>> right. >> final question -- >> that's what we're doing. the clinical trials are ongoing right now. >> final question for you right now, how much is the mrna technology, which is debuted here at scale, how transformational is that? i keep reading incredible new avenues of research for other vaccinations that might happen on that platform. >> absolutely. it's transformative, chris. it has been highly, highly successful with covid-19. and right now, even as we speak, investigators are applying it to hiv vaccines, to malaria, to tuberculosis, to influenza, and even to cancer immunotherapy. so, right now it was so successful with covid-19, a lot of people, good people, good scientists are working on a number of other. >> that's right. dr. anthony fauci, a pleasure as always, sir. see you soon. that is "all in" on the tuesday night. "the rachel maddow show" starts

right now. good evening rachel. >> good evening, chris. much appreciated. thanks for joining us. happy to have you with us. did you know -- i did not know. i think of myself as someone who keeps up with the news and current events but i have been out of the loop because i did not know that aliens did 9/11. i had no idea. i only learned it today. >> how do you navigate a course through material that encompasses ancient civilizations, extraterrestrials, secret societies, and what is the relationship between those and the governments of our moderate world? >> i was able to learn about an ancient race. >> they are the most evolved extraterrestrial group that has ever been involved with humanity. >> they take a genetic approach to help them manage this great experiment. >> the cia declassified a

document that describes a cataclysmic series of events. >> the main message are for us to prepare ourselves. >> you know, i had no idea. i thought i knew. i thought i knew about these things. i did not know. the ets, the aliens and what they did, i didn't know. they are preparing us for the end of the world. they're, i think, going to cause the end of the world? i don't know if that's supposed to be good. the aliens, these cute little deflated pillsbury dough boys aliens, they're hidden right out in the open. that was a movie -- do we call these things a movie? that was a film that was released in 2019 -- at least 2019 when it was posted online. the same filmmaker also made this the year before. now, in this, you will recognize some of the same dudes from the other movie. but in this movie they have different haircuts and they have

different per ported expertise. >> no tire tracks and no footprints. >> the germans had a settlement on the moon. they had a settlement on mars. and they were doing this as early as 1939. >> between the age of 16 and 17 years old, i was transported to the moon. and after 20 years, i was age-regressed back in time and then returned to civilian life. >> this money is going into underground military bases and secret space programs with technology far beyond what many of us could even realize. >> at some point, this is all going to break open. >> the more you get involved, the more compromised you become. they may actually kill you. >> did you see the giant skulls? the skulls of giants there at the end? the giants who were also maybe

old rich dutch people who got their portraits painted. i know. huh, huh, huh? you ever seen those together? and if you put those next to a turnip, i'll tell you what. it turns out the giants may have done 9/11 and i think shot jfk. it was the giants -- or it was the aliens that did that. maybe the giants got killed by the aliens after they shot jfk. honestly, it's hard to figure out. i will tell you, as this filmmaker evolved overtime, his aliens have gotten better looking. they've gotten more stylish, kind of cooler. can we say his aliens are getting more hip z over time as his movies about him evolve. i mention this and i introduce you to this filmmaker's work because for the future of oour republic and one of our two major governing parties, it's important to know that that guy,

the aliens did 9/11 guy, has a new movie coming out this week. his 2018 movie was "nazis in space" and aliens killed jfk. his 2019 movie was aliens are eating our dna and free masons and watch out. and here comes the end of the world and the aliens are peaceful seeming and they'll be cool with you if you watch these movies. those were his previous works. his new movie which comes out this week is about the arizona audit, the so-called audit of the arizona presidential election result arranged by republicans in the state legislature. that is the subject of his next movie. he appears to be sort of the authorized dock documentarian of the audit. the movie does feature all the big players. the opening scene in the trailer for the film is ken bennet, the

arizona republican official who has served all this time as the spokesman for the audit. there he is talking to the nazis on the moon, aliens did 9/11 till m maker. look at the background. he's at the site of the arizona recount audit thing at that arena in phoenix talking to the aliens did 9/11 filmmaker about the arizona recount. the film includes footage and testimony from the guy who writes treasure hunting and big claim to fame was creating a bar code scanner shaped like a house cat. he claims to have secret technology he can't disclose to you which he called kinematic artifact detection. it is secret, but it is supposedly being applied to all of arizona's federal election ballots to prove -- to prove -- to prove! that donald trump must have secretly won. ask the secret cat scanner. the movie also includes,

apparently, the ceo, maybe also the sole employee of cyber ninjas. that's the firm, the guy, who's actually running whatever it is the republicans are doing with the federal election ballots in arizona. his name is doug logan, the ceo of cyber ninjas. he was shadowed out visually in the original trailer of the video. when local reporters in arizona recognized his voice, the filmmakers recut the trailer to make doug logan's voice digitally altered. then they cut him out entirely. but if you think you are ready to learn the truth about the 2020 arizona election results and you specifically want to learn that truth from the guy who finally figured out that it must have been aliens who did 9/11 and wow jfk too and watch out they might steal you and take you to the moon for 20

years, if that's the guy you want to learn the truth from about the arizona presidential election in 2020, he had some big news for you this week. you will not be shocked to learn that he announced this news on a telegram channel that's for followers of the qanon conspiracy theory. but that's where he made the announcement. you guys, you guys, his new movie is ready. he did the aliens movie in 2018. did the different aliens movie in 2019. but his 2020 movie is ready. it's apparently shot on site at the election audit in phoenix. it is premiering at a church in phoenix this weekend, which i think means it's time to the end of the audit. whatever they're doing at the audit is supposed to be wrapped up. and the big culminating event will be the screening of the official documentary of what happened in arizona and how the arizona audit will expose the trump truth of the -- the reason we know about any of

this is because really good reporters, dogged reporters, at the "arizona mirror," "the arizona republic" have been documenting this stuff for posterity. you otherwise wouldn't believe it. but a significant portion of the country, a majority of republican voters across the country say they believe that donald trump actually won re-election or at least that there was significant fraud and there were many irregularities in the last election. and when majorities of republican voters tell pollsters that, what they are thinking of is this so-called audit in arizona, right? there's a recount there, right? and it sounds like they're turning up stuff that's really, really bad. well, now from the guy who brought you the movie on the left about the secret space program growing aliens deep inside the earth, we're about to get what i guess is the authorized documentary expose of

the arizona thing, including the support and involvement of the republican officials and contractors who are running it. and it would be hilarious -- it still is kind of hilarious, except for the part where this is the basis for republicans in huge numbers now saying that the last election was distorted and corrupted by massive fraud. and so nobody can have any faith in the election outcome. and therefore republican controlled legislatures across the country must dramatically restrict voting rights and change the administration of elections so we never have another election like 2020 again. i mean, it will also be the predicate for whatever's going to happen in our country in august when arizona says they're going to release their findings after whatever it is the qanon cyber ninjas people did to the ballots and voting machines in arizona, their report on the so-called audit will be ready in late july or early august.

and august is when trump says he will be reinstated as president. he expects in august to be reinstated as president, presumably, he believes, on the basis of what arizona is going to say they found in this thing that they set up in this local arena and had documented by the nazis on mars guy. this just doesn't seem like a healthful way for a mature democracy to handle the transition of power, you know? and it -- you know, maybe it all seems like fun and games until an angry armed mob storms your national capitol to stop the election results from being certified. or someone reporting to the pro-trump faction in your state legislature starts banging on your door demanding to know who you voted for, threatening that you seem like the kind of person or this seems like the kind of address that feels a little shady to them and is going to be reported as fraud. the watchdog group, american

oversight, this week obtained a bunch of documents from the arizona republican who is set up and have administered the so-called audit there. among the documents they obtained was this one. reporting back, apparently, on a door-to-door canvas, quote, by a citizen's non-partisan grass roots project. they say they went door-to-door in maricopa county and pima county, arizona, knocking on people's doors asking who lived there and then asking about their vote in the presidential election in november. and then reporting up to arizona republicans that literally most of the addresses they went to seemed like likely fraudsters. 52% of those canvassed addresses required an affidavit for an irregularity. 52? really?

a majority of households in arizona are seen as needing affidavits because of irregularities as reported by volunteer citizen canvassers? this tracks with news we saw a week ago in "the arizona republic," quote, people are knocking on the doors of county residents in arizona and asking how they voted in the last election, while falsely claiming to represent the county recorder's office. the mysterious door-to-door survey has alarmed local officials. it comes after the u.s. department of justice warned arizona senate republicans against plans to canvass voters' homes as part of an unprecedented review of november's election. in fact, that warning is true. in may, the u.s. justice department, awe senior u.s. justice department official wrote to arizona republicans warning them about what they were doing with the so-called

audit, warning them ability strict federal laws that govern the handling of ballots and voting machines after a federal election. arizona republicans blew that off and kept doing exactly what they had been doing before, which means the justice department apparently didn't mean what they said in that letter because they never followed up or took any visible action, despite the implied threat in that letter. but the justice department's letter to arizona also explicitly warned arizona republicans about what had been their stated plans, to go bang on people's doors, to ask them about their vote in the presidential election. after doj sent that letter warning about the mishandling of ballots and voting machines, warning about plans to go door-to-door, arizona republicans responded to that part of it saying they didn't have plans to do the door-to-door stuff anyway. in this records request, thanks to american oversight, we know that happened. i mean, what arizona republicans have reported to them from these

volunteer canvassers is that it was thousands of arizonans who got knocks on their door with random people holding clipboards trying to appear like official something demanding to know about their vote in the presidential election. it happened in maricopa county, pima county. the justice department explicitly warned arizona about doing this, warned arizona republicans because it's against the federal law that prohibits intimidating voters in this way. they got the warning. they apparently did it anyway in three counties. thousands of households. is the justice department going to do anything about that other than their stern warning they sent in may followed up with no action in response? anyone? hello? is this thing on? we don't know what, if anything,

the white house and the biden administration, more broadly, plans to do to try to defend voting rights and to protect election processes against this unprecedented and still rising tide of pressure from republican-controlled legislatures and republican state houses around the country. today a reporter for "vice news" says she asked the number two senate democrat, dick durbin, what would happen next after republicans filibustered the voting rights bill in the senate today. writing senator durbin responded, quote, i'm not sure, meaning i'm not sure what will happen next. he then hinted that president biden is, quote, doing lite of things that haven't been announced publicly. before too long, white house chief of staff ron klain retweeted that, pointedly, literally with a little pointing emoji, seeming to endorse the idea that there may be actions president biden himself or the

biden administration more broadly is taking on this issue that we can't yet see. okay. i'm intrigued. i'm looking forward to finding out about that. but whether it's potentially justice department action to enforce federal laws around the handling of ballots and not intimidating voters or whether it's something else they've got in mind, when it comes to the law, when it comes to the path of legislation, it did hit that big expected speed bump today thanks to democrats unwillingness to reform the filibuster rules in the face of republican willingness to use the filibuster against absolutely everything, even voting rights. all 50 republican senators voted today that there should not even be a debate on the voting rights bill, the for the people act. that also meant that republicans didn't even consent to consider to even talking about a different version of the bill, like for example the significantly reduced iteration

of the bill proposed by conservative democratic senator joe manchin of west virginia. senator manchin has been the focus of so much attention on this issue because of the peculiar angle he took on this thing. it wasn't just that manchin said he didn't want to vote for a voting rights bill unless it had republican support. he said that, but he also expressed this relentless and sort of inexplicable optimism that some republicans would support voting rights in the end. when he wrote his op-ed in his hometown paper recently expressing his opposition to any voting rights bill that didn't have republican support, that was sort of an implicit criticism of his democratic colleagues in the senate for writing a voting rights bill that no republican senator could support. senator manchin put his theory to the test though. he wrote his own version of the voting rights bill, showing his concept of the kind of bill he felt republicans rightfully should support and should be expected to support on voting

rights. senator manchin drew up his own proposal, what he thought should get republican votes. the republican leader in the senate, mitch mcconnell, responded by calling the pro posed bill, quote, rotten. and then today republican senators, all 50 republican senators, voted to not even consider what joe manchin put forward. so, does this change senator manchin's mind about any of this? does it shift his idea that no voting rights bill should pass if it doesn't have republican votes? now that he sees the way that republicans are approaching this issue in terms of deciding what they're going to vote for, what they're going to vote to debate, what they're going to vote to hear, does this change his mind about whether or not a voting rights bill must have republican votes if it is going to be a legitimate approach to this issue that deserves his support? we don't know. senators leave at the end of this week to go home for a two-week-long -- oh -- july 4th

recess. what senators hear from their constituents when they're at home about the importance of voting rights, that may be determinative here as to whether this is now over or whether there might be a next step. at home in phoenix, arizona, today this was the scene at the offices of democratic senator kyrsten sinema. she is the other conservative democrat who's been a hold-out on this issue. also insisting since republicans ought to support voting rights, democrats should give up on it if they don't. i know, i know, i know. and her constituents clearly know. in addition to these visits at her office today, senator sinema is also facing ads like these ones running on arizona tv stations just blasting her for not being willing to get it done, for not standing up for voting rights. now, i don't know how this is going to end, but i do know that republicans in the states are

going maximalist with their position on this issue. to the point where they literally aren't ashamed to have the dude who makes movies about nazis on the moon and aliens doing 9/11 becoming the official documentarian for their effort to promote election fraud narrative to bolster not only disrespect for election broad strokes but specifically to bolster republican efforts in all republican-controlled states now to rescind voting rights. senate republicans in washington know that as long as the filibuster is there, democrats have no options in terms of backing up voting rights. clear on that -- the republican party being clear on that in terms of whether there's going to be federal protection for voting rights clears the field for republicans in the states to go maximalist and shamelessly as far as they can on this issue.

to make voting as restricted as possible, to target voting restrictions and the administration of elections in a way that is maximally partisan to their advantage. and so they proceed. unless democrats can figure out, can get their heads around the fact that this is what they're up against and fight the this same kand of fight on the same kind of terms. minnesota senator amy klobuchar is an original co-sponsor of the voting rights bill that stalled today in the senate. she said her next move is to take the show on the road. she said she's going to start doing field hearings in the states documenting stakes and taking it to places where the fight is being wage. senator klobuchar joins us next. stay with us. r joins us next. stay with us with extra broccolini. my tuuuurrrrn! tonight...i'll be eating cheesy cauliflower pizza and yummy broccolini! (doorbell rings)

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across the nation constitutional rights are being assaulted, and i fear that if we don't act as a body in this moment we will have crossed a

dangerous rubicon in our nation. why are some people hiding? to what end? for what purpose? at whose behest? >> we were reminded on january 6th that it is up to us to protect against threats to our democracy. honestly, i would love to get some support from the other side of the aisle, but we have to be honest. i don't expect we're going to get it. so, my republican colleagues, this is not the end of the line for this bill. this is not the end of the line. this is only the beginning. >> senators raphael warnock of georgia, amy klobuchar of minnesota were among many democrats today who spoke out in support of s.1, the for the people act, the big voting rights bill ahead of this afternoon's vote. it's passed the house. if it can pass the senate, it

will go to president biden and he will sign it into law. but that effort to get it on to the floor today for debate failed. all 50 republican senators voted against even starting debate on the bill. this was a filibuster. they required 60 votes to get this thing onto the floor and republicans insisted that would not happen. republican senate leader mitch mcconnell promised to make sure the bill stays dead, that it never goes anywhere. he vowed today to, quote, put an end to it. but despite today's defeat for proponents of the bill, a chorus of democratic senators said this fight is still beginning. they're not letting this go. senator klobuchar chairs the rules committee in the senate and announced her committee is packing up and going to georgia to hold a field hearing on the voting rights to hear first hand from voters in one of the states where election rules and voting rights are being radically restricted in the aftermath of president trump's re-election

loss last year. vice president kamala harris is technically the president of the senate. in that capacity, she presided over today's vote. afterwards, she also promised that this is not over. >> the issue here is is there actual access to the voting process, or is that being impeded? and the bottom line is that the president and i are very clear, we support s.1. we support the john lewis voting rights act. and the fight is not over. >> you can hear the reporter at the end there saying, what's next? what's next? which of course is the key question. joining us now is minnesota senior senator, the chair of the rules committee in the senate, senator amy klobuchar. senator, it's great to have you here. thank you so much. >> thanks, rachel. >> what's next? where does this go? >> what's next? we're going to georgia. the rules committee has not gone on the road for 20 years, and that is just the beginning because my colleagues maybe

should have learned a lesson in georgia, my republican colleagues. and that is i smiled when i heard the great senator warnock speak, the guy who said it all in probably one sentence. this is all summed up that some people don't want some people to vote. and guess what? when the people of georgia saw what was happening back in early january, when they saw the big lie being perpetrated on them, when they saw their elections being undermined by the republican party, they turned out and they voted. they didn't just vote in one democratic senator, they voted in two. so, we had the people on our side on this big time, rachel. democrats, republicans, independents. the bill polls at 78% for many of the provisions. we have a united party as you saw by the vote today. so, we are not ending this fight. and one of the ways we do that is getting out of this capitol dome and heading out to the states so we can hear from people and so my colleagues can hear them because it's hard to

hide when you have people talking about standing in 10-hour lines without food and water or people trying to find one drop-off ballot box in the middle of harris county texas of five million people or the discriminatory voting practices or six states still requiring notarized signatures from notary publics just to get an application for an absentee ballot. that's what they're going to hear when we go out there to states across the country. >> and is it your expectation that that kind of pressure and that kind of public support for the voting rights protections in this bill, is it your expectation that that will peel off republicans who will decide that they want to align themselves more with public opinions on this. or is it your expectation that democrats in your own caucus will decide that this is important enough and there's enough public support for this that this is worth a new approach for the senate rules that allows this to be passed

without republican votes? >> i would take either. but the point is that i'm not giving up, and senator warnock is not giving up, nor is senator merkley. we are not giving up. and i favor abolishing the filibuster. and i came to that decision after years of inaction, after seeing how important legislation on things like climate change, immigration reform, things where there was bipartisan agreement got stopped because of archaic procedure. and i don't think our colleagues should be able to tyrannize us and the country and hold the country hostage. i don't think you should be able to filibuster our democracy. that's what i believe. of course, yes, we have to convince our colleagues to make changes. they've been open to reform. you've heard senator manchin talk about the standing filibuster, and we can proceed that way, and we can also put pressure on republicans. but the point is there are so many provisions in this bill, including, by the way, the disclose act to go after dark

money in our politics. that is overwhelmingly popular. and i would like to see my colleagues on the other side vote against that or my honest ads act which simply says that social media companies have to put disclosures and disclaimers on these ads so we know exactly where the money's coming from. all of these things are going to be on the ballot as we move forward. >> i mentioned a few minutes ago about an exchange with senator durbin of illinois that a reporter from "vice news" had with him today in which he told her he wasn't sure what was going to happen next procedurally. but he also said that it was his understanding that president biden and the biden white house are doing a lot of things on this issue that haven't been announced publicly but that might be materially relevant in terms of what happens next. do you have any idea what he's talking about? is there someplace else we should be looking in terms of next steps and what else should be available? >> there's a lot of things. we're working on an

infrastructure package right now. there's the bipartisan group that's negotiating hard, but there's also going to be a second package, and we can include election infrastructure in there. when it comes to the justice department, you're looking at people like benita gupta that's over there, people like kristen clark. these are experienced leaders who understand voting rights. this is not your daddy's justice department or should i say your daddy william barr's justice department anymore. these are incredible forceful leaders who know what they're doing. so, i can't tell you exactly what they're going to do. but what i can say is they're going to make sure that these states out there who are even thinking of impinging on people's right to vote, they're going to go after that because you can't do that in america. this is a fundamental right shared by democrats, republicans, independents, anyone that wants to vote in america, something that our whole country was founded on, the simple idea of democracy. and these guys, whatever they are, cyber ninja, whatever they

are, they are messing with us right now. and people in this country don't like that. look at what they did in georgia back in january. so, we've got major, major work in front of us on many fronts, rachel. so, i don't want to take away from the work we've got to do in the coming month on infrastructure and build back better. but i can tell you there are a number of us that see the evil that's out there and we're not just going to pretend and go away. that's why i'm bringing the rules committee out on the road. >> minnesota senator, share of the rules committee, senator amy klobuchar of minnesota. it's great to have you here. i know that this is the start of a different kind of fight here. thanks for keeping us apprised tonight. it was great to see you. >> thanks rachel. all right. a little jarred by the whole daddy william barr thing. i'm just going to take a quick shower. i'll be right back. o take a quik shower i'll be right back when heartburn takes you by surprise.

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this is power. so's this. you recognize it. but for the corporate special interests and billionaires buying our elections, dark money is power. billions spent manipulating elections. gerrymandering partisan congressional districts. and restricting our freedom to vote. exactly why we need the for the people act--h.r. 1. to finally ban dark money. ensure fair congressional districts. and protect our freedom to vote. because the real power is you. and it's time for the people to win.

what if you could push a button and it's time and less carbon would be put into the air. if there were a button that would help you use less energy, breathe cleaner air, and even take on climate change... would you press it? a year ago my very good,

very old friend, a producer on the show, steve benin, published a book that is basically a -- i mean, it's not a reference guide. it's a narrative. but i have sense used it as a frequently referred to reference guide for how to understand today's politics and how to understand what's not the same between the two parties. the book is called "the imposters: how republicans quit governing and seized american politics." the basic thesis is that the democratic party is different from the democratic party in one very specific way. they are post-policy. whatever they may have been in the past or whatever they may have been driven in the past, the key insight you need for understanding them today is that they are not working on policy anymore. they are not working on governing. they're working on power. they're working on messaging. they're working on all sorts of other things that benefit themselves. but governing, policy, running

the country, not a functioning dynamic inside their party at all. and a post-policy party uninterested in governing is of course a very nice, very empty vessel that can, with shocking ease, be taken over by, say, a demagogue with no goals beyond his own power and ego. here's a little piece of it. this is from a brand-new afterword to "the imposters" out day. among the hallmarks of postpolicy thinking the isty ae jenks of data, evidence and the expertise. in the case of the 2020 presidential election, the data showed trump losing the race badly. indeed, christopher krebs, the nation's top cyber security official at the department of homeland security celebrated the fact that the elections were the most secure in american history and with were untainted by irregularities. president trump responded by

firing christopher krebs for having told the truth when even attorney general william barr couldn't find the evidence of systemic fraud. trump parted ways with him too. it would have been awful enough for an american president to borrow the playbook used too often by foreign autocrats, but the calamity was made worse by the willingness to endorse trump while he tried to overturn the results of his defeat, unmoved by trump's apparent madness and the toll it was taking on the integrity of the country's institutions. and of course that effort has only grown in pace and scope since then. the effort to undermine the results of the 2020 election is now the animating force within the republican party, which more than anything is working on rescinding voting rights and seizing partisan control. it shows no sign of slowing down, quite the contrary.

here's one very important point that steve makes in his book. and this is part of why i love steve and have worked with him for so many years, since literally we were kids, at least i think of us as kids. he also writes about the fact that it is not inevitable that the republicans are a post-policy party. it is a choice they are making. and you can prove it. steve says, quote, it would be a mistake to assume republicans are incapable of effective policy making. when utilizing gerrymandering techniques to give republican candidates unfair and undemocratic electoral advantages. for example, republicans have demonstrated an uncanny ability to carefully utilize evidence in pursuit of substantive goals. appeals court found ub are can officials drew boundaries that targeted black voters with, quote, almost surgical precision. it was part of a racist scheme to undermine democracy, but it was also a remind thaer when republicans are willing to set

their minds to it, they are willing to roll up their sleeves and do work in pir suit of their goals. their goals are sometimes abhorrent but the party at least has the capacity, meaning they're pneumorat, right? they just don't choose to be when it comes to things like bogus election fraud games. when it comes to drawing maps for election fraud gain, they can do that. laws aimed at making it harder for certain people to vote and easier for republican officials to overrule election outcomes they don't like up to and including tonight's united republican senate blockade against even debating a new voting rights bill. republicans are showing they can set a goal and work toward it. it's just that the only goal they seem to have right now is making it harder to vote and undermining faith in american elections. joining us now is my friend steve benen, a long-time

producer of this program, the author of "the impostors" out today in paperback with a brand-new afterword. this is the part where we remind people you were also the first ever guest on the first ever "rachel maddow show" where you were sitting in front of a fake bookcase. now 13 years down the road you're still my guest when i need to talk to you. but those are real books and they're at a jaunty angle. >> i'm annoyed by the fact when i look back at that original interview you look the same and i don't. and that seems terribly unfair. >> it's a wig. that's pretty much how i do it. that's my secret. steve, i want to ask you about what we saw today and the conversation i just had with senator klobuchar. seeing republican unanimity against even debating the voting rights bill, seeing senator

mcconnell define this as something that -- a hill he'll die on and this is not a problem and it needs no solutions and republicans will entertain nothing on this issue. how does that fit into your broader understanding of what the republican party wants and what they're good at? >> well, what they're good at is acquiring and maintaining power. and that is really their only principle focus, their only principle goal. i think today we saw evidence of that. what democrats did was approach this as a policy matter. they saw a problem in need of solution. they relied on data. they relied on evidence. they turned to experts and they put together a credible governing solution the way a governing party should. what did we see from republicans? we saw the opposite. we saw them discard the data. we saw them discard the evidence. we saw them focusing on their political goals, their ideological goals. that's very much in keeping with this post-policy thesis. a governing party would approach this entirely differently.

that asymmetry where democrats are approaching one way and republicans another, that asymmetry is the defining problem in my mind of american politics today. >> you and i talked about this idea, this insight into this difference between the parties for a long time before you wrote the book and we've been talking about it ever since and now with the new afterword, i feel like the conversation keeps getting deeper but we're in the same place that we were and we still have the same pressing issue in terms of what the country needs which is what do you do about it? we still don't have a playbook for what to do when one of two major parties in the country gives up on the idea of governing and decides to work essentially just on holding power. do you feel like your understanding of this phenomenon has advanced to the point where you can be prescriptive as to how democrats should approach combat with their partisan counterparts here given the differences between the two parties? >> i think that some democratic

senators make the same mistake that some voters make, which is that for years we can make the assumption that there were two responsible and mature governing parties. folks make that decision all the time, assuming that both democrats and republicans have the technocratic wherewithal to solve problems. and the point i'm trying to emphasize in the book is that that assumption is badly in need of reexamination. to assume our governing party is to overlook this radical transformation that we've seen in the party over the course of the last 12 years. and so when we see some democratic senators, people like west virginia's joe manchin, they make this assumption -- they're sticking to this old fashioned assumption that republicans are the same as they were. they're not. they've made this transition to being a post-policy party. they've abandoned the pretense that policy making matters altogether. >> and that means that there's no point in arguing policy with them essentially. >> exactly. >> that the field of combat once

they've designed it is power only. it has to be power politics, right? >> exactly right. when republicans focus exclusively on the acquisition and maintenance of power and treating them as if they're a member of a governing party, that leads to breakdowns. we've seen several of those breakdowns just this year on thing lieks the first debate of 2021. but we see from republicans a preoccupation with dr. seuss and the months that followed on infrastructure. on january 6th commission, on voting rights. again and again, the democrats are talking past one another because the parties are not just asking -- they're not just offering different answers. they're asking different kind of questions. >> steve benen is a producer on this show. he's the editor of maddowblog.com. there's probably nobody writing on politics in a daily way that has more influence on the way i think about politics than the great steve benen.

steve, congratulations on the paperback. the book is called "the imposters: how republicans quit governing" thank you so much for your time tonight. it's great to see you. >> thank you so much. >> more ahead. stay with us. so much >> more ah d. with us great tasting... they're power-packed vitami that help unleash your energy. loaded with b vitamins... ...and other key essential nutrients... ...it's a tasty way to conquer your day. try centrum multi gummies. now with a new look. i've got big news! now nurtec odt is the first and only medication proven to treat and prevent migraines. don't take if allergic to nurtec. the most common side effects were nausea, stomach pain, and indigestion. ask your doctor about nurtec today! ever notice how stiff clothes ask your doctor can feel rough on your skin? it's because they rub against you creating friction. and your clothes rub against you all day. for softer clothes that are gentle on your skin, try downy free & gentle. just pour into the rinse dispenser and downy will soften your clothes without dyes or perfumes.

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polls are now closed tonight in the race to be the democratic candidate for mayor in the largest city in the country. and even if you know absolutely nothing about new york city politics, even if you've never been to new york city, you probably know that the democratic primary for mayor in new york city is essential will i the whole ball game. new york isn't what it used to be, and whoever the republicans pick in their primary, that person dollars to donuts will not win the general election in november. the democratic candidate will have a huge advantage. it just means whoever wins today's democratic primary will likely go on to govern the city

that has a population larger than 40 of the 50 states. former presidential candidate andrew yang, the borough president from brooklyn, lawyer and civil rights activist maya wiley. that's just to name a few. that's a minority of the candidates who are running bum whether or not you care about who's ultimately going win, this is going to be fascinating to watch, because this is the first time new york's using ranked choice voting. you pick your top five and list them in order of preference. if your first choice doesn't win and gets knocked out, your first choice gets re-al located to your second choice, third choice, fourth choice, fifth choice. it's complicated. at least the tabulating is

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all right, that's going to do it for us for now. overnight we're going to be watching election results come in, including in new york, also the very interesting question of who will replace cy vance, the new york state prosecutor in manhattan who's been pursuing this complex, perhaps consequential investigation of donald trump and his business. we'll have coverage of all that and more tonight here on msnbc, continuing now with the last word with lawrence o'donnell. >> you know it's election night, if not in america, in new york city, because steve kornacki's here. that's going to be fun. also with us leading off is senator jeff merkley the