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hi there, everybody, it's 4:00 in new york, if war is hell as those who know say, then it has been a year of hell on earth for millions in ukraine, a year of anguish and grief of bravery and heroics, of death and destruction, and of pride. and hope still. that ukraine still stands today, one year after the war began is nothing short of a miracle, one of the ukrainians own making. my most conservative estimates, 8,000 civilians in ukraine are dead. 13,000 have been injured. 5 million have been at least temporarily displaced within ukraine, plus another 8 million ukrainians have been forced to plea abroad, the equivalent of every person in los angeles, chicago, houston, phoenix, philadelphia, and san antonio, all of them, suddenly end violently driven from their homes and lives. and all of that is to say

nothing of military casualties that have been suffered, an estimated more than 10,000 plus ukrainian troops are dead, many of whom were school teachers or shop owners or utility workers or film makers, or doctors, nurses, plumbers, any other type of normal job in life, you can imagine is what most of them are doing a year ago. but the cataclysm of war aside, the word of the day has to be resilience, the ukrainian people have proudly and defiantly shown the world, they will not stand by while vladimir putin seeks to take by attrition and force what he wrongfully believes to be his. president zelenskyy who spent his day in commemorative events, thanking service members in a hospital, held a press conference and delivered a national address. he again urged russia to halt aggression and praised the courage of his country men and

women. insisting tomorrow every is worth fighting for. people are today showing support for the ukrainian people. here in the u.s., the biden administration today unveiled a new $2 billion support package. it includes a range of high-tech military equipment, ammunition, and financial ailed. as g7 leaders and united nations members recommitted themselves to a campaign of support and pressure. >> members should not, no member of this council should call for peace while supporting russia's war on ukraine and the u.n. charter. in this war, there is an aggressor, and a victim. russia fights for conquest, ukraine fights for freedom. >> one year of war and

heartbreak, and resilience, is where we begin our coverage with some of the most favorite reporters and friends. he spent the week with ukrainians, preparing to mark the anniversary of the war and "new york times" pentagon correspondent is here. last march at the start of the war, the chairman, joint chiefs of star, mark milley, and nearby countries, she's been helping to tell the story of the war since the beginning. we're happy to have both of you, we start in kyiv. take me through not just the day but the week's events built to today. >> look, this weekends very differently than we all thought it would have ended last week, a week ago, because first of all, joe biden came here, and that was a surprise, and that really sort of put the wind in the sails of the ukrainian people, we also have expected either an offensive or a barrage from the

ukrainians. now, it is friday, late night here in ukraine, and that hasn't materialized. there is some fighting, there are things going on, but it is not the offensive that we thought it was. it does seem on tuesday, when vladimir putin announced that he's pulling or suspending russia's participation in the new stark treaty, the nuclear agreement between the united states and russia, that seems to have been his big play. we never want to see these things because we're in an active war zone. president zelenskyy delivered a press conference today. there were hundreds of journalists assembled from around the world asking him questions. i did have a chance to ask him about what happens in this next year, what happens if russia isn't pushed out of ukraine. what happens if the war doesn't end. let me show you a little of how our conversation went. >>. >> last week, the president of poland said if this war is going

on one year from today, there's a real danger that empowered russia will invade another state, given how effectively you have held back a russian advance with nato's help in ukraine, is it even conceivable that russia could invade another state, particularly a nato state. >> unfortunately, i believe it's possible. and that might happen. why? i can give you an explanation. president putin needs to demonstrate successes and victories. so there's not going to be a success on the battlefield in ukraine, and he will not succeed with the massive revenge in ukraine. so he would need to demonstrate success. >> so i thought that was an

interesting answer. he's saying if they don't succeed in ukraine, they have to succeed somewhere. putin has something to show for this expansionist idea he has of russia. i thought that was an interesting answer. >> everything that zelenskyy has asserted on the world stage has been something that time has now proven out. so some o. assessments when the war first started a year ago were that kyiv would fall very quickly. that did not bear out. and i think that reframed the credible narrators of the war, almost instantly, in dramatic fashion, and zelenskyy became the source, not leaving kyiv. never leaving kyiv. sending his young kids and his wife to the western part of the country, but never leaving kyiv. change the course of the war and how we cover it, and how it, perhaps, has gone down, and we'll ask helene, but what the military was willing to arm the ukrainians with. can you take us through the evolution of zelenskyy as the

authoritative narrator of the war? >> reporter: well, one year ago today, we had intelligence briefings that said that the russians think it will take three days or so. americans and brits also thought it wouldn't be very long. they offered to get zelenskyy out of poland, and into poland, and have a government in exile. he declined. then they suggested he goes to lviv in the west of the country. he declined and he was posting videos from the very first night right here in kyiv. that's part of the story. the other part of the story, as we're learning more and more, and we learned a lot on thursday night, from joe scarborough's special is that a lot of what they succeeded in doing, they did with intelligence from nato and the west. they knew where things were. they knew how things would go, and number three is the resolve of the ukrainian people. all of those ingredients were necessary to get us to where we are today, one year later where russia has lost territory that it held as recently as october, and it looks like this war is in a stalemate with the newly

arriving leopard tanks, and in a few months, the abrams tanks, whether they get jets and long range missiles that was almost inconceivable. i think they needed all three ingredients, a resolve and support from the united states and nato. a strong and resilient ukrainian people. and leadership from volodymyr zelenskyy, who many people thought was not up to the challenge. they thought he was a good guy, anti corruption, important in a country like this, they knew he was pro western. nobody really thought he was up to a fight with volodymyr zelenskyy, and it turns out that he was. >> helene, for whatever was underestimated about zelenskyy, the american and the west's intelligence about russia was spot on. and i know there's still, i mean, i think the times, i think you byline the first great piece of reporting about that strategy and why sharing it, what became part of a military strategy. and a diplomatic strategy.

can you weigh in on sort of the last year in terms of how either zelenskyy's fortitude or the skill and fortitude of the ukrainian military as well as the resolve of the ukrainian people has shifted what american military and intelligence officials thought we were entering into a year ago. >> yeah, hi, nicolle and hi ali, it's really interesting because i was -- i woke up this morning, and i was looking at, you know how social media does your -- what you were doing one year ago, and it -- i posted something that said this really sucks and with no picture or anything, and i was like, what was i talking about. and it hit me, oh, russia had just invaded ukraine. it feels like this was, god, it's been such a year. it feels like we've come such a long way since then in what we believe ukraine is capable of.

a year ago, we woke up on this morning completely thinking this was going to be over in a week. we thought that ukraine would not make it. we thought the russians would get to kyiv in days. we thought zelenskyy was a dead man walking. and i remember that horrific feeling that i was watching events unfold in front of me that i thought at the time, i knew how they were going to end and it was going to end in a horrifically bad way. a year later, we're looking now at so many deaths so the casualty estimates that we all have, that we all use are probably hugely underestimated. i think the amount of war dead, because ukraine doesn't really want to give those figures and russia certainly does not. but i think on another level, ukraine has so wildly

outperformed any expectation that any of us had that you can't help but look at this as sort of almost a morality story. you're looking at a russian military that usually under performed, a ukrainian military that he's hugely overperformed and has been able to over the past of the year, the weapons, they've gotten weapons they haven't been able to do before, and as long as the ukrainian troops continue to outperform these expectations, nato and the west seem to be hanging in there, particularly the united states, or, you know, are going to continue to back them. i think this year, the next few months is going to be pivotal. i mean, you're now hearing, which is something you never heard in the first few months of the war last year, but you're now hearing officials, senior officials from western governments, from the biden administration saying that they

think that ukraine can win. even can win this year. an official sent this to me a couple of weeks ago, and i made him repeat it again because i was like did you really just say what i thought you said. but the problem for everybody, then, is you get to the point of what does putin do then? i mean, everything that the biden administration talks about doing is about strengthening the hand of ukraine so that it can go to the bargaining table. but we're not used to seeing a humbled vladimir putin and that's where the escalation risks that you were talking about at the beginning of this segment get -- start coming into play. >> helene and ali, stay where you are and jump in. we're going to bring into our coverage, john kirby, who's brave enough to face questioning from me and the two of you, national security council coordinator for strategic communications at the white

house one year ago today, he was the pentagon press secretary, a fixture at the podium bringing updates to only us but the world. i want to make sure i can get your personal reflections. pick up on a year ago the assessments of russia that were shared as part of a strategy to deter the invasion itself have held up. but the estimations of zelenskyy and the ukrainian military seem to have maybe underestimated his resolve, the skill of the military, and the fortitude of the ukrainian people. is that a fair assessment? >> i think helene was absolutely right. i mean, they certainly did out perform a lot of expectations. i mean, we didn't know a year ago exactly how things were going to unfold. we certainly had a good sense of what mr. putin was planning to do, which is why we declassified

a lot of information ahead of time to sort of throw him off his game. we knew he had upwards of 180,000 troops, all different types, artillery, infantry, and we shared as much of that information with them as we could. we did not have a perfect sense of how the ukrainians were going to defend themselves in the early hours and days, and they certainly did surprise everybody with how well they did. i don't mean bravery and courage on the battlefield. i'm talking skill. organizational elements and how they were able to perform on the battlefield. i think also maybe we didn't fully appreciate ourselves how valuable the training that we had done with ukrainians since 2014 this really been. we basically not just the united states, but our allies helped transform them from a soviet style army to a western style army with greater

decentralization, the ability to be agile and nimble in the moment and make command decisions on the spot, something that the russian army still can't do. i don't know that we fully appreciated. i know we were proud of our training and all we did. i don't think we fully appreciated how much it took and how much it transformed their military. >> let me ask you about the other side. without access to classified intelligence, seeing the empty abandoned russian tanks lining up on the way to kyiv made me think that the russian military was not all that maybe we thought they were. what was at ha moment for the leaders of the pentagon? >> i think we really -- i'd have to go back and look exactly, it was somewhere in the first week or so, week to ten days when we -- as we were watching the operational reports coming out of ukraine, particularly as they tried to move on kyiv, and i think it was in that time frame where we began to see there were real cracks in their performance

capables. they were running out of fuel because they hadn't factored in fueling the vehicles, they were running out of ammunition. they hadn't factored that in. their command and control was faulty. by that, i mean the ability to direct moments in the field. the other thing is how poorly they were at integrating air and ground. so russian aircraft and air force commanders making decisions completely independent of what their army commanders are trying to do on the ground. there was no synergy there. i would tell you this, here we are a year later, and they still are suffering those same problems. they still haven't solved logistics and their command and control is not where it needs to be or where you would expect it to be after a year of war. unit cohesion, moral. i've said it before. putin is changing journals as often as i change my socks.

he can't find the right leadership to run the war. they have not come out on the other side after a year of war and improved. on the other hand, look at what ukrainians have done in a year. they have already taken back more than 50% of the territory that the russians first captured in those first, you know, couple of weeks or months of the war. more than 50% of that is back in ukrainian hands. >> ali velshi. >> reporter: yeah, i wanted to point out, you can't see it from here but dnipro river is right over here. not far from here is where the russian tanks made it to. they were at the gates of kyiv. they were in parts of kyiv. they were out by april 1st. they left a humanitarian massacre behind them, which is a sad day for ukraine and the world when zelenskyy was asked about it today, he said what was the saddest day of the war for you, he said the day we liberated bucha. that said, that's how close the

russians were. they almost took the capital of an independent country and they were fought off. that was within the first, you know, two months of this war, the first month of the war really. five weeks of the war, they were able to do that. so somewhere in that first five weeks is when everybody in the world realized this is not what we thought it was going to be. >> and then john i'm going to ask you to share, how did we adjust? how did that change the calculations on what we were willing to give? the delta seems to have shrunk. i know it's not totally aligned. what are they asking for that we're not giving and what does that system do? again, it's not perfectly aligned but it does seem to have shrunk. can you take us through the evolution of what they asked for and what we were willing to give once they had some success on the battlefield? >> we really tried to evolve the support we give ukraine with the war as it has evolved and changed over time.

in the first few days and weeks, it was all about stingers and javelins. right? the stingers knock out russian helicopters, advancing on kyiv or trying to advance on kyiv, and those airports. but also the javelin antitank missiles. they were moving in a mechanized set of columns toward kyiv down from the south out of belarus, and the ukrainians really wanted those anti-tank missiles. they were quite effective with it, knocking out columns, lead vehicles, and knocking out one or two in the middle of the column. then as, to ali's point, as mr. putin realized he was not going to get kyiv and kharkiv, he withdrew all of his troops to the north into belarus, and refocused his efforts in the east. then it became an issue of long range fires, what we call long range fires. artillery, the ability of having the ukrainians strike russian lines, well deep inside and give them some stand off distance, and that's when we started

sending howitzers, and now the himars. in the fall, mr. putin decided he was going to hit civilian infrastructure with cruise missiles and iranian drones. air defense, not that it wasn't always an issue, stinger or air defense capabilities, more long range air defense capabilities became important. now what we're trying to do in critical months and helene talked about the importance of the next couple of months, she's right. we're trying to get ahead from what we think the fighting is going to be in the spring. ukrainians are preparing not only to defend themselves until the operations but conduct offensive operations of their own. and that's why we're taking battalions, and training them on combined arms maneuvers, this is the ability to fight in an open terrain, in an integrated way, using artillery, including air defense, and we're giving them training at the same time,

flowing into ukraine, the kinds of weapons and platforms they need to do that, whether it's bradley fighting vehicles or leopard tankings -- tanks that the germans are going to provide, to allow them to defend themselves and their units in the open terrain. we're trying to get ahead of what we think the fighting is in the spring. >> it is my distinct impression that we flow all of that training, weapons, ammunition, and there's still some in the military who believe the solution is not a military one. can you just speak more sort of holistically about our national security leaders see this war ending. >> it's so interesting that you should ask that because that's exactly what i would love to hear kirby talk about. but it's the -- and this gets back to what i was saying about

where does vladimir putin end up. when you start looking at the question of how does this movie end, do we believe that vladimir putin turns tail and after he's defeated. let's say ukraine does what we all think is quite possible and maybe even probably, and they're able to stop, not just stop the russians from advancing, but they're able to target that crimea land bridge, for instance, and push them back there all the way back to the sea. let's say they're able to push them back in the donbas. what happens, then? let's say they get back to the february 24th lines, the united states would certainly probably describe as victory. does putin then stop and say, hey, i lost? i'm going to, you know, tell the russian people this is a mistake

or does he start lashing out and acting up elsewhere. does he start escalating and threatening and using that nuclear threat that he was doing last fall? it's almost as if it feels as if the biden administration is sometimes afraid of winning because winning could also end up, winning for ukraine could end up dragging united states into a place that we don't necessarily want to be. if russia escalates, and that's sort of the thorny question that i don't know that we have an answer to at this point. i certainly don't. but i would love to hear kirby's thoughts on that. >> i push back on this idea that we're afraid of winning or that we certainly don't want ukraine to achieve victory. we absolutely believe that they can and we certainly want them to win, but it's important that mr. zelenskyy gets to determine

what that looks like. what is victory? what is success, and if it ends up at the negotiating table, under what circumstances is he willing to sit down with mr. putin, and what would he be willing to negotiate? we're not going to dictate those terms to him, he's got to figure that out for himself. what we want to do is figure out in the meantime, we're giving him all the tools and training he needs to succeed on the battlefield, if and when he sits down on the table, he can do so from a position of strength. i don't think anybody could get accurately inside his brain to know what would drive him to the table or what would drive them to say, okay, i've achieved enough success or not. we're not focused on that. we're focused on helping president zelenskyy make that determination. i will say this, however, and it's not insignificant. mr. putin has been at war for a year as well. and he started out with about 180,000 troops. he has lost about 200,000. well, he's suffered 200,000 casualties, some killed, some

wounded. that is significant. that is 200,000 casualties, more than he devoted to the effort to begin with. .1, .2, about 80% of his ground forces are as we speak involved in the war in ukraine in some way. 80% of his army dedicated to this one conflict, and he has lost obviously thousands of tanks, armored vehicles, and he has expended a huge inventory of his cruise missile capability. he has put a lot of energy into this fight, and it's not exactly clear right now how much more he would have left to do something else, you know, another adventure somewhere else. we're not taking that lightly. he has a powerful military. he has invested and spent and gone through an awful lot here just in this last year in ukraine. >> a conversation you won't hear anywhere else. john kirby and helene cooper, thank you so much for starting us off today. ali sticks around a little bit longer. as russia's invasion enters year

two, calls are growing for vladimir putin to stand trial for war crimes. we'll talk with one of the security experts work to go build a case against russia which could lead right to the top. colonel eugene vindman joins us. back here at home, special counsel jack smith over at doj on both his january 6th and mar-a-lago documents cases. how his office is moving full speed ahead with new aggressiveness in both of those probes. and later in the show, to mark the one-year anniversary of the war's star, country music superstar brad paisley has written a new song in support of ukraine, and here's the plot twist, president zelenskyy is on that track. we'll play it for you and talk to brad about making a song with the wartime leader, and about why it's so important to continue to pay attention to the war in ukraine. all of those stories and more when "deadline white house" continues after a quick break. don't go anywhere. " continues after a quick break. don't go anywhere.

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people just understood that this is a war. we are not just some military people fighting with one another. this is the war where somebody can just rape a woman, kill her, and then to burn down her body. or even just not to do anything. just throw her out. >> you're not making that up. that actually happened here. >> that actually happened here and in big numbers, so it was not some accident. it was system. it was systematic atrocities, killing, raping, everything.

>> that was our friend, a ceremony to honor the victim of the atrocities committed there. one of the many towns devastated by russian violence. more than 71,000 alleged war crimes have been reported in ukraine over the last year. ukrainian and western authorities say there is evidence of murders and of executions. shelling of civilian infrastructure, forced deportations. child abductions, torture, sexual violence, and illegal detention. one expert tells reuters that they are an intrinsic part of the invasion itself. quote, what is clear from the prosecution's investigations over the last year is that there is a criminal plan and the russian military operation is inherently criminal. in the sense that you can not seek to extinguish ukrainian identity without the massive commission of war crimes, and crimes against humanity and possibly genocide. let's bring in retired u.s. army colonel, eugene vindman, deputy

adviser to the national security council. he's been on the ground in ukraine six times since june, investigating war crimes. he goes back to the country tomorrow. ali is still with us in kyiv and fresh off the reporting trip in bucha. eugene, tell us what the status of the investigations are, and give us your real assessment of what accountability, real accountability for war crimes that are not rogue events, but these soldiers are rewarded by vladimir putin himself after they carry out these atrocities in bucha. >> well, thank you, nicole, for having me back again. it's great to be on your show. as you mentioned, i have been to ukraine now six times. i'm about to go back for a seventh trip. i work very closely with ukrainian investigators. the prosecutor general's office. and our job or the job of the atrocity crimes adviser group is

to empower, provide resources, and expertise on war crimes, and it's a multinational group. the uk, the eu and the u.s. are involved in this mission. and as you mentioned, the numbers are staggering. 71,000 cases. that's a number that while the cases continue to grow, the number of prosecutors does not. in fact, many of the prosecutors certainly earlier in the war were called to the front line, and were mobilized, and so that's a staggering job, and it's even more staggering when you think about the documentation for these crimes. and i've been to bucha. i've seen the location of these mass burials and where the executions took place, and you compiling the data bases of video evidence, cctv.

it's a mammoth job, and we're helping the ukrainians with this extremely important endeavor. the ukrainians will constantly say, you'll hear the refrain that they want weapons, but they also want accountability. they always follow up any requests for weapons and the ability to win the war with accountability after the war is over. >> i know that the atrocities in bucha, turning point for how we understand the foundation of the russian military and vladimir putin's regime, but a turning point in terms of how the ukrainians see this ending. there's no negotiating with the leader carrying out war crimes, right? >> reporter: you're exactly right, and eugene, this is an interesting point i learned in a conversation i had with a number of army chaplains, as people of faith, can you forgive as you counsel these soldiers or not front lines and bury them, and they said, you know, to get forgiveness, someone has to ask for forgiveness, and that's not

what seems to be happening here. as you discussed the documentation of the war crimes, one thing that's amazing about the bucha story on april 2nd of last year, we learned about it. there was satellite imagery, there was video, there was testimony. people had cell phone videos. we were able to gather more information about that commission of war crimes than we often have been able to in recently history. whether you can prosecute anybody for it is another story, but at least the evidence of the war crimes of the things that are contrary to the geneva convention, shooting people whose hands are tied behind their backs. shooting women, raping women and children. the evidence is solid. >> that's right. and the evidence continues to mounlt. and -- mount. and frankly, we've hit the tip of the iceberg. evidence in areas that have been liberated. think about the cities that have been completely to the ground, like mariupol, had populations

of tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, and that will have to be eventually fully investigated as well. and so there are many more crimes to be investigated and it's critical that the investigations continue, so the question about who is going to be held accountable when is a difficult question, and frankly, there are still war crimes trials from world war ii. there are war crimes trials from yugoslavia. those are conflicts that are decades, many decades old. and the key is to gather the evidence, build the cases, and when the opportunity, which it will inevitably happen presents itself, you will present the cases. the ukrainians have already started. they have had a few prosecutions of lower level war criminals. and in many ways, this is a classic way of how you build a

case. you can start from the bottom, and then you build each level of authority up until you reach the pinnacle. in this case it would be vladimir putin and the senior civilian leadership and military leadership of the russian federation. >> you're heading back tomorrow, we'll track you down no matter the time zone. ask ali from there with the latest. thank you so much for joining us today. ali velshi, before you go, i want to signal you out for an extraordinary week of reporting, including today's questioning at the press conference and anchoring from kyiv. what a privilege that we all have to get to showcase your reporting and analysis and insights from there. we're so grateful. >> reporter: nicolle, the whole time, your show has created space to tell the story and keep it centered for our audience, and i'm grateful to you for that. >> thank you, my friend. when you get back, come sit here, and we'll try to sift through everything we've learned

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there are more signs today that suggest that former vice president mike pence will inevitably testify before a federal grand jury about his old boss's efforts to overturn the 2020 election result. a senior law enforcement official confirms that special counsel jack smith has preemptively asked a federal judge to force pence to appear before that grand jury before he's even had a chance to argue against his subpoena in court. it comes as one of the most conservative former judges to have once advised mike pence personally warrants that any fight against his subpoena would be a quote dangerous gambut and that pence doesn't have a chance in the world to win his case. let's bring in michael steele,

harry litman back at the table, former depp tip assistant attorney, we may move you into the studio until the end of time. i want to start with you michael steele. if you had put it on a bingo card that judge ludig would become the voice of reason in sort of the pence legal calculations, he was the one who gave pence some of the legal analysis that said you cannot overturn president biden's victory, this is a formal certification, and he is now extending that role as counselor, if you will, to mike pence to say you will not prevail in fighting this subpoena. >> yeah, when you're beholden to the institution and not some guy at mar-a-lago, that's the kind of advice you get. it's sound. solid. constitutionally based. looking at the fact pattern and understanding what the reality is for someone like mike pence

who was at the full fulcrum of he's a central player. the idea that somehow you're going to be less offensive to donald trump by trying to wiggle in one direction puts you at odds with everything else, the constitution, fact pattern, the rule of law. all of those other things that you espouse next president of the united states. the reality is a hard one here for the vice president. he's getting good advice. the test for all of these pokes, whether you're talking about mike pence or any of the others who are having their sights set on the oval office is just how far are you willing to go to tell the truth to the american people versus your own political ambitions, and we'll see whether or not he gets to pass that test. >> michael steele, i'll let

harry weigh in, we've spent six years hearing that prosecutors block everything out. i think the six years have proven that's not true. it's a different thing to be partisan than it is to be political. bill barr was political and partisan. merrick garland is not partisan, but he's extremely political. he appears from the outside, and history may prove me wrong, i hope it does, to have paralysis around politically charged probes. i wonder what you think the impact is of an iconic conservative figure like judge ludig and laughing at the pence legal movements? >> well, it's actually a clarifying moment from where i'm sitting. at a certain point in this process, all of us scratch our head and go, is it just me? am i the only one. >> my friend, i feel like that every day. pull my hair out. >> i'm actually reading the

words and yet somehow i seem to be out of step with everybody else, and so the judge is very clarifying in this moment. to your point about the attorney general, yes, he's paralyzed by the politics here. what i would say to him is you're actually freed from the politics. yeah, this is the first time you've had to, you know, consider bringing charges against a foreman president or invoking the -- or requesting the vice president to appear and testify. yeah, all of these things are new because we've never been here before. we've never had a president who tried to overthrow the government. we've never had a vice president whose life was threatened by his president before. so, yeah, it's not just me. it's you who don't get it. >> and, i mean, i'll let you take all the time you need, harry. the thing is, we saw mueller was

so deferential to pence, he never calls him in. we saw this because there's such institutionalism inside doj that doing anything differently than what doj has done before is so jarring to these doj institutionalists. as michael steele is saying, we're not the variable, trump, a criminal, corrupt leader who brazenly sought to plot a coup against the government he ostensibly led, that's the variable. >> yeah. and, you know, mueller was very old school this way. jack smith, i think, has been the opposite. including the kinds of aggressive moves now. we've got pence, meadows, ivanka and jared recently. you know, the last sort of iconic moment with pence was what ludig calls a profile in courage of standing up.

i was less impressed than others that he followed the law. that's the indelible pence moment for now. what he's asserting, and this is to the nearly silly, even though the law is unsettled. nevertheless, i think we can all sort of gu fa is at that during these conversations with trump, which is what smith is really looking to get, he was somehow in his guise as the president of the senate. >> i bet you a million dollars that trump has no idea that an american vice president -- i bet you trump has no idea that's even a thing. >> i don't know if that's the standard for bringing claims, i think you're right. but look, it's, a, silly, but, b, it's so contrived, he combines it with a pious statement as if it's a weighty constitutional principle, and he's just standing up for separation of powers, and it is going to be shot down. now, i think it's actually

calculated to have a little bit more delay because this is, we've talked about this before. more open-ended, of course, we've talked less about speech or debate. short work of it, maybe it's medium work of it. it can't succeed. the general test was is that a legislative act when he's getting, you know, completely -- >> he's being called the p word. >> for example. he's not the p word in the sense of president of the senate, then, and it's got to fail, and he's going to look contrived at, and i think, michael, you know, his suggestion that the motivation because his only path to the presidency the presidency far-fetched as it may be has to doe of trump supporters. but the legal claim is lousy and -- but conjoined with this mike pence piety is i think

really a bad look and one that is going to sully the january 6th, you know, reputation he received. >> all right, michael and harry are sticking with us. up next for us there's new reporting about one of those boxes containing classified documents that turned up at mar-a-lago late last year and how jack smith wants to know about how that material was handled. much more after a quick break. don't go anywhere. more after a. don't go anywhere.

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as part of the investigation into the ex-president's mishandling of classified documents special counsel jack smith is reportedly trying to understand what appears to be a months long chaotic and perilous journey of one box. quote, people familiar with the trump legal team's efforts to locate documents describe a confusing chain of events that delayed discovery of the box including having its contents up loaded to the cloud, e-mailed to a trump employee, and moved to an off-site location before finally ending up back at mar-a-lago in a bridal suite that is now trump's office. nbc news has reached out to the parties involve in the reporting but have not heard back. what is significance of the story of the box up loaded to the cloud? >> besides there are things

outside of mar-a-lago no surprise there. i think the significance is now deep the mistrust of doj and smith is to the whole trump team. there is a possible explanation basically what happened. there is a whole sheaf of skekling that some aide had to photograph and there were a couple classified documents in there. the aide did that and sent it over to mar-a-lago where it arrives after the searches have already been executed. so now back in mar-a-lago are a couple classified documents. now, in a different situation where there's some credibility and trust, the defense would explain and the trump's lawyers did give it over right away and it might be okay. but now, you know, there's so much bad blood and so much noncompliance over so many months, you know, the way smith is seeing this is there were other things there and then you brought them back to mar-a-lago but after our search -- >> it's quite justified. michael steele, i'll give you

the last word. >> i agree with the distrust. it's all nufarious. i'm curious as to who outside the united states have copies of some of these documents. i'd love to see our government pursue that trail to some extent. there's more to the takingf these documents than just the innocent look of, oh, we just boxed them up when we left office. so there's a lot more there there. the mistrust is earned, well-earned by the doj and other agencies that are looking into this, and they should continue to pursue it because i'm sure there will be other conversations like this, nicolle, we'll have in the months ahead. >> right. there are only patterns no outliers in the trump story, only patterns of mishandling classified documents, patterns of distrust, patterns of disregard for classified information. no outliers in any of those categories. up next for us a look at how the biden administration has handled the past year and the past week of russia's brutal war and

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six days ago russia's vladimir putin sought to shake the very foundations of the free world thinking he could make it bend to his menacing ways, but he badly miscalculated. putin thought ukraine was weak and the west was divided. and in his trouble president zelenskyy said in his speech to the european parliament light will win over darkness. one year later kyiv stands and

ukraine stands. democracy stands. america stands with you, and the world stands with you. hi again, everyone. it's 5:00 in new york. in the face of a full year of brutal russian aggression against the country of ukraine and its people president joe biden has rallied and upheld a strong defense of our ally. he has marshalled physical support in financial assistance, training, sanctions against russia but also garnered support at a moral level, building and harnessing widespread unity among a majority of americans and aeroallies abroad. it is a showcase one might argue of biden's foreign policy acumen and his promise and pledge to stand up for democracies the world over. he has sent russian president vladimir putin a clear message that ukraine will never be

russia's victory, a promise that has so far borne out as kyiv and ukraine still stand and russia has suffered massive losses and humiliation. but of course this war is far from over. ukraine has lost hundreds of thousands of lives and putin has given no indication of backing down, but president biden maintains the united states unwavering commitment traveling to kyiv just days ago and definely walking with president zelenskyy through an active war zone, in kyiv biden remarked on his conversation with ukraine's president exactly one year ago on the day russia invaded. >> he told me that you could hear the explosions in the background. i'll never forget that. and the world was about to change. i remember vividly because i asked you -- i asked you next. i asked you what is there, mr. president, what can i do for you? how can i be of help?

and i don't know if you remember what you said to me, but you said and i, quote, gather the leaders of the world, ask them to support ukraine. >> in what is likely to be one of biden's biggest global tests of his presidency he has united our western allies in opposition to putin. here at home bipartisan support for ukraine has been an stord thing. it's a rarity during a time when our country feels more polarized than ever before. our friend and ambassador michael mcfalls stresses this, quote, it is in america's interest to stay the course. he writes this, quote, stand up for democracy also produces tangible instrumental benefits for american national security. the separation of interests and values is false dichotomy. the success of democratic ukraine in repelling autocratic russia would assure small "d"

democrats around the world our idea is gathering steam. small "d" democrats would feel more emboldened. in parallel countries in africa, asia, latin america, and the middle east watching this war from the side lines right now would lean more toward the u.s. not china and russia after a victory in ukraine. one year into the war in ukraine is where we begin the hour with two of the experts we've turned to most frequently, the author of the piece we just mentioned, michael mcfaul is here. an msnbc national affairs analyst. also joining us retired u.s. army lieutenant colonel alexander vindman. he's a former director for european affairs for the national security council. i remember the first time i you on and you were calling each other mike and alex. but i'll go with mike and alex

today. ambassador mcfaul, take you through your piece. >> go ahead. >> take us through your piece because you broaden this out in a way we don't do often enough. >> well, on this tragic, horrific anniversary of putin's invasion -- russia's invasion of ukraine i took -- the reason i wrote the piece was to take a big step back and write directly to america. it's like why should we care? what's in it for us? and i start with the moral piece that president biden talked about in his speech in warsaw. this is a fight between a dictatorship and a democracy. this is fight against annexation. remember we fought world war ii over annexation. and this is a fight against imperialism. russia is an empire. they're trying to recolonize their former colony, ukraine.

so there's sound reasons we should be on the side of ukrainians. but i think there's actually national interest reasons too. if you don't care about morals and just care about us i think there's big reasons. first and foremost if ukraine defeats putin our allies in europe will feel safer. if they lose to putin our allies in europe will feel threatened and we'll have to use more soldiers and sent more to the front line and that's not in our national interest. if ukraine wins mr. xi jinping is going to have to think twice about invading taiwan. but if he loses and putin wins i think that creates a more permissive set of conditions for war there and i am scared to death we might get dragged into. and third and finally thanks for quoting the piece this stupid -- let me be more polite. this false dichotomy between interests and values we have to set aside.

we're not going to contain, whatever the verb you want to use, compete with china if we're going to be more like them. it's when we are the leader of the free world, that has very tangible benefits for us in dealing with all countries around the world. a win for democracy in ukraine is a win for american democracy and our values around the world. >> and alex, it seems that a majority of americans even if they don't have the intellectual appreciation for -- for the chess pieces that mike is talking about, you know, if china sees this it plays into calculations about taiwan, i think the american people are smart enough to recognize that democracy far away is fighting for the same thing that our democracy at this moment is fighting to preserve here. and there has been a pretty sustained high level bipartisan support for the war. are you surprised by that, heartened by that?

tell me what you think that is due to. >> nicolle, good to see you again. mike, good to see you again of course as always. i think, you know, i'm heartened by the fact that we do continue to enjoy a high degree of bipartisan support for ukraine. it's something that i've been concerned about that somehow we will succumb to ukraine fatigue and we'll take our eye off the prize. i think we have a busy news cycle continuously as we get into the 2024 election cycle. it's going to be crowded out. right now by far the most important geopolitical event of the day is -- and this comes from folks like mitch mcconnell across the political spectrum is ukraine. and whether we have a russian victory that undoes u.s. prosperity for the 21st century, brings back these rules of the jungle where the strong prey on the weak, schoolyard bully or do we continue to preserve a system, a rules based

international system. and i think people understand this intuitively. they understand russia is a bully. and i think the american people in general understand that if russia wins we'll have a much, much more complex geopolitical environment. you don't have to get into the nuts and bolts to understand that. >> mike, we're going to make sure we get alex's audio -- are you there? are you back, alex? we lost you for a second. >> our interests are essential -- sorry, our values are essential to our interests. what guides us across different types of conflicts, it prevents us from being flexible when we shouldn't be and succumbing to this in this case we should bend our values. we should be consistent by recognizing that american values

are central to the way we conduct our foreign policy. >> mike, i want to ask you about something alex mentioned. you mentioned mitch mcconnell's strong support not just over the past year but this week, this from today. as my fellow leading republicans and i have explained it's not an act of charity for the united states and our nato allies to help supply the ukrainian people in national defense, it is a direct investment in our own national interest. at long-term cost to the united states in both dollars and security risks would be astronomically higher than the minuscule fraction of our gdp we've invested in ukraine's defense thus far. it's a good for joe biden mitch mcconnell put that out and a good thing for our standing in the world in terms of how europe and nato and even putin sees us. one of the reasons -- i'm not inside mcconnell's head, but one of the reasons he had to put that out is because the likes of

ted cruz and marjorie taylor greene and others in the putin wing of the republican caucus, which isn't large but it is loud, are still inexplicably skeptical of the effort of ensuring that ukraine, a democracy's success in the fight against russia, the autocrat, an apadversary of our country. that is still an extraordinary commentary on our domestic politics. >> i agree. and i applaud senator mcconnell's statement. i agree with it. and i don't always agree with senator mcconnell, by the way. i was at the munich security conference with democrats and republicans, and there was a lot of agreement. in all those meetings i spent most of my time in meetings about ukraine. but some of the people you just listed they were in munich. they don't go to munich. and i saw mr. trump's statement just a few days ago about what he says. there is a divide within the republican party. by the way, it's in the democratic party, too, between

isolationists and engagement. but it's really acute in the republican party and i can tell you having just spent several days with ukrainian officials in munich, they're nervous about it. they're nervous right now it's all solidarity, but if this drags on and they don't achieve a breakthrough on the battlefield it might begin to wane especially as we get closer to our presidential election. and that's why i think a critical mistake, we've got to be all-in now. you know, many leaders in munich said we're going to be with you for as long as it takes. and sitting next to ukrainians when they heard the word long, they got nervous. they don't want a long war. they want a short war. they want to wrap it up now with more weapons, better sanctions, more sanctions now because number one a long war means a lot more ukrainians chi. they don't want that. but, two, they worry about western supporters being there if there's not a victory on the

battlefield. >> and they should. because the front-runner on the republican party is someone who ambassador taylor said this week would not have done what this president has done to protect and advance ukraine. and alex, you know that better than anybody. i want to turn to this question of how -- how we help ukraine win and how we help them win quickly. it seems to increasingly turn into a conversation about planes, fighter jets. let me show you what chairman of the joint chiefs mark milly said to my colleague joe scarborough last night. >> it would be very difficult to go nose to nose with the russian air force, plane to plane. the russians have 6 whereby 700, 800 fourth and fifth generation fighter bombers in their inventory. the ukrainians have 100 or something like that. to get 4 or 500 fighter bombers in there in the weeks and months that's a high bar to do and i don't know that's feasible and achievable in the near term.

in the long-term maybe that's something policy makers want to consider. >> it did not seem an enthusiastic embrace of at least american military supplying jets to ukraine. is that a blow? do the ukrainians have a plan to get them from somewhere else? tell me where this stands. >> so it's clear to me that we're still underestimating the ukrainians. we're still kind of bogged down by our misplaced understanding of russian power and the limits of russian power. and again, a year on we haven't learned all lessons we should from this war. clearly the ukrainians have applied whatever technology we've given them asymmetrically. whatever we've given them, they've gotten squeezed ten fold from. and i think the fact is even a modest amount of air power, it's not just the military capabilities but also a signal we'll be there, we'll continue to support the ukrainians, and

they will figure out how to employ it within their air power. that means more control in the skies, the ability to knock out more russian drones that are flying, the ability to contest airspace especially selectively where the russians still can fly relatively freely along the battlefield's edge and punish ukrainian armed forces with their airplanes and helicopters. we should be open to providing everything and anything. the president keeps saying as long as it takes. i'd like to hear him say whatever it takes. that's what's missing from this discussion right now. we still have some sort of false understanding of systems that escalate the war, which is a mirage. we have seen no indications of any appetite for the russians to escalate. so what is it that's holding us back? is it the fear of winning? it's not clear to me and this is a question the administration should be asking itself. what is holding us back from providing all the assistance the ukrainians need to win? >> mike, you want to take a stab

at that? >> let me say a couple of things. first of all, what the biden administration has done with our nato allies and what president biden himself has done to put that coalition together is extraordinary. it's historic. that photo you're showing right there, that's historic. that's like kennedy going to berlin, 1963. he has done that, and you haven't seen the 500 phone calls and trips that put that together, a tremendous achievement. that's number one. number two, i agree with alex. yes, you've done great and there's more to be done. and we have this debate about every weapon system over the year. first they didn't need high mars, they couldn't use them, then about the patriots. they're really complicated, then they got the patriots. it was about the tanks and they finally got over that hurdle. and so i -- and now it's about not just planes but about this

weapon system these long-range missile systems. when you talk to the ukrainians that's at the top of their list. they think with that they can achieve a break through in their offensive. i'm not a general, i'm not a colonel like alex vind mchb when i listen to ukrainian military people say that my answer is, well, who are we to tell them what they need and don't need. they've proven us wrong before especially at the beginning of this war. so i just think we need to remember that. finally on the planes, one little thing i think we needed again, right now we're all talking about our planes. i think we talked about it, nicolle. remember back in march there was a plane from poland and other allies, 75 or so of them. whatever happened to that plane? so, again, i applaud what the administration has done before, and i wish that they would lean in because nobody remembers what you did in the first year of the war. everybody will remember what

happens in the last year of the war, and we want the last year of the war to be victory for ukraine. >> no one has helped us understand and predict what would happen and what is happening better than the two of you, so i want to thank you for joining us today. i want to thank you for all the frank conversations over the last year. and we were talking about it before it actually started. ambassador michael mcfaul, colonel alex vindman, thank you for starting us off today. >> when we come back there's brand new reporting how the united states rewrote the intelligence play book to expose russia's war in ukraine to help keep ukraine and the world one step ahead of them. and later in the hour i've been waiting for this all week. we've got a real treat. country music superstar brad paisley will be our guest. he released a new song today. it features president zelenskyy on the track.

it's about all the ways we're similar, all the ways our desires to be safe and happy and free are universal. we're even going to bring on a special guest along with brad to help make it happen. he's a familiar face to all of you and you won't want to miss that conversation. "deadline white house" continues after a quick break. don't go anywhere. continues after a quick break. don't go anywhere.

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russia plans to manufacture a pretext for its attack. this could be a violent event that russia will bring on ukraine or an outrageous accusation that russia will level against the ukrainian government. russian media has already begun

to spread some of these false alarms and claims to maximize public outrage, to lay the groundwork for an invented justification for war. let me be clear. i am here today not to start a war but to prevent one. >> that was u.s. secretary of state antony blinken over a year ago calling out russian attempts to manufacture false pretexts for the invasion of ukraine. it was all part a bold and new u.s. intelligence strategy which helped unify the west and blunt russian efforts to use propaganda to justify its aggression. today "the new york times" examines how this previously inconceivable tactic, releasing declassified intelligence to expose russian plans, has redefined how the united states uses intelligence and how it unified the west against vladimir putin. "the times" writes this, quote, the play book is not just about naming and shaming russia and its allies. it has become a powerful tool in

the united states artinal to try to stymie the kremlin's offensive by exposing russia's military plans and aligning support for kyiv's war effort in allied capitals. joining us now democratic congressman raja krishnamoorthi of illinois. he's a member of the house intelligence committee which is where everything seems to be happening. tell me how much knowledge you had ahead of time of how this would be used as the secretary of state said to try to prevent a war and what your assessment is of how effective it's been. >> it's been brilliant. it was very effective. it did three things. one it helped to alert our ukrainian friends as to the threat that was impending at the time. secondly, it helped to unite our allies and other interested parties in the region in backing the ukrainians. and then third, i think it

helped -- it got them thinking twice what they were doing and getting them wondering what else do we know. i think this is a very effective strategy, and you can overdo it, but so far the administration has done an excellent job of balancing the need to keep our methods and ways of gathering intelligence secret while disclosing information to accomplish those other three goals. >> it's also not something we use and then discarded. it seems the intelligence community continues to innovate, and i want to read some of "the times" reporting how it's been used now to try and influence china's calculations. "the times" writes this, quote, ahead of mr. blinken's meeting with china's top foreign policy official the united states disclosed to allies intelligence normally held in tight secrecy. it included details about the ammunition and other weaponry china was considering providing russia. then mr. blinken shared the broad conclusion that china was

considering giving military support to russia. the disclosure was driven at least in part by the u.s. belief public warnings and the declassification of additional intelligence eabout internal chinese deliberations could still deter beijing from delivering to russia weapons systems to aid moscow's military campaign. it's an extraordinary piece of information about what u.s. intelligence is dealing with, but i think it's an important piece of the public messaging especially where you have some of these i don't know if you even call them rogue but some of these outliers in the republican party who somehow think russia is a distraction from china. it would appear they're allied. >> that's exactly right, and i think that -- i think especially when you're dealing with the chinese communist party which is a propaganda machine, remember what they called the repeat chinese spy balloon, they call it a weather balloon. and they've also been spreading

other misinformation. it's so important to dispel myths and explain exactly what's going on. i also think the chinese communist party is concerned about its international reputation. they're not north korea, and they're not iran, which are otherwise pariah internationally. they -- they are trying to cultivate ties with different nations around the world. so when the united states calls them out and explains what they're about to do is about to cross a red line, i think they take notice. and i think it will have an impact. >> we've covered all week long kevin mccarthy's decision to keep a promise to tucker carlson to release tens of thousands of hours, 40,000 hours of security footage. and we've covered it largely from a domestic perspective. but i wonder from your perch in the intelligence committee if

you have concerns about those angles and the seat of american government falling into the hands of adversaries, if that makes us less safe at home. >> that's a very good point, nicolle. i don't know what's in those tens of thousands of hours of footage. i haven't seen it, but tucker carlson would not be the first person that i would disclose this footage to. you know, it does contain probably information about escape routes. it might contain information about security systems, the positioning of our u.s. capitol police. and so to share it with somebody who believes that the entire january 6th episode was a false flag operation and trying to actively redefine it is also very problematic. and so i just question why this happened other than to say it looks like it was yet again trying to placate speaker mccarthy's hard-right base.

>> there's not much else to deduce from this. thank you for your candor and insights. congressman krishnamoorthi, it's great to spend some time with you today. thank you. when we come back i've been waiting not just all day or all week but for many, many months for this. we get to welcome back country music superstar and my friend brad paisley to the show because today -- today he did something extraordinary. he released a new song that he made in support of ukraine. it features president zelenskyy on it. i don't think president zelenskyy has ever done this before. i know brad hasn't. he's going to tell us how it came together after a quick break. ll us how it me together after a quick break.

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we saved the very best for last. as we mark this end of one year of war in ukraine one of the prevailing themes we talk about all the time on this show and especially for the last few days is freedom, hofragile it is, how important it is to protect it in ukraine, in this country, and all around the world. so on this day it is fitting that one of our good friends here at the show has made a tribute to freedom and to concountry that is right now in the front lines defending it with their lives as we speak. multi-grammy award winning country music superstar brad paisley has released a brand new song today from his upcoming album set to come out later this year. that new song is called "same

here" it features. an extraordinary appearance by ukrainian president zelenskyy. all the proceeds from this song will go to united 24. that is the ukrainian charity that will help efforts to rebuild in ukraine. let's listen to some of the song. we'll listen to the whole thing, but we have some of it right here. ♪ whatever you think from the songs that you sing to the drink that you drink ♪ >> to defend our houses and families. ♪ want someone to share your hopes and fears ♪ >> the credit there at the end, that was president zelenskyy and he said at the end of the clip

because -- i was going to try not to cry but i might. joining us now gram award winning superstar winning brad paisley and our dear friend igor because every story involving ukraine involves our friend. tell us how this song came to be. >> we're a team now. when we walked on the special last summer the answer to call, the situation where we try to raise money on nbc for ukraine, one of your first ideas was to -- so much this was nicolle's idea to do a special to raise money. one of your first ideas was to write an original song that dealt with the situation, and you found out quickly how hard it is to get multiple artists and corporations together in a two-week span to write a song

where it's -- it's a legal mess. and it was never i guess meant to be that way, but you did amazing things with the special. in the midst of that i said i've already written a song if you want it hear it. and in a nutshell basically the ukrainian government heard this, zelenskyy heard this, and eventually he said i'd like to be on that. and in that sense it's sumplifying but it's really as simple as i think he realizes that is the quickest way to somebody's heart and a chance to reach the folks in our country maybe getting inundated with news and facts and pictures. when we sing something that's got some feeling and he gets to say some words at the end of this, it's a chance to reach people where they live. >> we need to hear this song every word of it for ourselves here. i remember where i was sitting

when you -- you wrote the song in time for the special. we just didn't get all the pieces in place, and that's a complicated process with the leader whose country is at war, active war. but just talk about how you -- i mean just tell me about your first conversation with him. did he -- did he give feedback about the lyric? what did he -- was the conversation organic? tell me how that came to be he's on this track? >> this is somebody who from my limited experience with him is exactly sure of how he wants to, you know, i guess present things. he is -- he's a master at communication, and when he heard the song, he did have lyric changes. he had some changes to the end of the last verse that he suggested, and i kind of took into consideration what i thought he wanted and rewrote a couple of lines. and ironically it made it

better. it became a better song than even the first thing i'd written. i wrote this with great writers. and when we wrote this i never imagined it going to this place -- of course you're not thinking, well, we'll put the leader of ukraine on the song. i thought it would maybe be a ukrainian singer singing something in ukrainian or some phrase. and in the end i remember distinctly thinking about this and thought what if president zelenskyy would like the last couple of minutes to say what he wants to say to the american people, and here we are. >> how did you know that this was the thing because, you know, you performed in the special.

you perform amazing grace. you perform a version of your own song with the ukrainian flag. but that's more than most people have done and you weren't done yet. you wanted to do more. why? >> this hurt my heart a year ago. i remember where i was a year ago. i was in the gym working out and got a text from a friend of mine who works in the government here, and he said this is a nightmare, and he said ukraine's getting attacked, and i just turn on the news and felt so helpless. and i've learned over the years, you know, the only thing that makes me feel any better about any of these dire situations is to help, you know? and it's -- i've been trying throughout the course of the last year to do things to help like changing the lyric of one of my songs and putting a flag up and seeing a lot of support out there when i would play concerts and trying to lead that

way, but it's another thing entirely to really paint the picture we participate in this song, which is trying to say that i think when you boil it down folks that want to be free are all the same in the things that they care about. and so i -- you know, it's my way of trying to help. >> igor, nothing that we've done to try to help could have happened without you. you're our little secret weapon. i guess after this not so secret. and as you are helping me with the special that brad performs in, brad and kendall, his manager, started -- i remember are you guys going to get on whatsapp, we've got to get you -- and you, igor, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week help us do what we think we can to help. and i wonder why it's worth all

the effort that we take to do the things that we can from here. why is it so important? >> well, nicolle, to be honest i think there are three key elements to surviving this war with ukrainians. one is practical. we need the weapons, all the financial help, humanitarian help and everything. second is to kind of keep the people going on the ground, so kind of make life better on the ground. but the third one is probably the most important one. it's the morale of the people. i mean the secret weapon and the secret why kyiv hasn't fallen in three days despite prophecies from a number of intelligence services is people's morale. you know, when you're fighting with a smile on your face, you know, you're far more effective on the battlefield. so -- and you're far more effective at surviving to be honest. the kids need to smile, everyone needs to smile, and i choose

that for me. look, i'll give you a story. the first time i approached zelenskyy's team about this because i'm a former advisor they said, hell no, we're not even going to approach him because it's so unorkt dox what we train to do here. if you want a press release or exclusive interview fair enough, but it's a song and we haven't done it before. i said i'm a former advisor, and it worked. as i told kendall and brad once, you know, it's going to be difficult to start with this project, but, you know, once zelenskyy kind of gets in on the project he's going to be offering changes. he's going to get all creative. and to be honest i mean the song is amazing but it's a piece of art. it's a piece of history as well which is really important, so people need to cherish this moment because i don't remember where i was when candle in the wind came out or wind of change or something like that. and now i know when the next one

came out i'm here, i need to remember this. but to be honest it's a long artistic journey, and i think there could be a music video and there could be a whole movement around this song because it's a monolith going to stay in this beautiful song. >> i think it's all those things. how do you feel, though, hearing that, brad? >> yeah, first of all igor is one of the bravest people i know. he's right i think back to the president started to get involved and said, yes, i'd like to do this. there were changes, long conversations. it was really fascinating to see once we sort of recorded his lines about this then he got involved in the next process. he got involved in making sure it was right. and everything he wanted to say

and -- yeah it is an interesting thing. this is unlike anything i've ever done because you just realize the stakes are ten times higher than anything we go through in our -- in our world over here. but, you know, that's my favorite part of that last verse, our worlds are very different but in some ways i'm not so sure. they've got their own kind of football team that lets them down every year. you know, welcome to my world. >> it's so beautiful. i want to talk about the zelenskyy factor because this all bringing me right back to the day before the special aired. i think the president saw this one and wanted to rewrite the run-down and changed who introduced you. and i want to talk about president zelenskyy as an artist for both of you. i have to sneak in a quick break but brad and igor aren't going anywhere. stay with us. igor aren't going anywhere stay with us

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♪♪ what will you do? will you make something better? create something new? our dell technologies advisors can provide you with the tools and expertise you need to bring out the innovator in you. we are back with brad paisley and igor. brad's new song which is out today features ukraine's president zelenskyy and called "same here" and it's so beautiful. you can get it anywhere where you stream music. brad, talk about the charity and where the money goes. >> yeah, the united 24 is an amazing thing where a bunch of celebrities and basically famous ambassadors are trying to utilize raise some money to do various things. but mine in particular is to

rebuild housing. it should -- if we do this right it'll be 4,200 people back with a roof over their head again. and it's a very basic need, and i'm thrilled that this -- that this thing i wrote is going to do some good that way. >> igor, talk about the need and how important and, you know, the u.s. news we look at what our president announces and the aid that goes, but that doesn't come close to meeting the need. and without people like brad and efforts like this actually getting back to something nearing pre-war normal seems herculean. >> it's difficult to relate the. what you see on the news is one or two destroyed buildings and they look horrific, like from bucha, outside of kyiv. but what you don't realize that there is an entire street, so we had on video with my production company that we had to shoot,

and the location to find a building that had the middle section missing. and basically the guy said, well, pick and they go, how many are there, he goes, about 20 in one small town, so likely bucha, and if you think about it like a high residence residential building, that's hundreds of families in every single building, and they have lost their partners and nowhere to live, and it's a basic need. somebody will have to do something about it, and, i mean, the government will step in. they don't have enough resources because, you know, hundreds of thousands of people are dead, you know, hundreds of thousands have lost their homes, and, you know, we all need to kind of join in, and that's why, you know, kind of relaying that message, and amplifying that message that we're all the same is incredibly important because we all have the same needs and desires and wants and, you know, we're human beings, and that's what makes this world bearable. >> we have to see ourselves and

our brothers and sisters in ukraine that way. brad, i wanted to ask you, i mean, the way you tell the story of the president's involvement, it's very clear he went from politician and leader of government. zelenskyy to artist, which is what he was and did before he entered politics. it el me about zelenskyy the artist. >> well, there's a tremendous amount of creativity i sense on his part, and he's really got an idea of what he wants to do and how he wants to come across, and you know, he understood from day one that there are things about this song that are obviously the journey of explaining our similarities that start, you know, the first verse is about california, the second about mexico. then it goes across the ocean to this nation at war, and he really knew that the lines he wanted to say had to reach the

american people, and dealing with these themes, we are so reminded by the things he says in this to me, at least, of who we want to be, of who we want to be as a nation in terms of, you know, freedom, fighting for freedom. we'd like to think we'd all have that kind of resolve. god forbid we are ever tested with that, but he really knew where he was going as an artist on this, and i basically had to sit back and say yes, sir. >> you see, though, brad, i mean, you see the -- i mean, just the response because you have reached one of the few people, i think n this country that reaches all corners of our country despite our polarized politics. to be honest, this show doesn't. you stand across all of our divisions. do you think zelenskyy intuits all of those divisions and knows how to speak to the things that we still agree on as americans?

>> i think so. i think that he knows that -- first of all, he's -- and igor can speak to this, do you guys really care about politics at all right now, or are you more interested in getting what you need to survive. you can answer that better than i can. i get the sense he knows this is about reaching people's hearts. i want to do that in this. look, they can debate, you know, government aid all they want. that isn't my department. my department is i would like to raise money and put people back in houses, you know, and deal with all the things that i can do. >> and at another time, that wasn't a particularly polarizing statement in america, right, like that was the best of, the way we saw ourselves and you still have the majority. i think it's important to note that this week mitch mcconnell, the most senior republican in the senate stood with president biden and his decision to travel to kyiv. but i know, igor, you are astute

a reader of american politics of anybody i know and anybody that comes on the show, i wonder if you can speak to the importance of having these unifying, it's not just a song, these moments that give the whole country something to rally around to continue its commitment to ukraine. >> well, nicolle, i actually noticed something really interesting today. so i was closely monitoring brad's twitter account, and other social media accounts, and i actually got my friends to remember, so i got them on the case as well. and we're following the traffic, and to be honest, i mean, the responses that i've seen, the genuine organic responses were bipartisan, and they were positive so people were saying, like, this is great that we're focusing on, you know, human side of things. but then something strange happened, and i started noticing those, like, hate tweets appearing, and we actually monitored those accounts and all of them have been registered in 2022, mostly in april. they all post similar messages

and we actually recognize some of them as the bots, allegedly russian that we have tracked before in different cases. i think what's really happening in america, people need to understand that, especially from a foreigner like me, you're all the same, right? we're all the same here across the planet, but especially you in your beautiful country, you're all the same but there are agents of hatred, artificial agents of hatred that are trying to divide you and your country becomes weaker and other countries, allegedly russia, actually benefit from that. just remember, you're all human beings, it's easier to shake hand than hate each other. >> leave it to you to keep all of us positive. two of my favorite humans, two people i love to talk to anytime and especially on tv today, brad's new song "same here" featuring president zelenskyy, from his upcoming album is out now. if you haven't downloaded it

yet, do so now. brad paisley, and igor, thank you for making my whole week by spending time with us. thank you so much. >> thank you, and igor, be safe, okay. >> yes, my friend, always. >> thank you. a quick break for us, we'll be right back. us, we'll be right back. ♪♪ what will you do? will you make something better? create something new? our dell technologies advisors can provide you with the tools and expertise you need to bring out the innovator in you. step up. prep up.

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thank you so much for letting us into your homes for another week of shows "the beat" with ari melber starts r