deadlines and decisions as we come on the air with right now the justice department getting ready to make its case about a so-called special master, somebody independent to come in and review documents found during the mar-a-lago search. the judge saying she's inclined to grant the former president's request so can the doj convince her not to? we're waiting for that filing to drop possibly any minute. just about 15 minutes from now, president biden is set to speak in pennsylvania. see the microphone he'll take on the left side of your screen, trying to flip the script on republicans ahead of the midterms with a law and order message, that would include federal law enforcement like the fbi. we'll talk about what to expect and where else the president is headed ahead of the midterms. stocks taking a tumble for a third straight day with wall street worrying about another interest rate hike from the fed. we're live with the context you should know. we're live overseas where an international team is on the ground ahead in kyiv ahead of

the biggest nuclear power plant. a pair of u.s. senators who landed, what they're telling our team in ukraine about the surprise visit. we have all of that coming up. i'm hallie jackson in washington. i want to start with nbc news justice reporter ryan riley and former prosecutor and msnbc legal analyst carole lamm. ryan, i want to come to you with some of the questions hanging over this filing, some of the key questions our team has identified. is it going to convince a judge not to appoint a special master which is what the department of justice wants. will the filing give us new clues about the investigation itself, things we did not know more broadly? will the doj challenge the judge's jurisdiction here, the one who said, she said this weekend, judge cannon, she was inclined to go ahead and appoint the special master which raised eyebrows in the legal world. to you on this. >> the investigation itself we could see bread crumbs. the justice department has chosen to speak through the file sogs we could see some new information.

i think the biggest argument looming over this is whether or not the special master is necessary because the doj is going to want to make sure that this is going to be tight to just -- in terms of attorney/client privilege documents and going to say, essentially, that we have already gone through this and identified any attorney-client privilege documents. what donald trump is going to try to do is try to broaden this out beyond attorney-client privilege documents. theoretically a lot of these documents that are protected by classification shouldn't be attorney client privilege documents and shouldn't be relevant to the question of whether, in fact, he had the possession of these documents he wasn't supposed to possess, setting aside the fact that he wasn't supposed to possess any documents because those are records properly belong to the american people under the presidential records act and shouldn't be in a former president's control even if they aren't classified. setting that aside i think that's what this is going to be all about. they're going to try to make this about executive privilege and broaden the scope of what the special master should be looking at while -- whereas doj

will say listen this is a small subsection of the documents that have anything regarding attorney-client privilege they've gone through it. that's their big battle to make sure if there is a special master in place, to make sure this is seoul solely about the question of attorney-client privilege and isn't broadened out in any way by donald trump's efforts on his legal team. >> help us with the context of everything we've seen over the last several weeks and the scale of significance here, whether it is relatively minor, right, which it may very well be and i know you're going to explain that, but also, what it means for the timing? does it, as some have suggested, have the potential to slow down this investigation overall? . >> i think slowing down the investigation is an unlikely scenario in this case, and while it's always interesting when the department of justice files what looks to be a 40-page brief on any subject like this, i don't think that ultimately this is going to make that much difference to the department of justice's investigation.

this is why. in the execution of a search warrant, the agents are limited to reviewing and perhaps taking just what happens to be there in the moment, right. i mean, these documents just happen to be lying around when the agents went in and what they were really looking for were these highly confidential and/or classified documents. they were not necessarily looking for attorney-client privilege documents. if they ended up taking them and they had run them through their taint review process, which they did, and that was approved by the magistrate judge who approved the search warrant, then this relatively what appears to be a relatively small subset of documents, whether it's rereviewed by a special master or not, the doj can fought on another track and say we're going to proceed with our investigation and whatever happens with these documents, happens. they're not necessarily critical to this investigation. >> what do you think the judge

will take away from what is expected to be a 40-page filing instead of a 20-page filing given that judge has already in some ways showed her hand a bit as to where she feels she might want to end up going as it relates to the special master? >> yes. the judge did indicate tentatively she was inclined to appoint a special master, but, of course, that was before she knew that the department of justice had already concluded its taint review process and often those processes take a long time, but for a small sub-set of documents it doesn't take that long. it took donald trump's lawyers a couple weeks to file the motion so factually the documents have already been reviewed. if she appoints a special master to re-review those documents they can do that. at the end of the day, it may be an exercise that even this judge finds unnecessary or fruitless but may decide to do it just to

be on the safe side. >> ryan, any timing guidance? it could be any minute or in an hour? >> we don't know. sometimes they like to push the deadlines a little bit. definitely coming some point today, but we don't know what time. >> thanks to the both of you. >> what we know is coming any minute, president biden hitting the stage in pennsylvania. you see it live on the left side of your screen. he's hoping to flip the script on republicans when it comes to support for law enforcement but the president in pennsylvania is part of the push to talk about his accomplishments and support democrats running in november. he signed this executive order in may focusing on criminal justice reforms meant to make agencies more accountable, raise standards for use of force meant to support law enforcement and a whole bunch of different ways. let me bring in white house correspondent mike memoli who is traveling with the president in wilkes-barre pennsylvania, jonathan allen is with us along with former police chief and msnbc law enforcement analyst carmen best. as we wait for the president to

take the stage, which we think will happen in nine minutes, there's interesting timing. the president was supposed to deliver this speech a month ago. he got covid. you know what happened inside that month. this search of mar-a-lago, lawfully executed search by law enforcement, that led some more maga republicans you could call them, allies of donald trump, to slam the fbi even as other republicans said maybe we shouldn't be going after law enforcement given that republicans have tried to position themselves as the party of law and order. there are interesting threads that president biden could pull on here if he chooses to do so. >> that's right. timing is everything in politics. look at the message the president was bringing here a month ago and he will bring again today talking in a defensive way about the ways in which democrats are not the party of defunding the police. his administration wants to hire

100,000 cops and train them with the executive order to highlight the fact that there was this bipartisan achievement, legislation for the first time in three decades meaningfully taking on the issue of gun violence in this country. what we have seen as you say in the month that has passed, is an opportunity for the president really to make this argument he was also prepared to make to counter that republicans as he has put it cannot be pro insurrection and pro-cop at the same time is relevant when you have the recent attacks from some republicans on law enforcement, the threats that we know they're facing across the country, even the discussion from senator lindsey graham in the last few days about the fact that there would be violence in the streets. i don't think you're going to hear the president refer to his predecessor to the raid at mar-a-lago, the white house has done everything they can to keep a bright line between what justice department is doing and how they're proceeding politically. this is an opportunity for the president to really take an opportunity -- take what they feel has been given them, an

opportunity from the president, former president, to highlight what they call maga extremism. we got a taste last week when the president had that kickoff rally in maryland and talked about the fact that extreme maga republicans embrace political violence. that's the message that president is going to be delivering again and certainly at a higher level in the prime time speech later this week in philadelphia. a return to that campaign theme, the soul of america. >> a speech you scooped. please standby. i know you're speaking over the applause for senator casey. i want to come back to you in a minute. to the point memoli is making, you've had the white house and this president looking to put distance between themselves and the document investigation, doing that in an appropriate fashion right now, trying to show the independence of the doj, while at the same time, emphasizing his support for law enforcement. talk about this tight rope a bit that president is walking here? >> i think these are themes that biden is comfortable with,

actually, going back to the 2020 campaign, he's somebody who talked about the importance of institutions, talked about the independence of the justice department as a candidate. it's something he's discussed during his career. at the same time he talked about funding police that was key to his campaign that he distance himself from all the democrats calling for defunding the police in that 2020 campaign season. he took a -- basically broke with his base and said i'm going to put more money into cops' programs. somebody who has had a record on cracking down on gun violence and seeking new gun controls since at least 1994 when he passed the crime bill through the senate as the judiciary leader there. this is something he's comfortable with. what i think is interesting about this moment, though, hallie, it's not yet clear what's going to happen with president trump and what's going to happen with the doj's look into these mar-a-lago documents. you know, anything that he were

to say about that would really be i think out of step with what he's described as that need to have independence for the justice department. >> carmen, let's talk about what the president has done. as mem and john have talked about, the president wants to fund police. the president laid out an executive order on the screen here with a number of steps he wanted to see as it relates to and went into place as it relates to law enforcement. what do law enforcement agency, especially those getting criticized at the moment, want to hear from president biden this afternoon in your view? >> i think it's incredibly important that president biden support police, you know, police agencies all across the country are woefully understaffed. they're having difficulty recruiting and retaining police officers. officers, i talk to them all the time, they need to feel ter being supported and be funded and the community needs them

there. we know that communities cannot thrive if gun shots are flying, if there's high violence and high rates of crime. the support of the president is going to be important in moving the needle so to speak to find community support for police. >> chief best, there has been i think an appropriate focus on gun violence in this country and specifically what local municipalities with states and what the federal government can do to combat this. do you believe the white house is doing enough here? what do you want to see from the president is this. >> yeah. i know they're trying to limit the issues around the assault weapons and i think that most people from what we've heard, agree that assault weapons in the hands of 18 year olds doesn't make sense. i served in the military with a lot of restrictions around how and when we were trained and used the weapons that we had,

and so for there not to be legislation around this really doesn't make sense. it doesn't matter whether you're blue or red, conservative, progressive, most people can agree we need common sense legislation around this issue in particular. >> john, let me turn to you, because there is -- as much as there is a policy there's a po political policy on this as well. we know how important it is to the midterms and in 2024. you have reporting on democrats who would rather, it's a thanks but no thanks as far as campaigning with president biden ahead of the midterms, tell us about this? >> you saw bob casey, the senator from pennsylvania on your screen, he's not on the ballot, he's with biden. john fetterman for the other seat is not at the event even though he released an ad talking

about his campaign and his political biography is reason for getting into politics was to combat gun violence and communities. that's what biden is talking about in an area of pennsylvania that fetterman has it to do well in. the problem for fetterman and for biden as well, i guess, is that fetterman is running ahead of biden in pennsylvania. his approval ratings are better than biden. as fetterman tries to beat me met oz he's decided it's not best to be with biden today. in addition as he announced that yesterday he pointed out the difference between himself and biden on federal marijuana policy. as biden was saying i'm coming to pennsylvania, fetterman was not only saying no thanks to this event today, but also, here's a way in which i am not with joe biden. you're seeing among senate candidates and house candidates how they handle this question but a lot of them are not asking biden to come rally for them. some will show up at official

white house events in their states but most would prefer that president not come and do political events for them. >> this is not the only stop that president is going to be making before the midterms. you talked about what else he's going to do this week, the prime time speech, but even in the next few days, we have a map on screen, we know that the president is going to be stepping up his road game, if you will. >> yeah. hallie, we've been talking about that promise the uptick in his travel and starting to see it. the president today making his 12th trip to pennsylvania. it's the state he's visited most other than delaware, of course, since becoming president. he spend a lot of time at home there. but this is the state that made him president. it was the last one that put him over 270 electoral votes. this is going to be following his 12th visit by the 13th visit on thursday in philadelphia. the 14th visit next monday labor day in pittsburgh a favorite place for this president and we are seeing a mix of events, right.

this is technically an official event. we'll see the president go to battleground ohio for an event, a groundbreaking for a new plant that is opening up there as a result of that new legislation, the chips act. we will see the white house continue to balance these kinds of official events that let some down ballot democrats in tough races, matt cartwright, from this district in a toss up race who did speak here as did josh shapiro, the attorney general running for governor as well, they will find ways as president biden likes to say, i'll campaign for you or against you, whatever helps you the most. today those two democrats were aligned with the president on this law and order message. times where democrats will be looking to establish distance between themselves and the president. >> mike memoli live in wilkes-barre and john allen and carmen best. a break in the programming. we expect a couple more speakers and then bring you president biden live the second he begins speaking right here on msnbc. we're going to get you a check on wall street because stocks, down for a third straight day.

what it means for your money. plus why a top-level fbi agent once caught in gop cross hairs has resigned. later, elon musk trying to a strategy to get out of buying twitter. we have a lot to get to. e a lot. e elbow grease, you can do just about anything. thanks, dad. that's right, robert. and it's never too early to learn you could save with america's number one motorcycle insurer. that's right, jamie. but it's not just about savings. it's about the friends we make along the way. you said it, flo. and don't forget to floss before you brush. your gums will thank you. -that's right, dr. gary. -jamie? sorry, i had another thought so i got back in line. what was it? [ sighs ] i can't remember. i'm greg, i'm 68 years old. i do motivational speaking in addition to the substitute teaching. i honestly feel that that's my calling-- to give back to younger people. i think most adults will start realizing that they don't recall things as quickly as they used to or they don't remember things as vividly as they once did.

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so we are watching the markets closely here about 40 minutes before the closing bell because right now you've got the dow down for a third straight day with investors reacting to more signals from the fed they could raise interest rates to fight inflation. also in the mix a bunch of economic reports out today. here's what we're learning. consumers are feeling better, confidence is up in august after it fell for three straight months. what does that mean? people are starting to feel more optimistic about the economy partly because gas prices keep going down. employers are still having a tough time filling open positions. we saw 11 million open jobs.

home prices on the real estate front not rising as fast as they have been over the last few months. they're still up 18% in june compared to a year ago. here to break it down, senior business analyst stephanie ruhle. when you look at the three sort of threads we put on the screen, plus the news that dow is down again today, help us understand that, help us make sense of those data points and the ones more cohesive thought? >> here we go. so first let's talk about consumers. when you think about consumer confidence, all of it goes to what do we pay for the most and see the most often? it's gas prices. when gas prices are going up, people are suddenly paying $80, $120 to fill their tanks, they get panicky. it costs more to go anywhere and do anything. so when prices start to go down, we immediately get more confident. remember, store shelves are filled again. we're not having as many supply chain issues. people are comfortable. that's a big positive on the economic front. now you could say how about 401(k)s?

people are looking at their 401(k)s and the stock market and freaking. remember, you cannot look at the stock market every minute of every day. the stock market going down --. >> you can. it will drive you nuts. >> correct. it will drive you nuts an not make you more financially secure. do not do it. the market is reacting to jay powell's comments we heard where the fed is focused on fighting inflation. if they are what's the tool they use? it's raising rates. if you raise rates that is not good for the stock market because remember, when rates are at zero the only place to put your money is stocks. so yes, the stock market is going down because people are concerned that the fed is still worried about inflation. all in, we're in a good place especially when people are going oh, my god the real estate market, you said it, real estate prices are up 18% from a year ago and if they cool down a little that would make things more affordable and we have an

affordable housing problem in this country. it's not bad it see prices go down. >> stephanie ruhle always bringing the context. you will bring us an interview with wes moore. democratic candidate for governor in maryland on msnbc. thanks to stef and her team. to new nbc news reporting, a senior law enforcement official confirming to us a top fbi agent has retired, not just any agent, but somebody under scrutiny for his alleged role in the investigation of president biden's son hunter. investigative correspondent tom winter is here and there's sort of the news, the headline and then a bunch of context that's important to help us understand what the headline is. >> we're talking about assistant special agent in charge timothy tebow who retired. folks said he resigned. he left the bureau, but he was of retirement age and eligible. that's the way he went out here. this is somebody who is -- whose name has caught on in certain

circles of this country, particularly after a letter from senator grassley that he published and sent to the attorney general merrick garland as well as fbi director christopher wray in late may and pointed out a number of social media posts allegedly authored that included statements against the former president that he retweeted. a linked in project tweet that called into question the mental faculties. he liked a number of "washington post" critical articles critical of the justice department as it pertained to roger stone and former trump national security adviser michael flynn, called into question attorney general william barr's efforts to run the department and the decisions he was making. this came up during a raised congressional testimony last month, and he was asked about it, and he said it was concerning to him those posts. you know, the fbi director has been so rose solute here over

the past several years pushing fbi agents to check their political beliefs when they walk in the door as it pertains to their investigations to be unbiased, open-minded and also to present that in their public postings or statements. i think if it was up to the fbi director there would not be a single agent that had social media presence other than the official fbi accounts. but this also then raised kind of a new level when in july senator grassley said he had been contacted by several whistleblowers who raised concerns, serious concerns, he says, about whether or not this former now assistant special agent in charge was involved with shutting down a potential inquiry into current president biden's son, hunter biden. a couple things to point out here. first off, that investigation was opened. it remains ongoing. number two, that investigation is being conducted by the fbi's field office in baltimore, not

the washington field office where he worked. third, an assistant special agent in charge it would be difficult in this instance for them to shut down an investigation or to do so in an effort that would try to make it permanent. those decisions when they involve a prominent political official's son or that official themselves, are typically made higher than that at the special agent in charge more likely the assistance director of the fbi level because they are so high profile and, of course, there's a political component to all of this, which is so important, which is there are a number of investigations or potential investigations that could have come up in the fall of 2020 all were pushed until after the presidential election to make sure that there were no efforts or any sort of information that came out about overt steps in those investigations that could have impacted the election. >> tom winter, thank you for the comprehensive reporting. appreciate it. coming up on the show the timeline in fulton county just when georgia's election investigation is expected to

wrap up. later, the country now quietly helping russia on the battlefield in ukraine. the nbc news reporting later in the show. the nbc news reporting later in the show ealthy diet is one of the most important things. i also feel the same way about my dog. we got her the farmer's dog sent in the mail. it was all fresh. i want my dog to have a healthy and long life. the farmer's dog helps that out. see the benefits of fresh food at betterforthem.com

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microphone in pennsylvania. we're waiting for president biden in a couple minutes to take that stage for his speech on reducing gun violence, on law and order, law enforcement. we're going to bring that to you live the second it starts and a couple headlines out of georgia today starting with a new look at something we all know, that the election there in november is going to be tight. new polling from emerson college shows republican herschel walker with a slight lead over raphael warnock. 46 to 44%, inside the margin of error, well inside. in the race for governor brian kemp with a four-point lead over stacey abrams. and then another big headline out of georgia, new insight into fulton county's investigation into potential 2020 election interference. the district attorney there says she's about 60% through witness testimony. she's hoping to wrap up this investigation within the next few months. this is one of the legal shadows hanging over former president trump. blayne alexander is joins us in atlanta. tell us more about where this

investigation stands and what these final few months apparently final look like. >> you know, hallie, before we jump into that it's important to put this in quick context. it's very easy to forget by the amount of times we talk about this investigation, the amount of times you see me on tv talking about this but the grand jury process is a secret one. we know some of the high-profile people who have been called to testify, the legal battles back and forth, there's a great deal about this investigation that we just don't know. we don't know the people that have come forth and testified before the grand jury and don't really know what happens behind closed doors. the fact that we have this update on timing from the fulton county district attorney is a notable update. the fact that she says she's hoping to wrap this up by the end of the year cuts out about five or so months we were thinking it could stretch into next year. i think the other notable thing from this, there's about 60% through with the witnesses they want to hear. she still has about 40% more people to go. we're going to see more

subpoenas, we're going to see more called to come forward and testify and going to be watching that very closely. so i want to play you a little bit of what she said during an unrelated news conference yesterday where she gave this update. take a look. >> i'm pleased with the pace that we're going. you know, there can't be any predictions. many people are unsuccessfully fighting our subpoenas. we will continue to fight to make sure the grand jury and the public gets the truth, and i am very hopeful that by the end of this year i will be able to send the grand jury on their way. >> now hallie, to the other part of your question as to what the potentially final months could look like, we're wondering who else she's going to call. she told me she's going to call anybody and everybody who had knowledge of what the president was thinking, doing, the former president, around the time that involved the georgia election. she's called a number of high-profile people. the latest are members of the president's former circle,

former chief of staff not ruling out calling his family members or ruling out a subpoena of the former president himself. so those are certainly the things that we're going to be watching very closely when it comes to these next few months snead this is also happening in a state where as we alluded to there are high profile races with brian kemp in the mix too. >> absolutely. we know he is going to be called to testify before the grand jury after that november election. we are kind of seeing these two worlds collide, even though both the district attorney says i'm not being political in any way, this is a completely separate thing, that doesn't have to do with the elections but republicans, including brian kemp, say otherwise. we've already seen the two worlds kind of intertwine or this kind of seep into the politics. it's something that democrats are seizing on when looking at the back and forth, for instance, between the governor wanting to quash his subpoena and something that people are watching closely when it comes to what could potentially come out of his testimony.

>> you've watched this up fold and been on the ground in atlanta and georgia since the start of this investigation. has there been anything that surprised you about the way it's gone so far? >> i think a couple things. i am surprised, honestly, we do know as much as we do about this. like i said, this is typically a secret process. the d.a. when she spoke to me, she didn't hold back a heck of a lot about what her intentions were. any time she speaks on anything unrelated to this she's going to get questions thrown at her and she answers them. she does go into giving details where they are timing wise. i think the other thing, though, that has been interesting is that she's not held back on calling people to testify. we've seen senator lindsey graham get a subpoena, a sitting governor, the attorney general here in the state and that she's notably said she is not at all going to shy away from calling the former president, i think those are some things that are notable. i've watched her for a number of years, reported on her, she's somebody who doesn't shy away

for going after whoever she thinks has information. >> blayne alexander in atlanta, thank you. still ahead, which u.s. senators are in ukraine today meeting with president volodymyr zelenskyy as ukraine steps up attacks to retake the south. the last american plane left afghanistan a year ago today. how the tens of thousands of afghans on those planes forced to leave their homes are doing here in the u.s. one year later as we wait to hear from president biden any minute. stay with us. h us n's new welcome unlimited plan, for just $30. (daughter) i've already told everyone! (nurse) wait... did you say verizon for just $30? (mom) it's their best unlimited price ever. (cool guy) $30...that's awesome. (dad) yeah, and it's from the most reliable 5g network in america. (woman) for $30 a line, i'm switching now. (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. it's the all-new subway series menu!

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appreciate until you need them, is the firefighters. the firefighters have been with me my whole career and let me tell you something, an old expression, god made man and then he made a few firefighters because you got to be crazy to be a firefighter. by the way, please sit down. i'm sorry. please sit down. i keep forgetting. thank you. but look, when i ran for president i said i looked at the world the way i looked at it growing up in scranton. that wasn't hyperbole. i meant that. what families wanted in scranton when i was growing up was the basic as it is today -- a decent job, the opportunity to be treated with dignity, everyone, my dad would say, everybody, everybody is entitled to be treated with dignity, simple dignity. the fact is that they want to go to good schools, safe neighbors, decent place to live, and just a

fair shot, just a fair shot for their kids. you know, a peace of mind knowing your kids can go to school or the playground or movies or high school game and come home safely and not have to think about it. for too long, too many families haven't had that peace of mind. they watch the news and see kids gunned down in schools and on the streets almost every night you turn the news on that's what you see. they see their neighbors lose loved ones to fentanyl which is a flat killer. they see hate and anger and violence just walking the streets of america. and they just want to feel safe again. they want to feel a sense of security and that's what my crime plan is all about. you know, i call it the safer america's plan and both your members of congress voted for it. it's based on a simple notion, when it comes to public safety

in this nation the answer is not defund the police. it's fund the police. [ applause ] fund the police. and give them -- we expect them to do everything. we expect them to be protect us, to be psychologists and to be sociologists, i mean, we expect you to do everything. i'm not joking. everything. you realize more police officers are killed dealing with domestic violence than anything else. realize that? the point is, we have so much of you, so much of you. i've not met a cop who likes a bad cop. there's bad in anything. lousy senators, lousy presidents, lousy doctors, lousy lawyers. no, i'm serious. but i don't know any police officer that feels good about

the fact that there may be a lousy cop. i'm tired of not giving the kind of help them need. folks, look, we're in a situation in this country where we have to give additional resources they need to get their job done. matt gets it, matt cartwright. this is not hyperbole. matt is the chair of the subcommittee that controls the funding for public safety. he knows what it means investing in effective and accountable community policing that builds and strengthens public safety. i'm old enough to remember when the cops used to walk the beat in wilmington and scranton, they knew everybody, they knew the kid, someone in trouble, whose house to knock on the door and say, mom, your son just did. m i'm not being facetious. they knew the neighborhoods neighbors. as part of the american rescue plan, they voted for, we set

aside 350 billion, with a "b," dollars for state and local governments across america and urge them to use it like your governor did to make communities safer. here in pennsylvania, governor wolffe is using $250 million of that money to reduce crime and violence across this state. [ applause ] mayor brown -- [ applause ] mayor brown just described how it's helping fund community policing in whim wilkes-barre. every member of congress, every single one in this state, voted against the support for law enforcement. talk about how much they love it. they voted against the funding. flat out. flat out. every republican in the house. every republican in the senate. every single one. i know we expect so much from

our law enforcement officers, so we need to support them. that's why my crime plan to help communities recruit, hire, and train nationwide more than 100,000 additional officers accountable officers, for community policing. [ applause ] i mean it. folks, when it comes to fighting crime, we know it works. officers on the street, who know the neighborhood, not a joke, who know the neighborhood, who know the families they're protecting, who get the training they need to be able to do their jobs well, who work to earn the community's trust, and as we hire more police officers, there should be more training, more help and more accountability. without public trust, law enforcement can't do its job serving and protecting all the communities. if i can interject for a moment,

my deceased son beau was the attorney general for the state of delaware. what he used to do is go down on the east side, called the bucket, highest crime rate in the country, a place where i used to -- only white guy that worked as a life guard down in that area on the east side. you could always tell where the best basketball state in the state and city is, it's where everybody shows up. he would go down and hang out and sit on a bench with my -- my grandson who is now 17 years old, and the police used to be in the car, local city police. he would walk up and bang on the window and said get out of the car and meet these people. let them see you, know you, know who you are. the truth was, remember what happened to community policing. we went from having enough cops on the street to cities doing well and then deciding they don't need more police officers. so they reduced the police forces and you don't have two

cops in every vehicle. one cop in every vehicle. i don't blame one cop for not getting out in some certain neighbors, not getting out of the car. and what happens is, it used to be, i can remember that when my son was the attorney general, he would go around in the tougher neighbors and he would ensure that every single cop gave his cell phone number to the local liquor store owner, the local church, local grocery store, local hamburger joint so if there's a problem they pick up the phone and call. what do people not want to do in tough neighbors? they don't want to be the one identified as turning so and so in. i remember going on the east side in wilmington and one of those old victorian three-story apartment buildings and going up to see a woman whose name, she passed away, won't mention her name now, and standing in that rotunda, that part that stuck out around the building and said, joey, i know, i know what's going on. they all plan it downstairs.

i can hear them. i'm afraid to tell anybody. i'm afraid to tell anybody. the gangs. so i got her -- i got a phone number for the local cops. she called. they promised not to identify her because they knew there her because they knew there would be retribution and the crime rate began to drop for real. not a joke. you got to know people. you got to know and you got to be able to trust the police. the police have to be able to trust the community, but we slipped away from that. we have a hell of a lot fewer cops today than we did when i wrote that initial crime bill. but now we got to get back to it, and by the way, i'm not making a case there aren't bad cops. there's some really lousy cops. there's some really lousy doctors. there's some really lousy lawyers. i mean it, but here's the point, as we've seen too often, public trust is frayed and is broken, and it undermines public safety when it gets frayed. it literally undermines safety.

families across the country have to ask why in this nation, for example, so many black americans wake up knowing they could lose their life just by living their lives. if you come from neighborhoods like i come from down in delaware, if you have a 16 to 17-year-old son and you get your driver's license, you sit down and say, look, if you get stopped, put your hands on the wheel. don't do anything. i mean, i'm being serious. i'm being serious, but here's the point. simply jogging, sleeping on their homes. you know they made headlines or not, there are a lot of lost souls. increased trust makes policing more effective, and it strengthens public safety. the communities, by the way, that want the police more than any other community are the tough poor communities. black, white, immigrants, they need the help. they want the help. it's not that they don't want

it. they want the help. without that, victims don't call for help. witnesses don't step forward. crimes go unsolved, justice isn't served. i took executive action, which i'm allowed to do as president, i always admired governments can take executive office. i couldn't do it for state offices. one, no federal officer is allowed to use a chokehold. no federal officer can restrict -- there's restricted no-knock warrants. we created a national database for officers who have misbehaved and been held accountable so they can't hide. my plan will help make sure the state and local governments adopt these same reforms. and my plan tuz something else really important, it addresses the opioid epidemic. how many people are dying of opioid overdoses now, and by the way, laced with fentanyl.

the attorney general can tell you more about that you never want to know for a fact, for real. he's been such a strong leader on this, but we're going to impose tougher penalties for deadly fentanyl trafficking. that's poisoning communities across this country. this is a key part of the unity agenda i'm announcing, that i announced in my state of the union address. we can do this. we have to do this. we'll make america safer. my plan also takes common sense action to reduce gun violence and violence overall. the bill's in the progress we made this summer when i signed into law the bipartisan safer communities act, the most significant gun safety law we passed in 30 years. it took 30 years. [ applause ] and we beat the nra. we took them on and beat the nra straight up.

you have no idea how intimidating they are to elected officials. the vast majority of republicans in congress couldn't even stand up and vote for it because they're afraid of the nra. . it's not unusual, every democrat, republican get afraid of certain interest groups. law enforcement supported it. faith leaders and teachers supported it. victims of gun violence and their families supported it. young people in this country, like the students of this great university support it, and the nra and voted against it saving lives and keeping americans safe. but guess what, we took on the nra, and we're going to take them on again and we won, and we will win again. we're not stopping here. i'm determined to ban assault weapons in this country.

determined. i did it once before, and i'll do it again. for many of you home, i want to be clear, it's not about taking away anybody's guns. in fact, we should be treating responsible gun owners as examples of how every gun owner should behave. i have two shotguns at home, it's a long story, i'm not a posed to guns, but i support the second amendment, but the second amendment has one of the most conservative justices in history, justice scalia once wrote, like most rights, the rights granted by the second amendment are not unlimited. they're not unlimited. [ applause ] right now you can't go out and buy an automatic weapon. you can't go out and buy a cannon, and for those brave right wing americans who say it's all about keeping america

independent and safe, if you want to fight against a country, you need an f 15, you need something more than a gun. i'm not joking, think about the rationale that's used. folks, look, i went to every major school shooting in the country since i was chairman of the judiciary committee all the way through as vice president and president, over 48,000 people tide died from gunshot wounds in 2021 in the united states of america. over 26,000 by suicide. guns are the number one killer. the guns are the number one killer of children in america, of children and number one more children die from guns than active duty police and active

duty military personnel combined. hear that again, more children in america die from guns than active duty police and active duty military in the united states combined. we have to act. we have to act for those families in buffalo, uvalde, newtown, el paso, parkland, charleston, las vegas, orlando, i've been to every one of those things. i spent four hours last tight, met with every single one of the parents of the families who lost someone, see the looks on their faces. think about it. think about the devastation that's occurred. we have to act for all those kids gunned down on our streets every single day that never make the news. there's a mass shooting every single day in this country, the streets of america, every single day. you have to act so our kids can

learn to read in school instead of learning to duck and cover. literally, schools all across america, kids are showing up [ applause ] with psychological damage done to our kids, not just covid but covid and how it's impacted, on top of that a child going to school, children see this on television. you know, we're living in a country awash with weapons of war, weapons that weren't designed to hunt. they were designed to take on an enemy. that's what they were designed to do. for god sake what's the rationale for these weapons outside of a war zone? they inflict severe damage. when i was recently in uvalde, you know what some of the parents had to do? supply dna, supply dna because

the ar-15 just rips the body apart. could not identify, could not identify the body. a 20-year-old kid can walk in and buy one? dna to say that's my baby. what the hell is the matter with us? i'm not joking. thinking about it. what are we doing? and by the way, how many -- my dad used to love to hunt in the poconos when we lived in scranton. how many deer or bear are wearing kevlar vests, huh? not a joke. do you realize the bullet out of

an ar-15 travels five times as rapidly as the bullet shot out of any other gun? five times. and can pierce kevlar. imagine being a parent, not just losing a child, but not being able to physically identify the child or the adult because they've literally been blown apart. we equip our service members with the most lethal weapons on earth to protect all of us, protect americans, but we require them to receive significant training, extensive background checks, mental health assessments. they have to learn how to lock up and store their weapons responsibly or they get kicked out. we let