no problem. yeah. success starts with intuit quickbooks. hey everyone, it is 4:00 in new york. i'm alisha menendez. we've known about the former president's blatant disregard for white house documents and records for years. the shredding of documents and how officials had to meticulously tape records back together. but now reporting reveals new details about trump's mishandling of records that could point to the potential reason why as nbc news reported yesterday the national archives asked the justice department to investigate trump's hanging of documents. the "new york times" saying that the national archives discovered what it believed was classified information in documents donald

j. trump had taken with him from the white house as he left office. the discovery occurred after mr. trump returned 15 boxes of documents to the government last month. nbc news has not independently verified this report. the justice department has declined to comment. the archives has confirmed that officials transferred documents from mar-a-lago last month. the "washington post" reports that those documents contained, quote, correspondence with kim jung-un, that he once described as love letters as well as a letter left for trump by barack obama. and also a man of hurricane dorian that had been altered with a black marker y trump. now congress is launching its own investigation potentially adding to the long list of legal headaches for the former president. in a letter to the national archives, carolyn maloney points

out that removing or concealing government records is a criminal offense punishable by up to three years in prison. former national security adviser sandy berger for example was prosecuted for taking classified documents from the national archives. former president trump and his senior advisers must also be held accountable for any violations of the law. the handling or mishandling of trump records is also quickly becoming an issue for the january 6th select committee as they work to piece together what trump knew, who he was talking to and what if anything he was doing about the attack on the capitol. there are multiple reports that there are massive gaps in the white house call logs the committee has received. nbc news reports that the records show not one call to trump or from trump for several hours after his speech outside the white house.

that is despite the fact that we know that at least two calls trump had during that time period, one with alabama senator tommy tuberville, and the other with house gop leader kevin mccarthy. and that is where we begin today, we are joined by "new york times" washington correspondent michael schmidt who broke the story about the missing call logs, also with us former acting solicitor general, now a georgetown law professor, and betsy woowoodruff swan. what is missing in those call logs? >> so the call logs ared to show basically who was calling into the white house switch board, into the oval office and the calls that were going out from there. this is a long standing system

that the white house has had that tracks the president's correspondences. such a log, a group of numbers in a log like that, would be critically important to the investigation because what they are trying to figure out is what is truly going on behind closed doors on january 6 in the west wing. that is one of the biggest lines of this inquiry. so if you are doing that investigation and you are most focused on that or as focused on that as any other part of this, those call logs would be really important because we know about different calls that went on between trump and members of congress who were in the capitol at the time that this was going on. so what happens is that the committee gets the phone records from the national archives and despite the fact that the committee knows that there were calls that trump had, they do not show up in those call logs.

so why don't they show up in the call logs? there is no evidence that the call logs were tampered with or deleted. what we believe may have happened is that trump was using other people's cellphones or perhaps his own cellphone to communicate. and what that means is that recreating this crucial period of time in which we're trying to -- the committee and the media and everyone else is trying to figure out what was trump doing, why was there is a delay in the national guard being deployed, piecing that period of time together will be all the more difficult now because they will have to sort of work backwards and around trump by subpoenaing phone records of different people who were around him to try to figure out what those conversations were. >> michael, there is a detail you shared there that i want to read a little more about there your reporting. since the january 6, 2021 attack, former trump administration officials have said that investigators would

struggle to piece together a complete record of trump's conversations that day because as you said of his habit of using his and other people's cellphones. at least one person who tried to reach mr. trump on his cellphone on january 6 had their call picked up by one of his aides. it is unclear where mr. trump was at the time. can you talk to us more about this habit? it seems highly unusual using other people's cellphones. >> look, donald trump did a lot of things that were highly unusual and a lot of things as we've seen in the past few days that run in the face of typical record keeping and typical functioning of government. i'm not exactly sure what the presidential records act says about what the president has to use the land line from the oval office do this, but what trump would do is that he would use his phone and other people's phones to make calls on open lines. open lines where he often talked

about things that his aides were concerned that he was talking about because it would be so easy for a foreign adversary to listen in on such a conversation. so the president functioning differently than previous presidents by using his cellphone so much while he was in office, and the question now is was that government cellphone that he was using, was it a private cellphone. we know at one point he did have a personal cellphone when he was in the white house. how can the select committee figure out how that phone was being used. and who are the individuals around the president whose phone he was using to talk to different people. you can imagine a scenario where a lot of different folks were calling the white house trying to talk to the president. perhaps they were calling aides that were close to trump and the calls came in that way. but the most fundamental level, most important thing about this, is that piecing this period

together is now going to be more difficult for the committee. >> betsy, to that point, how big of a challenge is this issue of the missing call logs for the committee? >> it certainly is one that they will have to grapple with, but also something that brings an interesting opportunity because whoever else's cellphone that president trump might have used to have these conversations during the january 6th attack, that person is likely an invaluable witness to the committee. if it they can figure out whose phones he was using, which people were handing phones to the president to set up these calls, those people become targets number one, two, three, four for new subpoenas if they aren't under subpoena already. raises questions about whose phones might have been in the mix that day. we know ivanka trump of course spent a ton of time with her dad as the attack was unfolding. we know mark meadows has had a lot of visibility into what was going on with the president in

terms of his specific response to the attack. and the fact now that we know that some phones other than the ones that the select committee has gotten records about were used for these communications, raises what could potentially be a promising new line of inquiry. of course that said, the select committee has a whole, whole bunch of lines of inquiries that are already under way and they are working under a line because of concerns that the republicans will flip the house during midterm elections. so while on the one hand there is a little promise here. at the same time, any new challenge, anytime consuming undertaking is of course a hurdle as well for investigators. >> exactly. as time is of thes sense. neal, is that how you see it, a new line of inquiry, and if not, the way betsy has laid out, is there another way for investigators to get around this issue of the missing records? >> totally new line of inquiry.

and it is really unfortunate because this gap may make the 18 minutes of the nixon tapes case that were missing look quaint by contrast. and you had said it is unusual to borrow cellphones from other people. but it is not unusual if you are a mobster. because you do it because it makes things tough to trace. and that is what it looks like is going on here. and i'm sure that trump would have made his calls on pay phones if that didn't imply he had to leave the house. indeed trump really did operate in this -- this is of a piece of other stories in which he ran the presidency like a mob boss. if you don't create a record, you can't get caught. and what he didn't realize is that the presidency is more like filing your taxes. you are liable for the stuff you forget to include. and -- well, to be fair, not much that he could draw personal experience with paying taxes either. but the fundamental point here is that there is an entire legal regime to ensure the

preservation of records, the presidential records act is part of that. and when you go into the government on day one, you are told you can't use other cellphones, you have to use only your phone for official work, only your official email. there is a whole suite of things you are told and it is impossible that trump wasn't told those things. he had to have been told. so that makes a criminal investigation of this by the justice department more likely. this is an easier thing than some of the other stuff that is a piece with all the missing documents story. >> and i want to turn to the other big story, the national archives finding classified documents. walk us through where things stand now. >> so trump had taken with him a bunch of boxes from the residence down to mar-a-lago as was reported earlier this week. and when those boxes arrived back at the national archives,

there is 15 or so boxes, they open them up and when they begin to look at the contents of that, they recognize at least one piece, one document, that contained, or they believed contained, classified information. that raises a whole host of questions about why was it that there was a classified document that was essentially outside of government channels. so that is the whole thing about classified information. the idea is to keep it i think so the government so foreign adversaries do not know about it. so it had been sitting in mar-a-lago near trump's office in cardboard boxes for over a year and then the national archives looks at it and has to now figure out what to do about that. this issue is even more complicated than the hillary clinton issue because as president, donald trump could

declassify simply by saying essentially out loud any document or classified material that he wanted. so this classified material that they identified, they looked at and they thought was classified, what we don't know is what type of classified material was this, was this something that trump had declassified himself and took with him as a souvenir but probably should have stayed within government as a government record? or is this something that was indeed classified when it was taken out of the white house and what does that mean. so we're very early in the reporting on this, but when they opened the boxes they saw something that concerned them. >> understanding that we are very early in the reporting of this, what could the legal implications be for the former president? >> they could be big. so i think we have three tiers of wrongdoing. we have the documents that

donald trump hid in florida including some of this classified information, the documents that he ripped up, and the documents he flushed down the toilet. and there is something poet either tick about all of this somehow winding up with the comparison with hillary's email. so there is a political problem with trump, but as you are saying there is a criminal and legal one. first, there are several statutes that forbid the conceal concealment, removal or destruction of documents. and there are two punishments. one is jail but the other that congress said is disqualified from being able to hold a future federal office. and that makes this tailor-made for this case. it seems like the attorney general has been worried about bringing an investigation against donald trump. this statute actually congress is saying to the attorney general it is about people like trump, it is tailor-made, it is

for political officials and one of the punishments if convicted is that you can't run for office again. and then as michael says, the other punishment is for the classified information. and that is a serious thing. you know, sandy berger who was president clinton's national security adviser, he broke the law and faced the consequences for it. he tried to take a classified document out of the archives. trump evidently did it with a bunch. and michael is right to say the president has declassification authority, but it looks like that these documents were taken away from the white house when trump wasn't the president anymore, so he may not have exercised his declassification authority. you don't have that authority as a former president. >> betsy, i want to talk about the hillary clinton comparison and play something for you that congressman adam schiff said about it last night. >> the classified allegation is much more serious in my view,

that is that donald trump brought to mar-a-lago in an unsecure location in boxes that others may have access to classified information if that allegation proves correct. the justice department in my view will have to investigate. it would be i think intolerable for the department to have investigated hillary clinton over handling of classified emails and ignore allegations that donald trump may have brought classified documents and violated classification by bringing them to mar-a-lago. >> betsy, what do you make of that, did the justice department set a precedent with hillary clinton that now forces them to take this seriously? >> well, the justice department would possibly find its own legal analysis concluding that there are differences between these two episodes, but there is no question whatsoever that the broad principle that federal law enforcement should be concerned

when classified information gets mishandled applies to both cases. what makes the trump situation something that will be complicated for doj to handle is what neal and mike have touched on, the fact that the legal issues in play here are unprecedented as were many of the legal issues that played out during the trump administration. so in addition to just figuring out factually what happened with these materials, there is also the question of when a president takes a document that is classified and decides that he or some day hopefully she wants to declassify that document, how exactly does that process work and when on the time clock of the presidency does it have to happen. does it have to happen before noon on the inauguration day of the president's successor? what does the president have to do to specifically declassify a document? if the president says it out loud alone in a room, what does

that mean legally? one of the things that made the justice department an extremely interesting place to cover during the trump administration was not just all the weird factual circumstances that seemed to unfold all day every day, but also all the unprecedented legal messes that lawyers at doj had to sift through. and this is one in a long chain of those messes. i think that we can say with total confidence though that it is something that attorneys at the justice department will have to look at closely because otherwise it would just appear to be a pretty jarring double standard. >> neal, speaking of weird, speaking of messes, there is this detail now being reported by axios from maggie haberman's upcoming book, while president trump was in office, staff in the white house residence periodically discovered wads of printed paper clogging a toilet and believe the president had flushed pieces of paper. i should point out trump put out

a statement denying the story. but that is stunning, right? >> it is stunning. i moon, if trump was just angry about a document, he could have just ripped it up. but like everything else in his life, this one went down the drain on purpose. and, you know, betsy is 100% right, what donald trump has done is create a jobs program for lawyers. i think, you know, he has to be the worst client i've ever seen for a lawyer to have. and for people like me, i just want to go a couple days where i don't have to be on the show and have a break, but every couple days there is a new legal story because this guy could not follow the simple law. its not hard. like don't steal classified information. don't bring government stuff to mar-a-lago. don't flush stuff down the toilet. use a government cellphone. these are all things that thousands and thousands of federal employees every day abide by. but trump thought the rules

didn't apply to him. >> and it makes complete sense why the january 6th committee is uses tactics normally reserved for mobsters and terrorists. when we come back, liz cheney this afternoon firing off a warning to trump and his allies promising the january 6th select committee will not be intimidated. and that their hearings will show exactly how the ex-president's massive campaign to mislead the public led to violence on that day. plus, as the republican caucus continues to fracture and ally themselves with the insurrectionist party, democrats are optimistic that they can hold on to the majority in the house and they are seeking out former president barack obama for help. tell be addressing lawmakers on the need to stay united. and later, the white house battling a wave of harmful misinformation and conspiracies that is going beyond covid and the big lie. plus chilling reporting about the growing threats against lawmakers. all those stories and more when

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a fiery op-ed from january 6th select committee vice chair liz cheney today. she writes this, quote, those who do not wish the truth of january 6 to come out have predictably resorted to attacking the process claiming it is tainted and political. our hearings will show this charge to be wrong. we are focused on facts, not rhetoric, and we will present those facts without exaggeration

no matter what criticism we face. every generation of americans has fulfilled its duty to support and defend the constitution. our responsibility now falls to us. >> tim miller is joining us now. and neal and betsy are back with us. tim, let's start with you. an op-ed in rupert murdoch's paper throwing down the gauntlet to trump and his allies. why now? >> look, obviously the rnc that voted to purge liz cheney over the weekend, i think that their continued rhetoric in the far right media, a little bit on fox, but especially so if you go into the bannon media world that is trying to undermine the credibility of this, i know getting into campaign season and liz cheney is a smart operator and she knows a lot of the republicans will try to turn it into a partisan witch hunt and

so she is framing the debate. i think the most important sentence relevant was almost all members of congress know this, this being that what the president did was wrong on january 6th. but many still lack the courage to say it. liz is calling out all of the people who whisper behind the scenes in the republican caucus that they would like to move on, that they know better. and basically saying letting them know that you are not going to get off the hook on this. like i am here, i'm a bright star on the christmas tree making sure that everyone knows that you know that this was wrong. and i think that this is important because, look, a lot of republicans will make themselves feel better by saying that there is nothing really we can do organization the base wants this, i'm just playing the political game. so liz's point, if all the republicans who knew better said it, we could move on from this. they had an opportunity to prevent him from running again to neal's point about other potential threats that are

coming forward. republicans who knew better stood hand-in-hand and if they said this is wrong, we need to move on, there would still be the far right, there would still be a small caucus, but they would be ostracized. instead they have chosen the opposite, to ostracise the truth tellers. and she won't let they will away with it. >> and our team focused in on that section as well. i want to read you some of what came before and after that line he referenced. as at select committee will demonstrate in hearings later this year, no foreign power corrupted america's voting machines. and no massive secret fraud changed the election outcome. almost all members of congress know this, although many lack the courage to say it out loud. mr. trump knew it too from his own campaign officials, from his own justice department and from the dozens of lawsuits he lost. yet mr. trump ignored the rulings of the courts and launched a massive campaign to mislead the public. our hearings will show that

these falsehoods provoked the violence on january 6. sounds like she is setting the stage for those public hearings. >> absolutely. so liz cheney has become a national hero, a hero to the constitution, and the rule of law. and this is the same person who used to run ads against me when i was at the justice department calling me part of the al qaeda 7 because i did a pro bono case representing a detainee. but she has a spine unlike other members of her party. and that language you just quoted i think previous -- what i think the public hearings will show later this year, it will be well investigated, well reasoned, and way beyond donald trump's ability to refute. right after that part you showed, she goes through and provides a really sober analytic discussion of what the 12 the amendment to our constitution requires, doesn't allow pence to throw out the election or all

sorts of nonsense like that, and she just obliterates all the garbage that was in all these different many memos that donald trump had commissioned or was receiving back in november through january. and ultimately the piece is throwing down a gauntlet for the american people. she is saying do you stand for the rule of law and the constitution or do you stand with the fabulous and rioters. and unlike the impeachment trial last year where so many republicans walked out, didn't watch, they is saying in this piece you american people watch what happens in these hearings because the truth will come out. >> and betsy, layout the challenge for the committee as they begin to present what they have learned. we mentioned yesterday just 43% of americans say trump bears a lot of responsibility for january 6th. how do they make their case? >> one challenge for the committee is going to be persuading americans that these hearings will reveal information that they don't already have.

january 6th as far as the justice department goes, it is the most investigated crime i believe in american history. from a journalistic standpoint, there has been wall to wall journalism the last year detailing on a forensic level really exactly what happened that day. so the challenge sort of the first challenge for the select committee will be saying here is why we think people need to spend more time watching a congressional hearing to understand stuff that they don't already know. and one thing that cheney made clear, that they will have hearings that address some of the whackiest conspiracy theories regarding what happened during the 2020 election, which was a perfectly secure election. we published emails earlier this week between michael flynn and other people close to and within the president's outside legal team where they went back and forth over the draft of an executive order that would have

called to seize voting machines. in the draft text of that executive order, both in now multiple drafts of that order that i've reviewed, they all talk about this one conspiracy theory based in antrem county in michigan, where they were talking about using the military to scoop up essential information. and the fact that the military is also talking about addressing some of the really, really whacky conspiracy theories is important because it gives us a sense of how they are going to view their role. they are seeing themselves not just as investigators but also as laying down sort of a benchmark of facts i think that everyone can agree on. so this is probably the most concrete stuff that we've heard yet from cheney regarding the direction that these hearings are going to go and it is some interesting -- >> interesting indeed. thank you both. tim, are you staying with me.

he has been a force to be reckoned with for 15 years a today they are relying on him again. house democrats meeting with barack obama this hour for guidance on a unified party message heading into the midterms. that sorry is next. e heading ine midterms that sorry is next move to sofi and feel what it's like to get your money right. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ move your student loan debt to sofi—you could save with low rates and no fees. go to sofi.com to view your rate today. ♪ ♪

we're hoping things will pick up by q3. yeah...uhhh... [children laughing] doug? [ding] never settle with power e*trade. it has easy-to-use tools and some of the lowest prices. get e*trade and start trading today. i disagree politely with the premise that we are headed into the minority. i think the american people when they understand the stakes both

what we have done on their behalf to advance the ball, make life better, and the radical nature of the house republican conference at this moment that we can make a strong case to hold the majority. >> that is hakeem jeffries this morning as his party hopes to reset before what it looks like a challenging midterm this is fall. in a meeting organized by jeffries, barack obama will meet with house democrats this hour on their midterm messaging. nbc news reporting that he will stress the importance of not running away from all they accomplished this year. president biden doing his part traveling to a vulnerable swing district in virginia highlighting key parts of his "build back better" agenda. and joining us now, political analyst fernando mondy.

and today 15 years ago barack obama announced his run for president. talk to us about his continuing force within the party. who is it that he can help motivate and organize? >> well, there is no question that president obama continues to be a force within the democratic party base and taking into consideration his many formidable political skills, one of them that he actually bedeviled him was being able to hold on to congressional majorities in midterm elections both in 2010 and 2014. but where i think his message to the democratic caucus is important continues to be on the central issue in the country today which is the state of the economy, the state of jobs. we now have two book end democratic presidencies, the biden presidency of course now and the obama presidencies which were gang busters for the american economy and i think so long as president obama can make that case to the democratic base

in the cities certainly with young voters, with african-american voters, he continues to be very popular with hispanic voters and young democratic base voters, that will be a message that the democrats must define this election around. what biden has done on the economy is historic. they have created i think over 6.5 million jobs already into year one. and with the covid pandemic slowly but surely receding into the background, this is the opportunity i think for them to get that messaging in place going in to the string and summer to set the stage to try to hold on to these majorities in november because it is a very good story to tell the american voter. >> tim, in light of the picture that he paints there, have republicans self inflicted wounds calling what happened on january 6 legitimate political discourse for example provided a bigger opening for dems going into midterms?

>> unfortunate live to give a little real talk. i'm not sure that is the case. i think he hits on one key point what the democrats need to do. i think sell the elements of the economic recovery that are going well. the job rate, stock market has had a little dip recently but overall has been good during the biden tenure. the problem is that the inflation issue is something that affects people in their day to day lives and there are a lot of people that in their pocketbooks aren't feeling like the economy is getting better even though the numbers say so. and so what i think the democrats need to do is, one, listen to former president obama about making the case about the things that are going well in the economy, but they need to add in something else, and that is listen to joe manchin who has been really focused on this inflation issue and i think acknowledge, and you saw a little bit of this with president biden today, acknowledge that people are feeling pain at the pump, feeling pain at the grocery store, and instead of saying all

the things we said that we were going to do that will solve inflation, say we're changing our approach and we'll have a couple specific things that directly address the inflationary issues that are in your pockets. and i think that would help the democrats kind of make this case on the economy. because right now, if you just look at the numbers and poll numbers, rather, they don't match what the economic numbers say and i think a large part of that is what is happening with inflation. >> tim, that deep see you did at the beginning of your answer was how i knew that the real talk was coming before you even said it. you are both staying with me. next, the popular governor who refuses to condemn neo-nazis. at it again in florida. we'll ask one more time what is wrong with ron desantis. is onwrg with ron desantis.

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joe rogan and his repeated use of the n word is now taking a prominent place in florida politics. ron desantis is voicing his support and saying he owes no one an apology for his use of the racial slur. >> i think the left fear the fact that he can reach so many people and so they are out to destroy him. but what i would say is don't give an inch, do not apologize, do not cow to the mob. stand up and tell them to pound

sand. >> not apologizing, a key tactic straight out of the trump party playbook. also this week desantis refused to condemn neo-nazi rallies and signal support for legislation that would restrict classroom discussions about gender identity and sexual orientation, a bill the biden administration calls hateful. we're back now, and your thoughts on your home state governor. >> well, to paraphrase a song my kids keep singing, we don't talk about ron desantis no, no, no. and truth of the matter is this is what he wants. his candidacy for president is based on one strategic premise, owning the libs and outtrolling the other side to play strictly to the base. and i have to be very candid as a democratic strategist myself, it is not a bad approach if you are ron desantis because we know this is hitting on exactly what the republican base wants to

hear. and as he is trying to dance the very delicate dance of not alienating donald trump who also has his sights set on 2024, what you see desantis doing is what a troll does and a good republican troll in today's republican party. and again, it is just all about owning the libs. he will deal with the ramifications after winning the nomination which is exactly what he did in 2018 here in our governor's race. >> and tim, all of these politics have consequences. this week desantis signaled his support for a bill proposed by state republicans that would ban the discussion of sex y'all sexual orientation or gender identity and give parents the right to sue school districts to that violate the policy. white house says this is not an isolated action and we're seeing republican leaders take actions to regulate what students can or cannot read, what they can or cannot learn. and most troubling, who they can or cannot be.

this is politics at its worse. cynically using our students as pawns in political warfare. tim. >> look, so let me get this straight, joe rogan who is a podcaster that is making $100 million a year and has a massive platform and can say and do whatever he wants is in danger of being canceled and there is this cancer culture on the one hand, and then on the other hand, it is okay to cancel a teacher who is making, what, $35,000 a year, who wants to teach their students about different kinds of families, different kinds of gender orientations. it is all troll all the time. right? like, you know, i can almost respect somebody who is a free speech absolutist, right, who says no matter how hateful the speech, i defend your right to say it. that is not what ron desantis is

doing. he is just trying to own the left no matter what the issue is. if it is hateful right wing speech, then if you criticize that, that is cancel culture. if it is pro gay speech coming from teachers, canceling that is not only okay, we can sue these teachers. we'll put bounties on their head. it is nonsense and i think it goes against everything that should have been within what was in the old days traditional conservative values. what you didn't want to teach your kids, which is if you make a mistake, be a man and own up to it and change your approach. that is the message to the joe rogans of the world. but that is not what ron desantis is interested in. >> and i want to add to this toxic brew also the ways in which the governor has shared misinformation on covid, this from the orlando sentinel. desantis' statements about vaccine effectiveness and safety, antibody treatments and the power of natural immunity

are cloudy or wrong. listen, he is not the only person trying to win with this playbook, right, trying to gently distance himself from trump while doubling, tripling down on trumpism. that is his entire play here. >> it really is. and one has to understand how political practitioners and in this case folks seeking higher office work. he has not been penalized. he's paid for approach for this approach, it is the approach that got him into a position where he is now besides donald trump one of the leading todays for the republican nomination in 2024. but here is where it gets cool if you like the republican civil war. trump is pissed. trump is very well aware that as ron desantis' fortunes rise and as he rises in the 2024

nomination polls, it becomes a problem for him and that is why i think that you see not only trump himself directly throw some brush back pitches against ron desantis, you see trump soldiers like roger stone directly go after ron directly go after ron desantis in public and is private so it's going to get very, very interesting as the year progresses, and as their fortunes coincide. >> maybe ron desantis can call the former president on one of his burner phones. thank you both so much for joining us. the u.s. warning those canadian trucker protests happening right now could spill across the u.s. border. the super bowl and to washington. that story is next the super bowl and to washington that story is next . entresto is the number one heart failure brand prescribed by cardiologists and has helped over one million people. it was proven superior at helping people stay alive and out of the hospital. don't take entresto if pregnant; it can cause harm or death to an unborn baby. don't take entresto with an ace inhibitor or aliskiren,

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or other symptoms of an infection, a severe or worsening rash, are or plan to become pregnant, or breastfeeding. avoid grapefruit during treatment. ask your doctor about living longer with kisqali. the unprecedented demonstrations in ottawa this week against trucker vaccination requirements have caused traffic and economic gridlock on both sides of the border. and nbc news is learning u.s. officials are warning that a separate trucker convoy is possible there and could cause far-reaching havoc from the super bowl in los angeles this sunday to the state of the union next month in washington. nbc news correspondent cal perry is live in port huron, michigan, near the ambassador bridge that connects the u.s. to ontario, canada. cal, tell us about what is happening at the border. >> reporter: hey, lisa, so, the ambassador bridge is about 60 miles from here and connects detroit with windsor, but in

windsor, on the canadian side, you have a very small group of protesters who have managed to snarl that bridge. it is completely closed to commercial traffic has been diverted here and you can see that commercial traffic backing up the bluewater bridge only has about half the carrying capacity of the ambassador bridge so this has snarled the economy. roughly $350 million of trade goes back and forth between the u.s. and canada every day on the ambassador bridge and you can see how that's just not happening. we've heard from automakers who are curtailing some of what they're doing on their assembly lines, ford, gm, chrysler and toyota all saying this is affecting them. in the background of this, as you say, dhs, department of homeland security, here in the united states, has put out a warning, a bulletin about a possible protest in the united states of truckers starting at the super bowl, ending in washington, d.c. key in this bulletin, and i think it's key to the story, they talk about the snarling of u.s. cities, but they add it could also be the counterprotests that they are worried about. we're seeing some of that in windsor, and just for our viewers to be clear.

this small protest in windsor, canada, just across the border, totally different protest than the one in ottawa. it's a small one, but it is very effective at shutting down commerce across the border, elisa. >> how is this expected to unfold? what's next? >> reporter: well, we're going to find out if police can clear this small area. it's basically a small intersection in windsor that's blocking this bridge. they have been talking to protesters. police have said to the local media there, some of the protesters have told them, we're willing to risk our lives for this cause. of course, they want to drop these vaccine mandates. the police at some point, and you would think it's coming soon, the governor of michigan, governor whitmer saying they need to clear these lanes. you have to assume this is going to come to some kind of conclusion one way or the other. >> nbc's cal perry, thank you as always. the next hour of "deadline white house" with my friend, dr. jason johnson, starts right after this quick break. friend, dr. jason johnson, starts right dr. jason johnson, starts right after this quick break energy. woo hoo! ensure, complete balanced nutrition with 27 vitamins and minerals.

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may contain alcohol swabs, lip balm, other materials to promote hygiene and reduce the transmission of diseases like hiv and hepatitis. i would note that what we're really talking about here is steps that we're taking as a federal government to address the opioid epidemic, which is killing tens of thousands if not more americans every single day, week, month of the year. we put out this statement, though, because there was inaccurate information out there or i should say, hhs put out the statement because there was inaccurate information out there, and we wanted to provide clarification on the allowable uses for the hhs harm reduction program. >> just a final point at it.

does the administration support any effort, then, to distribute drug paraphernalia? like the pipes that we were hearing about? >> the statement makes clear that we don't support federal funding, indirect or direct, for pipes. >> hi, everyone, it's 5:00 in new york. i'm jason johnson, in for nicole wallace. press secretary jen psaki having to correct the record yesterday, clarifying that, no, the white house is not funding the dissemination of crack pipes. it's part of a new federal grant program aimed at combatting the opioid epidemic. "the washington post" provides some context. quote, a heightened concern came months after the department of health and human services announced a federal grant for local programs that provide myriad harm reduction tools or services that minimize the risks associated with drug use, including distributing drug paraphernalia such as clean needles. republicans seized on crack pipes, causing the phrase to trend on twitter on tuesday. the latest in continued

resistance from the gop against harm reduction techniques at a time when people are dying of drug overdoses at record rates in the united states. but look, let's back, back, back it up even more. this story started when conservative news outlet, and i use that term loosely, the washington free beacon, published a story that stated the government was funding kits that will, quote, provide pipes for users to smoke cake crack-cocaine, crystal meth and any illicit substance. the story was then written up in other outlets. it was all over fox news's television programming. and even republican lawmakers spread the inaccurate information. yesterday, the hhs released a statement denying that pipes are what the money is being used for. the statement reads, in part, no federal funding will be used directly or through subsequent reimbursement of grantees to put pipes in safe smoking kits. the goal of harm reduction is to save lives. the administration having to

address this story as it battles a wave of harmful misinformation and conspiracies recently, ones that hit on topics from covid to the 2020 election and now funding. we know from the updated terrorism bulletin that our heightened threat environment is due to factors including an online environment filled with misleading narratives and conspiracy theories so while this crack pipe misinformation can hurt biden politically, false stories like it pose huge national security implication as well and that's where we begin. dr. carter is an associate of political science at howard university. we have a senior advisor to the lincoln project. and clint watts, former consultant to the fbi's counterterrorism division and now a distinguished research fellow at the foreign policy research institute and an msnbc national security analyst. what a bunch of fantastic names

i've got here today. i'm going to start with you, tara, because the genesis of this story, and i think this is really key. the genesis of this biden pays for crack pipes story is from the washington free beacon. it is a conservative republican leaning newspaper outlet. what is the motivation for conservatives and republicans to promote these kinds of stories and this kind of misinformation in a news outlet? >> thanks for having me, jason. i think you went to me first because i'm at your alma mater. >> there's that too. >> listen, this is part of the playbook, right? republicans understand how to gin up their base. they know that certain buzz words, certain cultural issues, certain issues around race, because let's be honest here, they chose the term crack pipe because i'm sure that in those circles, that is a euphemism for urban, black crime. this is the way that people --

that the fear factor that republicans use to do this. they've done this historically. welfare queens in the '80s. the willie horton ad. you know, those are all things that they know work for their constituency, which is unfortunate, but it's politics. what's scary here, and i know clint will talk about this, is the fact that it seems as though the republican party and the right-wing ecosystem on the other side is more interested in conspiracy theory than actual fact, and these conspiracy theories are dangerous. let's go back to pizzagate. remember that? the idea that there was some kind of child sex ring going on in a pizza shop in washington, d.c., and a guy showed up with an a ak-47. these types of things lead to very dangerous acts because a lot of these people are unhinged and they act upon it because they think this is really happening. so, i think it's irresponsible of them to do it, but they don't give a damn. they're doing this because it's about political expediency and getting people out to vote for them.

>> and click bait, right? that's the whole goal. it's like, i want people screaming and raging, et cetera, et cetera. dr. carter, but there's real sort of dangerous consequences for this. i want to throw up this poll real quick. this is where joe biden stands with african american voters. if you look at his approval rating, january -- sorry, april in 2021, it was 83%. he has dropped 20% in just under a year. why, dr. carter, are african american voters inclined to even be susceptible to this kind of information? black voters aren't any more susceptible to misinformation than white voters, but there's something about this kind of story that got picked up by black news outlets as well. why does that happen? >> well, look at the historical treatment of black people by this government. i don't think that it's a far leap for many people to make that potentially the government could actually be subsidizing people's drug addictions and in

particular crack addiction, which is racialized, it's black, because of the way that the government has treated black people. i mean, it wasn't very long ago -- i mean, i'm sure many here remember when we were having congressional hearings and we saw maxine waters talking about what role the government actually did play in flooding black communities with cocaine throughout the 1980s and of course that turned into a really horrifying war on drugs that has not stopped people from using illicit substances but it's also led to the overpolicing of black communities, even though black people are not any more likely to use illicit drugs than anyone else. in fact, most cases,less likely and when we talk about crack-cocaine in particular, this drug has been maligned in a very particular way that led to disparate sentencing for black people who were in -- or for people, excuse me, in possession of crack-cocaine who more likely were black or latino, and we see our prisons runneth over with

folks from those communities so it's not that black people are more susceptible. it's the fact that black people have historically been done wrong by the u.s. government so it's not too far a leap to believe that the government would not just sort of subsidize but encourage drug usage because there is a fairly healthy belief in some sectors of black communities that the government is invested in black failure and in destroying the black community and that could be through drugs, that could be through the dissolution of black families, through a number of means. so that's why i think this story got picked up so quickly, even though it was very easily verified in other ways. >> look, there's a reason that snowfall on fx is that popular, right? lots of people believe this is how this stuff happened. clint, one of the things that we talked about a lot that i don't think is discussed enough today was misinformation in the 2020 election and specifically how russia engaged in misinformation. now, look, we know right now that this is primarily from the "free beacon" but the

russians recognized and understood, whether it's ukraine, united states, or other places, that the best way to foment misinformation is to dig into ethnic, religious, and racial cleavages that already exist in a country. tell us a little bit about how a story like this, the idea that the federal government was engaging in basically a free drug program to sicken and possibly kill black folks, fits into larger narratives of how we've seen foreign enemies attempt to exacerbate ethnic conflict in the united states. >> jason, going back to pre-2016, the way you infiltrate audiences, especially in the united states so that you can pit them against each other later is on social issues, race, religion, and economics are the three principal drivers for that. and they tend to go in, we saw it in 2014, 2015, trying to drive messages, literally on both sides of the aisles, foreign against everything, is a way to infiltrate audiences and get them fighting each other, and the outcome of that, if you look at the 2016 election, what they were trying to do, russia

was, was to have the force of politics inside the united states essentially impede the u.s. using the force of light military intervention, in this case, like ukraine today, to stop us from having a unified country, and what that plays forward is continuation of this divisive sort of politics. in 2016, they had to make fake news and throw it over the fence into the u.s. and have us take it on. today, what they do is they take this divisive sort of lies that we see, i mean, just look at the three stories today of the news feeds of conservative media, we're talking about gazpacho police, butterflies and crack pipes, right? when you just look at those three, they're trying to play on moral arguments, racial arguments, religious arguments, and they're not the only ones, i would add. iran also does this, particularly on the race and religion means, so every time they see an opportunity, if you've got americans saying things that are good for them, they're going to amplify that and use it against other

americans. >> tara, it's one thing to have a news outlet driven by clicks lying and putting out misinformation. it's something else entirely when you have elected officials doing it. we've got marco rubio as well as marsha blackburn, saying, oh, yes, the biden administration is putting crack pipes out there. not only do these collectively, they have hundreds of thousands of followers on facebook and twitter who are repeating this information and then it's getting amplified, but also, these are elected officials. you can't go after them the same way that you can a newspaper. what's the danger in having elected officials who just want to out and out lie on a regular basis and don't face any consequences from their own constituents? >> it gives credibility to the kookarie that's going out there. it's mainstreamed it. marco rubio, of all people, should be ashamed of himself because of how far he's fallen and what he's been willing to say and do to debase himself in

order to ingratiate himself with the trump voters that he needs because he's running for re-election, so he's capitalizing on this wave of conservative media attention so that he can get the primary voters out to vote for him in the upcoming election this year in florida. but he knows better. now, marsha blackburn, on the other hand, you know, she was -- she's always been on the fringes and been allowed a mouthpiece and a loud mouth for trumpism. this doesn't surprise me. but she's also the same person that took big pharma money in order to prevent the d.e.a. from having more power to seize opioids -- for opioid seizures, so, you know, she needs to be paying attention to what's going on in her state where they have a historic record of opioid overdoses instead of trying to gin up and amplify misinformation like that. but it's par for the course for these people, and it's dangerous. but only the voters can hold them accountable. >> and that's the thing, tara. i'm glad that you mentioned this point because when it comes to

racial dog whistles, crack cocaine is, like, oh, that's black people. opioids, oh, that's jesse pinkman from "breaking bad," we have to feel sorry for him so there's this racialized element to who we should feel bad about when it comes to drug abuse. when you're combatting misinformation, we've got credible sources like roland martin, michael harrod, who writes for the grio where i write. you have plenty of individuals who have tweeted out, combatting this kind of misinformation. the problem is, even for the audiences they're reaching, which are african americans and those who may be african american outlets, they're still beat out by marsha blackburn. they're still beat out by the fact that the shade room for the breakfast club has way more followers than all of them combined and they were spreading misinformation. how do we find the sort of balance where credible voices in the african american community can speak out against disinformation, especially because at the end of the day, if this stuff is allowed to

fester, that's what leads to people not feeling like they want to vote this fall. >> well, absolutely. that's exactly what this kind of stuff is meant to do is to have a cooling effect on the voting booth. but i think it also needs, like, you know the roland martin that you mentioned, who's often talking about this kind of stuff, it's not sexy. for a lot of people, the truth is much more difficult for them to accept than this really elaborate lie. who is staking their political career on crack pipes? i mean, that just boggles the mind. given the way that crack has been maligned, given the racial nature of that -- the racialized nature of the way we talk about that drug, et cetera, et cetera. so, the fact that you have people who are -- should be smarter, should be savvier in using their platforms more responsibly amplifying these stories, we have to go for them too and say, you have to do better, because it's not enough for just the rolands of the world and the michael harriot of the world and others out here,

they're yelling into the void. their followers are not the same followers, probably, that are looking at the breakfast club and the shade room, and if these people want to consider themselves players on the national stage, and in particular as influencers around votes, i mean, everybody goes to the breakfast club now if they want to talk politics. we've seen people show up on the shade room and other spaces because we know they have large, black, young audiences. all people we want to attract to voting booths. then you have to also have the same sort of level of scrutiny of them and not just let them get by with being entertainers, right? because they have a lot of responsibility. if you want to play in that space, then you have to do it in a responsible manner, and we have to demand more of them and not just ask sort of the same sort of venerable folks that we know in black media to do all the heavy lifting because they're going to be crowded out of the conversation anyway. >> right. there's not one person in the biden administration who's, like, here's my career, let me sprinkle some crack on it and

that's going to work. contribute, we have this other misinformation story about literally butterfly research facility that had to get shut down in texas because of right-wing information. now, look, if it was peacemaker and he was fighting butterflies, that's one thing but this is literally just a research facility for environmental purposes that had to shut down because of the violence associated with misinformation that they believed they were hiding pedophiles or something else like that. what are the government consequences to misinformation? tara mentioned people showing up with guns, but we've just got a health -- this is an environmental facility that's been shut down. what's the long-term danger of this sort of thing? >> it's called mediated, terrorism, and the idea of making these claims, if you have an outsize audience, if you have a large audience, even if you're basically saying it in jest sometimes, or if you're being somewhat serious about it for political gain, when these speakers in the political sphere make these claims, one out of 100 people believe them, and

they don't just believe them. they're angry to the point where they either mobilize to a place like january 6th or they go in terms of an assault on a place like this butterfly sanctuary under false pretense. tara's exactly right. this is an absolute replay, at the butterfly sanctuary of what we saw with pizzagate. you might remember anwar, mentioned in some of the bulletins, throw out a plot, throw out a concept that involves violence and then they can say, i didn't tell anyone to do that. it was just an idea. so it's a way to have plausible deniability but still achieve the effect. i think the danger is there's a lot of innocent people around this country, election workers, healthcare, frontline workers in our fight against covid. butterfly sanctuary, these are places for children's education that are facing direct threats to their life and safety. these are creating real-world harms and i think that's where, as a country, we got to figure

out what do we want to police and how do we want to police it, and i think saving the lives of people that are public servants, saving the lives of healthcare workers, that seems like something we need to focus on in a big way, and these individuals, they believe in this stuff. it's not going to go away and that's why the politicians who are making these false claims ultimately should be held accountable for what they're saying and the ultimate what happens from all of this. >> dr. niambi carter, tara, clint watts, so much for starting us off. when we return, the former fbi agent who led the investigation into hillary clinton's emails says if classified white house documents were found at mar-a-lago, it's a big deal. a big, big deal. we'll ask pete strzok about what happens next. plus amid a rash of anti-semitism across this country, senator ron johnson is holding up president biden's nominee for the role of anti-semitism envoy. he's mad she called him out. there's plenty more to the story. and at this hour, barack obama is rallying house

democrats ahead of what may be a difficult midterm cycle, what we're learning about the former president's message to members later in the hour. "deadline white house" continues after a quick break. in the hour. "deadline white house" continues "deadline white house" continues after a quick break. ♪ i think to myself ♪ ♪ what a wonderful world ♪ at intra-cellular therapies, we're inspired by our circle.

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as we told you in our last hour, we're following some stunning new reporting into the former president's handling of white house documents. "the new york times," citing a person familiar with the matter, reports that the national archives discovered what was thought to be classified information in the 15 boxes of documents trump retrieved by national archives from

mar-a-lago last month, leaving the national archives to ask the department of justice to investigate trump's handling of his records. as nbc news reported yesterday. nbc news has not independently verified "the new york times" reporting, and the doj has declined to comment. but questions about how the former president handled his records have come under more scrutiny today. axios was provided with an exclusive look at the hotly anticipated book about trump by "new york times" white house correspondent maggie haberman that deals with how he dealt with documents. while president trump was in office, staff in the white house periodically discovered wads of printed paper clogging a toilet and believed the president had flushed pieces of paper down it. joining us now is peter strzok, former fbi counterintelligence agent who led the investigation into hillary clinton's emails, also author of the book, "compromise," which is now out in paperback. thank you so much for being with

us. i want to start with this. the idea of the president flushing important documents down a toilet, stuffing them in his mouth, feeding them to a bird, putting them through a shredder like tom and greg in "succession," i don't care what he's trying to do. from an investigative standpoint, what should be the headline about these allegations and possibly true behaviors of the former president? >> i think the headline, jason, is that the facts that have emerged are so great that it isn't possible for doj to ignore it any longer. i mean, there are a number of things going on here. the first is, as you indicated, trump's attempts to rip up, swallow, flush, whatever the case may be documents that should have been preserved as records. there's information that's come out that members of white house staff were taking documents and placing them in classified burn bags to have them destroyed rather than preserve them. all those go to the presidential records act but what the game changer is that has happened is these allegations that have come out that there's potentially

classified information that was maintained at mar-a-lago. now, that changes everything, because as you know, the presidential records act, yes, it's a law, but there's really a lack of any sort of enforcement mechanism. that absolutely isn't true when it comes to the mishandling of classified information. that's a federal felony, you can be faced with fines or time in jail if you violate it and that's the kind of thing that really changes the entire fact pattern here and i think based on all of this is what is going to bring doj and the fbi in to investigate. >> now, pete, i want to make this clear. you were part of the investigation into hillary clinton's emails and using them on unsecured server but i think there's an important distinction that you can lay out. one of the things you were known for is saying, hey, i want to make sure that when a letter was sent to congress by the investigator, like comey, we think this was her not being careful, right? you didn't necessarily think that there was malicious intent. what you're saying or i think

what we're seeing here is that we can assume malicious intent. we can assume a cover-up on the part of trump with this sort of documentation, not just somebody who may not necessarily know the proper way to use emails, which is what we saw with former secretary of state clinton. >> well, i think that's a great point, and i would make two arguments here. the first is, look, the fbi doesn't open investigations because a crime has occurred. in many cases, the fbi opens an investigation to ask the questions and to find out information to determine whether or not a crime has occurred, so, you know, it seems there are a lot of unanswered questions here about what this sort of classified information is, if it exists at all, but those are specifically the kind of questions that the fbi asks as part of conducting an investigation. and the second point is, the hardest thing, when you look at criminal mishandling of classified information, inevitably, one of the hardest things to determine is the intent of what the person was when they did it, whether they knew it was wrong, whether they

were trying to do it in variance with the law, and again, when you look at president trump, former president trump, if you want to say, well, did he know this was wrong, on the one hand, reporting is that he was told repeatedly, look, you can't tear up these documents. these are records. you can't go flushing them down the toilet. you need to preserve them and when it comes to classified information, i mean, take your pick of the dozens and dozens of campaign rallies where he led chants of, lock her up, specifically because he said hillary clinton had classified information on her server and in her classified emails and that's wrong and she should go to jail. there's no argument for any jury for doj to be able to play videotape after videotape of former president trump saying, having unauthorized retention of classified information is against the law. it's a slam dunk argument when it comes to trying to establish what he knew was and wasn't against the law. >> i want to close with this

because the doj is a key part of this. it would be the next step. it strikes me that the doj has almost made itself incompetent, ineffective by being so concerned about being apolitical or everything else like that. we have the mueller report, which laid out multiple ways that trump and many of his cronies tried to obstruct justice. we have information about documents being destroyed one way or another. what is taking the department of justice so long in bringing up substantive charges against the former president and members of his administration? this seems like an open and shut case to me, but maybe i've been watching too much "law & order." >> i think doj has to be prudent. whenever you go about investigating somebody at the level of, of course, a former president of the united states, but even people who are cabinet officials, there is a great deal of care that needs to be taken to make sure that there's a legitimate predication there. in my mind, this is clearly beyond that threshold. if you look in the past, what the fbi investigated in terms of former cia director john deutsche, in terms of sandy

burger, general petraeus, hillary clinton, there's a clear path that doj takes. to say they want to be apolitical, in my mind, to hesitate to look at trump isn't apolitical. it's kind of the opposite of that. this is trump, who through tantrums and threats and four years of behavior has caused people to back away from doing the very basic thing that the fbi should be doing, and that is, in my opinion, in this case, a very clear set of facts that merit opening an investigation to find out just what were the facts and circumstances surrounding this classified information that may have been found in his possession at mar-a-lago. >> it's not apolitical to not go after crooks. pete strzok, thank you so much. and we want to remind our viewers that you can stream nicole's fantastic interview. it's really good, with pete strzok and hear how he endured becoming a target of the ex-president. you just need to scan the qr code that is on your screen right now. it's on the choice from msnbc, exclusively on peacock.

when we return, what's really behind senator ron johnson's attempt to block president biden's nominee as anti-semitism envoy? that story when "deadline white house" returns. itism envoy? that story when "deadline white that story when "deadline white house" returns oh, we can help with that. okay, imagine this. your mover, rob, he's on the scene and needs a plan with a mobile hotspot. we cut to downtown, youres rep lisa has to send some files, like asap! so basically i can pick the right plan for each employee. yeah i should've just led with that. with at&t business. you can pick the best plan for each employee and get the best deals on every smart phone. there's a different way to treat hiv. it's once-monthly injectable cabenuva. cabenuva is the only once-a-month, complete hiv treatment for adults who are undetectable. cabenuva helps keep me undetectable. it's two injections, given by a healthcare provider once a month. hiv pills aren't on my mind.

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increasingly, jews have been singled out. today's rise in anti-semitism is staggering. senators, if confirmed, i shall

fight anti-semitism worldwide without fear or favor and with that one goal emblazoned before me, to make a difference. >> that was a pledge made this week by debrah lipstadt, an accomplished and respected professor of modern jewish history and a person supremely qualified for the ambassador level position president biden nominated her for back in july. since then, republicans have essentially held up her nomination over some old tweets, specifically one directed at foreign relation committee member ron johnson who said last year he, quote, wasn't concerned about the january 6th rioters, although he would have been if they were black lives matter protesters. lipstadt, some would argue, krktly argued ron johnson was engaging in white supremacy nationalism, pure and simple. she got her hearing thanks to the urging of some 96 jewish

federations. she would act as the voice of the biden administration, a voice of desperate need right now amid a marked rise in what she calls jew hatred across the globe. but despite the fact that she apologized to senator johnson on tuesday, he just couldn't seem to let it go. >> you have engaged in the malicious poison. you have accused people you don't know of very vile things. i mean, wouldn't you agree that probably calling somebody racist is just under murderer and rapist? when you're being nominated and considered for confirmation to a position of diplomacy, representing the united states, i can't -- i certainly cannot support your nomination. i hope my other colleagues won't either. you're just simply not qualified but i wish you the best in life and i do accept your apology. >> joining our conversation is ceo and national director of the antidefamation league, jonathan

greenblatt, and samira, assistant professor of jewish and gender studies at the university of colorado boulder. jonathan, i'll start with you. first off, it's just amazing to me that senator johnson, like many conservatives, thinks that being called a racist is actually worse than the racist thing that he does, but more importantly, when you hear that sort of vitriol, that sort of anger, that sort of, i can't believe you called me this, how does that make you feel when he is obviously putting his own personal ego, his own personal sense of guilt over someone whose job it is to protect a minority that has been under severe assault in this country over the last six or seven years. >> well, thank you, jason, for asking. i just really appreciate having the opportunity to have this conversation. because i think you just hit the nail on the head. the senator's ego is not more important than the crisis facing the jewish community today. i mean, literally, just today,

the british jewish community reported an increase of anti-semitic incidents. they had over 2,200 incidents last year, making it the worst year on record, a 34% increase around the world. we've seen a torrent of incidents in places like france and germany and so on, and here in the united states, we're still recovering, if you will, from the hostage crisis in texas, from anti-semitic flyering around the country. from holocaust distortionism and outright denial so in light of this context, jason, it's astonishing to me that professor lipstadt, who's one of the most esteemed experts in the united states, that he would have the audacity to say she's not qualified. the one thing that she is is qualified. she is a scholar. she is an expert, not an idea log and if the senate wants to

fight anti-semitism, vote and confirm professor lipstadt today. we need her in place now more than ever. >> professor, i want to read you some information here from "washington post" and get your thoughts on the other side. it's talking about, what counts as assistant semitism? the biden nominee receives a hearing on the topic. she points out, jews make up 2% of the u.s. population and 0.2% of the world's population. but according to fbi data, 55% of all reported religious bias crimes in the united states and 2020 targeted j ews. in the united states, a pew research center survey of jewish americans between november 2019 and june 2020 found that 53% said they personally feel less safe than they did five years ago. professor, if we were looking at this on a scale of the sort of, you know, highest moments of anti-semitism, anti-semitic violence in america versus the lowest levels, where are we right now? are we heading towards a code

red? have we had similar periods in the past? >> we have had similar periods in the past, but the times that come immediately to mind for me are times like the 1920s. i think for many american jews alive today, and i'm -- i study american judaism, so i'm not saying this isn't true globally, i'm just saying i'm not really qualified to speak beyond the united states. i think for people alive today, this is a time of stunning and striking new anti-semitism in their lifetime. it's not that it's unprecedented historically, but for most people alive today, with the exception of members of the greatest generation, people, for instance, my grandmother's age, this is really a new experience. i want to go back to that statistic that you just read. 53% of american jews feel less safe today than they did five years ago. that's really serious. and that's saying, in our lifetimes, this is anomalous.

>> jonathan, one of the things that we're seeing right now across the country is this huge push by conservatives to remove books like the graphic novel "maus," to not have children taught about the holocaust, and claiming it's all critical race theory. we're seeing a desire on the part of many republicans and many conservatives in this country to not only sort of paper over any attacks on jewish americans but also eliminate the historical context that people could use to understand why people are in danger. what's the best way to combat this now? we can't all assume that kids are going to grow up and have great professors like professor mehta. what do we do at the high school level and the junior high level where parents of conservatives are trying to keep kids from understanding american history. >> well, i think -- >> jonathan, sorry. >> i think there's no question that from any angle -- can you hear me okay? there's no question that from any angle -- that any angle, we are living in the most

extraordinary times. it's hard to square, and to build on what the professor said, at the adl, we track anti-semitic incidents. we are seeing record numbers, the likes of which we haven't seen in decades. and you know, there's a straight line from charlottesville to capitol hill, from congresspeople insisting that the jewish people are responsible for covid and that plague to other members saying the jews or the jewish state is responsible for a kind of genocide. all of this hyperbole, all of this hysteria, makes jews feel afraid so i think it is absolutely crucial that we put professor lipstadt in place, but we just need to keep in mind that to fight anti-semitism, jason, this is sometimes called the oldest hatred. it's going to take a whole of society effort. alone, a special envoy, she can't do the job. she's not a silver bullet. we need the government to act. we need law enforcement to investigate and prosecute as well as look at models like

restorative justice. we need business to step up more than ever, social media needs to get it under control. facebook, instagram, tiktok, twitter, and ultimately, civil society too. houses of worship, ngos like adl, all of us have a role to play if we're really going to turn back this tide of hate once and for all. >> jonathan greenblatt and samira mehta, thank you so much. we'll check in on capitol hill where democrats are getting a pep talk. plus president biden talks about narrowing his pick for the supreme court. our look at the exclusive interview coming up after this break. exclusive b interview coming up after this break.

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we've been coming here, since 1868. there's a lot of cushy desk jobs out there, but this is my happy place. there are millions of ways to make the most of your land. learn more at deere.com today, we got a glimpse into president biden's current state of mind regarding his pick for the supreme court. lester holt sat down with the president for an exclusive interview. take a listen. >> can i ask you where you stand right now on your nomination process for supreme court? what your short list looks like or if you want to name the nominee right here, we'd be happy to hear you. >> well, first of all, the short list are nominees who are incredibly well qualified and documented. they are -- they were the honor students. they come from the best universities. they have experience, some on the bench, some in the practice

of law. >> what's the number you're at, four, five, six? >> well, what i've done is i've taken about four people and done the deep dive on them, meaning thorough background checks, and see if there's anything in the background that would make them not qualified. >> is it important that you believe they'll get a vote from the republican side? >> i think whomever i pick will get a vote from the republican side for the following reason. i'm not looking to make an ideological choice here. i'm looking for someone to replace judge breyer with the same kind of capacity judge breyer had, with an open mind, who understands the constitution, interprets it in a way that is consistent with the mainstream interpretation of the constitution. >> and you can watch more of lester holt's interview with president biden tonight on nbc "nightly news," tomorrow on "today," and of course, ahead of the super bowl on sunday. let's bring in punchbowl news founder jay sherman live on capitol hill and at the white house, jonathan lemire,

political white house bureau chief and host of msnbc's "way too early." jonathan, great to see you. both are msnbc contributors. jonathan, i'll start with you. look, to me, the chances of any republicans voting for a biden nominee are somewhere up there with, i don't know, ben simmons getting the scoring title once he goes to new jersey. do you think there's any chance that any republicans are going to vote for his nominee or is that just the president trying to appear to be above the partisan fray? >> reporter: lester did miss out on a chance to ask the president what he thought about the james harden trade. we'll wait for the follow-up interview. the president did not name names today in terms of his short list and we expect there might be a few added to the four he says he's done a deep dive upon. some of them, though, have received republican support in the past. a couple of votes. you're right, though, that happened at a different moment and the supreme court seat is certainly draws far more scrutiny than any other bench, any other one a republican senator would have to devote

upon. but i will say, though your skepticism is well taken, the white house thinks they might get a couple votes. they have some hope they can get some but obvious they only need 50 with the vice president to get a tie. they can't do that right now with one democratic senator, of course, recovering, lujan at home. but they feel like they'll have enough and they will get this pick seated on the court later this year. >> jake, right now, the former president, barack obama, is having a conversation. he's trying to rally the democrats. this is his great big, you know, "any given sunday" speech, we can do it, pick up your plow shares, whatever he has to do. how is that being received by democrats right now? do they want to hear from the former president? do they want to hear more from biden? what's the tone being set and how is this being received? >> i'm going to get to that in a second. i just want to answer the last question that john did a great job answering, but i would say that it's virtually certain biden will get at least one

republican vote, susan collins has voted for every supreme court justice that she's ever had the opportunity to vote for, except for amy coney barrett under the trump administration. so, at least susan collins, i would have to of crazy circumst, will vote for a supreme court nominee. so that's number one. number two, we have some new reporting in punch bowl news p.m. which is coming out shortly about what barack obama said and his message, i will say, listen, democrats always want to hear from barack obama. he's one of the most popular democratic presidents in our history so people are always excited to hear from him, but his mezage was stop complaining, get what you can get and stop complaining about what you're not getting, which is the message nancy pelosi has said at times. we should brag more about what we have done. we passed a massive rescue package, we passed the bipartisan infrastructure bill. we already, democrats that, not me and you, but we have already done a lot. that is a message that a lot of

democrats don't want to hear because with all of the levers of power in washington, the democratic senate, house, and white house, they feel like they should have a build back better package that goes through the house and senate and to the president's desk. they have not yet. they might not in the future. we don't know yet. but that is his message. he dropped, he used the example, we dropped the public option during the affordable care act debate because we weren't able to get it through, but still, we celebrated obamacare. he talked about legislating being a relay race. one generation or one congress starts the race and passes off the baton to the next congress or the next generation. and that generation runs with it. so, you know, i will say this. this is a message perhaps that only barack obama could deliver because if any seated member of the leadership delivered this message, they would probably not have hell to pay, but they would be subject to some criticism, let's say.

>> jake sherman and jonathan lemire, thank you for giving us that update. we'll be right back after a quick break. uh, i-i'm actually just going to get an iced coffee. well, she may have a destination this one time, but usually -- no, i-i usually have a destination. yeah, but most of the time, her destination is freedom. nope, just the coffee shop. announcer: no matter why you ride, progressive has you covered with protection starting at $79 a year. voiceover: 'cause she's a biker... please don't follow me in. ♪ i see trees of green ♪ voiceover: 'c♪ red roses too ♪r... ♪ i see them bloom for me and you ♪ (music) ♪ so i think to myself ♪ ♪ oh what a wonderful world ♪

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that does it for deadline white house on this thursday. thank you for joining us. "the beat" with ari melber starts rights now. hi, ari. >> hey, jason. thank you. welcome to "the beat." i'm ari melber and this is a major news night right here on

this broadcast. trump white house veteran peter navarro is here, now, for his first exclusive tv appearance since facing that new subpoena from the january 6th committee. and this is how we got here. >> white house trade and senior economic adviser peter navarro. assistant to the president and director of trade and manufacturing policy. >> former white house trade guy, peter navarro. >> peter navarro is our guest tonight. >> we had over 100 gresmen and senators on capitol hill ready to implement the sweep. >> this guy did an interview with ari melber on msnbc last night. they have this plan to hype these gossamer fantastical claims of supposed fraud. >> he said the quiet part out loud. >> navarro explained what the coup plot had in common with the football play was teamwork and obviously brain damage. >> congratulations, peter navarro. i think you earned