"the washington post" reports that prosecutors in new york gave the trump organization until today to convince them not to charge donald trump's family business criminally. quote, prosecutors in new york have given former president donald trump's attorneys a deadline of monday afternoon to make any final arguments as to why the trump org should not face criminal charges over its financial dealings, according to two people familiar with the matter. that deadline is a strong signal manhattan d.a. cy vance and letitia james, working together after each has spent two years investigating, are considering criminal charges against the company as an entity. today's "washington post" headlines confirming last week by nbc news and "the new york times" that the ex-president's company is expecting to be charged criminally. "the times" reporting charges

are pending as well. last thursday lawyers working for trump personally and for the trump org. ronald fischetti said on friday prosecutors are going forward with the case against the company because weisselberg wasn't cooperating and saying what they wanted him to say with respect to whether trump had personal knowledge about his cfo az alleged use of cars, apartments and other compensation. and while the cases in new york are flashing red today, they do not represent the only legal dilemmas for the ex-president and his legal circle. a cornucopia awaits the ex-president, his familiar-and his friends. in washington, d.c., quote, recent filings made by the ag's

office shows a probe is starting to home in on the actions of trump's longtime financial confidant and others. topping the list of witnesses d.c. investigators now want to interview is allen weisselberg who is, of course, also at the center of the new york city probe. and over in san francisco the fbi confirmed to the "san francisco chronicle" it recently paid a visit to the home of a known giuliani associate who was involved in a smear operation against hunter biden. it is not known if the fbi activity had anything to do with giuliani or the efforts against the current president's son. the new york investigation flashing red is where we start today. some of our favorite reporters and friends. former u.s. attorney and msnbc legal analyst joyce nantz is here. also joining us "washington post" investigative reporter josh dawsey joins us. his by-line is on the piece of reporting we read from. and former assistant director for counterintelligence and security analyst, frank joins

us. first, start with your reporting and tell us if there are any updates today. >> for months, years, there have been investigations into the trump organization, the financial dealings in new york, and they seem to be coming to a head now. today was the final deadline, end of day today, to present any sort of mitigating evidence to not have charges brought against the company and our sources indicate the cfo allen weisselberg could face charges as soon as later this week. a two-pronged effort here. one the trump corporation as a whole and then weisselberg in particular. prosecutors in new york have been quite frustrated they've not been able to secure the cooperation they wanted from mr. weisselberg. they believe he still maintains close contact with former president trump and on a recent morning my colleague saw him drive his bmw into trump tower. he's going there almost every

day. right now it looks there's a crescendo coming in the upcoming days on various investigatory fronts in new york. >> joyce, if we go back in time and we look at everything we know prosecutors have, explain why they need weisselberg's cooperation with all of the paper that they have in front of them. >> the key inflection point in cases of fraud is proving knowledge and intent on the part of defendants. it's easier to go after the corporation. i suspect we'll see that if an indictment is handed down here. but cy vance and letitia james have a treasure-trove of documents. they still need someone, though, who can put knowledge and intent in the mind of the president.

and who better than weisselberg, who has been with him for decades, who likely knows where all of the bodies are buried, and can talk about the president, the former president's level of involvement in transactions. at this point without a cooperator in weisselberg's shoes, there's at least some possibility that trump or other key folks involved in the corporation would have the ability to defend by saying weisselberg did this. it was him, it was folks at his level. we didn't know. we would have never condoned this. that's why someone like weisselberg is the linchpin witness for prosecutors. >> so, frank, talk about what happens from the investigative side if the company is criminally charged today or later this week. >> well, first, let's pay particular attention to the actual charges themselves because there's a lot of theorizing about whether the

fringe benefits and failure to disclose them, which is serious in and of itself, absolutely. i don't mean to downplay those. but many people seem to think there are more charges coming than just that. if it's kind of painted as the trump attorney is painting it saying this is about -- people got fringe benefits but it's not part of their salary or income, and it's going to be painted to the trump base as, look, there's a snafu with how we decided to handle these things. who can figure out their taxes anyway? i think there's more coming. let's pay particular attention to what those charges are. also, even the announcement, the public reporting that charges are coming, serves a purpose whether it's intended or not for other people who have knowledge to think this may be the time. i'd better come forward now. let's watch and see if there's some evidence of other people

coming in to cooperate if weisselberg won't. and we need to watch from a security standpoint how trump and his cohorts portray this to their base, whether they will use rhetoric that inflames people toward possible violence or further undermines our criminal justice system. >> well, frank, i need you to say more. i'm thinking as i listen to all three of you that trump has now been -- he's run afoul of the law so many times we have so many models to look at whether it's an unindicted co-conspiracy in michael cohen's documents for campaign finance violations, whether it's the six obstructive acts of obstructing the muller investigation. we have seen the playbook run enough times. you mentioned a security concern. say more. >> there's a track record of attacking the investigators,

attacking the prosecutors. and anytime you do that, there is this growing fringe element that wants to act out violently because they seem to be so loyal to this former guy that when they think he's being unfarpunf attacked they act out. he seems to relish that but does nothing to contain that and say i don't mean you should be going and hurting people, that you should be attacking the courthouse or people's homes this is a track record. i think we should get concerned about that. i think the people responsible for security in and around the d.a.'s office in manhattan and the courthouse need to understand that kind of intelligence gathering is needed right now because they're going to start to inflame people. >> josh, i know it's your job to watch the things the ex-president says and does. i missed his political events over the weekend.

has he already started attacking? i think it is public facing acknowledgement of guilt or impending legal doom when he starts attacking the people investigating him. has that commenced already? >> it has. in north carolina and ohio. you're already seeing lots of critical rhetoric. what he's doing is painting them as part of a broader deep state cabal as he's done for years to put them in with mueller and these people who will go after him as unfair fishing he had pe expedition, witch-hunt, and he's done that time and time again when there have been various inquiries into him and his administration. you're already seeing that with his allies as well on social

media and television appearances where they question the credibility of james and vance and you can imagine if any sort of charges are brought against the trump organization or mr. weisselberg there will be a full-throttle attack mode from the former president and his allies. there will be an attempt to scourge and besmirch them. he's done it over and over. he's done it quite effectively. it will be curious what happens here. >> joyce, the variable seems to be he used all the levers of the federal government including his treasury secretary and everyone available to him to keep the financial records and records of his businesses from every other investigator. mueller didn't have them. this is the first investigation into his businesses where they've been armed with all of the paper.

can you talk about something, i think frank alluded to, that if the company is charged criminally with whatever those charges are today or later this week there could be more. what else might they be looking at? what does more mean? >> so more is an interesting question here. prosecutors are notoriously tightlipped about what they're looking at. part of that is because there are rules that require secrecy around grand jury proceedings but you never want to tip your hand too far unless you're involved in plea negotiations with someone you want to cooperate. so we've seen lots of tips of the iceberg that involve different types of fraud, insurance fraud, tax fraud, bank fraud, and this could turn out to be a rather broad indictment covering any sort of conduct the former president was involved in during the statute of limitations period or this narrow focused charge we're hearing the most about these

days, this notion that there were some tax issues that weren't properly reported. i think that really leads to frank's security point, nicolle, because we have seen the steps that trump was willing to go to when he was threatened, but when the threat didn't materialize, it was only on january 6 we saw him point this angry mob towards capitol hill in an effort to save the presidency for himself that we got a true sense of what he was capable when he's really threatened. if there is an indictment in manhattan, there's no telling what he will do. >> joys, i want to ask you a weedsy question. there were questions about whether mueller was looking at witness tampering, and i want to read you some of his past statements about loyalty particularly as it pertains to weisselberg. he says this in his own book. quote, i think the reason we have so many loyal people we reward loyalty and everybody knows this. it has become part of the corporate culture of the trump

org. people like allen weisselberg and matt calamari are great and have proven themselves over years. he also after 2018 after michael cohen was charged and said to be sentenced said of weisselberg, the trump organization didn't betray him when he agreed, 100% he didn't. now as said, he effectively ran smear campaigns but he was the president. he was thought to perhaps have campered with witnesses but, again, he was the president. are there questions whether he has bought off allen weisselberg? >> there is no way to look at this situation and not wonder. look, nicolle, trump's idea of

loyalty is not your idea or my idea. none of us -- i guess we don't have the power to, but even if we did, i doubt we would dangle pardons in someone's face to keep them from testifying in a federal investigation. and we know that's part of trump's tool kit. he's willing to do anything to protect himself. so has something happened with weisselberg? is there something over his head or so valuable that he's willing to be indicted or remain in prison? we don't know that for sure, but we also don't know exactly how far prosecutors have gone in their talks with weisselberg. it's possible he's on the fence, that he needs a little bit more persuasion, that he's not quite there, that he's in the process. one thing that's effective when you're a prosecutor is looking at the possibility of charging someone's children.

most people, most right-thinking people, will do anything to protect their children. and keep them from going to prison. if that is a possibility here, there's been some signal that's under consideration, then weisselberg may be closer to flipping than not. >> it is another pattern of the trump era, frank, fathers and sons in most instances. i want to widen the circle beyond fathers and sons and put up the trump associates, rudy giuliani under federal investigation, i think by two u.s. attorney's offices, victoria tensing, eric trump has been deposed by one of the new york investigations, donald trump jr. has been deposed as the d.c. investigation into the 2016 inauguration and allen weisselberg has been investigated or at least

interviewed in multiple probes. what does that look like for prosecutors? do they look at a culture? is that why the company is on the precipice of being charged? >> yeah, it matters, and i'll get to that in a second. as of today we have mother jones reporting in a great piece that ivanka in her testimony to the d.c. attorney general about the inauguration committee enriching the trump international hotel and the organization, seems to have perjured herself essentially saying, no, i had no role in the inauguration committee, yet there's emails and emails with her on them right down to selecting the menu and the catering and hosting events during the inauguration. let's add her to the list of friends and family caught up in the toxicity that, yes, there's

a culture of corruption. and, yes, investigators and prosecutors pay attention to that because it can go to the approach and strategy to a prosecution whether you're looking at an enterprise approach, whether you're going to claim the entire organization is systematically corrupt, that is exists to commit fraud or fraud is how is does business and, therefore, that allows you to take down an entire organization. and it makes a difference when you're deciding to charge corporate officers at an organization if it's systemic, if they were all in it and coordinated and collaborated together. that helps prosecutors decide whether individuals need to go to prison as well. >> you know, josh, i remember -- i think it was maybe 2018, one of the turnovers between chiefs of staff, one of the candidates asked as a condition of potential employment for a legal defense funds to be committed. this person didn't end up taking

the job, and i don't know if the fund were committed but it wasn't because he thought he would commit a crime on the senior staff. it was because even trump's closest allies were cognizant of the criminality and corruption around the ex-president. do you think they're really going be to be successful in blaming this on a loose network of state, local and federal investigators and prosecutors? >> what the former president is trying to do is convince the republican grassroots, which are far more likely to be with him, that is the case. you've seen throughout the presidency a durable where his numbers have stayed in the low 40s and those people believe him no matter what he says. his famous quote was shoot someone on fifth avenue and it stuck with him no matter what. i think you're seeing an effort to convince those folks of that. if there's incontrovertible or compelling evidence that there

was decades of tax fraud, i don't know that to be true. i'm saying if there is that, it's probably a more difficult sell, i guess, if the charges are less severe. there's an argument he can make that it was an overreach. i guess we'll have to wait and see what the evidence and the actual charges if they come are here. >> so, joyce, there is a pattern over the last four years of news about the ex-president's legal woes breaking in the next two hours. say that happens, we learn that his company has been charged, what are your first questions? >> the first thing i want to do is exactly what frank was talking about. i want to read the indictment and see what the actual charges are and who they're brought against because that will tell us whether this is a limited sort of an indictment or whether it's a broad, expansive prosecution that's now under way. it's really important to remember that the new york attorney general has ruled her

investigation into the d.a.'s investigation. that suggests this isn't some low-hanging fruit, that there's really something serious afoot here, whether that would all come out in an initial indictment or a staged sort of prosecution here. we don't yet know the answer to. but i want to read the document as soon as it's available. >> josh dawsey, since you are on this beat, if news breaks, please come back and share it with us. joyce and frank, thank you for starting us off today. when we come back, how close were we to the american president deploying american troops on american protesters? new reporting suggests pretty darned close. and the top military lead hers to push back aggressively against a very volatile and angry president trump. plus, an exclusive look at what really happened behind the scenes on january 6th, even the nation's vice president was caught off guard by the

president treating the capitol riot as a spectacle. but first, we'll head out to surfside, florida. officials there say the priority is still search and rescue for the 151 people who remain unaccounted for. a live report on that and a look at some of the victims who are now being identified from this horrific tragedy. all those stories and more after a quick break. quick break. s mov. an alternative to pain pills voltaren is the first full prescription strength gel for powerful arthritis pain relief... voltaren the joy of movement this isn't just a walk up the stairs. when you have an irregular heartbeat, it's more. it's dignity. the freedom to go where you want, knowing your doctor can watch over your heart. ♪♪

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it is the fifth day of digging through the enormous rubble and debris in surfside, florida, today, as engineers and officials continue their rescue efforts as well as trying to piece together exactly how that

entire building collapsed last week. a report about the building from 2018 has resurfaced in which an engineer flagged a, quote, major error from the building's origin regarding the drainage on the pool deck that it caused, quote, major structural damage. the residents were told the building was in good shape. also over the weekend after days of pleading, families were allowed to go on site to grieve for their missing loved ones. the death toll has risen to ten. as of this morning 151 souls are still unaccounted for. hope remains among the families waiting. one of the people missing is judy spiegel, who is son and daughter spoke with andrea mitchell earlier today about why they're not giving up. >> i think that my family is just really scared because, like, obviously it's day five. there's been no one that's rescued that's alive at this point. i mean, we're hoping and praying for a miracle, and we are holding on to hope because we

really want to be reunited with my mom. >> joining us with the latest from surfside, florida, is allison barber. i have read everything this weekend from things about the structure to the more searing stories of people waiting for news of their loved ones. take me through both sides of this ongoing tragedy. >> reporter: yeah, i mean, there's a lot to process. one resident who lives in one of the towers in this condominium still standing, they feel like the discussion needs to be all parts, not just the search and rescue, not just the grieving families, but also how this happened and what accountability looks like. they say there are levels to that, that they think laws need to change at a federal level, state level, local level, and that things should maybe change in the way condo boards operate as well. but officials, they say, all of that stuff will come later, that the focus right now is on search and rescue. crews are still working, trying

to recover anyone alive from the rubble. the update we got this afternoon was one no one wanted, the news they had pulled yet another body from the rubble bringing the death toll to ten. we don't know a lot about all of the victims. eight of them have been identified. from the little we know these were precious lives. they were people's mothers, people's fathers, grandparents, siblings, people who were loved by someone and greatly missed. i want to go through the names and let you see their faces and tell you what we do know. stacy fang is a mom, she was there with her young teenage son, the only person pulled alive from the rubble early thursday morning. she passed away at the hospital. her family said there are no words to describe the loss.

and then gladys and antonio lozano. then there's anna ortiz and her son. said to call luis unforgettable would be an understatement and then christina elvira and leon oliwkowiicz. 151 people are still unaccounted for. what a normal thursday it probably was. they probably brushed their teeth on a normal week night, many expecting to just go to work the next day. they were asleep never imagining the floor underneath them would collapse. that is exactly what happened. people are still trying to understand how this could happen and start the process of

grieving. we spoke to a person who lives in one of the condos still standing. listen to what she told us. >> i had a dog. which i walked at least two to three times a day. and there were a number of people at the champlain south who walked their dogs as well, and we always stopped to say hello. right now whenever i see a photo of one of the people that are missing, i just get very upset. but it's mostly anger at the fact that something like this happened. >> reporter: she lived in the east tower. the one that collapsed is the south tower. there's a makeshift memorial with photos of so many people still missing and now stuffed

animals. they took to that makeshift memorial. nicole? >> are any of the other buildings around evacuated? have they been deemed safe or unsafe? >> reporter: when we spoke to people who live in the east tower, they said they've noticed some cracks within their building, in the garage area. they said having spoken with officials and once they finally got someone out to look at the building they were telling us it was frustrated that it took longer than they would like, they feel comfortable and safe but at the same time we've had the mayor of surf side saying that these other towers that are connected to this big kind of condominium that they're under a voluntary evacuation. he said if he lived in the north tower he would have chosen to evacuate. he's not aware of concerns mandating that people need to leave.

people feel like they don't know what is going on and let's focus on the search and rescue. for people still living in those nearby building, no, we want to know how this happened now and make sure this is safe because there are people still living here as well and tomorrow of those answers people feel they haven't gotten them enough from their own condo board. constant updates particularly to the families of those still missing. nicolle? >> thank you for your extraordinary reporting of just an unbelievable tragedy. thank you very much. when we come back, is the chairman of the joint chiefs milley becomes the latest manufactured villain for the right, new reporting on the role he played last year has emerged in keeping a check on trump's desperate and dangerous power grab against everyday americans. that story is next. is next

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really alarming new details are emerging about reaction to the protests for racial justice and they reveal just how willing the former president was to use maximum force to crush anything and anyone who stood in his way. "the new york times" is reporting trump aides had drafted an order to invoke the insurrection act and deploy the u.s. military to washington, d.c. from that "times" reporting quote, mr. trump engaged by the

demonstrations had told the attorney general bill barr and general mark milley he wanted thousands of active duty troops on the streets of the nation's capital. trump was talked out of the plan by the three officials. michael bender reports in his new book that trump wanted to put general milley, now a target of a coordinated right-wing smear campaign over his comments about race in charge of what could have been a brutal and violent campaign to suppress the protests. milley firmly pushed back in what quickly became a shouting match in the situation room according to an excerpt. it goes like this. quote, i said you're an f-ing charge, trump shouted at him. quote, i'm not in charge, milley yelled back. quote, you can't f-ing talk to me like trump said. there's a room full of lawyers here. will someone inform him of my legal responsibilities. he's right, mr. president, bill

barr said. the general is right. joining our conversation is the host of the independent american podcast, president of righteous media and founder of iraq and afghanistan veterans of america. and mike schmidt is here, a "new york times" washington correspondent and national security adviser whose byline is on that story we started with about a draft of the insurrection act being prepared. tell us more about that. >> well, the president was very serious about this, and i think that's what we were trying to show in our reporting, this is something the president talked about openly and talked about it so much that his aides thought he may want to do it and he may argue he needs to do it and have that document ready for him. on a broader level it shows us something we've come to learn and know, but that is that trump's first instincts are towards grabbing as much power

as possible, grabbing as much of the mill taerp to use as possible when he faces a domestic problem, when he faced problems politically, he often reached for the justice department. here he was facing a problem with protests and he was reaching for the military. and it follows that pattern and behavior, something that we see up through and after the election when there are discussions in the oval office about martial law and there were concerns about the president using the insurrection act around the election and such. indicative of the president's larger behavior over four years of trying to grab the arms of government and using it for his own politicalness and showing the severity and serious nature of what the president was considering. >> and, paul, to mike's point, it's about not just the pushing out of military power but the pulling back of it as well. when you look at one of the

central questions that a 9/11-style commission to look at january 6th would answer, most people want to know why the national guard wasn't deployed more quickly. it's not just an eagerness to use the united states active duty military troops on the streets of american cities, in this case, to quash protests, it's holding questions now about whether he held them back on january 6th. how do we get to the bottom of all of these questions and future proof the presidency? >> i think it starts with a full investigation of what happened on january 6th but way prior to that as well. a year ago right now i was covering this and others were trying to sound the alarm because trump had gutted the senior leadership, replaced all the senior leadership with his cronies and we were all praying that the guardrail would be chairman of the joint chiefs, general milley. it seems the reporting is he was that guardrail for democracy, for the military, for what could have been much greater violence

and definitely an unprecedented use of our military against american peaceful protesters. mark milley has become like the new general fauci. i think reporting over time will confirm he fought inside to try to keep americans safe and he tried to protect the military. and now fox news, the right-wing attack machine, extreme gop-elected officials have made him the new fauci. they're going to make him pay. this is payback for crossing donald trump out in the open and they're going to make an example of him. in the end our military will suffer. we are right now at war with syria. we are firing artillery into syria, launching rocket strikes. people are attacking the chairman of the joint chiefs of staffs. i can't underscore how damaging that is for our national security, the fighting men and women overseas. >> you know, paul raises an interesting point, mike. you've written a lot about people who tried to hold the

president back either to protect him from himself politically or to protect the country. where does general milley fit in that with these pieces we're learning from your reporting, from mike bender's book? >> well, i think there are these moments that we see where he was working to try and contain the president, to try and educate the president about the severity of using something like the insurrection act, road blocks to stop him from doing that and working with the other folks like bill barr and such in this moment to stop it. at the same time with milley it can be a mixed picture because the image of milley in military fatigues walking through lafayette park outside of the white house as it's being cleared as the president goes for a photo-op is something that is seared in the american history. this was a very tumultuous time. there was enormous amounts going

on in the country. there was at the very least the perception that the park was being cleared so the president could go for a photo-op. and the president's top military adviser not wearing the uniform that he uses in the footage you were showing of him testifying before congress but wearing his military fatigues, the same thing that troops on the battlefield used when they're out fighting war, is walking with the president, accompanying him as this park has just been cleared to essentially for a personal political reason. and that is something that i'm pretty sure he understands the severity of and he's spoken about that publicly but it is a very, very important moment in last summer and in what leads up to the election. >> paul, it's an important point because bill barr and others that are in this reporting,

esper, they all are now emerging in this body of reporting about -- i'll put it in the category of how bad he really was, the ex-president, but there are plenty of examples of mike saying they went along with it. i think a lot of people made the point milley looks like he's in fallujah not in an american city where people have the right to protest. let me play twhau donald trump said to governs. it's pretty clear what donald trump wanted the protesters to be met with from the military or law enforcement this is from a call with governors at the time. >> you have to dominate. if you don't dominate, you're wasting your time. they're going to run over you. you're going to look like a bunch of jerks. you have to dominate. and you have to arrest people and you have to try people, and they have to go to jail for long periods of time. paul, i think mike bender's book is also allegedly reports that he wanted protesters shot and

they weren't shot to kill, shot to maim, i believe, is what he told people to do. how do you walk that back? we've talked about what fox news is sort of trying to pull apart with the military, how do you put back the way the commander in chief wanted them to function in american society and on american streets when people were protesting? >> it's very difficult. i was critical of trump throughout his time in office and before because he politicized the military at a level we've never seen before. he continued to rope them into politics, stuff that used to be off limits became fair game for donald trump. i've called him president mayhem because his mayhem spread across the entire country and across our foreign policy apparatus and the pentagon. i think we will hear some folks will be on an image rehab tour. other folks maybe stayed inside and held the line and tried to keep him contained. he was like a drunken reckless abuser trying to get in the gun

closet. the pentagon is america's gun closet, right? we have to remember i used to sound the alarm all the time and remind people he has access to nukes. if you didn't lose sleep at night, remember, donald trump had access to our nukes. he also had access to our national guard and many other forces that he could deploy against the american people. i think that's part of his legacy. this was more dangerous than sending us into iraq or afghanistan. the hardest thing you can ask a 19-year-old man or woman in uniform to do is to stand across peaceful american civilians and potentially command them to open fire. that is unprecedented. that is the single most dangerous thing you can do for our military and for our democracy that is defend enter on that all-volunteer force and the trust bestowed upon it. >> paul, should there be a focused commission to look at all of the orders given by the last commander in chief to the military? >> sure. i'm for as many investigations as we can have.

in the military we do an after action review after every training mission, after every combat operation. we look through everything and say what went well, what went poorly, what can we do differently? that's what a good military does, what a good democracy does. pour sunshine on all of it. have more hearings, more transparency and more focus. this does impact real-time operations. the secretary of defense and the chairman of the joint chiefs have to deal with all of this nonsense instead of dealing with getting our troops safely out of afghanistan and dealing with rockets coming in from syria. we can't do everything at the same time. and when the chairman and joint chiefs have to get marred up in the domestic politics it takes the eyes off the ball. putin loves this. kim jong-un loves this and that's the real danger of what we're experiencing right now. >> paul is sticking around for more. mike schmidt, thank you for joining us on your reporting. when we come back, congressional republicans and conservative pundits have spent the last week as we've been discussing railing against a

woke military. we'll ask paul if the men and women on the front lines should actually be taught more about race and racism in our nation's history. that conversation is next. t. ♪ all by yourself.♪ - oh. - what? rain. cancel and stay? done. go with us and get millions of felixble booking options. expedia. it matters who you travel with. ♪ ♪

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the mere prospect of our military holding honest and brave conversations about the history of race and racism in this country is seemingly too much. too much to countenance for some conservative lawmakers and their allies in the right wing media, and it is all they're talking

about. how that dialogue, the conversation about race in america would somehow undermine unit cohesion and by extension our national security. but there's an argument, a pretty good one, that the opposite is true, that learning about racial discrimination in our shared past would, in fact, perhaps be beneficial for military officers. joining our conversation, chair of the department of african-american studies at princeton university and msnbc contributor, eddie glove. paul rieckhoff is still here. paul, i know you had a lot to share about this. i follow everything you share on social media. tell me your take. >> this is the most obvious thing in the world, like getting to know people you serve with in the military and in your country would be a good thing. it would be a good thing for national security, for our military, for america, and maybe just to underscore that point for people that may not be familiar. the enlisted ranks of the military is more diverse than america. for the folks in right wing media and other places who want to criticize our military and question its diversity,

apparently they haven't been to a recruiting station recently in a place like new york, detroit or los angeles because it is the ultimate display of great american diversity. people from all background signing up to enlist and work together on behalf of america. so people criticizing this really don't understand the modern military. this is not 1860. i mean this is a very modern, progressive, integrated, diverse military that's now finally correcting some of the wrongs that the trump administration put in place like banning trans people and other things that hurt our national security. so, you know, i think general mccaffrey called it twaddle with brian williams. i don't know what to call it and i don't want to respond to it, it is so ridiculous. but hopefully we can have the conversation. >> eddie, speaking of light, you know, the red herring the right puts out there is unit cohesion. it seems they're jeopardizing that with the way they are talking about these things.

>> absolutely. >> oh, absolutely. in the middle of the senate intelligence committee -- >> i'm sorry. eddie, then paul. go ahead, eddie. >> remember, the senate intelligence committee report about russian interference in the 2016 election said that the russian government sought to sow discord. we see them playing in that issue. we know it is a national security issue. the idea that it threatens unit cohesion makes no sense. the last point i have been trying to figure out is what the substance of these folks' patriotism, that, in fact, the way they attack our military, the way in which they're defending those who sacked the capitol, i don't know what the substance of their loyalty to the country is. that, in some ways, what we're seeing over and over again, nicole, is a kind of defense of a view of america that presumes that only people who look like them and think like them matter, so much so they're willing to attack the very people, the very

institution that defends the country. it makes little sense to me, but in some ways it makes a lot of sense. >> you know, paul, i want your thoughts on the first question, that their argument seems to be something that they're moving us farther away from. but to eddie's point as well, i mean what are they for? you go back to you and i were on the air together after their treatment of secretary austin, their treatment of general milley, if you are against those two men, who are you for? >> they're for themselves. what they're displaying is the ultimate contrast to the principles of our american military, our great american military, honor, integrity, personal cork. it is a demonstration the opposite of that. maybe it is a great teachable moment. don't be like people on fox news, be like secretary austin, like general milley, have honor, have integrity, put the greater good ahead of yourself, seem to understand other people. be an intellectual, a warrior scholar.

don't be a knuckle-dragging moron who hates people who are not like you. it is what you hear out of russia, not from america. we have to underscore this is talk and criticism that hurts our national security. it is also going to hurt their politics. if the republicans think it is going to get them more independents and help them grow the party, they're sadly mistaken because this is cutting to a very important core, veterans, military folks, prior service, people who care about national security, have always made up an important core of the republican party and those people are fleeing by the platoon, brigade and division by the minute. >> eddie, what did you think? it is the first time i had a chance to talk to you, when you heard general milley saying he is offended that generals are being accused of being woke because they're teaching america's racial history? >> well, i heard -- i heard very clearly a defense of liberal education, that we don't want our soldiers, our officers to be narrow minded, to be kind of

locked into that kind of provincialism that prevents them from seeing the vast diversity of the world, townsing the complexity of our country's history and our present so they can actually make serious and substantive and significant interventions in our moment. i heard a robust defense of what it means to be a liberally educated person, a cosmopolitan human being and how it makes a better soldier. the lost point i would make is this. there's always been this incredibly conflicted, vexed relationship between race and our military. black folk served in the civil war, we served in world war i, world war ii, the vietnam war, nicole, and we came back home and faced this over and over again. this is just an extension of our history it seems to me. >> oh, you just -- i mean we need to spend more time on that. paul rieckhoff, you are the perfect person to do this. we will make it a points later this week. thank you, paul, for spending time with us today. eddie isn't going anywhere because the next hour dealing

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♪ ♪ the truth is there's almost no idea more unamerican than the notion that any one person could choose the american president, and i will always be proud that we did our part. on that tragic day to reconvene the congress and fulfilled our duty under the constitution and the laws of the united states. >> hi, again, everyone. it is 5:00 in the east. a stunning new account of the vice president's experience

during the january 6th insurrection provides brand-new context to the comments you just heard there. in an excerpt obtained exclusively by nbc news from a book out called "frankly, we did win this election, the inside story of how donald trump lost" michael bender writes of a dramatic break between the former president and his second in command on the day of the insurrection. bender writes this, quote. a swarm of rioters just outside the room had smashed windows and busted through doors and now prowled across the waxed sandstone block floors beneath the iconic cast-iron dome. pence's life and the safety of just about everyone else in the capitol that day rested in the hands of the national guard. quote, i want them down here and i want them down here now, pence instructed in a private phone call with the nation's top military and defense officials gathered at the pentagon. initially, trump seemed to be enjoying the may lay, heartened to see his supporters fighting

so vigorously on his behalf. he watched more as a passive spectator than as the president of the united states who had helped to incite the violence unfolding little more than two miles away. trump didn't call off the intruders until almost 4:30 p.m., about a half hour after pence had called the pentagon looking for support from the national guard. that never-before-reported conflict between trump and the man whose life he endangered one of the latest examples of one of trump's most loyal allies privately breaking with him in the aftermath of the election loss. there's the account of former attorney general bill barr who willingly subverted the reputation and integrity of the justice department in service to his ex-boss. the details come to us in an interview with abc new's jonathan carl in "the atlanta." quote, my attitude was, it was put-up or shut-up, barr told me. if there was evidence of fraud i

had no motive to suppress it, but my suspicion all along was there was nothing there. it was all bull bleep. bar ultimately made his findings public. on december 1st he told the "ap" the justice department uncovered no widespread voter fraud that could change the outcome of the election, a statement the ex-president didn't take kindly. bender reports that soon after the "ap" story went public trump confronts barr asking, how the -- could you do this to me? why did you say it? quote, because it's true, barr replied. the president, livid, responded by referring to himself in the third person. you must hate trump. you must hate trump. end quote. barr thought that the president was trying to control himself but he seemed angrier than he had ever seen him, his face was read. as charlie sykes writes, don't cry for bill barr, america. quote, for barr, as with mike pence, there was a line that even the most devoted towedies

were not willing to cross. on one level, it is helpful. on another it is hard not to be cynical about the amount of denial, delusion and self-loathing that went into their sycophancy. they knew what they were doing and what trump was, and yet they worked to empower him until they could not anymore. two of trump's most serious and loyal aides speaking out today is where we begin with some of our favorite reporters and friends. from "the washington post", senior washington correspondent and msnbc political analyst phil rutger is here. his new book is called "i alone can fix it" and it comes out july 20th. matt miller, former chief spokesman tore the doj and msnbc justice and security analyst. olivia troye is here, former top aide to former vice president mike pence, now director of the american accountability project. as promised, eddie is still here. i want to start with you,

olivia. you know mike pence. mike pence was reported to me to sort of have been stunned by trump's political depravity, by the fact there was no line he wouldn't cross, by his indifference to human suffering around the pandemic. but why was he surprised that trump then turned on him around the certification on january 6th? he had seen who trump was. >> well, he certainly had seen who trump is firsthand. we lived that together for quite sometime. but i think that at the end of the day, i think when you are the vice president to this man, you're literally working down the hallway for this entire time, i think somewhere in mike pence's head he thought that they were in this together and that trump knew that he was a loyal person. he rarely had daylight between the two of them. he was completely loyal the entire tenure while there. i saw it firsthand.

so i think he was shocked that day when he goes in to certify the election results, and i think that what happened and the way it played out was shocking to him. i think the reality of this situation was on full display, that trump is loyal to nobody. it doesn't matter if he's going to put your life at risk. he's going to do what we all know he's capable of doing. it is really just about him. >> i want to stay with pence. this is also from michael bender's new book. quote, after the election dominion filed a $1.3 billion defamation lawsuit against sidney powell, who defended herself by claiming that her allegations were too ridiculous to be believed. no reasonable person would conclude that the statements were truly statements of fact. powell's attorneys told the federal judge presiding over the case. pence laughed out loud when he read the court filing. i was very surprised at her statement, trump told me. pence meanwhile refused to go along. anything you give us, we'll review, pence told the president, but i don't see how it's possible. that stance would make him enemy

number one a few weeks later. phil, i want to ask you something that i think i've spent a long time over the last four years asking you. you know, was it inertia that kept the people who knew better quiet? was it that it didn't endanger pence's life until his family was hunkered down and rushed out of the capitol on january 6th? i mean what bought their silence until the very, very end? >> nicole, i think it was all about political power because they knew they didn't just have to, you know, go along with and believe what president trump was saying, they had to go along and believe what tens of millions of americans also believed because donald trump as a candidate and then as a president had this extraordinary ability to sort of bring his supporters into his own alternative reality. he would, you know, concoct these theories and spread these conspiracies and tell these lies, and yet so many people in our country believed them and

were loyal to him because of it. so that power there, that political power that he had to bring all of those people together was in a real way very threatening to somebody like mike pence who didn't have that same kind of political power and knew that his career could crumble if trump decided he wanted it to, and sort of there was this intoxicating sort of pull that drew people like pence and barr and others in the administration closer to trump even as they knew what he was saying was simply not true and, in fact, dangerous for the country. >> i mean the fact that not one person was willing to sacrifice their ambition to do for the country is the reason we're here. it is the reason hundreds of people attacked the capitol and erected a noose to, quote, hang mike pence. their words, not mine. i want to turn to bill barr. jonathan carl, matt miller has a really interesting interview. it is interesting in substance and it is interesting in its

existence. let me read a little more from it. barr told me he had already concluded it was highly unlikely that evidence existed that would tip the scales in the election. he'd expected trump to lose and therefore was not surprised by the outcome. he also knew that at some point trump was going to confront him about the allegations, and he wanted to be able to say that he had looked into them and that they were unfounded. let's stop right here, and stop any parade plans for bill barr. bill barr did the unprecedented and unleashed the united states justice department to look for election fraud, i think nor the first time. you are not supposed to do that until after an election is certified. bill barr looks under the hood and when he's absolutely certain there is none, then and only then does he tell trump he won't go along with the big lie. why do you think he is talking, matt miller? >> it is the same -- for the same reason that phil said about mike pence. it is absolute political self-calculation. right now he is trying to burnish his own reputation after the fact, and i think when he finally did speak out on

december 1 is it had nothing to do with trying to save democracy from donald trump. it was trying to save a republican senate for mitch mcconnell. the article makes clear that was his motivation. the way he portrays himself in this article it is almost as if he were a bystander to trump telling the big lie when, in fact, he was one of the people helping tell it. the big lie didn't start on election night or the day after the election. it started in the weeks and months leading up to the election when donald trump was telling the story, telling lies about voter fraud and the attorney general was out there doing the same. we talked about it a lot on this show at the time. he was out, you know, doing a tour of conservative media, making claims about supposed election fraud that the justice department had to retract on multiple occasions after he made them. so to, you know, try to claim now that he came out to do the right thing when, you know, his actions showed that he was telling the lie until he couldn't do anything to save donald trump. the justice didn't can't go into court and make up claims with no facts. if you do that you end up like

rudy giuliani, dispared. he couldn't do anything to save him. all he could do was speak out against him and he spoke out because he wanted to save the republican senate, ultimately unsuccessfully. that's the real story about what bill barr was up to. >> well, he makes such a good point. i mean jonathan karl has this great exchange where mitch mcconnell is now pulling -- almost replaces trump as his sort of political patron and mitch mcconnell is begging him to get out in front and say there was no fraud. mitch mcconnell didn't do that publicly either. i mean they all have blood on their hands. none of them did anything, and i think -- i think chris christie's sound is played in the impeachment trial of the disgraced ex-president because it was rare. a lot of the republicans, bill barr among them until that "ap" interview, mitch mcconnell, kevin mccarthy, they let the big

lie go for weeks and weeks until the insurrection. my question for you, eddie, is if bill barr wants us to read this interview with jonathan karl, and if he did the interview i guess he wants he us to read it, why didn't he go to president biden's inauguration? if he didn't think there was any fraud, why not call and congratulate him, why not tell him while the subpoenas were renewed against donald trump's public enemies? if you are somewhat remorseful, which is the only reason i can imagine he is doing an interview with jonathan karl, none of the actions suggest there's remorse about turning the justice department inside out and obliterating people's confidence that the rule of law wasn't a tool of donald trump's political arsenal. >> well, nicole, i want to make a distinction between political calculation and remorse. there's a sense in which bill barr is trying to recoup his reputation among certain constituencies, but it is not to kind of introduce himself back

into mainstream of american politics it seems to me, because the end of the article is very fascinating because you remember trump is yelling at him at the top of his lungs, demeaning him, diminishing him. he says he is going to resign and he doesn't resign, but when he finally submits his letter it is -- apparently it is so good trump says, this is good. i mean these people have no spine. they are in some ways deferring to a troglodyte who happens to be the president of the united states. the article in the end doesn't seem to suggest he is remorseful about his positions that he took while being a.g. he is trying in some ways to reposition himself vis-a-vis the constituency he cares most about. it is not remorse in my mind it seems to me. >> yeah. phil, that's a great point. i wonder as a journalist covering the human carnage donald trump left in his wake, how do you sift through these

folks not wanting to, i guess, come out on the right side of history? >> well, nicole, i think clearly a lot of the people who worked in the trump administration, especially those in the higher profile roles like the former attorney general, are thinking about history and they're thinking about how they're going to be remembered years from now. they're also thinking about their career potential down the road. i mean it is not like bill barr is in his 40s and has 20 years of working ahead of him, but he may want to do innings in his life in his career, he may want to serve on some boards. he is reported to be working on his own book, so he has to be thinking a little bit about how he can separate himself from the most sort of dangerous and unseemly aspects of this presidency, and it is a very tricky thing for him or for any of the others to do. what we've seen the last four years is people who worked directly under donald trump in the administration have had a very difficult time landing, you know, prestigious, high-profile, highly paid and sort of publicly

valued positions in civic life because of working for this president. >> olivia, i am not going to read it here, but the ex-president, you know, by carrier pigeon smeared bill barr. i think he called him a rino. the garland justice department rebuked one of his -- something viewed as one of the more political moves he made, the criminal prosecution of john bolton for publicizing his memoire, "the room where it happened" i think was the title. his doj and people who were still there, national security posts and others are now under scrutiny for the perception that donald trump's enemies list happens to coincide with the list of people whose e-mails and phone records were seized and spied on. who wants bill barr? >> well, the fact of the matter

is, nicole, and i agree with the other commentary on here, all of these people stood by and they were supportive of this man getting another four years in the oval office. that is something that shouldn't be lost on anyone. they went along with this along the way. they watched the dangers that happened along the way. they knew that donald trump was calling for the insurrection act. all of these stories are true. they have been lived firsthand by many of us who served in this white house and saw all of this happening firsthand. these are people who were in very senior roles, in cabinet-level positions where they could have made a greater difference along the way, but they were going along with it. thank goodness that the election didn't go that way, but that lie, it still lives on. it is an incredible danger to our country still. so while i appreciate now that all of these are coming forward and trying to set the record

straight and they're trying to recover for what history will say, just remember those moments in the past of what we all lived and the danger of it, and that danger continues on and there are a lot of people still in office today who are elected officials who continue to enable this kind of movement across our country. >> you know, matt miller, in terms of why it matters now, you know, why are we starting with this? i think it matters now because it would have done so much good at the time. i mean if these people had spoken out at the time, we might not have had a deadly insurrection. if these people had broken with trump publicly, if the things we are reading about milley we had known at the time instead of worrying after lafayette square that the military had been corrupted. i don't know if there was an off-ramp for bill barr, that's pretty touchy. but if we had known at the time that mike pence, you know, was trying to get the national guard, i mean why did they stay quiet and what good is it to

know these things now and do you think it is good? do you think it is good information and important to know? >> it is important to know about this now and to continue to discuss this because the story is not over. the big lie is continuing. it is continuing in states, and there are republican officials who have to make the choices that bill barr and mike pence and the rest of -- and mitch mcconnell, who didn't say anything, who in this article said, "well, i can't say anything because the georgia senate election." think of the governor of arizona right now, doug ducey, where the republican members of the state legislature are continuing to conduct this audit and removing the power of the democratic elected secretary of state, are doing everything they can to perpetuate the big lie and to really make it harder to hold fair elections in the future. there are people like doug ducey who know better. the governor of arizona knows better and should be speaking out and should be doing something, and i suspect he is not because he's making the same political calculation that mike pence and others were making when donald trump was president. it is important to continue to have this conversation because the people in the republican

party who did step up after january 6th, liz cheney, mitt romney, some other -- you know, members of the senate that voted to convict, they need to be the leading lights of the republican party and their voices need to be lifted up. we need to hope that they give courage to the others in the republican party who know better but are still keeping quiet. >> phil rucker, we cannot wait to read your next book. matt miller, eddie glaude. thank you for being with us this hour. olivia is sticking around. with the house set to vote on a january 6th commission this week, there are new questions about what the president's disgraced top officials knew in the days and hours leading to the insurrection. that reporting is next. plus, the incredible story of a conservative spy operation that managed to infiltrate high-profile democratic events including a democratic presidential debate and targeting anyone viewed as a threat to the ex-president's

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i asked him for some specific commitments. one of them was to take the select committee seriously and appoint serious participants, not obstructionists. >> we want justice, accountability. that's what we're looking for. and recognition for every officer that day. >> that was police officers michael fanone and harry dunn.

they, of course, fought back the insurrectionists on january 6th and defended the capitol and protected everyone inside. they're speaking out after their meeting with kevin mccarthy in which they asked him for what shouldn't be a hard ask at all, justice, accountability, serious people to be put on the committee to try to understand who and how and why our democracy was attacked that day. the push for accountability will be front and center on capitol hill this week with house democrats moving ahead on a vote to set up a select committee to investigate the january 6th attack. joining our conversation, clint watts, now a distinguished research fellow at the foreign policy research institute. lucky for us, an msnbc national security analyst. olivia troye is with us as well. i want to come back to some reporting because the investigative journalism on the insurrection at this point is all that we have. it is all that we have to inform the public of what happened, and

these feel significant. let me start with this. trump aides knew january 6th rally could get chaotic. "propublica" obtained new details about the trump white house's knowledge of the gathering storm. after interviewing more than 50 people involved in the events of january 6th and reviewing months of private correspondence, taken together these accounts suggest that senior trump aides had been warned the january 6th events could turn chaotic with tens of thousands of people potentially overwhelming ill-prepared law enforcement officials. rather than trying to halt the march, trump and his allies accommodated its leaders, according to text messages and interviews with republican operatives and officials. you know, clint, the more information we get, the clearer it is why kevin mccarthy and republicans don't want us to know. >> that's right, nicole. it is bad. every report that comes out at this point you see there's more tentacles between the

insurrectionists that broke into the capitol and those people at capitol hill. it also goes to explain how you probably remember around january 6, 7, 8, when we would be on here talking, nicole, it seemed there were republicans taking it very seriously, they were quite upset. everyone was wondering how vice president pence could put up with this after they were literally trying to go kill him. then you saw this kind of pull-back, or at least it feels like that now in retrospect where they must have realized there were quite a few people that really knew what was going on that day, that there were connections at the white house that knew what was going to happen. when we rewind this and you just look at the line-up the night before, there's some good reporting out on that today. in terms of, you know, you've got michael flynn, who has just been pardoned. he is talking about potentially calling for martial law with the military. you have alex jones there on the scene. you know, you look at roger stone who has also been

pardoned, he is there. this is the line-up that's going to bet people riled up. when you look at what could have stopped it, well, it is people inside the white house that could have stopped this and they chose not to. >> one of the questions i think that came up in the impeachment trial, olivia, was about following the money, that these weren't spontaneous crowds. they were planned events. the trump campaign was e-mailing and texting supporters to come to washington. donald trump headlined the preinsurrection rally and sent them to the capitol, lied to them and said he would be walking with them. let me read a little bit more about the event organizers from "propublica". one of the women for america first organizers told "propublica" that he and his group felt they needed to urgently warn the white house of the possible danger. quote, a last-minute march without a permit, without all of the metro police that would usually be there to fortify the perimeter felt unsafe. that's justin stockton in a

recent interview. quote, and these people aren't there for an -- flower contest, added jennifer lynne lawrence, stockton's fiance and co-organizer. quote, they're there because they're angry. so these seem like the kind of witnesses people in a commission would say, yeah, we knew that law enforcement -- they're speaking to two central questions i think people had since january 6th. they knew that law enforcement was outmanned and they knew it was, you know, a match had been struck and they were raging. >> yeah, we need to get to the bottom of this. this needs to be investigated. we need to be talking to these individuals and really understand what happened then. what happened inside the white house when they reported that -- how did they respond? what did they say to that? what happened in the failure to act on this? what happened with the security apparatus? what happened that led to a failure of securing the capitol that day? when you have all of the signs

lined up like this and you have such coordination between these groups and you have these groups actually filing for permits under a wrong name, an incorrect name, a false name that leads capitol police to investigate in other directions, i mean all of this to me is just classic coordination of these groups that basically leads to a terrorist attack. there's a lot of communication here going on that i think we really need to ask questions on and understand, and not to mention a complete dereliction of duty by the people sitting inside the white house and president at the time himself. >> clint, we've talked a lot about the threat that qanon and its adherents represent in terms of the conspiracies that fuel violence and the threat of violence. let me read you this headline from "business insider." trump-loving insurrectionist and a convicted stalker are among 36

qanon supporters running for congress in 2022. what do we do about that? >> nicole, it is one of the biggest messes that's out there. it is also hard to get my head around because i'm not exactly sure what they believe in because they're so anti-government in some of their views. i don't know why they would want to be part of the government. it is a little paradoxical. at the same point it is a direct threat i think to the undermining and integrity of democracy. we see this to a lesser degree now. we have one or two sort of qanon adherents. we have those that play to the qanon phenomenon. that's the problem. eventually they will take over your party. it was always a self-destructive strategy over the longer term. imagine going into a national security oversight committee hearing with maybe 30

qanon-elected congressmen. what would the questions even be? there were a couple of times i worked in government and at fbi headquarters, we had off-the-wall question. what if every question is off the wall and doesn't adhere to any form of reality? these also -- these qanon adherents, if they believe these conspiracies they oftentimes have no concept of civics or how the government works. it breaks down the government, not even because they're trying to. they literally do not understand how government works. some of the questions that you hear even today in hearings do not comport to any reality of how any of these agencies operate in a day-to-day basis. >> and it is just important to button this up with this. i mean there's now an intersection between the disgraced ex-president and this conspiracy movement, qanon. kevin mccarthy had a chance to say, no, not in my republican caucus, not in my republican

party. thank both for spending -- >> there's also -- >> go ahead. >> it has become a belief system much like religion. it is a fantasy world and you will hear that and see that. they're talking as if it is a cult-like figure. it is quite frightening how it might play out over time if they remain committed to it. >> we'll stay on it with your help. when we return, the wild, new "new york times" investigative reporting about a right wing spy operation that infiltrated the highest levels of democratic politics and targeted anyone seen as a threat to the trump agenda. that reporting next. next. mbers. 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 martin's family needs it with hassle-free claims, he got paid before his neighbor even got started. because doing right by our members, that's what's right.

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there's some remarkable new reporting in "the new york times" to tell you about. it reads like fiction. it reveals what appears to be a dramatic escalation in the lengths and the elaborate plans that the far right activists are willing to go to to subvert their political competition. through dozens of interviews and the collection of federal election records, journalists at "the times" tracked what appeared to be conservative operatives, spies really who over the course of several years infiltrate and imbed themselves into progressive groups in multiple states. from that report, quote, the endeavor in the west appears to have had two primary goals, penetrate local and eventually national democratic political circles for long-term intelligence gathering and collect dirt on moderate republicans that could be used

against them in the party battles being waged by mr. trump and his allies. what the effort accomplished and how much information the operatives gathered is unclear. sometimes their tactics were bumbling and amateurish, but the operations use of spy craft to manipulate the politics of several states over years greatly exceeds the tactics of more political dirty tricks operations. joining us, "new york times" investigative correspond, mark muzzetti. i had a million questions. i worked on republican campaigns, i won't say dirty campaigns, but there's a norm of what campaigns do. were these people run by campaign operatives and paid by them? >> no. so about a month or so ago we did a report about an effort to sabotage and discredit the national security adviser, h.r. mcmaster, back in 2018.

that operation was run by a man named richard seddin, a former british spy. this operation we just reported on started about six months later by the same person, richard seddin, who was paid by at least one wealthy republican out west, a woman named susan gore. actually, the heiress to the gortex fortune. it was an effort privately funded to gather intelligence about democrats, infiltrate the party circles over time, and also to try to take out moderate republicans starting in wyoming, expanding in colorado, arizona, eventually, as you just read, to go after republicans who are seen not sufficiently with president trump's agenda. so this was not done by any particular political campaign. it was done privately but with the aim of having a real impact on national politics. >> now, were they run by like a

headquarters or were they given a lot of latitude to freelance and pick their own candidates to hurt? >> so our understanding is that they were primarily run by richard seddin, who had a number of these undercover operatives, two of which we primarily focused on in our story, a couple who worked sort of different sides of the street in terms of infiltrating progressive groups, democratic local state officials and also on the republican side. so how much guidance they took from their donors is unclear. i think seddin does appear to have primarily run the operation, and he and the undercovers appeared to have a fair amount of latitude to do these operations. >> all right. i want to end with the happily

ever after because it is something. but i want to ask you about the law. are there any laws to prevent people from giving fraudulent or unintended financial donations with the purpose of infiltrating and spying on campaigns? is that -- does that violate any campaign laws? >> so what we report is that they gave numerous federal campaign donations as part of this operation. they gave $20,000 to the democratic national committee. that got them an invite to the democratic debate last february in las vegas. they gave to individual candidates. they gave to senator mark kelly in arizona. now, the law is that you cannot use a -- do what is called a straw donation. the money has to be yours. you can't be a pass-through. you can't give a donation for somebody else. so it is still unclear whether there were any laws broken. they gave the money in their name. the question was, whose money

was it, if it was really theirs or if it was someone else's. if it was someone else's there are potentially legal issues here and potential investigations of illegality. >> so talk to me a little bit about how they lived. they lived, it sounds like, undercover as progressives, as democrats when they were really not just republicans, but so fringey that they were living undercover as democrats spying on democrats and reporting back to sort of fringey conservatives, and then they get married and they're toasted by who? >> by glen beck, the conservative commentator. the reason for that is that he is the uncle of one of the operatives we reported on, a guy named beau mayer, who ends up, as you said, marrying his girlfriend, the other operative, sophia la rocah. the back story of this couple is

that they used to be part of the group project veritas, and that's where they actually met when they were working undercover doing sting operations around washington, going after the fbi and others. they are then recruited for this western states operation by richard seddin. they actually are, indeed, a couple, and then just a week and a half ago they were married and toasted by glen beck. >> so the couple that spies together. mark mazzetti, it is more like a netflix mini series. it is an incredible piece of reporting. if any investigation is inspired or launched by what you have reported, please come back and update us on this. it is just a remarkable, remarkable piece of investigative reporting. thank you for spending some time with us to talk about it. when we return, some potentially very, very, very good news for people who have been vaccinated with the moderna or pfizer vaccines. we will tell you about it on the

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this may look like a regular movie night. but if you're a kid with diabetes, it's more. it's the simple act of enjoying time with friends, knowing you understand your glucose levels. ♪♪ (upbeat music) - [narrator] this is kate. she always wanted her smile to shine. now, she uses a capful of therabreath healthy smile oral rinse to give her the healthy, sparkly smile she always wanted. (crowd cheering) therabreath, it's a better mouthwash. at walmart, target and other fine stores. today some really good news, really promising news in the fight against coronavirus. a new study out today by washington university in st. louis finds most people who have taken one of our approved mrna vaccines, that's the moderna and pfizer vaccines, could be protected from covid for years and the variants and they might not need a booster shot.

it is a good sign for our immunity against an unpredictable virus and yet another reason to be vaccinated if you haven't yet. about 34% of u.s. adults have still yet to get one shot. joining our conversation msnbc medical contributor dr. ben gupta, pulmonologist and global health policy expert. as if we needed more data about why these vaccines are so protective, we have it here. i wonder if you think we are at the point where with the delta variant proving very contagious among unvaccinated populations in communities here in our own country this is the kind of information that might help? >> great to see you, nicolle. let me break it down with a big qualification. if you are immuno compromised and about 4% to 5% falls into that category. they're on steroids, recent cancer, poorly controlled

diabetes, this probably doesn't apply to you. you probably will need a booster shot come fall/winter. you're the one exception. for everybody else it is excellent news. you may not have to roll up your sleeves again. when i am talking to workforces across the country, the reason people don't want the vaccine is, hey, doc, i have been previously infected, why do i need the vaccine? it turns out, if you have been previously infected and recovered and got the vaccine, your antibody levels are through the roof. you may never need a booster shot. it is encouraging. for the rest of us, it is encouraging maybe you won't need a booster shot throughout 2022 if not longer. >> can you answer this question? i know the answer but i think this is something that people are wondering. who is still getting sick and how sick are they getting from coronavirus? >> young, unvaccinated individuals are primarily,

nicolle, who we are seeing in intensive care units across the country. that's number one. number two, the cdc came out with a study just last week suggesting of the 18,000 individuals across the country hospitalized with covid, 99.2% of them were unvaccinated. again, a bent towards younger demographics, those unvaccinated. i want to also say, nicolle, that the delta variant is sparing nobody in terms of how severe it can cause illness regardless of your age. back in 2020 it was our parents' generation, those older, maybe with preexisting conditions. now it is different. now it is those that are younger, as young as 18 i have cared for on ventilators with severe covid. very unpredictable. we are seeing a different reality with the delta variant. >> when you have a patient and you help them heal, do they become advocates of the vaccine? i mean does that experience scare them straight? >> you bet it does.

not only have i seen that they become an advocate it for it, but they're evangelizing with friends of theirs that were waiting and seeing. that's a common refrain. we talk so much about the vaccine hesitant and, yes, maybe there's 15% to 20% there's 15 t 20% of the country hard to reach, but there's that 30% still reachable here, waiting to see, waiting for what their friends' experience may have been with the vaccine, if they got infected, what it looked like. learning by experience, hearing from those you trust has been vital, and i have seen converts become advocates. >> will you do me a favor. if there's who's feeling better, that didn't think the covid variant would get them and they want to spread awareness for the vaccines for whatever the reason, young people or whatever it is, bring them with you next time you do the show. i would love to talk to them,

amplify their voice. >> will do. thank you, nicolle. >> one last question for you, dr. gupta. i can't help know you're in a place with a big heat wave. how are you doing? >> doing okay, thanks for asking. maybe i can do a psa for everybody in the pacific northwest, dealing with 110 degree temperatures to stay cool to the extent you can, indoors, lots of people are running outside, trying to stay indoors, stay hydrated. minimize alcohol. stay hydrated. >> one of the results of being in everyone's workplace and homes, we know where you are and how hot it is. i had to ask. dr. gupta, thanks for spending time with us. when we return, a major milestone on the road to normal, courtesy of the boss, bruce springsteen. that story is next. that story is next

the world we're inheriting, it's in crisis. we got here after years of bad policies, climate deniers, polluters, lobbyists. but now... i do solemnly swear... ...finally a president who gets it. real leadership in congress. it's our moment to tackle climate change and invest in clean-energy jobs. this is about our future because if we don't stand up, if they don't act, if we let this moment pass us by, we will never get it back.

♪ ♪ it was a huge moment, symbolic, cultural, psychological, economic, on saturday night, brought to you by the legend himself, the icon, the boss, mr. bruce springsteen. that performance, revival of springsteen on broadway marked the very first full length, full capacity show to return to broadway since everything was

shuttered last year. now here we are, 471 days later, it was a packed house at the st. james theater. before you get worried, everyone had to show proof of vaccination for safety sake and they're holding off on reopening other shows until after labor day. still, it is a very welcome return, to some degree of normalcy. you have to excuse us for quoting the boss. quote, a dream of life comes to me like a catfish dancing on the end of my line. broadway is back and we will be too after a short break. s back too after a short break. ♪ when technology is easier to use... ♪ barriers don't stand a chance. ♪ that's why we'll stop at nothing to deliver our technology as-a-service. ♪

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these are extraordinary times. the beat with ari melber starts now. >> thank you so much. welcome to the beat. i am ari melber. this week starts with new confirmation of the escalating criminal probe into the trump administration. here's what we know. the new york d.a. is preparing charges. that fact is not even in dispute. donald trump's own corporate lawyers confirming today they have been advised some kind of charges are coming. two, those charges are coming fast. this could be next week or as soon as this week. three. as a final step before any charges, today is the legal deadline for the trump organization to make any final arguments for why the d.a. should not indict. and four, there are several signs this case will begin with narrow financial charges about tax evasion and benefits, not