hi there, everyone. it's health care in new york. it be that kind of week that let congressman jamie raskin yesterday on this program to say this -- everything is moving in our direction. it is a week of staggering developments and has given the investigation into the juks select committee a boost of energy. hours ago they released a list of subpoenas.

the committee alleges that two of the people subpoenaed allegedly met with the expresident inside the white house on january 4th to discuss the lineup of speakers at the rally before the insurrection. one of the individuals is now a trump-backed congressional candidate in ohio. this expands the wide net cast by the committee as it investigates the causes, the events, the money, and the key figures involved in the deadly capitol insurrection and fends off a campaign by the expresident and his allies to obstruct their work. just yesterday, a stunning blow was delivered to the expresident in his toefrtd shield all of his presidential records from the select committee. it's one that may have major consequences for the other trump allies and staffers hoping to derail the probe. an appeals court rejected trump's bid to block the committee from getting their hands on his records, citing the fact that both congress and the white house agree that, quote, there is a unique legislative

need for these documents and that they are directly relevant to the committee's inquiry into an attack on the legislative branch and the peaceful transfer of power. pete williams says it is prosisely the point made by the court that the january 6th serves a valid and important purpose. mark meadows is attempting to toss out the subpoenas from the committee. the point made by trump and meadows could very well mark a dangerous turn in republican thinking, though, around the insurrection, one that could lead to obstruction of any and all recommendation has the committee might ultimately make in order to prevent the next coup. from the "washington post's" greg sergeant, let's consider the idea that met owes' claim advanced. after all that happened protecting the process of concluding our elections from corruption and beefing up

oversight of potential white house law enforcement are not legitimate purposes. in other words, in response to this attack on political order we should do nothing meaningful to protect our system against another one? all of this amid the looming threat of an attempt to steal the next election. it's leading for calls for the select committee to be more visible, broadcast its findings even as the investigation is firing on all cylinders. eugene robinson rights, investigate the house select committee investigating the january 6th insurrection at capitol will fail us if it quietly goes about its work. it needs to be louder. the way to investigate a crime with an eye toward prosecution, and january 6th was definitely a

crime is to gather -- the select committee has no power to prosecute. it is only job is to reveal. here at the table with us, nbc news and msnbc national affairs analyst john heilemann. daniel goldman is here. we will give you a spoiler alert. eggs announcing today he will be suspending his campaign for new york attorney general. we will talk about that later in the program. back with us in washington, d.c., nbc news senior capitol hill correspond it garrett haake off his triumphant impromptu interview with jamie raskin that made us all look comparable by comparison. that was such a boone, to have you and then to have him. pull this all together for us, this new batch of subpoenas makes clear that perhaps the

witnesses that they keep talking about, the 300 that they have already engaged with, the thousands of documents. ly ann caldwell tweeted earlier that mark meadows before facing criminal contempt turned over 9,000 documents to the committee. they may have given up more leads. ali alexander was in yesterday for eight hours. this may be part of a probe into who was planning what and how much knowledge donald trump had of it. >> we are in the middle of a critical period for this committee. they are staffed up, they are focused. and they are having finally some success of linking together some of the interviews of folks they wanted for some time. yesterday jamie raskin told us they are trying to develop a fine grain image of what happened on january 6th. we know the big picture. the big picture is not in dispute. the latest round of subpoenas are the kind of people who can give you the fine grain detail. they are the organizers of the rally. these are people who applied for

permits and were talking to government functionaries about how to set up the basic details of how these rallies came together and led to the attack on january 6th. the witness list for next week includes some of the bigger names in donald trump's orbit, like bill stepien, his former campaign manager. folks who can help connect what donald trump was doing in the leadup not to january 6th, but to election day, and at a time immediately afterwards when the streaming for what became january 6th started to come together. so we are seeing all of those pieces get linked. i can tell you with regards to eugene robinson's column i said similar things to the committee. at some point they have got to talk about what they are finding it cannot just come in leaks if they want people to trust their finding. the answer i have gotten back time and time again is that those public hearings, the public reveal will come at a time of their choosing. liz cheney is talk approximating doing weeks of hearings when they feel like the time is

right. much to the frustration of those trying to cover this committee and those waiting their results are likely closely trying to pull the image out of what is out there. they will make their reveal when they are good and ready. >> i understand that, and i understand that, dan goldman, but i think that one of the catastrophic consequences of the mueller investigation being conducted the way robert mueller wanted it conducted is that, one, no one has any idea what was in volume one. two, to the degree they know what was in volume two it looks like donald trump got away with obstruction of justice whachlt do you think about not just the decision to share with us, the public, at a time and playoffs their choosing but what sounds like a bristly reaction to

eugene's argument. >> i don't know if it is bristly. but i think eugene is right. i think frankly most of the committee members would agree with eugene. but i think what the frustrated public and media needs to remember is, you have got to put the facts together before you present the facts. they are interviewed nearly 00 people. you are not going to want to have hearings with 300 people. that's going to be boring. it's going to be useless. and it is not going to tell the story. it is not dissimilar to what we did with the ukraine impeachment. we had closed door depositions, there were calls for it to be done in public. then we did have public hearings. >> uh-huh. >> that enabled us to tell a story through the witnesses. of course, we weren't making anything up, but we were able to idea the relevant and valuable portions of their ten hours of testimony and pull it out in a shorter hearing. we are going the want that.

you, as the media, the public, is going to want this to be distilled into its core parts and core points when it comes public. but they have to figure out what that is. they don't know. so you don't want to do this investigation out in public. i will just add one more thing. >> please. >> because what we learned from the investigation in the ukraine investigation is that there is very good reason to keep this closed and to breecht not only all of us from -- prevent not all all of us from knowing what all the witnesses said, but from the witnesses from knowing who other witnesses said. don't fforget, we don't want bil stepien, these people to be able to coordinate their testimony and tell a narrative they want to pretend was real. we want them to go in not knowing what other people said. that is a much better way to get to the truth than doing everything in public. >> i guess, john, all of these subpoenas include document

questions. we know even someone who is -- he's sort of a hostile witness wrapped in a cooperative witness wrapped in a riddle. mark meadows turned over 90 pages of documents before he has taken actions that will lead to him facing a contempt referral late friday night. >> right. this gets into the distinction that eugene is making between prosecutable crimes versus trying to tell people what happened and to make policy recommendations to keep it from happening in the future which i think is probably the most important of all these things. how do we understand how these networks work? how do we understand who is out there and what they might do next time if it is true like mark gehlman says, january 6th was rehearsal. that means opening day is coming

soon. we are out of preseason and we want to know how to prevent that from happening. i think that the argument -- if you are prosecuting a case -- dan knows 100 times more about this than i do. you can build a paper case. sometimes it matters more there are some cases that are paper cases. they want to produce all of the paper they can. it has been a big 24 hours for that if the courts continue to rule the way they are ruling on the question of executive privilege. but on the question of making people understand i think it is a false binary. i don't think it's about tiling. i don't mind they haven't done them yet. they can do them next year. hearings is not the point. hearings might be point but are they going to be buried in the middle of the day on cable? are they going to be on primetime? is the whole thing going to involve a media communication strategy that works on every level on the digital level, on the television level, on print

level? how do you try to make the biggest amount of noise you can possibly make? that might involve a couple, some -- i don't know, some number of hearings with key witnesses who have been kept in the dark what you can really then make a point with. but it's going to also involve a much more complicated media strategy because honestly no diplomat to some of these impeachment hearings, the country is not watching cable all day long at 2:00 in the afternoon, and 3:00 in the afternoon. >> they are not? >> at 4:00 they are all watching you. which is why i would suggest primetime starts at 4:00. but i think there has got to be a very thoughtful effort to tell this story in multiple forums with sophisticated strategies to try to elevate it in a way that accords with its importance. this is, we said on the show many times, it is the ball game. >> the whole thing. >> whole thing. that means you have to be very

thoughtful about how you can get the clearest story, the most dramatic story, the truest story, and a story that breaks through the cluttered ecosystem we live in right now and a bifurcated one where half of the country doesn't watch msnbc or cnn. how do you get this thing way up on the mountain top to have the kind of public impact that broadcast networks had in the 1950s and 1960 ooz. that's what you have to aim for, to make a national moment out of this. it requires creativity. you can't fall back on, some days of hearings. >> as a former communicator i would like to spend days brainstorming this one. some day we will do this. but the distinction, these are the closest people to donald trump inside the white house. the closest people to donald

trump on his presidential campaign, and the closest people to donald trump in that sort of skuzy underbelly of white supremacist-aligned militia groups and far-right media figures like alex jones. so these are got going to be people that fox news can say we are not going broadcast a bunch of deep state actors. it's trump's campaign. whether they become witnesses i don't think we should make guesses what everybody's personal life dictates. not everybody can go to jail for contempt of congress. i don't think we know who the witnesses will be. john heilemann, garrett, makes a great pitch to perhaps maybe send over some candidates for production manager for whatever this committee does. but my question to you. i fell like liz cheney understands what eugene is arguing and her tweets over the last 72 hours have been about

exceptionally interesting document production from mark meadows. she at the beginning of the week -- i think it was monday -- and chairman thompson did as well, talked about how there will be public hearings. i remember hearing that and thinking if there is one thing that triggers the impeached expresident, it is row block coverage. these are only trump act lights, trump sycophants, trump pardoned people and trump staffers. he cannot surprise himself from these people. >>ert at that. and you can cannot overstate the importance of liz cheney, the importance he brings to this committee. she as a korch conservative republican who wants this fight more than even some of the democrats on the committee. cheney believes she is probably the last republican stand standing between her version of the republican party and donald trump's. she has been aggressive from the word go in trying to draw him out on his preferred mediums on

the most watched television programs she can get on, 60 minutes or other network broadcasts when she can. the committee gets this, by the way. this is part the -- feels like a little thing but faming her vice chair making sure she gives a big spreech at every one of the hearings, they are trying to use her as a bludgeon to get under the former president's skin and create those kinds of media moments that, no offense to raskin or schiff or other folks who have been casted a partisan figures from the previous impeachments, she plays a pivotal figure in how it gets elevated to the next level, whatever that ends up being. >> liz cheney is -- this is my experience of her, have been worked in the bush administration with her. she's like a see and destroy missile. when she identifies an enemy nothing gets between her and the enemy. she identified trumpism as the

enemy, trump as the match and the insurrection is his doing. talk about her as a prosecutor in this sort of rein of public opinion. liz cheney understands i think messaging very well and she understands the importance of doing this investigation aggressively, but doing it correctly. you raised the mueller report. i can't help but think what would have happened if mueller's report was the first we had heard of any of the information in it. if it doesn't drip and drop and drip and we all felt a little bit like whomp whomp. that was a much more credible report than it got credit far because of the way bill barr framed it and because of the leaks that occurred not withstanding the efforts of mueller. here imagine if what we are going to find out is we are going to understand right from the get-go what donald trump's role was, if he had one.

what the white house's role was, what the campaign's role was. and that's all going to come out. and i think liz cheney understands it. i think that's why to say, as a kind of stay tuned message, we've got some good stuff. just sit tight is the right message. you don't want this stuff to just dribble out. you want it to be -- come out, as john says, very powerfully, and liz cheney clearly understands that and she clearly has a different angle on this than some of the democrats do. but she's also right, that this is the last gasp in some ways to defeat trumpism. that's why i reason for attorney general, because it is not just trump anymore. it is trumpism that's going around the country. as barton said, 2020 was a dry run. who they are doing now is trying to pave the way for a coup in 2024 that will be successful.

liz cheney understands that. >> two more things on liz cheney. all the things you said were right. two more things. she understands -- as dan just said, she understands the implications of it, the stakes. >> right. >> in a profound way. you can hear it in everything she says, in the not even just a fight about trump or trumpism. it is a fight about the future of american democracy. it is a fight about the soul of the country, whether the country stays what we all were raised to believe it is. >> right. >> and she's someone who plays the way you just described and she right now has nothing left to lose. that makes her incredibly powerful. she's rational. she knows that in this republican party, the one we live in today. she has no future. i think that little bit rates her in a profound way. there is no more dangerous player on the field than the one that's going for broke because there is no tomorrow. for her politically -- as we sit here now -- she imagines a world where there is a political future forrer. but she knows right now she has

no future in the party. no. that gives here a freedom and a courage that's hard to overstate, both in the degree of freedom and courage but how important it is to have someone who is as conservative as anybody you can imagine in america properly understood and who is also like i don't care about my political future right. >> i think she's the only one thinking about her political future. she is a conservative and there is no way back to conservative -- what mitch mcconnell and mccarthy are going is scooch around trumpism. that joe biden is a illegitimate president and there are trackers in the vaccines, and she knows this means destroying trumpism,

burning to it the ground. you have to go through it. lance the boil and pull all that rot. i want to cover one more piece from the subpoenas today gard before we lose yo. this individual was subpoenaed, robert bobby pooed jr. and max miller met with the former president in his private dining room off the oval office on january 4, 2021 to discuss the january 6th ellipse rally and the speakers at the rally. we know donald trump was involved in the pressure campaign against pence because he had a meeting on the 5th. i guess we also know why 4,000 people a day were dying of covid. this is what his meetings were up. on the 4stest lining up speakers in the rallies and on the

59:about pressuring partnerships. what do you know about these men who were in the room with the former president on the 4th. >> the events of january 6th aren't in any meaningful way in dispute. it's what happened between election day and january 6th that will be the story this committee is trying to tell. if they piece together these individual meetings, whether at the war room at willard hotel, whether they be meetings a the white house, in this case in the dining room off the oval office with perhaps just a few people present. those are going to be the things that link the former president to these events most directly that would demonstrate potentially foreknowledge. max miller is already out talking about this and saying one of the first things he would do if he gets elected to this body is vote to shut down this committee. >> i bet. >> it goes to what we were

talking about yesterday, the idea of obstruction, if you want to call it that, happening in plain sight. right. >> right. >> there is no effort to hide the motivations here. everything's going to happen to cover up what was they aring in the interegg numb is happening right in front of us. >> it has been their strategy. >> it worked for them so far. >> it has. garrett haake, thank you for starting us off, and thank you again for your work yesterday. it was stunning. john heilemann and dan goldman stick around. when we come back a ruling from the supreme court today on the texas abortion ban. justice sonja society myer citing an ominous prediction of long lasting and what she calls catastrophic consequences for the fabric of this country. we will get reaction to that and the addition. president joe biden pledging an expanded effort to protect voting rights as he arns about our back sliding democracy here. later on the program, georgia underscoring the

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today the united states supreme court ruled on that texas abortion law. in a split decision, the court ruled that texas abortion providers can move forward with lawsuits against the state's near total ban on abox but they declined to overturn the law while the case moves through the lower courts. two justices, chief justice john

roberts and justice sonja society myer penned spread dissented saying what this means for the women of texas and for the fabric of this country. roberts wrote the clear purpose and effect of sb 8 has been to nullify this court's rulings warning his fellow justices that quote the nature of the federal right infringe does not matter. it is the role of the supreme court in our constitution that is at stake. society myer wrote n this court's finest moments this court ensured that constitutional rights can neither be nullified openly or directly by state legislator, today's fractured court errs gravely -- this choice to

shirk -- to shrink from texas's challenge to federal supremacy will have far-reaching repercussions. i doubt the court let alone the country is prepared for them. joining us now, nyu law professor alissa murray who clerked and judged with sonja society myer. dan hilemon and gold nanoare back with us. melissa, vigilanteism was ushered in. the state wasn't the enforcer. it was the work around, whatever you refer to it as in law school. and all abortions after six weeks would be banned. what does this ruling do? >> these were concerned with

jurisdictional questions, whether these lawsuits should be in court. the court said it was dismissing it. that's off the table. then it turned to the suit brought by if abortion providers against various state court officials, uj js, clerk, as well as licensing officials in the state and the leader of a texas right to life group. the court held that the state court judges and clerks were in proper defend ants and allowed the suit to proceed against the licensing officials. here's the rub. that's not really a victory. by allowing the suit to go forward against the licensing officials the court has cabined the kind of reefly that the providers can seek. the providers want the law to be enjoined, to stop it from going into effect in texas. that can really only happen if the defendants against whom suit is brought are those state court judge asks the state court

clerks who are charged with ushering these lawsuits in and who can actually stop this law from going into effect. by suing the licensing officials the best relief you can hope for here is that they will not sue the providers and take away their licenses. but they are not in the position the stop the law from going into effect. that's the problem. >> to boil it down to the reality for women living in texas, can you or can you not have an abortion in texas if you are a day after six weeks pregnant? >> you can't. this law is still in effect even as this lawsuit proceeds. and if they get to a point where an injunction is levied, justices sotomayor and roberts were trying to shape relief for the providers but goe gorsuch and others in majority were showing the fifth circuit how it can be narrowed. all of this is in the details,

what kinds of relief can be provided here. even if we do get an initial injunction that stops it from going into effect right now it will be overturned when this case is almost certainly appealed to the fifth circuit. >> i want the read more from justice sotomayor's dissent. it feels like another one we will be read asking talking about for a very long time. let me start here. this is a brazen challenge to our federal structure. it echos the philosophy of john c. calhoun, a rural issent defender of the slave holding south who insists the states have the right to or nullify any federal law with which they disagreed. the supreme court's interpretations of the constitution are not the constitution itself. they are, after all, called opinions. the nation fought a civil war over that proposition. melissa? >> well, the previous to which justice sotomayor is referring,

the broef that said these opinions are afterall just opinions was written by two conservative lawyers. john is the architect of texas sb 8 and the private enforcement regime that essentially insulated this law from being enjaned, stopped from going into effect. she's making the point that these two have effectively allowed the court's decisions and the constitutional lights that the court has long protected to be nullified. that's exactly what happened in the antebellum period leading up to the civil law where states said we are not going to follow the federal law, the missouri compromise, we are going to do what we want with regard to slavery. she's making the point that this was an existential crisis for the supreme court. what's the point the supreme court saying what the law is if states are free to do what they want? here the court has allowed the states to continue doing exactly what it wants. >> we talked last time you were

here, john, about the justices themselves making clear in their public statements how acutely aware they are of the 22-point plunge in public opinion of the united states supreme court in gallup polling which has been polling the question for decades, just since 2001. i am not sure any other institution, rather than the republican party dropped that far that fast. just sotomayor, my disagreement runs different than whether the petitioners may sue. the dispute is whether they can displace constitutional rights by employing schemes like this one. used the word stench last time. and this team schemes. here's clearly sounding the alarm and trying to yank the

court out of this sort of spiral into the basis of right-wing politics. do you see it differently? >> no. i see it exactly the same way. i think, actually there is very particular parallelism between what justice sotomayor wrote in her dissent actually from the bench in her arguments from the mississippi state. she said -- the stench quote was about the politicize algs of the court and the notion that if the court becomes seen as a political actor that's the stench. the only reason this case was before the court, the mississippi law was passed because new justices were added, trump justices, it was presumed that composition of the court would change and allow the overturning of roe v wade. she says that's the stench that attaches to the court when it becomes a political body undermines legitimacy. she says the same thing in this prior quote but says the notion, the argument that the court is

not -- but these are just opinions. they are opinions, therefore that have no weight. they are not the law. that really runs straight up against what the previously historically conservative view of the court was was that stare decisis and press department was the law. >> rate. >> and when you had settles law for 50 years, in a 7-2 decision and 50 years of women have built their lives, families lives, reproductive lives around settled law, it had force of its own. that effectively was the law going forward. if you just start treating opinions as if they are willie -- gossmer, right, it is a thing that contributes to the politicization of the court because we could turn over every precedent at any given moment if the court's composition changes. she is now standing next to roberts, she go saying it out

loud and the notion that states' rights, that states will be allowed to in willy-nilly way full my the role of the federal government. that's a old song in america. and you put those two things together, we tone care about precedent anymore and states can just toss the federal government aside, that's what she's -- that is a dangerous -- that's when you think about what does that mean for american society going forward. it is a very, very different looking america than any america we grew up in. >> dan, last word. >> there are a couple of things that interest me. one that chief justice roberts joined in that sentiment and very concerned as he has generally been. that's a little bit different than justice sotomayor doing it as well. but i think from a practical standpoint what the court did today is -- first of all, they haven't stayed this law pending

resolution. so it's in effect. and the way that this law was sfrured, it's kinds of a head fake. it's to say they can have vigilantes going after them but they are never going to do that because they don't need to because all the doctors are so worried. >> scared, right. >> when the court -- when gorsuch says one traditional way of litigating the legitimacy of the law is to be sued and then to make a constitutional claim, that's -- everybody understands that's bogus because no one is going to be sued and it is just going to remain there as an overhanging threat. >> it had its affect. to be continued. after the break for us a pair of stark warnings on the state of the free world. one from another country, and the other from a dear friend, somebody you will recognize. next. dear friend, somebody you will recognize.

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truth is i am not a liberal on a conservative. i am a institutionalist, i believe in this place and i yield to no one. but the darkness on the edge of town spread to the highway asks roads and neighborhoods, it is now at the local bar, the bowling alley, at the school board and the grocery store. it must be acknowledged and answered for. grown men and women who swore an oath to our constitution elected

by their constituents possessing the kinds of college degrees i can only dream of have decidesed to join the mob and become something they are not while hoping we somehow forget who they were. they decided to burn it all done with us inside. that should scare you to no end as much as it scares an aging volunteer fireman. >> that was the final departing message from our dear friend and colleague brian williams who so accurately framed this moment we are all living in. a dark won for our country and our democracy at large. it is a major theme this week at president biden's democracy summit an event he concluded this afternoon with a speech to world action and called for world action on voting rights. >> because what's true around the world is also true in the united states. the sacred right to vote, to vote freely, the right to have your vote counted is the threshold of liberty for

democracy, for every democracy. with it, anything is possible. without it, virtually nothing is possible. we have to come together and get it done. and we will. >> we are back with melissa murray, dan hilemon, dan goldman. melissa, that was i think the second speech the president has given about voting rights and democracy. does it, in your view, signal a turn of his folk to us think? what did you hear today? >> that address may have been given on an international stage but i think it was likely directed to his colleagues across the street in the capitol where we have major voting rights legislation pending, legislation that would seek to protect the right to vote, that has basically just been lying there, and languishing in congress. and it could not be more brave -- i know we talked about abortion and we normally don't think about reproductive lights linked to voting rights, but you

don't get laws like sb on 8 until you gerrymandered your district to a point where those who oppose don't have a voice. the court has essentially insulated itself by making it harder for individuals in this country to vote. >> melissa's point -- she's too elegant to make this more harshly, but it's on us for separating these threads out. they are all the same story. and there really were never two sides to this. there was one president who didn't hijack the republican party. they ran to him. they glommed onto him. and he said, do not believe your ice, do not believe your ears in early 2017 at the beginning of his presidency. and here we are and 40% of the

country not sure joe biden is the legitimate question. one third of the country, 25% thinks the vaccines -- every problem we face -- we have a majority of republicans who think roe is settled law. it is about to be overturned by the supreme court. you have an inability to pay attention as a country long you have this to really understand and deal with what is happening. you were in the arena for a while -- we will talk about why you got out. but how do we solve this? >> well, i think we need to recognize and acknowledge what the issues are. and we need the people to rise up. i mean, we need to recognize -- i think joe biden put it right. the right to vote is our most fundamental right. if that is denied us, then we don't have a democracy. and i think what i am reading from the outside is obviously trying to get the infrastructure done, trying to get build back better. and then they are going to turn to the voting rights, which may require the -- at least a carve-out of the filibuster

which i think will suck up all the oxygen and build back better would never get done before that happened. but that is a true existential crisis and those efforts to suppress the vote and allow for a fairtarian take over of our democracy is what they intend to do but haven't seen before. we can't sit on the sidelines and watch this go by and say well somebody else will deal with it. that's why i jumped in the race for attorney general. i think we need other people to get out there and talk about this and confront these issues and not just to expect there will be other people. at the ends of the day, what we are going to need is we are going to need two things. one, everybody is going to have to vote, even if it is difficult. and two, we are going to have to have faith that our judiciary will hold. as it did in 2020.

but these will -- all these things will be litigated if they are actually enacted and executed. and those are the two things. because we are going to have to show -- we are going to have to vote out people who don't believe in democracy. and we are going to have to litigate the efforts to overturn the will of the people. >> i want to get you on your decision to get out. and i want to get to brian's closing message. i have to sneak in a quick break first. don't go anywhere. break first. don't go anywhere.

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we told you at the top of the hour that our friend, dan goldman, has decided to suspend his own campaign for new york a.g. tell us why. >> well, yesterday, as we all know, attorney general letitia james announced that she was withdrawing from the governor's race and going to seek re-election to be attorney general of new york. i had already always said at the beginning that if she were to run for governor, i would be -- that would be the only condition in which i would run for attorney general, and i think that tish james has done a very nice and fine and important and really productive job as attorney general in new york, rising up to some of these challenges around the country that trump brought on us, and i am not -- i have no interest in challenging her or battling with her, because i think she is taking the state in the right direction.

i will say that, you know, as a fledgling, newbie, politician, so to speak, somewhat of an accidental politician, i was really moved by the reaction that i got and the three weeks of my campaign. the ground swell of support was really meaningful and nice and what was nice about it is obviously, as i told you on your show, nicole, i got in this because i wanted to get back in the arena. i wanted to fight these fights that we need for democracy, for the right to vote, for reproductive rights, for climate change, for people, you know, in new york, and new york is such a significant state, nationally, to be a model for other states and to make sure that we're doing the right things, and it was very heartening that there were so many people out there who had a thirst for that kind of a message for someone like myself who's an experienced lawyer but not a politician, to jump into what is, you know, a

somewhat political -- certain a political arena, even if the job itself is not so political. and so, to your question about what can we do? and we talked about in the last segment, you know, i tried to jump in, and i think there's a thirst for that. i think that good candidates, people with honesty, with integrity, who want to hold everybody accountable, who seek to have one standard of justice and democratic values, there's room for that right now, at least in the democratic party. >> well, i'm glad you ended that way, because we covered your race and your candidacy and your willingness to jump in despite not being a career politician because the opposite is happening on the other side. i think there are four credibly accused spousal abusers endorsed by trump running for office on the republican side. i mean, the pool of people attracted to politics, i don't know if it could be any more different. >> yeah. i don't know. i mean, look, i think the people attracted to politics over the course of our lives has

diminished in quality just across the board because the whole thing of it's just become so ugly and nasty, but there's no doubt that we don't have -- if you look at the democratic party, it has problems. not all the candidates are perfect. not have many people who believe in the jewish space lasers. >> none that i know of. >> that was my understatement. zero is the number. and you know, and are willing to believe in all these other crazy conspiracy theories, up to and including the big lie but you have a million other conspiracies. you have genuine qanon people in congress now and there's more running and those candidates are not just bad candidates, not compelling but also nut jobs and you see a lot of that on the republican side. >> when i got to congress in the beginning of 2019, i had never heard of qanon, and i remember asking my colleagues on the house intelligence committee, what is this? the way they described it to me is, it is this crazy, cockamamie thing from the right about how someone is going to rise up -- i

still don't really know what it is. but to think of where we are now three years later where we have people who seriously believe in this, who are in the halls of the capitol, is scary, and that is, to the point of why i ran, that is an existential crisis for our democracy, and if we don't have people who are willing to step up and to take that on, then we're going the lose our democracy. >> i remember the first time i read qanon in the teleprompter, i thought it was, like, quaalude. qua-non. >> i remember that. >> since then, i've had a program, so i mean, i knew -- i have to say, they sit at the intersection of this threat, and if they were called al qaeda and not qanon, we'd have a totally different posture and be having totally different conversations about them, so i think to the degree that crazy people believe crazy things, that's their right but to the degree that they

intersect with the threats, that's all of our problem. it's so nice to have both of you in studio. thank you, my friend, for being in the studio with us. melissa murray, hopefully next time you'll be at the table too. the next hour of "deadline white house" starts after a short break. addeline white house" starts after a short break. sis, or psoriatic arthritis, are rethinking the choices they make like the splash they create the way they exaggerate the surprises they initiate. otezla. it's a choice you can make. otezla is not an injection or a cream it's a pill that treats differently. for psoriasis, 75% clearer skin is achievable, with reduced redness, thickness, and scaliness of plaques. for psoriatic arthritis, otezla is proven to reduce joint swelling, tenderness, and pain. and the otezla prescribing information has no requirement for routine lab monitoring. don't use if you're allergic to otezla. it may cause severe diarrhea, nausea, or vomiting. otezla is associated with an increased risk of depression. tell your doctor if you have a history of depression or suicidal thoughts or if these feelings develop.

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miss crawly, it's me mr. moon. i haven't heard from you in awhile, i'm starting to worry here. ♪ grab a brush and put on a little make-up ♪ make-up. ♪ hide the scars to fade away the shake-up ♪ you whoo. your destination is on the right. okay. whaaa! ♪♪ i do absolutely agree that it's racist. it is a redux of jim crow in a suit and tie. >> our complaint alleges that recent changes to georgia's election laws were enacted with the purpose of denying or abridging the right of black georgians to vote on account of their race or color in violation

of section 2 of the voting rights act. >> the 21st century jim crow assault is real. it's unrelenting. and we're going to challenge it vigorously. >> hi again, everybody. it's 5:00 in new york. even before it was passed, georgia's new voting law, sb-202 was slammed for the disproportionate burden it places on voters of color, making their access to the ballot and the right to vote much more difficult. there was the provision that limits drop boxes, the one that makes it harder to vote by mail, even the part of the law that bans handing out food and water to people waiting in line, which has an outsize impact on communities of color. and now there's new reporting in reuters that shines a light on a purge of minorities from their positions on local elections boards. in describing an october meeting of the spalding county board of elections, reuters reports this. quote, this was an entirely different five-member board that

had overseen the last election. the democratic majority of three black women was gone. so was the black election supervisor. now a faction of three white republicans control the board. the spalding board's new chairman has endorsed former president donald trump's false stolen election claims on social media. the report continues, noting the trend was taking place in other counties as well. quote, the panel in spalding, a rural patch south of atlanta, is one of six county boards that republicans have quietly reorganized in recent months through similar county-specific state legislation. the changes expanded the party's power over choosing members of local election boards ahead of the crucial midterm congressional elections in november 2022. these changes all follow the passage of sb-202, which allows the republican-controlled state election board to assume control of county boards if it determines that they're underperforming. the state board has already

launched a performance review of fulton county, which leans democratic. all of this, a prime example of the concerted, relentless, day after day after day effort by republicans to place trump loyalists in positions of overseeing elections all across this country. axios reports this. quote, trump is tapping his national network of allies to identify republicans who were weak in 2020 because they refused to go along with his efforts to overturn the election. no office has proven too small. his apparatus touches everything from unseating governors, members of congress, state legislators, secretaries of state, to formulating policy and influencing local school boards. one common thread with many of the candidates he's backed so far? they all support his efforts to overturn joe biden's victory. republicans passing legislation and installing loyalists to seize control over local elections is where we start this hour with some of our favorite reporters and friends. charlie sykes is here.

an msnbc contributor and the editor at large of the bulwark. also joining us, a.b. stoddard and the reverend al sharpton, host of "politics nation" and president of the national action network. so, charlie, i imagine climate change activists feel the way i feel covering the demise of democracy. it's happening before our eyes. i don't know what more evidence people need. maybe we need bureaus here out in georgia and texas and wisconsin and michigan, but overturning democracy is something that they used to pass voter suppression laws that were so egregious, baseball pulled their game out of georgia. and what? nothing. it's just been copied and put in place in other states, and now they have what they've wanted. not only did they restrict access to the right to vote, they've installed not just backers of some random politician, believers of a conspiracy theory about the results of the 2020 election.

people that are to the right or to the fringe or maybe it's up and down of bill barr and chris krebs, lifelong republicans. they're now in charge of elections in georgia. >> right. and that axios story, i think, is the one that really set off the alarm bells, that you are replacing all of the republicans who might have served as guardrails or bulwarks against stealing the election the first time around and replacing them with true believers in the conspiracy theories, and look, as you point out, there's nothing stealthy about this. this is happening in realtime. it's in plain view. so what we have here is not a failure to communicate. i think it's a failure of imagination. i think there's a failure to imagine how bad it can be. you know, i've asked this question before. if people think this is an existential threat for democracy -- to democracy, why aren't they acting like it? and i think in part, it's because there is a reluctance or a denial to use your imagination to imagine what the end of democracy would look like. what would it look like if you

had a republican legislature manipulating the vote in georgia and overturning a popular victory, say, for joe biden? what would it look like if you had state legislatures in places like pennsylvania, michigan, wisconsin, or arizona who would do this sort of thing? what would happen if all of the people who had, you know, stood to thwart these attempts in 2020 have been replaced by the true believers, because i think it's happening. they're not making any secret of it. they told us who they are. and the question is whether there's going to be any response. >> i mean, charlie, let me just follow up with you. we know what it looks like. hey, brad raffensperger, this is donald trump, see your way to find votes. brad raffensperger says, sir, yes, sir. we know what it looks like. donald trump to acting a.g. rosen, just declare the election corrupt and me and my allies will do the rest and mr. rosen says, sir, yes, sir. we know what it looks like because donald trump tried it.

>> but they didn't. >> right. so, what -- >> and what would have happened if they had gone along with it? what would have happened if the department of justice had been mobilized? what would have happened if mike pence said, yes, sir, i'm not going to count those electoral votes. we've seen what the attempt looks like. we haven't seen what happens if there's no one to say "no" to the trumpists. >> you know, a.b., we spend a lot of time talking about liz cheney in the last hour and her seek and destroy mission to if not eradicate trumpism and the anti-democratic impulses from the republican party, at least name and shame them. it's amazing that as the committee gets their hands on more evidence of the egregious nature of the coup plot, that no more republicans come to the cause that liz cheney and adam kinzinger are fighting. what's your sense on why that is?

>> yeah, it is really upsetting. i mean, i think that it's heartening that liz cheney and adam kinzinger, because of what they've learned in the investigation, the revelations that are unfolding in the committee's work, are now concerned about the need to reform the electoral count act, so there's some kind of finally bipartisanship on the issue, at least of that, that what will happen at the counting of votes in early january of 2025 is cause for concern if not alarm and we can expect terrible things, you know, at best, violence in the middle and breakdown of the constitutional order in the worst case scenario with more violence. but to get to a push to reform the eca, i think they want to get first through their committee's work. problem is, obviously, the clock is ticking, so they can't make a public push now for the need for

reforming this really sort of murky old law because they want to show the public what they found. it's not working on the timetable we're dealing with. joe manchin, who every democrat believes is the only person standing in the way of all this, has admitted he's having conversations with republicans in the senate about potential rules changes, meaning sometimes working around the filibuster. we don't know specifically what that's for, but we can hope that he is actually talking to people like mitt romney and retiring member rob portman or others about some kind of reform of the electoral count act, at least, if not support for his freedom to vote act. this is all, as dan was referring to in the last hour, like, being subsumed right now by their frantic need to finish their negotiations on their economic agenda. this is going to burst into the fore in early winter next year, and they're really running out of time to try to get some kind

of bill through the congress, at least on the electoral count act. >> what's amazing, rev, and i'm not joking, i mean, maybe the problem is that lacking bureaus in georgia, not having a correspondent in spalding county means that we have this story and we can't see the people. we can't see their faces, but it's happening now. so, whenever they turn to it, it's already too late. republicans have spent every day since last november pushing back against our democracy, straining it, distorting it, perverting it. this is from the reuters report. the ousted democrat in spalding called the changes a power grabby local republicans who wanted to go back and prove the big lie was real, referring to trump's election fraud claims. they wanted control. they got control. reconstituted boards in two of the six counties have already moved to restrict voting access in addition to spalding's termination of sunday voting, lincoln county has proposed

consolidating seven precincts into one voting center, which critics say would discourage voting by people traveling from remote areas. proponents say it would make voting more efficient and secure. i'll remind our viewers that there wasn't any election fraud in georgia, so measures that make things more secure are solving a problem that doesn't exist. >> what we're seeing is raw and naked power grab that clearly is directed at the majority black districts, but now it's gone beyond that. because even if you are a white republican that does not believe in the big lie, and does not believe that donald trump was robbed out of the election, you're being disenfranchised in terms of holding power, holding an election office, and they're stacking it where not only are they limiting access to the ballots, they're now stacking it where they're going to control who counts the ballots that are

cast. and when we say we can't imagine this happening, well, blacks of a certain generation in georgia can imagine it, because it was in the lifetime of my parents' generation where they couldn't vote at all, which is why you see a reaction on -- among older blacks in georgia, because they are seeing the return to a reality that they saw when they were young. and now i think for the first time, whites, republican and democrat, are seeing people that will manipulate the system to disempower them and to limit their right to vote. and this is brazen. so, you cannot only say you want someone that is white or someone that is white republican, no, you have to be a white republican that has drank the trump kool-aid. otherwise, you are the enemy. >> and who wants to go backward. i mean, they're committed to disproving -- to proving -- to

proving the lie that the election was stolen, which of course republicans in that state, republican secretary of state and republican governor, oversaw three recounts and it was not. i want to show you, rev, what president biden said yesterday at his democracy summit on the status of federal voting rights legislation. >> we need to enact what we call the freedom to vote act and the john lewis voting right advancement act to prevent voting discrimination, provide baselines for assessing the -- accessing the ballot box, and ensure the will of the voters is upheld. and so much more. we should be making it easy for people to vote, not harder. that's going to remain a priority for my administration until we get it done. inaction is not an option. >> rev, is there -- tell me there's more happening behind the scenes than what we see. >> well, we have been certainly

they've joined the president of the urban league, naacp and others about six national civil rights groups. just yesterday, we talked to two senators. i won't give their names, but we are in constant zoom meetings now pushing forward and i'm beginning to see some of the senators understand the gravity of what we're looking at, because it's not just a voting or civil rights issue. it's an issue of democracy. and it cannot happen. unless there is some carveout or some arrangement around the filibuster. whatever that ends up being, i understand as said on this program that senator manchin is talking to some republicans. whether it is an adjustment of talking all night, whatever it is, we have got to save the right to vote and protect the right to vote in this country. this is no time for playing the language game or playing with semantics or i can't do this, i can't do that. we are seeing -- when you look

at the 202 bill in georgia that is now law, and it being duplicated around the country, we can only stop this with federal law. that's the only way it was dealt with in 1965 when the voting rights act originally happened. the senate must move now. our democracy's at stake, and they've got to understand that we are already late. it will be too late in a minute, and we cannot let the filibuster stand in the way. we've got to find a way around it, through it, or under it, but we have to get to a majority vote since no republicans wants to stand up to donald trump. >> a.b., i want to show you the vice president's comments at the democracy summit. >> here in the united states, we know that our democracy is not immune from threats. january 6th looms large in our collective conscience and the anti-voter laws that many states

have passed are part of an intentional effort to exclude americans from participating in our democracy. we know that the right to vote cannot be taken for granted. at every turn, it must be safeguarded and strengthened. >> a.b., listening to vice president harris there, it strikes me that the voter suppression, voter nullification laws that are brazenly being championed predicated on the lie about voter fraud which is nonexistent, aren't just an immoral stain -- they're not just anti-democratic. they're a foreign policy challenge. this administration has a very hard time standing for democracies around the world and against autocracies with ours in its current condition. what do you make of that as a potential way of bringing some of those, i don't know how many there are, but republicans who used to care about things like democracy in other parts of the world?

>> right. i mean, that's why i hope these conversations are going on with some republicans, you know, in an ideal world, senator manchin should be able to get ten of the reasonable ones to come around to his bill, which is far pared down from the for the people act, and does address the politicization of the vote count. now, the world is watching our response to january 6th and the fact that these new laws, as the rev points out, yes, they suppress the vote and they have to do with vote casting, but the more pernicious outcome is the nullification and stealing of elections. it's the vote counting that will be corrupted because these new laws enable the partisan state legislatures to corrupt the counts so that any amount of money and education and registration and mobilization

efforts put in to getting the vote out cannot overcome votes being stolen, and that really needs to be the emphasis when senator manchin talks to republicans, and when joe biden and kamala harris talk to the members of the public. we need to move into crisis conversation and the reverend sharpton was very eloquent about this. it is not just the right to vote. it's the right to have your vote counted. that is what makes democracy continue to function. and i just don't hear the messaging, and i don't think charlie does either, out of the leadership of the congress or the white house about the urgency of voters' wishes and votes being nullified and votes being -- sorry, elections being stolen. that's the larger macro threat, and they're just not speaking about it. >> and that is sort of the intersection of the 1/6 committee's work and their effort to look back and to protect the future. all of you are sticking around.

charlie sykes, a.b. stoddard, the rev, al sharpton. when we come back, it is like groundhog day, another review of the 2020 election, this one by a conservative group in the key swing state of wisconsin, and guess what? they found nothing. they found no voter fraud. they found no mysterious ballot dumps because there wasn't any. just more proof confirming president joe biden's victory there, the latest debunking of the big lie is next. plus the first major lawsuits filed in connection with last week's deadly michigan school shooting. the family of two shooting survivors is suing the school district. and what is behind the sharp increase we are seeing in covid cases, covid hospitalizations, and continued deaths? a medical expert weighs in. "deadline white house" continues. weighs in "deadline white house" continues. a mountain of toys to fulfill many wishes must be carried across all roads and all bridges. it's not magic that makes more holiday deliveries to homes in the us than anyone else,

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so, go ahead and stop me if you've heard this one before. maga republicans caught up in donald trump's lie about election fraud push for an election audit. they do it and they find absolutely no evidence of fraud. and by doing so, expressly debunk donald trump's claims of fraud in their process. that is precisely what just happened in wisconsin and if it feels eerily familiar, it's because it's happened before. in michigan. and in arizona. and in georgia. the audit in wisconsin, which was run by the conservative wisconsin institute for law and liberty even debunked one of the disgraced ex-president's favorite election lies, that there was a so-called ballot

dump on election night, writing this, quote, despite frustration and suspicion about milwaukee ballot dumps, the existence of the votes and the percentage that went for joe biden, about 85.7%, appear to be plausible. the report adds this, put simply, there was no unexplained ballot dump. the report concludes emphatically, quote, there was no evidence of widespread voter fraud in all likelihood more eligible voters cast ballots for joe biden than donald trump. we found little direct evidence of fraud, and for the most part, an analysis of the results of voting pattern does not give rise to an inference of fraud. we're back with charlie sykes, a.b. stoddard and the reverend al sharpton. it's news, charlie, because what's actually newsworthy is the number of people who still believe the lies, even after actors in their own information echo chamber disprove the lies. explain that. >> yeah, that was exactly the point i was going to make.

look, will is an important conservative organization. i know lots of the people involved so their report is quite significant and it will make no difference whatsoever, why? because pretty much everyone in wisconsin knows there was no fraud. ron johnson, who believes every crack pot conspiracy theory in the wild didn't believe the big lie. he knew that joe biden won. scott walker knew that joe biden had won. the speaker -- republican speaker of the state assembly, robin voss, knew that there was nothing wrong with the election, and yet they have gone along with it. and this is part of the dynamic is there's so much now momentum of the base, the base has been so poisoned by this toxic disinformation out there that it continues. so, in wisconsin, you have probably one of the most respected conservative organizations saying there was no problem, and yet, the state legislature continues with kind of a clown car investigation that makes headlines every day for how ridiculous it is, very

much like arizona, and i don't know that it's going to change the political dynamic here at all, although once again, as you point out, the facts ought to speak for themselves, and you and i are old enough, i'm older, to remember when a report like this might have actually moved the needle, when facts were recognized as stubborn things and conservatives believed that facts don't care about your feelings. well, that's -- that was then. this is now. >> you mentioned ron johnson, i mean, he's been in receipt of sort of russian-aligned disinformation. i think his latest crackpot theory is about mouthwash. what is sort of the future of the republican party in wisconsin, charlie? >> well, i think right now, they're looking at the midterm elections. they're looking at the polls, and they're thinking they're in a good position. the congressional lines look like they will have a strong majority in the congressional delegation. they will continue to control

the state legislature. i think ron johnson thinks that he's got a good chance to be re-elected, so it really is going to come down to the governorship in wisconsin because right now, the governor is really the only thing standing between absolutely unified control of government, not just by a republican party but by a republican party that will not stand up against any of this trumpist disinformation and an election tampering. >> and the whole thing, charlie, is the allure of the lie, because you're saying that even people who know it's a lie take it in and they can't break up with it, is that right? >> yeah. yes. they're either afraid of the base or they think they can appease the base, or they figure, you know, why not? i mean, if this is what we have to say in order to keep and maintain power, that's what we will continue to do. so, again, you know, you look around, the state, people like congressman mike gallagher, you know, does he speak up against the big lie? no. but he knows that it is. and so that's kind of the

environment where the crazies continue to drive the train in a state that used to be known for having a little bit of common sense. and it's embarrassing and disappointing as a response. >> it is, but i think at some point you have to deal with the country that you've got, and the country you've got is a country addicted to disinformation because the alternatives on the other side just aren't more appealing. and you know, disinformation, if you consume it, must be like porn. maybe you don't tell other people you like it but the you el, really like it, and the answer on the other side can't be, eat your spinach. it should be all of our problem. everybody cares about the truth and democracy. should be interested in both getting out something just as appealing as the -- i mean, they're addicted to something that is not good for them. the lies are not good for the country. it's not good for them. but the alternative isn't selling. where does the answer lie, rev, in making the truth appealing? >> i think the answer lies in

that they have got to really start, on the other side, the democrats, the president down, on really ringing the alarm bell and letting people know where we are. they're not looking for votes that were stolen in wisconsin. they're not looking for votes anywhere. they're looking to stall enough time to keep their base energized to hopefully win back the senate and the congress in the midterm elections and head us into an area where, look at what they're doing with women's right to choose in a stacked supreme court by donald trump with three seats. what they will do at the federal courts. there is a plan, and the democrats are not telling people that we are on the brink of seeing the democracy that we knew, that we learned about in school, totally eradicated. and these people are playing the clock on us, and they're not talking that way.

they're talking in nice, noble terms, and what they're saying -- the content is right, but the passion and the fervor and the sense of alarm is not there. on the other side, they are passionate. they are ringing bells with total lies and fabrications, and they're exciting people. people are not excited about, we are in a real disastrous cycle toward this country being governed in a way it was never meant to be governed before and in a way it was never governed before, but our side is sort of like saying, well, let us try and correct this. no, you need to start shouting that we're on the brink here, because we are. look at georgia. look at what they're trying to do in wisconsin and texas. look at the supreme court on the texas decision. we are getting ready to see women and blacks and lgbtqia and all of these groups at the same

time go back 50 years, and you don't need to say it a year from now. it will be too late. you need to say it now. you need to say it emphatically, and you need to say it where they will rise up just like donald trump has been able to get other people to rise up on a lie. you must be able to get them to rise up on the truth by saying the truth in no uncertain and very graphic ways. >> you know, a.b., there is something so palpable in the exasperation that democrats feel. they can't believe it, almost. that a lie that was debunked by bill barr and chris krebs, now animates 430 voter suppression, voter nullification lies. they can't believe it. it's time for the disbelief to wear off, for them to take off the gloves and get in a room and figure out how to beat it because you don't beat a relentless campaign of disinformation with despair. you beat it with an aggressive, a hold no prisoners countercampaign. and if it's not a subversive and a -- i mean, it has to be on all

levels. this is a subversive campaign to destroy our democracy, to roll back the right to vote and to nullify the votes themselves, even if democrats can put the bolder on their wall, crying through all the obstacles and cast a vote anyway. what the republicans are engineering is, maybe it will count, maybe it won't. what needs to happen on the other side isn't despair and hand-wringing and a once every four month speech about the importance of voting rights and, oh, please, contemplate getting rid of this stupid rule called the filibuster. democrats control the house and the senate and the white house, and they should control the message and the message should be -- i don't know what it is. i think a lot of people didn't smoke because they grew up watching the ads of the hole in the throat and the voice. there has to be something about the dangers of disinformation to our country and family. their families ripped apart by qanon. there has to be some education about the dangers of conspiracy theories. it is more dangerous than a cigarette, and no one's talking about it, and democrats don't seem capable of having a sustained conversation with the american people about the dangers of disinformation.

>> right. i agree with you that i think this sort of snuck up on people, that a year ago, last december, i wrote, before january 6th, that donald trump was going to have to try to break the republican party. it was sort of, you know, something he had to do for his ego or his numerous pathologies but what i didn't realize, that when the big lie was a litmus test, that it actually was going to become an organizing principle. it's now -- it doesn't just energize the base. it is the one issue they talk about. it is how you make yourself a candidate. you sign off to run for something, you say you believe the election was stolen, and donald trump finds you and supports you. the democrats have to counter that every day, and they have to make it clear that every republican who is backing the big lie is out, complicitly, to take down the constitutional

order. >> that's all. that's what it is. listen to a.b. charlie sykes, a.b. stoddard, the rev al sharpton, thank you so much for spending time with us on a friday. when we come back, we'll take a closer look at the very first lawsuits filed against the school district and others in connection with last week's tragic and deadly school shooting in michigan. that story's next. y school shooting in michigan that story's next. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ experience the power of sanctuary at the lincoln wish list event. there is no place like home y'all! exand these peopleer oknow thatry there is no place like wayfair. i never thought i'd buy a pink velvet sofa, but when i saw it, i was like 'ah'. and then i sat on it, and i was like 'ooh'.

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i understand we can't change the perverted values of the

second amendment society overnight. values that prioritize gun ownership over the lives of our children. but we can make the cost of denying our own responsibility to stop this slaughter of our children so costly that maybe, just maybe one less child will survive and not be murdered. >> well, that was the lawyer for the parents of two survivors of last week's deadly high school shooting in michigan. leading the first legal action against the school district and its officials seeking $100 million in damages in each of two lawsuits, one in federal court and another in state court. the 17-year-old daughter, parents, riley france, survived being shot in the neck. her sister, 14-year-old bella, stood next to her when it happened. the parents say the school officials failed their daughter and all students at oxford high

school and violated their civil rights and the 14th amendment that gives their daughters a clearly established right to be free from danger that was created and/or increased by the defendants. joining us now is robin thomas, executive director of the giffords law center and our friend, chuck rosenburg, former u.s. attorney and senior fbi official, now an msnbc contributor. these lawsuits are not the first conversation we have had about other ways to stop gun violence, sweeping federal legislative action, and they seem to continue the conversation around, just as the lawyer said, who else can be held responsible, and i wonder what you think of these lawsuits, robin. >> you know, in some ways, this is not surprising. we have a country awash in guns and we don't have the steps in place, we do not have the kinds of laws which help prevent these kind of shootings, things like child access prevention laws and safe storage laws.

almost 5 million american children live in homes with loaded, unsecured weapons, so it doesn't surprise anyone when these shootings happen, and in this case, i know the facts are so egregious. i mean, there was information about the risk that seemed like both school officials and the parents were aware that this young man presented a very imminent threat, and in the case of the parents, knew that he had access to a gun. so, you know, the instinct to want to blame someone, to want to place the blame squarely on the parents or on the school, i get that, i feel the same way, and yet really, there's a larger context here, which is our country, our national leaders, our state leaders are not even taking the basic steps we need to ensure people have responsibility for storing guns safely, so it is really important, i think, to keep the conversation a little more broad. what can we do to prevent these kinds of shootings? you know, school officials in this case, seems like they had some information that would have made a difference. but are we really saying that this is the job of schools, that schools are who we charge with

stopping these shootings? it's a huge issue and one that's a tough one. i mean, the legal standards are high, i'm sure other lawyers will agree with that. it's not an easy standard to meet. most of these cases settle or don't make it to the end because they're really tough charges to prove, but the facts feel so strong and clear that we want to believe something could have been done, and clearly, it could have. >> let's stick with the facts of this lawsuit, chuck, for the purposes of the next couple minutes. let me show you some of what is in this lawsuit and i think in the same way that prosecutor mcdonald argued that the parents' complicity and knowledge was so egregious it was criminal, it seems that this lawsuit is making a similar argument, a similar kind of argument against the school. this is from the lawsuit itself. upon information and belief in the evening of november 29th, 2021, after defendant's teacher one, counselor one and staff

member released ethan crumbley from school without discipline and without investigating his inappropriate internet search and without notifying the school safety liaison officer that ethan crumbley had posted to his twitter account, quote, now i am become death, the destroyer of worlds, see you tomorrow, oxford. and here's the lawyer yesterday going further than that, talking about what would warrant a search and what did not with ethan crumbley. >> at oxford high school, they'll search your backpack if they think you're vaping. but they refused to suspend or search a student who wrote what we now know was reams of homicidal notes and drawings, scenes of classroom slaughter and mayhem, and they allowed a deranged, homicidal student to return to class with a gun in his backpack with over 30 rounds of ammo in his backpack when

they knew he was a homicidal threat. he had told them as much. >> the fact that is not in dispute, at least in my understanding of this case, is that there was an intervention that the school found the drawings and the internet search and alerted the parents. and that ethan crumbley was permitted to go back to school. what do you make of the merits of the lawsuit, as you see it so far, chuck? >> you know, nicole, the facts are awful, and it's absolutely heartbreaking, heartbreaking, and to robyn's point, we are a nation awash in guns. but she also made another point and i wanted to expand on it a bit. just because someone files a lawsuit and asks for a lot of money, doesn't mean they're going to get it. here's why this case is hard. you would have to show that the teachers and the administrators and the counselors acted with a deliberate indifference to the safety of their students or with reckless disregard for the safety of their students.

look, my little sister is a teacher. if i know anything about teachers, they care deeply about their students. it doesn't mean that catastrophic mistakes weren't made in this particular school district. it's clear they were. and that if they had a chance to do it over again, they would have done it very differently. but proving, as a plaintiff must, in order to win a civil suit in court, that teachers or counselors or administrators acted with deliberate indifference to the lives of their students is actually quite hard to do. and so that's why you see, nicole, in some cases, and i think the shooting -- the awful shooting at sandy hook in newtown, connecticut, is a good example of a judge dismissing the case. there still is a burden of proof on the plaintiff, and if a plaintiff can't meet it, they lose. >> so, your sense, chuck, just to make sure i understand you, is that you understand sort of the emotional underpinnings but on questions of the law, it's not a good case? is that your sense?

>> well, i don't know yet if it's a good case or a bad case. i read the lawsuit today, all 46 pages, and the allegations are deeply disturbing. but there's a difference, nicole, and this goes, i hope, right to your question, about making allegations that are disturbing and winning a lawsuit. it's hard to win these lawsuits. now, maybe the district decides it wants to settle because they want to mitigate or minimize the risk of losing at trial. that happens too. but you still have to prove the case, and again, making a mistake, even a catastrophic mistake, is not the same. it doesn't equate to being deliberately indifferent to the lives of the students and the school. i think that this is a hard lawsuit to win. i don't think it's an impossible lawsuit to win. and one of the things that happens next in a lawsuit, assuming that the case survives a motion to dismiss, is that both sides exchange information

in a process called discovery and we might learn more about whether or not the school and its teachers and its counselors were really deliberately indifferent to the lives of their students, but i doubt that's the case. >> chuck rosenburg, robyn thomas, an unbelievably sad story, and the law is obviously complicated. i'm grateful to both of you for helping us understand it. thanks for spending time with us today. when we come back, it might feel like we're getting back to the darkest days of the pandemic, a sky-high number of daily cases, hospitals reaching capacity. our medical expert will help make sense of exactly where we are, where we're heading and what might be different this time around. nd what might be different this time around.

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♪ i had a dream that someday ♪ ♪ i would just fly, fly away ♪ surge in cases comes alongside soaring hospital rates, largely affects those unvaccinated in indiana, they became the fourth state this week to call in the national guard to manage hospitals there that are nearing it's also happening in highly vaccinatedhl places, like new york, where the governor put ut nonessentially procedures on pause at nearly three accident hops. the states also announced masks will be mandatory at all indoor public spaces that do not require proof of vaccinate. let's aboutic in dr.

bedilia. doctor, what is happening? >> well, we are seeing increased numbers, nicolle. despite these increases, in what you're seeing in already places where the health systems are strained,te i'm sorry to bring further bad news. there are darking clouds on the highsen, too. we're aboutn, to go into a seco holiday season, that may see increase from delta. if thatm isn't enough, western asking omicron is very clearly more transmissible. you're seeing an increase in omicron cases in places like the u.s., who detected their first initialct case later than south africa did, when we're still learning about it, but it may be goinging thema efficacy against infections unless wens get boosted. nicolle, we have the tools. the place we're at, we have to takeat advantage of the tools, e

we going to be proactive? >> i commend new york state for taking the steps, because many of the places in the state where the national s guard have, don' have indoor mandates. haven't we learned that at this point? the same thing with boosters. we know boosters are needed with omicron, but only about a quarter of americans are boosted. we have the tools, but will we use them, is the question. >> we now have enough his 20ir. are we looking at potential school shutdowns? are we looking at never going back to our offices? what in your view are we heading into? >> i think that omicron has thrown aic wrench of an unknown. we're still learns about t. but one thing is clear in the future, and cases are up. hospitalization is up, 50% of our total population being vaccinated is not nearly enough, even with delta, the rate of

transmissibility. people may sea what if it's not -- we don't know that, by the way, but let's say it is less severe, but a variant that cases more infections is likely to find people who are vulnerable. so a small percent of a big number is still a big number. so weather at now is that we need to take that proactive action, so we don't get to lockdowns, which means we have to get the boosters, which means we have to put the mask mandates into place.av that's how we avoid lockdowns and schools closing down again. we need to do it now rather than waitingat to see what the next peek of this case, of this wave will be. >> i just cannot contemplate reading the news, seeing the undeniable facts of hospitalization, the undeniable facts that f 0% are unboosted, making any choy other than to vaccinate or boost.

it will never make sense to me. thank you, doctor. a quick break for us, we'll be right back. doctor. a quick break for us, we'll be right back. we're making the fagioli! ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ this looks great. awesome. alright. thank you! what... what recipe did you use? oh. my nonna's! she a good cook? -no. as i observe investors balance risk and reward, i see one element securing portfolios, time after time. gold.

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♪ this is what healthier looks like ♪ the president knows his stuff, y'all. that's why they call him the potus, which means person on top -- what is it. >> president of the united states, jimmy. ♪ he's the potus with the mostest ♪ now, this even jimmy fallon will welcome president joe biden for his late-knew debut as president. he will appear virtually, but it's jimmy fallon. they'll figure something out. they'll figure something out. we'll be back after? - san francisco can have

criminal justice reform and public safety. but district attorney chesa boudin is failing on both. - the safety of san francisco is dependent upon chesa being recalled

as soon as possible. - i didn't support the newsom recall but this is different. - chesa takes a very radical perspective and approach to criminal justice reform, which is having a negative impact on communities of color. - i never in a million years thought that my son, let alone any six-year-old, would be gunned down in the streets of san francisco and not get any justice. - chesa's failure has resulted in increase in crime against asian americans. - the da's office is in complete turmoil at this point. - for chesa boudin to intervene in so many cases is both bad management and dangerous for the city of san francisco. - we are for criminal justice reform. chesa's not it. recall chesa boudin now.

the good news is that it's friday. thank you for letting us into your homes. "the beat with ari melber" starts right now. hi, ari. >> thank you, nicolle. our top story, new reporting on the maga riot committee dropping two new subpoenas day. our top story will also feature adam schiff, who is standing by, and joins us live in this segment. we are also tracking these new details about the plotting, in writing, by trump attorney jenna ellis, pushing what looks like clearly an unconstitutional scheme that would