it's 4:00 in new york. it was one of the most charged and polarizing criminal trials in recent history a trial that has become a major flash point in our divided country has come to an end. kyle rittenhouse, who shot three people, two of them fatally during unrest in kenosha, wisconsin in august of 2020 has been found not guilty on all counts. the verdict came after nearly 24

26 hours of deliberations by a jury composed of seven men, five women, and one person of color. it came after a trial chock full of controversy from day one starting with the judge refusing for the people shot by rittenhouse to be referred tos a victims. rittenhouse took the stand and said he was forced to act in self-defense when he shot three men. during close, statements, the defense claimed that rittenhouse, who came from kenosha, from illinois, armed with an ar-15 was there to, quote, try to help this community. the prosecution referred to rittenhouse as a, quote, chaos tourist, who was looking for trouble. the city of kenosha is on edge at this hour. ahead of the verdicts, schools had begun remote again, and the governor deployed 500 national guardsmen. the president is kulg for protests to remain peaceful saying this, quote, while the verdict in kenosha will leave

many americans feeling angry and concerned, myself included, we must acknowledge that the jury has spoken. i ran on promise to bring americans together because i believe that what you nights us is far greater than what divides us. i know we are not going to heal our country's wounds overnight but i remain steadfast in my commitment to do everything in my power to ensure that every american is treated equally, with fairness, and dignity under the law. the family of jacob brake whose shooting by a police officer triggered the unrest that drew rittenhouse to kenosha in august of last year is expressing outrage over today's verdict. jacob blake's uncle spoke to nbc's gabe gutierrez. here's some of what he said. >> there was no self-defense. self-defense is when you are protecting your home, protecting your family. he in a bastardly and dastardly

law used the law to work for him. there was throughoutly no self-defense. >> the family of anthony huber, one of the two men fattlely shot by rousz is out with a statement that reads in part, today's verdict means there is no accountability for the person who murdered our son. i sends the acceptable message that armed civilians can show up in any town, insight violence and then use the danger they have created to justify shooting people in the street. the acquittal of kyle rittenhouse is where we start this hour. shack brewster is outside the courthouses in kenosha for us. maya wiley and here. and the reverend al sharpton is here, host of msnbc's "politics nation." shaq, i start with you. what are you seeing and hearing? >> things are calm here in kenosha. i will tell you here in front of the courthouse there is some demonstrations. there are still some demonstrators here, but many of

the people that saw gathered on the courthouse steps have since left. it was that moment when the verdict was being read that you say a nix of people on the steps representing the divide that you are seeing across the country in reaction to this verdict. there were those who were on the steps who were there supporting kyle rittenhouse saying he was acting under hisself defense or using hisself defense -- excuse me. practicing his second amendment rights. and you had people there who were calling for his conviction saying this was tied to the social justice movement that we are seeing all across the country. and you saw somebody come out of the courthouse, announce the verdict and you heard a mix of cheers and you saw the disappointment on some people's faces including the uncle of jacob blake as you mentioned was the situation, was the shooting that started this entire situation here. one thing we noted with the jury is not only that they took their time doing this. this extended into four days of deliberation. they were behind closed doors

more than 24 hours going through this. according to pool reports they looked tired. they looked like they really went through a lot. we know they didn't give us much to work off of. they asked to see more video evidence early in the week. they asked for more copies of the jury instructions that extend about 36 pages. but there was not many signs, there were not many signs that we had to go off of as they were going through this process. so the anticipation here in kenosha was high. you saw a lot of people paying attention very closely and reacting to the moment when that verdict came down. >> shaq, having watched the whole trial, in your view, what did this turn on? >> you know, i think there were a couple of different moments. of course the moment that many legal experts say was the most risky was when you saw kyle rittenhouse take the stand himself. you saw he had an emotional moment. it of course became a controversial mochlt moment if you look culturally at how

people interpreted the moment when he became emotional on the stan. but that was a moment when we heard from the defense attorney afterwards, he said he had no choice but to put hess client on stand to humanize him, to show that he was a 17-year-old and he believed he was acting in his self-defense. another moment in this trial is when gaming grosskreutz took the stand and admitted he was shot after he raised the gun toward the destruction of kyle rittenhouse. i think that was another moment people 30i7b9ed you. you saw this with the prosecution and the defense, the idea that both of them leaned into the cultural ideas behind this trial. the prosecution called kyle rittenhouse a vigilante. said he came here looking for trouble, that he was there creating the situation that then required the self-defense. you had the defense mentioning in parter this defense, that if

the shotting of jacob blake, the man who was shot by kenosha police officers, if that was justified, then he suggested that kyle rittenhouse's shooting was also justified. you had both sides leaning into the conversations that uz saw outside of the courthouse, and those cultural themes of original is atlanticeism, the second amendment and the right to self-defense. you saw that in the courtroom where in many cases attorneys try to separate what happens outside, in the cultural tonings they try separate that from what happens inside the krour. >> maya, on what legally did this acquittal turn in your view? >> i don't think there is much question that obviously the jury bought the self-defense claim. this was one that included witnesses in addition to what shaq said that said for instance mr. mic guinness from the daily

caller who said mr. rosenbaum lunged for the rifle, as rouse testified. and you had the medical examinationer that the prosecution put on who said, yeah, it could have been. it's possible that there was a lunge. those are the kinds of things that helps the defense create reasonable doubt. but i do want to say, at the end of the day, i really think this turned on the judge. because we have a judge that in addition -- it's not just that he said you can call the people who have been killed or injured victims. it's that he allowed demonstrators to be labelled as rioters and even in one instance, drew hernandez, who is etiological and has a very formed biased opinion, who gets to be on the stand as a fact witness and use the word antifa, even when the department of homeland security has said white

supremacy is a significant danger in this country, and not antifa. so what that tells us, though, is the inability of the prosecution to actually cross-examine on the bias of that witness. and then throwing out the misdemeanor gun charge? really? he threw it out. reading the statute, it is not clear to me how that stands. what it means to the jury, essentially, the jury knows there was an illegal weapons charge, and they know the judge took it away. these are very clear signals to a jury what the judge thinks about the case. and we have so many examples in this. and that's a deep problem for the belief that the justice system works. and i do feel like we are in more danger today than we were yesterday. >> maya, i will follow up with you. these are some of the headlines that the judge earned during the trial. judge says he let rouse randomly select jurors out of a tumbler

so he would feel in control. rouse judge in spotlight after disallowing the word victims in the courtroom. judge in rouse trial faces backlash from asian food joke. definitely not okay. what -- i think the president's statement speaks to this, and he puts himself in the camp of americans who feel angry and concerned. what are we left to feel about the administration of justice? >> well, i think one of the things that this trial has shown many people who have had the opportunity to see inside a courtroom is what black people in this country have been experiencing for hundreds of years, which is the system doesn't necessarily work fairly for everyone. because people are people. they have biases, and they bring them into courtroom. so while the system sometimes work -- i don't want to say it never works. but in this case, it's very hard

to look at this and say it did. certainly -- and i want to say this about the jury. the jury clearly worked hard. and there was someone or some group of people on that jury who were probably fighting about the evidence. and that's one of the reasons it was three and a half days. but, as i said, you can't have the neutral arbiter, the judge, putting his hand on the scales and call it justice. and that is a problem that we have had in the system. unfortunately, in many cases, not in all of them. but it's certainly the case that you don't get -- peace is a choice. peace is a choice. but justice is a requirement for that choice. and that's the problem. >> rev, the victims are anthony huber and joseph rosenbaum. and i want to read a statement from wisconsin governor tony evers. no verdict will be able to bring

back the lives of anthony huber or joseph rosenbaum or heel gaige grosskreutz's injuries. no ruling today changes our reality in wisconsin, that we have work to do toward equity, accountability, and justice, that communities across our state are demanding and deserve. your thoughts? >> i think that the governor's statement is correct. and i think the broader context of this verdict today is most disturbing, which is why i think the president and the governor has to speak to this. and there needs to be clearer federal legislation. we can argue about the case in particular. but when you look at the broad message that came out of this, is they have said now that vigilantes can go to protests and kill people and say that they were defending themselves. which puts all americans, particularly those that won't to

protest for whatever issue, in danger. the precedent that it set, that you can have a judge sit there and say people can be killed, but you can't call them victims, but you can call the other side what you want, then i can let a tumbler sit in front of a man charged with murder and let him choose his own jury. so i think that many of us are far more concerned about what the broad message this verdict gives, than to arguing what the legal experts ought to argue, and rightfully so, about the particulars of the case. the message coming out of it -- don't forget the two people in michigan that went on their front stoop brandishing guns when people were protesting in the front, they went to the trial to witness kyle rittenhouse. people that are pro-gun people,

that can support rittenhouse, to see him aquitted but when black ministers sit with people in georgia after a young man was killed, who had no gun we are bar trd the courtroom in the same news cycle. that's the problem we are facing in the country today. it took a tremendous blow with this verdict. >> rev, you inspire a million questions right now. i will stick to where your focus is. how is the family of jacob blake doing? >> i have been in touch with his father. in fact he will be on "politics nation" with me tomorrow afternoon. he's outraged because the thing that these people came to his city and killed people that were there protesting for his son, who was shot on videotape, jacob jr., on videotape, seven times in the back. and the policeman was never

prosecuted. and here people -- whites, by the way, who were standing up for his son, and they were killed. and now they are being told that their lives were meaningless, that the court of law does not protect the fact that they were killed is an outrage to him. and i think it is an outrage to all of us. and it is a threat to all of us. to all of us that are known activists, we have got to be concerned what message this sends to anybody out there that think they can get away with harming any of us, and anyone else that stands up in protest and say it was all self-defense. and don't call them a victim, even though they were killed by an ar-15 by a young man that should have never had it in his hand. >> shaq, we have been describing kenosha as on edge. i know the governor has spoken out. the president has spoken out. i know there are preparations, national guard has been deployed. but can you just tell me sort of what's on the minds of the

people that you have run into since the verdict was made public? >> one common thread i have been hearing from people on both sides all across the city is how tired they are of the situation, the tension that they have been feeling. i mean they keep saying it has been a tough 15 months for the people here in kenosha. i had one small business owner tell me that he was frustrated, that he couldn't wait for the moment when people stopped talking about kenosha. and he was waiting and anticipating the verdict for that reason. i think that is something that you are hearing from people who wanted to see the conviction of kyle rittenhouse, and those who were calling for the acquittal of kyle rittenhouse. there is this understanding that -- understanding that they have been through a lot over the past year and a half. and they want the media presence to go. they want the protests to go. they want to resume that normal life again. i think one thing that you saw throughout the deliberations which, again, we entered day four of the deliberations.

you saw that tension just continue to grow. schools going virtual, for example. you saw businesses that had boards down off their windows for the past year, since what happened last august. they decided to board up again. that tension was growing, and people are breathing a sigh of relief right now. and they hope that the calm that you are seeing right now throughout the city -- they are hoping that continues through the night after this acquittal. >> maya, i want to ask you to pick up the thread that i think the rev is pulling in a very restrained manner. but the message that is sent is one that is undeniably amplified by some of the most prominent figures on the right. tucker carlson has been talking about kyle rittenhouse since the earliest hours after the shooting happened. and when you talk about the -- what is heard and the messages sent, what are your concerns in that category?

>> i absolutely agree with the rev here that -- it is one of the reasons why i said we are in more danger today than we were yesterday. and it is because of that larger messaging that if you bring a gun even if there is a real question about whether you are lawfully carrying it, to a protest, that you have a real possibility of getting away, even with murder. that's the reality of what we are looking at when we are just seeing the larger conversation that's happening here. and this is why it is so important that we have a justice system that n fact, is fair and neutral. because it only escalates the dangers. because people then think they have permission. and it can never be permissible to be a vigilante. i want to bring up one other thing that we need to remember in this cycle of news that was in the cycle of news when there

were demonstrations, which is that when kyle rittenhouse is breaking curfew with a semiautomatic rifle, he's being greeted with water by law enforcement, and said thank you for being here. that was the beginning of the permission. and it came from law enforcement, because, although they were vigilantes, they were being viewed as friendlies. that is also dangerous. because the truth is, protesters are actually protesting to make the changes in law that should help us find more peace. because, in fact, we are getting closer to the kind of justice system we need. and so we have to have law enforcement be law enforcement and be constitutional and do the job right. and we have to be able to have demonstrators who can demonstrate. and yes, we need peaceful demonstrations. and we had a lot of peaceful demonstrators. and that in the event that things go wrong, you can't just

kill someone because things are going wrong. it is just not our way. it cannot stand. and this is a signal that actually, yes, it can. >> rev, i want to give you the last word on this. i believe we were on the air together, i believe all four of us ended up in parts of this conversation when jacob blake was shot. it set off national protests in the other direction, i believe, the milwaukee bucks did not play one of their games that night or that week. and i wonder what today's decision does to the broader movement for justice and where the conversation goes. i know legislation is stalled, at best, in washington. are you feeling discouraged? do you have to take a long view? how do you feel about the bigger fight today? >> well, i feel that we had this year the victory with the case of chauvin. i feel yesterday when the

governor stopped the execution in oklahoma, those were two wins. today i think was a big defeat. in this struggle, you are going to have victories and defeats. what you must do is keep your eye on the prize. we must have laws that protect everyone equally. and i think most americans that are watching this should ask themselves, if a black person hadgot an ar-15 and went to a city where someone was being harmed. if we had gone to brunswick georgia with an ar-15 and say i am going to protect all black and we are going to kill people, we would have gone to jail. and no judge would have sat there and said we could select our own jury. there is still that racial divide. we took a big hit today. but we are going to keep on ticking, because we have no choice but to keep going. and we keep going because we

want the see equal justice and equal fairness under the law. and let us never forget that jacob blake jr. never got that, never got a day in court. that's why those young men were there in the first place. >> shaq brewster and maya wiley thank you for starting us off on this. the rev sticks around. after the break, in a country already on high alert for domestic extremists moved to carry out acts of violence, new questions about what messages are being sent about vigilanteism in the rittenhouse verdict. plus, somewhere we are pretty sure kevin mccarthy is still talking. how the democrats delivered a huge win for president biden and the american people. just in time for the holidays the cdc has now officially endorsed covid booster shots for all adults. we will talk turkeys and boosters, coming up. don't go anywhere. e. so now, he's free to become, wonderland will.

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the kyle rittenhouse acquittal today, not guilty on all counts, did not happen in a cultural vacuum. there are some alarming contexts to this moment worth talking about. last week, the department of homeland security released its latest bulletin warning americans again of the ongoing threat posed by domestic extremists. that's no surprise give what has been happening to school board members to medical

professionals: lawmakers have already offered rittenhouse internships, and he has been framed by some as a hero. americans saw what they wanted to see, what did the domestic violence extremists wrong them see in for that, frank figliuzzi joins us. the rev is still here. frank, i wanted to know what sorts of worries folks in law enforcement would have about the messages, as maya, and the rev have been talking about, that might be received based on rittenhouse's acquittal? >> i had a column for msnbc daily come out earlier this week. said this. i am not as focused on the verdict as our response to it and the repercussions of it. that was monday when we had no idea what the outcome would be. from my security lens, what i

get concerned about and what i think law enforcement seems concerned about is the license this seems to give to people who don't like something, the answer is to get in the car or if you are 17 years old, drive to wherever that thing you don't like is is act out violently. where did we see this happen recently? at the united states capitol, on january 6th. the message is this is going to be okay. the law enforcement is going to be faced about 17-year-olds, and 30-year-olds and older who feel it is okay to get the ar-15 and go, quote, help the police on the street and act out violently. this is already -- rittenhouse is already being heralded as a hero. in the last hour i have been monitoring extremist sites. they think he is a hero. as you referenced congressman matt gaetz posted earlier this

week i am going to offer him a congressional internship f. the criteria is that you have to show that you hang out with the proud boys, there is video of you punching a girl in the face that you have been radicalizes on line to think that white supremacy is okay, then let's pray for congressional internships from here forward. don't be surprised if you see rittenhouse walking the halls of congress or being pulled out to campaign stops for various officials. this is where we are today. add to it the fact that the division over this verdict simply is a symptom of a larger ill, which is that we continue to lack trust in our institutions, now particularly the criminal justice system. >> now, frank, rev said this makes it more dangerous to be a protester. what do you think about that? is it -- are protests going to become more dangerous because of the messages heard by this verdict? >> i think -- i think that's

true. i think we are already a heavily armed society. the fbi tells us they are breaking records with national instant check systems for background checks on gun purchases. we seem to be breaking that record every single year. but now it's exponentially larger. it is going to make law enforcement a much more challenging job, assume everyone now is armed, not only with a handgun, but now with a long gun, and assume that every potential protest is going to result in some form of violence and shooting. and you have got a recipe for a very ugly situation in an already divided country. i will point out it is going to be violent for either side, difficult for either side. violence, arson, property damage, the whole environment that kyle rittenhouse at 17 found himself -- chose to go into the middle of -- that's -- neither -- none of that is acceptable. but if you like the idea of vigilanteism, if you like the

idea of citizens taking the position of cops and shooting people that they feel threatened by, stand by. it's happening now and may continue to grow. >> rev, i want the read some of what frank is describing. this is in politico. the lionization of kyle rittenhouse by the right well before he was acquitted and the five counts he faced rittenhouse had found absolution elsewhere. a swath of conservatives who turned his case into an example. rittenhouse is an avatar for second aemtd amendment virtuosity. since his arrest legal defense funds have been formed in his name. right wing commentaors blasted media coverage of the case. memes depicting rittenhouse as a or captain america have kropds up on twitter and t-shirts have been made with the silhouette of rittenhouse shooting his gun with the words "don't tread on

me", and" free kyle". matt gaetz offered him a congressional internship. matt gaetz faces charges of child sex crimes. rev? >> something that has been revealed but not extensively covered is when they found that was violence in minneapolis after the killing of george floyd some of them were right wingers that made it look like some of the protesters were committing the violence. i am not saying they didn't. but there were those that acted that way. and at my network, we do a lot of pro tests. they can put people in the protest, to bait these kinds of interactions and then a kyle type can then become a hero

coming this with violence and solving a problem that was instigated by people that really wasn't on your side. there is all kind of danger that comes out of the signal that happened today. i think we need to really talk about this openly and candidly. when you talk about him being offered a congressional internship, he becomes a hero because he stood up -- stood up to what? he went to kenosha looking for trouble. he was not in kenosha in trouble. he went there looking for trouble. so how are you going to make someone who was the aggressor looking to do something, apparently not trusting that law enforcement could do it. so he's going to come in and do it himself. then he acts like he was the one that was holding his ground. his ground was wherever he left from. >> his mom drove him. he brought a weapon. it's an unbelievable moment. i am really grateful to have

both of you to talk to about it. a. practicing note. the rev will interview the father of jacob blake, jacob blake sr. as well as the mother wand de cooper jones tomorrow night atteckh 5:00 eastern on "politics nation." up next here, kevin mccar thou's small tactic couldn't stop the house from passing lands mark legislation and delivering the biden administration a big huge win. more on that after a quick break. ck break. [gaming sounds] [gaming sounds] [gaming sounds] just think, he'll be driving for real soon. every new chevy equinox comes standard with chevy safety assist, including automatic emergency braking. find new peace of mind. find new roads.

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this bill is -- this bill is monumental. it's historic. it's transformative. it's bigger than anything we have ever done. >> speaker nancy pelosi celebrating the house passing the build back better act this morning. a $2 trillion spending package that together with the infrastructure bill is the centerpiece of what promises to be a transformative biden agenda. the bill passed narrowly and on largely narrow lines. all but one democrat voted for the bill zpeelt republicans's best efforts to stop or delay it, mccarthy engaged in a wanna be phil buster that he admitted was useless. even mccarthy acknowledged the

outcome. quote, i don't know if this speech is going to make a difference, he said after 3:00 a.m. as the "new york times" reports, the bill still has a long and difficult road ahead. democratic leaders must coaxet through the 50/50 senate and navigate a tortuous budget process almost certain to reshape the measure and force it become to the house, if it passes at all. even pared back from the $3.5 trillion plan that the biden administration originally sought the legislation could prove as transformative as any since the war on poverty in the 1960th especially for young and old americans. joining us jackie amainy, and jonathan lemere. jonathan lemere, i start with you. big day.

>> big day, no question. and day that some democrats along the way had fears that whatever that when nancy pelosi calls the vote that that vote is going the pass. that's what happened today. you were right to caution. there are still lots of twists and turns ahead. the pathway through the senate already thorny. it is probably going to change in the senate, have to get kicked back to the house for more modifications. but there is still home among all democrats on both sides of pennsylvania avenue that this will indeed get done. what a win it would be for the party and for the president. thises of course the centerpiece of his agenda, one that he embraced to be as transformative as an fdr or lbj. it is going to help families, those in need, going to give

them breathing room, extra cushion there to make ends meet. it is one that democrats feel as they know they face root now concerns about inflation and the supply chain. but they think this, when it comes into effect -- they believe americans will feel results of this early next year. it will not only help their everyday lives but bolster the democrats heading into the mid terms. >> we are often critical of the democrats for not explaining what is in the bill. to be fair that's on all three of us, too. let me take a second and explain what's this the bill. $555 billion for clean energy. $400 billion for free pre-k. $200 billion for the child tax credit. $150 billion for home care. $150 billion under the broad category of housing. aca credits, $10 billion. $40 billion for pell grants. $35 billion for medicare. and $90 billion for other. the package -- and this is sort

of previctory lap, prepassage in the senate, has 58% support. i think the democrats bet that as people understand what's in it, things like universal pre-k and the child tax credit, will only move those numbers up. tell me where things stand this hour, jackie? >> i think democrats are going to be fairly focused on this messaging hurdle that they have clearly seen resonate in the polls and addressed reporters this week. that is that while the bipartisan infrastructure bill has been successful amongst voters and the provisions in build back better have individually been polled and been successful, the bill all together, build back better, has had some other problems. so i think you are going see members go home, recess after getting this through, and they are going to try to recalibrate on the messaging front here. but we are -- as we have all

noted, this face as thorny path ahead. it is because of some recalcitrant members like kristen sinema and joe manchin who have spending concerns, and they have threatened to end joe biden's campaign promises and pushing through his agenda. sinema has opposed raising taxes on the wealthy. manchin sought to scale back democrats spending plans all together constantly waving the red flag on inflationary concerns. he opposed the party's attempts repeatedly, to create new social spending programs, especially ones that are not being fully funded. so there is a messy monday ahead we are going the see play out in real time just the way we saw it play out this the house this december. >> jonathan, i don't always catch kevin mccarthy during waking hours. i definitely missed him overnight. but let me read some of his

hazing that he's getting. congressman raskin said it is a feat of epic proportions to speak for four hours straight and not produce a single memorable phrase original insight or even a joke. mccarthy thinks he is a whip but so far he proved he is only half right. if you took the worst orator in the world gave him the worst speech in the world and made him read it for longest time in the world that would be a lot like listening to kevin mccarthy tonight, except probably better. adam schiff. what did he -- what was he doing? >> you can imagine my surprise when i folk up for the 5:00 a.m. to kevin mccarthy still talking. he was still talking. we were grateful for him in that regard, i guess. he wrapped up in the first few minutes of my show this morning. he admitted himself this was not going to be something that changed any votes. another moment he acknowledged

he was trying to break nancy pelosi's record for longest speech on the house floor. that's simply a silly accomplishment. but this is really -- what this really is about -- everything mccarthy does needs to be viewed through this prism, the idea of trying to be speaker of the house next year. republicans do feel like they can win back the house. they know how tight the margins are. the party that controls the white house usually loses some seats in the mid terms. democrats say, hey, we can win this still, and getting this agenda through is key to that. mccarthy needs to keep control of his caucus. he has gotten blowback here in recent months over the january 6th committee, over some republicans defecting to vote for the diplomat bill. he's certainly trying to maintain his standing with former president trump. he have been sort of off and on since the insurrection when mccarthy was critical briefly of trump before crawling back to him. this is all mccarthy trying to prove a point, saying look i am tough, standing up for this, i

am doing all that i can, i am trying to rally the party around me. that was the point of his speech last night, one that delivered few memorable lines where he said there is no such thing as baby carrots. they are big carrots chopped up small and the emgs rounded off. that was the takeaway from kevin mccarthy's speech. >> if you look at the week he's -- >> you know, the way that you spelled that out, i think most people who question whether or not it was a successful week. but i talked to a numberof republicans this morning who were buzzing on the house floor despite one of the most transformative social spending packages getting pushed through by democrats who felt like they had an okay week considering the

circumstances. we made it through is what an ally close to mccarthy said. that was saying a lot considering everything going on this week which was basically the extremist part of the conference. you know, causing mccarthy a lot of problems, reminiscent of what john boehner was dealing with the rise of the house freedom caucus. i will spoil one of the great lines that michael steele gave to us. encapsulating what mccarthy successfully did. if your job is moving the minority in the house to the majority, you need to focus on addition, not subtraction. that means keeping all the frogs in the wheel barrow, even though some of them are pretty ugly. i think that's what you saw mccarthy trying to do this week. the uglies being some of this pretty violent and horrific rhetoric not being condemned. whether these tactics are good

for americans is a different story but it is a strategy i think some republicans can understand especially as the chances for the republicans taking back the house look better than ever right now for a hot in the party. and mccarthy did get that trump endorsement, that stamp of approval. the email went out shortly after he left the floor this morning, praising mccarthy for his performness. >> i can't imagine what it is like to live for the praise by carrier pigeon. thank you for spending time with us today. up next for us, the giant leap toward covid boosters for all adults in the u.s. stay with us. s. stay with us

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a cdc panel just unanimously recommended both pfizer and moderna's covid boosters for all adults. the decision comes hours after the fda authorized the boosters this morning. covid boosters are expected to be immediately available to all adults as soon as cdc director rochelle walensky signs off on the broader use. however, a number of states and cities did not wait. they have already begun to allow all adults to receive boosters in the past weeks. let's bring into our coverage msnbc public health analyst dr. irwin redlener, the founder of the columbia center for disaster preparedness. when president biden called for boosters if everyone in september, at that moment, it seemed like the cdc and the fda were out of sync with where this was heading. i know lots of people all over

the country from nevada to the midwest to new york who have already had their boosters. why does this feel like they're sort of following? >> well, what's happening now, nicole, is that it was clear for many, many months, as you said, that we're going to be, all of us, heading to getting booster shots. many states did rush ahead of the formal federal announcement but now i think we're all going to be in sync and the idea at the end of the day is that if you're 18 years of age or older, you should be getting your booster shot, and the booster shot could either be the same vaccine that you had originally or it could be one of the other vaccines. it doesn't really matter as far as we know. so, that's where we are. and as a matter of fact, i think this won't be the last booster shot we'll be talking about, and i'm pretty sure that a year from now, we'll be having, at the latest, we'll be having the same conversation and we'll probably be needing regular booster shots for this virus that's not going

away any time soon. >> it's not going away, it is, in fact, in parts of europe surging. i saw in "the new york times" website last night, cases in the u.s. are up 33%. what should people do for thanksgiving and the hanukkah and christmas holidays? how big is too big? >> yeah, we have to be on the alert, nicole, and i'll tell you, you know, a couple years ago, it seems like decades ago, the red line was 25 or 30 people over for thanksgiving. last year was zero and this year we're having a modified celebration of those holidays and what that -- what i mean by that is that nobody's coming here that is not vaccinated except for children who are not eligible, and those children should be tested. anybody at risk in your party, in your gathering, should be tested. and the testing idea is actually a really good way for those people who have not been vaccinated to make sure they are where they should be.

unvaccinated people should wear masks and try to keep the windows open for increasing ventilation, and you know, let's not create a day out of it. let's have people over, do our thing with vaccinated people, and then time to go home. it's a kind of a reduced version of the gigantic celebrations that some of us are used to, and we just have to be cautious and vigilant right now that we're not doing anything just because we're tired of covid, which we all are. it doesn't mean we can let our guard down. >> we've talked about the kids' vaccine for many, many months now. mow are you feeling about what you're seeing in terms of the numbers of kids 5 to 12 that have already been vaccinated? >> well, i think we have to get all of our children vaccinated. now, you know, originally, it was 12 and up. now it's 5 to 11. i think we're making good progress on getting children vaccinated but we really have to keep pushing. i mean, the more children, the

more people in general that get vaccinated, as you know, nicole, gets us closer to this magic number of herd immunity, whatever that number might specifically be, but we know it's a lot more people have to be vaccinated in america to get ourselves closer to being able to say that the population is protected. so, it's good progress. we've seen essentially zero serious complications in children so far, and i think we just have to keep going forward, and parents really should feel reassured and comfortable that the vaccine's working in kids. it's a reduced dose for them, the 5 to 11-year-olds and it's a safe vaccine. so, let's keep up the pressure and let's make sure our children are protected as much as we can. >> dr. irwin redlener, our medical expert, also having to do some of his own tech work there. thank you for rolling with the punches there, doctor. the next hour of "deadline white house" starts after a quick break. don't go anywhere. e" starts aft

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obviously skewed about the results. all the republicans voted for trump the way they voted for the assembly candidates, he would have won. he didn't get at least 1,000 votes other republicans got. that's why he lost. >> hi again, everyone, it's 5:00 in new york. we are watching the developments out of kenosha following kyle rittenhouse being acquitted of all charges. if there are any developments, we'll bring them to you right away. for now, we focus on a

different situation under way in wisconsin, the republicans' outright war on american democracy. the video we just showed you was that smoking gun confession from one ron johnson wherein he admits that donald trump simply got beat in wisconsin, and when you have lost ron johnson, well, that says everything. johnson thought he was confiding in that clip in a right winger about the scam to sow doubt about the 2020 result, but it happened to actually be a democratic activist. the important thing, though, is we know that he knows it's all b.s., which makes today's news all the more galling. in a stunning new piece of reporting in "the new york times," ron johnson and other republicans in wisconsin have now launched an all-out assault on their state's election system. to ensure republicans have full control over its voting process. from that reporting, quote, the republican effort, broader and more forceful than that in any other state, where allies of former president donald j. trump are trying to overhaul elections, takes direct aim at the bipartisan wisconsin

elections commission, an agency republicans created half a decade ago that has been under attack since the chaotic aftermath of last year's election. last month, a report ordered by republican state legislators and performed by wisconsin's nonpartisan legislative audit bureau found, big surprise here, no widespread fraud in the 2020 election. but the report did make dozens of recommendations for the election commission, and republicans pounced. the "times" continues with this, quote, then the trump aligned sheriff of racine county, the state's fifth most populous county, recommended felony charges against five of the six members for guidance they had given to municipal clerks early in the pandemic. the republican majority leader later seemed to give a green light to that proposal, saying that prosecutors around the state should determine whether to bring charges and that is not all. the milwaukee journal sentinel reports that senator ron johnson is calling on wisconsin lawmakers to take over elections, to ignore both the

bipartisan commission and the state's democratic governor, tony ivers, nothing more than a power grab is how governor ivers describes these republican efforts and according to "the new york times," he has vowed to stop johnson's proposal. the republican quest to take control of elections in wisconsin and elsewhere around this country is where we start this hour with some of our favorite reporters and friends. john heilemann is here onset. hello, friend. >> it's been 17 months, i've been waiting to say, hi, nicole, in-person. >> it's been a long time. >> don't treat me like chris christie today. just, like, i want to -- i came in here going, i don't need the christie treatment today. >> did you write a book about rescuing the republican party? >> not to my knowledge and i know who tucker carlson ask and i'm happy to talk about the conspiracy theorists at fox news. so here we go. >> i digress for a moment but let me -- the whole thing was pretending to not know what

tucker carlson did. >> it's the most ludicrous thing in the world and on top of that the notion that sean hannity and laura ingraham don't promote conspiracy theories. everything about it was bonkers and bonkers if you apply rationality but in fact all it was, was just him trying to somehow thread the needle of, you know, i can -- i can be against trump on these five grounds but not on the larger grounds and i certainly am not going to take on fox news and i'm not going to take on anybody else who could help make me the republican nominee in some fantasyland where his head is. >> taking on conspiracies is essential to the story. tim miller is here, now a writer at large for the bulwark, and errin haines is here. we're not really off topic here, though. i mean, this whole idea of taking on conspiracy theories is welcome. i mean, as tim sort of is the resident beat reporter on right-wing fantasy land and having someone take on conspiracy theories is overdue

and extremely welcome. it's just talking about doing it without taking on the largest disseminators of the conspiracy theories is disingenuous. >> disingenuous is as nice as you can say. i have fomo. why wasn't i invited to hang out in new york and make fun of chris christie? >> we miss your ponytail, tim. once you grow your back, you can come. >> you're all welcome. >> hair doesn't seem to be a prerequisite for this. just saying. >> oh skblchlt oh, i think errin is throwing some shade. >> she's on fire. >> i'm lashing out. i'm jealous. >> she thinks i'm chris christie, apparently. >> he has hair. >> it must be better in-person. >> definitely. >> exactly. >> we might never get to the wisconsin election story if you were all here in-person. wouldn't that be fun? i miss those days, never actually getting to our top

story. tim, though, jump in on, i mean, and i actually think the conspiracy theories are better frame here. i mean, it is the conspiracies that are the oxygen for something asinine like this getting any traction in wisconsin. >> well, look, there's a direct tie between what chris christie's doing and what ron johnson is doing. just based on that video. the funny thing with that video is we wrote an article in the bulwark six months prior where he had called former republican state, county chairman, mark becker, and made a phone call where he told mark becker the same thing he said on that video. we ran an article. he had already been caught being disingenuous, ron johnson. then he gets caught again on video. this is similar who that christie is doing, right? you say what you got to say to the audience that is in front of you. and when the republican base

audience is demanding conspiracies, demanding things that are out of touch with reality, demanding that you tell them that down is up, then that is what they're going to do. and so, you can't -- where christie fails is he tries to come and say, i'm going to be this straight shooter. i'm going to be the one that tells it like it is because, you know, the bar is so low that i can just step over it one inch higher than ron johnson and say that, yes, donald trump really lost. but you can't go much farther than that, because you risk getting out of step with what, you know, the republican voters want. and so now, what's happening in wisconsin is the outgrowth of that. if you're going to lie to people and tell them that the election's going to be stolen, well, then, they're going to demand action. so, you got to do things like get rid of the election commission that republicans created five years ago and say that it's corrupt for some reason. and now try to take control over elections even further. and so, you know, you can see the path that you walk down

here. >> we are going to come back to your hair because as riveted as i was by everything you said, i feel like leslie jones just got used to -- >> i'm a republican again. >> very confusing. >> totally distracted. >> really confusing. >> disorienting, honestly. very disorienting. >> right? we do really need to get around the table and work all this out. it would be easier to multitask that way. errin, i think there's this frame we had around the insurrection and really even the georgia voter suppression law that this was some sort of bookend, right? that he lost, and he was so mad, and these were acts of retribution. they were nothing of the sort. they were ground-laying for next time. and the ground-laying is what is happening with such a ferocious sort of head of steam that we should all be paying a lot more attention to wisconsin and other places rolling back access to the polls, rolling back and altering who counts the votes.

this war on election officials is in its early stages, not an end stage. >> yeah. and you know, the thing is, this is the evolution of what 21st century voter suppression continues to look like, and wisconsin is absolutely the latest battleground in the ongoing war on voting. and the thing is, the big lie, we are seeing, certainly, does not need president trump to continue -- former president trump to continue to repeat it although he obviously, certainly, is in certain venues but republicans at the local, state, and federal level have taken up this false cause of election integrity, and wisconsin is just the latest place where that is happening. this is not a fight based on facts, as we've seen. senator johnson is singing a very different tune, and because he likely needs to, as well, he has not said whether or not he plans on running for re-election but wisconsin is a place where in the last two presidential cycles, we're talking about something like 23,000 votes deciding the elections there. so, you know, republicans of all

up and down the ballot are concerned about their chances based on an expanded electorate and who shows up to vote, and so now you have a continued, you know, these continued innovations in voter suppression that are not only about making it harder to vote for some americans, but also to create this municipal infrastructure that really challenges the validity of certain votes that some people do not want counted, and we know that's not in the spirit or the interest of democracy, and again, just as that "new york times" story said, this is being done on a completely evidence-free basis. >> i mean, that is a generous -- >> can i just jump in? >> go ahead, tim. >> one thing really quick on that since i'm back to my republican hair, i can give republicans advice again. look, here's the crazy thing about what errin is just saying. not only is it -- it's obviously corrupt and anti-democratic. we've talked about that. but it's actually stupid, logically. in wisconsin, the biggest batch of people who don't show up to

vote are non-college white voters. white voters who don't have a college degree. who are they voting for in the last election? donald trump. so, not only is it corrupt and they feel like they have to cheat to win, not only is it anti-democratic, i actually don't think it's a good strategy in the long-term for republicans. they've bought in to this b.s. that more voting is good for democrats, which isn't even necessarily true, so it's stupid, in addition to being corrupt. >> well, no one ever accused them of being smart autocrats. >> yeah. i mean, look, that's true. i spent the afternoon talking to chris krebs for the next episode of "the hell and highwater" podcast and they just put out this report on information disorder and how messed up everything is and we had a long discussion. couple things that resonated. one of which is, the notion to what -- not a bookend, what january 6th was, what the insurrection was. he's like it's an a-b test is

what that is. when you're running an autocratic playbook, what you're doing is testing out which conspiracy theories work and which don't, which lines have traction and which don't. you're a-b testing. if this fails, it's not a failed coup. it just means we've learned now what works and doesn't work and what's now happening is the logical extension of that, which is the big lie is the argument that now has kind of emerged out of that. it's the next logical step in the progression. and you think about the -- to the point about wisconsin. you know, if you remember back in 2016, wisconsin was a state that did not vote for donald trump in the primary. republican voters in wisconsin voted for ted cruz and the argument among the charlie sykes of the world, if you went up and hung out, my dad was from wisconsin, i know wisconsin pretty well. republicans up there were the least trump-y republicans in some ways in the country. >> they were paul ryan republicans. >> yes. and even more moderate than paul ryan in a lot of cases and the fact that the republican party in wisconsin has gone this bonkers -- you like to say bat

bleep, i'm shot sure i can -- >> you always put the bleep in the wrong place. >> i know. it's really a sign of how pervasive this is because if those republicans are embracing these kind of tactics, it means this is not the craziest end of the republican party, by any means. it means it's seeping really deep into the soil of republicanism in a way that's just, you know, is, in fact, setting us up. and the last point that errin made and the point that chris krebs was making, i asked him at the end, trump fired you, trump's clearly a cancer, has been a cancer, was metastatic, but is this now not about trump anymore? he's like, no, this is not about trump anymore. trump is a problem but trump is not the problem. the problem is that this stuff is now out there, and it's in the party and it's alive and it's its own metastatic cancer that's kind of operating on its own volition now and that's what we have to deal with is that problem and this wisconsin thing is the perfect example of that. >> look, there was some

reporting earlier in the week that rupert murdoch was done with trump. doesn't mean that tucker carlson's going to start radicalizing his viewers and embracing the kyle rittenhouse -- i mean, trump stopped being the story on election night, and it was really mccarthy and mitch mcconnell laying their hands on what they knew was a lie. the reason i showed that ron johnson tape isn't because i have any appetite to see ron johnson but it's instructive that even sort of the bottom of the barrel on the right, the biggest purveyor of disinformation, literally foreign disinformation, knows the truth about the election. >> he knows. >> he knows trump lost. so, ron johnson knows trump lost. it is -- >> but he also knows what the market is now in his party. he now knows the market, not just trump's approval or disapproval but he knows what the base of his party wants, to tim's point originally, which is ron johnson's a barometer for where the wisconsin republican party is. we don't know if he's going to run for re-election or not but the fact that he is doing this is a, to me, tipping the hand that he's actually not going to retire as some people thought he might and he's going to run

because he thinks this is the way to protect his right flank and he now knows that's where the republican party is in wisconsin. it's kind of an extraordinary thing. he knows the truth but he knows what his party now wants and probably understands that he's probably right. >> you know, tim, the democratic party's bet is that delivering, delivering for the public, delivering shots in arms, checks in checkbooks, universal pre-k, all the stuff in both infrastructure bills, is the way to win. the way to win the midterms, the way to win re-election, the way to sort of elevate democratic candidates. with the right on another sort of -- in another reality, it truly is kelleyanne conway's alternate reality now. what do you make of sort of the asymmetry of one party making an argument based on demonstrable, provable facts and the outputs of the slow gears of governing and another party beholden to conspiracy theories that ron johnson doesn't even believe?

>> look, it means the democrats have a tougher job, and so they can't just complain about it, right? they have a big job, which is try to protect the -- our democracy and so, you know, winning elections, if you're a democrat, is pretty important. and so, if you look at their theory of the case, what you just laid out by passing infrastructure, passing the deal, i was in west virginia last week and in monroe county, west virginia, and there's no broadband. you can't get on your cell phone at all, which obviously is annoying but also has -- hurts the economy and hurts different options of things people can do for business. people couldn't stay there during covid and move there like some folks did out of the city. and so, hopefully that helps them. but they've got to tell people about that. the two challenges for the democrats is to keep the suburban former republican, former independent types in the mix, and i think talking about how radical the republican party is, is probably the best way to do that. but then you got to claw back

some of the working class voters, and they need to know what you're doing for them, and h that, i don't think, is what the democrats are doing a very good job on. i think there's this assumption that we pass these things and they know it will accrue to our benefit. we didn't see that in virginia. glenn youngkin did better than donald trump did in rural virginia and white working class communities so democrats need to be able to do both those things at once and on top of that, it wouldn't hurt if the economy started to improve as well. they've got a ton on their plate but those are basically the challenges for them. you can't just pass it and assume people will get it by osmosis, and i think that's what they got to focus on the next year. >> errin, we didn't get to -- go ahead. >> nicole, if i just cut in on tim's point and also affirm his right to change his hair style as somebody who clearly has a lot of different looks here. if voters can't vote, it doesn't matter who you are gaining or losing. >> right. >> and that is the real issue as these states continue to seek to find ways to make it harder and

less convenient to cast a ballot in the absence of federal intervention, voting rights is where in congress? nowhere right now. the supreme court certainly has not been a friend to voting rights in recent decisions, so unless there is going to be some sort of intervention at the federal level to mitigate what these states are doing, you're going to -- you know, you're not going to have the democratic agenda and priorities are not going to get passed if you don't have the voters who are able to keep you in power. and that really is what republicans, i think, have realized and are continuing to move forward with as a strategy because voter suppression is something that they at least believe is something that could work in their favor and that has worked in their favor in the past. >> and we didn't even get to redistricting and the part of the laws that even republicans will acknowledge are the most ominous, which is stripping nonpartisan election officials

of their authority to sort of call balls and strikes when it comes to elections. tim miller, your hair derailed the whole conversation. >> can we agree that errin has the right to change her hair as long as she doesn't change it to look like tim's. >> done. >> we're just jealous, man. just keep it. >> tim, i think you look fantastic. just threw me. tim miller, errin haines, thank you both for starting us off. john heilemann isn't going anywhere. when we come back, new questions about the timeline during the capitol insurrection after the former commanding officer of the d.c. national guard has today demanded a retraction of that inspector general report we told you about yesterday, the one that said he was told twice to send troops to the capitol. we'll update that story next. plus, the mysterious disappearance of a chinese tennis star who accused one of her country's most powerful leaders of sexual assault and the international furor that has

ensued. and more from our deeply personal one-on-one interview with huma abedin, her reaction from anthony weiner told her the truth about his text messages. "deadline white house" continues after a quick break. don't go anywhere. continues after a quick break. don't go anywhere. ay sale is on now! score unbelievable savings with our biggest sale ever! like ge appliances up to 40% off rugs up to 80% off and lighting up to 65% off. plus get bonus savings with a wayfair credit card and free shipping on thousands of products. don't miss our black friday happening now through november 27th. only at wayfair.com. >> man: what's my safelite story? my truck...is my livelihood. so when my windshield cracked... the experts at safelite autoglass came right to me... with service i could trust. right, girl? >> singers: ♪ safelite repair, safelite replace. ♪ my plaque psoriasis...

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today, there's further escalation in a story we started this hour with yesterday about the muddle of accounts and the timeline of the national guard response on january 6th and why troops were sworn in to assist police officers four hours after the capitol was breached by the insurrectionists. the former commanding general of

the d.c. national guard is demanding a retraction from the defense department's inspector general report this week that says that he had to be told twice by army leadership to send in troops. the first time at 4:35 p.m. and then again at 5:00 p.m. retired major general william walker tells "the washington post" he never received the first call and calls the report, quote, incomplete, inaccurate, and sloppy work. in march, walker made headlines for testifying that limits set by the pentagon prevented his wishes of acting sooner. as "the washington post" puts it, walker's latest objection, quote, injects fresh tension into the ongoing political turmoil and finger-pointing stemming from the assault more than ten months later. joining our conversation, matt miller, former chief spokesman for the justice department, now an msnbc analyst. john heilemann is back with us. matt miller, i'll say at the beginning, we wish you were at the table. it's much more fun to be back here in studio. we started this hour with this story yesterday, and i think dan goldman and john both made the

right point, we're fighting about whether it was 4:35 or 5:06. why wasn't it 2:00? >> yeah, that's absolutely the right point. the first breach of the capitol happened at 1:50 and the call came instantly from the chief of the capitol police to the pentagon asking them to send in troops and actually the mayor of d.c. had made a request even earlier than that, when she saw the people that were assembling at the capitol. while it is important, because every minute matters, but the difference between 4:35 and 5:08, the real question is why the pentagon took so long and different people from the pentagon and talked about it that and given answers that they worried about the specter of servicemen in military uniforms confronting peaceful protesters. no doubt they had in their mind those ugly scenes over the summer of 2020 when secretary esper and general milley had accompanied the then president

as he made that walk across lafayette square after clearing the square of protesters. so, there are some potentially kind of good faith reasons why they might not have, but they were mistaken reasons ultimately. there was an insurrection happening and just as the fbi failed to properly anticipate what was happening, the national guard and the people at the pentagon to whom they report failed to take it seriously as it was happening. >> this is obviously struck a nerve and as matt's saying, for some sort of noble reasons, this is -- this is the new walker interview yesterday in today's "post," says this. quote, every minute mattered. you have to understand. these are my friends here, walker said, referring to his relationship with police chief steven sund, who was forced to resign following the attack and other law enforcement officials. i read yesterday's story, went back and read it again when i saw the update today. i'm still lost on why there's a

fight over 25 minutes and nobody feels as sensitive about the 3-hour gap. >> the first one, you listen to walker and say, he's like, first of all, if you're in a command structure, the notion that you would have to be told twice, like, i can see why he's pushing back on that if he's maintaining that he didn't get the 4:30 call. half an hour, and you said, every minute matters and it's true. at 4:30, there was still brutal fighting going on, on capitol hill. i was up there. some of those body cam images we've gotten were in that 4:00 hour and so to say every minute mattered and i didn't ignore a call at 4:30, i understand why the guy is standing up for himself. i get that. the second question, though, goes to the public policy question, which is this question of, why we raised it yesterday and we'll raise it again. the 2:00 hour, if you were up there, felt like two days. i mean, the stuff you were seeing and the degree of peril and jeopardy that was clearly present on the ground, you know, felt like a long time and the notion that the 2:00 hour passed and the 3:00 hour passed and

people, as i mentioned yesterday, congress people were hearing stories that the -- that the administration was stopping military from being deployed, the national guard from being deployed, yesterday, dan goldman raised the larry hogan thing, which is also true. the governor of maryland was on "the circus" and he said he was sitting there all through that period, wondering why they weren't getting called. talking on the phone with congressional leaders in the bunker and they were saying, you got to send your national guard and he was saying, i can't do that until it's ordered. larry hogan was in the same position for two hours. i think that -- why people aren't more defensive about that, why that's not the central question, i don't understand it. to me, it's the central question because i get why walker is wrapped up in that half hour but the larger question is, two hours where even if you buy matt -- matt miller makes the point, there was definitely sensitivity about -- that we've heard reporting on, which was, we don't want to militarize this

in advance of any attack. we thought, maybe attack is coming, maybe there's going to be a riot but we don't want to militarize it and escalate it but once the capitol has been breached -- >> here's the other thing that happened and i don't remember what time i went on the air. i think it was around 2:00. before i got on the air, the pipe bombs had been found. >> yes. >> so there were already bomb scares. >> right. >> at the dnc and rnc, i believe. >> before the capitol was breached, there were the bomb scares had been reported and like, i think in the 1:00 hour, maybe even earlier than that, the first bomb scares were -- not that long after noon, i think. i'm not certain about that. but again, once the capitol is breached at 1:50, you would think the capitol has been breached. mike pence is in jeopardy. the leadership's all in jeopardy. everyone's in jeopardy. why is that not the moment when you immediately pull the red cord, the rip cord or break glass or whatever the right metaphor is here, be like, every national guard within 100 miles should be on their way to the capitol at that point. >> you know, matt miller, i

worry that we're muellerizing the 1/6 committee and i would love your thoughts on that. but all these conversations, all these gaps in our understanding, all these gaps in accountability, all these sort of missing pieces of the puzzle, an ig report here, another congressional committee investigation here, call for the full accounting that the 1/6 select committee wants to do. where do you sort of stand in terms of your optimism and confidence that they'll fill in gaps like this one? >> i think they'll get there. look, we often have this question or people haven't worked in government have this question about government. is it more "veep" or "house of cards"? meaning, when government makes mistakes -- >> i can answer that. way more "veep." >> way more "veep." but are they sins of incompetence or banality and on january 6th, you had both. mistakes of bureaucratic fumbling in the lead-up to january 6th, the fbi failed to properly disseminate intelligence from one of its

field offices, mistakes by the capitol police not properly preparing and staffing and arming policemen on the front lines, and then you had the mistakes at the pentagon, not deploying the guard quickly enough. on top of that, you had the sins of banality with the leader of the executive branch organizing this rally and sending his little army off to the hill to break into the capitol and try to overturn the election. and the -- and ultimately, we have to address both. and i think the january 6th committee is doing it. there are a few other committees who have already done a report on some of these, let's call them, the "veep" mistakes from january 6th, and made recommendations and i think the january 6th committee will look the it too because ultimately, we can fix those mistakes of incompetence. the fbi can do better. we can come up with better problems. and i think ultimately, it's the other problems, the sins of venality from january 6th that are much more troubling and hard to address. >> i mean, just to not let this wonderful metaphor end here, it is the combination of the two, right?

and i mean, it's a smash-up of, you know, maybe even some of manchurian and "veep." it is donald trump harnessing with his -- what liz cheney has described as his intention to have violence carried out against the seat of democracy. coupled with what you're describing, which is sort of run of the mill incompetence. >> yeah. absolutely. it's the two of those together. a president that was willing to attack his own government in the way no president has ever done before and then the failings of the government failing the way government often does, not anticipating it and not responding effectively. those two things coming together are what produce those -- such a horrible day. >> matt miller, thank you for spending time with us. next time, hopefully it's around the table. heilemann sticks around. the sexual harassment allegation by a world famous tennis star against one of china's most powerful leaders came as a shock. now, her subsequent disappearance has sparked an international uproar and talk of

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when you stop and consider all the angles to this next story, from who it involves to the accusations being made, to its very serious geopolitical implications, you can make a fair case that it is the biggest mystery anywhere right now and involves a chinese tennis star, peng shuai, the 35-year-old once

ranked number one in the whole world in doubles. two weeks ago, she used social media to accuse a former high-ranking chinese government official, a vice premier of sexual assault, at his home three years ago. it was seen as a very brave me too moment at least until the post and the player herself completely vanished, just disappeared. people obviously noticed. players, fans, and the women's tennis association are demanding answers. flash forward to yesterday. chinese state media shared a statement of sorts that they say was written by the player, peng shuai. judge for yourself how believable that is. the statement suggests she's safe and sound, no problem, and, oh, that sexual assault allegation from two weeks ago, well, no, that's not true either. if it sounds like a crude fraud to you, then you and the women's tennis association are in agreement and alignment, and looming over this whole story, don't forget the opening

ceremony for the winter games in beijing is 11 weeks from tonight. joining our conversation, ben rhodes, former deputy national security advisor to president obama, and an msnbc contributor. and kavitha davidson is here from "the athletic." i start with you. tell us about what was happening before and whether we know if she reached out to anyone or had any concerns that this might happen. >> yeah, so, we don't know very much about that, unfortunately. her post was taken down by censors on chinese social media site about 30 minutes after she posted it and that was on november 2nd and nobody has really heard from her since so this is a very scary situation, and frankly, american and international media took a few days to really catch on to the story, and i'm very glad that we're talking about it now. >> what can the ioc do? i mean, other than sort of raising awareness, can they

demand to see her or what? i mean, how powerful is sort of tennis in china? how much -- how big of a deal are their sports stars? >> china has been using sports much like russia has for years as a marker of where it sees itself in the global community and its global ambitions. and i think most americans, when they think of that, think about basketball, but tennis is also a huge part of that. for the last five to ten years, china has been bidding on futures tournaments and juniors tournaments and just signed a couple of years ago a ten-year deal for the wta finals to be held there, so tennis is a huge deal. the wta coming out and calling for transparency and for assurances of her safety is a big deal, but the ioc also does have a lot of power here. you know, as you mentioned, the olympics are going to be held in beijing just in february. and the ioc likes to tout itself as a marker of democracy and women's equality, and you know,

back in 2012, when saudi arabia finally sent a woman, the ioc took some credit for that, and credit for really furthering the cause of women. well, their silence in this case has been absolutely deafening and they use the words "quiet diplomacy" and i don't quite know what that means when we haven't heard from this woman in three weeks. >> quiet diplomacy, ben rhodes, is what we use when someone is being sort of lost in north korea. what does this say about the state of u.s.-chinese relations? >> well, it says a lot about china, first of all, that what you had is this -- this woman knew the risk she was taking. she said in her post that she might be courting self-destruction. and minutes after that post goes up, it's taken down, and her disappearance is not the only one that's taken place in china recently. we have had very prominent business people, jack ma, the most famous chinese entrepreneur, disappear for a long stretch of time with similarly vague statements put out. what's different here, nicole, is the courage of the wta and obviously the courage of this

athlete and her fellow players on the tour. you had serena williams speaking out. you had naomi osaka speaking out. you had the tour speaking out. that is showing more courage from the women's tennis association and its players than 99% of corporate america has in standing up to chinese repression. i think that's why this is such a seismic moment in geopolitical issues and in sports issues coming together. because you have a group of people not bowing to the fear that china can leverage its economic clout to tell them what to do and silence this woman. >> ben, one more question for you. what can a white house do? you've advised a president. what does sort of american leadership, if it's even a possibility, look like? >> i think you can speak about this. you can give voice to this. the chinese government does not want attention on this woman and her allegations. and so you can provide that attention. they are trying to sweep something under the rug in front of the entire world.

and you have the biggest megaphone in the world in the white house to speak out against it. and to speak out -- the ioc's, look, supposed to be responsible for the safety of athletes. how can they guarantee the safety of athletes at the winter olympics if athletes are disappeared like this inside of china? i think you want to bring as much attention to this issue as possible. >> it's an unbelievable story, john heilemann. >> well, it's an absolutely unbelievable story, although unfortunately, if you look at the record of chinese human rights abuses, it's not unbelievable at all. it just happens that this woman, this level of prominence, chinese abuse of human rights of thousands -- more than thousands. >> 11 weeks out from the opening ceremony. >> all the time. and i guess the question that i actually, you know, am curious about is whether, you know, we had joe biden, the administration is now thinking about a diplomatic boycott of the olympics. does this become a trigger point for that? is that a useful tool? there's a lot of debate about whether diplomatic -- there's those -- the republicans who are calling for a total boycott, economic sanctions around the

games. others who say, you know, we want to make sure the athletes can still compete. there's kind of a big debate happening around this, and the -- against the backdrop of pervasive human rights abuses, does a high-profile case like this -- we don't know fully what's happened but obviously it smells very, very bad -- does this, like, kind of amplify that and turn this into a much bigger potential international question in terms of diplomacy and the olympics? >> we're going to keep our eyes on this story with your help. we'll continue to cover it. ben rhodes, kavitha davidson, thank you so much. when we come back, more from our interview with huma abedin and the moment her then-husband anthony weiner finally revealed the truth about the text messages he was sending to other women to her. ssages he was sendr women to her

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tell your doctor if you have a bleeding condition or take blood thinners as risk of bleeding or bruising at the treatment site is increased. talk to a urologist about what your manhood could look like. find a xiaflex-trained urologist at bentcarrot.com we had a chance to get up close and personal this week with huma abedin. we talked to her about her husband, anthony weiner's sex scandal that shattered her life as she knew it but in one clip we have not shown here yet, huma takes us inside the moment anthony weiner finally admitted to her the truth about his text messages to other women. here's that moment from our interview with huma abedin, streaming right now on peacock. >> it was eight weeks pregnant. i was a newlywed. i was deeply in love with my husband. you know, he was the first man i was ever with, the first man i ever loved, my first valentine's day date and it was a big decision to decide to marry a public person. i knew that came, you know, with

advantages but also disadvantages, as you well know, as somebody who's lived out in the world for a lot of your adult life. but it was perfect. i mean, i -- i opened the chapter with waking up in buckingham palace and writing a letter to my husband, saying, we have to be grateful to god that we've been blessed with so much, and then a week later -- >> on that stationery that's this thick, right? >> beautiful blue stationery. it felt like i was in a dream. and to have this secret, carrying this child, i had, you know -- i wasn't considered an older mother at the time, even though i was 36, which i don't believe is an older mother, but anyway, i was -- so, i was nervous but i was also excited and then four days later, to get this earth-shattering news that, you know, his twitter had been hacked and then it turned out to be true that he had sent -- he had been exchanging these inappropriate messages with people online. >> there's a really raw scene where he admits the truth to you. will you tell us that story?

>> so, it was days after he had told me, morning after morning, he hadn't sent it and we'd gone away to a friend's house for the weekend, and he had seemed not himself the last couple of days and i couldn't quite figure it out. i was so sure he was right. i didn't know anybody at the time who had been hacked, like, the idea of being hacked. i know maybe now it seems like much more common place but in 2011, it just seemed like this shocking news and as we were -- >> pre-2016 election, right? >> so much of, you know, what happened in those days, i think, predates what happened in 2016. and i remember we were getting ready to leave and he has our bags by the door, and he looked at me and said, it's true. i sent it. and it all just sort of poured out of him. and he immediately wanted to drive back to the city and come clean to the world because i think the lying was sort of eating him up inside. and that was it. i recount the scene of walking outside and just basically looking at, you know, at this

backyard and at this pond and thinking, what is happening to my life? i didn't -- i was in such shock, i didn't even know what was happening. >> john, there are not a lot of stories more sordid, and i remember when that was happening, you and i were often on "morning joe" together, sort of talking about the shocking and sordid developments.

if you're, i guess i struggle. she had her own profile. she was enormously influential figure, influential as anybody that worked for her, incredibly close at the personal and political level, and in terms of having a role in her campaign, how she moved through the world, hillary clinton, it is in a way the notion that everything about her marriage was a narrative through the prism of him, is he ill, is he a criminal, is he pathological, is he just craving ambition to the endth degree. all of it has been about him. the notion that she at some point would want to claim that narrative, make it her own, tell her side of that story, i think there's something very natural and human about that, even though it is obviously on some level mortifying to address these things in public, but is it harder to address them or harder to have had the whole

story of it perceived through the prism of her now ex-husband. maybe this is necessary for her to reclaim it. >> she blew my mind doing that, taking the story we thought we know about, and telling what it was like for her. catch the conversation on demand on peacock. sign up for free to watch it. john heilemann, what are you doing at 4:00 these days? every day. >> can we get, like let's get like a bar in here? >> i mean, yes, i'll bring it myself. my bar is still full. covid era bar here. >> the dogs. >> i have a new puppy, we'll bring the dogs if there's any room. >> i swear, if there was a room here, bring in the pooches.

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♪ >> president biden's first pardon, fresh off his legislative win this morning. the president in the rose garden, pardoned a turkey named peanut butter, this year's official thanksgiving turkey, he also spared the other turkey jelly who benefitted from luck and tradition. quick break for us. we'll be right back. k. no one can deliver your mom's homemade short ribs. for starters, your mom doesn't have a restaurant. if she did, it would be impossible to get in. she'd become famous overnight. she'd get talked into franchising everything. and at that point, they wouldn't really taste like your mom's short ribs.

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thank you so much for letting us into your homes during these extraordinary times. we're grateful. the beat with ari melber starts now. >> happy friday. nice to see you. tracking breaking news in the murder trial of kyle rittenhouse who shot and killed two protesters at a blm rally. the breaking news after over 24 hours of cumulative deliberations,