that's all in on this thursday night. alex wagner tonight starts right now. good evening, alex good evening, alex good evening, alex good evening, alex chris, the question of accountability in american democracy seems to b increasingly vaporous. >> it certainly does i think that's partially why trump exists, but also why this, you know, is anyone gonna ge him? >> well, the fifth avenu school of accountability, it's one of the biggest tourism see ever spoken. thank you, my friend and thanks to you at home fo being here it came as a shock near the end of the january 6th committee's sixth hearing last summer when vice chair liz cheney dropped a bombshell. the prospect of witness

tampering in the investigation >> first, here is how one witness described phone calls from people interested in that witness' testimony, quote, what they said to me is, as long as i continue to be a team player, they know i'm on the right team, i'm doing the right thing, i'm protecting who i need to protect. you know, i'll continue to stay in good graces in trump world. >> as long as i continue to be a team player. well, the news of potential witness tampering by trump world was shocking, it was not the last we would hear about it. in december the committee released transcripts of closed-door depositions with witnesses, through those depositions we found out that former white house aide to trump chief of staff mark meadows and star january 6th committee witness cassidy hutchinson appeared to have been the subject of an effort by trump world to influence her

testimony. by way of a refresher, early on in the committee's investigation ms. hutchinson was represented by stefan passantino, he was being paid by a trump super pac, meaning that hutchinson did not have to worry about what would likely be expensive legal fees trump world was taking care of her. but that came at a price according to hutchinson, before she was deposed by the committee passantino told her, quote, we just want to focus on protecting the president. we all know you're loyal i'm your lawyer, i know what's best for you the less you remember, the better don't read anything to try to jog your memory. don't try to put together timelines. or, in other words, forget everything, which is not something you really hear unless you have a supporting role in a mob film but that apparently is the sort of advice you get when you have a trump-backed lawyer and tonight we are learning that that curious and very suspicious dynamic of trump world paying

the legal fees of witnesses ensnared in investigations into the former president, that whole thing is still happening this time in special counsel jack smith's investigation into the trump mar-a-lago documents fiasco cnn is reporting that dozens of mar-a-lago staffers and people inside trump's orbit have been subpoenaed by the special counsel team to appear before the grand jury in washington, d.c. and that many of the mar-a-lago staffers who have been subpoenaed to testify are reportedly being represented by attorneys paid for by trump entities i should note that nbc news has not yet confirmed this reporting, but it is interesting. now, there is no indication here of illegality or impropriety in this reporting but it sure does raise a whole lot of questions cnn also goes on to report that today margot martin is former white house staffer who moved to trump with florida appeared today before the grand jury in d.c. and one of the special counsel's most senior

prosecutors was involved in that testimony. quote, the staffers are of interest to investigators because of what they may have seen or heard while on their daily duties around the estate including whether they saw boxes or documents in trump's office suite or elsewhere they are casting an extremely wide net, anyone and everyone who might have seen something, said one of the sources familiar with the doj's efforts by all reports special counsel jack smith is quite busy we know from reports that the special counsel has sought the additional testimony of trump's lawyer in the classified documents case, evan cork rihn and that mr. cork rihn has argued that attorney/client privilege prevents him from testifying special counsel jack smith's team is reportedly arguing that attorney/client privilege does not apply when those communications could be used in furtherance of a crime this thing is called the crime fraud exception. today abc news is reporting what exactly the special counsel's team is interested in asking mr.

cochran about. special counsel jack smith is proposing to ask a counsel about an alleged phone call they had the alleged call would have been on the same day that investigators subpoenaed the trump organization for surveillance footage from trump's mar-a-lago resort as the government grew suspicious that trump continued to hold on to classified materials even after one of his attorneys asserted in a sworn statement that he had complied with the subpoena requesting any remaining documents in his possession. while the special counsel's investigation at least one of them is clearly ramping up it is far from the only investigation into the former president. in fact, with potential charges looming in both new york and georgia, we may be at a point where all of these investigations into trump are finally coming to a head joining us now with danya perry former assistant u.s. attorney

for the southern district of new york and barbara mcquaid former u.s. attorney for the eastern district of michigan thank you for being with me this morning. danya, in terms of the -- what seems unusual to me at least and hon its face, this notion that the person who is under investigation has his affiliates paying for the counsel of other people who may be important witnesses in that very same investigation. is that unusual and, if so, what does it suggest to you >> it's not atypical and it's not inherently nefarious you see third parties paying all the time legal fees for witnesses or defendants, it could be a parent, it can be a company which is required to indemnify one of their directors or officers. here, as you pointed out in your introduction, it's more akin to a mob boss paying for the underlings so that they will fall into line, and we saw that in really excruciating detail in

cassidy hutchinson testimony, there is now an ethics complaint against her former attorney. and there i think that approaches criminality, it certainly is a breach of that attorney's ethical duties to represent solely the interests of his client in that case or certainly it appears that way from the testimony we've heard. >> is there anything to be done in in situation? we know cassidy hutchinson eventually got new counsel and that's when she became infinitely more forthcoming with the committee. is there anything that can be done to encourage witnesses not to use certain counsel >> when if at such time a criminal prosecution is brought the prosecutors will likely request and the judge will surely grant a hearing that will test the loyalties essentially of that person's attorney, and a judge may excuse that attorney and appoint one for that witness in the event the judge finds

that there is undue pressure being mounted either a carrot or a stick on behalf of that witness. >> barb, i want to ask you the subpoena drag net that has fallen over mar-a-lago, is it surprising to you that now -- first of all, i think a lot of people thought the mar-a-lago case -- we were told from reporting in the "washington post" last fall that charging decisions were imminent before the special counsel was brought into this. does it suggest to you that this investigation is going to go on much longer? i mean, how do you read the subpoenaing of new witnesses at this stage of the game >> yeah, it's difficult to know, alex, everything that's going on, but i can imagine some prosecutors just have a different perspective on how much information they want to lock in before a case goes to trial. i can understand why jack smith might want to talk to all of the people who work at mar-a-lago and might have some exposure to the facts that occurred here even if he doesn't want to call

those people as witnesses ultimately it may be useful to lock them into their story now so that they can't be used as defense witnesses, he can neutralize their story by locking them in now. what you really don't want to happen is to charge donald trump now, the case goes to trial, you think you have a solid case and then there is a dramatic moment where the courtroom doors burst open and some butler who worked at mar-a-lago comes in and says, oh, i'm the one who stashed the documents somewhere, i forgot to mention it all this time so by interviewing everybody who had access to that place you might learn something new but it seems to me more likely that you are locking in people to have them become defense witnesses down the road. >> each side is taking out its own insurance policy, right sh the feds, the doj are like we're going to neutralize you by calling all of you in, trump world may be doing their own form of insurance by having their paid for counsel represent these witnesses. is that what's happening here?

>> it could be i don't want to make am i accusations about what -- >> sure. >> -- the trump lawyers may or may not be doing as danya said, there is an ethical duty by a lawyer to represent a client in their best interest and if they believe that there is some conflict they are supposed to get themselves out of that situation so that a client can have zealous representation i don't know that that's going on but certainly what we heard from cassidy hutchinson about her representation does suggest that that might be part of the m.o. that donald trump engages in as a prosecutor you want to button down anything where there might be a little escape valve so there's no way out once you bring your case. >> who knows what those lawyers are doing with their clients, but the fact that trump-affiliated super pacs are spaying for them means somehow trump must think there's some skin in the game for him in terms of having his folks pay for their counsel. he is not known to be a prolifically generous person evan corcoran, the crime fraud

exception, the fact that we now know what the specific incident is, a phone call between trump and his lawyer on the very same day that the doj wants to subpoena this video footage, which ends up being pretty meaningful to this investigation. what do you think of the case the doj is trying to lay out here >> it sounds -- >> again, not sure -- >> i'm going to go to danya first and then i absolutely want to hear what you have to say, barb. >> it sounds like they're making a strong argument and according to reports we may have a decision from the district court as soon as tomorrow, so we'll see what the judge thinks. it sounds like a strong argument and, you know,in that event mr corcoran will have to testify, will have to provide, you know, evidence and testimony that could indeed incriminate his client it may very well be that that gets immediately appealed and runs up and down the circuit,

that's certainly the m.o. in trump world. so it may be that the testimony does not come very quickly, but it will come. >> do you read anything, danya, into the crime fraud exception that jack smith is trying to go at trump lawyers on crime fraud? does that seem particularly ambitious to you or does that seem par for the course in a situation like this? >> that's also an m.o. in this case we have seen that already, a district court in california has already found that the crime fraud exception applies with respect to a different lawyer of trump's. >> john eastman. >> correct so any number of lawyers are in hot water themselves in having represented trump and have had phones seized and have had grand jury subpoenas issued. so this is, as you say, par for the course. >> barb, i have to ask you about what is happening in these timelines that all seem to be to some degree converging we don't know what jack smith is doing, we don't know whether he is going to charge the former president with anything, but

there is action happening at the same time that we're hearing there are potential indictments coming down from alvin brag the da in new york and his investigation into trump and the hush money payments made to stormy daniels and fani willis, the fulton county georgia looking into trump's efforts to subvert the results of the 2020 election does it surprise you that these weather fronts seem to be converging at the same time. >> i suppose it does, alex, because you think about these cases they are of varying degrees of complexity. the stormy daniels case could have been charged years ago, here we are seven years after the fact that that one is being charged. it doesn't surprise me that the january 6th case is taking until now and beyond because of its complexity and the georgia case falls somewhere in between i think it's very likely we're going to see charges next week in the stormy daniels case out of new york. i think we're going to see charges from fani willis sometime within the next month if not sooner. and then these two cases with jack smith i'm not sure, but it

does -- you get the feeling they're getting close to the end just because they're putting witnesses like mike pence into the grand jury and the lawyers sounds like they're getting close to the end there we could have a situation where donald trump is defending himself in court in four different places, new york, georgia, maybe florida if they charge mar-a-lago there or they could charge it in d.c. but then also in washington, d.c. he will have to have court appearances in all of those places i imagine he will welcome in as the circusthat he relishes and use it for fundraising and to claim victimhood and grievance, but it still has to be distract to go a candidate's schedule you can't have a rally if you have to be in court. >> unless he has a rally at court, which is not out of the realm of the possible when we talk about donald trump. danya, "the new york times" has some new reporting about the defenses that trump may be testing out as it pertains to potential indictments, i will read than excerpt. according to two of trump's

political allies, the campaign, the trump campaign, will aim to portray any charges as part of an coordinated offensive by the democratic party against trump who is trying to become only the second former president to win a new term after leaving office, specifically his campaign team plans on trying to connect mr. bragg's investigation into trump to president biden now, i understand the political strategy of that, but as a legal defense, i mean, how does that work what would your advice be if you were defense counsel in this situation? >> it would be to find an actual legal defense. that is accurate i mean, that has been his defense since day one, this is a political witch-hunt here, you know, as you just discussed with barb, there are many different battles that are converging at all once on him, so i guess that gives him a little bit more ammunition to say that this is a concerted war against him, but that is certainly not a legal defense.

he's probably testing it out and hoping that if it does meet with, you know -- is welcomed that he might try it out with a jury, but that would be almost certainly shot down by a judge that's a jury nullification argument essentially that does not usually fly with a presiding trial judge. >> i do have to wonder from the prosecutor's standpoint how much do you have to gird yourself for an onslaught of total wacko, bonkers, circus-like atmosphere because that seems to be what they're telegraphing at this stage and how much does that actually effect the trial, the rest of the investigation if, by the way, you know, jack smith is trying to continue his work as there have already been criminal charges in the fulton county case and the manhattan case, like how much does it complicate the situation for the prosecutors? >> i think they are trying to put their heads down look, you have two local prosecutors, you know, you have jack smith on the one hand, you have the southern district of new york on another hand, but

you have local district attorney out of georgia and a local district attorney out of manhattan, and this has certainly never been done. i'm sure they're bracing themselves, they are trying to put their heads down and do the work, get the job done, you know, be apolitical about this as much as they can and actually try the case on its merits, and as a legal matter, which is what it is, and i'm sure they are just trying to just get the distractions out of their way, sweep them aside and focus on proving the elements each and every element of each and every crime that may or may not be charged and prove that to a jury beyond a reasonable doubt and that's their job. >> yeah, they're going to need a set of noise-canceling headphones that are bigger than the island of manhattan. bash, the straimt from the trump campaign tonight on the planet d's quote witch-hunt americans will not tolerate radical left

democrats -- trump has a tendency to personally target individuals, the degree to which it's not just about canceling the noise but also the concern for the physical safety of these prosecutors, these investigators. >> it's a very real threat, in the same way we saw thousands of people come to the capitol on january 6 when they believed donald trump's claims of a stolen election, they are going to take up the mantel in his defense as well. i think that when there are charges filed and i think it's a when and not and if, i think there will be violence somewhere. i don't know how bad it will be, but there are unhinged people who do believe all of these things he says that it's a witch-hunt and a hoax, and there will be people that take up that mantel in the same way we saw after the search at mar-a-lago, court-authorized search, and he talked about, you know, how the fbi came in and raided his beautiful home and a man went to the fbi office in cincinnati with a nail gun and an ak-47 and found himself dead later in the

day after a standoff with the fbi. i do fear that we're going to see those kinds of things because of the outrage that donald trump deliberately stirs up. >> my fear of this unknown is particularly acute danya perry and barbara mcquaid, thank you for your time and expertise this evening. we have much more ahead tonight. how a rural county in california that trump won in 2020 is totally changing its election system because of a conspiracy theory. but, next, down in florida they are quite literally rewriting the history of the civil rights era thinkings to governor ron desantis and the stop woke act. democratic florida state representative anna-esque monte joins me to discuss all of that. that's coming up next.

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chances are you learned the story of civil rights icon rosa parks back in elementary school, she became the mother of the civil rights movement after she refused to give up her seat to a white man on a bus in montgomery, alabama, back in 1955 parks' action inspired the montgomery bus boycott by led to the supreme court ruling that bus segregation was unconstitutional it is a fairly well-known story, but 68 years later rosa parks' story is being, shall we say, rewritten. "the new york times" reports today that an effort to get a

social studies textbook approved for use in the state of florida, at least one publisher has made significant changes to rosa parks' story "the new york times" compared three versions of the company's rosa parks' story meant for first grader, a current lesson used now in florida, an initial version created for the state textbook review and a second updated version. in the current lesson on rosa parks racial segregation is clearly explained, quote, the law said african americans had to give up their seats on the bus if a white person wanted to sit down in a second version created for the florida textbook review race is mentioned indirectly. quote, she was told to move to a different seat because of the color of her skin, and the reference to white people is gone and in the third updated version, race isn't mentioned at all. quote, she was told to move to a different seat she did not. who knows why rosa parks was told to move, could have been

anything according to the "new york times" the particular textbook is no longer under consideration by the state when the "times" asked the florida department of education about that, they suggested that studies weekly, the publisher in question, had gone too far, but the publisher said it was simply trying to to follow florida's standards namely the stop woke act. it basically bans the teaching of any lesson, especially ones about race and racism that make any student feel discomfort which could be anything that suggests systemic racism exists or existed because, who knows how that would make students feel, especially white students. the stoep woke act is currently in effect from kindergarten through 12th grade in florida's public schools but it has been halted in colleges and universities due to multiple legal challenges, and on that front we have news today the 11th circuit court of appeals ruled that while those challenges are working their way through the courts florida cannot enforce the stop woke act in colleges and universities

joining us now is florida state representative anna eskamani representative eskamani, through for joining us, i know you've been involved in battles to basically stop what the governor and others are trying to do to florida education. how are you reading this victory in court today it is not permanent, it is a temporary victory but do you think it portends anything as far as a larger battle >> first of all, thanks so much for having me. it's a big victory for us, especially since right now we have house bill 999, which is a huge takeover of higher education in florida, canceling certain wages and minors including woman and gender studies which i studied, it goes after tenure changes, general education courses and it cancels dei and crt and much of it bill's focus comes out of that anti-woke act hb-7 the fact that we have this temporary victory in court does

speak to the thrust of house bill 999 and how that is also going to be unconstitutional. >> i just wonder and certainly the battle in and around these issues in higher ed seems to have gotten more traction in terms of pushing back than what's happening in k through 12, these textbooks, this is what's actively happening, this isn't theoretical, these are publishers changing their textbooks for reasons that remain unclear at this juncture. it seems like it's an effort to comply with a vague law that has a deeply chilling effect on any discussion about race or racism, even if it happens 60 years ago. do you have the sense that -- i mean, we know this one example of this publisher doing this do you have the sense that other textbook hubble shers may have been doing the same thing? >> well, not just publishers, i mean, we are seeing corporations eliminate their di programs even though they don't need to. we see school boards expand the

don't say gay trans bill even though they don't need to. there is this proactive coercion happening because so many of these entities whether it's public, private, nonprofit, they're acting in a place of fear so if they stir lgbtq people they don't want to talk about it if they embrace equity and inclusion they are going to call it something else. we've seen censorship going over the entire state of florida even when it's not in law it's almost like they feel this pressure and force from governor desantis to do that. in the case of publishers, these are billion dollar deals and oftentimes the largest states dictate the curriculum in other states so i assume it's a profit motive for some of these publishers, but i also would urge corporations not to give into this fascist agenda. don't erase history to appease one man. it's so important the next generation know our history so that we don't repeat it. >> you know, when you talk about who is pushing the agenda, certainly the stop woke act is

very much something that the governor like to tout as an achievement of his administration but there are groups working hand in glove with his administration to execute this agenda and i think it's important that we sort of call attention to the reporting on that. the florida citizens alliance this is from "the new york times" reporting today a conservative group has urged the state to reject 28 of the 38 textbooks that its volunteers reviewed, including more than a dozen by mcgraw hill, a major national publisher these are the kinds of objections this group has, an eighth grade book gave outsized attention to the negative side of the treatment of native americans while failing to give a fuller account of their own acts of violence such as the jamestown massacre i mean, who knows what they will say about slave insurrections and whether we have put too much owe news on slaveholders the asymmetry is quite obvious

when we are talking about the genocide of the native people's in this country, but this seems to be working. the florida citizens alliance seem to have an outsized role in determining what children can learn. is there a counter movement on the progressive side that is work to go push back >> first of all, this is a very good point governor ron desantis has surrounded himself with extremists whether it's this organization or moms for liberty or think tanks from other states that have come to florida. he has surrounded himself with some of the worst characters and people who do not have the best interests of every child in mind but to answer your question, we do have organizations like the florida freedom to read project and so many others that have really erupted as counter and also just everyday people. we're seeing more engagement from young people, students staging walkouts on their college campuses the hearing we had on house bill 999 this week, 220 people came

out to testify against that bill here in tallahassee. to the point where the senate actually amended their version to adjust to some of the points that people made in the house. so this backlash is happening from everyday people, but we have to maintain it not just through legislative session, but also to the next election cycle so we can make sure that we elect people who have everyone's best interests in mind, not just a few elites, not just their own political agenda. >> i've got to ask you it seems like the fear is the point in all of this, right even if there are challenges the idea that these laws exist, that they've been proposed on passed by the legislature seems to almost be the point, in the same way that conservatives are trying to throw fear into the mix when it comes to abortion or access to abortion or abortion medication, the entire point is to terrify people enough to make choice that is aren't good for them or to actually prevent them from seeking out the truth

i wonder if that strategy is working or whether you think the national attention is having its due effect >> well, this is why i always reference how every culture war is also a class war because to your point, when you scare people from learning about their history, from learning the stories of their ancestors frrks seeking gender-affirming care or making the right decision for their future by ending a pregnancy, when you scare them from making those decisions you're also deciding what their economic stability looks like, if they are going to be able to have enough money to have things meet, to access care they need, to have an authentic life, have higher education and be free thinkers so much of this is tied to separating the have's and have not's and making it hard for those where access is not clear cut to reach our full potential. we have to look at this not just from an culture lens but also an economic and class struggle lens to ensure we're lifting up every person and overcoming these barriers which are designed to

just be cruel for the sake of being cruel and to punish people who already struggle with different systematic barriers. >> yeah. >> this is not about winning every battle, it's about winning the war. >> yeah, it's notable that we are talking about the public school system here that kerv sieves have focused on thanks for your time tonight. >> thank you. we have got lots more ahead tonight, the tentacles of the big lie creep into a rural california county's election system and who exactly is to blame for the largest bank failure since the 2008 financial crisis? stick around (psst psst) we have got lots more ahead with flonase, allergies don't have to be scary spraying flonase daily gives you long-lasting, non-drowsy relief. (psst psst) flonase. all good.

in the 2020 ee section donald trump lost the state of california by 5 million votes but he won the state's rural northern shasta county with 65% of the vote. nobody disputes that outcome, but now shasta county has become ground zero for election conspiracies in a way that threatens to completely uphend the county's system of voting. it all started in 2021 and 2022 when the local militia groups teamed up with a wealthy conservative filmmaker living in connecticut and started a campaign to us the republican leadership in shasta county.

several republicans were replaced with hard right members that have made it their mission to transform shasta county in a conservative utopia. it has reportedly led to a devastating exodus of county employees who are being replaced with fringe right wing figures today the "l.a. times" reports that the super conservative shasta county board of supervisors offered the top job of running the county to the leader of a california secessionist movement, a man who wants to get the rural conservative parts of california to secede from the more liberal parts and become a 51st state which is quite an idea this he want to secede from the blue parts of california except for san diego and parts of silicon valley anyway, there is more. the new shasta county leadership has a plan to cancel the county's relationship with dominion voting systems. dominion has been providing election machines to shasta

county for decades but it is also at the center of the baseless election conservative pushed by donald trump now dominion has got to go in had its place shasta county supervisors are working with election conspiracy theorists and mike lindell to develop a new system to count all of shasta county's ballots by hand. lindell has promised to provide the contee with all of the resources necessary including financial and legal resources for any legal fight they have with dominion. maybe some free pillows as well but who knows. not everyone is on board with this plan. this week citizens of shasta county confronted the board about that plan as well as reports that supervisor kevin cry has been flying to meet with mr. lindell on the taxpayers' dime >> when you did fly across to meet with mr. lindell, did you use taxpayer money to fund that trip

>> i did fly out there, absolutely. >> okay. was it with taxpayer money >> i was on a county-sponsored trip, parts of my -- parts of my trip i paid for myself that were outside the purview of the county this whole has sort of been a hostage to this dominion voting machine situation. how are we supposed to have an election if an election were to pop up and i don't think the answer is a hand counted system provided by the my pillow guy that doesn't make any sense. it doesn't make sense. >> it is hard to know how a man who sells pillows for a living has the time to moonlight as a voting systems developer but this is where we are cry foul about american democracy for long enough, loudly enough, and eventually someone will ask you to fix it the country's second largest bank failure, there are more candidates than you think. that's ahead

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i can reassure the members of the committee that our banking system is sound and that americans can feel confident that their deposits will be there when they need them. treasury secretary janet yellen today testifying before the senate financial committee yellen was there to discuss president biden budget plans but she began with some reassurance

because the clouds surrounding the second largest bank collapse in u.s. history, those clouds still have not lifted. maybe that's because the reasons for silicon valley banks failure are numerous there was the bank's decision to put billions into long-term government investments, something that is traditionally safe but the fed raised interest rates the investment value plummeted. when the bank clients panicked and demanded their money it caused a run on the bank then there was congress' 2018 decision to roll back strict regulations established by the dodd/frank act senator elizabeth warren and other democrats have argued that rolling back those regulations was a primary cause of silicon valley bank's failure. and who had thought that those roll backs were a good idea at the time none other than silicon valley bank back in 2015 svb's ceo greg becker told the senate banking committee that the bank had a, quote, deep understanding of the markets, strong risk management

practices a fundamental strength of the innovation economy. he also noted that svb's business model did not pose think systemic risk and that dodd/frank would only put an outsized burden on the bank. eight years later svb's model did clearly pose systemic risk that then required the federal government to create and activate an emergency rescue plan as it turns out that outsized burden mr. becker was talking about might actually have been a set of necessary guardrails. andy lowry of the atlantic argues that americans should be outraged over all of this. there is no success story here, she writes, the complexity of financial regulations and the dullness of balance sheet minutia should not lull any american into misunderstanding what has happened. the bank failed. the government failed. once again, the american people are propping up a financial system incapable of rendering itself safe. joining us now is annie lowry, staff writer the "the atlantic" and the author of "give people money. it's good to see you thank you for being here

>> it's great to see you, too, alex thanks so much for having me. >> i wish we were talking about cheerier things but i do want to get your thought on how -- let's just start with the regulatory roll-backs, right? i think people -- it was a bipartisan effort to roll back some of these dodd/frank protections in 2018, i believe it was 13 democrats worked to repeal those parts of dodd/frank act for these midsize td banks, midsize td banks that had $200 billion in assets. my question to you are these are people, these are democrats whose names we know. tim kaine, kyrsten sinema of arizona, jon tester, mark werner of virginia. what was it about the political climate in 2018 that made these democrats want to cross the aisle to do -- cross the aisle to do something like this and how did anyone convince them that a bank with $200 billion in assets was a mom-and-pop shop?

>> these are great questions and there are not great answers. we have seen again and again that wall street and other financial firms are relentless lobbyers against these regulations and argue that the regulations hurt the american economy by preventing lending, by making it such that only the biggest banks can succeed in the united states. the argument was that these smaller banks couldn't compete against bigger banks and that they didn't pose systemic risk because they tended to operate within a smaller confine this is a crystal clear example of regulators stepping on a rake here or congress stepping on a rake by relaxing exactly the regulations that would come back and the lack of them would endanger the broader american economy and require a bailout that is backed by the american people again and i think that at the time, you know, there was some thought about trying to get some

bipartisan work done during the trump administration and i think that we've seen that democrats in congress are not immune to the pressures from financial firms from their consistent lobbying we've seen again and again that democrats have been willing to go along with this kind of thing, although they tend to have folks on their side of the aisle who are the strongest pro regulatory forces including elizabeth warren. >> barn kree frank the co-author of dodd/frank serves on the board of signature bank, which is the other bank that failed in the wake of the svb failure. he joined the board in 2015. it is distressing when you look at the list of democrats who have been involved in this moment and they are some of the champions of financial reform. how do you square something like that >> it's hard to square without understanding that there are just simple financial incentives here and signature bank notably unlike silicon valley bank that failure had a lot more to do with the crypto ecosystem,whic thank goodness has largely been

kept out of the broader mainstream and wall street financial ecosystems so there's been a lot of turn license in those markets but they haven't had very many real economy spillovers although there have been some, precisely because congress did not get its act together to regulate and thus to allow crypto in. signature bank it was a slightly different set of issues, but, yeah, this is again -- i think that the american people should really be asking themselves if they think that congress is capable of setting out the kind of regulations that would truly protect them here. this is a really, really disturbing event, despite the fact that it now seems that the damage control might have worked fairly well and there might not be as broad financial contagion as we initially worried. >> to some degree the jury is out, though, right could the fed's actions incentivize bad behavior in the future >> oh, absolutely. absolutely the fed has come forward and

said that we will not prevent these financial institutions from failing in a way that would harm the real economy and would spread financial contagion so they've come in and basically set themselves up as a backstop. that will have this knock-on effect of encouraging greater risk taking down the road. and then i also think that we are now experiencing this kind of unusual side effect which is that this financial contagion and the inability of the banking sector to keep itself safe is complicating the fed's path for interest rate policy because they are now concerned banks pulling back on lending too suddenly themselves will cool the economy off and could put the entire economy at risk of recession. so we're dealing with really, really significant financial complications, all of which are completely unnecessary all of which stem from this bank having terrible risk management policies and regulators and supervisors not stepping in when they should have weeks and months ago when it became obvious that this problem so, you know, develop into a crisis.

>> annie lowry, thank you for giving us all permission to be outraged at everyone everywhere all at once. my friend, it is good to see you. next time we're going to talk about something positive happening in the american economy. thanks for your time. >> i hope so, alex thank you. we will be right back. what's up, little bro? turns out, some wishes do come true. and it turns out the general is a quality insurance company that's been saving people money for nearly 60 years. for a great low rate, and nearly 60 years of quality coverage- go with the general.

if you look past the pile of flaming debris in these photos you can see that in the distance is the eiffel tower. i point that out to give you a sense of how this is happening in the very center of paris. tonight several thousand protesters lit fires and clashed with police clad in riot gear throughout the city and the images are breathtaking. the thing that these protesters are angry about is that today french president emmanuel macron raised the retirement age in france from 62 years to 64 years. but they are not just mad about

that policy change, the protesters are also mad at the way macron did it. there was supposed to be a vote today in france's parliament on this issue but it was unclear if macron's side had enough support so just minutes before the report the president invoked special power powers to shoehorn the changes through parliament without parliament's approval. whether this will lead to a new confidence vet or a vote that repeals that he just did it's hard to tell it might be wise for republicans who have toyed with the age of raising the retirement age, it might be wise for them to look at what is happening across the atlantic that does it for us tonight. i will see you again tomorrow. "way too early" with jonathan lemire is coming up next 11 of the nation's largest banks are stepping in to rescue first republic bank. we will talk