developing as we're coming on the air this afternoon, news that gives us a clearer snapshot of the state of the republican party and it is still donald trump's republican party. the message sent with the gop just today voting overwhelmingly to punish two of their own. you see them here, liz cheney and adam kinzinger for their work on the committee investigating january 6th. an attack on the capitol, the republican party is now, today, officially describing as, quote, legitimate political discourse. remember, nine people died in connection to the insurrection, more than 150 law enforcement officers were hurt. we will talk about what else the party is saying today and what's going down behind closed doors as mike pence takes the mic at a different meeting sometime this hour. plus, green across the board for wall street right now after that stronger than expected jobs report from the labor department. the head of the national economic council brian deese joining us live from the white

house in a minute. and breaking this afternoon, one of the country's biggest airlines wants the justice department to make a new no fly list after all that bad behavior on planes. we have our tom costello jumping in front of a camera with developing details. i'm hallie jackson in washington. good to be with you on a friday afternoon. we will start with new details on that rnc vote coming into us. you see here nbc's leigh ann caldwell covering this for us from the capitol, josh dawsey investigative political reporter to the "washington post" joining us, also here former republican congresswoman barbara comstock along with olivia, chief political strategist for the renew america movement. with the reporting and the nuts and bolts -- josh, you are there, you are in salt lake, right, where this rnc meeting is happening? >> yeah, i am. >> and leigh ann, you're covering from the fawout from d.c. the resolution said in part and i'm reading just like it was written whereas representatives

cheney and kinzinger were participating in a democrat-led persecution of ordinary citizens engaged in legitimate political discourse. that is significant here. >> reporter: yeah, it's really significant, hallie. that is an official framing from the republican party now that they are saying that january 6th was legitimate political discourse. and now that is now the position that the party has taken by censuring the two people, adam kinzinger and liz cheney for trying to investigate what happened on that day and the lead up. legitimate political discourse is not what they think happened. so the party is -- the display of the party between the maga wing and the cheney wing are now fully in public view and this is something that some republicans don't want to be talking about and some are confused about it. for example, leader mccarthy who was in mar-a-lago last week

talking with donald trump, while he is willing to embrace that wing of the party, he doesn't want to draw the divisions to it. he was asked about it earlier today and he refused to answer questions. meanwhile, there's senator mitt romney, for example, tweeted his support for liz cheney today, so did senator cassidy of louisiana, larry hogan, the governor of maryland also tweeted his support for them. >> yeah. >> reporter: so this is something that the party would -- many in the party would rather be focusing on joe biden, but over and over again they are still talking about the last election, january 6th and taking former donald trump's side. >> let me get you on other developing news just into us here. listen, we knew that congressman jim jordan had spoken with former president trump on the 6th, he had said it publicly, he had talked about it before. what's interesting now is according to your reporting and our colleagues here at nbc is that the select committee apparently knows how long they spoke for, what time they spoke, which indicates the level of

detail of the records that they have received now from the national archives related to the trump white house. >> reporter: yeah, that's absolutely right. so records that were given from the archives to the january 6th committee detail that former president donald trump and jim jordan spoke for ten minutes on the morning of january 6th. like you said, we knew that they had spoken that day, but now we know how long and what's important is the committee assuming -- we can assume that they also have what else the former president did on that day, who he talked to, who he communicated with. it is obviously in those documents so that's really, really interesting. they have one more other tidbit from the january 6th committee as well, i'm told that in the spring they're going to be holding hearings, which we knew, but i'm told that there's going to be weeks of hearings and many, many hearings that will lay out the picture of everything they've learned. it's not going to be the end of their investigation, but it's going to be a very critical part

of their investigation so the country has that to look forward to in the next few months. >> great reporting. of course, january 6th, josh, is the backdrop to a lot of what's going down where you are in salt lake for this meeting. >> right. >> you were in the room where it happened -- story for the quote, but during this censure vote, right? give us a little bit of color from inside. >> sure. it passed overwhelmingly without any sort of discussion or debate. it was a voice vote and almost every voice in the room could be heard saying yes, there were a couple of nos, later a couple members, henry barber from michigan, a close confidant of chris christie in new jersey said they voted no but there were not many no votes. the resolution had been supported by ronna mcdaniel and dave bossy, a top trump ally who had worked on it behind the scenes. it was a fate a come complete by the time the hearing began or media began on friday. >> let's be clear about what this vote was about.

when you look at liz cheney and adam kinzinger and their voting records they both get high marks for voting in line with former president trump's position as well as the majority position of the republican party. they were not censured for not being conservative enough or republican enough. >> right. >> they were censured for not being, frankly trumpy enough, josh. >> right. yeah, i did an interview last night with mcdaniel and bossy and both of them said exactly that was why, their work on the january 6th commission and what they were doing, you know, as part of that commission and both of them made very clear that that's what it was about. you know, liz cheney's folks are saying that the republican party is being held hostage to donald trump. both mcdaniel and bossy claimed to me that they were not doing -- but i've talked to sources close to the former president and he does obviously support this and wanted this to happen. >> you also broke some news, josh, that i had actually heard from a source speculating on this yesterday on this something called rule 11 which for all intents and purposes allows the

rnc to get involved in a republican state party asks them to and wyoming did in a primary. this is what we're seeing right now as you have laid out in the "washington post" and the reason why this is so important that liz cheney right now has a lot of cash. she's sitting on a good amount of money as far as fundraising for her race. her next closest competitor has a fraction of what she has. the republican -- wyoming republicans, josh, you know, want to see a cash infusion from the rnc against liz cheney. >> right. so what rule 11 means is that the republican party is going to fully recognize liz cheney's challenger as a presumptive nominee. they can send money, send staff to the ground, share data with harriet hageman. it takes the apparatus of the republican party should they choose to use it and put it squarely against liz cheney. mcdaniels and her aide said they had not decided exactly what they would be do or what commitments it would be, but by

passing this rule 11 privately earlier this week it gives them the chance to use a resource of the republican party against liz cheney. both of these things, hallie, i think it should be noted -- i asked mcdaniel are you aware of the party ever censuring a member of congress before, she said no. and the same with rule 11. that they were not aware of the party ever using a rule 11 for challenger against an incumbent. rule 11s are used for incumbents but never for a challenger against an incumbent. we don't really have any precedent of that. >> josh dawsey, leigh ann caldwell, great reporting. thank you for joining us from washington, out to salt lake. appreciate it. i want to bring in former congresswoman barbara comstock and former top adviser one of them to vice president mp. olivia troy. great to sisi you here. more breaking news, we have just now heard from liz cheney in response to what happened and what went down at the republican party meeting. she says, one tweet, this was

january 6 and it looks like she has tweeted and i'm looking at it off my phone a video. she said this is not, quote, legitimate political discourse. barbara, i will start with you and your reaction to this. >> well, liz is exactly right. and this resolution which actually has no impact or meaning is both morally repugnant from the party of lincoln to be standing with the insurrectionists that basically become the trump confederate monuments party. but, listen, it's only 168 republicans that's there in that committee, but it's also politically stupid because here in virginia we have just had a model of winning with glen youngkin for governor, turned around a 12-point difference between trump in '20 and youngkin in '21 because republicans focused on issues which the whole issue set is now favoring republicans if you look forward, but if you are going to keep hitching your wagon to the trump grievance train, it's a

losing prospect. so this is politically stupid, but more importantly it is morally wrong, it's constitutionally wrong and these very same people who, you know, orchestrated this and voted on it were the same people subpoenaing phone records and bank records and things with me during the clinton administration and we were rightfully doing it then and liz cheney and adam kinzinger and that committee are rightfully investigating the insurrection and they need to continue. and the people on that day, trump jr. said, hey, stop it. he has to say more. so these people are going to be embarrassed by their same statements on january 6th that contrast with this ordinary, you know, discourse that they're saying because if these 168 members had all these people come in and like on january 6th and try to invade their hotel and some of them died and 150 of them were injured, i don't think

they would be calling that legitimate political discourse. >> owe live yarks let me bring you into the conversation on this and on the point that i know you've made that you feel like the rnc is irrelevant, which i think echos a little bit of what we heard from the congresswoman there, but money does matter. when they start taking steps that in some way cut people off or support others who are, for example, going up against liz cheney, could that potentially have an impact? >> i think it could, but i honestly i have more confidence in the people of wyoming. i hope that they're watching this closely and i hope they're watching a political party in the united states legitimize political violence and violent -- and, you know, what was basically a datete on police, an attempted murder on the sitting vice president of the country. that is what this vote today represents, it represents a u.s. political party, the republican party, siding with these individuals. so, you know, i think, yeah, it

gives pause on what the next step will be in terms for liz cheney, but i have full confidence that hopefully she will prevail because i think it matters because today this moment really does matter. it's a sad day for america. not only is it rock bottom for the republican party but it's actually sad to watch this on display that this is who they are and the side that they have chosen. >> there are -- there are a couple of, i think, snapshots as we laid out at the top of the show of what we're seeing of the republican party coming out of this meeting. one of them is what we're talking about, one of them is this idea of unity under former president donald trump but the other is what feels like a disconnect on messaging here. nbc news has a new piece out looking at what's described as this disconnect between the obsessions frankly of former president trump and then the messaging that you're seeing the republican want to talk about, you know, want to talk about, for example, crime in the united states, wanting to talk about president biden in their view being weak on crime, et cetera, that strategists see as really

important to trying to have success in the midterms, not these, you know, conspiracy theories that former president trump continues to issue statements about even this week. congresswoman, do you see that as potentially problematic come november? >> well, it is if some of these bad candidates that trump is picking get the nomination. they could very well lose in many of these swing seats, but even -- listen, these are the people who lost races because they nominated people like roy moore and christine o'donnell, i'm not a witch. but here is what's important, the american people and republican voters they can support liz cheney and i encourage them to keep contributing to her. you can support the candidates, the republican candidates, who are standing up and saying no to this. because right now the rnc is wasting money on paying trump's legal bills, they're going to now waste money on fights instead of helping maybe the swing districts. if you are a republican or an

independent-minded person, somebody who doesn't want to see this party taken over by insurrectionists, go out and support the sane candidates, there still have some there, god bless, you know, liz and adam but also today mitt romney and senator cassidy stood up and said this was wrong, governor hogan in maryland and others. so i think you're going to see more and more republicans like those 56% who say we're real republicans, we're not trump republicans, that's the 36%, and that is waning and if the trump party now insists on it's trump or nothing, they're going to die in '24 but they can very much harm what seems like a lock to get the majority in both the house and the senate because of biden's poor performance. but some of these candidates that they are supporting certainly, you know, people like liz's opponent does not know the state and the issues nearly as well and is not committed to

them. liz is a conservative who is committed to the constitution and conservative principles and was long before donald trump came on the scene. donald trump, remember, was writing checks to chuck schumer and hillary clinton, you know, some of us are old enough to remember because that wasn't too long ago. >> olivia, what are you hearing on this to wrap us up here from the people you are still talking to inside the party? >> i think they're trying to pull away from this and donald trump keeps putting it back front and center. he is holding the party hostage and that's what it is. but the rnc has allowed this to happen and they have sided with him. >> olivia troy, former congresswoman barbara comstock, thank you to the both of you for bringing us your perspectives this afternoon. we have other breaking news we have to get into now and it relates to michael avenatti, a name you probably know, a face you probably recognize on the left side of your screen. he famously represented stormy daniels in her lawsuit against

former president trump. the verdict is now in in a fraud case. he has been found guilty on charges he stole money interest her. the money was supposed to go to daniels for a book that she planned to publish. i want to bring in msnbc legal analyst danny cevallos. drink us up to speed on what we're learning. i know this has just developed in the last 20 minutes or so. >> michael avenatti was accused of stealing essentially $300,000 from his then client stormy daniels. late in the trial michael avenatti undertook to represent himself as his own lawyer and cross-examining stormy daniels and other witnesses against him. now -- well, during that -- during the trial avenatti advanced what i perceived as a theory that i've used myself in cases, which is this is a contract dispute. it doesn't belong in criminal court. let her sue me in civil court where this belongs. unfortunately the jury didn't see it that way and neither did the government apparently convicting him just minutes ago.

>> you know, we had seen some testimony in this from stormy daniels, for example, who had said michael avenatti stole from me and lied to me. this was something that was very public here that it exploded into public view as you said avenatti was representing himself, he pleaded not guilty. what are the consequences that he faces at this point, danny? >> well, keep in mind he was already convicted in another court for similar type -- kinds of crimes. the reality is now he is an already convicted felon which when it comes to sentencing will blast him up into a different strata when it comes to the judge figuring out his federal sentencing guidelines. the federal sentencing guidelines are driven by how bad your particular crime of conviction is and what your criminal history is or was. for his first crime and conviction he was a zero, as we call it, he had no criminal history, now he does have a criminal history, the court will take that into account and his sentence will reflect that.

does that mean he will get the max under the statute? probably not. but it means he's going to get a lot more than than if he had no significant criminal history. >> as somebody who had kept an eye on it as it was unfolding, do you believe there is a turning point or can you pin toint putting your defense attorney hat on a moment when the worm turned for avenatti? when it became clear that, yes, this guilty verdict would come down? >> first i'm going to put my attorney attorney hat before the defense attorney hat and the attorney attorney hat is this, as soon as i heard that he may have been stealing from a client, i knew that at least certainly as an attorney but i knew that his goose was likely cooked and here is why, when you look at attorneys what we're trained to do and what we are punished for, the bar or the disciplinary board will work with you if you have a dui, if you get in a bar fight, of course, i have done none of those mention, but if you do they will work with you. where they will not work with you is if you even commingle your funds with your client's. you do that and you are gone.

so when avenatti started advancing this whole, well, she said she would pay me for this book argument at trial, i knew it wasn't -- in my mind it wasn't going to fly because it seemed that the evidence showed that in the fund where stormy daniels' money went, michael avenatti was dipping in allegedly to pay for his own things and that is a huge no-no in lawyer land. you play around with your attorney trust accounts and for the most part you can plan on being disbarred. so i knew that this argument would probably not be a winner. >> danny, appreciate your perspective wearing your attorney attorney hat. thank you for bringing us more on that breaking news. some other developing news, you've seen it, right, these new job numbers in just today that show pretty surprisingly strong start to 2022 even in january, even when the omicron variant was just knocking folks out around the country. here are the numbers, 467,000 jobs were added last month, a lot more than what exists were

expecting. they were only thinking it was going to be like 150,000. the unemployment rate is 4%. president biden perhaps unsurprisingly welcoming of course this strong jobs report at the white house. watch. >> america's job machine is going stronger than ever. fueling a strong recovery and opportunity for hard-working women and men all across this great country. america is back to work. >> i want to bring in from the white house brian deese national economic council director. good to have you back on the show especially on a day like today where there's plenty of news for t good to see. >> you good to see. >> you i don't think you would quibble when i said there are probably good surprises in your view in these job numbers not just the top line but upward revisions in previous months, right? november and december the number of jobs really top 700,000. can you talk about the disconnect here, why they were revised up so dramatically, why

you think there was such a miss on the prediction for this most recent month. >> well, the practice of estimating jobs numbers during a pandemic is hard, but what we learned from this jobs report was both that we saw strong job growth in january and as you mentioned amidst the omicron variant and a lot of people being out sick temporarily, what we also learned was a clearer picture of the past year and what that shows is 6.6 mlg jobs over the 12-month period, that's the strongest monthly job growth we have seen on record and also a consistency, a remarkable resilience of this economy to continue to grow, to continue to add jobs even as we've dealt with the ups and downs of this pandemic. so it's good news and it reinforces that we've got strong resilient job growth and that also helps a lot of people who might be on the margins of this economy, the margins of this labor force. one thing we know is a really strong economy and strong job growth helps to lift everybody up with higher wages as well

shoo what is your message to americans who may be looking at this? we know people care about their money, we know that that is a big driver for folks and for their concerns and anxieties and hopes who are looking at this going, okay, is the worst behind us now? what's your message to them? >> well, there's a lot to look forward to here. there's a lot of strength in this economy, there's a lot of strength in this recovery and we still have challenges and a lot of people are feeling that out there. people are frustrated, the virus has been a real drag on people's psyche and also prices are high and that's affecting people in their pocketbooks. our core message is we are seeing extraordinary economic growth, that was the result of deliberate policy choices we've made and the benefits are being seen across the country. now we need to keep this going. we need to attack the problems that we have, we need to focus on the issue of prices but do it from this position of economic strength. you know, the united states is uniquely positioned globally. lots of countries are facing inflation challenges, no country has the combination of really

strong economic growth and strong labor market outcomes. we need to take advantage of that strength and keep this momentum going. >> let me ask you about something you mentioned which is the inflation challenges that we face. the president acknowledged today the higher price of gas and groceries. i want to get your response to new reporting from our friend and colleague at cnbc kayla tausche who spoke with economists. quote, on virtual discussions in early spring white house officials acknowledged the possibility of inflation brought by stimulus and infrastructure spending, but the risk was dismissed by officials citing the political popularity of the policies and the desire to add more fuel to the economic recovery. so, brian, what do you say to critics who might argue the administration misread the threat of inflation? >> well, what i would say is on a day like today what you see is that the policy choices that this president led with have led to the strongest economic growth in 40 years and the strongest labor market outcomes on record. if we step back and look at inflation, this is a global challenge.

in december the european union hit its highest inflation rate since the creation of the european union. germany hit its highest inflation rate since injury hand reunification. the united states because we have strong growth is uniquely well-positioned to face this. we can take actions to go directly at these prices. just today the house of representatives passed a bill that would help to build semi-conductors here in the united states, secure our supply chain when we know that the reason why car prices are adding a third of all inflation is because we don't have enough semi-conductors, enough micro chips to build the cars that people want here at home. so we need to take these steps, act on these issues. i think if you look overall the economic outcomes that we're seeing are good for the economy, good for families, we just have to stay at it. >> then on that front and i know only have you for 30 more seconds here. partly what was interesting about these job numbers we got today is that we saw them in january, a month when omicron as

you know was raging across the country. in many places omicron is getting to be in the rear view. what is the outlook, do you believe, for let's say february, march, april, as you talk about you want to continue to forge ahead and look ahead? >> well, there's always uncertainty to we will never put too much emphasis on one month but we are seeing positive developments on case counts and hospitalizations on come cron. we know people need to get vaccinated, boosted and as we do that we can hopefully continue to make progress on the vaccine front and continue this economic recovery as well. taking steps like the house passed bill today would help to add to that momentum so that's where we're going to be focussed. >> brian deese, thank you so much for being with us today. i know it's been a busy one. coming up, we are live in ukraine as russia gets a big show of support from china today. speaking of china as the olympic games officially get started in beijing, the new accusation that china has been targeting u.s. reporters in a big hacking campaign. we will talk about what we know

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developing news from delta airlines, which is now asking the government to put unruly passengers on a national no fly list. this is in a letter to the torn general, merrick garland, and delta's ceo says that would help prevent future incidents and help send, quote, a strong symbol of the consequences for bad behavior. the report coming three days after two passengers were taken off a plane for disrupting a delta flight, a story we've heard over and over in the pandemic. the faa more than 300 of these things in the last year alone, more than half of which involved fights over face masks. tom costello is joining me with more. you cover the aviation and transportation industry, it feels to me like this is delta trying to up the ante related to bad behavior on flights. >> reporter: i'm going to clarify that number. it's 300 reports of bad behavior this year. year to date. 6,000 last year. so the numbers have been off the

charts here. delta alone has 1,900 people on its own internal do not fly list, in other words, their behavior was so bad that the airline says you can never fly delta airline again. other airlines have similar numbers of passengers they banned for life. what delta airlines ceo wants to do is combine those lists, american, delta, jetblue, united, all of them on to a master list that the doj, the department of justice and the faa would keep track of and those people would be banned from flying on any u.s. airline, period, because their behavior at some point was so bad that they were convicted of this type of behavior, convicted is the keyword here of unruly dangerous behavior on board a plane. the faa just got back to me in terms of a dot statement, they say they appreciate the input from delta airlines, they say they continue to work to drive down these incidents and it has a zero tolerance policy as we have reported the faa and the

dot adopted a zero tolerance policy about bad behavior and with that when the penalties increased dramatically, $37,000 fines, banned from life from an airline and airline, potential jail time, when that happened the rates started going down but they've still got people behaving rather poorly and very often it's the mask and an alcohol issue that drives these types of cases. >> what's your sense from the folks that you have talked to in the industry about whether the creation of a no fly list like this would be enough or whether it would be too little too late? >> i think that this is gaining momentum. we've already heard the national flight attendants unions calling for exactly this kind of thing, the airlines in general have called for this type of activity. we know that the tone general made this a priority to prosecute these types of cases on board planes. if you got on a plane and you knew that if you acted badly, if you created a disruption, if you created a flight diversion that you were going to be banned from ever flying on any u.s. airline

ever again, that might be a pretty big incentive to act your age or at least act appropriately. >> you can say it, tom. act like -- act like a nice guy. tom costello, thank you very much. i really appreciate you being with us on that developing news. thanks. >> you bet. now to the crisis in ukraine. new video into us in the last couple minutes of u.s. troops training ukrainian soldiers to defend their country should russia decide to invade. vladimir putin meeting with president xi who backed putin's security demands in eastern europe. they called on the u.s. and nato to abandon what they call the ideological approaches of the cold war. here is how john kirby responded with our andrea mitchell here. >> if anybody is guilty of a cold war mentality it's china and russia, not the west, not the united states. if anybody is the aggressor in europe it's russia. they are the ones with over 100,000 troops aligned against the border with ukraine. >> nbc news foreign

correspondent matt bradley is joining us live from ukraine. good to see you. let's start with this big show of support that vladimir putin is getting interest china as he is there attending the olympics, et cetera. walk us through. >> reporter: yeah, hallie, these two countries need each other right now, both of them are under extraordinary pressure, more so russia and vladimir putin. i mean, vladimir putin facing a lot of pressure when it comes to here in ukraine and that enormous amassing of troops all around ukraine's border but also china and their goals with taiwan. both of these countries increasingly -- this isn't new, this isn't just a product of the last couple of weeks. both of these countries are seeing themselves becoming international pariahs. so when we're seeing them glad handing each other at the olympics in beijing, you know, what we're also seeing here is this little message between them. if you don't have a friend, then you have a friend in me and that's what we're seeing. we also saw vladimir putin going

to beijing, armed with a very nice 10 billion square meters of natural gas contract for china. and, you know, this isn't new, either. vladimir putin often uses natural gas as part of his diplomacy. he uses it here in europe as more of a stick often he uses it kind of as a carrot but in china he's using natural gas diplomacy very much as a carrot to entice china on his side, but the fact of the matter is he doesn't need to. these two countries are building up with their growing economic clout, especially china's growing economic clout. we're seeing that in new details being discussed and inked between the two countries, they're creating a coalition against what they see as a western world or entire world that's closing in on them and telling them to stop their human rights abuses, to stop drifting away from the west and they're seeing each other as friends. hallie? >> matt bradley live for us in ukraine on that.

matt, thank you for that reporting. speaking of china, coming up after the break, who they picked to help deliver the olympic flame in beijing today and why some are slamming it as chinese propaganda. that's next. are slamming it as propaganda that's next. with relapsing forms of ms... there's a lot to deal with. not just unpredictable relapses. all these other things too. it can all add up. kesimpta is a once-monthly at-home injection... that may help you put these rms challenges in their place. kesimpta was proven superior at reducing the rate of relapses, active lesions, and slowing disability progression vs aubagio. don't take kesimpta if you have hepatitis b, and tell your doctor if you have had it, as it could come back. kesimpta can cause serious side effects, including infections.

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out against the chinese government there because i fear for their safety if they do. >> with me now msnbc foreign affairs analyst victor jha. always great to have you on the show. thanks for being with us. >> pleasure. >> let's talk about the uighur athlete featured in the torch lighting ceremony for china. to critics it felt, i think, in many ways like a transparently manipulative stunt from china here because of obviously the criticism that they are abusing uighurs in what the u.s. has called a genocide here. how did you see it? >> so, hallie, i think that's right. i mean, there's a genocide taking place now that the chinese government has done nothing to address world concerns about it and so their answer to it is is to have the final athlete that lights the torch be someone from that region.

i mean, as you said, i mean, it is so transparent, it is insensitive, it's hand fisted. it shows the bubble that both the ioc and china as the host live in, thinking that this is somehow going to assuage international concerns about what's taking place with the forced detention of all of these folks. >> what did you make of what we heard from house speaker nancy pelosi telling athletes to be careful about how they call china out? >> i think this is a very different environment than when the athletes went in 2008 to beijing because china has complete control. because of covid they're able to exercise complete control. there are no foreign tourists. you saw everybody in the stadium were all people that were invited and they are invited because they are not going to cause any sort of commotion. the athletes were told not to bring phones torques bring burner phones. at least from what i could see

of the ceremonies none of the u.s. athletes were taking out phones and taking pictures like the chinese athletes were. it's a secure environment for the chinese government but it's not a very safe environment for athletes if they were to speak out. >> dr. cha, thank you for your perspective. we have some developing news into us now, former vice president mike pence speaking right now in florida talking about his role in certifying the 2020 election results. let's listen. >> and i will not allow the democrats on their allies in the media to use the actions of those who ransacked the capitol to demean the aspirations of 74 million americans who cherish our values and cause. inscribed on the liberty bell are words from lavidicus, it

reads proclaim liberty throughout all the land and to all the inhabitants thereof. men and women of the federalist society, let's keep proclaiming liberty. on the foundation poured in the constitution of the united states. and defended by every generation since. let's raise the banner of freedom high and let's be confident that the american people will rally to our cause. let's keep the faith. let's keep faith with the ideals of our founders enshrined in the declaration and that constitution. let's keep faith with those millions of americans who know in their heart that the sun has not set on the land of the free and most of all, let's keep faith with him who has ever guided this great experiment in freedom as we do our duty, to

god and country. i know the best days in this one nation under god, indivisible with liberty and justice for all are yet to come. thank you. thank you for the honor of addressing you. god bless you all. and god bless america. >> that of course was former vice president mike pence addressing a gathering of the federalist society in florida. you heard the tail end of his speech there right before we cut over to him he said something that i think is worth noting here. he said, he acknowledged, i had no right to change the outcome of our election, referring of course to the actions and what happened on january 6th. the pressure that former president trump put on the former vice president to try to subvert the legitimate election results. here you have mike pence clearly stating frankly what is reality and what is fact, that he could not have changed the outcome of the election.

he also added kamala harris will have no right to overturn the election he says when we beat them in 2024. so continuing to try to overlay a political filter on to his comments. let me bring in nbc's leigh ann caldwell back with us from capitol hill. it is not going unnoticed that the former vice president is saying this, you know, in the very days after and as he's come under attack from his former boss for not having done that very thing. >> reporter: yeah, that's right. i mean, mike pence is in the most interesting and difficult state that any republican could be in at this point. so we're now talking about this and pence saying that president trump is wrong, meanwhile what just happened with liz cheney and adam kinzinger at the republican national committee is a stark contrast between what is happening in this party. so we also know as as far as the january 6th committee is concerned that just in the past week they spoke with two of mike pence's top aides, mark short his former chief of staff and greg jacob, his former white

house counsel. we know that greg jacob was someone who was really pushing back against this claim that mike pence could overturn the election. so mike pence coming out and saying that is pretty significant, especially since he is perhaps plotting and planning a run for president in 2024. hallie? >> presumably this will -- i'm looking at my phone because i just feel like any minute we're going to hear from former president trump. he's not going to be happy in. he has blasted pence in the past and now you have the former vice president very directly saying, you're wrong. something donald trump just doesn't like to hear. >> reporter: yeah, i mean, that is exactly what he doesn't like to hear, especially publicly, not even privately from what you have reported for the last five years, hallie. and so the fact that mike pence is taking a different lane, a different tact than donald trump

is, he is -- you know, i don't know if it's political, i don't know if he is reading polls and seeing an opening there. i don't know if it's because of the legal pressure that he is under and that his former staff is under with this january 6th committee and the department of justice. i don't know what the answer is, but it is just an incredibly interesting development considering that mike pence for the past year has not wanted to talk about this, hallie. >> two thoughts here. there is a connection to i think what we started the show with and what we're looking to be ending the show with here. we came on the air talking about the censure of two republicans, liz cheney and adam kinzinger for helping serve on the january 6th committee. the committee looking at the attack on the capitol, something that the republican party has now officially deemed legitimate political discourse. that insurrection. that's what they are calling it. that's the terms. that's their language here. right? >> reporter: yeah. >> it is that very day now that mike pence is saying, hey, i couldn't have done anything.

i couldn't have overturned it. listen, he could not have. that is every assessment that that would not have been constitutionally an option for him, and yet that is exactly why all of those rioters showed up at the capitol on the day of the insurrection, to try to compel mike pence to do just that. >> reporter: it's a stark contrast between what the -- the party and the two wings of this party and which wing is going to win out. you know, what mike pence said, his words are almost verbatim, which is really interesting, to what senator lindsey graham told me yesterday. i was asking him about legislation up here on capitol hill to make -- to close loopholes, to ensure that the vice president -- that there is absolutely no role for the vice president other than opening the envelopes on january 6th for the electoral college. now, lindsey graham, who is someone who is very close to the former president, told me

yesterday that he thinks trump is wrong on that issue to think that the vice president could have done something, and he went on to say that he would support legislation if he deemed it necessary. and so, you know, two people who were definitely in the maga and trump world, very close with him, now within 24 hours apart from each other taking the stance means that perhaps that this position might be more popular even among republicans than we might think at this point. >> there's the political filter that i think you are right to pick up on here. while it is still sometime away and we know that, the former vice president long speculated to make a run for that. regardless of what former president trump does, to run or to not do that, this feels like

a bit of a runway laying for mike pence on a question going to come up again and again getting pastz the midterms and get into the swing of the presidential campaign. >> reporter: by saying this he clearly chartered the path forward. the fact that he came out and said this shows that he is -- which direction he is going under and maybe there's only political inclinations why he is doing this or maybe there's more there and has to do with what the january 6 select committee is learning and maybe perhaps because of what is happening in the legal pressure that he is under. but i think that all of this is very connected and mike pence being able to come out and say this is just a really interesting development and one

i didn't expect especially at this point. >> live on capitol hill, thank you. we'll take a quick break. we'll be right back. break we'll be right back. dry eye symptoms driving you crazy? inflammation might be to blame. time for ache and burn! over the counter eye drops typically work by lubricating your eyes and may provide temporary relief. those'll probably pass by me! xiidra works differently, targeting inflammation that can cause dry eye disease. xiidra? no! it can provide lasting relief. xiidra is the only fda-approved non-steroid eye drop specifically for the signs and symptoms of dry eye disease. one drop in each eye, twice a day. don't use if you're allergic to xiidra. common side effects, include eye irritation, discomfort or blurred vision when applied to the eye, and unusual taste sensation. don't touch container tip to your eye or any surface.

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hi there, everyone. happy friday. 4:00 in new york. in the