president biden at a meeting with the global leaders. a bit earlier president biden set down with the french president macron, biden saying he and macron are on the same page. the g7 summit happens just days ago before the official sit down with vladimir putin. >> translator: we have a bilateral relationship that has detearated to its lowest point in recent years. former u.s. president mr. trump is a talentsed individual. president biden, of course, is radically different from trump. it is my great hope that, yes, there are some advantages, some disadvantages. interestingly in the last hour, gerry connelly told me the way that putin describes donald trump is very similar to what we hear from some of his gop supporters. >> i was also struck with his

description of trump. i don't mean this facetiously, but frankly those words could have come out of the mouths of republican enablers in the republican congress. new setbacks for the johnson & johnson coronavirus vaccine. they're being asked to scrapping about 60 million doses from the baltimore plants, after being deemed not suitable for use. ten million doses will be distributed domestically and abroad. mike memoli and matt bradley are joining us. mike, first to you, as we have the president winding down a very busy day. what more are we hearing about his meeting with president macron? >> reporter: we've been talking all day about the very busy agenda, tackling the pandemic, trying to jump-start the

economies, encounters the rise of china. a lot of the discussions is president biden trying to reestablish and to improve the u.s. relationship with some of our closest allies after four years of the trump administration. one of the most interesting relationships was with the french president. we remember when trump hosted him at the white house, some of the strong, even aggressive handshakes and back slaps. we had an interesting sight of these two men, as they try to focus on the areas of mutual concerns. >> the u.s. is back, we feel strongly about the cohesion of nato. i, for one, think that the european union is an incredibly

strong and vibrant community, and has the able to handle issues, but provide the backbone and support for nato. >> reporter: alex, there is another dynamic as the president has one-on-one meetings, that's in preparing for that confrontation coming in geneva in a few days with vladimir putin. of course, the president has been having meeting with his team for weeks about how to approach that meeting, but using these conversations to try to prep in a way as well, to learn the messages and how he should be presenting his case and how to deal with some of the tough areas with the russian president. >> it wasn't lost in my he had his classic aviator glasses there. i'm sure he wished he could have

put them on, and probably did as soon as he could stand up and get underway. so matt has more on the fascinating remark from boris johnson. johnson tried to dodge the question of comparing president biden with the former president. >> reporter: johnson has been trying to restylize himself ever end biden went to the white house, and for good reason. johnson is the one who had the closest relationship with the former president, so close that joe biden even described him, as you're about to hear, once in 2019 as a physical and emotional clone of donald trump. now, of course -- boris johnson was more consistent in the political policies of

donald trump. he had a lot of the same suspicions of international institutions that donald trump did, including, of course, famously the european union, which is why he championed brexit and was rewarded for it, but here is the sky new interchange with boris johnson. >> it's absolutely true that, with president biden, with joe biden, you sort of feel like that he wants to -- he's a great believers in the transatlantic alliance, in the special relationship. >> reporter: he also famously referred to you as a physical and emotion at clone to donald trump. i wonder how you responded and whether -- >> the relationship is in extremely good order. so i want you to know that the relationship is extremely good, getting better all the time. >> reporter: was it fair to call you a clone?

>> look, i'm not going to -- >> reporter: the relationship is extremely good, as boris johnson said, but there's tension. joe biden who wears his irish-american identity proudly, he weighed in and warned boris johnson, what's called the northern ireland protocol, could reignite temperatureses in northern ireland, the same thingses that have been almost entirely dormant for almost 20 years, so there is some tension there. but what you heard just there is a british prime minister who may have been experiencing some buyer's remorse about his affections for donald trump, and snow that there's been something of a regime change in washington, he's try to go make up for lost time. alex? >> i think in american parlance, he was probably thinking, can we just move on? i want to bring in peter spiegel, u.s. managing editor of

"the financial times." and the chief of -- peter, since you're front and center, i'll start with you. overall, that exchange, this special relationship is something we've seen repeated time and time again, with presidents on both sides of the pond, aluting -- alluding to -- >> it's awkward. this is the embodiment of the trumpism. it was trump who championed brexit, and really sort of seized on johnson as his ally in europe. johnson said, we're very excited, joe biden is coming, so he's been trying to roll that back over the course of the last six months, but there is some bad blood.

not only had set a member of the torrie party, and there is always tensions between democrats and torries in that regard. there are clearly tensions that are there that are residual, but you have to remember, below that, on the intelligence, on the trait relationships, these are two countries that have an aliance that stretches back. in terms of interest and global interest, you know, particularly with china and russia, and the challenge that the u.s. is facing, they have need britain on the side, bring intelligence, they need to be able to mend those that happened -- and clearly trump wants to do that. >> you do i think the way they describe their relationship that they're on the same page, do you think that can be applied? maybe not as solidly, like with a black sharpie pen, but do you

think they can get there? >> i think it possibly could. one thing is quite clear, is that boris johnson is a bit of a shape shifter. he always has been. i think he made it clear yesterday, when they made a quip about how they had both married up, boris johnson said i will not disagree with that, or indeed anything else. to me that set the tone of what boris johnson is trying to chief in the next few days, reverse from his earlier comments about biden to also sort of sidestep biden's comments about him. you know, try and look forward. this is a very important relationship for boris johnson. let's not forgets that part of brexit was being able to set its own deals with other countries. so it's important for boris johnson to build this

relationship. he will be looking to do everything he can. of course there are some disagreement with northern ireland, for example, just to state one thing, but i think, overall we'll see a fairly convivial relationship. >> with regard to china, with the focus, how kleely do you think china is watches what's going on there in the uk? >> china is watching this very closely indeed. it realizes the very point of the g7, which is rich but mostly western countries and japan. part of their reason for being together is their democracies. they are necessarily aligning themselves against china. they're trying to provide an alternative to china, in terms of infrastructure. they came up with build back better, b3w, which i think they

called it, to try to entice country to say use their infrastructure money for green initiatives. much of this is positioning the g7 against china, but disagreements are beginning to emerge. of course, the u.s., canada and the uk are going to want to be tougher on china than europe will want, because e. of course, europe has ties with china that it wants to preserve more so than the u.s. does, so some friction there, but it's a united front there. >> the biden administration has said, look, this will not be solely stressing these talks aimed at china, but how we, in fact, can produce affirmative and positive rea.s through the world, but how much to achieve that does china have to be at the center of the conversation? >> it's all china. the administration may try to sell it as a broad initiative,

that it is about the world, but this is all about china. to develop on what ravi was saying, what's interesting to me is the willingness to accept american leadership again after four years of resistance. this china initiative, again as ravi said, this is not something that at the top of the european agenda. they want to trade china and said their goods to china. this is not top of the list. between very opage about what the loans are getting into the developing countries. these are large loan, very onerous, and there's a lot of

concerns for china to say you can't pay it back? you are now under our thumb. this is an effort by the biden administration to push back on there. there are institutions set up after world war ii, but there's been concerns that they're too slow and co-opted by china. >> how hard is it going to be that, hey, we want to make sure this is not the anomaly. that trump was the anomaly. >> that's very hard. frankly the substance is almost secondary to the imagery. biden want to say america is back. i've been talking to european diplomats who are pro-american. they said it is very difficult to have these conversations to convince their own governments,

it's now time to play ball with america again. there is a struggle, because there's a pushback with saying we can no longer trust the americans on this. >> how many of those that you're talking to are not necessarily pro-american. >> frankly, because i show up with an american accent, the ones i talk to tend to be more pro-american and the frustrations, they are trying within their own systems to say trump is an anomaly, we can work with the americans, and they are finding pushback, particularly in france and germany, who assumed the americans would always be reliable and always be for them, they've had a bit of a shock and are trying to figure out weighing to deal with the world what happens if the

americans aren't there anymore. four years will not by papered over in one g7. we're going to have to spend more years on that. >> will you both come see me again very soon? i appreciate you. thank you. what did jeff sessions and bill barr know about secret investigations into democratic lawmakers? that's next. investigations into democratic lawmakers? that's next.

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amanda goldman is on capitol hill for us. another welcome to you on this day. are we anything from barr or

session about they see accusations? >> reporter: former attorney general barr is now distancing himself from these reports that the trump justice department was working to seize communications around a number of journalists and at least two congressmen looking into then president trump, and we have confirmation from eric swalwell as well as adam schiff that they were targeted, but -- and as you know, the top senate democrats are calling to subpoena former attorneys general william barr as well as jeff sessions to testify about these investigations, but we're also getting new details from apple as they start to explain what happened, saying that the doj under president trump was scud to turn over metadata on phone number and e-mail addressing. apple said a nondisclosure order

prevented them from notifying the customers in this case. we did hear from at least one congressman, peter welch, when he spoke with our own ali velshi. >> he hired people to come in and essentially be a cell within the justice department, whose job it was was to enforce the political whims of president trump, independent of the law, in violation in many cases of constitutional rights. so i think what you saw there was attorney general barr doing everything he can to deny and lie. >> reporter: alex, i should share that a former senior official at the justice depend told our own pete williams when jeff sessions was attorney general, he never approved

subpoenas for members of it is house, but this is comes as democrats are increasingly frustrated, especially with the biden justice justice department that they are not learning any more information. so a lot more to come. >> including with this next conversation. joining me is joyce vance, former u.s. attorney, and professor at the university of alabama school of law. joyce, i'm curious, would you say that then attorney general and attorneys general jeff sessions and william barr, is that an abuse of power? >> there's a lot that we don't know here, alex, so it's tough to classify what's going on here. it's certainly important to have both of these now witnesses testify under oath, so that congress can understand and develop a better understanding of what happened here and what went wrong.

>> we have to reiterate that both of these former attorneys general say they don't have any recollections, they don't have anything to do with this, and that they don't -- they're denying everything at this point, but i do recall bill barr testifying in front of congress, specifically with kamala harris when she was senator, he had this rather nebulous answer, well, there was discussions, but nothing you could pinpoint him on. so which is it? >> we still don't know why he stumbled whether she landed on the word "suggested" anyone suggest to you that you should open an investigation. perhaps because it's not clear whether a president is ranting and raving, is that a suggestion that the attorney general should investigate? there are a lot of investigative

details we don't know here. it's possible that a subpoena seeking subscriber information, which is a term of art in this area, wasn't specifically focused on a person in congress, but it then released information back into doj that provided information about accounts that were owned by people in congress. that looks like that's very likely in this case. so there may be some wordsmithing going on on the form of these former doj folks. that's why it's important they be questioned under oath. >> do we know for certain that which was being sought by both apple and microsoft was merely whether there was a connection, or did it extend to content? would that make a difference legally? so this is for metadata. it doesn't look like there was any release here on the contents of communications. that brings a whole different

level of scrutiny to get that sort of information. the real question here is, was this an investigation being conducted for political reasons or properly predicated. we know the former president was focused on leakers. we know that ag barr seemed to be very productive. in the meantime of closing it, he brought down hand-picked loyalist from the new jersey u.s. attorney's office. there's a lot 6 red flags that indicate we should be concerned. that's why this is one of those situations where we have to say, more work is required. let's switch gears and talk about don mcgahn, this week we got the transcript of the testimony from last week, and he revealed that trump was not telling the truth when he said he never considered firing robert mueller. from mcgahn, he certainly entertained the idea, certainly

had a number of conversations with me of something along those lines. what is your reaction to this? was there any part of his testimony that surprised you at all from a legal standpoint? >> it's obstruction of justice, but it's always been obstruction of justice. these are the facts that were revealed in the mueller report. so, you know, now we have a former white house counsel, who is supposed to be the lawyer for the presidency, not the president. he has come in front of congress and talked about conduct that amounts to obstruction of justice by the former president of the united states. the question is pretty simple, alex -- the question is, will someone do something about this? >> that is the question, because these things happened, many of the things that mcgahn was talking about, happened several years ago. why did it take so long to get his testimony? >> there's a bit of a back-and-forth balance that goes on here with any executive

branch communications. so certainly the former president took extraordinary steps to keep anyone from testifying in front of the congress. it looks like it was a compromise that limited the scope of his testimony and kept him from being forced to testify in public. obstruction of justice cases are very close calls, in large part, because the government has to prove the charges beyond a reasonable doubt. it's possible that there's evidence here that deserves further consideration, but the reality is when you have robert mueller laying out 9 facts and mcgahn confirming them, it becomes a critical decision point for everyone involved. >> we appreciate your input. thank you so much. how vladimir putin compares president trump with president

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at this hour, the group is discussion health with the uk scientific adviser, and you see there earlier the two briefly discussed the relationship with france and the u.s. >> i think what you demonstrated at the leadership is partnership, and we appreciate that. >> i think we can do a lot, too. the united states, as i've said before, the u.s. is back. in the next hour, the group of seven is expected to gather with a photo op. that would be the last event of the day before the meetings resume tomorrow. joining me now is florida congresswoman stephanie murphy.

welcome back to the broadcast. it's good to see you. i'm curious, as you watched president biden overseas, what's your assessment been so far? his message is that america is back. is it resonating for you on the world stage? >> well, it's great to be with you, alex, watching president biden overseas is incredibly refreshing. we finally have a president who is comporting himself in a manner that is consistent with the post that he has. he is reaching out his hand to repair the relationships we have where our eye lying and the fellow democracies that are at g7. we have a number of global challenges we are all trying to work together on, whether it's the pandemic, climate change, the rise of china or russian aggression. it's so important we work together to combat these challenges. we simply can't do it alone.

alliances are so important. it's refreshing that we have someone who understands the job as commander in chief to ensure that the u.s. has a place on the world stage and is working hard to repair the aliances so we can push back these adversaries. >> a stunning new pew research study conducted between march and may. it shows the u.s. is viewed favorably by 62% of the world, compared to 34% just a few months ago at the end of the trump administration. how much do you think this trip can boost america's global image? >> i think that poll tells us that leadership matters, and what we say as a nation, what our president says, matters. so i think it has a significant impact on our ability to repair

relations with our allies, as well as to deter our adver -- adversaries. in a recent interview vladimir putin discussed more. take a listen to this. >> we have a bilateral relationship that has deteriorated to the lowest point in recent years. former u.s. president mr. trump is an extraordinary individual, talented individual. president biden, of course, is radically different from trump. it is my great hope that, yes, there are some advantages, some disadvantages. >> so i'm curious, in your former position as a national security specialist at the pentagon, what do you make of putin's answer and how critical is a meeting with an adversary like russia?

what kind of tone needs to be set? >> it's clear from putin's comments that he's disappointed that the bromance with our former president trump is over. trump would never confront russia, and as a result russia engaged in aggressive actions toward the united states without any real consequences. biden has an opportunity here -- president biden has an opportunity here to set the record straight, to let russia know the united states will not stand for this type of aggression. you can't hack our private industries, our government agencies, our cry cam infrastructure, our elections without consequences. i think it will be different for biden to encourage cooperation while also setting very hard boundaries, and ensure that we impose consequences when russia violates those boundaries. >> i want to take us live and

show quickly the vice president. she's in washington, d.c., attending a pride parade. of course, here we go, live pictures right there. there we have it. in keeping with that, we should take note that today, a very com better day five years ago, orlando's pulse night clubs took the lives of several people. before i -- let's take a quick listen to our vice president. >> our transgender community and our youth are all protected. we need still protections around employment and housing. there's so much more work to do. i know we are committed. we understand the importance of this movement and our roles of leadership in this ongoing movement. so happy pride, everything.

>> hold the crowd there. hold. >> reporter: happy pride! >> there we hear the vice president, you know, talking about what we want to do going forward. i go back to the pulse nightclub shoot, congresswoman murphy, and how you think today. >> happy pride indeed. however, today does mark five years since a gunman took the lives of 49 victims in my community. for us, it feels like it happened yesterday. the emotions are so raw. after five years, i still can't fathom why someone would have done that. and -- but to be honest, i haven't an even harder time understanding why some

politicians have refused to take steps. while i'm proud the president will soon sign a bill we were able to pass through the house and senate to commemorate and mark pulse as a federally designated monument, we still need to do far more to honor the lives that were lost. we need to do that in the space of gun violence prevention, and making sure we pass gun safety laws. >> that would be a poignant thing. we were hearing from the owner of the dance club that no one will ever dance there again. a moment of pride that's also doing something to keep the horrors of covid in the past. that's next. horrors of covid in the past that's next. yeah, 1 out of 3 people get shingles in their lifetime. well that leaves 2 out of 3 people who don't. i don't know anybody who's had it. your uncle had shingles.

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some new video to share, on a plane that was forced to land in oklahoma city. it was heading from los angeles to atlanta when an unruly passengers disrupted the flight. it got so bad the captain could be heard over the system asking for help to detain the man. >> this is the captain speaking, we would like all [ bleep ] strong males to the front of the aircraft to handle a problem passengers. >> you can about imagine please

were waiting to take that passengers into custody. it is the latest in a series of problems with you will rulie passengers who have recently disrupted flights. in new york city, the brooklyn pride mini street festival is underway. lindsey, welcome to you. i understand there's a covid vaccine pop-up. can you explain how this will work? >> yeah, right here. this is all about the convenience factor. somebody may not necessarily drive themselves to a clinic. but if they're walking by, they it just takes three minutes. i talk to somebody just did that. they are here to answer the questions. there is not a ton of data and research on which immunity with vaccine hesitancy. they don't always asked for

gender identity or -- but here as a graphic. they did a survey in the spring to talk about this issue. they found 53% of trans adults are likely to get the vaccine. only 32% of bisexual women, and 29% of black lgbtq adults. so right now there's not enough research. historically this community melt marginalized. let's listen to the people running this pop-up and why this is so important here. >> we're seeing there's still some hesitancy, right? the idea is where can we do to be with people in their community. that's the big thing. we have people that are his fan. they may not take themselves into a clinic. if we can meet them on their

turf, their ground, their neighborhoods? >> of course, 2019 pride was huge. five million people. 2020, everything, of course, stopped. it was virtual. this year is a bit of a mix. here at this pride fest, they have this vaccine clinic. they'll be dodds these things all across the month, and they say this is the key to get new york city back to where it was. thank you so much, lindsey. let's face it between now and the end of time, there would be countless books brings on the pandemic, but there will be one that could be the most definitive, the author joins me next. nitive, the author joins m next we made usaa insurance for members like martin. an air force veteran made of doing what's right, not what's easy. so when a hailstorm hit, usaa reached out before he could even inspect the damage. that's how you do it right. usaa insurance is made just the way

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a new plan to make sure something like that doesn't happen again. >> i think that's what our countries now want us to focus on. they want us to be sure we're beating the pandemic together and how we're building back better together. and it comes as a new book is taking an inside look at the errors made and how america mishandled one of the biggest health -- staff writer for the new yorker and author of the book "the plague year." you look at this book and how the u.s. and the country probably mostly completely fumbled the ball. what happened? we had three strikes, alex. the first one took place in early january when robert redfield, the director of the

centers for disease control called his counterpart in china to see what was going on, and gow told him this was not a humanly transmissible ideas, even though chinese authorities knew different. urged gao to le cdc team in to help out and find out what was going on, but the chinese authorities wouldn't let u.s. scientists in. had they been able to get in, we would have found out, right then, that this was not only humanly transmissible but what was really a mystery for a long time, it was transmissible by asymptomatic infections. 70%, as many as that, of the people that got covid didn't even know they had it. but they were carrying the virus and spreading it, so we didn't know that for months, and it would have changed the way that we reacted to this. the second was the, oh, the fiasco of the tests.

as someone who has worked on stories before at the centers for disease control, it was heartbreaking to see that noble institution so humbled by the colossal errors that they made. even when they finally finished the test, when they sent it out, they knew before it left the doors of the cdc that this test would fail at least 30% of the time and they didn't tell anybody. the public health labs discovered that it was creating all these false positives. >> lawrence, can i ask you, if you give me those numbers, did they think that 70% efficacy was better than no percent? i mean, what do you think the ideology was? because as you said, it really did tarnish their image. >> alex, it's a mystery to me, honestly. i don't think that the entire cdc knew it, and there hasn't been any reporting outside of the cdc about, you know, what actually happened and who knew at the top.

but the people who formulated the test discovered before it left their lab that it was failing. and yet they sent it out anyway. >> okay, give me point number three, because you said there were three things that were the critical errors. >> the last, strike three, was the masks. you know, even public health officials were suspicious of the utility of masks. the surgeon general notably tweeted, don't buy masks, people, they don't work, and you know, finally, they had enough tests to show that mask-wearing was essential with this particular coronavirus. it might not work for every virus, but for this virus, it was the most important thing we could do, and when the president rolled out the plan, finally, in april of 2020, he said, you know, this is -- my health advisors say this is -- will work. they want you to wear it. i'm not going to wear it, but if

you want to wear it -- yeah, and he turned into a saboteur. he undermined the whole project. he even went to a mask-making factory without a mask on. >> i remember that. i mean, everyone was just thinking, what are you doing? the image of that alone was so devastating. let me ask you with regard to anthony fauci, who he has eviscerated many times on this whole mask issue. was there anything about anthony fauci, once he did know that masks were good and could be helpful, there was a concern about the supply of masks that were on the front lines and fauci at first was hemming and hawing about the efficacy of them but they needed them for the doctors and the nurses and the critically ill patients. was that part of the calculation for fauci and those working with him? >> it was, and honestly, alex, it was a mistake. when you hear that masks are not working, not necessary, and yet

you see health workers wearing them, you immediately think something's wrong with the picture, and so if they had been more straightforward with their messaging, i think that some of the distrust that's followed would not have taken place. >> let me ask you about something you wrote about the federal government saying because there was no national plan, quote, the pandemic was broken into 50 separate epidemics and dumped into the reluctant embrace of surprised and unprepared governors. how consequential was that approach? >> oh, had there been a federal plan -- i mean, there was a federal plan, it just was never pulled off the shelf. but had there been leadership, i think we would have had an entirely different experience with this pandemic. the governors were expecting the federal government to come in with fema and the national guard and, you know, just every -- all the resources of the federal government put to work but in a phone call in march of 2020, the

president told them that, you know, we're behind you, but you buy all this stuff yourselves. and gretchen whitmer, the governor of michigan, told me she realized at that point that in her state, they didn't have enough ppe for the next shift. it wasn't a matter of weeks or something. they were out. and it was up to the governors to find a way to get all these supplies, and they were -- wound up competing with each other even sometimes when they secured those things, they were seized by the federal government. so, it was -- it was a -- it could be almost comical if it hadn't been so tragic, you know, the health workers -- many of them got ill and a number of them died. how many would have been saved had they had the ppe they needed? >> yeah. i'll tell you, lawrence wright, we described it as being potentially the definitive book. it is called "the plague year"

and i think we're absolutely right in categorizing it that way. lawrence, thank you so much. it's a big decision facing new yorkers and today for the first time, many get to do something about it. first time, many get to do something about it ♪ it's grilled cheese time. ♪ ♪ yeah, it's time for grilled cheese. ♪ ♪ after we make grilled cheese, ♪ ♪ then we're eating grilled cheese. ♪ ♪ because it's time. ♪ ♪ yeah. ♪ ♪ time for grilled cheese. ♪ i've never slept like this before. we gave new zzzquil pure zzzs restorative herbal sleep ♪ yeah. ♪ to people who were tired of being tired. what is even in this?

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xfinity internet customers, switch to xfinity mobile and get unlimited with 5g included for $30 on the nations fastest, most reliable network. right now, new yorkers are heading to the polls as early voting in the city's mayoral primary is starting. let's go to msnbc's cori coffin who's outside a polling site in manhattan. actually, you're inside now. how are the voters feeling about the mayoral candidates, cori? >> i would say one is overwhelmed. there are a lot of candidates in this mayoral race with bill de blasio not running this year, he's term limited, that opens it up to some 13 democratic hopefuls and 2 republicans are going head-to-head in this primary as well. all of this culminating in this new choice ranked voting system, which is new this year for new york in which people can choose their first person and then they

can choose alternates so in case their first person does not get the majority, their alternate vote still counts for something. i spoke with a first-time voter today. listen here. >> i just became an american citizen last month so this is my first time ever. living in new york for as long as i have, i think it's important that we have good leadership and just to feel that we have a voice in the process of choosing the leadership of the city. i think it's important. >> reporter: all right, alex, so here are all the candidates up on your screen, and really, from polling, there have been some really wild swings that we have been seeing in just these last few days. eric adamson now taking the lead over andrew yang, former presidential hopeful, and then maya wily getting the highly coveted alexandria ocasio-cortez endorsement. they say their main issues are safety and economic recovery

from covid. long way to go here. >> thus a primary. thank you so much, msnbc's cori coffin. ♪♪ and a very good day to all of you from right here at msnbc world headquarters in new york. welcome, everyone, to "alex witt reports." in just about 30 minutes or so, we will see president biden and the other g7 leaders and some guests as they are expected to take another group photo before wrapping up a very busy second day of the summit. the group of leaders coming off several leaders today, talking global infrastructure, combatting china's growing influence, and pandemic recovery and prevention. all while president biden drove home his central message, america is back. >> the european union is an incredibly strong and vibrant entity that has a lot to do with