there's so much i wanted to read from the buck. it is all like that. ali vitali. the other member of the levy club. the capitol hill correspondent and the electable writer buck. why america hasn't put a woman in the white house yet is the subtitle. and total 184 classified documents were found inside boxes taken from donald trump's mar-a-lago estate. more on those latest threat -- heavily redacted affidavit. the velshi banned book club is diving into the book crank. a deeply emotional and real story about addiction. author ellen hopkins is going to join me to discuss. live stay with us, another hour of velshi begins now. it is 9 am in the, east exam in the west.

i am ali velshi. we know more this weekend than ever before about the fbi. and the search of the mar-a-lago estate. new details just released to the public, the possibility of criminal prosecution of the twice impeached ex president's so plausible, now, that some federal prosecutors are actually seeing it out loud. less than 24 hours ago we got our first look at the affidavit used by the fbi to convince a federal judge to greenlight the mar-a-lago search. the document is heavily redacted to protect the safety of civilian witnesses and law enforcement officers, but there is plenty to see and hear. including this line. quote, there is probable cause to believe that evidence of obstruction will be found at the premises. the affidavit directly contradicts his claim that he was already cooperating with the government. it makes it clear the lengths the government went to before pursuing action to recover the material. outlining how the former president -- the affidavit paints the picture of a hubris tech and

former executive with no appreciation for the rescue placed the country under with the oath he took to protect them. what started as a retrieval mission has turned into an unprecedented criminal investigation of a former president. he repeatedly thumbed his nose at government requests to return top secret documents. highly sensitive material that was irresponsibly spread around trump's florida resort. according to the affidavit, 14 of the 15 boxes retrieved earlier this year contained classified records. a total of 184 classified documents. the affidavit describes those documents containing information about, quote, clandestine human sources. information relating to human intelligence capabilities, techniques, processes, and procedures. these documents should have been kept in a secure location. affidavit explains how the most incompetent, and dangerous president in history allowed classified information to be, quote, unfolded, intermixed

with other records, and otherwise improperly identified. trump predictably slammed the affidavit as a public relations subterfuge. no president in the history of the united states has ever been criminally prosecuted after leaving office. however, the department of justice, the fbi, and the federal judge who are of said this was okay, so there was real cause to believe the actual crimes are being committed by a former president. crimes that warranted a search of his private residence by the fbi. there is even more evidence of the legal danger donald trump faces. in the same memo that was released along with the affidavit, in the memos explanation for why the redactions in the affidavit were necessary, quote, the materials the government march for reduction in the attachment document must remain sealed to protect the safety and privacy of a significant number of civilian witnesses. in addition to law enforcement personnel, as well as to protect the integrity of the ongoing investigation and to avoid disclosure of grand jury

material in violation of the federal rules of criminal procedure. that phrase, a significant number of civilian witnesses, is one that should be a big, flashing, red warning sign to a man who is so far avoiding any legal consequences. without this morning, to us discuss the study of relegation, 's is, carole a pulitzer prize when-ing reporter. she's also msnbc contributor. good morning, carrollton confronting us this morning. this is been a fast unfolding story. for the moment, the affidavit was released yesterday. the redacted f -- people like you reporting today to try and make sense of what's in there is a technical violation, of which that seems there was evidence there is, one because step should not have been there in the first place, and what in there is a deliberate violation. the affidavit makes a reference to obstruction. big caught my attention, in particular. >> that is right, ali, you are so smart to focus on the criminality that the government

is pursuing. it is clear that since april, based on the letter written by trump lawyers, trump and his team knew that donald trump was the potential target of this criminal investigation. his lawyer argued, you cannot criminalize a paper records violation. you cannot do this. he made this argument, over and over again. the problem is in the former presidents own making. donald trump was told by his lawyers in the spring, and then in the fall of 2021, to return these documents. told that these documents should be in the government's hands. the former president red luck today agreed to return 15 documents. 15 boxes of documents and january. and those included significant top secret documents. so secret that they reveal, as we reported last week, intelligence gathering methods of the u.s..

the holiest of the holy, right? the thing that the government does not want shared, ali. the problem here is, after the president, the former president returns those 15 boxes, the government had reason to believe, based on interviews with witnesses, based on other information, that it remained, still more classified records at mar-a-lago that the president was holding tight to, as, quote unquote, mine, as he told aides. the real issue here is three criminal statutes. concealment of these records well full retention with national information, that is information we used to protect our country's security, and then third, obstruction. that means that despite saying that you do not have any more records of the governments property, you do. despite insisting to your lawyers that you have turned over everything, you actually

have more. that is the potential obstruction of the criminal investigation. >> what is even stranger's, let alone, the legal defense that donald trump claims he has. he keeps talking about it. you wrote about it on tuesday. you said, in a legal filing on monday, trump's lawyers insisted, he had been cooperating with the justice department's request. in fact, however the narrative they laid out, as well as the other documents and interviews, show that trump ignored multiple opportunities to quietly resolve fbi concerns by handing over all classified material in possession. including a grand jury subpoena that the trump team excepted on may 11th. again, and again he reacted with some familiar mix of abstinence an outrage causing some in his orbit to fear he was essentially during the fbi to come after him. yesterday carl rose said the same thing on fox news. they said, why don't you just asking for it? they did asking for. there is a grand prix subpoena. there were letters. there was no chance he was not asked for the documents.

>> that is absolutely right, ali. the most worrisome moment, i mean, we have chronicled months, and months of requests, the fbi waited a month to look at documents that were in the governments possession. 15 boxes had been returned to donald trump's request. he was blocking them from seeing them by saying, i need to look at them first. my lawyers need to look at them first. of course, they could not find a lawyer with high enough clearance to do the job for them. it looks like the trump team never reviewed the records. the fbi, patiently, waited for months. the worst moment in this, in terms of legal liability, is when trump's lawyers, after conferring with their client, after reviewing records, assert in june to the fbi, and the department of justice, all classified materials. we have looked through everything.

everything that should be returned has been returned. we found no more classified records. what is critical there, ali, is the government offered 1 million chances to return the documents. and then, lawyers for the former president assert, and swear, there is nothing more here. actually, there was. i am told that some of those documents are also incredibly sensitive. if they fell into foreign hands it would, immediately, caused grave harm to our country's security. this is not something that should be lying around in an area where a pastry chef and bartender may have access. >>. that accidentally people may have had access to, it is a charitable thought. that someone new information is there to confront various purposes. carol, things for your great

reporting and joining us. she's a national investigative reporter for the national post and an msnbc contributor. my next guest is david priess. he's a former fbi investigator. he's the author of several books including the presidents book of secrets, the untold story of intelligence briefings to america's president. david, i want to pick up exactly where we left off with carole. there must be people around the world. american spies, a very can sources of other countries, to despise. american people have been pride providing -- allies who have been providing americans with information. all of who must not be sleeping. wondering whether anything about them is sitting around mar-a-lago for 18 months. either inadvertently or having been traded for for something. >> it is a rough day for intelligence officers and their sources. that is for sure. listen, i think people suspected that some of this would be out there. even i, looking at this really

carefully over the last two weeks, was not prepared to see that list of documents where it classification level, with the controls on them. >> controls on them that is the thing like each diaz to derive human information. the spies that give us information about the most sensitive work overseas. the s i, the signals intelligence, the job of them is to intercept information. seeing that really brought up some a motion. people risk their lives to collect this information for national security. not for partisan, political purposes. simply to protect the united states of america. now, some of those people who either helped collect that information directly, as human sources, or people who helped enable that technical collection of communications, have to be wondering, am i safe? is the information that i hope to collect protected anymore? do we have to, essentially, sacrifice that because it has been compromised? >> i want to go further into

that, david. we talk to lawyers. we talk to people who think he should be prosecuted. we talk to people who say lower level get people get prosecuted, even if there is no intent. even if you accidentally take the stuff. as intelligence officers are people who have access to intelligence information, you are trained on the stuff. this is not supposed to happen. frank spoke to us about what you just talked about. the h c s. the human intelligence controlled systems. let's listen to what he set. >> look, i spent 25 years in the fbi. eventually heading up all counter intelligence and espionage investigations. these classification markings that i saw today really caused the hair on the back of my neck to stand up. hcs, human lives are at stake. there has been a lot of close, but not there, accurate descriptions, or inaccurate descriptions of what this means. these are human beings who have said, i am going to be trey my country, and i am going to work

for team america at the risk of death, or in president. myself and my family are at risk. they are reporting and it is in worked hcs documents. >> i have no idea where america got its intel on ukraine. other than that first few days of, it it has been excellent. there are people elsewhere who are providing the american government with information that is really important to the safety of its troops, and possibly the safety of democracy around the world. this is not just americans, this is those people who are now, quite literally, impossible danger of being killed. >> that is true, and there is another element to it as well, on the international front. the united states cannot operate overseas in intelligence, and diplomacy, and military action without partners. we do that to get there. this kind of, i don't know, disclosure, we do not know yet. at least it was to close disclosed to someone who did not have a clearance after he left the presidency.

he had no right to be seeing these classified documents. we do not know how many other people saw them. that is part of the investigation. we know that this information was seen by people who should not have seen it. if i'm a partner of the united states, giving information in the intelligence field, or helping to enable intelligence operations, i have to scratch my head a little bit at this. i have to say, hopefully that is not happening anymore. we want this investigation to be done. how could this have happened? how could we have trusted this government to protect this information? then you find in the news that there are hundreds of documents that are out there, that could have been disclosed in an authorized profession. it could encourage some areas to have sources that are being protected now and being compromised >> we are not going to get that in the public sphere, we are not going to be discussing that is journalists. someone needs to figure out the

potential damage, and how it stops. the world is going to have to be assured that it stopped. they are going to need some convincing. david, thanks again for everything. david priess is a former cia edge agent and brief or two -- john ashcroft. it's been more than two months since the supreme court did the unthinkable and overturn roe v. wade. just ahead, we will explore the enormous backslide in abortion rights. we have seen it nationwide including just this week. plus, it is one thing to hear or read about the daily violence in ukraine. it is another thing to see it with your own eyes. i will talk with the polo -- pulitzer prize photographer, who has brought the harrowing images of families forced apart, and at innocence. lost the velshi banned book club is back with a painful but real look at the realities of teen drug addiction. we are digging into crank. that is coming up on velshi. velshi. this is the moment.

for a treatment for moderate-to-severe eczema. cibinqo — fda approved. 100% steroid free. not an injection, cibinqo is a once-daily pill for adults who didn't respond to previous treatments. and cibinqo helps provide clearer skin and less itch. cibinqo can lower your ability to fight infections, including tb. before and during treatment, your doctor should check for infections and do blood tests. tell your doctor if you've had hepatitis b or c, have flu-like symptoms, or are prone to infections. do not take with medicines that prevent blood clots. serious, sometimes fatal infections, lymphoma, lung, skin and other cancers, serious heart-related events, and blood clots can happen. people 50 and older with heart disease risk factors have an increased risk of serious heart-related events or death with jak inhibitors. this is the moment. but we've only just begun. speak with your doctor about cibinqo today. an innovation from pfizer.

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last six months the world has seen countless hours of video, images and reporting, on the violence and bloodshed of ukraine. however, if you have been able to capture the full scope, emotion and the devastating toll of the war that's taken on the ukrainian people, like the photojournalist. lindsay addario, an award winning photographer for the new york times has been -- and she's captured -- with the help of the ukrainian

army, lynsey addario has been able to get closer to the action that most people in -- this is a photo -- drone footage back in -- any war i've ever covered, because it's an artillery war. you must never see anyone. you heard the whistle of an incoming round. you lie down and you look for hope. you don't yet kill. lynsey addario joins me now from just outside chernihiv, she's covered a lot of conflicts zones, including rocked, are, for south sudan, somalia and congo. she's the author of multiple books, including of love and war, and it's what i do. lynsey addario, my friend, good to see you, thank you for being with us. she you are in chernihiv right now, and just the image behind, you and your conscious when you come on the show to just give us a picture of where you are. it looks devastating. >> yeah, i mean, generally i'm out here -- my -- only stop wherever i am and say

hello -- i'm photographing today, volunteers cleaning up [inaudible] who are off to the left and the cleanup still continues, the funeral still continue, the war still goes on, we are six months in. and it's hasn't -- it is not ending. >> you really have had a lot of experience covering conflicts. you've seen every shape and type and texture of them. this photo -- i want to just bring it back, the photo of the soldiers looking at drone footage. tell me about how this is different to covering what was going on in this picture. g wh>> my next -- it's an artillery war, actually has quite a range, we don't often hear small arms fire, which is, you know, iraq, afghanistan, we kind of knew where the frontline was. we knew where the positions, were the insurgents of the taliban. so we knew had to take cover. this is very different. and in this particular photograph, just to get to this

base, which was south of izium, we were told we would drive about five kilometers, and russian tanks were positioned along that road. then they were constantly shelling the road, so we drove a fast as we could, we were ordered to run to the bunker as soon as the car stomped. and as soon as we got into this bunker, the building next to us was hit with a tank round, which basically shook the entire foundation of this village. and then there was actually small arms fire outside the building. because a small group of russians tried to penetrate the area close to where we were. and i was the first and only time in this war i've actually heard a gun battle. >> wow. okay, so, that's the military side. this next picture, a mother with a newborn in a maternity ward, it looks nothing like what you think a mother with a newborn in a maternity would look like. it doesn't look like a place that you necessarily want your kid. tell me about this. ur kid. tell me abou>> i think it's a bn

right for women to be able to give birth in a safe and comfortable place. this is very early on in the war. this is march. it is in one of the maternity hospitals in kyiv. there were constant air sirens. and so women who were either in labor, who had just delivered, who had a newborn, they had to go down to the shelter constantly. it was moldy, it was dark and dank. and the conditions were horrible. >> i want to show a picture of families who were leaving mariupol, arriving in zaporizhzhia, and of course zaporizhzhia has been in the news. i want to just passed by this picture. this is a picture -- i want to see the picture of the people on the bus. yeah, that's when i'm looking for. zaporizhzhia is in the news again this weekend. but this one was remarkable. it's a simple picture, lindsey lynsey,. .

tell me about this. -- >> it is absolutely heartbreaking to watch the people come out of mariupol. because frankly, they were almost catatonic. a lot of them were sort of a motionless, which, to me is even worse than the showing of a lot of emotion, because it just shows the amount of trauma that -- a lot of the people that we met have been living in basements for 4 to 5 weeks, they haven't even seen the sky, they pulled up here in buses, their journey was arduous, they had no idea if they would even make it because they had to pass through dozens of russian checkpoints. o pass so really people are suffering at every single part of the journey. >> back in april as well was the massacre in bucha. you have a picture from august, long after this was -- long after the massacre was over, about a mass burial in bucha. that was still -- no matter what happens in this war --

that will be seared into the minds of people who covered it and watched it. tell me about this picture. >> there were about 500 people who died in bucha. this was a particular burial search. 21 people who had numbers, not names. it was searing hot, it was at the high noon. this is an august, as you pointed out. this is months after bucha went through this horrific events that went through, the torture, the killing, the mass murder of people, civilians, people found tied up shot at gunpoint. people are still being buried months on. and as just astonishing to me. >> one of the things that you have said is that we cannot sanitize, were particularly when it comes to targeting civilians. lynsey addario, we are so great for the work you continue to do. please, please stay safe. >> thank you, ali. >> lynsey addario, photojournalist for the new york times. -- more and more dire by the day. up next, 19 or three, president

and ceo of the center for reproductive rights joins me to talk about where things stand and how the politics are shifting as this you post to a reality begins to set in. ns to set in

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this sub isn't slowing down time any time soon. i'll give it a run for its money. my money's on the sub. it's subway's biggest refresh yet. this past wednesday marked two months since the supreme court overturned roe v. wade, a decision that dramatically transform the landscape of abortion access in america, literally overnight. on thursday, several new laws took effect in a few states, for the restricting abortion access for millions of people across much of the south and midwest. abortion is now completely outlawed with few exceptions, in idaho and tennessee, after trigger bands officially took effect two days ago. well abortion has been banned in oklahoma and texas for much of the past two months, both states began enforcing new laws this week that now make it a felony to perform an abortion. providers could be fined up to $100,000 in both states and face up to ten years in jail in

oklahoma and up to life in prison in texas. abortion is now completely banned, with varying exceptions, and unclear exceptions, in 11 states. in a 12 state, wisconsin, the law is so unclear that abortion providers have deemed it too risky to continue their work. additionally, georgia and ohio ban abortions after the sixth week of pregnancy, and that's before many women know they are pregnant. while florida has a 15-week ban in effect, as things stand, approximately one third of women of reproductive age in america no longer have access to a single abortion provider in their state. even more states are expected to enact bands in the near future. indiana, for example, has already passed a new abortion ban that will take effect next month. but amid this turmoil, they have been some glimmers of hope for supporters of abortion rights. this week, a judge issued a preliminary injunction, that temporarily blocked north dakota's abortion ban. meanwhile, another judge sided with the department of justice

in its lawsuit against the state of idaho owed idaho -- though the statesman was allowed to go into effect. that wouldn't as a pulled airline's guidelines to medical professionals that federal law requires them to provide an abortion if necessary in lifesaving emergency situations, even in states where abortion is banned. confusingly, another judge ruled against the biden administration in a similar lawsuit in texas, and that's a sign that the fight for abortion rights is far from over. joining me now is nancy northup, president and ceo of center for reproductive rights, i know organization that is filed lawsuits in multiple states on behalf of abortion providers, including the one that successfully blocked north dakota is a war sham ban from taking effect this week. nancy, thank you for joining, us it's good to see you on this topic. so, we are we? obviously, empirically, we are worse off than we were the day roe v. wade fell. but is there a sentimental change -- is their political change?

are the things happening that could result in better outcomes in months to come? or no? >> let's just start with what you set up, which is that we are seeing the extremism -- on full display, in -- this week. one in three women, in the united states, have now lost access to abortion care in their own state. we saw things like texas, as you pointed out, and they let go into effect this week, a law, a felony law, with up to 99 years in prison as a consequence of that -- and, as you point out, texas, attorney general is fighting the united states government because texas doesn't want to comply with federal law. it's as you have to give emergency care to pregnant women who come into a hospital in a crisis situation. they don't want to do that until she is on deaf store. so, the extremism is in full

flower. as you pointed out, we did have that great win in north dakota, under the state constitution. and this is where we are seeing some real protections. that is what the vote was in kansas was about. the state constitution in kansas protects the right to abortion, even more strongly than the federal constitution did under roe. so, i think what we are seeing here, both in kansas and in north dakota is that there are state constitutions that provides imperfection protection. but also, when the voters get to decide themselves, they don't want the rights taken away. i think we are going to continue to see that building. i am looking for a silver lining. here is the extreme isn't the silver lining? is the fact that someone said to me in alabama, couple of weeks ago, this is not the god catching the car, this is the dog slamming into the car, or people who supported restrictions on abortion, now looking at this thing and saying, that is not exactly what we thought it would be? >> i think that is right.

four years it was able to be kicked around as a political football. you could talk about banning abortion with no real consequences. it was not going to happen because constitutional protections were there. now people are seeing what it really means to ban abortion. they are seeing that it means that 15% of pregnancies and up in a miscarriage. some of those and up with people going to the emergency room. they are being denied care. doctors have to worry about the fact that they will be criminally prosecuted up to 99 years in the state of texas, if they make a wrong call about treating a pregnancy emergency. they are realizing what it means to have to travel hundreds and hundreds of miles to get abortion access in a state other than your own. i think the reality of this has set in. we have always seen, even back when roe was in place, row

voters and mississippi voted against putting a person in their constitution. voters haven't given the chance to directly decide with the law is. they vote against these kinds of extreme measures. >> in fact, a new poll suggests that 66% of voters will have this as a important part of their vote this year. that could be determinant in some races in november. >>, i think it will be very important for everyone who supports abortion rights to make their position known in every way that they can. that includes making sure that they hold their public officials accountable for the positions they are taking on the issue. >> nancy, thank you for joining. us nancy northup is the president and ceo for the center for reproductive rights. it is a 500-page novel written inverse about the corrosive impacts of drug use. crank is not an easy breed. it is wildly uncomfortable. it is meant to be all of those things.

in just a few minutes, alan hopkins, the off therapist buck, will join us to discuss. why it is a target of book bans since the date was first published in 2004. (mom) yeah, it's easy and you get $960 when you switch the whole family. (geek) wow... i've got to let my buddies know. (geek friend) we're already here! (vo) the network you want. the price you love. only from verizon. the unknown is not empty. it's a storm that crashes, and consumes, replacing thought with worry. but one thing can calm uncertainty. an answer. uncovered through exploration, teamwork, and innovation.

an answer that leads to even more answers. mayo clinic. you know where to go. we have a lot more velshi on

the way. including the succession of the velshi banned book club. i'm joined in just a moment by ellen hopkins the author of the important book, crank. it is a tale of addiction that explores the damage drugs can do to an individual and those around them. make sure to join us tomorrow morning as i speak to one of the lawmakers who had a hand and president biden's decision to forgive student loan debt. congresswoman i anna pressley of massachusetts joins me to discuss the student loan forgiveness plan, and weather goes far enough. plus we will discuss the midterm election and what is at stake in the house of representatives in november. that is tomorrow, 8 am eastern, on msnbc. we will be right back. say hello to your fairy godmother alice

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serious, sometimes fatal infections, lymphoma, lung, skin and other cancers, serious heart-related events, and blood clots can happen. people 50 and older with heart disease risk factors have an increased risk of serious heart-related events or death with jak inhibitors. this is the moment. but we've only just begun. speak with your doctor about cibinqo today. an innovation from pfizer. the summer between sophomore and junior year of high school christina snow heads to albuquerque, new mexico. to see her estranged father. christina knows little about her father. just that, quote, truth be told his love of drug surpassed his love of family. and quote. it is here that christina meets atom, the neighborhood bad boy. and her first love. adam opens the door to a world christina never knew. one with alcohol, cigarettes, crystal meth, or as it was called, crank. back at home in the throes of a powerful addiction christina

struggles to return to her suburban normalcy. her life rapidly and violently spirals out of control, with very dire, and very real consequences. the award-winning book is more than just a cautionary tale. crank is a multi layered examination of what drug addiction can do to an entire family, a community, and a team user. many sobriety programs explain addiction as a web. something that spends outward until everyone in the addicted person's life is entangled. frank, crank is the literary embodiment of. that written in free versus the reader can get incredibly close to christina. there is an intimacy that only exists within the white spaces of this, which makes it a uniquely difficult read. we are underwater with our protagonist. when the book ends it it's like breaking the surface and coming up for air. triumphantly, crank does not cast blame. we are there to witness christina's story and learn from her missteps. there is not a moment of

judgment in the 500 odd pages. drug use aside, crank grapples with themes that most teenagers and their families will face, including innocence, identity, deceit, and the power of choices. if this story rings true, perhaps something similar happen to an old friend, or even your own child, that is because it is. crank is a loosely based fictional account of author ellen hopkins's older batter with the quote, monster. the first few pages hopkins speaks to the reader directly. she reads in part, quote, nothing in this story is impossible. much of it happened to us or families like us. many of the characters are composite of real people. if this story speaks to you, i have accomplished when i set up to do. crank is indeed a monster. one that is tough to leave behind ones who invited into your life. think twice, then think again, and quote. >> crystal math is not the monster most teen users are battling, nowadays. make no mistakes, they are

battling one. it is opioids and highly potent forms of fentanyl. over the past two years overdose tests have ridden dramatically spiking from 492 deaths in 2019 to 954 deaths in 2020. an increase of 94%. the highest rates were among native american and latino teens. drugs do not discriminate. anyone can become addicted. anyone. it is a gutting and painful reality. it is an issue that is not going away. some parents, school board members, and lawmakers would like to believe we are moving crank from the books of students and will remedy the drug crisis in this country. we know at the velshi banned book club that the opposite is true. very few people will go through high school and college without being confronted with the choice to do drugs. reading books like crank is a safe way, the only safe way, to explore this. read this book with your children. have this conversation. right after the break we are having a conversation with our own, ellen hopkins, the author

of the new york times bestseller, crank, and numerous other books. we will explore her real life experience with adolescent drug addiction. the power of first, and the fervent bang that crank has faced across the nation. n.

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saving you up to $500 a year. and it's only available to comcast business internet customers. so boost your bottom line by switching today. i am thrilled to be joined by comcast business. powering possibilities. ellen hopkins, the writer of 13 new york times bestseller. 's including this week's feature, crank.

ellen, welcome to the book club. thank you for being with us this morning. >> thank you, it is a pleasure. >> i would like to start with the banning. your books has been tough around since 2004. there has been a major uptick, lately. it is not once of the most banned books or challenged books that we have ever covered on the book club. conversely, it is also assigned reading in some schools. tell me about this. >> it is an interesting dichotomy. the current challenges are different than the challenges we face before. over the years there have been single challenges. a parent would see their child reading this book, and have a problem with it. one-on-one the challenges are different. this is a political movement. the goal is political. it is not just to get a puck off the shelves. it is to make a political statement. that is the difference.

so, a lot of the challenges, my bucs, they will be on a list. they see my name somewhere. they are like, take all her books out. not even just the one. i have 14 young adult novels. they have all been challenged, at this point. i am kind of getting used to it. i am also less happy about it, every single day. let's put it that way. >> how interesting. i think you are right. we look at a lot of these books and it is not clear why some of them appear unless. some of them are based on the author. some of them are based on the writing. some of them are based on politics. why are you less happy? i only ask you that because i am seeing increasing examples of bookstores that have banned book sections. getting books challenged causes people to want to read them, in some cases, i think. >> that is true, but there are also kids who cannot find these bucks. they cannot afford to buy them. they need to have them available in their school libraries, specifically, their school libraries. a lot of them do not have access to public libraries.

this school library is a place where kids can find books that they need to answer questions for them, to give them some insight. a lot of the kids that read crank, they want the insight because it is not just for themselves, maybe they have lost a parent to attraction. maybe they have lost a friend. to addiction. they need these pucks. they need that insight the bucks can provide. school libraries are sometimes the only place where they can. from >> in september it'll be the annual band book week. in 2009 your poem, titled manifesto, was used as the weeks actual manifesto. it ends this way. it is uniquely relevant today. quote, a word to the unwise, torch every book, char every page, burn every word to hash. ideas are in combustible. and therein lies your real fear. i feel like this could be the

tagline for the velshi banned book club. that is the point. you will not when this. you will burn a lot of books. you will ban a lot of books. you will variant ruin access to books. you will never crush the ideas. >> the thing, you know, that people forgot, i think, about teenagers especially. we have been guardians to our grandchildren. i have raised three of my grandchildren. i raised three generations of kids through teenager. the thing about it is kids are very smart. they are very sophisticated. they know where to get the information on their phones, if you are not going to have it brought them in a more palatable place. i think the idea that kids, you can hide stuff like addiction, or gender issues, or sexual abuse, these things have been affecting us since i was a teenager. we just were not allowed to talk about it.

>> we have photos on the internet. >> we were not allowed to talk about them. young woman who were being abused by their parents, or whatever, they were not allowed to say anything. bucks open avenues. they open the idea of communication, and dialogue. this is how we change. this is how we change the bad things. this is how we make society better. by opening doors to conversation, and information. ignorance is not a weapon. i say that all the time. knowledge is the weapon. >> that is interesting. we think about the other way, these days. thank you for that. look, this book is hard to read through a fictional lens. knowing that it's actually based on, some basis in truth, on your life and daughters story, adds a layer to it. why was it important to make that clear to the reader that crank is a partially true story? >> i never wanted anybody to say addiction could not happen this fast. it did. my daughter was, she was 148 iq,

straight a kid. she made a bad choice. that's took away 25 years of her life. it was 25 years in and out of the addictive cycles. i wanted to be able to turn that around four kids by showing them that this could happen to my daughter, and this could happen to you. this could happen to your daughter. it is important to realize that yes, this is a true story, yes, addiction affects everybody. not just there. >> how is your daughter now and how does she feel about these books? >> she is very good now. like i said, it was 25 years of her life. it took her almost 30 to get her all the way okay. she is not very happy about it, or was not at first, but she has seen how much good this puck has done. it is a trilogy, actually. it is the deeper part of

addiction. and then fallout is about her three oldest kids point of view. losing their mom and that faction. when she saw how much the bucks have done, and they have done a lot of good, i have gotten thousands, and thousands of messages, and emails, and whatever from people, telling me how much the book has helped them, or help them through. when she saw that, she was good with. it and she is good with it now. >> i have done a bit of a disservice. what i like to do with these boxes read from them, and discuss certain things. this is a bigger issue. because it has been banned and challenge for so many years you are here as a kind of a marital's guest. but, i do want to talk a little bit about the book itself. identity is a primary theme in crank. for one, christine that posed by the name bree when she's under the influence of drugs. the neighborhood golden boy ends up as a rapist. tell me about these issues of identity. >> for her it was a way to to

become someone else. someone who did things that she would not normally do his christina. she becomes bree. that is her alter ego. and real life he did actually have an. she called herself sarah. she also thought that if she got in trouble, which she did, it is in the book, she went to juvenile hall, she became sara, and it took them three days to figure out where her parents were because she would not tell them. that is true. i think that it gave her license to do things that she would not have normally done. >> ellen, things for the book. thanks for sharing this information. thanks for the very long fight you have been engaged and. thank you for reminding us that knowledge is the real tool. ellen hopkins is the best selling author of crank. if you or someone you know is battling addiction or has substance abuse issues there is help. the substance abuse and mental health services national help

telephone line is free, confidential, and available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. the numbers on the screen. i will post this on my twitter. there is always a way forward. that does it for me. thanks for watching. casting back here tomorrow morning from 8 to 10 eastern. on velshi. don't forget, fell she is also available as a podcast. you can listen to the entire show on the go, at anytime. subscribe and listen for free wherever you get your podcasts. stay right where you are. cross connection begins right now. now. good morning. welcome to the cross connection. i'm jason johnson, in for tiffany cross. donald trump asked for it. the doj served the tee, piping hot. friday's release of the highly anticipated redacted affidavit, at the center of the mar-a-lago search, was full of shocking, and damning information for the twice