hi, everyone. it's 4:00 in the east. is it political desperation, roid rage or both behind the presidential meltdown spilling out into the open in the critical 25 days before polls close in donald trump's increasingly precarious re-election fight. in just the last 24 hours the president of the united states of america has threatened to return to the campaign trail as soon as tomorrow, less than a week out of the hospital with an infectious disease for which there is no cure. he's also attacked the governor of michigan for not thanking him enough after officials thwarted a domestic terror plot to kidnap her. he's left lawmakers within his

own party dismayed and he's called on the sitting attorney general to arrest his political rivals. if all that wasn't enough, donald trump took a full two hours out of his day today to rant and rave in what he called a virtual rally on rush limbaugh's radio show. in the end it was limbaugh who ended the interview, reminding the president of his jam-packed schedule. it's no small wonder democrats in congress are today talking about the 25th amendment, drawing attention to questions and concerns about donald trump's physical and mental competence. but the threat to donald trump's presidency at this point lies at the ballot box with polls suggesting donald trump's chances of mounting a comeback against joe biden are slipping away. "the new york times" describes trump's, quote, increasing frustration over his political fortunes with surveys that show him trailing mr. biden by double digits. the "times" says it's not just the public polling that has warning lights flashing red

inside trump world, internal data in the republican party is conjuring political doomsday scenarios with republicans increasingly concerned that donald trump's devolving behavior is to blame. the "times" writes it this way, quote, one week after he rampaged through the first presidential debate and then was hospitalized with the coronavirus only to keep minimizing the disease as it spread through his white house, the president's conduct is not only undermining his own campaign but threatening his entire party. new polls show mr. trump's support is collapsing nationally as he alienates women, seniors and suburbanites. he's trailing not just in must-win battlegrounds but according to private gop surveys, he is repelling independence to the point where mr. biden has drawn closer in red states like montana, kansas city and missouri. the president digging himself deeper into a political route of

his own making is where we start today. white house reporter for the associated press, jonathan la mere is here. also joining us, real clear politics associate editor and columnist, a.b. stoddard and a contribu contribu contributor. i understand you have some reports about the president's plans tomorrow. >> that's right, nicolle. hello from the humble a.p. white house booth here in the west wing just steps from the briefing room. we indeed know that tomorrow the president will be having his first in-person event since his coronavirus diagnosis. we have reported, other outlets have as well,gathering a group lawn of the white house tomorrow. details are still being worked out. the timing has not been announced but it will be aboabou about -- there will be several hundred people tomorrow at some point during the day and it should be noted it will come two weeks to the day from the scotus

event also on the south lawn and rose garden, the exact same event that many health experts believe was perhaps a super spreader where we know a number of white house officials, senators, other republicans who were in attendance have all contracted covid-19. the president himself of course began to show symptoms a few days after that event. his diagnosis came later that week, and two weeks to the day he will be having another event in the exact same location. it does seem like the travel that he floated last night on sean hannity's show suggested perhaps a rally in florida on saturday, maybe one in pennsylvania on sunday, it seems like that is not coming together just yet. our reporting suggests it will be monday when he returns to the road with an event, probably not a rally, probably a smaller event in western pennsylvania. then we will go from there and of course we are now only three and a half weeks or so from the election and the candidate has been sidelined and certainly as we know is itching to get back out there. he's been on a media blitz and

certainly not been shy about using twitter but this raises all sorts of questions as to what this event tomorrow could look like. will masks be required? what sort of social distancing will be inacted? what sort of safety measures will be taken for staff, reporters there and others? and most of all, what exactly is the president's condition? we still do not know if he is still contagious. we still do not know when or if he has taken a test. has he tested negative at this point? he's been cagey in interviews, so has the white house doctor. we're expecting another update later today but there has been no word whatsoever on the president's condition today and i will note, tomorrow will be the first time anyone outside of a select few members of the staff will have seen him. the public nor the press, we have not laid eyes on him since monday upon his return from walter reed medical center. >> oh, but we have, jonathan, in those for the history books

videos where he is coiffed and saying befuddling things. i want to ask you a few questions though. first, do you feel safe there in the briefing room on the white house grounds? >> nicolle, that's a good question. i'll note i am in a small enclosed space by myself. if i step out of this little office i put my mask on. i have an n95 mask, as do all the other reporters who are here. the whca, the white house correspond ent's association has strongly encouraged that only those in the press pool be here. there aren't other reporters hanging around. there are no events to cover. certainly it's a different feeling west wing. it is basically a ghost town. as i said, we have not seen the president. there are very few staffers out and about, in part because so many of them have either contracted the coronavirus and are isolating at home or others are in quarantine, maybe not

sick themselves but have been exposed. it has an eerie, almost ghost town-like feel to it. >> jonathan, has he tested negative? to get into my grocery store in my town, i have my temperature checked and i have to attest to being -- not having tested positive for coronavirus in the last 14 days. so he couldn't in his condition go into my grocery store but he's going to host an event there at the white house? >> nicolle, we simply don't know. they have not said if he's tested negative or not. i can tell you that i did. the press pool receives a rapid test every day that we're here. i tested negative this morning, as did my colleagues, the few of us who are here today. the president, they have steadfastly not said not only in terms of whether he has tested negative since being diagnosed with covid-19 but of course we still don't know when his last negative test was before he was diagnosed with covid-19. that remains the outstanding question. we know he tested positive upon

return from that fundraiser in bedminster, new jersey a week ago thursday but it remains unclear. the white house simply will not say when his last negative test was and that's raising all sorts of questions and speculation that perhaps it wasn't thursday morning, perhaps it wasn't even wednesday morning, perhaps it wasn't even tuesday morning, the morning of the debate with joe biden. they are simply not saying, and it stands to reason the longer they don't want to say, the worse the news is. >> jason johnson, i don't know if this guy is the lone survivor of the press office, but one of, i guess, the not infected staffers, kaleigh mcenany has tested positive as i believe four of her deputies. one of them was on hallie jackson's program this morning. she pressed him brilliantly and he declined to answer the questions. let's watch the contortions they're going through. >> when was the president's last negative test prior to his

diagnosis? >> so, we don't have that. >> you don't know or you don't want to say? >> we don't have that. i don't personally know. >> what does that mean? >> there are -- >> have you asked? i think wednesday you said you were going to look into that. >> the president doesn't check all of his hipaa rights at the door when he becomes president. >> so it's a privacy thing then, the reason why you're not saying the last negative test, hipaa? >> that is one reason. we've had numerous updates per day -- >> nobody's answered this question, have they? >> extremely transparent but i'm not sure why you're -- >> but you're not about this piece of information. >> it's not something that has had been pehealth value. >> did the president comply with the cleveland clinic debate requirements to be negative 72 hours -- >> you're doing it backwards. the president is very interested in getting back -- >> i'm focused on getting an answer to this question. the 72-hour requirement to test

negative, did the president comply, yes or no? >> we are looking at how the president can get out there without transmitting the virus. >> that is not the question in front of you. i just want to be clear. again, yes or no, do you have an answer? >> we only have time to talk to the white house about very important issues. >> god bless hallie jackson. there's a whole lot of patience involved in trying to pin them down but the truth is their message is we plan to lie to you. we read out the results of george w. bush's coloscopy. there are no hipaa rights for the president of the united states, especially when there's an infectious disease with no cure. what do you make of this, jason johnson? >> one, like you, nicolle, hats off to hallie jackson for holding him accountable and

pointing out in another part of the interview, they said the president is engaging in social distancing and she said we've seen the videos, no, he isn't. the fact that i can find out more about the covid status of nfl players from my fantasy football team than we can find out about the president of the united states who's supposed to be the leader of the third world and has his finger on the button, that's a problem. i shouldn't be able to find out more from roger goodell than i can from the white house. their lying is not only dangerous, not only a form of gaslighting, but it also creates an environment where if we do eventually get an answer, we don't trust them. this erodes the relationships that the people who are supposedly running our government need to have with the press in order to get anything done. >> i don't know that you can -- i can't think of anything that you and mitch mcconnell agree on but i'm guessing you're going to agree with this piece of his judgment, jason johnson. here's him and the last time he was at the white house. >> i haven't been to the white house since august 6th, and i

personally didn't feel that they were approaching the protection from this illness in the same way that i thought was appropriate for the senate. >> it's sort of in the category of how bad is it? it's so bad that mitch mcconnell won't step food on the white house premises. >> i'm glad to see that mitch mcconnell is concerned about his own health and coronavirus. i wish he were as concerned about the american people and actually would push through some sort of care form for all the people who have been put out of their homes and the people who can't make their rent and the people who are losing their health care. if anything, nicolle, what that demonstrates is the perpetual hypocrisy of the republican party. they will protect themselves. he will not go to the white house. he will not have a one-on-one conversation with his boss but he won't pass any legislation to protect the american people as they suffer by the hundreds and thousands, not just in death but also in sickness and also financially. >> i might have to play that

clip every day between now and election day because i read a lot of the smart reporting from folks with their ear to the ground of what's happening in the republican senate races and i think it's as simple as that, jason. they won't endanger themselves in some instances but they will not do a single thing to protect people who don't have the luxuries of working at home or social distancing. a.b., i want to turn to the president's grasp on reality and what we can detect from his public utterances and his behavior that's outward facing about his grasp on reality. he last night took off after william barr, i think the most subservient official left in his cabinet, christopher wray who's on his bad side for telling the truth about the integrity of our elections. he released a video this week with other national security officials in which he was clearly communicating with the american people and people around the world about the election being accurate and fair

and something you can trust. donald trump didn't like that. and mike pompeo, who this was the weirdest of all, i think he's mad at him for not turning over hillary's emails. i guess donald trump is still looking for them. his attack on barr was the most interesting. he said he has enough information to indict joe biden and barack obama. it's clear that somewhere along the line trump had it in his mind that the end game of the durham probe was an indictment for president obama and vice president biden. >> or someone. the reporters of the party and the right conservative media has been waiting for this and touting this for a very long time. i don't think any of them really expected indictments of a former president or vice president, but president trump always likes to tell us that they're indictable and they committed the greatest crime in the history of american

politics, but this pressure on bill barr who has come to the rescue of donald trump before the mueller report was released, after it was released and every single week and month since in ways that have completely destroyed his reputation as a fair player and someone who is doing the business of the american people, instead of serving as a personal cronie and lawyer of president trump, the pressure has been on him all along obviously that this report would come out before the election. people have been asking about this report for a year and a half. i've always said if it comes out before the election it means that they actually have something that they can tell us is really consequential, even if it's a bit player who gets in trouble. if it comes out after the election it was a ruse all along so they could say something was under investigation, an investigation of the investigators. i think that trump is always

erratic and quick to create conspiracies and crap all over people who work for him, but i think that whatever has happened since he left walter reed is likely to escalate in the weeks to come. no question that he always blames other people for his sinking poll numbers, and bill barr will be the last person who gets blasted on fox for this. >> it's such a good point. just to pick up on one of your points, a.b., he is someone who understands the damaging effect of the cloud of an investigation, and you're right, he wanted to leave a cloud of an investigation into the origins of the russia investigation as sort of retribution for the investigation into him. i want to read you a tweet because it seems that even he believes he's going to lose. he tweeted this about the legislation introduced by pelosi about the 25th amendment. he tweeted, crazy nancy pelosi is looking at the 25th amendment in order to replace joe biden with kamala harris.

the democrats want that to happen fast, because sleepy joe is out of it. he seems to be already moving on to next february when he's in trump tower rage tweeting against the new president. trump can't hide anything forever. >> right. he's done a lot of that this week. he said that he never needed any medication and of course he just today said that he might have really been in trouble without the experimental medication that he received, that he could have -- the things that come out of his mouth. but i wonder even though we've heard him slip a few times saying if joe wins or if i lose, but i wonder if this isn't just the focus that they want which is on kamala harris becoming president and that kind of focus on that. joe won't make it two months, she's going to be president, she's a monster, is it meant to

in his head juice his support. >> let me just push on that a little bit, jason johnson. i think that's the right question but what does it say about what's left in one juices their support by calling a woman a monster? >> that's been par for the course for the trump campaign but the problem is -- and i think this is really key when we saw the debate earlier this week. one, there's nothing monstrous or terrible about senator harris, and if your best campaign pitch 20-something days away is basically choose your own adventure of if joe biden becomes president and the 25th amendment and then we get kamala harris, that's your pitch? that's not something that's going to compel people and make people end up following you one way or another. i think we saw this over the course of the summer, the attempt to demonize senator

harris, the attempt to make her out to be a bad person, the attempt to make her out to be some terrible woman who throws brown people in jail, none of that stuff resonates with the american people. in particular, and i got to say this, in the face of covid she still comes off as more competent than anybody in his administration. he's not helping himself with this. again, sexism and racism is pretty much all you've got left in the bag of tricks for the trump administration. the numbers look bad and he's got no other place to go than after senator harris. >> let me just put on my former republican operative hat for a nanosecond. in the final weeks you are shoring up the behavior of going out and voting which is challenging for everybody. it's challenging for moms in the suburbs which is who donald trump seems obsessed with. he keeps tweeting at them and making videos for seniors. the two things he said about the two women in the news this week, he's called one a monster.

he's attacked the other after the fbi foiled a plot to kidnap and possibly kill her. we'll see how that plays. everyone is staying put. when we come back, donald trump's cries of alleged voter fraud are proving one thing for sure come november 3. both sides, democrats and republicans, need to be ready to spar over a contested election result should that come to pass. how everyone is preparing for what happens 25 days from now. and we'll go back inside the murky world of donald trump's finances, two new stories today, blockbuster reporting on how he's made his money and how these problems could turn even bigger and more legal in nature for him should he become a private citizen just like the rest of us once again. plus, it's not just the white house dealing with it, the pandemic is still very, very real. it appears that that fall second wave we were warned about might be arriving. all those stories when "deadline: white house" continues after a short break. don't go anywhere. continues after a short break. don't go anywhere.

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they're sending out millions and millions of ballots. are they sending them to all democrats? who are they sending them to? where are they going, et cetera, et cetera. this is going to be the second biggest political scandal in history. the first biggest is the russian crap that we've been going through for three and a half years. >> what are you doing about it? >> we have many lawyers and we've actually been winning many cases. how about where they have the ballots counted and the ballots have to be in by november 3, election day, but they don't have to be counted for two weeks later. that means you're never going to know who won the election. it's going to be two weeks later. i want to see on november 3 who

won the election. >> oh, so much to unpack. just earlier today though donald trump called mail-in voting the means by which many, many americans, democratic voters, republican voters, plan to cast their ballots this year due to the pandemic the second biggest political scandal in history, second only to the russia investigation. comments like that are why democrats and republicans are bracing for a potential contested election. "the washington post" reports, quote, the campaigns of president trump and former vice president joe biden are preparing for all scenarios, each amassing robust legal teams to prepare for post november 3 disputes in addition to monitoring election day activity and ballot counting. an uncharted battle over who the next president will be after a campaign that has roiled and exhausted americans, could severely test the nation's faith in its election system and undermine the principle that the president should be selected by voters rather than congress or

the courts, experts said. we're back with johnson, a.b. and jason. i keep coming back to the christopher wray video, the video that the fbi put out this week where the fbi sought to take i thought this extraordinary step of producing a public video to counter that message from the president, but because he's the president, democratic party, the republican party, the campaigns of joe biden, the campaign of donald trump, the sitting attorney general and we learned this week from pro pub ka and "the new york times" that they have unleashed prosecutors to bring election fraud cases that you usually aren't allowed to bring in the days before an election. what should we be prepared for, a.b., in terms of sort of expanding our audacity meters when it comes to donald trump? >> he's very much telegraphed already what he's going to do which is to say that any votes

that come in after he gets a good wave of republican votes on november 3 aren't valid. he continues to lie about mail-in voting when he says they're being sent out unsolicited. five states do all mail-in voting and this year an additional handful of states because of covid are sending people not applications but directly sending them ballots. in only one of those states could it even possibly be consequential and that's only nevada in that group of states would be a swing state. it's ridiculous to pretend that he's not going to be able to win new jersey because they're sending these ballots out unsolicited. but the idea that chris wray is this sort of lone voice willing to buck bill barr at the doj and then the president to come out proactively to make this case really shows us just what kind of tension we're going to see when bill barr is trying to make the case for the president's

narrative and threaten lots of suits and lob all this criticism about people, quote, playing with fire like he said on cnn last month. you're going to have people like chris wray stepping up and saying that so far they haven't seen any evidence of fraud. that tension, who's going to join chris wray. will governor ducey of arizona who has a democratic secretary of state and has been quiet throughout all of this when maybe it's close in arizona, is he going to step forward and say our count is going just fine, thank you. what is going to happen in those states? what is ron desantis going to do in florida, a close ally of the president, wants to be president soon. what kind of wild theories might he come up with or will he back down? so that's going to be this really interesting thing. who are the people who stand by the system and who are the people who play games at trying

to go along with the president in the days do come. more than two-thirds of americans are prepared for an extended count and that's a really good thing. they know from the midterms that this has already happened, the primaries this year in a pandemic that extended counts take a while. i think americans are more prepared than the president and the republicans understand. >> jason, i just want to flesh out the picture though because i think it's more than a nutty president who knows he's going to lose tweeting things. i think what the foiled plot against gretchen whitmer maybe makes real is that the tweets are acted upon sometimes and whether they're cause and effect, i think that's a question only law enforcement can answer, but there are dots that can be connected between the things he says and the things bad people do. i want to read you this from politico. trump campaign ready to unleash thousands of poll watchers on

election day. the campaign has established what it says is a 50,000 plus army of volunteer observers across an array of battleground states like north carolina and pennsylvania where operations are und way. poll watchers monitor everything from voting machines to the processing of ballots to checking voter i.d. they're not permitted to interact directly with voters but they can rely problems to local election officials or campaign higher-ups. there's a civic piece of poll watchers and some history of it but that is not the vain in which donald trump is talking about 50,000-plus army, is it? >> no, no, and that's very much connected to what we saw in michigan this week. the president is raising an illegal white nationalist terrorist army that he wants to go out there and intimidate people so we have both the legal and the extra legal. from the legal standpoint we see things like what just happened

in wisconsin where the milwaukee bucks had actually agreed with nba players to turn their arena into a polling station that will be useful during the pandemic and then they had to shut it down because republicans said it's technically past the deadline so any ballots that are in that location, if you vote there, will invalidate everything at that polling station. we will see wholesale attempts to invalidate where people have voted by the hundreds and thousands. then you've got poll workers going out there. here's what's key about what happened this week. it's not just that gretchen whitmer was obviously protected and this plot was foiled but it's intimidating local people, intimidating a county commissioner, a local election official. the fact that you've got these white nationalist groups -- gretchen whitmer has a lot of protection that your local board is not going to have. if someone throws a molotov cocktail into my house, i may not go to work the next day or i

may be intimidated into not making the right decision. >> donald trump has been talking about how, if he loses, it's because it was rigged, but he never says anything about the problems applying if he wins also. why does he think only a result that has him losing means it was rigged? why aren't his problems just generally about the vote? >> you answered your own question there. the president really seems to only care of course about his victory. let's remember in 2016 a race he did win, he did allege voter fraud then because he was upset that he lost the popular vote and suggested that the margin of invalid votes cast for hillary clinton was about 3 million or so, the exact same margin that hillary did win the popular vote. this is part of a larger picture here and a top operative told me yesterday they see the writing on the wall here. they know the president's in

trouble. they know that he is with three weeks to go sinking in terms of support because of that widely panned debate performance and especially his covid-19 diagnosis which of course reinforces to many americans how he manaismanaged the entire cri. their hope is that in the next few weeks the president can close the gap, tighten the margins in these key battleground states and they do believe he may have an advantage in terms of the vote cast on election day itself because so many democrats have been turning to mail-in voting. they hope that that day, if things are close, they can kick it to the courts and that will be where the decision is made. they feel that might be their only chance to win which is sort of a deeply cynical approach but one right now the republicans are hanging their hats on. >> what a state of affairs. jonathan, put your mask on and stay safe there. a.b. and jason, thank you all for spending some time with us. up next, two new reports on donald trump's taxes today.

we'll talk about what has been uncovered and what legal implications exist for the president or perhaps private citizen donald trump. president e citizen donald trump

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get to work and keep our communities healthy. relieve traffic. reduce pollution. rescue caltrain. [all] yes on measure rr. there are two blockbuster and detailed new news accounts out today on more of donald trump's shady and questionable business dealings. "new york times" published today the latest installment in its

investigation into donald trump's taxes which they say reveal how in 2016 he engineered a sudden financial win fall, more than $21 million in what experts describe as a highly unusual one-off payments from the las vegas hotel he owns with his friend, the casino mogul phil ruffin. it casts more light on donald trump's financial maneuverings during a time of fiscal turmoil and may offer a hint to one of the enduring mysteries of his campaign. in its waning days as his own giving had slowed to a trickle, mr. trump contributed $10 million leaving many wondering where the burst of cash had come from. then there's this from "the washington post," quote, five years ago donald trump promised to preserve more than 150 acres of rolling woodlands in an exclusive swath of new york's suburbia prized for its luxury

homes and rural tranquillity. in exchange for setting aside this land on his estate known as seven springs, trump received a tax break of $21.1 million, according to court documents. new york attorney general letitia james is investigating whether the trump org inflated the value of seven springs as part of the conservation easement on the property, according to filings. let's bring in msnbc contributor david farenthold. he's been covering the trump family and all their money. also joining us former fbi general counsel and legal analyst andrew wiesman who had the job for a while of following some of the money. he's the author of the "new york times" best selling book "where the law ends: inside the mueller investigation." david, take me through your reporting and what it adds to the bigger picture. >> you probably know that the trump organization and president

trump are facing two pretty significant state level investigations, one from the manhattan da and one from the new york attorney general. these aren't things that are going to get anybody arrested before election day but if trump loses or even if he wins, they'll be headaches next year and it gives you more of a sense of what the trump organization looked like before trump went into office. we wanted to understand why the new york attorney general was focusing on this kind of obscure piece of trump's portfolio, this seven springs mansion outside of new york city. he rarely even goes there so why is it at the center of this big state investigation. the reason is $21 million. trump got a $21 million tax break for saying he would conserve land on that property and the reason he got such a big tax break is he said the land was really valuable, had lots of development rights. turns out he misled -- he appears to have misled people about how much development rights he had. he applied to build houses but didn't succeed, yet he was still claiming credit for them, inflating the value of the

property. >> andrew, it reminds me of the conversation you and i had just about how leveraged he is when the first installment of the "new york times" tax evasion investigation came out. you write in your book -- this is the part that stays with me. in the end we found in the areas in which we chose to look, particularly in the one russian financial deal we examined as a result of cohen's cooperation left me with a deeply unsatisfying feeling about what else was out there that we did not examine. one of my strengths and simultaneously one of my flaws as an investigator is a desire to turn over every rock, go down every rabbit hole, try to master every detail. in this investigation that tenacity was as much an asset as a curse, the inability to chase down all financial leads or to examine all crimes gnawed at me and still does. i think about what you wrote there when i read all those stories as a potential new place where trump who is by every

standard a rich man but he seems in all of these revelations like he was always needing help from someone about being overleveraged. >> to follow up on what david said, i think that the president, if he is not re-elected, is going to be very busy. i think there are three buckets of things he has to worry about. at the federal level there will be the decision of the new attorney general, whether he should be charged with obstruction of justice for the matters relating to the special counsel investigation, and i think we may see the president do something we've never seen any president do which is try to self-pardon, but that will at least delay any sort of federal decision. at the state level you have a criminal investigation in the manhattan da's office and that looks like to be a classic follow the money investigation, reminds me very much of what we

did with paul manafort. they're clearly going after just the right things which is they need the internal accounting documents. that's a criminal investigation. then as david pointed out, the letitia james attorney general investigation, that is currently a civil investigation and it may or may not proceed but it's important to note that a civil investigation at the attorney general level can turn into a criminal investigation if they find sufficient proof and can prove intent. what david talked about is one of at least four transactions worth hundreds of millions of dollars that the attorney general in new york is looking at. so this president is going to be quite busy and obviously i should probably point out, the president cannot pardon his way out of state investigations, whether they are civil or criminal. >> david, can you put some

broader context around that. there's never a revelation that says donald trump did x, y or z by the book. there's never a business deal that when under scrutiny says this was a model for how to buy a casino in atlantic city or this was a model for how to take money out of your businesses and investigate in the campaign. there's not a single example of any of that. it says, one, he's shady, two, he didn't think he was going to win, and three, should he lose, he faces a lot of legal exposure. >> i think that's right. the trump organization before he got into politics was not that big of a company. he had this sort of famous name but it was not that big of an enterprise and he also was very difficult to deal with. a lot of folks i think just didn't bother trying to dig into his businesses. there was one notable exception which was the trump university investigation which trump fought tooth and nail, ended up having

to settle for $25 million. the most constructive case study is the trump foundation, the small charity that trump ran. i wrote about it in 2016. it had been going on forever and breaking the law forever. there was not enough money, not enough whatever for people to dig into it. once the new york attorney general dug into it, they find all kinds of blatant violations of the law. to me it was the same executives at trump's organization and the same accountants that handled all of trump's other financial dealings at his company. if those people can screw up on that scale and break the law that many times on the trump foundation, it doesn't bode well for their ability to withstand the scrutiny of a new york d.a. and a.g. at the same time. >> andrew, it doesn't bode well for the country that he leesads because it would appear based on what we know that he imported a lot of those guiding principles

to the presidency. i'm not going to let you leave though without pressing you on what you said in your last answer. you could imagine him self-pardoning. do tell. >> there's no question that the constitution has conferred on the president the power to pardon and it's incredibly broad. even though lots of people think it can be abused, but no president has ever tried to actually pardon himself. you can imagine this president saying why not give it a try? what's the downside? the downside is it isn't work. >> you're absolutely right. >> the supreme court says, you can't. so what, he's back in the same place that he would have been except it brings him delay. why not try it? i do expect if he's not re-elected that that's something we will see him try.

>> i just have to press you on this. do you think that would be like a prophylactic protection from changes being brought? can you pardon yourself before you've been charged? >> yes, you can. leaving the part about self-pardoning but can you pardon somebody who has not been charged, yeah. look at gerald ford with respect to richard nixon. you can in this country do that. there's debates in other countries that have the pardon power whether you can do it but here it is not necessary to first be charged and convicted before you can get a pardon. >> so now because of you, i will be on pardon watch every day. david, andrew, you both always expand my thinking of this extraordinary moment. thank you for that. when we come back, coronavirus cases on the rise again, sadly, in the united states. dr. patel on that and why on

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to peaceful protesters for law and order. and trump will again appear from the blue room balcony as he did maskless upon return via helicopter from walter reed. on monday he now plans to go to florida to greet supporters at a make america great again rally. let's bring in msnbc contributor dr. kavita patel, and former white house policy director. i keep thinking about how a president moves. and i've said this before, but a president can't drive himself. a president can't even sort of go by himself in a smaller aircraft, a president flies on a helicopter, which is enclosed, with people that are protecting him from someone who might wish his harm, secret service, with career public servants who fly the helicopter and who staff and maintain the helicopter and then he gets on an airplane where ten times that many people are

involved in moving the president and he may very well be contagious, right? >> that is absolutely right. and in addition, think about how many movements those people have. they have families. they go home. it is a literally a ripple wave of exposures. and i think the important question is, if it were something to essential to national security, or to be candid to the president's own health, one could maybe overlook this. but rallies and sending signals like his own children have, having packed indoor rallies without masks, still to this day, it just sends an irresponsible message. it has nothing to do any more with listening to science. it is just promoting irresponsible behavior. and we are now 41 states, they are now seeing rises in cases. so we're starting to get into that really vulnerable period in the country with covid-19. and i want americans, even though thinking or excited about the rally, to think twice and

just turn on television. just watch it on tv. don't go and exposure sel self-and potentially others. >> he'll be diagnosed on a fox news program tonight by a doctor via zoom. there are certain things he's willing to do from behind a computer but denigrating the remote debating or rallies. so even for him not all remote conduct is equal. and i wonder, again, we're in this period where dr. ulsterhome called it pandemic anger. people are starting to turn against the things that keep us safe and the president seems to be leading that charge. >> yeah. and it is now kind of boiling over from anger into almost what nicolle, what i worry about, it is a source of pride.

there is the anger and then it is shifting into this sense that you could be proud if you buck the expert or if you don't listen. and you're right, not only has he selectively chosen what to do remotely, but there is still so many questions and you've heard on msnbc, trying to press for officials to respond. when was his last negative test. you could put this to rest to have him take a pcr test today, and if it is negative that is reassuring. but people don't want to look back or release that and then to have a public display, while, by the way, what i think needs to be underscored is that the president had some very serious treatments with any patient, a young healthy one, you would expect to see residual symptoms, side effects potentially and expect a person to not be at their best capacity. so this question keeps coming up. is this president actually

acting in his best cognitive interest and the answer is no because he's putting other people at risk. >> and if you look at his behavior, dr. patel, it certainly supports that theory. i want to get you on the record about something dr. fauci told andrea mitchell yesterday before the 40,000 new cases that we're averaging. i think yesterday we were way above that. he sold i'm not comfortable with that. i would like to see that level way, way, way down, well below 10,000. we vn be we haven't been able to get it down. why do you think that is. >> masks one of them, and number two, reopening restaurants and smaller bars and restaurants around the country and seeing it on display with the white house, we have not done any contact tracing but perhaps even more disturbing, nicolle, we have no resources for people to kind of get easy testing if they are

worried that their sick and still being required to go to work. so i think it is a combination of all of those efforts. as well as the fact that this virus is very smart. it travels and gets big in a very small way. it could grow overnight. and so these cases are fin to increase, not decrease. >> dr. kavita patel, thank you for spending some time with us and bringing us clarity. the next hour of "deadline: white house" starts after a quick break. don't go anywhere. k. don't go anywhere. and that sticked to my mind. so, when $1 a day came out, i said, "why not"? why not just utilize that resource. and walmart made that path open for me. without the $1 a day program, i definitely don't think i'd be in school right now. each week for me in school is just an accomplishment. i feel proud every step of the way.

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unless bill barr indicts these people for crimes, greatest political crime in the history of our country, then we are going to get little satisfaction unless i win and we'll just have to go -- because i won't forget it. but these people should be indicted. this is the greatest political crime in the history of our country and that includes obama and it includes biden. these are people that spied on my campaign. and we have everything. hi, again everyone, it is 5:00 in the east. soo you listen to that and you're left with one question only, how deranged is he. he's talking about arresting and prosecuting his opponent joe biden and president obama. but perhaps more importantly he's airing his dirty laundry, a rare public spat between the attorney general bill barr and himself that reveals the end game of the durham probe in donald trump's eyes was always,

always the arrest and prosecution of president obama and joe biden and the people who worked for them. "new york times" writes it this way. quote, mr. trump has often argued that his political antagonist should be prosecuted but in this case he went further by indicating that he had directly pressured mr. barr to indict without waiting for more evidence, end quote. the a.p. flushing out the rare barr/trump divide. trump is increasingly airing his dissatisfaction in tweets and television appearances. barr has privately expressed frustration over the public comments. boo hoo barr put his fink on the scale of rappel career prosecutors and rewriting doj policy to grease the wheels for prosecutors to meddle in the

2020 election because he's refusing to prosecute the enemy and barr isn't the only one in trump. trump is raging against fbi director chris wray for claiming there is no widespread voter fraud. >> address christopher wray. will you replace him in a second term? >> well i don't want to say that yet. he's been disappointing. he talked about even the voting thing, he doesn't see the voting ballots as a problem. there are thousands of ballots, you pick up any paper in the country practically and they're cheating so how is that not a problem. that is a much bigger problem than china or russia. >> except it is not happening. but trump is also mad at secretary of state mike pompeo. because he didn't find hillary clinton's emails. >> so she had 33,000 emails. she got -- forget about what was on the emails. it is irrelevant, but many of them were highly classified and you go to jail for that.

and they're in the state department. but mike pompeo is unable to get them out which is very sad. actually, i'm not happy about him for that reason. he was unable to get that. he's running the state department and you get them out. >> that is where we start this hour. some of our favorite reporters and friends. donna edwards, former congresswoman and washington post columnist is here. also joining us nbc news correspondent heidi pryzbyla and sam stein and ben rhodes security adviser to president obama. ben rhodes, i'm going to thank the steroids or whatever it is that is sort of letting trump just let it all out. just tell us what you wanted durham to do and tell us what you told bill barr to do. it is clear that someone told donald trump or donald trump convinced himself that the durham probe was going to result in the indictments and prosecutions of his political enemies and only mad at bill barr because that isn't happening.

>> yeah. well the bottom line here, nicolle, is that he sent bill barr in search a crime that didn't exist, that nobody committed. and that is the root of this whole quote/unquote obama gate. we're just a few weeks from an election. and this is the logical re-election strategy. you recall in 2004 george w. bush was running on a very focused counter-terrorism message and obama in 2012 of keeping the economic recovery and obamacare going. that is what white houses are doing in the last month of an election. and frankly what trump is doing, the same thing he's been doing in office which is ranting and raving about hillary clinton and barack obama and the kmeers theories. the problem is that is up against a reality when the country is dealing with a economic crisis and a pandemic that he cannot manage at all. it is not a surprise that bill barr has had career prosecutors walk away from jobs in recent weeks because they didn't want

to go along with trying to make something appear to be more criminal than it actually was. and the last thing i'll say, i was a part of this myself. a tiny figure if the sub plot, they put out that masked trump officials and when i got in front of the committee they acknowledged, i haven't met any of them. so this lives inside of trump's head and it is the only play he knows how to do. >> but it is worse than living inside of trump's head. because bill barr, and this is the problem with the republican enablers and this is why i'm spent more time on this program asking why they stay and complicit in the crimes against the american presidency and democracy. it is abundantly clear to anyone with eyeballs and ears what donald trump wanted bill barr to do through the durham probe. here is bill barr fielding questions rather inartfully about just what the president expected from him. here he is with wolf blitzer.

>> bill barr could go down at the greatest attorney general in the history of our country or he could go down as just another guy. it depends. >> is it appropriate for the president of the united states to be putting pressure on you in the way he clearly did. >> i feel any pressure from that. >> you don't think he's trying to pressure you into going forward with the indictments and the criminal charges and stuff like that. >> no. when we talk in private, he doesn't talk like that. >> you doesn't talk to you privately. but publicly -- but is it appropriate for a president of the united states to be speaking about that about the attorney general. >> what do you think is inappropriate about what he's saying. >> so ben, why do they let him corrupt the justice department and shell for him after the fact. >> well, that is the million dollar question of this era. because as you say, we're not for republican enablers and bill

barr we wouldn't have corruption of not just the justice department but the entire government which has been sent in pursue of trump conspiracy theories. at the same time that he's ranting about voter fraud thought happening and conspiracies that didn't happen, spending resources on that. the durham investigation took up a lot of resources and time. they're not focused on the threat from white supremacists who were just engaged in a plot to potentially try to kidnap the governor of michigan. they're not protecting our election against foreign interference. so they're directing the resources of the government in a fundamentally corrupt way in search of trump's hobby horses and they're not doing the work of protecting the american people against terrorist threats at home, against threats of foreign interference from abroad and certainly not against the pandemic, which trump could barely have a word to speak about. even though we've had 200,000 americans lose their lives and continue to be a public health crisis and he is now a spreader

of not just disinformation but covid itself. we're through the looking glass here, nicolle, as we enter the last few weeks of this election. >> and donna edwards, the reason i have pulled this out today is for the point ben just made. the only discernible person still pushing sort of in the direction of reality is chris wray, whose fbi arrested and foiled the plot against governor whitmer, and whose department put out a video contradicting the messages around the election saying to the american people and i imagine there were some global audiences in mind as well, you can trust the integrity of the american election. but here is the country's secretary of the state. he found hillary's emails. >> we got the emails, we're getting them out. we're going to get all of this information out so the american people could see it. doing it as fast as we can.

i certainly think that they'll be more to see from the election. >> don't tell him, donna, shhh, they're running against joe biden. >> well, you know, this is a thing that is really amazing. so, donald trump, today, ran against barack obama, hillary clinton, his own justice department and department of state, who he didn't run against joe biden today. this is really insane and i think what you see with bill barr, bill barr has done every single thing that the president has asked. he served up the mueller report in his own way so that he could sabotage it. and he has done everything that the president wants. and here it is, he hasn't done this one little thing, which is to conclude a politically motivated investigation for the president, and bill barr is now writing his path to becoming the

jeff sessions of 2020. >> i mean, bill barr makes me miss jeff sessions. heidi, let me read you some axios reporting that donald trump responded to in an interview on rush limbaugh that went so long. rush limbaugh actually ended it. so axios reported that bill barr is telling republicans that the durham probe won't yield a report before the election. here is donald trump reacting to this on rush limbaugh today. >> if that's the case, i'm very disappointed. i think it is a terrible thing. and i'll say it to his face. this is a disgrace. if that just came out, and you know, i purposely tried to stay away from it because they all say it's better if i'm not involved. >> well have you de classified everything about this yet? >> i fully de classified everything. everything has been de classified. see this is what i mean with the republicans. they don't play the tough game.

they don't play the tough game. if this were the other side, you would have ha25 people in jail with what we found. these people should be brought to justice and before the election. but if we don't win this election, if we don't win, that whole thing is going to be dismissed. >> heidi, what is he talking about at this point and it is all out there and been investigated by watch dogs at doj and investigated by mr. huber and by mr. durham, at this point, what is he talking about? >> just to the broader picture, it just feels like a panic attack at this point. versus strategy that what worked in his mind so well in 2016 is not working now. look, they just had ron johnson's investigation dropped like lead and it was a bust. the lock her up, hillary's emails, he felt that was such a

good gig in 2016, he was going to do the same thing with joe biden in 2020 and it is not working out. he's now just tweeted, nicolle, that he'll have a big rally on monday at a time when we may have reason to think he's still shedding the virus. he's saying out loud and telling us that he needed this investigation to come out before the election. he's saying, he's trying to direct his justice department to do something expressly to help his campaign. he even announced earlier a cure for the coronavirus based on the antibody cocktail, it is not promising but not a cure. so his all time greatest hits, hill hillary's mails and an act that worked well for him in 2016. >> you know, this gives me no pleasure to say this but i want to say this.

chris christie is laying in a hospital. mike pompeo just debased whatever is left of his reputation as he sited atop the state department which is pathetic and sad and everybody around him who thinks he has a future. bill barr is a disgrace the world over. but for nora den ahi quitting and known to quit the durham probe, who knows what direction they would have gone. what comes of these men if trump loses in 25 days. >> that is a good question. could trump imsurvive the loss. i don't know. you could see the foundation for it continuing on. it is not necessarily a political party. it is a cult of personality. and you could see people are already trying to position themselves to inherent that mantle. if it is a blowout loss, than

mib something different will happen. it is possible he'll win and we just don't know. but people around him have sullied the reputations, people have ended up in far worse positions than whether they started. rarely does anyone benefit from association, except for trump himself. and this is been sort of a lingering reputation throughout his time in private industry and now in politics and yet you see people constantly thinking they could operate in his orbit and get through it. that they could contain him and control him. but that is not just the case. and i'll just add this -- well two things really, one, is the whole impeachment trial was the idea of using the levers of state for his own political benefit and republicans in the senate will say he's learned his lesson, clearly he has not learned his lesson this past week has been all about him trying to influence his cabinet officials to do things to use the levers of state to help the

election crisis. so that stands out to me. the other thing that stands out is something that ben talked about which is it is to transparent and obvious what they are doing. an the question is, if they were more competent about it, could they get away with. it is the problem they're not competent in trying to do the things that they're doing. and i wonder that. and it is a scary proposition that one of the things that will happen here is just not good at execution. >> yeah. and it is true. and you know what, maybe don jr. needs a michael cohen. bill barr has a career path after this. who am i fooling. when we return, gretchen whitmer connecting the dots went the terror plot to kidnap her and months of attacks by donald trump. we'll show you it to you. plus stunning new reporting from nbc news that underscores the cruelty of donald trump's policy to accept operate migrant children really little ones from the parents at the border. and as donald trump's erratic

behavior worsens so does his political standing. but how long will republicans stand with him. "deadline: white house" continues after a quick break so don't go anywhere. nywhere. and you're going to find yourself where you need to be. ♪ the race is never over. the journey has no port. the adventure never ends, because we are always on the way. ♪ ♪ tonight, i'll be eating a veggie cheeseburger on ciabatta, no tomatoes.. [hard a] tonight... i'll be eating four cheese tortellini with extra tomatoes. [full emphasis on the soft a] so its come to this? [doorbell chimes] thank you. [doorbell chimes] bravo. careful, hamill. daddy's not here to save you.

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of course, we know every time that this white house identifies me or takes a shot at me, we see an increase in rhetoric online, violent rhetoric. and so there is always a connection. and certainly it is something that we've been watching. but this took it to a whole new level. >> that was michigan governor gretchen whitmer last night on the connection between donald trump's attacks on her handling

of her state's coronavirus situation and the now foil add alleged kidnapping plot against her. and new this afternoon, whitmer doubling down writing in a op-ed, quote, i'm not going to waste my time arguing with the president. but i will always hold him accountable. because when our leaders speak their words carry weight and when they encourage domestic terrorists they legitimize their actions and they are complicit. and when a sitting president stands on a national stage refusing to condemn white supremacists and hate group whether he told the proud boys to stand back and stand by. he is complicit. six men face federal charges. several of the online profiles show histories of anti-government organizing and interest in countering what they considered an uprising against trump. seven other men face terrorism

and other felony charges in michigan. six of whom have now been arraigned. a senior official now said federal agents found they were tied to a group that follows the boogaloo boys dedicated to killing law enforcement officers. trump's response to the plot and whitmer's comments about it, well attacked the governor again and said she owes him a thank you. we're back with donna, heidi, sam and ben. ben, i wish we haven't called all of the other stuff unprecedented. because this is so truly unprecedented. to have a president who doesn't even come up with new ways to signal to the very forces that his own fbi is trying to foil and contain. >> yeah, well, nicolle, it is not hard to connect these gots. i worked in the obama white house and the radicalization to

terrorism is the same whether it is an isis terrorist or a domestic terrorist. it is somebody who usually consumes information online who believes their way of life is threatened and they have to take up arms against that. and we've seen trump demo grag refugees and we saw a shooting at the tree of life synagogue that they were participating in helping refugees. we've seen him demagogue black live matters and in kenosha, and attack the media as enemies of the state and plots uncovered attempted attacks or threats to members of the media. and now we see in michigan the governor who put in place lockdowns that trump said were a threat to people's liberty and tweeted liberate michigan, when two of the suspects were walking through the michigan state house carrying semi-automatic wep weapons, it is not a hard picture to connect. the words and conspiracy theories that he's spreading is clearly planting very dark seeds in the psyche of part of the

american populous. and creating and making worse what is a growing terrorist threat. and that really is an unprecedented situation. it is hard to find ways to think about it. but i think we have to deal with it as a country. because it is not going away even if he loses. there are people out there who have been radicalized through a mix of what trump is saying, from whater that consuming online and even the obama gate stuff, if you were told again and again that there was an attempted coup and that is the language that he uses against the american government and if you truly believe that, that could be a path way to radicalization. we talk about where we hope that our national leaders including republicans would recognize the danger of this trend and stand with people like governor whitmer who are trying to hold trump accountable and defend this nation and defend our communities. >> and heidi, at the time that trump was tweeting liberate michigan. she was simply trying to stem the spread of coronavirus in her

state. something that donald trump's own cdc had issued guidelines for that she was following. >> yeah, nicolle, i think it is hard for a lot of americans on the outside to understand the venom in michigan against her given that she was just trying to save people's lives and keep them safe. i spent much of my summer in michigan. i'm from michigan. and i saw people absolutely losing their minds over garden seeds. it was crazy. but when you start to understand the history there, ben outlined the culture being created in this country over the past few years along with the fact there is a long history of these militia related groups in michigan that were behind the federal building being bombed in oklahoma city some 20 plus years ago and then the confluence of social media and these men, these dangerous men finding each other and find commonplace together, then it makes more sense. and i'm sure that the base won't

see it this way. but isn't this moment that we're in right now the ultimate contradiction of the message that trump just keeps tweeting over and over about law and order. given that these groups, these domestic terrorist groups that we haven't seen rear their heads in 20 plus years in a way that is this coordinated are coming out at this point in time. that is not a coincidence in the minds of a lot of americans and to ben's point, they knew this was coming. i speaking with individuals on the judiciary committee when trump came in saying that they wanted to tackle this as a top issue, the rise of extremist right wing groups like this. >> you know, and donnie, there is a long history of politicians being held responsible for at least trying to direct to the

positive, the lawful and the safe, anyone who falls into their coalition. so i'm not saying that everyone that supports trump is a white supremacist or they're dangerous. but every white supremacist that had a an intersection with law enforcement and shared political leanings have turned out to be a trump supporter. >> and it turns out that unlike other politicians, he we could think of instances in the past where these groups try to insert themselves into the major political parties and the leaders of those parties disavowed them and shoved them out. across the board, donald trump doesn't do that. he invites them in. and the seeds that are out there of white supremacist groups and these militia factions and domestic terrorists have been out there. donald trump has been watering them. since the day that he took office. and so i think it is no surprise that right now in this moment he

is also calling on them because he's flailing and he's losing. and so he's trying to call the worst of us into his fold so that he could try to somehow protect his hold on the white house. i don't think it is going to work. but i think this is a very precarious time between now and the post election period in getting votes counted that donald trump is going to use this and people will hear those messages, nicolle. that is the problem. is that those messages are being heard and they're being acted upon because the president of the united states is sowing those seeds. >> and sam stein, you have talked about trying to orient nur -- your newsroom to cover the possibility of violence just like this. >> well, yeah. and i think it is something that every newsroom needs to sort of

grapple with, which is what could happen with this context and the possibilities of contested election. people who have war gamed this out have come to the conclusion that there is say real likelihood of violence that will pop up in the streets of america and you need to understand that this is potentially a coverage point that we have. i'll say this, two things and one is newsroom thing which is we need to sort of grapple, we have been grappling with the rise of right wing extremism but we have a long ways to go. in the last 24 hours, say the six men in michigan were muslim and they tried to kidnap a governor, i think conceptually they would have been treated a lot differently and we need to grapple with that. and the second thing is on the whole thing of trump and how he invites this, the white house said he's not trying to invite this and he has condemned this.

the record is clear here. it takes him a while to get to the point of condemnation, especially with the proud boys. but they also do things that either are blind to or they're trying to send wink, wink, nod, nod. and the rally they have announced on monday, which is his big try um fant return is in sanford florida. that is the site everyone knows of trayvon martin's killing. they did this with the tulsa rally, it was initially on juneteenth. maybe they don't recognize the symbolism and ill-prepared for this moment in time. but ben pointed out there has been enough dots out there to suggest other wise and i think the picture paints itself at this point. >> but the fact that it is a tight call between utter incompetence and flagrant race baiting said everything. thank you so much for starting us off this hour. whether we return, new reporting

from nbc news that the trump administration pushed ahead with its policy to separate migrant children from their parents, even infants, as their own u.s. attorneys in texas strongly recommended against it. we'll have that story for you next. y for you next hi, i'm dorothy hamill. as i look toward 65, i'm thinking about medicare. i know i want coverage that connects all the different parts of my health care to keep me aging actively. keep doing what you love. that's the aetna medicare advantage.

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just months before the trump administration implemented the zero-tolerance policy that separated thousands of children from their families, at the

southern border, federal prosecutors who ran a 2017 pilot program determined that children under 12 years old should not be separated because most could not find their way back to their parents on their own. that is according to a draft of a report by the doj inspector general obtained by nbc news. texas prosecutors wrote a memo briefing the justice department officials about the possibility of developing guidelines to protect young children from being separated if the policy was implemented. but that memo was never sent to then a.g. jeff sessions or his deputy rod rosenstein. the doj moved ahead with the zero tolerance program, separating hundreds of children under five years old from their parns. some as young as four months old. joining our conversation, jacob soberoff covering the southern border extensively and wrote a book about it is, it is called

"separated inside an american tragedy." so i could not read this inspector general report about the report, the report is not out yet, without going back to that propublica reporting of the children wailing. when you hear the children wailing, the first thing you think is why didn't anybody stop this the power of the scoop today is that someone tried. >> someone tied at dhs and hhs. i report about that in the book. and not just someone, but prosecutors along the border, nicolle, tried within the department of justice and we got some extraordinary reporting from the big "new york times" bombshell earlier in the week. and even this ins dend with john bash from the western district of texas came up. but we wanted to go deeper and look into why he never sent this memo in which his subordinates outlined they were imposing a maturity test, what was a

maturity test on the kids to figure out if they were old enough to understand what their address was, would their parents were, and who they wore going to meet if they could make their way home. he never sent it because he was never asked for it by his superiors, rod rosenstein and jeff sessions, despite they have a conversation about this preceding the fact that they prepared this memo and for all of this work, hundreds of children under five years old, not just 12 years old, ended up being separated anyways. you know, jacob, i remain gobsmacked by one of the big takeaways in that reporting in the week that rod rosenstein was one of the architects that have no limits on how young a cliern could be. and the inspector general report recounts one instance where a brother was breast feeding a child and they were separated. what do you make about the new

reporting about rod rosenstein's role in this? >> the negligence is astounding quite frankly. especially because of what we're talking about today. the fact that there were clear indications both in this memo that was prepared and sent to the u.s. attorney for the western district of texas, and also just the prosecutors along the border who are raising these concerns, that they knew that this wasn't right. they knew that children couldn't handle this. they knew they couldn't answer the simplest of questions. and when you combine it with what we know from the other i guess you call component agencies involved in this, health and human services, and the department of homeland security, there were warnings from dhs about the technology systems that didn't talk to each other and warnings from hhs about what this would do to children. one official told me that this what was the greatest humanitarian catastrophe of his lifetime and warned that harming children means a century of suffering, the rest of their lives the children will live with this. there are the number.

5,400 is the amount of children that will live with this because of what the agencies did and didn't do. >> how many of the 5,400 have been reunited with their parents? >> i hate to say this but we don't know. and we don't know because there are over a thousand still unaccounted for. the aclu said of the 1400 separated before the zero-tolerance policy began, they're still searching because of the data given by the government, phone numbers and addresses and et cetera is so poor that they are not able to track them down. so on the ground work that is supposed to be happening with ngo's has ground to a halt because of coronavirus. so those thousand families are a mystery in the eye of the government and the ngo is looking for them. >> what an unbelievable scale of a humanitarian crisis created by the trump administration. it is remarkable. jacob, thank you for your reporting on this.

whether we return, many republicans have been by his side for all of it. the story and john meacham joining us when "deadline: white house" continues after a short break. house" continuesafter a short break. did you know that feeling sluggish or weighed down

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out and replacing it with a new calamity. but every once in a while it is useful to stop and reflect on the historic nature of what we're living through. this moment in the american story. just take the last ten days. it was just last tuesday, september 29th, the morning of the first presidential debate, that we woke up talking about donald trump paying $750 in taxes. we went to bed talking about how he told white supremacists to, quote, stand down and stand by. then, overnight, thursday into friday, donald trump revealed via twitter that he tested positive for coronavirus and it wasn't long before he was on his way to walter reed medical center in marine one for treatment. the next few days were a cloud of mixed reports and questions about trump's health and the health of all of the people around him. thanks in large part to his doctors, trump, an active covid-19 patient drove around in the back of a suv to wave at

supporters. on monday he returned to the white house in mean one and immediately record a video for twitter. that gave way to several days of rage tweeting and rejection of a virtual debate, even though that is the way the rest of us are working and attack on a governor who is the target of a kidnapping plot and many more questions about the president's health, all of this serves as an exclamation point plagued by scandal, one that could end in a matter of weeks. and on that note, a message from our friend and colleague john meachham who treated those americans who have stood with this president will spend decades denying it or pretending it doesn't happen. we've seen this before with the joe mccarthy and the bull connors. there are still time to do the right thing. vote him out and let's move on. with that tweet, that loued me to sleep last night, jon meachham joins us now. i turn the floor over to you.

do you think that is where we are, that they will vote him out and deny standing with him as long as they have. >> i do. and i use the example of mccarthy and connor advisedly. hard to find people in my native region down here who will admit that before 1964 and 1965 they were sympathetic with the segregated order. it was hard in 1955, '56, to find cold warriors who would say, yeah, it was a good idea to let joe mccarthy wreck people's lives without evidence. it is amazing how quickly people can want to try to forget, when they've in some ways sold their soul for temporary dominion. now, you and i know this, politics is about clashing interests and you try to achieve temporary dominion and in order to find solutions to problems for a given period of time. that is in many ways what

governance is. but the american presidency is different. and or at least it should be. and it often has been. and i think, what prompted the remark last night was, a., i was cheerful because the yankees were winning and, secondly, it was that -- >> big game tonight. >> i know. it is very exciting. that comment from the president that -- about the governor of michigan. she didn't thank me for preventing white supremacist terrorists from kidnapping her. yeah, i guess that wasn't high on the list, sir. and i just read that and i thought, look, you and i both know scores of folks who are going to be, i think, if they're being honest, they're going to be trying to reconcile for a long time how it was that, with

their vote and either their voice or the lack of their voice, right, you could use your voice to speak out. it is also use of your voice to be silent. we know a lot of people who have just decided that taxes and judges are worth all of this chaos. and i genuinely don't -- i kind of understand it a little bit but it is not a decision that i could make. and one of the reasons i've advised president biden's generous demonstration and did a thing for the democratic convention, and a lot of people asked me why would you do that. i'm not a democrat. and my answer was, i don't know where i would have been in the late 1950s and early 1960s on the issues of the american south. but at least i know where i am on this one. >> you know, jorngs you use the

word reconcile. and i'm thinking about what reconciliation looks like in this country. i don't think it is an overstatement to say that even if donald trump loses and i think that is a big question mark and i trust the polls but i think things could change. i think we live in tumultuous times and as the media we shine the light on one thing and that is all that we cover and we'll probably spend a long time trying to understand why that is. but tell me how you think we get the country back together should he lose and should something different and more normal come to pass? >> yeah, well, here is -- i think this is hopeful but it is a hard truth. the hard truth is that 40% of the country, which is an interesting that that is kind of where his support is, is probably perennially with good

reason to change their mind on a good day. so 34% of the country approved joe mccarthy after he was censured. and they supported an apartheid anomalous in many ways but he's also a complete manifestation and explicable of perennial american forces, racism, isolation that are at our best we make ebb but they sometimes flow. those forces aren't going to go away because we live in a fallen frail and fallible world. and the good news about the presidency for a long time with some exceptions andrew johnson being the chief one is the american presidency has managed to check just enough of those forces, just enough of the time to make the national enterprise

as lincoln said worth fighting for. and that's really what we want in a president it seems to me and so look, and i'm not much of a numbers guy except the yank s yankees' score so i don't know where the numbers will end up. at 55, but i say one poll he was -- biden was at 57 or 55. even if he's at 53. that's george h.w. bush level in 1988. you know, that's in a structurally partisan era, a number, anything with a five on it is pretty good. and the two numbers to keep in mind are in 1964 lyndon johnson won 61% and 1972 nixon did and in 1984 regan won. they won above 60. if biden gets 54 or 55%, that's like the old 60. >> yeah.

i agree with you. i'm going to warn you that i might need your wider lens on all of this pretty regularly between now and election day, jon meacham. >> i stand here ready. >> good luck tonight to your yankees. when we come back as we do every day remembering lives well lived. ♪ things are getting clearer, yeah i feel free ♪ ♪ to bare my skin ♪ yeah that's all me. ♪ nothing and me go hand in hand ♪ ♪ nothing on my skin ♪ that's my new plan. ♪ nothing is everything. keep your skin clearer with skyrizi. 3 out of 4 people achieved 90% clearer skin at 4 months. of those, nearly 9 out of 10 sustained it through 1 year. and skyrizi is 4 doses a year, after 2 starter doses. ♪ i see nothing in a different way ♪ ♪ and it's my moment so i just gotta say ♪ ♪ nothing is everything skyrizi may increase your risk of infections and lower your ability to fight them. before treatment your doctor should check you

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there he was at the epicenter of one of the most

brutal conflicts in human history. father eduardo tamer was living in syria when the civil war there started. entire neighborhoods were wiped out. hundreds of thousands died. millions fled the country. in fact, it got so dangerous that father's superiors contacted him with an offer. according to the catholic news agency, they wanted to get him out and bring him to safety but he flat out refused. his response quote, i'm here for the people, i will die with them and for them. so according to the "new york times" he went about his business welcoming visitors, caring for the suffering and providing a safe rouefuge for those in need. father tommer a hero survived the syrian civil war, but he didn't and couldn't survive the coronavirus. he died a few weeks ago still in

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with two new haunted houses, the screams are just getting started. wear your favorite costumes and the fun never ends. come get your halloween on, happening now at universal orlando resort. thank you so much for letting us into your homes during these extraordinary times. "the beat" with ari melber starts right now. hi, ari. >> hey, nicole. i have a question for you this long week. say you can't do much with negative numbers. how do you add two? i was never big in math and that's why i went to law school. you