we'll get right to it. thanks,tive. tiff. good day from msnbc world headquarters in new york. it's high noon in the east, 9:00 out west. i'm lindsey reiser. a 7.2 earthquake has hit off the coast of haiti, more powerful than the one that devastated the island in 2010. it happened earlier this morning, about eight miles offshore, about 100 miles southwest of the capital of port-au-prince. reports of damage are coming in with some homes reduced to rubble as that area deals with aftershocks as well as threats of a tsunami. nbc's he had augustine is in havana, cuba with the latest on the quakes. ed, we know there have been shock waves across the caribbean. what are you hearing specifically from haiti? >> reporter: the haitian prime

minister has just confirmed there have been deaths following this massive earthquake in haiti. there are no official numbers yet. haiti as a state that is in dire straits. last month, the head of state, the prime minister, was assassinated. it's going to take some time to get any handle on the amount of deaths that we've seen in light of this earthquake. i spoke to a friend in port-au-prince before coming on air. he was in bed this morning at about 8:30 when the earthquake shook. the earthquake, he told me, went on for over a minute of tremors, and that was in port-au-prince. as you said in your introduction, this earthquake is bigger in terms of the richter scale than the massive earthquake that shook and devastated haiti in 2010. that earthquake killed an estimated 100,000 to 300,000 people, apocalyptic levels of destruction, sadness, and death. and as the death count comes in

in the following days, we can only hope that it's not as terrible as what happened 11 years ago. but we'll be reporting on this today, following it throughout the day and keeping you up to date. >> what else are you hearing from your friend, ed? has your friend been able to look around and survey the damage? and how is your friend doing? >> reporter: he was okay. he's a cameraman, and being a freelancer cameraman in haiti, you've got to be pretty tough. he even told me, i was surprised to hear, he wasn't particularly scared when the earthquake happened. but he did say in port-au-prince, as far as he was aware, there has been no significant damage. but he's just talking from what he can see out of his window and walking on the street. it's he early days and the picture will become clearer over the next few hours. >> certainly. ed augustine confirming there have been lives lost in haiti. we'll continue to work to find out how many we're talking

about. ed, we'll seen you soon. joining me, william heck of the u.s. geological survey. we talked about the quake being bigger than in 2010. does that necessarily mean more destruction? >> reporter: that's a really good question. we detected it as an earthquake larger in magnitude than we saw in 2010. it's about 100 kilometers away from the 2010 earthquake. what we worry about is not just the size of the earthquake but how shallow it is because that controls how much shaking occurred and how close it is to people as well as the quality of the buildings in the area. this event is likely very devastating from what we know from previous events. >> what do we know about the depth here? you said you look at how shallow it is. what do we know from the initial numbers coming out of there? >> right, so we model, we characterize an earthquake in

many different ways. right now we're able to estimate the slip along the fault. so we know that there's slip occurring near the surface. the hypocenter of the earthquake was around 12 kilometers or so. but, you know, earthquakes occur globally at all different depths. an earthquake can be deep and felt by a broad number of people but not cause a lot of damage. shallow earthquakes like this usually produce the largest amount of shaking. >> so this would be considered shallow, the 12 kilometers you mentioned. >> yes. >> how severe was this for people in and around the epicenter, what is it they would be experiencing during this? >> right, so they would be experiencing extreme shaking. and like i mentioned before, it's not just the shaking that's the issue. it's the quality of the infrastructure. if they're experiencing extreme shaking and buildings are collapsing, that's really what causes loss of life. we know that the 2010 earthquake claimed over 200,000 lives.

so the expectation is that this is going to have significant impact. >> some of the images that we're playing next to you that we're seeing already coming out of there show that as well. what are your concerns for this happening in haiti? we just heard ed augustine say the country is in dire straits. we talked about the devastation from the 2010 earthquake, the political instability with the assassination last month of their head of state. what are you most worried about for the people there? >> i think it's just going to be very difficult to rebuild. this is a devastating event to occur. from a seismic, seismology perspective, we know that haiti has experienced large earth cakes in the past, not just the 2010 earthquake, but there have been significant earthquakes, in the 1700s, for example, that caused huge amounts of devastation. so, you know, it's a very seismically active area. the seismic expectation is that large earthquakes like this can occur. so yeah, we're just -- it's just a very devastating earthquake.

>> it sounds like a little bit of a waiting game to find out how deep the destruction is. before i let you go, is the threat over? are we talking about the threat of aftershocks and tsunamis? >> there's always a chance for aftershocks, and that an aftershock could be larger than the main shock. the chance is small. we've detected six earthquakes that will give you a strong shake since the earthquake. i would expect to see aftershocks for a while. >> william heck with the u.s. geological survey, thank you so much. we continue to follow breaking news out of afghanistan. u.s. forces are on the ground in kabul as taliban fighters set their sights on the capital city. president ashraf ghani put out a recorded speech saying he's

mobilizing forces to prevent further instability. he promised to, quote, not give up the achievements since the last 20 years, when the u.s. toppled the taliban after the 9/11 attacks. police are tightening security on the streets of kabul and military choppers are flying overhead. the u.s. ambassador is explaining why the afghanistan forces had a hard time fending off taliban fighters. >> it was clear they were highly dependent on u.s. air support. so there are multipying effects. >> the exodus is under way at the kabul airport for those who are able to leave. concerns are growing for those who worked as translators for the u.s. military and haven't yet gotten any visas to travel. >> it is our turn to be helped. we helped them, we saved their lives. we were the people who communicate with two cultures.

otherwise, without us they would have done nothing. >> reporter: now you're abandoned and scared. >> yes. as taliban fighters hoist their flags in kandahar and other major cities, afghans who are not able to leave and who fear for the return of the taliban are seeking refuge. women are fleeing their homes with their children. some settling for the moment at this park in kabul. now, for a deeper dive here, we have a team of reporters and analysts. first, nbc news correspondent kelly cobiella who is in kabul. kelly, what's the latest on the taliban push? >> reporter: lindsey, there are reports of heavy clashes in a province more than 20 miles away. all of this happened with stunning speed, the taliban taking control of half of the country's regional capitals in just a week. the first of u.s. forces landing at kabul's airport for what the

pentagon says is a limited mission, to get embassy workers out. >> i expect by the end of the weekend the bulk of the 3,000 that we talked about yesterday will be in place. >> reporter: the u.s. embassy is ordering its staff to destroy sensitive documents and computers, according to a memo obtained by npr. afghan president ashraf ghani addressing the country for the first time in days, saying, "i as your president assure you i am focused on reducing violence." on the ground, the taliban are advancing across afghanistan at lightning speed. in one propaganda video they claim to be in control of the road to kabul, saying they're allowing government forces who surrender to pass. in another, militants claim they ambushed an afghan military convoy 50 miles from the capital and captured government soldiers. the militants now firmly in control of afghanistan's second largest city, kandahar, and

consolidating territory in the south, north, and west. the taliban took its first provincial capital one week ago. now their territory looks like this, closing in on kabul. panicked afghans are rushing to the capital as aid agencies warn of a humanitarian crisis. >> at least 21,000 people have been forced to flee from their homes and humanitarian needs are growing by the hour. >> reporter: these men all worked for nato as construction workers, cooks, interpreters. >> we translated, we put them in the jail. because of that, if they arrest us, they will kill us. >> reporter: many here feel abandoned and betrayed. nbc news has spoken directly to a taliban commander on the ground here in afghanistan. he said that the taliban is aware of the presence of u.s. forces on the ground and said that if they try anything, they

will be dealt with the same way the taliban has dealt with afghan defense forces. lindsey? >> wow, all right, nbc's kelly cobiella reporting on the ground in kabul, thank you. we want to get to nbc's shannon pettypiece at the white house. shannon, are we hearing anything from president biden about these major developments that happened over the last few hours? >> reporter: no, we have not heard anything. the president is away at camp david for the weekend. we did get a statement from the white house yesterday saying that the president is not double -- second questioning his decision, that he has no regrets about his decision and the u.s. is essentially staying the course. the white house has said the focus is getting out american personnel at the embassy, ensuring that the troops who have been deployed to the country to help secure that exit of embassy personnel are kept safe, and trying to expedite the visa application process for many of these afghans who had helped u.s. forces. but as we see this humanitarian

crisis unfold, the administration is really maintaining their course. here is what the pentagon spokesman had to say about that. >> we are certainly concerned by the speed with which the taliban has been moving. i'm not going to speculate about surprise. we're obviously watching this just like you're watching it and seeing it happen in real time. and it's deeply concerning. it's -- in fact the deteriorating conditions are a factor, a big factor in why the president has approved this mission, to help support the reduction of personnel there in kabul. >> reporter: and so despite that concern, the administration says that they still believe there is not a military solution to the situation in afghanistan. they are working to try and find a diplomatic one. of course the odds of that seem pretty long at this point. and for the interim they say they will continue providing aid

to afghanistan but not send additional forces in beyond what is going to be needed to help get those americans out. >> all right, shannon pettypiece, thank you for an update on that reporting. joining me right now for more analysis, colonel jack jacobs, u.s. army retired medal of honor recipient and msnbc military analyst. we just heard there the pentagon spokesman say, "i don't want to speculate on timing but we're all watching this as you are." what are you making of the speed at which all of this is happening? >> well, there are a couple of reasons why this may have happened with such great speed. the first to keep in mind is that there are reliable reports that the afghan forces were very short of the most important supplies. ammunition, food, and water. and so, particularly on outfit posts closest to its borders, in areas that fell first to the taliban and set up an

opportunity for the taliban to develop some momentum, these were real problems and caused the forces to flee. the second thing is the perception generally that there is nothing but corruption in the country and that extends through the chain of command in the military. this has been an endemic problem for a long time. and the third independent variable and perhaps the one that people are going to focus on the most in the coming days is the announcement by the united states that we were leaving. the last administration and this administration agree on nothing, but they agreed on one thing, that we were leaving. and this has had a very deleterious effect on the morale of the afghan forces, lindsey. >> so one thing that i keep hearing also is, yes, that morale among the afghan forces and how, with such swiftness and efficiency, the taliban has been able to, with each city, grow their ranks. i mean, essentially going into

prisons, for example. what are you hearing about -- are they truly gaining strength with each conquering? >> well, what happens is two things when they take over. first is they incarcerate or kill those who are resisting. those who surrender, they are very selective, but they add them to their ranks depending on who they are and what roles they played in the afghan army. so the general result is that the taliban has taken over areas that have become extremely placid under their control for the moment. and the taliban manages through fear. they don't really need to add lots and lots of people to their army. all they have to do is manage through fear and that's exactly what they're doing, lindsey. >> there are those who argue that the u.s. military needed to leave, 20 years in afghanistan was long enough regardless of now the outcome that's happening. do you understand that

perspective? do you agree with it at all? >> what happened is the following. we went in there in the first place, 20 years ago, to get rid of the taliban as a result of 9/11. to get rid of terrorists in the area. and we did that. actually with some great speed. and then the mission morphed. we came to the conclusion that it would be much better for our national security if afghanistan were turned into a quasi democratic or a democratic country with the kind of structure we have, with an army that was fully equipped, extremely well-trained, and able to respond to the requirements of the afghan national command authority. so we then spent the next 19 years doing exactly that. the trouble with that was that we were never very successful at doing it, because -- for a wide variety of reasons. one of which is that afghanistan is not the united states. there are independent variables

in afghanistan that don't obtain here. and our view of what a country and what an army is supposed to look like was not reflected in how afghanistan did its business. so we started out doing very well. we got rid of the taliban. and we got rid of al qaeda. and we wanted to get rid of terrorists. and we did a great job doing that. but we recognized if we didn't secure the area, that they were coming back, not realizing that we may not be able to secure the area and they were coming back anyway. >> wow, colonel jack jacobs, we could talk to you for an hour about this, unfortunately that's all the time we have, but thank you very much for your expertise. >> my pleasure, thank you. what's happened in the past two days on the covid front hasn't happened for more than a month and it is a bit of good news in the overall gloom. that's next. mission control, we are go for launch. ♪♪ t-minus two minutes

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the u.s. is reporting a rate of new cases not seen since november of last year with a current seven-day average of 140,000 cases a day but new vaccination numbers show a promising trend, almost a million americans were vaccinated thursday and that's the most in a 24-hour period since before july 4th, according to the white house. more than 500,000 of those were first doses. that means now just over half of the people in the u.s. are now fully vaccinated. americans who are immunocompromised could get a booster shot as soon as today. the cdc recommended a third shot of pfizer or moderna for roughly 3% of the population with weakened immune systems. and new alarm for southern states where cases are surging. alabama governor kay ivey issued a state of emergency over rising hospitalizations across the state and mississippi governor tate reeves has extended the state of emergency there. joining me is nbc news medical correspondent dr. john torres.

so doctor, put into perspective where we are. we have been talking to you since the beginning of this thing. it felt like we were making progress against the pandemic right when vaccines were becoming more commonplace. now cases are surging, some mandates are coming back. where are we and how do we get out of it? >> unfortunately, we're not in a place we want to be right now. two months ago, just the middle of june, we were down to around 11,000 cases a day. and most people were thinking, okay, we're seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, this pandemic is starting to wind down a little bit. that's at the same time the cdc came out with recommendations of not wearing masks indoors, being fully vaccinated. unfortunately more than the vaccinated took off their masks, unvaccinated started taking theirs off as well and that's when delta started hitting hot and heavy and now as you mentioned we're averaging over 140,000 cases a day over a two-month period. that trend keeps going up and up over the last few days and it don't look like we're out of the woods yet when it comes to this

but hopefully some of the measures being put in place will help with that including the vaccination rate like you talked about, are starting to go up again. some states that have said we will have no mask mandates are starting to rethink that thought process, more people are thinking about wearing masks, that's good, but you have to remember too we're starting to get to the point where kids are going to go back to school and that's going to cause a little bit of worrying as well because once they start congregating those cases might go up again. >> certainly. we've already seen that in some school districts. doctor, is there sort of a benchmark that you have for vaccinations where your going to breathe a little bit of a sigh of relief here? >> you know, we had talked about a long time ago having around 70% to get to that herd immunity. herd immunity at this point is probably something that's not going to happen even at the 70% rate. we'll have to live with this virus for a while. we'll keep it more controlled once we start getting closer to that. like you mentioned right now, half of americans have been fully vaccinated. we need that number to go even

higher because we're seeing in some states with low vaccination rates, those numbers are creeping up. and so the closer we get to getting those numbers up there, the less likely we are to have issues from this and particularly from this delta variant that we know is very contagious and has been causing breakthrough infections as well. those breakthrough infections would not happen if we didn't have unvaccinated people spreading the virus so quickly. hopefully we'll get there sooner rather than later. like you said, kind of a silver lining, more people are getting vaccinated now than they were even just a month or two ago. >> so doctor, you said learning to live with it. that kind of goes with what the former head of the fda, dr. scott gottlieb says, he expects covid-19 to become an endemic virus in the u.s. after this delta surge. what does that mean, what does that look like for us? >> so what that means is think about the flu, when you think about an endemic virus. that's a virus that is here, it never goes away, but it's not an epidemic, it's not a pandemic, it's just something we live with in our normal everyday lives.

but we keep it controlled with things like vaccinations. if those vaccinations don't work, and those cases start to pop up again, then we keep it controlled with things like masking, social distancing, shutting down businesses. for the most part vaccinations help to keep those endemic viruses under control. they'll never disappear, we just have to learn to live with them, lindsey. >> we've been hearing this is a pandemic of the unvaccinated but a "washington post" analysis shows there are some areas with two-thirds of american counties with a high vaccination rate living in a hotspot. why is that happening and have we learned about how to best address that when you do have a highly vaccinated population? >> lindsey, this is why the cdc changed their recommendations and are saying even if you're vaccinated, if you're in an area with a lot of coronavirus cases, you should wear a mask indoors. with this delta variant, even if

you're vaccinated, it's possible to get the virus and spread the virus. it doesn't happen off and it's not as likely to happen as with unvaccinated people. with unvaccinated people, it still is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. they're the ones that tend to get it, they're the ones that tend to spread it, but they can spread it to the vaccinated as well, that's why you're seeing those numbers. but if you take a look at overall country you'll notice in southern states, those hotspots that have high case rates, they also have low vaccination rates and that tends to go hand in hand, lindsey. >> got you. dr. john torres, thank you so much for your time, good to see you today. just when you thought the details couldn't get worse about the extreme measures that donald trump took to subvert the election, this week again there are new details. we're going to share them with you, next. t. (customer) hi? (burke) happy anniversary. (customer) for what? (burke) every year you're with us, you get fifty dollars toward your home deductible. it's a policy perk for being a farmers customer. (customer) do i have to do anything? (burke) nothing. (customer) nothing? (burke) nothing. (customer) nothing? (burke) nothing. (customer) hmm, that is really something.

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on capitol hill, president biden's infrastructure plan is

facing yet another roadblock and this one isn't from republicans. it's from members of his own party. in a letter to speaker pelosi, nine moderate democrats are threatening to sink the $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill on human infrastructure unless the house first passes that bipartisan bill that was approved by the senate earlier this week. nbc's ali vitali is on capitol hill. ali, does pelosi need vote she can get here, where does she stand on this? >> reporter: look, she can only use three. tight margins both in the senate and the house have been the key story line throughout this entire congress on every policy issue. so infrastructure here is no exception. really what's happening is speaker pelosi would like to do both phases of the infrastructure bill, both the hard infrastructure bipartisan package that just passed the senate as well as the $3.5 trillion human infrastructure package that's going to be done through reconciliation. she wants both of those things

to make their way through the senate before the house actually takes them up. but there are some democratic members in her caucus who say that's not what they would like to see here. in the letter they spent to the speaker they say, some have suggested that we hold off on considering the senate infrastructure bill for months until the reconciliation process is completed. we disagree, the members right. with the livelihoods of hard working americans at stake, we simply can't afford months of unnecessary delays and risk squandering this once in a century, bipartisan infrastructure package. it's time to get shovels in the ground and people to work. the thing is speaker pelosi's stance is not changing. she said while she's heard the people who would look to do this in a different order, she's sticking with the way she wants to do it. it really does maintain the leverage that might be needed in the senate so that the first part of this bill which does have bipartisan consensus is not just passed in the house and the $3.5 trillion other investments

aren't just left languishing between the senate and the house. but the members are correct in that this is still a pretty long process before the house actually votes on either part of this infrastructure bill. consider the fact that members are home right now on recess but they're drafting that reconciliation bill. chuck schumer put a deadline of september 15 on it. but nevertheless, that's still several weeks away, and then the procedural parts of it actually start happening in the halls of congress. so that's really the holdup that these members are talking about, them saying they want to see shovels in the ground as soon as possible. at the same time, though, too, it comes back to margins because this is only nine members which may not seem a lot like the several hundred in the house. at the same time speaker pelosi can only lose three. certainly a balancing act here as infrastructure continues on its way to passage. >> certainly looking like it's going to drag into next month as well. ali vitali, thank you.

new census data made headlines this week painting a picture of how our country continues to evolve and it's not just about the numbers and the changing demographics. it's about what it means for the next election. and it means a lot. the one person who can bring clarity to the census number confusion joins me next from the big board. you'll want to hear from steve kornacki, that's going to be coming up in our next hour. nexr people with moderate to severe psoriasis, are rethinking the choices they make like the splash they create the entrance they make, the surprises they initiate. otezla. it's a choice you can make. otezla is not a cream. it's a pill that treats plaque psoriasis differently. with otezla, 75% clearer skin is achievable. don't use if you're allergic to otezla. it may cause severe diarrhea, nausea, or vomiting. otezla is associated with an increased risk of depression.

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new details now about a tense confrontation when donald trump faced off in the white house with former acting attorney general jeffrey rosen, three days before the capitol riots. it comes as the senate judiciary committee heard new testimony this week from a u.s. attorney who resigned in january at the height of trump's pressure campaign to overturn the election results. >> the president of the united states, then donald trump, mounted a pressure campaign that was absolutely relentless, brutal, personally involved, directly aimed at the department of justice, seeking to break it and weaponize it to overthrow the election. for any attorney general to say "no" to a president and to enlist a department of justice leadership, all of the top officials, in saying they would walk, is a moment in history that really deserves to be fully captured. >> that was senator blumenthal

who was in the room for those senate judiciary committee hearings or testimony. joining us is katie benner, the "new york times" reporter who broke the story. katie, you wrote about this mass resignation threat. how did that play out? >> in the days before the attack you saw former acting attorney general jeff rosen realize one of his former employees, jeff clark, had been secretly speaking with president trump about whether to send a letter to officials in georgia saying they should rethink the results there. jeffrey rosen understood his own job was in jeopardy as the president is thinking about replacing him with jeff clark. he requests a meeting in early january saying, we need to talk about this, he, jeff clark,

white house lawyers and department of justice officials as they argue back and forth about the merits of whether the justice department should intervene in georgia. rosen says over and over again, we have not found evidence to support these georgia claims, we're not finding this and we're not going to do it. other officials chime in and say, and, if you replace jeff rosen, we will resign en masse and any attention that would have once gone to your claims in georgia will be completely subsumed by the chaos that happens if we all resign. >> wow. we're also getting to georgia in a second, but you also write that even trump's lawyer pat cipollone advised against firing rosen. what do you know about trump's demeanor at the time? was the weight of all of these election certification results really bearing down on him? >> from the reporting that we have, former officials, they say again and again that this was an

obsession for the former president, that he spoke of nothing else, that he contacted the justice department about nothing else. it was always one of two themes, one, why aren't you fighting harder for me, i don't understand, i have all these people around me, including his own legal team, sidney powell and others, fighting, fighting, why won't the justice department fight? when those officials including jeff rosen said, because we've looked into these claims and didn't find evidence to support them, that wasn't good enough. the other thing they heard again and again at the end of december, and we see this in notes memorializesed by another top justice department official, is that trump brings up the idea of replacing jeff rosen. he says, i hear this other guy, jeff clark, is pretty great, maybe he should run the department. officials say to him, you can have whatever leadership you want but it will not change the outcome. from what i've been told in my

reporting, he was obsessed with whether or not he could overturn the results. >> here is also what senator blumenthal told us about whether the doj can now take action against trump. let's listen to them. >> i want to put aside talking about specific individuals. but i will say, as a former united states attorney and a state attorney general for 20 years, there is a real potential here for criminal charges. there are also some officials who did his bidding. and there should be consideration of criminal charges for them and others who may have been complicit. >> so this is a two-part question, but speaking to what the senator was saying, from your reporting, are there any other targets of this investigation? also from what you're learning here, are there any potential criminal charges against the former president or anyone else? >> senator blumenthal is a lawyer and i am not.

and i don't think it's wrong to take a look at the statutes and look at the behavior that we've seen and wonder whether or not criminal charges could be brought. i will say that for the justice department, it would not be a cavalier move to bring criminal charges. i don't think that we could expect anything like that anytime soon. they'll want to vet all the evidence. they're going to want to know what investigators in the senate judiciary committee come up with. and they're also going to want to see what the justice department's own inspector general discovers. i don't think this is the sort of thing, it's not the kind of decision that would be made easily because even if there is evidence, even if there is reason to believe that an investigation is warranted, we are talking about criminally investigating the former president. the bar is extremely high, attorney general merrick garland is a thoughtful, considered person, he's not going to rush into it. i think that's important to note. even as we talk about whether or not criminal charges are likely or warranted, it feels like the kind of conversation is extremely hypothetical and we're in very early stages. >> i do want to get to georgia

because nbc news has confirmed that former u.s. attorney in atlanta bj pak testified before the senate judiciary committee this week. you've been writing extensively about this. what do you think he said in his testimony? >> from my reporting, and from what your reporters have confirmed, we know he went into that testimony and investigators asked a lot of questions about what was going on in atlanta. fulton county, you know, atlanta's county, was a county that the former president was extremely obsessed with. he felt there were allegations of voter fraud that were credible or that could help him win the election. bj pak quietly pushed back on all of tell me. he told investigators on the senate judiciary committee that not only had his investigators looked into this but state investigators in georgia looked into these claims and had not found evidence to support them but that was not an answer that trump wanted. he also testified that right after this enormous showdown in the oval office between top justice department officials

about whether or not the department would intervene in georgia, about whether or not trump would replace the top of the department, right after that meeting was over, and we see this also in emails and notes released by congressional investigators, that the number two official in the department immediately reached out to that u.s. attorney, bj pak, and said call me, it was 10:30 sunday night. pak said it was made clear to him that the president was so upset about georgia, he was not going to stop hammering on georgia, that pak had the choice to quit or be fired, that he was going to be leaving right away, and you see at 7:00 the next morning, he resigns. >> what's the significance here of a u.s. attorney getting a phone call at 10:00 at night on a sunday saying this is the writing on the wall here, you either need to quit or you're going to be ousted, how significant is that? >> i think there are two things

we should consider. one is that is how much the president was pressuring the justice department at the time. so much so that he was willing to get rid of top officials and he was willing to consider getting rid of top officials to get the answer he wanted despite the fact that he was told the facts did not support it. that's very searing evidence and and we should keep in mind when we think about how serious trump was about saying that the election should be called for him. and the other thing is, this is an ongoing debate. was it right or wrong, was it better or worse for officials to do things like resign so as not to raise the ire of the president, or should any of those officials have publicly said this is what the president is trying to do to the election, this is what's going on right now? what is is right to try to placate him and stave off disaster or should there have been some sort of more public reckoning at the time? i think for the officials at the justice department, they truly felt fear that if they were to be public and quit or be public

and make a fuss, they would be replaced by people who would do the president's bidding. but i think the history books are going to debate whether or not that was the right choice. >> we have to leave it there, fascinating stuff. thank you so much for sharing your reporting with us. it's only just begun, the political blowback from the u.s. withdrawal from afghanistan. what went wrong? i may not be able to tell time, but i know what time it is. [whispering] it's grilled cheese o'clock. ok everyone, our mission is to provide complete, balanced nutrition for strength and energy. whoo hoo! ensure, with 27 vitamins and minerals, now introducing ensure complete! with 30 grams of protein.

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or teaching biology without a lab. we are the leader in 5g. #1 in customer satisfaction. and a partner who includes 5g in every plan, so you get it all. without trade-offs. unconventional thinking. it's better for business. as the taliban advances across afghanistan at lightning speed, president biden is not having second thoughts on his decision to withdraw all u.s. troops by the end of this month. from what he views as an unwinnable war. joining me right now is zerlina maxwell, director of progressive programming at sirius xm and host of "zerlina" on peacock. zerlina, we'll play for you something the president said back in july. let's listen. >> reporter: does the taliban

takeover of afghanistan now inevitable? >> no, it is not. because you have the afghan troops have 300,000 well-equipped, as well-equipped as any army in the world, and an air force, against something like 75,000 taliban. it is not inevitable. >> i mean, the president is so confident there. and here we are a month later and the situation has just deteriorated so quickly. was the president getting bad intel? >> i don't know about the intel the president was receiving, lindsey, but i do think for those of us who remember the beginning of the war in afghanistan and what led to it, 9/11, we know that is 20 whole years of lives lost and trillions of dollars spent. so i think all of that has factored in here. and we're talking about multiple presidents dealing with this issue and understanding that i

think if any president had taken troops out, this was not an inevitable occurrence but it was a predictable outcome. and i think certainly the speed with which the taliban has reconstituted itself, taking over nearly half of the territories, is an important development for the biden administration to consider as they look to diplomatic options at this point. but i think all of the military experts that i've read and spoken to in the past week have said that the military options, we're out of those. and so i don't know that this was inevitable, but predictable for sure. >> when the president announced in april that he would pull out all of the troops by september 11th, the move was really supported by a majority of voters. if you look at your screen, according to a morning consult poll, 84% of democrats were behind it, two-thirds of i understand -- two-thirds of independents, more than half of

republicans. shermichael? >> lindsey, it depends on how fast the taliban regains control of various provinces in the country. it depends on whether or not we see at some point the risk in the near future of potential destabilization in the reasonable which i think it becomes at that point a question of what our interest in that part of the world and is it more so in the united states' interests to maintain some type of permanent military presence there or if we should just completely withdraw as the president plans to do. if we do withdraw completely, what are the risks down the line as the taliban continues to strengthen themselves in numbers to our allies but also to the united states. and so i think voters are going to be looking at various aspects of those things to inform their overall opinion about whether or not this is or isn't a good idea. >> shermichael, republicans in congress have been on the attack for biden's strategy here but

zerlina talked about previous presidents, for example president trump negotiated the withdrawal with the taliban. some are saying that was a bad deal. where are you placing a majority of the blame right now? >> i mean, look, i think we have to go back to the very beginning. we saw from the british empire to the soviet union, none of those countries were successful in occupying that part of the world. i think many americans for the most part have come to the realization that after spending 2, 3, $5 trillion over the past 15, 20 years, that we don't really see any benefit of our presence. and so i think if you look at this politically, as zerlina very eloquently stated, some president, whether republican or democrat, at some point in time, was going to make this decision. if not, the question would be are we willing to have a permanent presence in that region just as we do between north and south korea, just as we have various military

installations across the world, are we willing to make that financial dedication. i don't know that many americans, lindsey, are willing to do so. as far as the blame, i don't know if i would put any blame on one particular party or the other. i think the president is doing what any potential president would have done regardless of party. but again, i think the question is what are the risks to potential destabilization in the reasonable and how well the united states can react if such a thing does happen. >> zerlina, we saw president biden get this big major bipartisan legislative win, although of course now that might be in peril in the house. has that good been overshadowed by all this other news? we have afghanistan, the covid cases, governor cuomo resigned just as president biden was announcing this major win. >> no one can ever do infrastructure week without some drama, lindsey, it seems. and i feel like even though the biden administration, they essentially were like, yay, we did infrastructure week right, and it was tuesday, and who knew what was going to happen for the rest of the week. but i think as we sit in the

pandemic, as these developments happen in afghanistan, as we see essentially governors, conservative republican governors all over the country trying to play politics with people's lives and their health, you know, this is an inflection point in the country. katie benner's reporting is incredible because it demonstrates that what happened in our understanding of what happened leading into january 6 is essentially a coup in three parts. they lied to the courts, they tried to overturn the election that way. then they tried to put a pressure campaign on the justice department, that's step two. the insurrection was actually the culmination of the attempts to overturn the election. and that is very serious, it goes to the heart of our democracy. and so all of these issues are out here, and certainly the biden administration would have loved to have everybody end this week on friday and say, ooh, look at the progress on infrastructure. but i think that the issues are so much bigger than just the infrastructure package, frankly. and that is something we should

always keep in mind. >> good point there. all right, shermichael singleton, thank you. catch zerlina maxwell's show on the peacock streaming channel "the choice" on msnbc. now that new york state ended its impeachment inquiry for governor andrew cuomo, what does that mean for his future and other legal troubles? i want... ♪♪ it's the easiest because it's the cheesiest. kraft. for the win win. i brought in ensure max protein, with thirty grams of protein. those who tried me felt more energy in just two weeks! [sighs wearily] here, i'll take that! woo-hoo! ensure max protein. with thirty grams of protein, one gram of sugar, and now with two new flavors!

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good day from msnbc world headquarters in new york. welcome to "alex witt reports." i'm lindsey reiser. breaking news out of haiti, the prime minister confirming in the last hour people have died after a 7.2 magnitude earthquake hit just off the coast of the caribbean this morning. now, the exact number of fatalities is still unknown. but we want to show you a look at the damage here. this is near the site of the quake. people in jamaica reportedly felt the tremors. that was from a distance of about 200 miles away. as you may remember here, haiti was hit by a devastating earthquake back in 2010. that was a 7.0 magnitude quake so that was actually smaller than this one. and that one killed about 200,000 people. let's go right to nbc's ed augustine, following the breaking news for us. ed, what is the