morning. there are big stories, many on the legal front. a gunmaker held to account for the mass shooting at sandy hook. what the multi-million dollar settlement might mean for other victims of gun violence. in another shooting incident, alec baldwin is being sued over what happened on the set of "rust," where haylna hutchins was killed. sarah palin loses her court battle with the "new york times." as prince andrew settles a sexual abuse lawsuit against him. there are still questions about just what happened to bob saget. what his family is now saying about the investigation into his death. san francisco just recalled three members of the city's school board as that city, along with the rest of the country, deals with the impact of the pandemic. we'll get into the politics of that. and new details this morning about the drug test that almost disqualified the russian

teenager who is on track for another gold medal at the olympics. a lot to cover this morning. with us for all of it, we have former aide to the george w. bush white house and state departments, elise jordan with us. the host of "way too early" and white house bureau chief at "politico," jonathan lemire. and msnbc legal analyst charles coleman. along with willie, joe, and me. of course, willie, you have the top story this morning. >> yeah. it is an incredibly busy morning, and we'll start with president joe biden promising to give diplomacy every chance, in his words, to prevent russia from invading ukraine again. but he's warning skepticism about moscow's intentions, and an invasion remains distinctly possible, he says. in a speech yesterday, biden said it is too early to assess moscow's claim that it is pulling troops from ukraine's border. the u.s. has not verified that. >> yesterday, the russian government publicly proposed to continue the diplomacy.

i agree. we should give the diplomacy every chance to succeed. i believe there are real ways to address our respective security concerns. the russian defense minister reported today that some military units are leaving their positions near ukraine. that would be good. but we have not yet verified that. we have not yet verified the russian military units are returning to their home bases. indeed, our analysts indicate that they remain very much in the threatening position. the fact remains right now, russia has more than 150,000 troops encircling ukraine and belarus and along ukraine's border. an invasion remains distinctly possible. >> the president's remarks came hours after russian president vladimir putin said he does not want a war with the rest and is seeking a diplomatic path to resolving the standoff. putin adopted a conciliatory

tone and announced the kremlin would partially pull back troops from ukraine's border, but he did not commit to a complete withdrawal. in a few minutes, we'll talk with richard haass about these developments. later, we'll be joined by secretary of state antony blinken with many questions for him, joe. always have to take a grain of salt whenever vladimir putin makes a declaration about pulling back or pursuing a diplomatic path, joe, but it appears, at least for the moment, he's stepped back from the brink. we'll see what happens next. >> we certainly will. it makes sense for him politically. it makes sense militarily. again, he can get into ukraine. the costs because of what the biden administration has done, what antony blinken has been able to do in the administration, along with jake sullivan and others, along with our nato allies, again, standing shoulder to shoulder and having a very robust response to this threat is really the antithesis

of what happened in 2014. it's a message vladimir putin received. we'll see what he ends up doing. maybe he'll do what is not in russia's best interest. he's done that before. for now, mika, it looks like the standoff, we may be backing away from the standoff a little bit. >> a very clear message has been sent. >> good news. we're going to turn to a developing story out of san francisco, where voters last night ousted three members of its board of education in a landslide recall election. >> this is a huge story. >> yeah. >> politically, nationwide, this is a huge story. >> the recall of each member was supported by more than 70% of voters. critics accuse them of putting progressive politics over priorities like the pandemic. for example, the board was criticized for crying to rename schools when many parents -- >> including schools named after abraham lincoln and diane feinstein. >> this is when many parents

wanted to focus on the reopening of schools. some of the schools targeted were named after abraham lincoln, as joe said, george washington, thomas jefferson, and even long-time u.s. senator diane feinstein. the election also galvanized asian-american parents after the board changed admissions requirements for one of the city's most prestigious high schools. san francisco mayor breed who supported the recall will now have to appoint replacements. >> of course, elise jordan, the headline is this is happening in san francisco. one of the most progressive cities in america. you have parents -- and this is a clear warning. we saw it from virginia. we can now say, you know, from norfolk to san francisco, you have parents in the virginia election enraged that schools were shut down for too long, there was too much distance learning. they were talking about critical

race theory, which, of course, we heard is not taught in virginia schools. still, you're hearing the same thing about a rebellion -- and i've been saying this for a couple years. people get really angry, some people in their mom's basement on twitter get really angry, tweeting out, "how dare you talk about woke poli --" really, it pisses off liberals as much as it does conservatives. woke politics is actually really hurting democratic candidates. you take that and you take what, again, asian-americans and the feelings that, you know, they're actually being preyed upon, not just physically in violence but also politically. it was a toxic mix in a liberal city with three progressive

board members. it wasn't close. >> joe, how happy would you be if you'd won an election by 70%? that was pretty universal, the outcry from san francisco parents and, like you said, it's just reverberating around the nation, the anger over misplaced priorities in our schools. parents want their children back in a classroom and want them to not -- >> we're going to have more with reverend al on this a little later. a lot to cover this morning. sarah palin lost her libel suit against "the new york times." the jury returned a verdict in favor of the "times," saying they did not intentionally damage the former alaska governor's reputation when it linked the rhetoric of her political action committee to a 2011 tucson mass shooting. this was a day after the judge said he'd discuss the suit after the verdict regardless of the outcome because palin's legal

team had not acted -- the paper had not acted with actual malice when publishing the 2017 editorial. that's the legal standard necessary public figures must demonstrate to claim libel. the judge allowed the jury to reach a verdict, despite his pending dismissal. so both findings could be considered if the case goes to appeal. charles? >> charles, i think this case shows the standard -- you know, the "times" hasn't been successfully sued in 50 years. the standards now so high. >> right. >> sarah palin and others would say newspapers can act with impunity. they can say what they want to say. with palin, this was a pretty horrific mistake they made about sarah palin. >> sure. >> it was a newspaper that was openly hostile to her. in this instance, did james bennett do what he did because of actual malice against sarah palin? no, the standard is too high.

>> it doesn't appear to have been the case. the judge relies on a case that sets the standard where "the new york times" was being sued by someone else. "new york times" versus sullivan. they were actually sued in the same way. that is where that standard of needing to have malice shown in order to have them found libel. they ruled in a verdict in that matter in terms of a decision on the merits, basically saying as a matter of law, they did not make out a case. they were not able to have a case where relief could be granted. this was before the jury came back with a verdict. it was a little unusual the judge still allowed the jury to deliberate. >> right. >> in this case, because there is likely to be an appeal, it actually is going to create a more robust record for the appeals court to review and will likely play in that verdict being upheld. >> yeah. jonathan, there's no -- i know we've heard one or two or three

justices thinking about loosening the standard from the sullivan case. it's likely not going to happen, is it? >> no, it doesn't seem that way. certainly, it is such a high bar to clear, particularly in libel laws with public figures, and how difficult that can be, as well. the "times" -- and i wanted to ask you this, charles. did it help the "times" case that they quickly rectified this, to suggest, hey, this was not malicious. we're a newspaper industry. it is a deadline industry. we're working quickly. people make mistakes. mistakes are pointed out, and we fix it. >> well, i think when you're thinking about the judge and how the judge reviewed these things, it'll be subjective. in the eye of one judge, it could have been more of a factor than others. it made a difference in this case. i don't know from a legal standpoint that that is going to be a definitive marker to say, this is malice and this is not.

in this case, the judge was swayed by the fact they took immediate action to rectify what they were calling a mistake. >> willie, the bottom line here is, people in our business, we need to slow down. don't rush to beat, you know, whatever the competitor is. whether it is in the newspaper industry or on tv. slow down. get it right the first time. you know, i made the mistake before on air, saying things that, you know, i learned later i should have slowed down. it's like the clinton case we were talking about yesterday. everybody on the right was saying, why isn't the mainstream media covering it? it's a cover-up. mika will tell you, i read the pleadings for two or three days. i called -- probably called 30 people. i was on the phone for about four or five hours -- i guess it was monday. wait a second, calling lawyers, what does this mean?

i can't understand this. of course, it was very convoluted, but, you know, couple years ago, i would have probably just popped off. but this palin case shows, you need to sit back, make sure you get it right, and you don't need to rush toward deadline because you're afraid the other -- if you don't have the story nailed down, don't do it. don't try to be cute. >> yeah. that applies to editorials in this case just as well as straight reporting. "the new york times" admitted its mistake here. it did so at trial. as you guys have been saying, the standard is so high for libel to prove malice that it didn't meet that bar. another story we're covering this morning, nearly a decade now after the shooting at sandy hook elementary school in connecticut, the families of five children and four adults killed there have reached a $73 million settlement with the now bankrupt gun manufacturer remington. you'll remember 20 first graders and 6 adults were killed in

newtown, connecticut. the families filed a wrongful death lawsuit in 2014 about remington. the company that manufactured the bushmaster ar-15 rifle used in the attack. the case has been watched closely, both by gun safety advocates and gun rights supporters, because of its potential to provide a road map for victims of other shootings to sue firearm makers. charles coleman, what is the precedent here? this is the first time anyone has successfully sued a gunmaker. this was over the question of how remington marketed this weapon to people. what does that mean for future cases? >> willie, of all the cases we're talking about this morning, this one probably has the greatest implications and has the widest reach. because it is going to reverberate throughout the industry, not only with respect to gun manufacturers but also through ancillary companies that support gun manufacturers. now, what you're talking about is a situation where when a mass shooting happens and there is liability or potential liability, the question is going

to become whether the gun manufacturer was openly marketing their products to civilians, whether the gun manufacturer was openly and knowingly trying to push their products in ways they were going to potentially encourage violence or put their guns in the hands of actual regular people who may not have been trained or were going to use them for whatever purpose. this is going to make insurers think twice about who it is they're underwriting. this is going to make gun manufacturers think twice about how they manufacture guns. so this should be seen as a very big win for the gun safety industry or the gun safety advocates because people are now finally being able to pierce what seemed like an invincible sort of cloak around the gun industry for gun makers. >> yeah. mika, another story. >> they kept coming yesterday. >> "new york post" talking about pressure that the queen placed

on prince andrew to settle this case. >> he has settled a lawsuit with the woman who accused him of sexually assaulting her, saying she was trafficked to him by the late jeffrey epstein. nbc news senior international correspondent keir simmons has more. >> reporter: prince andrew dramatically averting a court battle, not admitting liability but not clearing his name, declaring his regret for his relationship with the late jeffrey epstein and commending the bravery of virginia giuffre and other survivors of sex trafficking. virginia giuffre claimed she was sexually assaulted by the prince when she was 17, trafficked by epstein. >> it was a really scary time in my life. i had just been abused by a member of a royal family. >> reporter: prince andrew paying an undisclosed sum to a charity she chose supporting victims' rights. >> there's no question mark, no public fund, no taxpayer money going toward this. >> reporter: for the prince, the

end of a damaging case stretching back two decades. virginia giuffre claims she was first assaulted by andrew in march 2001. in 2010, he's photographed with jeffrey epstein after he's released from jail. 2019, he records an interview with the bbc, widely viewed as a disaster. in it, he says he does not remember being photographed with giuffre in this picture. >> i have no recollection of ever meeting this lady. none whatsoever. >> reporter: then in january this year, he loses a battle to have a new york court throw out the case. he is stripped of his royal patronages. >> nbc's keir simmons with that report. charles coleman, what does a settlement like this tell you? potentially the possibilities are as to what happened, because they're not releasing a lot of key information. >> well, what we can surmise -- >> glean. >> reading between the lines and reading the tea leaves, there was substance to these claims, right? >> right. >> a lot of times what happens

in settlements, people say, well, this is not an admission of guilt. >> right. >> in fact, it is not an admission of guilt. but given the nature -- >> so what is it? >> it's an admission that we don't want this to go further and there is likely damaging information that could surface throughout the course of discovery if this continued to move. so -- >> well, there's also, of course, the queen queen saying him -- i mean, he's been disowned by the family. william loathes him. charles enraged by him. the 75th anniversary, is that the silver jubilee? >> diamond. >> whatever is coming up this summer, the message was sent. >> sure. >> get this out of the way. we're all going to be looking at the queen and not you. >> the only question that comes from this for me is one that, you know, is it really a matter of getting this dealt with in a very quick fashion and sort of trying to create some distance where it is made quiet in enough

time for that, or is it really about the substance of the matter in terms of being concerned about what other details could surface, that could be distracting, that could be harmful, that could be tarnish everything. >> oh, yeah. no, no, that's what i'm saying. the queen is about to, you know, get in our carriage, they don't want, you know, all the tabloids having the latest revelation come out. >> the statement says a lot. >> absolutely. >> he commends her for not giving up and -- you know, that's a huge change from things he had said about her in the past. so you can glean a lot from this. >> we often see that at the beginning of a lawsuit. people start out and say va heem , i didn't do this. this is preposterous. >> she's after money. >> correct. after the settlement has come along, someone changes the tune dramatically. >> the wording, it was one of those mistakes was made. i did not make the mistake, but mistakes were made and you were

very courageous for pursuing the mistakes made. >> passive voice. >> exactly. >> willie, i'm going to say, in general, lemire and i noticing the "new york post's" game is especially strong today. "under pressure from queen." >> ah. >> you have the queen reference. "prince andrew settles sex suit for $12 million." then the clown at the bottom. lemire, take us inside the "post." they had the shoplifter a couple weeks ago, running out with steaks. >> follow-up story perhaps. >> we complained. new york city responded. >> they get action here. take a look. right here. >> justice served. >> inside the paper. >> cold. >> pages 10 and 11. a "new york post" photographer and reporter was outside duane reade on park avenue when there was shoplifting. there is a photo of the security guard running him down and tackling the suspect outside of the store. >> keep that up. >> there you go.

>> lemire. >> yup? >> as a graduate of -- >> the tabloids. >> -- daily news, you have to be proud. that's a great moment. by the way, those photographers, my son worked for "the daily news" for a while. he said the photographers, the best. they were like sherpas. no, hey, son, sit down. be quiet. do this. do that. can't say enough about photographers at the "post," the "daily news." they are incredible. >> this is peter parker esque. >> it is really true. get me spiderman. no, i was a street reporter for the "daily news" a long time, as well. the photographers are the smartest, wisest, street savvy people in the city. they know where you should be, how to do it, how to approach your job, follow your lead. >> don't cross them either. >> at one point, willie, joey was in brooklyn. they were sitting in a car. suddenly, there was shooting. joey started to jump out of the car to follow the shooting.

the guy grabbed him on the shoulder, the photographer. he said, "son, no pulitzers won out here. let's wait for the cops to come." he said it was like that every day. the guys, the wisest ones that kept you out of trouble. unbelievable. willie? >> yeah, nice open field tackle, too, by the security guard. by the way, it is the platinum jubilee, the 70th year. >> platinum. >> the platinum jubilee, yes. another legal story for you, charles. the family of haylna hutchins is suing actor alec baldwin in a wrongful death lawsuit following the fatal shooting on the "rust" movie set in new mexico back in october. matthew hutchens, the victim's husband, filed a lawsuit against baldwin and others involved in the film's production on behalf of himself and the couple's 9-year-old son. he claimed baldwin recklessly killed the cinematographer and the film production failed to follow safety protocols and

regulations. baldwin was pointing a gun at hutchens inside a church during the setup of the scene when the firearm went off, killing hutchins and injuring the director, sousa. baldwin said it went off without him pulling the trigger. safety measures like using rubber bullets and double checking for live bullets before the gun was placed in someone's hand failed to be executed. the suit also names the film's assistant director who handed baldwin the gun, the production manager, the film's armourer, and the supplier. there was negligence somewhere down the line. the question will be if it goes all the way to alec baldwin. >> that is an interesting question. what we are looking at with the filing of this lawsuit is a legal royal rumble. it is going to end up being who was the last man standing? what i anticipate in this case is you're going to see a lot of motions to dismiss, a lot of

motions for, in some cases, to be separated from this case. many people are going to be saying, listen, i should not even be involved. i shouldn't be named. i shouldn't have anything to do with this. the lawsuit names a number of individuals. obviously, alec baldwin is going to be someone who named because he is what's called a deep pocket plaintiff. he is the biggest name. he'll have the most money. >> he was holding the gun. >> of course, and he was holding the gun. >> producer, as well. >> also a producer. obviously, there is the immediate sense of what would make common sense, in having baldwin named in a lawsuit. then from a strategic standpoint, that's why you want to name him as a lawyer as well -- i mean, in executing the strategy. now, what will happen is that as these motions to separate each of the defendants comes out, we will hear more and more finger pointing and more and more folks will say what it is they did, what it is they should be held

responsible for, and why that does not meet the standard for violating the care which was necessary in this case. >> think about the fact, i mean, the difference between him just being there as an actor. he's just there as an actor. that's one thing. the fact he was there as a producer as well. we heard about cost cutting measures. the fact they even chose the location for cost cutting measure reasons. insurance reasons. you really just, again, you wonder at the end of the day how much this is going to fall to him. just looking at it, generally, he looks to be terribly exposed. >> he has considerable exposure because of both things. he is the person who actually was holding the gun, so there is obviously that, as mika pointed out. of course. then there's the bigger angle of on set, what he's responsible for given his role as a leader of that production. >> yeah. >> both of those angles look terrible for him in terms of being able to get out of this unscathed. >> i know -- but if you were his

lawyer, what's the talk in the legal community about the interview he did with abc? >> bad idea. i said it here before, and i'll say it again. should not have done it. would not recommend it. those are all things that, as you get into the meat of this case, that's going to be played as part of every deposition that's taken. every person who is questioned, every witness is going to look at that and either point out where it is inaccurate, where it doesn't line up with the facts, where it is not corroborated, and it is all going to make him look bad. the more you talk, the more of a record you create. in this case, alec baldwin voluntarily, for no reason other than trying to create a better image of himself in the court of public opinion, has now given every other defendant in this case a lot of room to work with. >> yeah. >> he's made his walls close in that much tighter. >> elise, it seems that you look at the interview, you look. i mean, we were saying it in real time, you look at the

instagram post. you look at all the other things. again, i was wondering all along, as his lawyer, where is his lawyer after something like that? >> i cringe. >> you go dark. you keep your mouth shut. you try to get this taken care of quietly. respectfully. instead of posing for cameras and doing interviews. it's just -- again, it's just the whole process has been botched as some really halfway pr measure that will have legal ramifications, i think, as this trial goes on. >> you know, the press posture of alec baldwin and then his wife, hilaria, who really just, wow, can't even get started there. it seems disrespectful to the victims, just mouthing off in their quick defense. if they kept their mouth shut, probably they'd be in a better

legal position. but at the end of the day, all of their talking has made them seem like entitled celebrities. heaping on the wounds of this tragic, just tragic death. >> would you advise everyone in the family -- because his wife is always posting. they have a beautiful home. you see it. i cringe and think, this is not helpful. i'm not even sure why i'm thinking that. there's just a lot of instagram posting. >> tgs so interesting. this really articulates the intersection between the court of public opinion and who you should be doing legally. baldwin is not doing things correctly legally, trying to help in the court of public opinions. his family are doing things voluntarily that aren't helping in the court of public opinion. right now is not the time to be on social media. it's not the time to sort of be

expressing yourself, whether you're talking about the case or not. given who you are and everything you have at stake, this is, as joe said, a time to just go dark and stay there for a bit. >> we need to talk, also, about another case. >> yeah. >> in a little bit. not even a case yet. bob saget. now, the family is moving to suppress any public information about what happened. so many questions about that. >> we'll talk about that. also ahead, ukraine gets hit by a series of cyberattacks. what u.s. intelligence is saying about russia's likely involvement. richard haass joins us next to weigh in on the tensions overseas. plus, we've reported on the growing number of unruly airline passengers. why some senate republicans are now urging the justice department not to put those people on a no fly list.

>> wait a second. >> i'm so confused. >> wait a second, republicans now are for working class canadians and working class americans not being able to get to work because people are blocking traffic and breaking the law, so they support that. now, they're coming out in defense of abusive passengers that push and beat up flight attendants and push and beat up other people on the airplane? >> everything is upside down. >> why are they suddenly such strident defenders of the worst behavior? tennis star novak djokovic isn't backing down when it comes to getting vaccinated against covid. it seems he'd rather miss out on future trophies. >> he will. >> than have to roll up his sleeve. >> he will. you're going to get -- >> you're watching "morning joe." >> -- your wish, cinderella. >> -- your wish, cinderella.

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releasing any further materials to anyone other than them. ultimately, the court will rule on whether to permanently stop the release of information. >> charles, information comes out, he hit his head. we're all thinking that maybe, you know, his head went up and he hit a cabinet or something like that. maybe he fell down. now, "new york times" and other newspapers reporting that the injuries were so severe that doctors studying these injuries say it looks like he fell from 20 to 30 feet or somebody took a baseball bat to the back of his head. >> like that's what the amount of pressure that this strike, whatever it is. >> a slip and fall would just not cause this sort of damage. i'm wondering how successful -- you certainly understand the family wanting people to get out of their -- >> so painful. >> -- business here. i am curious though, what is the likelihood, though, the sheriff's department is going to block these public records from being seen by other people?

>> well, i don't know that they're going to be entirely successful in being able to get them blocked to that degree. at least giving the showing that we know thus far and what we've seen come out in terms of the motion that has been already filed. what i will say in terms of seeking this temporary injunction is that they may be able to get a protective order to block some of the details. while all of the records may not come out, what may happen is that a big portion of them that detail what suspicions may be or may answer certain questions around the additional story that seems to be developing here, those may not come out to the public because they may be redacted or covered. >> do you think they moved too quickly to rule out any criminal activity here? >> i don't. i think that what we're seeing now shows us that it's very possible. you know, early on, people just sort of -- we went with what we had. >> right. >> that's kind of how these stories develop. now that we're seeing the type of force that mika has

described, that doesn't just happen, in most cases, with a slip and fall. so there's clearly something else that may be going on here. i don't want to say the family is attempting to hide something. i'm not going to go that far. >> right, right. >> but i will say that, certainly, this sort of move, looking for temporary injunction in a matter like this, given what has emerged around the details, it creates more questions than it answers. >> yeah. >> florida has, i believe, pretty significant open records laws. it's easier to get public information in florida. >> this was in a hotel. >> than in other states. could that play into this, as well? is there a better chance we'll see it because of where it happened? >> absolutely. the discovery of information in terms of freedom of information being available does change from state to state. as you've said, john, florida is liberal in that regard. surprisingly enough. so when a judge is considering this temporary injunction, that judge has to consider it in light of what the law is in that state. when that state grants a fair

amount of latitude in terms of information being disclosed, they have to have a really compelling reason as to why they wouldn't do it. i don't think bob saget's shebt celebrity or the emotional turmoil of his family are going to be sufficient to block it entirely. it may block some but not everything. >> charles coleman covering a lot of ground for us. >> about 20 stories in ten minutes. >> thank you. coming up, a new round of subpoenas from the selectigaing attack on the capitol. this time, lawmakers are going after people outside of d.c. plus, protecting kids and teens from the dangers of social media. a new bill could help us move in the right direction. we'll talk about it with senator richard blumenthal ahead on "morning joe." joe." our bottles are made to be remade.

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have you heard of the law firm? >> have you or a family member of yours been hurt in a car stent? accident? if so, go to the law firm of haass and ratner. >> we'll get to that. >> alex with a good one. >> 555-5555. >> last week, we spoke with facebook whistleblower frances haugen about the dangerous impact social media is having on children and teenagers' mental health. last year, haugen released internal facebook documents that suggested the company was prioritizing profits over the safety of its users. facebook's parent company meta says it has since developed new privacy and safety tools on its various platforms to help curb the number of users negatively impacted from using its apps. joining us now, democratic member of both the judiciary and armed services committee, senator richard blumenthal of

connecticut. he, along with republican senator marcia blackburn, are introducing the kids online safety act. welcome, senator. tell us about this new legislation. >> well, thanks for having me. what's really distinctive about this legislation is, number one, it is bipartisan. senator blackburn and i have work on it through five separate hearings, giving those social media tech platforms an opportunity to testify, along with the whistleblower, frances haugen and other experts and researchers. what we documented here, very strikingly, was the harrowing, heartbreaking stories of kids in addictive, dark places, and destructive emotional rabbit holes. bullying, self-harm, eating disorders that were the result of tactics and algorithms that

tech platforms knew were doing that harm. what we're doing in this legislation is to give parents and kids tools and safeguards to take back control. options to disable those addictive product features. and to opt out of the algorithmic recommendations and protect their information. because the social media platforms collect information, use it to target kids and drive destructive content to them. so it really is about accountability. >> i mean, the impact, and you laid out here pretty effectively, the impact of this on young girls especially, self-harm, suicide, eating disorders, sexual exploitation, unlawful products for minors. >> you would think they'd do this themselves. >> all there. the question is, senator, how are parents empowered? how are parents empowered to make sure that their children

are not getting this information, that they're not -- >> getting sucked in. >> yeah, and they're not getting sucked into an algorithm that's going to lead them, like so many other teenage girls and young adults have been sucked into destructive, suicidal behavior? >> that's the key question. and our objective is to require the tech platforms to give parents those tools. in other words, to see what their kids are doing, how much time they're spending, what kinds of products they're following, and to, in effect, work with the kids to take back that power. that give them information they need to work with their children, support them, see what they're doing and take action as a result. and it imposes a duty of care, a legal responsibility that's enforceable against the big tech platform.

if they drive this content through the black box algorithms, it exposes the algorithms. it imposes transparency. parents will know what is happening to their kids and why it's happening. so i think the combination of information and control. >> good morning, senator blumenthal. i have a teenage daughter and about to be a teenage son. on behalf of a lot of parents, thank you to you and senator blackburn for taking up this critical issue. you have good bipartisan support around it. what does the future of the bill look like in terms of getting it passed, and what has been the reaction from the big companies? what have your negotiations with them been like? >> great question. first of all, we're very fortunate to have strong support from the chairman of the committee, senator cantwell, and also from others on both sides of the aisle. you know, if you sat through those hearings and closed your eyes and you heard the outrage expressed by my colleagues, you couldn't tell whether it was a

republican or a democrat. so i think we've got really strong bipartisan momentum going. partly, it's a matter of what kind of time we can have on the floor. a lot going on. but i think there's a dynamic here and potentially a bill on the house side, as well, to accomplish the same end. what's been the reaction of the tech platforms? well, they've said they want to cooperate, but we will see. you know, in the past, my experience has been, and this isn't my first rodeo with the tech platforms, that they talk a good game and then they unleash their lobbyists and lawyers, armies of them, tons of money, to try and kill legislation that may impose this accountability on them. >> yeah. >> so we will see. all right. senator, thank you so much. >> thank you so much. >> willie, quickly, before you go, give us your thoughts on the settlement with remington, the sandy hook families.

obviously in your state. it was a landmark settlement yesterday. >> you know, i'm so glad you asked about it. these families, the sandy hook families have become personal friends, almost part of my family, really profiles in courage and perseverance. this settlement is an enormous breakthrough, not only because of the $73 million but also, you know, the gun manufacturers have enjoyed this near complete immunity, almost uniquely among any industry. this settlement breaks that kind of impunity and legal shield in a way that i think can lead to legislation. for example, i've sponsored it with house member adam schiff, to eliminate the immunity they have under the current law. this settlement is a giant step forward. >> all right. >> senator blumenthal, thank you so much. straight ahead on "morning

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i understand that not being vaccinated today, you know, i am unable to travel to most of the tournaments at the moment. >> that's a price you're willing to pay? >> that is the price i am willing to pay. >> ultimately, are you prepared to forego the chance to be the greatest player that ever picked up a racket statistically because you feel so strongly about this jab? >> yes. >> why, novak? why? >> because the principles of decision making on my body are more important than any title. >> novak djokovic would rather

skip the french open and wimbledon tournaments rather than get vaccinated from covid-19 and keep his family safe from getting it. >> has the guy gotten other vaccines before? these are people that -- >> maybe he hasn't. >> the truck drivers, you know, they want to destroy small businesses and working class people's ability to get to work. but did they get vaccinations to go to school? did everybody that's saying, oh, i just am against all vaccines, did they get five, six vaccines to go to school when they were young? did they give their kids five or six vaccines to go to school? the answer to that is yes and yes. suddenly, because this is politicized, people start acting like this. for djokovic, i bless him, if he doesn't want to win the most grand slams ever, that's up to him. it's a free country. free world for the most part. okay. it's not so free of a world. in fact, it is becoming a bit

more illiberal, but it is a free country. he can do whatever he wants to do. man, for a guy who probably has gotten a ton of vaccines in his life already, it seems like a strange hill to die on. >> yeah. i mean, i agree. what he just said is defensible. if he doesn't want to get the vaccine, he's willing to -- >> sure. >> -- withdraw from or not attend those tournaments and give up those trophies, that's totally on him, up to him. what he can't do, what is not defensible is to lie about his status, to go to events like he did before the australian open and, with covid, be around other people. he can't do those things. also, the dangerous part that you're referring to here is he said, i have my information. we've heard this from other high-profile people. i have my own information that tells me i'm not going to take it, that ignores everything we've learned about this vaccine over the last year. it ignores all the data that shows the vaccine keeps you healthier, keeps you out of the hospital, it prevents you from

dying, on and on and on. by him using his platform to say those things, it is dangerous. it is his choice not to show up at the high-profile tournaments. >> people are free to be as stupid as they want to be. jonathan lemire, it is galling when people say, oh, it wasn't fda approve and had they're doing other treatments that aren't fda approved. just the hypocrisy of it all. >> right. he's fallen behind rafael nadal in the all-time grand slams list and won't be able to catch him. he says he is concerned about the impact the vaccine would have on his body. well, he won't have to worry about the impact of wear and tear of tennis on his body since he's not going to be able to play unless he gets this vaccine. coming up, new reporting on the january 6th investigation. how the committee is using thousands of text messages from donald trump's inner circle to piece together what happened that day. plus, former president trump is facing a looming court fight

right now that his long-time accounting firm has parted ways with him. >> yeah. also ahead, secretary of state -- >> i also say, don't believe anything we told you the last ten years. >> what? >> the accounting firm. >> oh, exactly. antony blinken will weigh in on the latest diplomatic efforts to prevent an invasion of ukraine. by the way, with covid lifting, you'll probably be doing more shopping. no doubt, there may be a slip or fall in your future. we have the law firm of rattner and haass. they are here for you and your family. one thing they want you to know, if you don't collect, they don't collect. "morning joe" back in a minute. >> you're so weird. >> it's not. they're great lawyers. weird. >> it's not. >> it's not. they're great lawyers.

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it's the top of the hour. welcome back to "morning joe." it's wednesday, february 16th.

jonathan lemire is still with us. joining us now, former treasury official and "morning joe" economic analyst, steve rattner. president of the counsel on foreign relations, richard haass. the author of the book "war of necessity, war of choice." >> you got a shoutout yesterday from the president yesterday about this "war on necessity, war of choice" nonsense. >> not nonsense. world war ii, the war of necessity. what putin is contemplating would be a war of choice. the president was sending messages to the russian people. >> willie geist, i think the conclusion of all of us around this table is that jon meacham couldn't have helped with the speech yesterday because "soul of america" was not in the speech. >> stop. >> but "war of necessity, war of choice" was. >> huh, richard. >> joe, how do we get our books plugged by the president of the united states? seems everybody else on "morning joe" gets their books in the presidential speeches.

>> saving freedom here in america. >> there you go. >> willie's, too. one thing vladimir putin is not, loaded. plead read willie geist's book of the same name. >> what an obscure reference that is. >> i love that book, man. i love that book. >> okay. >> we need to get the 18th, 19th reprinting, willie. >> it's a deep cut. thank you, joe. >> it is a deep cut. richard, we're going to talk about the war here. by the way, i am downloading as we speak here a book that you recommended. >> oh. >> audiobook. talk about the audiobook. i am a massive fan of the subject here of this book. >> audiobook called "miracle of wonder," malcolm gladwell, the life and music of paul simon. 5 to 5 1/2 hours. i told you, as good as the "beatles" documentary was, this is better. paul simon is talking about the creative process, why he did the

songs and how he changed over the years, from his early stuff to graceland and the music stuff. you'll get an insight into the creative process, more than anything you've ever heard. plus, it is great music. >> extraordinary songwriter. one of the greatest we've had. >> over the course of literally 50 years. >> over the course of 50 years. also, since you're our "morning joe" golf analyst, tell me about this -- >> i thought he was a lawyer. >> -- waste management open. i mean, did they have, like, tony soprano and other guys walking around out there as caddies? what is the waste management open? >> it's a major, what, fortune 50, fortune 100 company. >> yeah. >> in phoenix every year. i had to miss the first ten minutes of the super bowl because after -- >> is this the phoenix open, is that what we call it? >> i don't know what we are. it's the waste management phoenix open.

>> sports fans. >> it had three extra holes. >> we call the raiders the oakland raiders but go ahead. >> you would like this. at the 16th hole, it's about -- with the tee, it is 124 yards. >> they have to cut through garage? >> no windmills or anything, joe. you have a special grandstand built around, and you have thousands of fans watching the tee shot. almost like the beginning of the ryder cup, screams. two holes in one. the tradition is, when someone hits a hole in one on the 16th hole since the waste management open, everyone throws cups and beers on the golf course. >> hysterical. >> willie, we actually saw harold ford talking about this on the five. everybody is doing their clip. harold's was a hole in one, and all these people in the stands, they, like, started, like, throwing water all over the place. they just threw their plastic bottles all over the green.

a tradition like no other. [ laughter ] >> that's not water, joe. i have news for ya, that is not water. it's been going on for a long time there at the -- >> beer. >> -- yes, i call it the phoenix open but i'll call it the waste management open for the purposes of the discussion. yeah, there were two or three holes in one over the weekend. the place goes bananas, which raises the question, why don't we have that at every tournament? can you imagine on 16 at augusta? if the patrons there chucked their drinks onto the green. >> it'd be great. >> it was so fun. you could see people in the stands were having a great time. speaking of having a great time, let's talk about russia and ukraine. not having a great time there. do we have a clip of joe biden saying something? >> he had a pretty strange speech yesterday. >> we played it an hour ago. you saw it. you know what he said. he was tough. >> no, it was really tough. >> that's what i just said. he was tough. he actually has, over the past

two, three week, he actually has shown what an american president can do when, instead of constantly, like, crapping on your allies, you actually work constructively with them, bring them together, and have everybody shoulder to shoulder. it seems to be making a real difference. >> i think vladimir putin clearly underestimated the united states and president biden. piece by piece by piece, this has been pretty textbook. everything from providing oil and gas to the europeans so they're less energy dependent on russia. obviously, deployments to nato countries, the arms to ukraine, the threats of sanctions, but keeping open the diplomatic so-called off-ramp. this has been carefully orchestrated. this is not the cisis vladimir putin was hoping for, i think, when he initiated it several months ago. >> think about the weapons that have been sent to alies that are on the border of russia. again, troops going into poland.

this is the opposite of what he was aiming for when this began. >> also, the president has done, i think, right in taking off the option, taking off the table the option of american direct defense of ukraine. there's lots of reasons we don't want to go that far. everything he has threatened has been credible. he's taken away things that wouldn't be credible. the one challenge now if putin has decided going in big would be too costly, and i think he may well have, is he'd either go in small, say into eastern ukraine, or he'd basically continue to do what he's done the last few days. >> yes. >> we keep thinking of this about to begin. what about if we we rethink it. it's already begun. >> right. >> attacks on the financial institutions in ukraine and so forth, the attacks on the ministries. we're seeing a low-level, cyber-led siege. >> which can be democrat -- devast devastating.

would the sanctions apply to that? >> we need to think about graduating them. you want certain things in reserve to deter the big, old-fashioned military invasion. we have to come up with a strategy of dealing with what you might call a gray area or prolonged conflict. just say he keeps 50,000 to 75,000 troops parked on the border a while. just say he continues to do cyber. he uses some covert action. he helps separatists in eastern ukraine. he strengthens his hold on crimea. that can be a strategy for putin. we're prepared for the big thing. we also need to prepare for this lesser thing. >> jonathan, it is interesting. after afghanistan, we heard people that went away from biden and didn't approve of his handling of the presidency. basically, telling pollsters and people in focus groups, we've voted for competence. this was supposed to be the competent guy. we voted out the other guy because of this. afghanistan, again, as we said a million times, that was baked in the cake. that was coming since 2009. biden was going to get out no matter what.

we're actually seeing now, over the past month or so, that competence that people voted for. competence to actually do what 41 did, bush 41 did leading up to the first gulf war. putting in coalitions that boxed in saddam hussein. biden is now doing the same thing. in the beginning, you know, macron decided to imitate, you know -- wanted to imitate charles de gaulle. olaf was playing the role of helmet schmidt. >> keep going. >> continue. >> they were troublesome, but he got them in line. i won't say he got them in line. the alliance came together. in coming together, it was powerful for the german chancellor to actually be there yesterday to deliver the same message. hey, if you go into ukraine, bad things are going to happen to

you and your country. i mean, this is why people who wanted change, who wanted competence, this is why they voted for joe biden. >> right. an appliance that was deeply strained by joe biden's predecessor. i was in brussels when trump threatened to walk out of nato and blow it up, not giving his firm commitment to it. yes, there has been a rocky start, but president biden has held this coalition together. it seemingly has gotten stronger here. richard, though, to your point about whether perhaps this has already begun, and as much as we're seeing the u.s. try to get out in front of this, right, every piece of information and intelligence they get, they seem to leak it. we know what you're doing, kgb, president putin. teeth are taken out. there had been hope for a bipartisan agreement, republicans and democrats together. now, a strongly worded statement probably has vladimir putin

quaking in his boots. instead, this is what's happening, and it is beginning to be a low-level, lengthy, disruptive period, what can the u.s. do to get putin to knock it off? >> you want to do two things. one, you want to strengthen ukraine. economic help. cyber defense. make ukraine a less vulnerable target for putin. as the president hinted at yesterday, think about offensive cyber. you want to basically say, if you're going to play this game, two can do it. just say you did some things going after russia's energy industry. >> by the way, richard, explain. we always talk about what russia does to us or what they tried to do to us. can you explain just how much damage, because we never talk about it. how much damage the united states of america could do to another country if we did get engaged in cyber warfare. >> oh, we could do enormous damage. we've been self-deterred because we're worried about a world where -- it can be vulnerable. >> i guess what i'm saying is, militarily, people don't want to engage with the united states. you can ask the 300 russian

families who tried to engage with our troops in syria. that doesn't end -- it just doesn't end well. it's the same thing with cyber warfare. we're so obsessed about what other countries can do to us. we've never really engaged in it. russia doesn't want to engage us there any more than they'd want to engage us in an open battlefield. it doesn't end well, not only for russia, for anybody on the planet. >> right. steve will talk about it, russia's economy is so concentrated, that doing certain things against their energy sector would have an enormous, outsized impact. >> remember the geneva summit. president biden made a point of talking about the gas fields of russia, and more or less said, wouldn't it be a shame if something happened to that? that was the most cloaked threat we've heard from the president. >> now the waste management. willie, pretty gas fields you got there. shame. >> doing something to the russian gas fields would be self-destructive. it would drive the price of oil into the sky. >> the president warned yesterday, it was interesting,

yes, you're worried about inflation. energy prices could go up. it was an interesting speech. he was talking to the russian people and american people, first time he'd done that since the crisis unfolded. it was an important day yesterday. >> willie, it is interesting we're talking about joe biden actually making the right moves, much like bush 41 going into the first gulf war. you see the evidence of that, in that you've got mitch mcconnell, who has been talking about him going in the right direction. you have other republicans that are lining up with him shoulder to shoulder. i mean, this is a bipartisan effort. it is so nice to have both parties talking together for foreign adversaries to see. jim rish, who, of course, is a ranking member on the foreign affairs committee, along with chairman menendez, everything is coordinated. even when they couldn't get to a specific deal on sanctions, which i think they could still

get to eventually, they decided to all come together and deliver a tough statement to russia, saying you step over the line, we're here and you're going to pay for it. >> yeah. it is almost disorienting in this day and age to see bipartisan support for this. we see an out party supporting the president of another party. steve rattner, joe is right, you've got senators menendez and rish working on this deal for sanctions, a bipartisan deal. they've hit a snag. republicans are working on their own sanctions now. chuck schumer said he'd be in support of the sanctions. i guess my question to you is, if they did levy sanctions, putin has shrugged them off in the past. would they have an impact? is that a deterrent for him this time? >> sanctions are always a deterrent of some sort or another, but the fact is that, as richard eluded to, the russian economy is actually in somewhat better shape today to deal with the sanctions than before. john mccain famously called russia a country masqueraing as

a gas station. but they've done well economically the last few years. their gdp rate of growth has been almost exactly the same as ours. it is not terribly high. we've been through a pandemic, just under 2%. but they are growing. more interestingly, he has dramatically brought down their public debt level. they had debt over 100%. they went bankrupt in the late 1990s. he has been working that down. today, their debt to gdp level is 17%. >> who would have guessed, by the way, that boris yeltzin wouldn't be a good manager of money? >> putin has done all right. >> yeah, but not yeltzin. i'm not letting him guard the bank. >> they have the fiscal space to withstand sanctions, pay what they need to pay, and they're not going bankrupt soon. the other thing he's done with respect to foreign exchange is he's built up their foreign exchange reserves.

they have $650 billion of foreign exchange at the moment. that's the fourth largest of any country. it's 50% more than their total foreign debt. they only hold 16% of it in dollars. the rest is in euros, rmb, in gold, and all kinds of other stuff. by comparison, we are a reserve currency so it is not a fair comparison. we hold $250 billion in foreign reserves. he has the firepower, so to speak, the economic firepower, if you will, to withstand a fair amount of sanctions. lastly, just for interest, in terms of his military, they also spend roughly the same percentage of their budget on the military as we do. about 4% or so of gdp. but that doesn't, for them, lead to a lot of money because it is a smaller country. their total military budget is $62 billion. ours is $778 billion. it is kind of amazing how much trouble you can cause with a $62

billion defense budget, which is roughly, i think, the size of india's. it is also true that they have about 1.4 million men and women in their armed services, roughly the same as we do. they obviously don't pay those people very much. but they've done a lot with not a lot of rubles. >> let's talk about how things are different than they would have been 10, 15 years ago. the fact, i think, he's made a brilliant strategic move in leaning so hard into his relationship with china. when we're talking to other countries, we're saying, well, you must do a, b, c, or d, or we're not dealing with you. 15 years ago, they'd say, oh, okay. now, it's, okay, we'll talk to china. this is very impressive. they are doing so much better. when i talk about we need to have a better understanding of russia historically, world war ii, these charts help a lot, too, to understand that actually they are not what we all characterized russia as being 10, 15 years ago.

plus, they can now go to cseh china. >> that's correct. oil and gas is important in their economy, it's about 10% of their economy. ours is like 1%. still, it is only 10%. they have an economy. they're major exporters of other commodities that boomed in this market and is more valuable. >> what has putin done to turn this around? >> he's just done really tight fiscal management. for example, they put import tariffs on a bunch of stuff, including things like european cheese when they got into a trade war with europe. so he's basically said to the russian consumers, you're going to have to get by with less because we need to get our fiscal house in order. we need to get our budget in order. we need to get our foreign trade in order. essentially, he's imposed, i would say a rigorous fiscal discipline on the people. >> julia yafi saying putin was facing problems at home because he was actually cutting back on

some of the entitlement programs. on retirement, saying, we're not going to give you as generous retirement benefits, whi is par austeity that has helped balance the books. >> the other thing that of oil. in the russian budget, the price of oil, in order to get a balanced budget, is under $50 a barrel. now, it is roughly twice that. it's given putin an enormous cushion in order to go into a crisis. indeed, the crisis he helped generate raised the price of oil. russian figure skating star kamila valiyeva is on track for an individual gold medal after her winning performance in the women's short program yesterday. the 15-year-old has been allowed to compete despite testing positive for a banned heart drug prior to the games. but there is new reporting this morning about the sample she provided. in valiyeva's arbitration hearing on sunday, there was

testimony on her behalf that suggested the positive result may have stemmed from a case of contamination with medication her grandfather was taking. >> i'm sorry? >> and the "new york times" reports a document filed in her hearing reveals that in addition to the banned drug, there were two other legal substances that can treat the heart found in her sample from christmas day. now, according to the chief executive of the u.s. anti-doping agency, the benefits of the combination of the three substances, quote, seem to be aimed at increasing endurance. >> yeah. >> reducing fatigue and promoting greater efficiency in using oxygen. >> willie, i don't know about you. i don't know a lot of 15-year-old girls that have three heart medications coursing through their veins on christmas day, of any year. some people say, well, two aren't banned. but it shows a pattern that they are actually using -- >> it's a strategy.

>> a pattern and a strategy of using heart medication, like the one they found that should have disqualified her by now, for the purposes of endurance, increasing endurance and blood flow through the heart. >> yeah, that's the key. it's not just a heart medication. i don't understand the grandfather explanation. was she taking her grandfather's medication? need follow-ups on that. >> baffled. >> it enhances performance. it does. it's on the banned list. if you test positive for it, you're not supposed to compete. she competed last night. she is perhaps -- she may grow up to be the greatest figure skater of all time. she's the best in the world at 15 years old. obviously, last night, there were a lot of people frustrated. why is she allowed to skate if she tested positive for a banned substance? johnny weir and tara lipinski, the great commentators for nbc sports, they went silent last night during her performance. they said, this is just uncomfortable for us. we're going to watch it. we're not going to comment on it. making clear they don't think

that she should be on the ice. i would point again to sha'carri richardson, the great american sprinter who qualified first for the 100 meters, was supposed to be at tokyo. she tested positive for thc, the active ingredient in marijuana. was immediately pushed out of the olympics. it's on the banned list. she tested positive, couldn't run. why could this 15-year-old skater who tested positive for something that actually enhances your performance, unlike marijuana, why is she out there skating? >> you know, it's a real shame, willie, too. >> sad. >> you look at her. extraordinary skater. >> beautiful. >> kind of like the barry bonds thing. if barry bonds had never taken steroids, he would have been in the hall of fame a long time ago. he was one of the greats. you can tell, she's one of the greats. people around her have done her a horrible disservice. her real introduction to the world stage as one of the great skaters, possibly of all time, has been marred by illegal drug.

>> yeah. and she is brilliant. there's no other way to put it. johnny weir said that last night. he said, look, she is one of the best we'll ever see, but this is not right. she shouldn't be out there. you're right, perhaps people let her down. i hope she doesn't have a heart condition. that would be terrible. but the rules are the rules. the fact of the matter is she tested positive for a banned substance before the olympics. >> all right. we'll continue to follow this. richard haass and steve rattner, thank you very much for joining us. >> thank you. >> we have to get back to the office. >> exactly. >> give the phone number one more time. >> okay, okay. ahead on "morning joe" -- >> that's 555-5555. chiropractors are sending over referrals. a school board recall election is making national headlines. the surprising results from san francisco. what it could mean for school districts across the country. plus, some senate republicans are pushing pack

against a potential no fly list for unruly passengers. >> why? >> why they don't want people who disrupt flies banned from the skyings. >> and beat up the crew and -- >> everything is upside down with people. >> make flight attendants' and pilots' lives missable. >> so you can make your point. >> fellow passengers. this is conseconservative? no. >> we are retaining a new law firm. barnacle and sharpton and -- >> i don't know if they're in the same league. >> i like it. >> look at them though. they have firepower. they have firepower. >> we'll take them on. >> yeah. >> if i'm doing a class action, i'm going to these guys. you guys slip and falls, duis. i got a cousin, maury, okay. he wasn't drinking. he is going to need your help. >> you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. >> special rate. the "morning joe" rate.

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the path is gilded with the potential for rich returns. every day. >> half past the hour. welcome back to "morning joe. "beautiful shot of new york city. >> gorgeous. >> the sun is coming up. everybody, wake up. we have to get to work. we have to get t work. >> not as cold as it was yesterday. >> some people might want to come back to the office. >> a light-weight, double breasted fabric. >> it's not lightweight. >> it looks likeblazer. >> underneath, i don't get it. >> double breasted blazer. that's what people usually throw on and walk out of the house in the morning. >> are you okay? >> i'm okay. >> does it have the -- >> did you wake up at home in the morning? >> loaded question. does that say made for donnie

deutsch? >> here's the thing -- >> i know what it is. justify what it is. >> no. you know, it's just right off the rack. they have these special labels. >> you bought it off the rack. >> you did not. >> no. >> by the way, nothing compares to this guy. let's really go there. >> that fabric right there, i must say, that is exquisite. >> do you have the little patches put on to make yourself feel good? what is that? >> i need more than patches to make myself feel good. >> it literally says your name inside your jacket? >> if he loses it -- >> that's it. >> by the way, i have clips for my mittens. this is all just functional stuff. [ laughter ] >> wow. that's a lot of thinking and planning. >> i'm curious. you know, we're now going and doing 14 hours a day. >> yeah. >> i want you to have a branding segment on what's up, what's down. >> yeah. >> remember the -- >> the arrows. >> -- conventional wisdom error -- >> what is your brand up for the week? you have it prepared. what is the brand up and brand down?

>> okay. brand up is joe biden. >> yeah. >> he is doing the anti-afghanistan. >> yeah. >> in terms of -- basically, i think, strangely enough, i'd give a brand down to donald trump. because of the fact that his accounting firm basically said, you cannot rely on ten years of our financials. >> mr. pillow is having the problems. >> it tells you something, that something is coming in a big way. so the ex-president brand down. current president, brand up. >> i like it. >> eddie glaude, arrows straight up. >> it is more of a shooting star. >> rocketship, my man. >> we love eddie. >> i'm saying that because we're about to go on a woke tirade, and eddie is going to give us a big hug afterwards. he's going to pray for us as sinners, and we'll just move forward. >> mike barnicle, brand up. >> decent dude. always wrong, you say, but

decent dude. barnicle, your wife let you out of the house. >> i woke up this morning. >> did she give you -- >> it's a plus every day. >> wake up every morning. >> it's a plus. >> that is a plus. wife give you $20, $30 to put in your pocket? >> $15. >> $15. >> never gives me even numbers. new polling suggests crime and homelessness are dragging down the approval of california governor gavin newsom. 48% of registered voters in california approve of the governor's performance. that's down from 64% in september of 2020. on the issues, 51% of california voters believe the governor doing poorly addressing crime and public safety. up 16 points since 2020 and 66% believe he is doing poorly handling the issue of homelessness. that's up 12%. despite the falling numbers, voters do not think governor

newsom is at risk of losing re-election this year. meanwhile, in san francisco, voters last night ousted three members of its board of education in a landslide recall election. the recall of each member was supported by more than 70% of voters. critics accuse them of putting progressive politics over policies like the pandemic, for example. the board was criticized for trying to rename schools when many parents wanted the focus to be on reopening schools. some of the schools targeted were named after abraham lincoln, george washington, thomas jefferson, and even long-time u.s. senator diane feinstein. the election also galvanized asian-american parents after the board changed admissions requirements for one of its city's most prestigious high schools. san francisco mayor supported the recall and will now have to appoint replacements. this is a lot. >> you know, rev, we talk about

these issues in new york city all the time. about how there is nothing progressive about allowing homeless citizens to sleep on grates in 10 degree weather. same thing on the crime issue. it seems that we're seeing a transformation. mayor breed in san francisco has come out against a lot of the lawlessness going on in parts of san francisco. and other cities all across the country, as well as this recall. talk about -- talk about how eric adams' election really was a harbinger of things to come, not just for american politics but specifically for urban politics for democrats. >> i think that what eric adams' election showed is that if people that are running talk to the concerns of people, that they will support them even if they disagree on some of the

particulars. because they feel that that person understands what they're going through every day. so eric adams and i may not agree on some things, like bail reform or other things, but eric adams is addressing the plight that people live every day in the communities. whereas, some of these so-called progressives -- and the reason i say so-called is they've appointed themselves progressive. they really have not done things in a progressive way, not really been involved. the mistake they have with me is the movements they quote, i happened to be there up front. i know they weren't there. >> right. >> they're theorizing this stuff. my position is that those that address the people are the ones people support. in many cases, we're getting people that talk more people they've never talked to and they don't even really like. >> yeah. donnie, david shore after the 2020 election, one of obama's

top data people, looked through the polls and warned democrats, has been warning democrats a long time, you're underperforming with hispanics, underperforming with people of color, with black voters. you're underperforming with asian-americans. white woke democrats are far more progressive, even on issues of racial justice than people of color. he issued a warning and seems to be doing it every day. you're getting too far out there. you're losing hispanic voters. you're not carrying the number of black voters you have in the past. you're running off white voters. come back here. by the way, what makes david shores' message so powerful is he, himself, is one of these white progressives. he said, we have to look at ourselves and understand, we may lose this thing. >> yeah. the democrats have got to step away from the super wokeness.

san francisco really tells what is going on. you have three school board members that were voted out by 70% because they're focusing on things like changing the name of schools. abraham lincoln on a school. george washington on a school. this is not what voters care about. are kids safe? are they getting the right education? >> are the schools open? >> are the l sk schools open? >> yeah. >> the thing -- and this is a fact, this is not a discussion and even a moral discussion but a factual political discussion, that if you give the republicans the ability to point to democrats as this super woke culture focused on the wrong things that don't matter to voters, that don't matter to them putting food on the table, don't matter to their kids going to school, don't matter the higher wages, you're going to lose. it is that simple. you need to step away from super wokeness. >> and i know, eddie, you're of a different opinion on this. do you have any concerns about the democrats going too far for rank and file voters and all

demographic groups? >> my concern is whether or not we have the super wokeness doing this. that's my concern. so i think i've always been worried as a student of history, as one of the ivory tower theorists, rev -- >> he was, by the way, talking to you. >> no, he wasn't. >> a glance across the table. >> i don't consider eddie in that at all. >> he's not at all, no. >> eddie comes from mississippi. >> he does. >> i'm talking about people who never knew mississippi was on the map. eddie doesn't fit that. >> eddie went to morehouse. >> thanks for mentioning it. >> i have to say, you are a legend at morehouse. somebody that works in the white house ran up to me and told me about eddie glaude. you were the first to be president of the student government as a junior. he said, every young man on the campus, they all walked around and tried to talk and carry themselves like eddie glaude.

>> oh, man. >> you are a legend there. >> morehouse is not ivory tower. >> it's a great school. >> as a student of history though -- appreciate that. as a student of history, one of the things i see as one of the most dangerous combinations to thwart american progress is the combination of those who are explicitly bigoted and those who are worried about going too far. you can have someone actually co-write, co-author the 13th amendment, but think the 15th amendment goes too far. >> right. >> you can have someone actually support desegregation in the south but actually think, right, fair housing act goes too far. great society goes too far. so whenever i hear the language of going too far, i hear -- and it usually comes from latte liberals, mcha liberals -- not you, rev. >> i'll give you the mocha. i use the latte. let's get copyrights on those.

>> it comes from those who are invested in the status quo, who are worried they're going to lose something. >> take a guy like david shore, for instance. there are a lot of good people out there who are scared to death that kevin mccarthy is going to be the next speaker of the house. >> right. >> donald trump is going to get re-elected in 2024. that's what drives david shore. i know it's what drives donnie deutsch. it drives a lot of democrats who are afraid the party is going too far. >> right. so i think the fear of the party going too far is a fear based in a framework that has been defined by the age of reagan. a democratic party that sought to think of itself -- and we had this conversation at princeton -- in a third way, the republican light. i believe when voters have a choice between real republicans and republican light, they more often go to the republicans. so part of what i think is to avoid this kind of political spectrum, left, right, progressive, conservative,

actually speak to the issues on the ground. in san francisco, it is more complicated. there was a whole bunch of outside money that came into this. in san francisco, there is a debate about whether the mayor is engaged in a power grab. these three would go up for election in november. we begin to chart the money. we see the money is not necessarily local. it is part of a concerted campaign around the country by folks who are targeting school boards, who are connected to crt. mind you -- >> san francisco though. this is not birmingham, alabama. >> you're right. >> it is outside money. there's some power grab stuff in there. >> it's the issues also. >> i was going to say -- >> where i was going with the issue, i would only add this to eddie's analysis. not only do you have those who think going to the 15th amendment, 16th amendment or whatever is too far, you have those that undercut those of us

that are really on the front lines saying, well, we don't need the 13th, 14th, 15th amendment. we need to do away with everything. that's easy for them to say in theory. that's what i'm saying. tomorrow, i'm going to minneapolis to do the eulogy of a funeral of a young man. 2 years old, killed in a no knock gun warrant. no knock warrant, right? we're saying you have to change the law. you've got others that claim they're more woke than us and say, we don't need no law at all. then how do we protect that family? i agree, there's the extreme on this side. but there's the extreme on the other side that are used to undercut those of us that are out there really doing the work. woke without work means nothing. >> yeah. mike barnicle, obviously, a lot of concerns inside the biden white house. that the democratic party going

too far left. they will also be quietly pointing to what happened in san francisco to say, you know, we've got to get the schools open. we've got to focus on educating our kids, doing the right thing. i need to stop talking because, man, you sound like you're loaded for bear. go. >> let's dial this down a little in terms of the iq level, okay? i'll take it down to the -- >> that's my spot. don't take my spot. >> i'll take it down and boil it down to this. you can make a strong case, i think, that too many democrats just don't speak in terms of the average american comprehending what they're saying. >> right. >> they don't use language that is understandable to the average american. >> talking democratic politicians? >> huh? >> democratic politicians, you're saying? >> yes, yes. what i mean by that is more of the more important issues in this country was unveiled for the umpteenth time yesterday in san francisco with the supervisors being voted out.

the issue is this, if you have a child who was 12 years old two years ago when the pandemic began, you can look at that child now in high school and think that that child has missed so much of life. socialization, education, promise of perhaps college, gone, erased, taken from him or her because there's been no school for all practical purposes for two years for millions of american families. they wake up each day and have each day for the past couple of years, wondering, school today, no school today, virtual school today, masks today, no masks today, work today, no work today, stay home today? what are we going to do? >> tests. >> the anxiety level in this country is like a pressure cooker, a pressure cooker. >> that's right. >> when they hear these, for lack of a better phrase, and i hate the phrase, woke democrats talking about something that does not apply to them or their

household -- >> right. >> -- where are they going to go? they'll go to two places. one is truly dangerous, they go online. that's where they live, online. that's where the ocean of hate and resentment and anxiety further fuels them. and then the other place that they could go, unfortunately for the democrats, the republican party. >> well, that's -- >> they're doing it. >> -- a little of what we were talking about at dinner last night. the democrats, if there are three issues that i think people are looking for answers on, it's covid. what has been the biden answer on that? and it's economy and crime. how do they speak for themselves on those three issues so that they stand out. >> let's remember the three cs here, donnie. covid, crime, cost of living. >> okay. >> those are the three issues. democrats, covid, crime, cost of living. write it down on your blackboard. write it down on your hand.

covid, crime, cost of living. those are the three issues that people are going to be talking about. when they step into the voting booth, that's what's going to drive the voters who are going to determine whether republicans control the house and senate or democrats control the house and senate. >> it is. because those are about the voters. it's about me, not about you. people are selfish. i don't mean that in the bad sense of the word. they care about their well-being. those three things have to do with their daily well-being. >> let me say this, i used to see people go into voting booths when i was running. it scared the hell out of me. i had to drive away, you know, because i couldn't figure out exactly what they were doing. i figured out pretty quickly they were voting for their best interest. for their kids' best interest. for their parents' best interest. for their schools' best interest.

let's just face it, it's the wealthy. it's the elites. it's the people in the ivory towers. it's those of us around the table. we can go, well, you know, i'm really concerned just generally about where the republican -- i mean, we have the luxury of being philosophical when we go into vote. the majority of americans, they're trying to get by. they want their kids who are having emotional problems be able to go back to school. they want their small businesses, they want people to come into the stores again. we elites, republican elites, democratic elites, independent elites, have the luxury of sort of looking at it from 30,000 feet. most americans don't. so you're right, they vote for their family's best interest, and they should. >> what donald trump understood was that americans hate elitism.

they hate it. the average person -- >> no, he understood resentment. that's the only thing he understood. >> it's a different way of looking at it. >> he understood the elites. it's about race and elitism. he understood that. we can't give that back to republicans. we really are -- and we're on the precipice. if we don't get this right this time -- >> thank you. >> yes. >> if we don't get it right, it's over. you put trump and mccarthy back in. democracy is over. i'm not overstating it. that's where we're at. the democrats have to understand what wins elections and what loses elections. >> both parties, republicans and democrats, too many of them don't understand, i don't think, grasp one fundamental thing in this country. they always talk about, we want your family to get ahead. we want your family to do better. huge majority of families, i would submit, would settle for, hey, i want to get even with things. i just want to stay even with things.

>> yeah. also, just speaking -- you said "we," we have to get this right. there are republicans out there who actually agree with mitch mcconnell, that january 6th was a travesty. that donald trump is bad, not only for the republican the rep party but the republic itself, so when you say we have to get this right, there are a helluva lot of republicans, former republicans, independents out there, not just democrats saying there is so much on the line, but i will tell you, i'm hearing from a lot of those people going, what are the democrats doing? >> yeah. there's a saying in some instances, it's contested. who's the we is part of the problem. i think you're absolutely right. when there are folks on the so-called progressive side, when our kids aren't in school, they're experiencing anxiety, concerned about the names on

buildings, that's a problem. when you're talking about fundamental issues like putting food on the table, keeping a roof over your head, sending your kids to college, it's a performance art. >> you said it. let's face it. so many of these people that get on pro-trump television, it's always performance. but you're getting that on the woke side too. it's performative art, and it's leaving the country in peril. >> that's why we want to talk about these things in peril. when mike talks about resentment, a lot of that could be countered if people would talk about what you're resenting is not real. so last week we bring up the issue of the nfl and we want black owners and black coaches. people resent that until you hear people say, you do realize there's never been a black own never the history of the nfl,

and people start saying, oh, i didn't know that. if we talk to people rather than at them, you diffuse that. trump preyed on that. they're taking away from that. rather than encountering that, you get perform ative acting. they're playing the same script because both of them are not dealing with the needs of the people. >> really quickly, i understand the nfl is pursuing a certain black billionaire to buy the denver broncos. >> right. >> are you going to talk him into doing that? >> i will not tell you. i would rather deny talking about that. >> mike, go ahead. >> you talked about here this morning, in these last 10, 15 minutes, the state of the union is going to be an important speech.

uniquely, it's uniquely outlined for joe biden. that's who he is. your family. he's from the average family. i'm from the average family. he can say with clarity and honesty, no big words, short speech, 20 minutes at length, no long laundry list of accomplishments they usually do, clapping, booing, both sides, just straight to the kitchen table. >> one final thing. i see last night, biden and that speech, you know, he talked about being a bipartisan president that could bring people together, and all we've heard from the media, all we've heard from progressive democrats, all we've heard from trump republicans, he's failed like everyone else. he can't bring people together. look at ukraine. everybody, republicans and democrats alike, shoulder to shoulder. look at the biggest

infrastructure bill in american history. bipartisan. he brought people together for that. look at the covid relief bill. >> it hasn't been pretty, but -- >> he brought people together. not been pretty, but he has had three significant bipartisan achievements. >> there's more to be done. >> again, this goes back to democrats not knowing how to message. >> something to run on. >> he's actually making washington work. he's got to worry about what? covid. >> the economy. >> cost of living, and what was our third? crime. >> reverend al, thank you for coming on. tell us about the funeral real quick. >> it's tomorrow, the young man that was killed when police burst into his house with a no-knock warrant. he's lying there in his bed, he rolls over. he has a licensed gun, and they

just shoot him. no taser, no warner, just shoot him. >> by the way, people kick down your door and you have a licensed gun, what are you going to do? i'm not going to sit there going, hello, hello. if somebody kicks down my door, i'm getting the gun. >> he was not even the name on the warrant. so this is like breonna taylor. now you have this young man, amir locke. we need federal law on no-knock warrants because they keep happening, and they only happen in certain communities, and we know that. >> let his family know that we're going to keep them in our thoughts and prayers, everybody here in our family. >> when we come back, we'll talk about it more. coming up, stitching together the text messages leeing up to january 6th. jackie alemany joins us with her

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welcome back to "morning joe." a live look at times square. the sun is up and everyone's up and running in new york city. time to go to work. it's wednesday, february 16th. mike barnicle and eddie is still was. joining the conversation is john avlon. he's a senior political analyst with our friends at cnn. we're happy to have him on about his new book. his new book is "lincoln and the fight for peace." we'll get to that in just a moment. it's great to have you on board. first, the news. with tens of thousands of russian troops still on ukraine's border, president

biden is warning that a russian invasion still remains a distinct possibility. in his first fulmer remarks since the crisis began, he eeps to negotiation but directly warning russia that the united states would respond to any aggression. nbc correspondent peter alexander has the latest. >> reporter: new this morning defense secretary lloyd austin putting muscle behind president biden's head words, visiting the nato alliance being tested by russia. president biden is vowing to give diplomacy every chance even after the stark assessment of russia's capability to invade ukraine. >> our analysts indicate they remain very much in a threatening position. an invasion remains distinctly possible. >> reporter: overnight the defense ministry showing military equipment leaving areas

of ukraine, but the u.s. government says it's not verified that russia's troops are pulling back. their troops along the border has risen from 130,000 to 150,000, and even as members of the 82nd airborne left for poland t president made clear the u.s. and nato are not a threat to russia. >> to the citizens of russia, you are not our enemy. >> reporter: and had this blunt message for vladimir putin himself. >> i've been clear if russia targets americans in ukraine, we will respond forcibly. >> reporter: still putin wants security and wants ukraine banned from nato. it could be a precursor to invasion. cyber attacks knocked out two state owned banks on tuesday. with what happens next still

uncertain, president biden acknowledges a russian invasion could reverberate through america as well. >> i will not pretend this will be painless it. could impact our energy crisis. where we're at risk today, we'll pay a steeper price tomorrow. joining us u.s. editor at the "financial times," ed louis. i guess we can begin with the latest. while there are sanctions and consequences, there is also other forms of warfare beginning in ukraine as it pertains to russia. >> yeah. the cyber attacks, of course, are something that's been going on from russia to ukraine since 2014. we shouldn't forget ukraine has been fighting a war for eight years. part of that war is kinetic, 14,000 ukrainians. part of it is cyber warfare. so this is -- this isn't

actually anything very new. it could be of a far greater scale than we've seen, and it could go beyond ukraine, of course. >> mike go, ahead. >> have you picked up anything among your sources about the intelligence coming out of moscow, and it would lead some to believe putin does not have 100% satisfaction among his closest advisers. we don't know who they are obviously. but there's some unrest about his moves in ukraine or lack of moves out of ukraine. >> well, we do know -- it's a very, very good question. part of what's been taken and has struck many of us in the last few days is the certainty with which people like jake sullivan and indeed the president have been speaking in terms of the intelligence they've been getting on the ground and by implication from the kremlin. what we do know is putin's

circle of trust is much narrower than it used to be. this is typical of autocrats that they get more paranoid as time goes on, and those that they share information with, part of that must surely be because there is some contrivance and difference of opinion in the ministry over an attack on ukraine. i think that putin gambles, that the west would be divided, that he would be able to continue to drive wedges between western nations. i think he's been surprised. many of us have been surprised by the degree to which biden has unified the west. even the german social democratic chancellor, normally the first apologist within western europe, even he is now reading the riot act to putin.

so it's a very good question to which i don't know a precise answer. >> it's really telling. we have john avlon with us to talk about his book "lincoln and a time for peace." >> good to talk with you, ed. i'm wondering why putin might be blinking in the face of threats of sanctions givenen that he's kind of thrown them off in the past. what's different in this regime that might have caused him to back down? >> we don't know yet just how tough the western sanctions are going to be. i did mention there's a surprising degree of western unity, but we don't have package of sanctions that the west would impose if there was any type of russian invasion into ukraine. at the most extreme level it would be kicking russia out of the s.w.i.f.t. international payment system, which would turn it into a barter economy. it could deal in remnant b and

other currencies, but not the dollar. that's probably the most extreme sanction. targeting people around putin, exposing panama-paper-style proxies for putin, teachers worth $2,000, that kind of thing really gets under his skin because he's got a lot of money. some estimates up to $50 billion, looted from rapture in offshore accounts around the world. that kind of action might make him think much more carefully than action sanctions that damage the russian people. >> wow. >> ed luce, thank you very much for your analysis this morning. >> thank you. $2 billion -- willie, you and i should have studied judo in college. $2 billion judo teachers. who knows.

>> i can still do the crane kick from "karate kid." i can do it if it's still worth $2 billion. president biden is proposing another effort to with hold information from the committee investigating the january 6th attack of the capitol. nbc new has obtained a copy of the letter sent to the national ar kievgs ordering the agency to hand over white house visitor logs the panel is seeking. first reported this morning by "the new york times," the paper states in a letter to the national archives, biden's white house council said biden had rejected trump's claiming that the visitors laws were subject to zpec active privilege and that in light of the urgency of the committee's work, the agency should provide the material to the committee within 15 days. "the times" notes biden's white house council told the national archives the documents need to be disclosed in a timely fashion

because congress has a compelling need. willie? >> meanwhile the select committee issued six new subpoenas yesterday. the people were involved in organiing slates of what they call alternate electors to challenge joe biden's 2020 election victory. one went to arizona's kelli ward who tried to overturn biden's win in her state and has already sued the committee to be blocked from getting her phone records. pennsylvania state senator doug mastriano who was prominent in spreading the false clam of election fraud there was also subpoenaed as well as mark fin chiam who is running for secretary of state in arizona and has been endorsed by president trump. the three have not responded to kmernlts. subpoenas were also issued to

two meshes of trump's campaign team who are alleged to have been part of a coordinated strategy to line up alternative slate of electors, thompson said. joining us is jackie alemany who we're happy to announce this morning is an mnsbc contributor. congratulations. happy to officially join our family. we always thought of you that way. they'll piece together a timeline of events. jackie, you've been doing an incredible reporting of all this and you're laying out text messages from people like mark meadows and sean hannity real time to show what was going on that day. >> from our reporting we know that the committee has collected more messages than just mark meadows' texts. hundreds of thousands of text messages. but it's mark meadows' text messages that have been the

connect irv tissue for this committee and the work they've done since they obtained those 4,000 texts from him. so we put together sort of a map of everything that's come out so far. the committee as we've previously talked about has left a trail of bread crumbs of these text messages that they're using to put together a really vivid and comprehensive picture, and i think what's important about the text message as panel member elaine bur rah said there's a moment that would have been captured that would have otherwise been lost to history and paint a picture of the personal relationships between fox news and the white house that has helped the committee do actually a sort of forensic analysis of the social network that was being utilized in order to implement the plan of overturning the election. i highly recommend you take a

look at the picture. >> the text messages from sean hannity are so telling in that he saw the danger coming. listen to this. on january 5th, 2021, he said, e am very worried about the next 24 hours. >> that's him to mike pence. >> the night before the riots, hannity says to mark meadows, i am very worried about the next 48 hours. my question is, sean hannity was very worried about the next 48 hours. and he was telling the white house he was worried about the next 48 hours. why weren't law enforcement officers and the national guard and everybody else worried about the next 48 hours?

you are right. these text messages are pretty extraordinary. hannity also basically begging the white house, somebody in the white house to get people to stop rioting on the capitol grounds. >> yeah. and i think actually if we're taking a step back and looking holistically at mark meadows' inbox, there were people like san hannity sending text messages weeks ahead of the actual date. but there were also people like we've newly reported like james o'keefe that heads up project veritas who was adding fuel to the fire, sending mark meadows these text messages saying he had proof of voter fraud in churches in atlanta. the inbox, i think, really skpemly feed the competing good and bad angels mark meadows was dealing with as he was trying to apiece a boss who clearly was

unable to accept the fact he was defeated. >> jackie, mark meadow, where does his testimony stand? >> that's a good question. our sources are asking that. the justice department has yet to make a decision whether or not they're going to take up referral from congress to hold him in criminal contempt. as one source noted to me, at this point mark meadows has provided the committee with a ton of information. it might not necessarily be necessary to have him testify,al though obviously he probably knows a lot more than just in his text messages. but at the same time, they want to see him face consequences for what they view as a clear-cut case of criminal contempt. >> all right. jackie alemany, thanks so much fur your reporting. it's great to have you as a "morning joe" contributor. >> yay. >> i'm so grateful to you guys. i have to say when i started my newsletter three years ago, i had a list of five people i wanted to read the news every day.

my grandmother, the publisher of "the new york times" because we want the competitor reading us, trump, and joe and mika. >> we're on a specialist. >> i'm so grateful for your advocacy and thank you. >> we're honored to have you here and working alongside of you. just extraordinary reporting. >> welcome. >> thank you so much and welcome. eddie, there are a lot of people now that were pushing for merrick garland to become attorney general -- >> oh, boy. >> -- because he was done so wrong by the republicans in the senate. >> and he was. >> and he was. two things can be true at once. now, there are a lot of people who are wishing that joe biden had chosen somebody else other than merrick garland. >> just a smidge more aggressive. >> there are so many examples of them being too careful, being

too worried about republicans calling them ideological or prosecutions are ideologically driven that we can name one case after another case after another case where they've hesitated and they've held bark because he's been so cautious that actually the wheels of justice are grinding to a halt. if mark meadows ignores a s&p, let me quote rudy giuliani during the clinton impeach management. if he gets the subpoena, he has to respond to the subpoena. he has no choice. it's a federal subpoena. here we have a congressional script. this is black and white. he responds to the subpoena or faces the same consequences that bannon faced. >> absolutely, and one doesn't understand it in some ways. i think -- >> he might be providing something valuable? >> it might be, but i think there's also this underlying fear that if these folks -- if we press these folks too hard, if we go after them, that

they're going to, in fact, rebel seriously, that there's this concern that if you actually go after the mark meadows, go after trump in any aggressive way, that there might very well be the danger of the cold civil war turning hot. that's the most generous read i can get. otherwise they're feckless. >> john avlon, we don't -- we don't have law enforcement officers in there to try to figure out whether they're scared to enforce a law or not. you either enforce the law, you take your oath, you enforce the law, and you don't have that fear. and, by the way, if you're worried somebody's going to do something more illegal. you have cops standing by and you throw them in jail even longer. i'm sorry. this is the way republicans think this. is the way conservatives think. you don't have an option. you obey the law or you go to jail.

that's how we used to think. people don't think that way anymore. >> that's the way you need to think. you can't get boxed out, accused of trying to play a ref. if it's not wrong, what is? you apply the law. >> thank you. >> they gave us a whole bunch of laws to deal with insurrectionists, and we ought to be applying them. you look at seditious conspiracy and a whole bunch of laws. dust them off. they haven't been really applicable recently. >> they are now. >> a lot seems to apply on people who descended the capitol and followed whoever's command, cult members, whoever you want to call them. the people who executed a lot of this are facing serious and swift judgment. >> you're having working-class americans that were grifted upon, that bought into the

grift. >> they broke the law. >> because trust fund babies that inherited $400 million, you know, have never had to work a day in their life. they suckered these people. and by the way, they're still grifting awe of them. donald trump and others, still making millions and millions of dollars from poor working-class, upper middle-class who have been suckered. just like my grand mom when jim and tammy faye baker sucked her in to giving her social security checks. >> this idea -- i love it -- of trust fund insurrectionists, that is what we're dealing with, but if you want to comply a lincoln standard, you don't do fit for people at the top. the people who willingly perpetrated this fraud, this

insurrectionist attempt to try to manipulate people to run the capitol, they need to be most held accountable, and we haven't seen that yet. look, you can see the doj or wheels of justice are moving surely but slowly. we don't have as much time as people want to think. the clock's ticking. it's time to hold them accountable. >> john, your book "lincoln and the fight for peace," i'm so glad. when i wrote a book on truman, it's because no one had written a book on truman for a long time. just like lincoln. nobody has written a book in a long time. >> he's the most historical person since jesus christ. the thing that fascinates me most about abraham lincoln from the first time he become as

state legislature in 1834 until the day he dies, he's getting hatred from abolitionists, hatred from conservatives, hatred from democrats in the north, getting hatred from everybody in the south. lincoln is constantly -- as he says himself, he's walking on a tightrope, carrying the country's burdened on his shoulder. the one guy who jokes with critics basically says, back off. let me get to the over side of the reason and therch i'm listen to you. first off, you're talking about 100,000 people were killed in the civil war. they would have killed him if they had the chance. lincoln, what does he said? with malice toward none.

what a strong example for all of news 2022. >> it is the example. and he holds himself to the high est. you know, blessed are the peacemakers because they will catch hell from all sides and lincoln definitely did. but even in the middle of the civil war, he never lost sight of the fact that nothing divides us. it's not just the words but the actions in the last six weeks of his life where he visits a field hospital and insists on comforting not just wounded soldiers, but wounded confederate soldiers to send that message. the last six weeks of his life in particular, his fight for peace, his example, he says, the peacemaker. there hasn't been been a book written about this vision for winning the peace. >> it's so interesting, too,

this attitude filtered down to his generals. you had grant. you had confederate soldiers shown mercy. go home, take your guns. sherman as well. the guy who burned down georgia. we weren't allowed to mention his name in our north georgia room. it was pretty extraordinary. >> lincoln's prescription is very clear. by conditional surrender followed by a magnanimous peace. that was the message he sent to his generals on the river queen. he's bankly remembering what lip continue. told him in the past few weeks. lincoln says give them the most

liberal and honorable terms. don't let the folks off the hook on top. we're not going to execute them, but we're not going to let them reclaim their power. >> thanks so much for the book. i go back to it over and over again. but this piece is complicated. >> it is it happens on the backs in some ways of those who were formally enslaved. think about what happens in 1866 in memphis, what happens in north new orleans after lincoln. so how do you unpack the cost of his peacemaking? >> well, i think it's a case studied in losing the peace, the dangers of losing the peace. andrew johnson did it exactly wrong. by the late summer, the

brigadier generals from the confederacy already serving as governor, which is black code for slavery without the chains. he wants amnesty. we go creating off exactly the wrong path. grant tried to get us back. he's implemented it by a southern general. that's one of the lessons of reconstruction for us right now. you need to win the peace. you need to fight for the peace. if you don't, that's the whole point of fighting for the peace. you need to waechlk peace. that's what we failed to do after the reconstruction. >> by the way, there's a lesson that mike should follow us into the 21st century.

you look at iraq, disastrous obvious invasion based on faulty evidence, but even after we were there and go back and talk to the generals that were on the ground, what made iraq unravel the way it did and go into sectarian hell. i remember talking to one general after another. to any sunni, they said, you're fired. they created isis on that day. they created isis on that day. if you had -- if you follow lincoln and you keep these people and get them working on your side, sure, a lot of people want to raise hello. how could you let saddam hue zain -- p. you would.

fahad thehistory and science. >> we end up being victors in war. one of the great beauties of abraham lincoln's line and done and a career was -- it was the way forward from war, from con flick for if hor endecember devil is peace. >> the book takes an unusual turn. you have the occupations of germany and japan and the matter shall place. where the seed of the book came from, i found a quote from general lucius clay who led the occupation through slavery. the reporter asked him what got into your decisions? he said.

>> macarthur, believe it or not. an extraordinary look at the nations that allowed japan and germany to come out the other side stronger than they were. >> great to have you on. thank you so much. up next, where we're visiting the actual scatter gate. it's a weirder story than we even remember. we'll be right back with them. we'll be right back with them.

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you get people feeling sorry for him. i didn't think that was possible. in a conspiracy like this, you build from the outer edges and go step by step. if you shoot too high and miss, everybody feels more secure. you put the investigation back months. >> we know that. and if we're wrong, we're resigning. were we wrong? >> you'll have to find that out, won't you. >> listen, i'm tired of your chicken [ bleep ] games. i don't want hints. i need know what you know. >> a scene from the adaptation of "all the washington's men" writ binen by washington reporters. joining us, garrett graff, his

new book, "watergate: a new history." good to have you on this morning. tell us a few things that haven't been noticed about watergate, the scandal as we're looking back through the lens today. >> this marks the 50th anniversary of the watergate break in june. it turns out that actually we have learned a lot over the last 25 years, and so this book was an attempt not done since 1994 for the last time to tell the full story of watergate start to finish, soup to nuts. we've learned a tremendous amount of new information during that type. no one has ever tried to write the watergate story knowing the identity of that shadowy figure from "all the president's men," "deep throat," mark felt, the director of the fbi, that dramatically rewrites our

understanding of what took place then. this book pulls together the new nixon tapes, the newly declassified tapes we've learned, the full details that we've learned for the first time of the chenault affair and until recently, until the last decade, people didn't really understand was linked to the full watergate scandal at all. so this is a very different history of watergate than the one that we're used to/from "all the president's men." >> you say watergate is actually a bigger and weirder story than we remember. how is it bigger? how is it weirder? >> you know, the maxim, joe and mika, that we always learned about watergate was the cover up is worse than the crime because we think of watergate as this singularly weird event of the dnc burglary on the night of june 17th, 1972, but what it

turns out is that watergate was an entire criminal mind-set that richard nixon's men brought to the white house and then unfolded inside the oval office and around the oval office for years achbltd so the full scope of watergate actually encompasses more than a dozen inter-related scandals, some of which on their own would be some of the biggest scandals in american political history. the chenault affair being one of those treasonous incidents. it was a plan to extend the vietnam war, keep soldiers dying in vietnam for his own political benefit. by the time watergate is done, 69 people have been indicted and charged with crimes.

george steinbrenner, the new york yankees owner ends up being convicted as part of watergate. american airlines, goodyear tires convicted as well. >> hey, garrett, from january 20th, 1969 onward, more americans were killed in vietnam than had been killed in vietnam prior to january 20th when richard nixon was sworn in for his first term as president. could you explain more madam chenault and her husband of the flying tigers, her pivotal role in elongating the war in vietnam? >> yeah. this is a great chapter that becomes actually very intimately involved in everything that unfolds with watergate years later. fall of 1968, lyndon johnson is trying to bring the war to a halt. he announces a bombing halt in vietnam to try to bring the peace talks together, which he

actually thinks will help hubert humphrey, his vice president, win the election against richard nixon. richard nixon and john mitchell, his campaign manager intercede with anna chenault, this woman, also actually coincidentally a resident of the watergate apartment complex, and get her to intervene with the south vietnamese and to tell them not to participate in the peace talks, drag out the peace talks, and south vietnam will get a better deal if they wait till richard nixon becomes president. richard nixon knows this and decides not to make hay of this. but he fears this attempt at therese listen unravel his presidency, actually becomes the event that as the pentagon papers are released in 1971 leads him to create the plumbers

and bring g. gordon liddy and hunt into d white house to try to plug the leaks that he fears will actually lead to ton rav ling of this deep dark secret at the center of the campaign. >> it's fascinating. >> the book is "watergate: a new history." garrett graff, thanks for being on the show. come congratulations. now this. pete j. o'rourke died in his home in new hampshire due to complications of lung can i. o'rourke wrote 20 books on everything from politics to cars to etiquette. his work included two number one "new york times" best sellers. born toledo, ohio, he began writing at the national lampoon

and ended up as the magazine's editor in chief and wrote for the "rolling stone." wrote for "esquire," vanity farks car & driver, the daily beeflt. his first book was entitled "modern manners: an etiquette book for rude people." a hat should be taken off when meeting a lead lady and should be left off for the rest of your life. it's a stupid look. a conservative republican he was widely admired by both sides due to his unique style, fearless writing and skewered whoever he felt was deserving. the guardian once described him

as a right-winger it's okay for lefties to like. he's survived by his wife tina and their three children. a big loss. >> there are so many great quotes, mike, from him. a question was asked of him how can you ask somebody politely if they went to harvard, and pj o'rourke said, oh, no, no, no. you don't ask. they tell you. usually at the beginning of the sentence, harvard, i went to. >> it's so true. >> here's another great quote. he said -- he was maoist. he said, i couldn't say a maoist forever. i got too fat to wear bell bombs and i realized communism meant giving my golf clubs to a family in zaire. and he also wrote this.

i love this. there was pj o'rourke and rolling stones. i loves cars. there was pj o'rourke and car & driver. i loved humor. there was pj o'rourke in national lampoon. there was a brief time conservative tichl was fun, and pj o'rourke was the reason. >> yes. >> you know, joe, in a sometimes brutal envious business, the media, pj o'rourke was one of the nicest kindest people you'd ever want to meet, no matter whether you were a conservative republican, liberal democrat, or even a progressive today. i would strongly recommend if people still struggle to find out what washington, d.c. is all about this morning, go out and buy his book "parliament of whoevers," which defined washington and it stands out in neon lights. >> absolutely. up next, secretary of state

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47 past the hour. joining us now, u.s. secretary of state anthony blinken. mr. secretary, thank you for being on with us this morning. russia suggested yesterday it's pulling back its forces. what does u.s. intel say about this? >> well, there's what russia says and what russia does, and we haven't seen any pullback of its forces. they remain massed in a very threatening way along ukraine's borders. it would be good if they followed through on what they said, but so far we haven't seen that. >> secretary of state, good to see you. the secretary-general as you may know just a short time ago says nato has seen no evidence of any sort of pullback, and, in fact,

has seen further escalation, more troop buildup in the region. what more can you tell us about that, and what more would you need to see from moscow to have any suggestion that vladimir putin is actually going to de-escalate. >> jonathan, that's exactly right. i saw what general stoltenberg said. we not only continue to see the troops mass, but they're moving toward the border, not away from the border. we need to see the opposite. we need to see troops moving away from the border. as president biden said yesterday, we'd welcome that, but we haven't seen it on the ground. the bottom line is this. we're prepared either way. we're prepared for diplomacy with russia if they're serious. we're also prepared for russian aggression. >> what would be the upside for putin by invading the ukraine? >> hmm. mike, that's a great question because, you know, what we've seen from president putin is

basically to precipitate everything he says he wants to prevent. he says he wants nato further away from russia. nato has only gotten more united, more solidified as a result of the threat of russian aggression, and, of course, for defensive reasons, is moving more forces closer to russia. and so we've seen that. we've seen russia's actions alienate more and more of the ukrainian people from russia. that's exactly what putin says he doesn't want. so it's an excellent question, one best asked of him. what he's doing and what he's countering understand minds their interest. >> we've talked about how this crisis has brought nato allies together closer than for quite some time. can you high light some things our nato alies have done because we have a constructive relationship with them. and where some troops and

weapons have been sent to counter this threat? >> well, joe, you know, it really goes back to something president biden has been doing from day one, and that is working to revitalize and re-energize our partnerships. we know every problem we we have to confront we're going to be stronger and more effective if we're doing it in unison with other countries than doing it alone, and we invested a lot in that, and it's paying off just in this case alone with ukraine and russia's threats. there have been more than 200 engagements with nato, unc, allies and partners, and as a result they're all stepping up. we have allies who are ready to join in imposing massive consequences on russia if its renews its aggression. various partners have helped bolster ukraine's defenses and stood up for ukraine's economy and bolstered that, and so we're seeing countries step up in different ways but all to the end of supporting ukraine, standing up for the principles

that are at stake here as a result of russia's threats and doing it in unison, in coordination with us. >> we saw the germans dragging their feet a little bit at the beginning of this crisis. but yesterday the german chancellor in russia seemed to be delivering a unified message, again, with the rest of nato and a unified nato is certainly a frightening specter for vladimir putin because he's been used to being able to work one member off the other. i'm curious what your assessment is of the germans. are they doing everything that they can do right now to be good nato partners? >> joe, keep this in mind, other than us, germany is the number one supporter of ukraine economically. they provided more assistance to ukraine than any other country in europe. that's very meaningful, at a time when all of these tensions are sort of talking down ukraine's economy, germany's assistance makes a big difference. so different countries are doing different things in different ways but all toward the same

end, supporting ukraine, supporting the principles that are being threatened by russia, supporting us in trying to engage in diplomacy but also being ready if russia chooses aggression. >> we had richard haas on earlier this morning talking about the fact that even if there's not an invasion, we may have cyber attacks, other sorts of attacks. i'm curious, are we ready, are we ready to go? are we prepared for those attacks and countering those attacks and have we let the russians know that those attacks, too, will lead to a dead end for them? >> yes. you know, i was with president biden in geneva some months ago when he met with president putin. that was the time you'll remember that was the time the ransomware attacks were directed at us. president biden said to president putin, i can only imagine sitting where you are with the energy infrastructure if someone engage instead a ransomware or cyber attack

against you, you wouldn't like it. >> we were saying earlier, nice gas field if anything should happen to it. i wanted to ask about the other actor in this scenario, president zelensky in ukraine. there's some mixed messaging from him. at this point we know he's been trying to down play the threat to the ukrainian people, which has been a marked difference from what we're hearing from you and the west. give us the state of that relationship, how often are you talking to him, what is he saying to you about the threat he sees? >> we're in constant contact with our ukrainian counter parts, including my counter part, and of course president zelensky doesn't want his people to panic. he's trying to keep things calm. i understand that. they're taking this dead seriously, and so are we. we have provided to ukraine over the last year more security assistance than in any previous year. just the other day, we provided a billion dollar sovereign loan

guarantee. we're doing this in lock step with them, and we want to make sure we're there for them. others are there for them in this hour of need. >> you know, mr. secretary, i downloaded some of your songs in the past, i must say when i'm driving in my car, and you know, apple would just pop up, a song will just pop up as a suggestion, and for some reason you come up more than the beatles or rolling stones and i was thinking about this the other day when you put out a play list, and there were some people on the, let's just say the trump right that were so outraged as if you couldn't, like, listen to music, have a life and manage the state department. you seem to be doing so very effectively, but thank you for putting out the play list. we're getting good music selections and somehow we're managing to survive as a republic at the same time. >> joe, right back at you. i've got a lot of your songs

downloaded over the years. i. >> of course he does. >> i love the intros and outros for every segment. got to have a little music in your life! >> got to have a little music in your life. >> you know why he plays my music. >> because it's good. i love your music. >> it makes you mentally tough, if you can get through that, you can get through anything, staring you in the face. thank you, mr. secretary. >> good to be with you. >> we appreciate it. finally this morning, kind of a different angle here, we're taking a look at the relationship between misogyny and autocracy that's playing out around the world. joining us now, founder of "all in together" lauren leaders and professor of history at new york university, ruth ben-ghat, author of the book "strongmen," you sent the analysis that examines the links between misogyny and autocracy. it warns quote while the 20th

century saw improvements in women's equality in most parts of the world, the 21st is demonstrating that misogyny and authoritarianism are not just common comorbidities but mutually reinforcing ills. explain. >> yeah, i was stunned by this report. i thought it was extraordinary, and i have been thinking about this for a long time because, you know, the united states over the last 20 plus years really starting with the bush 43 administration and our engagement in afghanistan had recognized as part of our foreign policy that women were critical to stabilizing democracies around the world and we invested heavily in making sure women's rights were part of our support of democracy, and what the report really shows is that around the world and including here in the united states where you see backsliding democracy as we talk about so much on the show and the risks posed by it that there's a direct link to institutionalized misogyny, the roll back of

women's rights, participation in democracy undermines democracy itself, and i think it's an incredibly important report and important trend we should be watching closely here and around the world. >> ruth ben-ghat, you write about strongmen, and does this compute? >> oh, absolutely. and, you know, it's very easy for us to laugh at -- talking about putin a lot, he does ice baths, he's stripping his shirt off, and it's easy not to take that seriously, but it's deadly serious because when we look at when strongmen appeal in it a society, it's when there's been a lot of gender emancipation, so like kind of corrective to the feeling that males are losing control over bodies. there's also the thing that autocracy is about lawlessness, and so look at what trump's done, this kind of macho lawlessness that becomes something that's prized in a society. so that's why i dedicated in "strongmen," a whole chapter to

my cheesemo, look at a tool of rule, alongside corruption and propaganda. >> this is eddie glaug, do we see this element in trumpism, a future of trumpism that we have experienced over the last few years. >> the toxic masculinity that goes hand in hand with trump is undeniable. let's look at what's happening with voting rights. we talk about access to the polls, laws passed around the country that restrict access. we don't often talk about what that does to women's democratic participation. it's very hard to wait in line to vote for six hours if you don't have child care in places where they have rolled back things like drive through voting, there's a concern that's going to disproportionately affect women. i think what you see is the link, and some of trump's most ardent supporters who have a history of abuse towards women, et cetera, so i think there is a link. we have to look at it, and ruth

is right, the ma cheese moe toxic masculinity goes hand in hand with autocracy. we should be watching for it here and everywhere around the world. >> ruth, it's so interesting, we were talking earlier this morning about how donald trump did better, especially with hispanic men than the biden campaign ever imagined they would. and they started saying early on, months before the election, said he's got this strongman stick going and there are a lot of men, not just hispanic men, but in this case, it did bump the numbers up, in some black men it did bump the numbers up, and that appealed across demographic boundaries. >> yeah, pause the personality cult which trump certainly has one is all about being the man that other men would like to be. the man who gets away with things. that's why when he said, the

access hollywood tapes broke right before the election, i knew this would help him with certainly people, not hurt him. >> ruth ben-ghat, and lauren leader, thank you both very much for being on this morning. and that does it for us this morning. chris jansing picks up the coverage right now. hi there, live at msnbc headquarters in new york, it is wednesday, february 16th. we have got a lot to cover. let's start with the fast moving developments in the standoff over ukraine. defense secretary lloyd austin is in brussels this morning where he's meeting with his counter parts in nato as we speak, not giving up on diplomacy yet. he talked act the strength of the alliance just a few minutes ago. >> we're committed to article v and also the principles of collective security, and so