what recology is all about. as an employee-owned company, recology provides good-paying local jobs for san franciscans. we're proud to have built the city's recycling system from the ground up, helping to make san francisco the greenest big city in america. let's keep making a differene together. good afternoon, everybody, i'm yasmin vossoughian. we got a lot happening this hour. rallying on streets across this country right now, thousands of women from washington, d.c., all the way to california, they're marching to protect abortion rights. and then on capitol hill, happening as we speak, congress continuing its search for the right balance on the president's infrastructure and social agenda. now, he's telling them to take more time.

the politics of war playing out on tvs across this country. what did we learn this week after being in afghanistan for 20 years? and how is the political climate changing the way the political civilians work with the military? and then coming up in the 4:00 p.m. hour, the personal and very hard decision for pregnant women everywhere. should they get the covid vaccination? the cdc is now saying, yes, but i'm going to speak with one expectant mother who still has a lot of concerns. we do want to start first on capitol hill where lawmakers are working through the weekend to try and agree on a path forward for multiple pieces of legislation crucial to the president's agenda as we well know. it is about time to get the job done, said speaker nancy pelosi earlier today in a letter to democratic colleagues, the note coming after house democrats failed to wrangle enough support to pass the bipartisan infrastructure bill yesterday. forcing the speaker to delay a vote once again. so, what was the main hold-up? the intraparty battle between

progressives and moderates over the trillion dollar reconciliation bill. one of those moderates is arizona senator kyrsten sinema who released a scathing new statement just a little over an hour ago blasting democrats over delaying the vote, calling it, a, quote, failure, and, quote, inexcusable. nbc's julie tsirkin is on capitol hill for us. i read this statement from kyrsten sinema and i thought, it doesn't even seem like it's coming from the democratic party, considering how scathing it was, particularly toward progressive democrats in her own party. tell us about these new comments, the reaction we're hearing on the hill to them and where we are so far with negotiations as of this hour. >> reporter: yasmin, you can tell she's frustrated and she encapsulates how many moderates feel in the house and the senate after president biden paid a visit last night, telling moderates, we don't have the votes to pass the bipartisan infrastructure proposal right now. now, senator sinema is playing hardball and house democratic leadership and senate democratic leadership know that best, that

to take her seriously with the comments she's making. i want to read you a part of her statement. she's calling the house delay of the bipartisan infrastructure bill a, quote, ineffective stunt. she goes on to say that good faith negotiations require trust. over the course of this year, democratic leaders have made conflicting promises that could not all be kept, canceling the infrastructure vote further erodes that trust. you also have congressman gottheimer from new jersey, cochair of the house problem solvers caucus, he's also angry. he's saying the house democratic leadership is holding the bipartisan bill hostage over this reconciliation package, that multitrillion dollar plan, so as we round out a chaotic week in the house and the senate, there is one thing that we know and it's that president biden lowered the threshold, sources in the room yesterday told us that he's looking at a number between $1.9 trillion to $2.2 trillion, perhaps urging closer to what senator manchin and sinema want but away from

progressives' starting numbers. >> some would argue these arbitrary deadlines are what's causing a problem as well, holding people to these arbitrary deadlines. the september 27th deadline which we have passed at this point. with that in mind, though, talking about us through now what the speaker is promising when it comes to passage of these bills. >> reporter: well, i think speaker pelosi is not going to promise anything further because she's laid out multiple markers, you're right, for last week, both of those went and -- came and went without a vote on that bipartisan bill, and it really made some moderates angry and that is a tv friendly verbiage that i will use for how they're actually feeling. but as we head into october, i hate to tell you, we're going to be talking about deadlines for the rest of the season but let's talk about what's on the docket for this next month. october 18th is the deadline for the debt ceiling, treasury secretary yellen made it clear that's when the u.s. will run out of money to borrow, essentially. bad news for democrats is that that's tied to reconciliation right now because republicans in the senate are not willing to

help them lift the debt ceiling in a bipartisan way. something i should note that's been done over the last few years. then when you move through the month, you have october 31st. now, that's when those funding for the key highway programs, the surface transportation extension that the house and the senate just passed as early as today, that's when that will lapse. so they essentially have 30 days to figure all of these items out because speaker pelosi outlined in her "dear colleague" this morning, we got to pass the bipartisan bill by october 31st because the surface transportation programs are a part of that highway bill. so yasmin, buckle up. >> we've been buckled. julie, we've been buckled and holding on for dear life. >> reporter: hold on tighter. >> julie, thanks for joining us. we appreciate it. let's, of course, now go to the white house where president biden said earlier today that his administration will work like hell to get both infrastructure and his reconciliation social agenda bills passed. but stopped short of saying when.

>> i'm going to work like hell to make sure we get both these passed and i think we will get them passed. i'll be on the phone with them a lot. >> reporter: sir, do you think this could all be done by thanksgiving? >> i think it will be done by 2:27 a.m. on december -- come on. i think we'll get done. >> in the president's closed door yesterday he sided with the progressive stance, telling them to wait for agreement on reconciliation before voting on the infrastructure bill. nbc's heidi przybyla is at the white house. it looks as if, heidi, the president is now catching on to the fact that putting in place these kind of arbitrary deadlines or dates are causing more problems than helping with this situation and making the joke that he did, saying, 2:27 a.m. but although we would love for it to be exact. that being said, what does work like hell mean to this president right now? how confident is he he's going to get these bills passed? >> reporter: yeah, look, i was listening to julie talk, and here's what the president is

saying to kyrsten sinema and all the other moderates who are disappointed today. he's saying, look, i know you really want to bake banana bread. we could make banana bread, except we don't have bananas. basically, we could pass this. i know you want to pass it. i want to pass it. but we do not have the votes. so, the president is resetting the table. he's resetting expectations. he's giving them a bit of a framework to work within, by telling them to pick their priorities and also work within a certain band, a certain figure, right? and in this q&a that he gave to reporters, which was kind of unexpected earlier today, yasmin, he also sounded, honestly, a little frustrated. he said, look, the next phase of this is going to be joe biden takes it to the streets. i'm going to explain to the american people what is in the darn bill. here's what he said. >> there's an awful lot that's in both of these bills that everybody thinks they know. but they don't know what's in them. when you go out and you test

each of the individual elements in the bill, everyone is for them. not everyone. over 70% of the american people are for them. my objective here is to make sure we put in place the things that are going to make life more livable for ordinary people. i mean that sincerely. that's not a political statement. it's reality. >> reporter: so, biden went into this meeting saying, look, moderates, i know you thought you had the upper hand here, but you don't. and you both are going to have to compromise. you're going to compromise within this number range, and i also want you to take a look at what your priorities are, whether they be the child care tax credit or universal pre-k, medicare expansion, and then we'll work down from there and tweak the numbers and that's how this is going to work. he did not give a timeline. as a matter of fact, that was the big news this week is that he blew up the timeline which was supposed to be this week. >> just quickly here, heidi, any reaction to kyrsten sinema's statement from the white house? >> reporter: well, it's not

unexpected, and that's why you saw the president, i think, come out today to speak to the media after the meeting to say, look, i understand everybody's frustrated. those were his words, and he was speaking directly to sinema and other moderates in the house as well, but he's banking on the fact that all of them are in the same boat, and they can choose to either sail this agenda, which they were all elected on, or they can sink the ship, which would affect everyone come election time, yasmin. >> heidi przybyla, thank you. great to see you. we're going to continue to break down the latest infrastructure and social agenda items in our next hour when i am joined by new york democratic congressman richie torres. so right now, thousands are taking to the streets across this country in support of women's reproductive rights. you're watching one of the largest rallies in washington, d.c., not far from where heidi is standing.

the biggest trigger for this year's demonstrations and the restrictive new law first enacted in texas which bans abortions after six weeks of pregnancy. but there is broader fear across the board that protections under roe v. wade could also crumble as it faces its biggest challenge in decades. nbc's lauren egan is in washington, d.c., and stephanie stanton is standing by in austin, texas. lauren, i want to start with you on this one. it's been almost five years since the first women's march made its debut there in washington. from what i'm understanding, capitol police officers have now arrived at the steps of the supreme court to keep things peaceful. talk us through what you have been experiencing on the ground there so far. >> reporter: yeah, that's right. it's been five years since that very first protest, but the intensity and the passions are just as high. i want to show you a little bit about what's happening right behind me here. you see the pro-abortion activists are walking across the other side of the street. there you see the u.s. capitol police that have confronted them

right there and right here, closest to me in blue shirts, those are pro-life, anti-abortion protesters that greeted the women's march as they made their way up here. the women's marchers, their intention was to make it to the steps of the supreme court. they haven't been able to do that because they have sort of been blocked off by the anti-abortion activists who have kind of set up this concert situation right on the foot of the supreme court steps here. yasmin, i had a chance to catch up with a lot of protesters, women's marchers, earlier today. a lot of them raised two big issues and i was speaking with them. they said they were out here because they're concerned about what's happening in texas, and they're worried it's not just texas. it's going to spread to other states and particularly states where there are conservative legislatures. we're going to end up in a situation where abortion is essentially not available to a certain region in the country. second is they're really worried about a december supreme court case that's going to be heard

just a few weeks from now, really, on a mississippi law that bans abortions after 15 weeks. they really view that as the next big moment, pivotal moment, in the fight for abortion access. so, there's no mistake that they made their way up to the supreme court. it was an intentional message that they were supposed to send, highlighting the importance that the supreme court plays in this whole debate, and the scene that i'm seeing right here kind of underscores just how important a role it plays, yasmin. >> all right, i want to go to texas now where we find stephanie standing by as well. much of this, obviously, is focused on what has taken place in texas, the law that is now being enforced in texas. what is the main message that you're hearing there? >> reporter: yeah, well, good afternoon to you, yasmin. this was a rally against sb-8 and basically the bottom line message here, yasmin, is, these protesters, these organizers

want sb-8 overturned, plain and simple. they are calling on the biden administration to do that. they are calling on members of the u.s. supreme court. i am here outside the state capitol here in texas, here in austin, and this is ground zero. this is where those legislators on september 1st enacted sb-8, essentially banning abortion once a heartbeat is detected and as we know, that can happen around six weeks when many women don't realize they are pregnant. there was a huge turnout here today. thousands came to take part in this rally. again, there were activists, there was music, and i did have a chance to speak to some of the people on the ground. one of the organizers tells me that 87% of texans are against sb-8, and i did have a chance to speak to, as i said, some of the other people in attendance about why they felt it was necessary for them to be here, and here's what they had to say. >> it's not just about right or

wrong. we have to get there together. we have to come to a census, and this was not in everybody's best interest. >> roe v. wade is the law of the land. it has been for nearly 50 years now, and the extreme right fringe of the republican party is trying to take away women's fundamental rights. >> i marched for roe v. wade. i'm 66 years old. i marched back then, and i'm furious that we're having to fight this fight continually. >> reporter: and again, this was one of more than 600 marches taking place across the country. another one, i want to take you over to houston, there was a pretty large gathering there. thousands in attendance this morning, but that march, we are told, was cut short due to some rain. nevertheless, the message continues to resonate and the bottom line here is that people want women's right to choose restored within the state of texas. >> and these rallies happening across the country.

we're going to stay on top of it, continue to cover it for you guys and bring it to you as well. lauren, stephanie, thank you to you both. appreciate it. coming up next, everybody. >> afghanistan did not end on the terms that we wanted. >> chairman of the joint chiefs, general mark milley, getting grilled about the withdrawal from afghanistan while testifying on capitol hill this week. are we seeing a new era of post-war accountability? stay with us. ountability? stay with us bipolar depression. it made me feel like i was trapped in a fog. this is art inspired by real stories of people living with bipolar depression. i just couldn't find my way out of it. the lows of bipolar depression can take you to a dark place... ...and be hard to manage. latuda could make a real difference in your symptoms. latuda was proven to significantly reduce bipolar depression symptoms and in clinical studies, had no substantial impact on weight. this is where i want to be. latuda is not for everyone. call your doctor about unusual

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how do you look the men and women in the eye that have served under your command? how do you look young men in the eye? maybe we're going to remember you three as the three that broke the military. >> it seems to me that you put a high priority on making sure that you were favorably portrayed by the d.c. pres corps. you spent a lot of time doing that. fair enough if that's your

priority. general, i think you should resign. >> secretary austin, i think you should resign. >> so, that was just a small taste of how republican lawmakers treated the nation's top military advisor, general mark milley, in a hearing this week. gop senators in particular berated the decorated general on topics from the afghanistan withdrawal to communications with china during the trump administration. and oftentimes, in some pretty shocking ways, while not even giving him any chance to respond to their charges. my next guest called it a war against civilized norms in an op-ed for the "washington post." dana millbank is joining me now. thanks for joining us on this. really appreciate it. you start your piece like this. i want to read it. perhaps nothing republican lawmakers do anymore should come as a surprise, but their treatment of general mark milley on tuesday opened a new front in the war against civilized norms. why were you even surprised by

this? for instance, the treatment from hawley there, that we just played. >> well, yasmin, i've been in dozens, probably hundreds of hearings where whoever's coming before the senators, the members of congress to testify gets a real dressing down. it's not uncommon to be said, you should resign or, you know, to demand somebody's resignation. this was, however, something different. you had the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and they were accusing him of being disloyal to his country. they were accusing him of aiding the enemy, aiding the chinese communist party. they said he broke the military. they suggested that the military is no longer a trustworthy institution, and they suggested that he cares more about his own vanity and how he's portrayed than he cares about the lives of the men and women serving under him. now, look, this is the top general in the united states, 42 years in uniform serving his country. it seems to me you could give him a dressing down, the

afghanistan pullout didn't go well, regardless of whose fault it is. it's really a very different thing to say, you're not patriotic. you have betrayed your country. that's why i think it's gone beyond all norms. that's just -- that seems to me to be utterly out of bounds but there's nothing that is utterly out of bounds anymore as far as the republicans are concerned. >> it seems like former president donald trump was the elephant in the room during that testimony. when we talk about a lack of respect for the military, when it served him, and when he thought it served his base, he would disrespect the military in one way or another, and when it served him and he thought it served his base, he would prop up the military, depending on the hour of the day. did you see that? >> well, right. i mean, so, general milley, the very man who was getting the grilling here, was the one, you'll remember, he was in his camo fatigues and marching in lafayette square with donald trump to do his photo op with

the bible that day. that was infamous. i think general milley learned from that. he had a very different response to the january 6th insurrection and the activities leading up to it. i think that was a -- sort of a dress rehearsal, if you will, and he learned about, you know, the proper role of, you know, civilian control of the military but also not to be used as a prop. so, certainly, donald trump praised him when he was helping donald trump's cause, and he's going to criticize him for what he did, according to my colleagues, bob woodward and robert costa, but general milley testified under oath that he reached out to china to calm relations, to calm fears there, at the request of political appointees in the trump administration. so, the trump people are now turning against him for doing exactly what they asked him to do in the first place. >> it's interesting because your colleague, david ignacious, had

a different take or perspective in talking about how the testimony kind of was this refreshing take on looking behind the scenes as to what went wrong. why this was such an abject failure when it comes to afghanistan over the last 20 years, how forthcoming the testimony was, in fact, and i want to read a little bit from ignacious's op-ed. and he writes this. watching this pointed encounter between the pentagon and congress, perhaps we could all appreciate for once the blessings of our open democratic system. some countries suffer for decades from the shame of a lost war. their militaries seethe in silent rage. politicians invent conspiracy theories to explain failure, to suppress mistakes of the past war, prefigure the next one. what do you make of this? did you have any sort of takeaway like this one where there was more transparency than we would have expected in years past, especially from high-ranking generals like milley? >> yeah, i don't think i disagree with my colleague, david, on that.

what i was taking issue with was more the personal attacks on general milley. >> got it. >> absolutely, i think the testimony was quite forthcoming about what went wrong. i think you had, you know, democrats and republicans pointing fingers at each other, saying it was the trump administration's deal with the taliban. no, it was the way president biden implemented it. it was the general's fault. the truth is, it's all of the above, and you know, there's plenty of blame to go around here. so, it is a good result that is a result of general milley acknowledging this strategic failure, to use his words, that the pentagon is going to do all this after action research so they're just not repeated again. so, that's what an oversight hearing is supposed to be about, and it did serve its purpose in terms of that. it would seem to me that in our democracy, we can have oversight without suggesting that people we disagree with are not loyal to the united states. >> just last question here. we know the american public, the

american voter is fiercely loyal to the u.s. military. what do you think their takeaway is when they see josh hawley try to undress milley the way he did during the testimony? >> he was trying to make a distinction between the rank and file in the military and the leadership of the military, but another senator, marsha blackburn, said that the united states military is broken, that it's politicized. you know, that's not criticizing general milley. that's criticizing the united states military. so, i'm -- i do wonder whether some in the republican base even would take issue with that. >> great to see you on this saturday, thank you as always. up next, everybody, how california plans to move forward with its requirement that all students in the state be immunized against covid. we're going to take you there next. we're going to take you there next ♪ limu emu & doug ♪ got a couple of bogeys on your six, limu. they need customized car insurance from liberty mutual so they only pay for what they need.

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california is now the first state to mandate covid vaccinations for public and private school students. governor gavin newsom says it

will not take effect for all kids until the u.s. government has finished fully vetting the vaccine for two age groups, 12 to 15 and 5 to 11. the mandate is going to likely face pushback, of course, from parents following a recent string of anti-vaccination protests at school board meetings. joining us now to talk more about this in san jose, nbc's scott cohn. scott, good to see you this afternoon. this is astounding, this development in the state of california, and i imagine quite controversial. talk to me about what you're hearing there so far. >> reporter: yeah, it is generating some controversy, particularly in the sizable conservative pockets of this state. but governor newsom is pushing ahead with this. remember, he beat back pretty handily a recall attempt just last month based on, in large part, the closing argument, his response to covid-19 and so he is running with that. so, here is how this is going to work. again, the covid-19 vaccine will be added to the list of ten

vaccinations that are currently already required for school kids like polio, measles, mumps, rubella, diphtheria, tetanus and the like. this following the fda full approval of the vaccines. we only have emergency use authorizations of the pfizer vaccine for 12 and over. we could see this taking effect as soon as this fall. it does apply to public and private schools because it's a regulation and not legislation, state law requires that there be medical and religious exemptions from this. experts, many experts, are saying that beyond the schools, this could make a world of difference. >> schools are places where children are going to get infected, and fortunately, they have a much lower morbidity and mortality rate than the general population but they're going to bring it home so it's critical we get school-age children vaccinated, for their own good

in terms of safety, education, and for society's good. >> reporter: another potentially controversial aspect of this is that when the vaccination requirement goes into effect for school kids, it also goes into effect for teachers. right now, there is an alternative, which is testing for covid. that will go away under the governor's order, so we will see what the reaction is to that. the governor points out that california educates about 12% of the nation's school kids, but right now, accounts for less than 1% of the school closures. the state also has the lowest covid-19 case rate in the country, and the governor says he's running with that. >> and across the country, that mandate for teachers across new york city area going into effect this past friday. so, seeing how that's going to play out when doors open on monday morning. scott cohn, thanks thanks for that. we appreciate it. we're following breaking news from the white house as well. the president issuing another plea for americans to get vaccinated after the nation reached yet another grim

milestone in its fight against the pandemic. as of friday, more than 700,000 americans have died from covid. a number the president called astonishing before warning americans, quote, we must not become numb to the sorrow. with me now to talk about this, msnbc medical contributor, dr. natalie azar. couple things i want to cover with you, dr. azar, and first, just your reaction to this huge, astounding, terrible number now that we have reached, this milestone of 700,000 deaths from covid in this country. >> i know, it's not a number that i think, well, i certainly didn't predict this at the beginning. although, maybe some experts did. you know, it's a terrible number, and it's really astonishing too that just, you know, a little over 100 days ago, we were at 600,000, and so we've already, you know, accumulated another one hundred thousand deaths in spite of the availability of a free, safe,

and effective vaccine. you know, look, the 14-day average is down in terms of hospitalizations and cases and deaths, although the deaths are definitely lagging, but -- which is certainly a good thing, but we are heading into the fall and winter, and you know, cold temperatures in many parts of the u.s., and if you look at a map of, you know, high, very high, and extremely high activity, it still makes up the majority of the country, yasmin, so you know, we've got a lot of metrics that we're all following but we're definitely not out of woods yet. >> so, i want you to comment on the report that we just heard from scott cohn about this mandate that the governor in california has called for. and that is, vaccinating school children but not going into effect, of course, until the eua for 5 to 11-year-olds takes place. what do you make of this mandate? how could it change the game? >> well, you know, we talk a lot about the concept of herd immunity and for better or

worse, that number always includes children. it's not -- we don't and cannot achieve that with adult vaccination and adult infection alone, yasmin, so you know, the pfizer's data is sitting with the fda right now. they are meeting in two weeks, the advisory committee, to review the data and will presumably grant or recommend authorization to the fda, and if the fda agrees on that, then the cdc has a meeting planned, actually, for the week after so we're talking about three weekends from now where the 5 to 11 group could very well begin to be vaccinated. i wasn't sure if scott said they could mandate it until it receives full approval as opposed to an eua so i think they're going to get a lot of pushback from those conservative pockets and those parents who feel that it is, you know, going against their rights, but it is something that i think is going

to be necessary for us to move ahead as a country. >> before i let you go, i'm going to be having a pregnant woman on who is hesitant to get vaccinated in my next hour and we know the warnings from the cdc now urging all pregnant women, all women that are thinking about getting pregnant to, in fact, get vaccinated because of the high rates of mortality that we have seen amongst pregnant women. and the antibodies that could benefit a newborn baby. what would you say to this woman who is hesitant to get vaccinated? >> well, the statistics are stark, yasmin. you know, we have had over 125,000 pregnant women who have been infected with covid-19 since the onset of the pandemic. 22,000 hospitalizations and '161 women have sadly died. we now have the data that tells us that covid-19 in pregnancy increases the risk of icu admission twofold and increases a woman's chance of dying by 70%. we also have data that the

vaccines are safe and effective in pregnancy and there is no increased risk of stillbirth, miscarriage, or birth defects from the vaccine. what i would say is simply this. in order to have a healthy baby, you need to have a healthy mother. so, these vaccines are protecting mom first and secondarily, baby. some of the research that's been done on vaccinating women during pregnancy has come out of my own institution from colleagues of mine that just reported a week ago, showing that women who were vaccinated in pregnancy, all 100% of their infants had evidence of antibody spike, antibody in the cord blood, and as you know, yasmin, newborns, number one, are not eligible for vaccine, not even for the flu vaccine yet, but certainly not for the covid-19 vaccine, therefore, they need mom's antibodies for protection and this is the way you can do it. >> for those crucial first six months of life. dr. natalie azar, thank you as always. great to see you. coming up in our next hour,

by the way, i'm going to be joined, as i just mentioned, by an expectant mother to get her story on why she remains unvaccinated. i'm going to play that answer for her from dr. natalie azar to get her reaction as well. during the height of the george floyd protests, a former u.s. diplomat wrote an article about a system of white supremacy at the state department keeping minorities from being hired or promoted. the question now is, has anything changed in that time, and what can the biden administration do to create a more inclusive environment? christopher richardson wrote that op-ed and he's joining me next. that op-ed and he's joining me next namel repair toothpaste, we can help actively repair enamel in its weakened state. it's innovative. my go to toothpaste is going to be pronamel repair.

welcome back. in the aftermath of george floyd's murder, the u.s. endured a racial reckoning, yet little has been done to cement meaningful change in legislation. congressional police reform negotiations have stalled. voting rights remain under attack. and even the state department, some fear, has forgotten its

promise to radically change how it treats black employees. in an op-ed last year for the "new york times," former u.s. diplomat christopher richardson described the myriad of ways in which the state department has ignored its own racial history. by continuing to allow, quote, as he wrote it, an entrenched system of white supremacy to control the advancement and promotion of black employees. secretary of state, tony blinken, swore to remedy the diversity gap upon assuming office, saying, quote, he is 100% committed to equity and inclusion in the state department's ranks. but according to some u.s. din diplomats, that change is not coming fast enough and tensions are growing, particularly among younger employees who fear that senior officials are treating the crisis, quote, with band-aids. with me now is former u.s. diplomat, christopher richardson, who wrote that piece. christopher, thanks for joining us on this. we really appreciate it. i guess i first just want to start with your experience at

the state department. what inspired you to write that piece? >> i think for me, in the wake of george floyd, there were a ton of focus groups and task forces that were started to deal with these issues of race and discrimination at the state department. and i thought that there wasn't any historical context to what was going on. i thought that people needed to know and understand what exactly was going on at the state department and know that history of what was going on for a lot of people, what was going on in terms of the lower numbers of diversity, was by accident, and what i wanted to show was that it was actually by design, that the people who made the modern day state department were really committed to this notion of making sure there was a lily white organization. >> i want to expand on a little bit of what you wrote. an entrenched system of white supremacy controls advancement and promotion at the department, which has failed to recruit and retain black diplomats. this is quite a charge, i have to say.

and now you got secretary of state tony blinken saying he's going to change things. over the last year, since you wrote this, have you seen any changes inside the state department when it comes to recruitment, especially amongst diverse candidates? >> well, absolutely. the secretary appointed gina abercrombie as chief diversity officer. there has been work expanding the fellowship to have more african-americans in the state department, so there definitely has been a movement to that -- to have more change at the state department, but i think that what we need to see more of is transparency and accountability. for example, there's 70 diplomats wrote a letter discussing this anti-semitic officer who wrote over 300 blog posts and there hasn't been much in the way of actually trying to terminate or fire that employee. and so, i think a lot of these younger diplomats are looking at that and saying this is just a demonstration of all the thing

that have happened in the past and they're not seeing the kind of actions that they want to see, basically, in this arena. >> you actually wrote in your op-ed about instances in which you saw that diversity was frowned upon, was looked at in a negative way amongst the rank and file inside the state department. >> well, yes. it's not just me. it's just the history of the state department. i think that as a state department, we really focus on, you know, either being promoted, so i think a focus on diversity sometimes it leads to a problem among white officers who are like, well, if this person gets promoted based on diversity, then that's -- that harms me and my ability to be promoted. and what i think the state department needs to focus on is, look, we had 70 years of fits and starts. we need to be as dedicated and as devoted to having diversity and improving diversity at the state department as the people were who court reported these structures, who made these foundations.

so when the first black diplomat passed the foreign service exam, the reaction wasn't one of joy. it was one of anger as what the state department did was asked the president of the united states to sign an executive order specifically barring black people from joining the state department and when the president said no, they spent 20 years actively working hard to bar black people from being in the state department. that's the kind of -- ironically, that's the kind of passion that we need on our side of things, right? we need to have that same kind of devotion and commitment to change as the people who built these structures had to building these blocks and building this white supremacist system, to blocking the entrance of black people to the state department. >> christopher richardson, thank you for taking the time and writing the piece that you did. appreciate it. >> thank you so much. coming up, everybody, a whirlwind 48 hours for the national women's soccer league, a head coach is fired for alleged sexual misconduct. the league commissioner resigns, and all games this weekend,

canceled. how the sports world governing body is reacting. world governig body is reacting

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monitor these marches and bring you the very latest as they come. so, the national women's soccer league has called off all five games slated for this weekend amid widespread allegations of sexual harassment and abuse, predominantly at the hands of male coaches. earlier this week, the north carolina courage fired coach paul riley over claims of sexual coercion, spanning multiple teams and going back more than a decade. nbc's sam brock has more. >> reporter: well these accusations are now serious enough that fifa is investigating. women from three different teams spanning a decade of paul riley's career speaking out against alleged inappropriate behavior and coercion and just as disturbing, the league was told about what was happening and failed to act in a meaningful way. >> there was this culture of both normalized behavior but also verbal abuse that everyone else really spoke to.

the first time that she felt coerced, that's the word that she uses, that they went into a room together and something happened in that room and then it happened again two more times. >> reporter: the national women's soccer league says it has launched an independent investigation that happened immediately and they are also now instituting an anonymous reporting system where players can text their concerns and have them examined immediately. sam brock, nbc news. back to you. >> thank you, sam. coming up in our next hour, everybody, despite infrastructure legislation still going unsigned, what is next as moderate and progressive democrats struggle to find common ground? i'm going to ask new york democratic congressman ritchie torres about that. jacob soboroff is in haiti with doctors without borders as the country is struggling to overcome the effects of natural disaster after natural disaster. we'll be right back. tul disaster after natural disaster. we'll be right back. [man] uh, mine. why? it's just that it's... lavender, yes it is. old spice, it's for men. but i like the smell of it.

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wait, a minute? but what have you been doing for the last two hours? ...delegating? oh, good one. move your xfinity services without breaking a sweat. xfinity makes moving easy. go online to transfer your services in about a minute. get started today. the situation in haiti is becoming increasingly grim as u.s. expulsion flights carrying haitian migrants are continuing today. nbc's jacob soboroff is in haiti taking a look at what deportees face as they step off those flights. >> reporter: yasmin, those expulsion flights by the biden administration of those haitians that were crowded under that bridge in del rio, texas, continue here to port-au-prince and the united nations says that as many as 6,200 have been sent

here over the course of the last ten-plus days. the situation they're returning to on the ground is exactly why we wanted to be here in haiti over the course of the last couple days this week to see what they're faced with when they arrive. and the answer is a stark, a drastic situation where many of them haven't been for years f , if not a decade. we went to see a clinic where they're treating victims of gun violence, car crashes, people fleeing basically the pervasive gang violence on the streets of this city and then just yesterday, we flew on a u.n. aircraft with the united nations world food program to a region on the southern peninsula here that was hit hard by the earthquake and what we heard from the director of the world food program here in-country, in haiti, is that it's difficult to find who needs their help the most. >> here, you have the most vulnerable among very vulnerable

people, and you need to properly identify who they are, where they are, to do a properly registration and to do a prioritization on the assistance that you will give them. >> reporter: in other words, everyone is so vulnerable, you really have to find the most vulnerable of the vulnerable. >> exactly. >> reporter: identifying the most vulnerable of the vulnerable is the task of the agencies on the ground here. this is the poorest country in the western hemisphere. there is so much food insecurity, political instability in the wake of the assassination of the president and of course the natural disaster, the earthquake. the situation on the ground here was dire long before that earthquake struck, and that is what the biden administration is expelling those migrants to. frankly, republicans have called for more expulsions of the haitians who had arrived here. many turned back and went to mexico. democrats, some, have said those expulsions are inhumane. that's the exact word that the former special envoy who resigned over the biden administration's treatment of haitians used to describe those

flights back here. the u.n. has called for the u.s. to look at each and every case individually before they start sending people back, but very clearly, these are mass expulsions, a blitz, you might say, and they're continuing right now. yasmin? >> thank you to jacob for that enlightening report. it is the top of the hour. you're watching msnbc reports with yasmin vossoughian. ♪♪ hi, everybody, it's the top of the hour. i'm yasmin vossoughian. for those of you still with us, thanks for sticking around. if you're just joining me, welcome. we have a lot to get to this hour. wrangling support, of course, on capitol hill. a rare weekend of action in d.c. as democratic leaders search for support on an infrastructure deal and a social spending plan. but how long will that take after the president told them to hold off for now? i'm going to speak to a member of the