♪♪ s >> tonight on "the mehdi hasan show" is the question that seems to be on everyone's mind, is america a racist country. the politicians have their talking points but we'll give you the true facts and figures. >> plus joe biden won the 2020 election. it's not even up for debate. so why is the gop still trying to rewrite history? my conversation with georgia congresswoman nekima williams. also a crime against humanity. that's what one prominent author calls india's covid crisis. i'll talk about the suffering in her country. america has hit a vaccine call. how can the country convince doubters to get the shot? i'll ask the science guy, bill

nye. good evening. i'm mehdi hasan. it was the biggest question in the country this week, that liberals, conservatives and those in between seemed to be asking. is america a racist country? it started when tim scott, the only black republican in the senate made this his battle cry in his party's response to the president's address to congress on wednesday night. >> hear me clearly. america is not a racist country. it's backwards to fight discrimination with different types of discrimination. >> senator scott's rather unambiguous message on the thorny issue of racism in america put the first black and south asian vice president on the spot and kamala harris, like a good politician, also denied that america is a racist country. >> i believe that we need to -- first of all, no, i don't think

that america is a racist country, but we also do have to speak truth about the history of racism in our country and its existence today. >> joe biden was also asked about racism in america by nbc's craig melvin. >> i watched the rebuttal from the junior senator of south carolina last night, tim scott. he said, among other things, america isn't racist. is it? >> no, i don't think the american people are racist, but i think after 400 years, african-americans have been left in a position where they are so far behind the eight ball in terms of education, health, in terms of opportunity. i don't think america is racist, but i think the overhang from all of the jim crow and before that slavery have had a cost, and we have to deal with it. >> look. the question of whether america is racist or a racist country is frankly meaningless.

in fact, it's kind of a dumb question. how do you define a racist country? compared to whom, to what, by which measures? republicans led by tim scott, as usual, set the loaded framing and almost everyone followed suit. at least biden and harris, despite playing along, added their qualifiers, their caveats about america's history with slavery, systemic racism that followed. listen to joe biden on the night of derek chauvin's guilty verdict on the night for the murder of george floyd. >> it ripped the blinders off the world world for the systemic racism. systemic racism is a stain on our nation's soul. >> that's what matters. the existence of systemic racism in america today. republicans would like to distract you from that. they want to convince you that systemic racism doesn't even exist. >> we've just elected a two-term

african-american president. the vice president is african-american indian descent. our systems are not racist. america is not a racist country. >> there's not systemic racism in america. >> well, it's a bunch of horse manure. give me a break. it's a very harmful ideology and i would say a race-based version of a marxist type etiology. >> that's a lot of random words strung together. by the way, governor reeves denying systemic racism just declared last month, april, mississippi confederate heritage month. so there's also that. my view is that no republican should be allowed to deny the existence of systemic racism without first being asked to define systemic racism. for those at home who want a refresher, it's defined quite well by the cambridge dictionary, as policies and

practices that exist throughout a society or organization and result in and support a continued unfair advantage to some people and unfair or harmful treatment of others based on race. so, the u.s. doesn't fit that definition? really? this is a country in which black people continue to be underrepresented in elected positions at all levels. three black senators, including tim scott, out of 100 and 11 black senators total in american history out of almost 2,000. zero black governors today and four in all of american history, only one black president out of 45. this is a country in which have higher unemployment rates, lower home ownership rates than white people, in which black people are more likely than white people to face discrimination in the work place, a country which the median white household has eight times the wealth of a median black household. black americans are more likely

to be arrested than white americans and more likely to be convicted and more likely to have stiff sentences. black people are three times more likely than white people to be killed by the police. the killers of black people are less likely to face the death penalty than people who kill white people. even before the pandemic, black americans were 1 1/2 times as likely as white americans to lack health insurance and had a life expectancy 3 1/2 years shorter than their white counterparts. a country which last year during the pandemic, black americans were a third more likely to die from covid-19 than white americans. what do we call this, if not systemic racism? institutionalized discrimination and inequality. and the worst part of it is that republicans not only deny racism today, they're now denying

racism in the past, too. minority leader mitch mcconnell asked the biden education department to have the "new york times" 1619 project on slavery's origins in the u.s. removed from federal grant programs because he argues it tells a revisionist history of america's founding. yes, revised to acknowledge slavery's central role in america's birth and growth. that's the point. as the journalist who developed the 1619 project, nicole hannah jones pointed out, america is not a racist country. if we teach our children about all the racist things our country has done they may think the country is racist is a hell of an argument, i have to say. indeed. let's turn now to professor patricia rose. study of race and ethnicity in america as well as host of the podcast the tightrope. professor, thank you so much for coming on the show. when you heard senator tim scott wednesday night proclaim that america is not a racist country, what was your reaction? what did you make of that

particular formulation? >> well, you know, i was not shocked by it, but i was disappointed, because it really created a false binary. either we're racist or we're not, which is a ridiculous position. more importantly it personalized for many people what is, as you pointed out at the start of your show, systemic set of practices. americans can say to themselves, i'm not personally racist. i don't believe in racial hierarchy. therefore, i'm offended by this. so, it allowed people to take it up as a personal kind of moral claim without really having any reason to examine the systemic evidence in play. >> very good point. and here is a question for you. how is it possible that prominent, educated, republican elected politicians can deny the existence of systemic racism, given the clear facts and figures? is it ignorance in your view? is it dishonesty?

is it pandering to a reactionary white base? >> this is one of those multiple choice questions, all of the above. i think it's very much about intentional ignorance, and and performed ignorance. there are many americans who do not really understand what systemic racism is and the magnitude of it. others know very well what it is and have been fighting to not allow the changes necessary to undo it, right? so, both things can be true. you know, not only -- you started your show with lots of really interesting facts to show where these things happen. i want to emphasize one thing that didn't come out yet in that beginning, which is the fact that the government sponsored many of the policies and programs and refused to redress the consequences of those policies and programs. let's just take housing and red lining or the gi bill and the systemic exclusion in many cases of black veterans to the benefits relating to it. >> very good point.

>> this isn't just sort of things that happen, they've been happening systemically from the top down. >> indeed. and then you have republicans, you say performative ignorance. and then you have joe biden and kamala harris, other democrats going out of their way to deny that america is a racist country. they're worried when we talk about a country being racist or systemic racism, it sounds like to people we're saying all americans are race irk or america as a whole is racist. no politician is ever going to say that. >> right, right. it's so easy to stoke lots of white resentment when it comes to this topic and, frankly, the reason that we have so much white resentment about issues of systemic racism is because of a lack of education on the issue. so what 1619 and the curriculum any other number of efforts to

really try to explore the complexity of how race has shaped almost every facet of american society, from start to finish, the efforts to really educate a multiracial society would reduce white resentment. until we have that education, you have to worry about people immediately refusing to listen because they feel personally blamed. and when i teach these subjects, i'm very careful, look, this isn't about you personally. let's look at the big picture. let look at what has happened, how it happened and what the consequences are now. we're all in this boat. what would you like to do about it? you have a choice to be on whatever team you want to be on. this isn't about the color of your skin makes you an oppressor, another claim that tim scott was making. what is your relationship to this problem that exists in our society? >> you mentioned stoking of white resentment, you mentioned coming up with solutions. let's talk about the challenge of overcoming systemic racism.

a bunch of studies and polls that suggest if you try to sell otherwise popular progressive policies on housing, education, income inequality as ways of promoting racial justice or reducing structural racism, support for those policies drops. how do democrats get around that, by just not talking about race? that's pretty depressing, isn't it? >> yeah. it's more than depressing. it's also not going to be terribly effective in the long run. you know, i think what we have to do is figure out how to show as many american citizens as we can that they are both -- especially the white ones, right, are hardworking and have often worked against various types of odds. working class whites have just as many disadvantages as other groups of working class people. their disadvantages are not because of race. race is actually functioning as an advantage, even as there are other disadvantages they might be facing. we have to figure out a way to

tell the story that you can be hardworking and worthy based on a number of things but you also have had wind at your back to help you move forward beyond your hard work while other people have had headwinds that have held them back despite their hard work and have to be able to say those things so people can't so easily say to themselves i've worked so hard, i've earned everything i have. once you get people cornered with that feeling, you can't teach them about the process that has placed disadvantages in front of some people. >> you put it so well. i hope these democrats help tackle the issue come to you. we appreciate you talking to us tonight. you can hear her thoughts any time on the tightrope podcast. many thanks for your time tonight. >> thank you very much for having me. coming up, republicans are leading a war on voting rights. how far will they take it? i'll talk to someone who is

fighting back on georgia's front lines, nekema williams. later, we'll talk about india's deadly covid crisis. one author call what's happen thing a crime against humanity. how will it end? my conversation is still ahead. don't go away. n is still ahead don't go away. aah! ok. i'm on vibrate. aaah! only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪

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president biden completed his 100th day in office this week, former president donald trump remained in denial, still refusing to accept his electoral defeat and arizona republicans are more than happy to join him in that denial. trump lost the grand canyon state to biden by more than 10,000 votes. now the gop-controlled senate has started an audit, so-called, of over 2 million votes in the largest county. the recount being conducted largely in secret. this weekend it's announced that's no deadline for when they must finish.

there appears literally no end to the effort to overturn the votes of the american people, on top of restricting voting laws proposed in arizona itself and in states across the country. georgia, of course, leading the way with its new voter suppression law. how far will the gop go to pursue it's anti-democratic agenda and what can big d democrats do in response? nekima williams joins me now. she's the chair of the democratic party of georgia. congresswoman, thank you for coming on the show. first off, your reaction to what's going on in arizona, this bizarre audit, this recount that even cindy mccain, wife of the late gop senator john mccain, called ludicrous this morning. >> i can think of a few other words to call it, mehdi, but bizarre, ludicrous, are some of them. as they continue to uplift donald trump's big lie and continue to pretend we don't

know who is the president and what the election results were, they will get the same results in georgia when they counted our ballot is s not once, not twice, but three times. it's the same result. we're moving forward in the house, in congress. we have a president who just celebrated his 100th day in office right here in georgia, where we delivered our electoral college votes for joe biden. we're doing things like cutting childhood poverty in half, making sure america catches up with the rest of the world and ensuring everyone gets 12 weeks of paid family leave. so, i am allowing them to continue their charades while i'm doing the work of the people, mehdi. >> come on, congresswoman. you really think that the gop wants to talk about policy? that's so old fashioned. i would like to play some sound of south carolina senator tim scott, who gave the republican response to president biden's address wednesday. have a listen. >> the state of georgia passioned a law that expands early voting, preserves no

excuse mail-in voting. and despite what the president claimed, did not reduce election day hours. if you actually read this law, it's mainstream. it will be easier to vote early in georgia than in democrat-run new york. >> what's your response to tim scott, saying georgia is better than new york when it comes to voting and early voting now? >> well, i know one thing, mehdi, if tim scott had read this law in context with existing rules and laws in the state of georgia, he would understand that now in some counties, like the county that i live in where atlanta is, we are actually going to have fewer opportunities to vote. we're going to be restricted in our ballot drop box hours. i don't think he has actually read the law in context of what was already happening in our state.

so that's one thing. and as far as comparing the georgia law or south carolina law or new york law to other things, that's exactly why we need hr-1, mehdi. we need a standard process for voting in this country. >> good point. >> we need to make sure no matter where you live -- i don't know where you live, mehdi, but you should have the same rights i have in georgia, no matter where you live, what your zip code is. everybody should have the same access to the ballot. if tim scott wants to make sure people in new york have the same rights i have here in georgia or anywhere else, he should join me in making sure the hr-1 for the people act, gets through the united states senate. >> you mentioned hr-1 and the united states senate. the barrier to getting that through the nt is not just the fact that you need 10 senate republicans to come on board to overcome the senate filibuster but two senate democrats, joe manchin and kyrstin sinema are wedded to keeping the filibuster. even though they claim to support voting rights and democracy. what's your message to those two senators, sitting as you are in georgia right now, where voting

rights are under assault? >> my rights are under assault here, mehdi. if it were not for the federal government, me as a black woman in the south, would not have a right to vote in this country. i don't need this to be a partisan fight but those standing on the side of democracy, and those who are not. we need every senator to be on the side of what is fair, just and right, and making sure everybody has the same access to the ballot. i don't understand how we're going to allow a procedural rule like the filibuster to get in between me and my right to vote. >> yeah. i don't understand that either, which is why i keep asking democrats to come on this show. what is driving joe manchin and kyrsten sinema? do they not understand the argument? what is going on here within the democratic party? >> i think unfortunately there are still people willing to look

beyond what is at stake and look at the politics of this. i mean, i understand the politics of being in a deep, red state. georgia, some people told me georgia was going to remain deep red. we see when you stand on the side of the people and you make sure that you're giving everyone a voice in this process, change can happen. that's what we did in georgia. we can do that in other places, too. we have to make sure everyone has fair and free access. >> so, whatever is going on inside the democratic party, it doesn't compare to what's happening inside the republican party. yesterday senator mitt romney was loudly booed at a utah state convention for his impeachment vote on donald trump. let's listen to a few seconds of that. >> i don't hide the fact that i wasn't a fan of our last president's character issues. and i'm also no fan -- >> this morning, senator susan collins was asked about that booing on cnn. have a listen to what she said. >> mitt romney is an outstanding

senator, who serves his state and our country well. we republicans need to remember that we are united by fundamental principles, such as the belief in personal responsibility, individual freedom, opportunity, free markets, strong national defense. those are the principles that unite us. we are not a party that is led by just one person. >> congresswoman, isn't the gop still the party of trump? and, if so, where does that leave this whole concept of bipartisanship, reaching out across the aisle? can you, as a democrat, still do that in good faith? >> so the republican party is absolutely the party of donald trump. donald trump is still deciding who wins and loses in their primary elections. donald trump is still in control of that party and anyone who tells you differently has not been paying attention. as far as bipartisanship, i am

willing to work with anyone who is willing to make sure that they're always centering those most marginalized. i've not seen that in my republican colleagues up to this point. when that opportunity comes and arises, i will make sure i'm still serving my constituents in the process, but i'm willing to work with anyone, as long as they're serving those most marginalized. >> fair enough. nikema williams, thank you for your time tonight. appreciate it. >> thank you, mehdi. coming up, 100 million americans are now fully vaccinated. what about the people who refuse to get the shot? can their minds be changed? i'll talk to bill nye after this. this is richard lui with the headlines. hey, richard. teenagers among the five americans killed in friday's stampede at a religious festival in israel. the victim was identified as donnie morris of new jersey.

israel observed a day of morning sunday for all 45 who died. flags were at half staff across the country. today spacex safely returned four astronauts from the international space station to planet earth. it's the first u.s. crew to splash down in darkness since the apollo 8 moon shot over 50 years ago. dragon capsule parachuted into the gulf of mexico off the florida gulf coast. kamala harris is the first vice president immoral atized in the wax museum. it will be displayed with joe biden and the over office experience. the clay heads take six weeks to sculpt and the bodies take at least four months. more of "the mehdi hasan show" after this break. he mehdi hasan" after this break not just unpredictable relapses. all these other things too. who needs that kind of drama? kesimpta is a once-monthly at-home injection that may help you put this rms drama in its place. kesimpta was proven superior

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blooechs -- believes 5 million children could get vaccinated straight away once the vaccine gets approval. more than 100 million americans are now vaccinated against covid-19. new polling shows the numbers of those willing to go out and get the shot is slipping. this week the cdc recommended the j&j vaccinations resume while also revealing new guidelines on how to behave once you're fully vaccinated. those rule changes have left many confused what they can and can't do as we navigate the new normal. who better to talk to about all of this than bill nye, the science guy? he's host of the podcast science rules with bill nye and author of bill nye's great big world of science. pleasure to have you on the show tonight. let me ask you about vaccines. on the one hand we've had huge success vaccinating people in this country. on the other hand the number of americans willing to get vaccinated is slipping, and particularly bad in rural areas with 30% of those saying they definitely would not get a

vaccine or would do so only if required to do so by law. how do we get a pro-vaccine message through to such people? >> two things. first of all, your neighbors. when your neighbors get vaccinated and you see them behaving, in a sense, normally, that will encourage everyone to behave normally, and everybody will want to get vaccinated so they can have picnics and hang out together and toss the ball around or what have you. the other thing, when it comes to anti-science, it takes time. you would think, as a rational person or somebody trying to be rational, if you explain it you see the earth goes around the sun and here's the evidence. you would expect maybe the other person to go, oh, i did not know that. but it takes people often years to come around. so what i tell everybody at the family dinner with the conflict,

don't expect to change the person's mind the first time, but stick with it, because i think as people see the advantages of being vaccinated, they will want to get vaccinated. >> yeah. so, it's not what you know. it's who you know, in fact, in terms of the people around you saying get the message out. let me ask you, how much damage do you think the anti-vax message from the likes of fox news, especially people like tucker carlson, who i know you have clashed with in the past, how much damage is that causing? how irresponsible? how deadly is it? >> you can get furious with these guys. you know the expression, it's not helping. this idea that everybody has the freedom to do anything is -- we all know that's not exactly right. you can't yell "fire" in a crowded theater if there's no fire and so on. you can't drive on both sides of the road even though you pay taxes on both sides of the road. the argument i've made for many

years, and i'm not the first guy to make this argument, is that if a person doesn't get vaccinated and he or she gets infected, it will mutate in that person. now i've noticed that people don't like to use the word mutate because that's associated with evolution, the facts of life. we use the word variant. fine. it will vary in that person and then that could infect me, and that's not fair, right? >> yeah. >> everybody on the other side, it's not fair to make me wear a mask. it's not fair to make me get vaccinated. well, it's not fair to everybody else if you become an incubator for a variant, doggoneit. >> very good point. limits on the whole freedom argument. let me ask you with this. the overarching -- there are limits, agreed. on the issue of safety the overarching issue seems to be not just anti-vax sentiment, but

plain old hesitancy. a lot of wait and see. a lot of people's doubts seem to stem on how quickly this vaccine was created. you yourself said it would take two years to get a vaccine. so i wonder, isn't the near miraculous speed at which these vaccines were created and approved, which even scientists like yourself didn't expect, isn't that also partly what's undermined people's trust in them, caused hesitancy? >> yeah. so an interesting thing that i was really hardly aware of, when i made that assertion two years, being aggressive, very aggressive. this message rna vaccine, money this messenger rna vaccine, money has been thrown at the problem for over 20 years. and if you're out there watching of a certain age, 9/11 was an issue. right after that was this doggone anthrax scare where a mean-spirited person sent

anthrax spores that was, the word was, weaponized, in a paper envelope. and it killed a few people and made a lot of people very sick. along that line the messenger rna technology was being developed against anthrax, which is an agricultural -- normally agricultural disease. this research had been going on for decades, and it just got revved up. say what you will but operation warp speed, it got her done. then you have to get it distributed. having it exist is really important but getting it into everybody's arms is the next thing. >> yes. everybody's arms. not just american arms. before we run out of time, let me ask you this. in india right now, massive covid crisis, short of vaccines in a country that was a massive producer of vaccines. biden is under pressure to lift the patents of these vaccines. jake sullivan, the national

security adviser, said this morning they're thinking about it. would you urge the biden administration to waive intellectual property rights on the covid vaccines for the good of the world? >> the word, waive, i would find a way to protect them. the reason people still want to come to this country is our laws are very sophisticated. people have been messing around with laws for 200 and some years. there's got to be a way to do this. everybody appreciate just like climate change, we all are in this together. everybody on earth is in this together. so when people on another continent get infected and it mutates or varies, becomes a variant, it could reinfect all of us. it's in everybody's best interest to vaccinate people all over the world. >> yeah. >> and if we, the u.s., or the developed world has to pay for it, that's well worth it. as i tell everybody, i went to elementary school with a guy who had polio.

i have never gotten polio because i got vaccinated. you do not want polio. >> no. >> i mention that as a classic example. >> we've got to do what it takes to get india vaccines is what i'm hearing from you. bill nye, we're out of time. thank you so much for coming on the show today. my kids, in particular, were very excited to see you coming on the show. >> give them my best. science rules! >> will do. up next, lawmakers shouldn't throw stones if they live in glass houses. have a lot on my mind over the hi pockry ski in congress over d.c. statehood. we're getting ready for my 60 second rant. that's next. you can't plan for your period's... what the gush moments.

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statehood for washington, d.c. politicians in glass houses throwing stones. senator joe manchin said he opposes d.c. statehood. he thinks it's unconstitutional. he represents west virginia, whose own statehood was in 1863 in the midst of the civil war was considered by many to be illegal and unconstitutional. even lincoln himself was reluctant to sign off on the matter. it was essentially an unauthorized act of secession from virginia. mike rounds of south dakota, the founding fathers never intended for washington, d.c. to be a state. d.c. statehood is about packing the senate with democrats. the republicans could pack the senate with four extra senators, but hypocrisy award has to go to gop nancy mace, who said it wouldn't qualify as a congressional district, while standing in front of liz cheney, who represents wyoming, a state so fall that they have 100,000 fewer residents than washington, d.c.

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tragically, india has once again broken global records with more than 400,000 cases of covid in a single day. yesterday alone, according to official figures, considered to be an under estimate, more than 3600 indians lost their lives to covid. dr. anthony fauci said the country needs to treat the covid crisis like a war and called on the indian government to shut down the country for a few weeks. it's advice unlikely to be heeded by narendra modi, saying the government has failed time and time again to listen to even its own top scientific advisers on this issue. and those decisions are being

felt at the polls. modi's party losing big this weekend in vital elections in the state of west bengal. it's hard to quite grasp the gravity of the desperation across india right now. award-winning writer and activist penning a guardian op-ed, accusing the modi government of not just negligence but crime against humanity. quote, hospital beds are unavailable, doctors and medical staff are at breaking point. people are dying in hospital corridors, on roads and in their homes. crematoriums have run out of firewood. the forest department has had to give special permission for the felling of city trees. desperate people are using whatever kindling they can find. it's as if there's an invisible ufo parked in our skies, sucking the air out of our lungs, an air raid we've never known. i have the author of "the god of all things" and i spoke with her earlier at her home in new delhi. thank you so much for joining me on the show tonight.

you have written and spoken passionately over the years about the pain and trauma of poverty and inequality and violence in your country. so how does this current covid crisis compare? what are you feeling right now? >> well, there's the trauma of knowing that the covid crisis has sort of fallen into all the cracks that one has been writing about for 20 years. and you have a crisis now, which is the crisis of death. in the city i speak i'm in today right now where i'm speaking from hospital after hospital is just begging for oxygen. and there are political wars about it. you know, imagine the trauma of knowing you're going to run out of oxygen in a few hours. so you have that crisis sitting

on top of this volcano of a systemic problem. it's not even systemic actually because there is no system. and that's what one has been speaking about for so many years. and the healthcare system in india today is like somewhere, you know, where corporate medicine means god man quackery and almost nothing in between. you have a country like india with 1.2% of its gdp spent on healthcare, which is actively effectively 0.35% is something we have calculated because deducted are the things which have nothing to do with health. so you have a situation where the capital city where all the cameras, all the press, all the politicians converge is breaking up, cracking up. people can't breathe, and then you have this massive hinterland where the virus has spread, and

yet we have no news of what's happening there. there are no desks, there are no hospitals, there is nothing to be done about what's going on there. >> did you see this coming, i wonder? because yesterday 400,000 covid cases were recorded in india, a world record. but as recently as january india only had around 9,000 covid cases a day. and friends and family members of mine in india were telling me that covid was over in your country, was gone, there was complete complacency at all levels of society, wasn't there? >> well, you know, honestly, whether i saw it coming or not, we were just cautious because we knew what was happening in the europe and in u.s. but the fact is the government appointed committees warned the government that it was coming. they warned the government that there was going to be a shortage of oxygen.

they were red-flagging this from april last year and then again in november. nothing was done. and, in fact, the reverse was done. gloating, organizing pilgrimages with millions and millions of pilgrims organizing elections, the results of which came out today. and you have the opposition parties that won really calling the election commission out on this. you know, even the madras high court has accused them of murder. because you have massive spikes of cases where these huge crowds were gathering, not least the prime minister boasting about how many people he could gather in a rally without masks, without any fear of covid. >> yeah. >> so, you mentioned the government ignoring warnings. >> sorry.

>> you mentioned the government ignoring warnings from scientists and experts. here in america, here on this show, we've talked about whether donald trump is negligent, even criminally negligent for the hundreds of thousands of covid deaths on his watch. with regard to narendra modi, the prime minister there, you go much further. you say, what we are witnessing is not criminal negligence but an outright crime against humanity. strong words. explain to our viewers why you say that. >> well, as i said, there are two parts to this. one is the crisis that is here and now, the crisis of people in hospital, people dying on the roads and so on. and the fact that we did not have a system. that system was systematically dismantled by this government as well as the previous government into which this crisis has fallen. and, as i said in "the guardian" piece, you have to look at this crisis as it developed over so many years.

and as you and i have spoken before, mehdi, it's not just this health crisis but so much other, let's say, pogroms, murders, lynching, all of which played into what is going on now. last time this year muslims were being hunted down called corona jihadis. you had a whole sort of genocidal language. they were being shunned. they were being shut down economically. now, this has happened where you're having even the people who adored this prime minister just falling by the way side. it's hard for me to explain in two seconds, which is why i wrote about it. but it's such a huge crisis, which can not just be reported. it has to be understood with its political underpinnings. .

>> that was part one of my interview with award-winning indian author arundhati roy. you can catch the rest of my interview with her tomorrow night on peacock at 7:00 p.m. eastern. coming up, the recall campaign against california's governor gavin newsom. how likely is it that he'll actually be rooted from office, and who could replace him? that's at the top of the hour on "the week with joshua johnson" right here on msnbc. the only thing better than a new 5g phone is another one for free. right now, buy one of our best 5g phones, get another one on us. with verizon, get the 5g network you deserve, with the 5g phones you want. because the network is just the beginning. there's more to a yard than freshly cut grass. which is exactly why we built these mowers, to clear the way for stuff like this, right here. run with us, because the best yards are planted with real memories. search john deere mowers for more. (burke) switch to farmers and you could save an average of four hundred and sixty-seven dollars on your auto insurance.

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we'll be right back here next sunday at 8:00 p.m. eastern. and you can catch me monday through thursday on "the choice" on nbc streaming panel peacock. now it's time to turn it over to joshua johnson. johnson. hello joshua. >> hey thank you very. much hello to you. it's good to be with you tonight. the latest polls show that americans are feeling good about where america is headed, but what exactly does that mean? especially for the prospects of an infrastructure plan. also, joe biden marked 100 days in office, with kamala harris did to. we will look back at her first 100 days. as vice president. we have a live update on a boat that capsized just off the coast of san diego. officials say it looks like smuggling. and last night we asked for your photos of things that helped raise your perspective in these troubled times. i call it the observatory effect. and you did not disappoint. we will share some of our favorites, throughout the hour. from nbc news world