts of the country, the lab-based testing system becomes overwhelmed. so, companies like labcorp and quest simply become overwhelmed with the number of tests that get sent in and they're really the swing capacity in this country. they're the big platforms that have the ability to swing capacity into parts of the country where the virus is becoming epidemic. but part of the challenge also is that we're far too dependent on labs to do testing. if you look at other countries,

they have more point-of-care tests and they have more what we call lateral flow tests, things like pieces of paper that can give you a readout on whether you have covid at the point of care, even for home use, although i think we're a long way from clearing tests for home use. something like a pregnancy test, where it's a sheet of paper, you you take a swab from a patient, put it on the test, you drop some fluid on it, wait ten minutes and you get a result. a lot of countries have those technologies. i think you're going to tart to see them come into the market quickly here in the u.s. and i think that's going to open up new opportunities for testing, testing not just to diagnose active infection of people that have symptoms, but use it aggressively as a surveillance tool in large populations to try to detect outbreaks before they become large. >> so, doctor, here's some numbers from yesterday. covid-19 deaths from yesterday. spain 24, france 17, japan 16, canada 13, the uk 12, germany 9, the united states 1,358. population of the country's above 426 million. population of the united states,

328 million. so, we failed, obviously, as a country over the past six months on several levels to keep those numbers down. what do we do over the next six months to avoid a repeat of this, especially as we go through the period that you say could be the most dangerous, that period where a flu epidemic collides with the covid pandemic? >> yeah, i think it's going to be a very difficult fall and winter. now, there is some indication that flu may not be as severe this winter. you're not seeing a lot of flu in the southern hemisphere at all. and so, some of the steps we're taking to try to prevent covid spread is having even more of an impact on flu spread, so that's some of the good news. but the reality is, as we get into the fall and the winter season, people move inside, classes do restart, other respiratory pathogens circulate that are going to confound a diagnosis of covid. it's going to become harder to prevent outbreaks. and so, i think what you're likely to see is sort of migratory outbreaks across the country. we've kind of solved the epidemic in the northeast.

the sun belt looks like it's resolving. now you see spread moving into parts of the midwest and the west. and if this infection does move into more rural parts of the country and becomes pervasive there, that could be even more difficult than when it moved into dense cities, where you were able dense cities where you were able to target resources into those cities. if it's over a very geographically disperse, diverse region, that may be more difficult to control. that seems to be what's taking shape in the midwest and west. unfortunately, we're going to have more infection before we get through this. if you look at just the rate of infection we're on right now, if it doesn't get a lot worse but doesn't get a lot better by the end of the year, we'll have 30% of the population probably infected with this. unfortunately, there's going to be a lot of death and disease along the way. we're not out of this by a longshot. >> dr. gottlieb, i want to ask you about colleges, notre dame announcing yesterday it was going back to online classes after eight days in their first

attempt to send everybody back into school. north carolina, university of north carolina in chapel hill, a similar story. michigan state announced yesterday it will have online classes. was this inevitable in some way when you're asking 18 and 20-year-olds to go to college and not get together, not socialize, not to have parties and mix in the dorms? is this just too much to ask of colleges to do this in a safe way? >> i'm not sure it is. i mean, it's very difficult when you have this much infection around the country and bringing together college students living in close proximity and spread. when you talk to university presidents, they were putting together aggressive measures, routine testing. some colleges were going to test the entire population as they returned and test them three times a week and use testing as a tool to detect outbreaks. keep the students somewhat separated, try to protect the faculty. they were doing all the things they should be doing. where it seems to have been

broken down is the social activities off campus. i think they need a zero tolerance, if you want to come back to the semester, you need to give up large parties for the semester. it seems to mirror the mask debate. people want the economy to restart but people don't want to take simple interventions like wearing a mask. same with colleges. you can probably come back safely on campus if you implement all those measures, you protect the faculty who are more vulnerable and the staff but you won't be able to have social gatherings like last year first semester. have you to give it up. students were unwilling to do that in some parts. >> dr. gottlieb, i want to hear more about your piece in "the wall street journal" entitled "lifting lockdowns won't fully restore the economy," and i'll tag onto that, what about quick tests, why don't we have them? do other countries have them? i know the white house has them. wouldn't quick tests, like very

universally used, widely used, help restore the economy? >> i think it would. i think we need to think of screening as something -- testing as something we can do to do routine surveillance in a population to detect outbreaks and do the case-based interventions. we talked about the tracking and tracing. we need a very inexpensive test that can be easily deployed in something like a school, in a nurse's station where you can test the population on a regular basis. i think we're going to have that technology. it's the lateral flow technology i talked about, the pieces of paper that look like a pregnancy test where you put the sample on the paper. the quick test we rely are on antigen testing like abbott what the white house has. it still requires a machine and still complex to use. we need are those very simple

point of care tests that really anyone can be trained to use. they're so cheap literally, $2, $3, $4 a test. if we get that technology, i think we'll have that this month, i think you'll start to see these kind of products come on the market. they've been worked on for months and under review at the fda, if they do come onto the market in volume, i think it could really change how we use testing as a way to control the epidemic. >> let me run through quickly just three quick scenarios. again, just a quick -- go down the checklist with you because your a voice we and so many people have great respect for. sometimes there aren't clearances given. you have to read through 1,000 articles to come to your own conclusions. how do you feel right now about americans getting on commercial airplanes that have the center seat open? is it safe to get on commercial airplanes yet or would you personally still be concerned? >> i'm giving some advice to

airlines. i think it can be safe. i think it's how you travel. if you're wearing masks, taking precautions, i think you can travel safely. i've flown more recently. >> what about eating outside at restaurants? >> i've done that as well. again, i think you can do it safely, particularly in a part of the country where there isn't an epidemic. i'm here in connecticut. i feel comfortable having a meal in a restaurant outside. i've worn a mask in and out. the restaurant took precautions. i think with the right circumstances, it can be done safely. >> and i know -- this is very complicated and multi-layered and you talked about this before, but so many parents, so many friends are calling and asking, should we send our kids to school or have them do distance learning. what's your general rule on that? >> i think we should try to get in class learning restarted. in parts of the country it's

more difficult to control epidemic in the school. if you're trying to create distancing, you're creating pods around the student so the whole population isn't intermixing, students are wearing masks, you're protecting teachers and giving them proper protective equipment, i think there are ways to restart in-class learning. we don't want introuductions ino school settings where a lot of kids get infected. >> thank you so much for being on the show this morning. really appreciate it. still ahead, the strongest indication yet that president trump lied under oath to bob mueller's investigator. more findings from the bipartisan intelligence report on russia's interference in the 2016 election. former acting attorney general sally yates and senator cory booker will be our guests. a reminder, joe's new book is due out in november.

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i thought it was an angry speech. he lost control and he's been really hit very hard by both sides of that speech. that speech was ridiculous. >> hado you have a response to michelle obama's speech last night where she said you're over your head? >> frankly, she should have made the speech live. it was taped a long time ago because she had the wrong deaths. she didn't even mention the vice presidential candidate in the speech. you know, she gets these fawning reviewing. if you gave a real review, it wouldn't be so fawning. i thought it was extremely divisive. >> there's something about the obamas that gets under the president's skin. president trump spent time yesterday smarting over michelle obama's speech from night one of

the democratic national convention. >> it was a bad day. >> usually, joe, he deflects. he distracts and does something like some big shiny object to distract from something like the incredible speech by michelle obama. instead, those distractions came from the senate and from the head of the postal service, two major developments with blows to the president's narrative. the release of a new bipartisan senate report concludes that the 2016 trump campaign eagerly embraced russia's help in the election. as the washington examiner put it, the senate report on russia's hoax claims, the bipartisan report goes further than special counsel robert muell mueller's report, detailing the extent to which the trump campaign sought help from a foreign power to win the 2016 presidential election. approved by the committee's republican majority, the senate

report found that president trump had discussed hacked emails with roger stone, despite the president telling mueller that he didn't recall doing so. >> under oath. under oath. he lied under oath. >> last month the president -- >> where i come from in the redneck rivera, we call that perjury. >> last month the president commuted roger stone's sentence after he was convicted of seven felony crimes. the report also cited testimony and other information provided by several witnesses referring to the possible existence of compromising tapes and witness accounts of trump's conduct with women during past visits to moscow. but the allegations were not confirmed and the report stressed that it could not establish that russia had collected compromising material on trump. the senate intelligence committee affirmed mueller's investigation and stone's prosecution on the subject of

wikileaks, saying in part, quote, staff on the trump campaign sought advance notice about wikileaks releases, creating messaging strategies to promote and share the materials in anticipation of and following their release and encouraged further leaks. so, to talk about all of this -- >> i'm going to willie with this for a second. we need to underline that. willie -- >> blaring headline. >> donald trump -- i'm going to speak slowly because some of his hacks on capitol hill and some of his hacks off capitol hill like to say no collusion, this is a hoax. donald trump openly accepted what he knew to be russian help. he was told by the intel communities in august, in august, that russia had stolen material, and that they were

going -- the russian gru was going to use wikileaks to launder their stolen information. what did donald trump do with that information? he used it. and not only did it he use it, knowing that he was promoting an asset of russia spy agency, he went around saying, we love wikileaks. i love wikileaks. and he used that information over the last month of the campaign. knowing, again, that this was all in coordination with russia. and that was in the senate report had t report. that's well known to everyone likewise. i have to say this, too. trump's policy adviser, national security adviser, his campaign chairman, his deputy campaign chairman, his personal lawyer,

his political consultant and his attorney general were all busted for lying to feds or congress about their contacts with russia. this is -- this republican report lays all of it out in the starkest of terms. >> it does. and the argument from president trump, from roger stone, anyone else swept up in the mueller report has been that we were passive observers. yes, maybe russia interfered in the election, but we were just watching. what this report says again, and you said it at the top but it's worth underlining, this is a republican-led committee. republicans are in -- this is republican-led, bipartisan report, exhaustive report, almost 600 pages, shows russia not only interfered but the campaign willingly accepted what they dug up in their interference. and that roger stone actively worked to get those wikileaks

emails that, as you said, donald trump went out and tauted those emails on the campaign trail citing we like wikileaks, cited them on the campaign trail. the report talks about paul manafort, helping, working alongside russians to get information, to get these wikileaks emails out. it is clear once again, yet another report showing not only did russia interfere, but that the trump campaign in 2016, make no mistake, willingly accepted and used that information. >> benjamin, how devastating is this report for donald trump and the administration? >> you know, if people read it, it is devastating. as you just described, it shows a degree of involvement on the part of the trump campaign and donald trump himself, that even the mueller report did not quite

describe. partly because the report is -- you know, it's not a criminal report on an investigation the way the mueller report is. it's actually a little bit more of -- you know, it's almost more journalistic report based on a congressional investigation of counterintelligence risk. so, it can be a little freer than mueller could. the most important thing about it, however, is not the facts that it contained, it's the names who are on it. it's the fact that this was a bipartisan report by the senate intelligence committee, which actually, unlike the house intelligence committee under devin nunes actually did its job, did a full and complete investigation, produced the kind of information that you could write up in 1,000 pages that answers a whole lot of questions and identifies the ones you

can't answer. and the fact it's as devastating it is particularly clear that even the authors of it on the republican side were yesterday busy issuing statements suggesting that it didn't say what, in fact, it says. >> which was, of course, humiliating for those who tried to do that for political reasons when, again, they presented mountains of evidence that donald trump and his campaign worked with the russians and rn aided and abetted by the russians, an ongoing, aggressive attempt. instead, they did what useful idiots for vladimir putin have been doing now for several years. that is, clinging to the most lurid taelz in the steele dossier saying, you didn't prove that so the whole thing is a

hoax. asking claire mccaskill as if that one part of this investigation would somehow distract from the mountains and mountains of damning evidence. i just have to say it again, from the mountains and mountains of devastating evidence that donald trump lied to robert mueller, committed perjury under oath. witten had time to think through it and still committed that. then again, that you go through all of these people, foreign policy adviser lied about contacts with russia, his national security adviser lied about contacts with russia, his campaign chairman lied about contacts with russia, his deputy campaign chairman lied under oath, all of them, under oath about contacts with russia, his personal lawyer lied about contacts with russia under oath, his political consultant lied about contacts with russia under oath, and his attorney general lied before congress under oath,

and, of course, yesterday republicans concluded, republicans concluded that the president of the united states lied under oath to federal investigators about his campaign's contacts with russia. boy, that's some hoax, claire. >> yeah. i really wish we would refer to this report in a different way. i would like to say, tom cotton says that the trump campaign manager was working with a russian agent. ben sasse says, of course, the government should have been investigating what was going on in the trump campaign. john cornyn says, yes. carter page was doing suspicious things that warranted him being looked at by the people in oush government because of his activities with russia.

this is a damning report. if it was issued in isolation without all the other noise that trump creates, with all of his scandal, it would blow the lid off washington, d.c. but because of when it's being issued and everything that's come before it, my fear is people won't realize that this was marco rubio and tom cotton and ben sasse and john cornyn saying, yes, the trump campaign worked with russia and they should have been investigated. >> another way to put it, willie, is marco rubio said that donald trump's coordination with russia, his campaign's coordination with russia posed, quote, a grave counterintelligence threat. another way to say that, it posed a grave threat to american

democracy. >> it also, joe, shed timing on wikileaks' release of emails to john podesta. quote, at approximately 4:00 p.m. on october 7th "the washington post" released the "access hole" tape. witnesses involved in trump's debate preparation recalled that the team first heard of the tape about an hour prior to the public release. stone wanted the podesta stuff to balance the news cycle either right then or at least coincident, even telling his confidan confidante, quote, have wikileaks drop the podesta emails immediately. 30 minutes after the "access hollywood" tape was released, wikileaks released the podesta email. that's basically the timeline we knew from the mueller report. in the republican-led senate intel committee confirming a lot

that's been in the mueller report but even going further in some places. >> right. and we're doing the thing this morning of how we would like to talk about this. i think one of the things in the ideal world, one of the things this report illustrates vividly is how much this conversation over time has been polluted by the use of words like collusion, words that don't have any legal consequence but have -- particularly when they've been deployed for political purposes by people like bill barr and others. yesterday marco rubio did the same thing. did a video and after releasing this devastating report that has his name on it, releases a video that says, this report proves conclusively that there was no collusion between the trump campaign and the russians. and the only way to think about that is -- the only way to think about that is like, dude, you obviously don't know what -- either of these words are meaningless or you don't know

what these words mean because -- >> it's crazy. >> by any definition, by any webster's definition, the word -- collusion is exactly what this report has demonstrated. so, you know, i think we are -- i think we are -- i have some investigators here. i think we're looking at this thing saying this report is -- i know, guys, good morning. >> jonathan heilemann, that is the cutest -- that just made me like you. that dog is adorable. >> i know. good morning. anyway, i think -- what this report -- look, here, that's the point. the point is that collusion has been put to political purposes. that word has been mangled. and this demonstrates it to the largest degree possible. i want to point my finger again at marco rubio. you still have republicans engaged in this incredibly

absurd, but obviously what has been a successful effort on the part of republicans, and particularly bill barr, to redefine what this thing was because by any standard definition of what this report is, donald trump is guilty -- donald trump and his campaign were guilty of what they know in the common english language, but guilty. >> still ahead on "morning joe," former accounting attorney general sally yates will be with us, after her speech last night slamming the president for, quote, trampling on the rule of law. you're watching "morning joe." n" my husband and i have never eaten healthier. shingles doesn't care. i logged 10,000 steps today. shingles doesn't care. i get as much fresh air as possible. good for you, but shingles doesn't care. because 1 in 3 people will get shingles, you need protection. but no matter how healthy you feel, your immune system declines as you age,

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with a powerful and reliable internet and voice solution at a great price. call or go online today. from the moment president trump took office, his used his position to benefit himself rather than our country. he's trampled the rule of law to attack his enemy and protect his

friends. rather than standing up to vladimir putin, he fawns over a dictator who is still trying to interfere in our elections. he's even trying to sabotage our postal service to keep people from being able to vote. his constant attacks on the fbi, the free press, inspectors general, federal judges, they all have one purpose, to remove any check on his abuse of power. >> former acting attorney general sally yates speaking last night during the democratic national convention. sally joins us now. it's great to have you on the show. i want to talk to you about joe biden, but first i want to develop on the point that we showed you making last night. ask you for your reaction to

what you've seen or heard so far on this bipartisan senate intel report. >> well, i think that this report establishes the same thing that the mueller report did and same thing that our intel community had found before, but they've done it in even greater detail now. and that is that the russians were interfering in our election to try to assist donald trump. essentially vladimir putin was trying to pick our president. and even more frightening thing, i think, is that they're still up to it. they're still working now in this election. >> and you talk about they, they've done it. there are several in the trump administration who many are concerned, sort of joined in what appears to be multiple corrupt practices. if you were attorney general during the time that the mueller report was released, how would you have handled it compared to the way bill barr did?

>> look, i'm not going to go through and try to second guess everything there, but i will say this is that i think it was really important when the mueller report was issued for that report to be characterized accurately. and when that four-page summary came out, that certainly was misleading in many ways as to what the final conclusions were of that report, it seems that was the beginning of rewriting history in terms of what actually happened between the trump campaign and the russians. and so, to me, bob mueller's work should have spoken for itself. >> willie geist, great to have you on with us this morning. you obviously had some inside knowledge of investigations into michael flynn. you were there in that meeting in the oval office in 2017. you were very familiar with the details of russian interference in the 2016 election. i'm wondering if there was

anything in yesterday's senate intel report that surprised you. did you learn something new from what the senate unearthed in its three-year investigation? >> well, i will confess i have not read the full 1,000-page report. i have read some media accounts and excerpts of it. i left at the beginning of the trump administration. there was a lot more information that came to light after that. after i left government. certainly the specifics with respect to paul manafort's interactions with a russian intelligence officer. that ought to give a chill down the spine to everyone, that that was happening with the campaign manager of a presidential campaign and a russian intelligence officer. >> you spoke last night about the president saying he has bankrupt our country's moral authority. what do you mean specifically by

that? what does that look like inside the justice department, for example? >> yeah, you know, when i think about what's happened at the justice department, more than the impact on any one specific case, to me, the most troubling aspect of this is what it does to the public's trust in the equal application of the law. what is concerning is people will begin to believe that the rules don't apply equally to everyone. and that if you are close to the president or close to someone in power, that you get special treatment. and you can look to things like the roger stone situation, michael flynn or others, and this very concept that if you cross the president, folks will go after you. that's just the antithesis of what the rule of law is, and the antithesis of how the rule of

law has operated at least since watergate. >> it's claire mccaskill. first, congratulations on the vindication by tom cotton and john cornyn that the investigations into carter page and into the circumstances surrounding this russian asset in trump's campaign was called for. it was an appropriate investigation. unlike what the president has said. but i have a question for you. how many years were you in the department of justice? >> 27, but who's counting. >> 27 years. by my calculation, tens of thousands of cases that you were involved in and around during that time, can you tell me, there was ever a time that the department of justice asked a court to overturn the guilty plea of a defendant who had pled guilty to charges the department of justice had brought. >> no, i've never seen anything like that. i'm not the only one.

i think after that happened with respect to mike flynn, there were a couple thousand prosecutors, former federal prosecutors, democrats and republicans who signed the letter expressing the same thing. >> when you spoke last night, you talked about -- you started off by saying that our democracy is at stake. the rule of law justice. yeah, it is unusual that you would be speaking at a political convention, but that's where we are. what does joe biden need to do to restore the trust in our democracy and to get our systems back into order. is he up for the task? and does anyone, do you think, really understand the magnitude of the task ahead for the next president of the united states? >> well, i think joe biden is absolutely up to the task. you know, when i think about this election, to me it all

really comes down to, who do you trust? who do you trust to put the country first? who do you love to put up to our values and who do you trust to tell us the truth? joe biden, you know, has all of those things. when people talk about, you know, the decency and integrity that he has, that is absolutely the case. but let's not equate that to just being a nice guy. it's a lot more than that. he has got a moral compass about how he makes decisions, that aspires to live up to the values that have really always defined us. you know, you don't have to agree with someone on every single policy issue to trust that they are going to be making decisions that are in the best interest of our country. not his own personal interest, but best interest of our country. and try to live up to our values. and then the final thing in terms of telling us the truth, i mean, that alone, to me, ought to be a deal-breaker for our current president. we have to be able to trust that

our president is speaking honestly with us. and we will be able to trust that every single day with joe biden. >> former acting attorney general, sally yates, thank you very much for being on the show this morning. up next, one of the latest democratic lawmakers to draw the ire of president trump. senator cory booker is standing by. he joins the conversation next on "morning joe." we miss you. it's totally not the same without you. we're finally back and can't wait until you are too. universal orlando resort. buy now and get two days free at the parks. restrictions apply. ♪

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i think that women and men living in the suburbs who fulfill their american dream, or at least got a big part of it, they now live in a safe, beautiful area. they don't want to have people coming in and forcing low income housing down their throats. this has been a hot issue for before president trump, but he took it to a new level, and biden is going to take it to yet another level. in fact, they say cory booker, there's another beauty, that cory booker is involved. if cory booker is involved,

nothing good is going to happen. >> why is he picking on cory, calling him another beauty? democratic senator cory booker of new jersey joins us now, along with professor of princeton university, eddie glaude jr. cory, what's the deal, what's going on there? >> i don't know. and it's brutal honesty to try to understand our president's mind, but i do think it sounds like his normal tools in his tool box, the only ones we've seen he leads with, which is bigotry, fear mongering and in many ways trying to pit americans against americans. remember, from the very beginning coming down an elevator, he went right to racial tropes, talking about mexicans and muslims and he has not changed his way. so, at the end of the day, i am not focused on him.

i'm focused on us. and i'm really excited about the america and american spirit and american values we can make manifest if we come together despite people like him trying to divide us. >> senator booker, it's willie geist. i want to pick up on that point. you talk about trying to bring back what you call civil grace to our politics and to our country. i'm curious about how you do that and i'm sure you'll address some of that tonight in your address or tomorrow night in your address. and i wonder how you do that. in the past, a democrat might say, i disagree with george w. bush or i disagree with john mccain or minute romney, but they have the best interest of the country in mind, generally speaking, and their supporters are many of my friends. there does seem to be a different feeling in terms of the country along that divide, the trump line, if you want to call it that.

how do you introduce civic grace back into the country? >> we have to get out of the lie we tell ourselves. somehow on the big issues there's a lot of difference. i know there are some issues that divide america, like abortion rights, but just pick health care that we talked about in the democratic convention. you poll affordable cares act and principles, they're wildly popular on both sides of the aisle. you call it obamacare, somebody that large portions of our population have been demonized around, the polling starts to drop. if you look at issues from common sense gun safety all the way to what i think is the ending of the drug war and marijuana justice, you see it's popular on both sides of the aisle. yet, the way we personalize our politics, the way we've demonized each other, the way th that we talk about the humanity or lack thereof, dehumanize is

the core of the problem. how do we change that? we don't look for one leader to do it. we all have to take responsibility for showing that grace and trying to live, as john lewis called us to do, in the creation of a more beloved community. so, i'm optimistic, or as my professor glaude taught me, i'm a prisoner of hope because hope works muscle, hope fights and hope keeps going. this may sound very dramatic, but i really worry about the 50 years from now or 100 years from now for our country if we can't find ways to put invisible in this one nation under god. i see the intelligence report. you almost see glee jumping from the pages as add vversaries lik russia who go on social media pages and try to stir up hate because they ultimately know that's the weakness they can exploit to stop us from doing big things, from great things and moving our nation forward.

>> eddie glaude. got to get some audio. we have a microphone problem with eddie glaude. it's great because we have claire mccaskill here. we can jump to claire next. >> cory, i know that the speeches so far have been like chicken soup for you because they have been about decency and warmth. i have said earlier in the program how much i loved the elevator operator talking about joe biden's heart having room in it for someone besides himself. and all of those things are echoes of what you based your campaign on. how do you think it's going so far? my second question i want to throw in here, in case you want to do it, one of the things they were sharing polling information with russia was to try to track

jill stein's numbers in michigan and pennsylvania and wisconsin. they wanted russia to help out building up jill stein's numbers. in my opinion, that's what happened. do you fear they're going to do the same thing with kanye in those states where he might make the ballot, particularly some place like wisconsin? >> first of all, i just want to say, there's a saying by great humorist dave barry says someone who's not nice to you but not nice to the waiter is not a nice person. you and i both know the truth of that. we get to see, when we were in the senate how people are when the cameras are rolling and how they are to the people serving you in the caucus lunches. i know who joe is, because i got a chance to watch him on the campaign trail, and some of my favorite moments were the behind-the-scene moments watching each candidate go through their rituals and joe was putting his arm around people. not just the candidates but

talking to the people who are working backstage or getting things done. i really believe character matters in that spirit. look, the insidiousness or dark forces that work in this election that are counter to the values i think this nation aspires to, the idea that we can only win this election if we somehow restrict access to the polls, tear down the post office, pull out polling places, or if we try to gin up someone like kanye west, it's really unfortunate. but i'm sorry, that is just not going to work in this election. i really think it's insulting to the intelligence of african-americans, for example, to think that we're going to somehow be swayed away and vote for someone who is not a serious person in this election. so, i'm aware of this and have had conversations with a lot of folks working in grassroots turnout, particularly in minority communities. but there's something like i've

never seen before right now is people are really ticked off and angry and the racial politics and racism of that person, and also the fact that he is doing things, like you said at the top of the show, literally thinks by invoking the name of a black politician that somehow you can scare white people is both angering to the black community and the white community. one of the reasons -- i was reading twitter and the humor was great as people were saying, please, cory, move into my neighborhood because i know you'll shovel my driveway. this is a time that america is going to resoundingly reject these streams of bigotry and hate or the dirty tricks. and i just have a lot of faith for the future. >> i heard an audio check being

done by eddie glaude. we have him back. >> how are you doing, my dear friend? let me ask you one question. one fear of donald trump's comment to you is deeply classed notion. that people in the suburbs don't want working class people invading their communities. here you are on thursday, i know you know we need -- you're committed to this idea that we need a broad reimagining of the country. how do we speak to those poor, low wage earners who are being demonized in this politics, along with the race baiting at the same time? >> well, i think, you know, i think we've got to talk to that, invoke that truth more than we do. i just got frustrated sometimes, even when my staff informed me that no one had said the two words together, child poverty d running in a primary. that's what i think the power of this moment where this beautiful

woman, you saw on that elevator talking about who joe really was. and so i just -- i just want this country to see the truth of communities like the one i live in right now. i grew up in the suburbs. my parents had to get a white couple to oppose them to be the first black family in harrington park, new jersey, where i grew up. i live in a community now that the median income is $14,000 per household. we don't mistake -- i always say -- i got my b.a. from stanford but my ph.d. from the streets of newark from the best teachers i ever had that taught me about human character. i think the holy immoral, the obscenity that i have people in my neighborhood that work full-time jobs, work longer hours than my parents.

my parents worked hard. but they still have to use food stamps or payments to afford food for their families. we live in a broken economy that does not represent our -- the ideals we tell ourselves about this economy. until we confront that truth as a nation and see the worth and dignity about places and spaces i live in, we fail to manifest the virtues of america that we hail. and so this is the test of this moment for us, not just to reject donald trump because i will say this over and over again, this election is not about him. it's about us. beating donald trump is a floor. it's not the ceiling. it gets us out of the valley but you know we have been called by leaders of past generations that we must get to the mountain top. that's the difficult work of recognizing and seeing every american and really love that

values everyone. >> sounds like we have an extra guest on the show, senator booker. >> there's a lot of jersey, a lot of dogs, a lot going on right now. we love it. you'll be speaking tomorrow night at the convention. tonight kamala harris will officially become the vice presidential nominee. president barack obama, secretary of state, former secretary of state hillary clinton as well. i want to ask you about kamala harris, who is a good friend of yours and a colleague in the senate. and ask you what you think specifically she brings to this ticket. california is safe for joe biden, so that's not a question about the electoral map but she brings something else. what is that to you? >> well, look, i invoke that moving "waiting to exhale" a lot because i think there was a moment when she was appointed that a lot of us exhaled. and that in the incredibly long

history of this nation, we have never really seen this kind of ticket that you have gender diversity, race diversity, that you speak to the powerful immigration history of the truth of who we are as well as to the cultural majesty that is america, bringing people together from all around the globe. in so many ways, kam achaa is somebody, no matter what road you walk in life, you can see parallels with her. a lot of us around this country, the first big choice that a presidential nominee has to make, he has shown that we are america that's on the right road and we are on an inclusive road and recognize our richness that is us and so kamala is somebody that i think is really someone

who is making america be more seen than we ever have before when it comes to our national politics. >> senator cory booker, thank you very much for being on with us this morning. up next, the president is praising the latest far-right fringe candidate to win a republican primary election. keep it right here on "morning joe." migraine medicine.

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a far right conspiracy theorist won the republican nomination for a florida house seat. laura loomer was banned from uber and lyft after refusing to drive with a muslim driver. and banned from the site for

referring to congresswoman ilan omar for being pro-sharia law. the district includes mar-a-lago. won by hillary clinton nearly 20 points, votes in 2016. loomer is the second far right fringe candidate to win a republican primary in less than a week. last friday, marjorie green of georgia, who has embraced the q nonconspiracy theory won a run-off election. president trump congratulated both green and loomer for their primary wins on twitter. claire, are these just very unusual situations, or is something going on here, on the republican side? >> yeah, let's tell this story. you have a president of the united states. you have a woman win a republican primary in his home district who preaches the gospel

of hate against muslims, who has hooked up with a group of people who said that the children who died in sandy hook, that that was a made-up fairy tale that didn't really happen. you're the president of the united states and you can take several paths here. you can condemn this hate-filled nut lunatic that won this primary. you can stay quiet, because it's a safe, democratic seat and this woman, hopefully, would never get to congress, or you can go, you know, i'm all in. let's go for the hate nut. let's go for the crazy person. i'm all for the crazy person. i mean, republicans across this country, good-willed republicans, especially my former colleagues in the senate, come on. this is so bad. i have to smile because if i don't, i cry. this is so embarrassing to the united states of america, that this president is embracing this kind of hate.

>> so, andy, let's think about this in terms s of where the republican is. laura loomer is a bigot, islamap hch islama islamaphobe, she said that out loud. she's proud of it. she did all the things claire just said as well as other things that i'm not going to amplify because they bring so much hurt to grieving families. the most recent nominee, mrm, will not be there, former president bush will not be there. a president who trashed john mccain both when he was alive and after he died. that is the old republican party. it was only old until about four years ago. instead you have a president amplifying this candidate, laura loomer and another who supports a conspiracy theory group.

she will likely be nominated to congress. that's where they are right now. >> what we're witnessing is the mainstream of right-wing extremism. it's become, in some very clear way, part of our body pol. tic. when that happens, willie, we'll see two things. one, we're not going to see an agenda for a second term. what we're going to see on display is white grievance. it will be a white power hour as it were. and i think we're going to see clearly the mainstreaming of this extremism. because it's the fuel that brought donald trump into american politics, on to the national scene and it's the fuel that sustains his presidency at this moment when he knows he's in trouble. so i think we need to prepare ourselves for what we will see at the republican national convention, and that is the deepening of this mainstream,

which q nonand the person in florida just won the republican nomination, that this is just the tip of the iceberg. something much deep er, somethig much worse. >> so, claire, let's look at what's going to happen tonight back to the democrats here. you have the historic nomination of kamala harris as the vice presidential nominee to stand alongside joe biden. we'll have the first african-american president of the united states, barack obama, speaking, and hillary clinton speaking as well. it's quite a lineup and quite a contrast to what eddie just laid out that we'll see a week from now. >> yeah. it's going to be terrific. i really look forward to president obama's speech and, obviously, i think kamala harris has an historic moment in front of her tonight and i wish her the very best. i will point out another thing about the agenda for tonight like the other nights. it is dominated by women. and i am proud of my party for recognizing the role that women

are going to play in this election. you know, joe biden has a big lead with women in america right now. and they really made an effort to make this convention look like the support that is out there for joe biden instead of it being what we remember seeing, you know, 10, 20 years ago, when it was just every once in a while they let a woman come up and do something that was parliamentary or every once in a while there might be one or two women speakers. it's terrific tonight that once again you'll have strong women leaders on the stage. >> that is good news. and that does it for us this morning. stephanie ruhle will pick up the coverage after this final break. e coverage after this final break. from prom dresses...

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you're talking about ebates. i can't stop talking about rakuten. pretty good deal - peter sfx [blender] ebates is now rakuten, sign up today. >> hi, there. i'm stephanie ruhle. it's wednesday, august 19th. let's get smarter this morning, it is official. last night, former vp joe biden collected the delegates he needed to officially become the democratic nominee for president as part of a visually stunning nationwide roll call that spanned all 50 states and several territories. tonight, his running mate, senator kamala harris, makes her big debut at the all-virtual dnc. we'll hear from former president barack obama. before we get to move forward, we want to take a look back at last night.