embarrassed by this. but he would be far more embarrassed and ashamed if under his watch, the court were finally forced to adopt some ethical code and that's probably going to lead him to back off and say i've got no role to play here. >> all right thank you very much. we're going to have to leave you here today appreciate it. that is going to do it for me. "deadline: white house" starts right now. ♪ hi there, everyone it's 4:00 in new york, some news breaking late this afternoon, a manhattan district attorney alvin bragg, the investigator leading the investigation into donald trump's hush money scheme, it appears enough is enough "the new york times," under full bylines late this afternoon was first to report this alvin bragg is now going on the legal offense, taking the extraordinary step of suing

republican congressman jim jordan for seeking to interfere with the ongoing criminal investigation. from that "times" report, quote, the 50-page suit filed in federal court in the southern district of new york accuses jordan of a, quote, brazen and unconstitutional attack on the prosecution of mr. trump and a, quote, transparent campaign to intimidate and attack the district attorney lawyers for bragg are seekinr ms congressional allies from enforcing a subpoena they sent to mark pomerpomerantz. mark pomerantz was a leader into the investigation of mr. trump he later wrote a book about the experience viewers of this program may remember he appeared here as well mr. pomerantz resigned last year after mr. bragg, after his first term in office decided not to seek an indictment of trump at the time mr. bragg's lawyers also intend

to frercprevent any such lawsuii says is this where we start with our friends, "the new york times" glenn thrush is here also joining us the former chief of staff at the department of defense, he had that job at the cia as well jeremy bash is back. charlie sykes is also back he's editor-at-large of bull w bulwark. and an msnbc contributor mr. thrash, let me start with you, alvin bragg doing what no others really took the formal step of doing. alvin bragg was harassed for the prosecutors and mccabe was harassed, ran out of his job jim comey was harassed alvin bragg suing top trump ally jim jordan >> there is a lot of back and

forth going on i think one of the extraordinary elements of this is the fact that bragg seems to have gotten, according to the court filing, a thousand threats from his office from mr. trump and some of his supporters you know, and jordan is intending to have a hearing in new york next week, i believe, maybe at the javits center, is the report i've heard. with really the same intent that marjorie taylor greene had on the day of the arraignment, to counterprogram and to sort of, in their view, take the fight into the democrats' hornet's nest and i think what bragg is doing here is attempting to let mr. jordan and other people know that you can't really come on to their turf in new york city and get away with this without a fight. >> you know, glenn, it also, i

think also puts into stark contrast the reality, the political reality, the jordan committee was years in jim jordan's imagination in the making it's been a colossal flaw, even by republican standards and reviews which are, frankly, very, very low all you have to do is enough to make your way into a fox news rundown. they haven't succeeded to do anything they set out to do themselves and targeting pomerantz and bragg is almost like the reactive -- the kind of thing when you're in the minority, you're not setting the agenda. you're not holding the benghazi -- this is the bottom of the barrel, even for trump and the guys in the house. >> the guys in the house, guys and girls in the house, have a different agenda than others in their party. they can't afford to distance themselves from trump. and what you're seeing then is

essentially supporting a former president who today polled at 25%. there's a substantial number of republicans and an overwhelming number of independents who believe that trump did something wrong. what they're doing making sense in the gerrymandered districts, didn't make sense necessarily in the senate election, but they're sort of playing this out and the other thing, i'm sure you've heard about, there seems to be a lot of disputes going on in terms of the house majority we're seeing conflict over the debt ceiling, between mcckevin mccarthy and his budget committee chair. but you're also seeing significant friction according it my sources on the hill between the comer investigation and they're really going fishing. and now what they're attempting to do, i think, stage these events to counter a program that bragg did.

>> it's a great way of looking at this, jeremy bash jordan has gone fishing for alvin bragg. and alvin bragg with this lawsuit has snapped his fishing pole in half let me read from you the bragg lawsuit, quote, the judiciary committee subpoena of mr. pomerantz marks the first time in our nation's hist that congress has used its compulsory process to interfere with an ongoing state criminal case. the district attorney is likely to to the and the subpoena would injure the district attorney by, among other things, interfere with an ongoing case, compromising grand jury secrecy and attorney/client privilege. you can imagine any scenario, looking at donald trump's

career, it's clear that he sought to reach deep into the criminal justice system and undo and overturn the work of the judiciary all over this country. but to reach into an ongoing investigation into a politician, by that politician's party, is as bragg lawsuit said a first in our country. >> yeah, there are other congressional analysis with a reference to the judicial branch when i was serving as an investigator on capitol hill, we oftentimes had to yield when the department of justice was conducting a criminal investigation. even though there's a legitimate oversight function, we step back and we said, let the criminal prosecution and it's process go forward. i think what you see here today is really an attempt by the legislative branch to usurp the powers of the executive branch now, of course, in our three branches of government, we have different lanes in the road. but if the congress of the united states is able to essentially say we want to decide whether or not a criminal

prosecution can go forward and, in effect, what you have is the congress taking over the responsibilities of these executives to enforcing the law us united states. and that's a total i think change to our democratic system, to our separation of powers. i understand, obviously that bragg matter is a state matter, not a federal matter but al applies you can haven't congress interfering with the criminal code by the federal government or the states. >> and jeremy, the case has been filed -- it's a federal lawsuit, right? it's been filed through sdny what does that mean? what will the first step be? >> well, in some respects, i think, oddly, trump might have also wanted this case in federal court, because ultimately, he may want to bounce it up to the supreme court and argue that the state case by bragg is preemptive because it involves federal election law and there's adoption of

presumption in which fed courts can oversee federal laws oddly, maybe both the trump team and bragg team may be litigating before federal court before we know it and that means it's luckily to head to the second circuit which may be more friendly to the new york-based prosecutor i think, i fear, ultimately, this is going to the supreme court and they're going to have to define the contours how far this case can go and how far congress can go in interfering with it. >> you know, charlie sykes, often we come on the air and there's also a trump aspect to it as jeremy said this could end up before the supreme court, another institution that is historically low point in terms of the public's confidence in it down 40 points in gallup, asking the american voters what they feel about the supreme court

what do you make of this real lab yrinth right now, in state court and federal court and as jeremy said it may end up before the supreme court? >> yeah, sooner or one of the cases of donald trump will end up in the supreme court. it seems almost inevitable if it's not this one, it will be another one. what strikes me is that alvin bragg is bringing a gun to a knife fight and unlike robert mueller, he's pushing back and he's calling out jim jordan very clearly for a move that is pure political retaliation it is attempt to retaliate and obstruct justice and it is abuse of congressional power. and also, for political view, going back to glenn's earlier point, think about what jim jordan, the chairman of the house judiciary committee is doing. the willingness of jim jordan to put the work of the house, to

s subordinate the work of the house this early to donald trump's term they have all the other things on their plate right now, all of the other thing this could be cog, and jim jordan apparently has such a short leash from mar-a-lago, that he is going to take this committee, this hearing, to new york city. it is interesting that alvin bragg is pushing back so hard and hitting all of the keynotes, including the fact that this is a campaign to intimidate and obstruct it is an abuse of power. so this is not a trivial or a technical point that alvin bragg is making. >> charlie, this was jim jordan's response. and i do like to afford them courtesies they don't afford to earth one, where we try to get at the truth and the facts this is jim jordan's response to the lawsuit on twitter first, they indict a president for no crime then they sue the block congressional oversight when we ask questions about the federal funds they say they used to do

it that's not why there's congressional oversight, charlie. they don't even lie -- they can't stop lying anymore than they can stop breathing. the lawsuit makes clear this is about interference in a criminal investigation. >> right >> and the notion that if the copy senate democrats wanted to open an investigation into, i don't know, the u.s. attorney in delaware probe into hunter biden, the republican would literally give birth to farm animals on tv. they would go crazy, they would goal nuts. the idea that interferes in a criminal investigation say job for congress is something that democrats and republicans used to agree as a no-go. i think what we were trying to get at yesterday, we have relied only the pitiful sort of gates of norms >> yes >> i think when a story like this breaks, the reason why we come in with it because what

alvin brag is pushing against is something that has to come to the courts because the norm has been annihilated the courts no longer respect that an ongoing investigation is not something they can mettle in what is it in your view, what does it look like, to try to preserve some of the principles of rule of law >> well, you have to raise the issues, you have to push back, and the asymmetry, trump was playing by a different set of rules than robert mueller was playing by the obstruction is very much the trump playbook it's all of the cases of obstruction of justice, but i think what we have to recognize is from donald trump point of view that obstruction worked it suck ceeded it's not surprising that he and others would go back to the playbook and perhaps succeed

here what i do think is interesting is the fact that jim jordan is playing this aggressively on this issue, because he's completely out of his league now. he's out of his league he's going to be in federal court. and he's not going to be able to finesse this on twitter. do you remember before the election, jim jordan was the real man of political genius who put on the republican house judiciary twitter account, remember, it was something like elon, kanye, trump, as if somehow those were the guiding lights this is the guy. this is the history of this twitter account. and now he's in a world in which he will be held account. and where he ahas to tell the truth. and where federal judges are going to ask him tough questions and it may go up a little bit higher but alvin bragg is calling him out. letting the world know, look, these people are attacking a legitimate criminal investigation. they're seeking to interfere they're seeking to intimidate,

raising questions to the threats, as opposed to just simply putting their head down and hoping that the process, that the process and the system works without being aggressively defended so, i think we're seeing something about the aggressiveness of alvin bragg this early in the case >> i mean, glenn, the mind is focused by threats to your life and your wife's life, and that is what alvin bragg's life has included since his probe near his point where it was clear to trump and the people around him that he would be charged i want to ask you about the intersection with the threats of political violence and what charlie's talking about, the success of trump's obstructive conduct. i mean, other than bill barr and it looked like based on an incredible time body of reporting mr. urham, trump has had his way with the types of prosecutors who sought to investigate him. and even when they found evidence of criminality, he has still managed to come out on

top. do you think there's something learned in the body politic, especially on the legal side, in terms of bragg's response? >> i think there's also a sort of time and life cycle of investigations you know, the mueller investigation occurred on a president who was in office, and, you know, barr's memo, famous or infamous, precluded prosecution of a sitting president. so, i think a lot of it has to do with that but i also think that we're dealing with a very different fact set and i think january 6 changed absolutely everything. it was a concrete demonstration of what an insurrection looks like and i think it stilled to a great extent federal prosecutors and local prosecutors to take this a great deal farther down the road >> glenn, i'm going to ask you to formllow up and expand on

whether or not that analysis that jack smith also takes that view >> it seems -- look, we're in plato's cave territory here, like we're able to sort of discern who is going in, we're interviewing defense counsel to sort of see what questions are being asked. but on both the january 6 investigation and the mar-a-lago documents investigation, things seem to be accelerating. and the one thing i would say, i did a piece last week on the overlap between fan ti willis' case in florida, there's a lot of pressure on jack msmith to gt to the witnesses, the witnesses that lois is interview evening before or simultaneously with her. because you don't want a lot of testimony banging around it just creates the possibility of problems, discrepancies in testimony. so, to give you a long answer to

a very short question, smith has a lot of incentive to move really, really quickly >> jeremy, i'm intrigued by this idea that january 6 changed everything i certainly, watching it and i know trump doesn't want to us believe our eyes what we see and hear, that was part of his -- i think it was the spring of 2017, that was his message in debate, to his own voters. people who came to his rallies but those of us who saw what this movement became, that it became an unsuccessful coup, but an insurrection, all the same, led by trump still cheered by trump, trump's current position on january 6 is that he's are political prisoners and he will pardon them if he returns to the white house. what do you think, and i guess this has been part of my education in watching trump's impact on the rule of law, prosecutors are human beings and where a lot of people, including myself, are

disappointed that the mueller report wasn't more clear, it didn't say in english six crimes of obstruction of justice were committed. and the day he leaves office he should be charged criminally for them it did i think, leave a laot of people that the mueller team in the end blinked at the end do you think there's a prosecutorial difference in how prosecutors handled trump post-january 6 >> yes, i do think that, i've been talking to people overseas, friends of the united states, not americans they look at what's going on and they think themselves and said to me, you know, what january 6 showed us is exactly what donald trump thought of american democracy. when american democracy supported him, he was for it when dmamerican democracy didn' support him, he was willing to

literally tear it down, attack it send people to attack it. and that shows people around the world if donald trump is elected president again, i have to say, there are some people who believe this whole drag situation actually makes it more likely that trump will be the nominee. makes it more likely that he will emerge to the heap on top if he becomes president again, we have no idea what he will do to american democracy, and that scares the living daylights out of our friends around the world and it should. >> we need new words for living daylights because i'm sure that's not the words they used i do want to turn to what glenn and i started talking about, and that is, the impact of what we can deduce in the mark about the jack smith probe i'm going to ask you to stick around when we come back, i'll tell you about the other breaking news, a top trump ally, his speechwriter, his voice, steven miller, was in court today for

many hours as trump seeks to block the former vice president mike pence from testifying plus, a whole bunch of very sensitive leaked intelligence documents about the war in ukraine and other hot button foreign policy crises has left the pentagon stunned about this week, and looking for answers. we'll tell you what has gone missing. later in the program, dominion and fox news are gearing up to go to trial imminently, we'll tell you what to expect when that starts, all that and more when "deadline: white house" continues after a quick break. don't go anywhere today. there's my little marzipan! [ laughs ] oh, my daughter gives the best hugs! we're just passing through on our way to the jazz jamboree. [ imitates trumpet playing ] and we wanted to thank america's number-one motorcycle insurer -for saving us money. -thank you. [ laughs ] mara, your parents are -- exactly like me? i know, right? well, cherish your friends and loved ones. let's roll, daddio!

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manhattan district attorney alvin bragg's investigation into donald trump is but one in a sea of many, many, many investigations involving and targeting trump. this week, trump will be questioned in the business lawsuit brought by new york's attorney letitia james, and that trial starts two weeks from day. and limiting all of that as we've been discussing special counsel jack smith's probes into the classified documents trump took to mar-a-lago and his role in the january 6 insurrection. just this morning former speechwriter to donald trump steven miller reported to u.s. district court in washington and was seen entering the area where the grand jury tied to that discretion meets regularly. now, there's some big clues out there about what information steven miller might be able to vow. for instance, the grand jury

will certainly want to know what he and jump talked about on the morning of january 6 and how they crafted and modified trump's speech at the ellipse that day here's what we learned about that process from the january 6th select committee >> as you can see from the president's daily diary, the president spoke to stephen miller for over 25 minutes that morning. following his call with mr. miller, president trump inserted for the first time a line in his speech that said, quote, and we will see whether mike pence enters history as a truly courageous great leader. all he has to do is refer the illegally submitted electoral votes back to the states that were given false and fraudulent information where they want to recertify. these last-minute edits by president trump to his speech were part of the president's pressure campaign against his own vice president >> pence mentioned here is

timely for today's news cycle. as we speak, trump is seeking to block mike pence who said he was done fighting, he was done fighting his subpoena. but now trump is trying to block pence from testifying in front of the same grand jury and familiar with the litigation involved might have been a secret but how confident should trump's team feel, given that just last week, a federal appeals court judge denied trump's effort to block the testimony of several other senior white house aides, including stephen miller which is likely how he ended up before the grand jury today we're back with glenn thrush and charlie sykes. and jeremy katy tur that stephen miller testified six hours. do you no anything about that? >> no we've heard the same thing you that alluded to that would quite likely involve the revisions of the speech. but if you know steve miller, he

can talk for six hours straight. that's kind of his thing, that's kind of his thing. but he really is -- i think people on the outside don't understand, you know, they've been a lot of people who moved in and out of trump world over the years. miller is really one of the most consistent elements. he is a guy that just got himself on trump's plane in 2016 he used to be an aide to jeff sessions and if you want to talk about someone who is kind of the keeper of the trump message so far as it exists, he's the coiner of the american carnage line in the inaugural. so miller is somebody who has a very, very close relationship with trump and a lot of words are exchanged between the two of them, and presumably, that's what he testified about. >> and i guess, jeremy bash, the difference between, i have the transcripts before his apparent before the january 6 select committee, they asked the questions that we showed there they got a whole lot of

objection, objection, executive privilege, objection so the first opportunity to pierce that executive privilege shield would be this grand jury, if that is what has happened but i want to just go back to the four crimes that were referred by the select committee for donald trump the obstruction of an official proceeding conspiracy to defraud the united states inciting insurrection. the speech on the fake electors list certifying joe biden's victory is the linchpin to everything how significant do you think stephen miller is? >> well, if mike pence's role on january 6 was to oversee the official counting of the electoral votes before the joint session then it's private clear that donald trump on instructed that official proceeding after all, people went to the

capitol, stormed it, visited mayhem and violence and armed assault on that official proceeding that caused mike pence to go scurrying into a safe zone protected by the secret service so, i think the fact that stephen miller inserted into the speech a specific intimidation line directed at mike pence i think is further evidence, as if any more were needed, that donald trump obstructed an official proceeding of the united states. that, of all of the charges that the january 6 committee referred, that's pretty clear cut, nicolle, i don't think that's much in doubt >> charlie, i have all of this great illustrative sound of stephen miller that i cannot bring myself to play it. let me just describe it. he went on "fox & friends" on february 14th. it's an important date in this process, obviously, what's the lectors meet but the plot that he was broadcasting on cable news we've

got to the 20th. the only date in the constitution is january 20th so we've got more than enough time to certify trump as winner of the election as we speak today an ultimate slate of electors in the states is going to vote and we'll send those results up to congress i mean, he's got a mountain of publicly facing criminal exposure on all four of the criminal counts. if jack smith decides to create the architecture of the conspiracy, the chief co-conspirator to donald trump is stephen miller. >> well that was exactly the point i was going to make. at the conspiracy, you need more than one person, who is at the center of all of this, who is writing the speeches again, we're speculating here. stephen miller might not simply have been a witness. he may end up being a target here because if there was a conspiracy, 33 was a co-conspirator he's the rasputin of the trump

administration he's the whisperer you can see all of the ways to overturn the plot to the election, and more specifically, part of the plot to obstruct the official proceeding of u.s. congress, so he's right there at the center so it's very interesting that he would be here at this stage of the investigation and would testify personally >> glenn, one of the things that's been under criminal jute-s scrutiny by the justice department is the stephen miller spot and it's tweeted about on "fox & friends" and it seems that the public facing evidence of trump and stephen miller's role in that is abundant do you have any sense, at republic facing goings ins or out, what the heat is along jack smith's fake electors plot >> i think it's intensifying

we've reported my colleagues, danny hickman and goleman and myself reported last week, that smith's office appears to be looking at potential wire fraud which is email communications between the various, quote-unquote, conspirators over the electors' plot and mail fraud which would portend to sending a slate of national electors to a national archives as well as a conspiracy charge, as well as obstruction of official process charge. and we should say, we've reported that last week there was a court ruling, that ratified the use of -- extending the obstruction proceedings statute, two cases involving january 6. so the train seems to be moving quickly in that direction. whether or not -- we haven't, i think, reported that miller was a target but miller was clearly in a lost these meetings, communicating

with the president directly about this stuff >> well, if you're talking about why you're a fraud, there are obviously more sides of the wire you can say more about that, glenn thrush >> that's what we know about public reporting that we've done over the months and years is that trump himself tends to refrain from email, even texting. i think there was some reporting in the last few months that he started texting. it's not something that he's done, so presumably, we're talking about individuals perhaps who are involved in -- the folks that have been discussed again in public reporting like john eastman. people who are circulating documents, jeffrey clark from the justice department who drafted the letter is somebody who produced paper so the individuals who were sending around paper and emails with specific -- with specific elements of electors fraud

but, again, you know, trump is not somebody who has tended to operate in a text or paper space. >> you know, jeremy -- >> to say the least. >> -- yes, and there are all sorts of reasons why i'll refrain from offering anything but if you think about clark and meadows and eastman and miller being scrutinized as part of a possible or potential conspiracy to commit the four crimes referred by the committee, do all four of them, you know, go in there and keep their mouth shut about who directed them to doll so? i mean, trump was directing the whole thing on tv, at rally stages in georgia, the events from the georgia runoff. the phone calls, there's so much, again, public-facing evidence of trump's role in directing the whole thing. what do you make of this picture that glenn is gdrawing with the sharper focus? >> yeah, i think crimes happen

in plain sight and of course, jack smith or a member of his justice department is going to go through the process of talking through every relevant witness so at the end of the day, no one can say he took a short cut or mailed it in on the contemprary, he's going do his due diligence, but the crimes happen in plain sight it's kind of like the mar-a-lago case which jack smith is also handling with respect to documents. i mean, combing or accidentally combing, in the segment, nicolle, this is a case where donald trump and his attorneys, willfully, purposefully, misled the fbi anddepartment of justice about their handling of classified documents potentially to grave detriment to national security you know, when jack smith looks at the conduct, they're looking at state of mind they're looking at intent. they're looking at what they call in the law mens rea

in the mar-a-lago documents case i think it was pretty clear for trump and his team to mislead federal investigators and block them the task of handling information. >> and mens rea with the tv documents, saying i can declassify them by thinking it with all of the documents, the idea of commingling is an important one, when you've got pence and biden with some documents in their libraries, that is a plausible investigation. but there's a 15-month paper trail of what the government wanted back and what they were looking for. we know exactly what was there that shouldn't have been there this was more about lying what about they still had and refusing to return it. it seems to be dripping in intent >> well, this is what's extraordinary about the scandals of the trump era during waterwatergate, we had, u

know, the secret white house tapes that revealed the nature of the plot. there's nothing secret about donald trump he's announcing it all in plain sight. all in public. he goes on fox news and he confesses it he puts it tweets. imagine the things that he has said on twitter that are just now coming out as part of secret documents couraged by the prosecutors, or taped uncovered by the prosecutors we would think oh, my god, there's one smoking gun after another. but the smoking gun has been, as jeremy just mentioned, they have been in plain sight now for months the question is connecting the dots, you know, buttoning it up. getting all of the witnesses in and making sure that we, you know a line it with the statutes but whether you're talking about january 6 or whether you're talking about the mar-a-lago documents, you know, most of the central facts are known, are public facing. and this is part of the reality that donald trump seems to

believe, if he just comes out and says, yes, i did it. i'm glad i did it, and i will do it again that somehow that will protect him. we'll find out whether that works for him again. >> i don't say that often in this show, but in his defense, so far, it's worked. glenn thrush, thank you for reporting to us those pieces of reporting that you guys have done, important reporting on fani willis and other witnesses looking at the same acts, as well as the latest reporting on jack mysmith's presentation jeremy sticks around for a little longer. up next, why will a leak of a cache of national security documents words of one intelligence official a, qteuo, nightmare for these united states that story's next. that's why y. with flexible multi-cloud services that enable digital innovation and enterprise control, vmware helps you keep your cloud options open.

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using the services you want in the clouds of your choice. with flexible multi-cloud services that enable digital innovation and enterprise control, vmware helps you innovate and grow. at this point, do you believe the leak is contained? are there more documents out there that have not been released probably? is this an ongoing threat? >> we don't know, we truly don't. >> we don't know that was national security council spokesman john kirby on the stunning and still rather mysterious leak of a huge batch of unclassified documents. now, here's what happened, late last week, intelligence officials announced, or revealed that more than 100 documents leaked online on various social media sites revealing in detail

american national security secrets on everything from ukraine to the middle east to china. from the "the new york times" reporting on this, quote, the scale of the leak could be hugely damaging. with one senior intelligence official calling the leak, quote, a nightmare, for the five eyes, in reference to the u.s., britain, australia and canada. the so-called five eyes nations that broadly share intelligence. both the pentagon and fbi are investigating leaks to find out who was behind them. sources assessing the damage from exactly what documents were leaked perhaps the most alarming revelation that we know about so far, one of the documents released just in late february gives a grim assent of the situation of ukraine reporting, for more than a year, ukrainian air fences reinforced by western weaponry have kept russian weapons at bay, but

without a nug influx of munitions, ukraine's entire air force network weakened by a barrage of missiles could fracture potentially voout voout of russia to unleash his lethal fighter jets in way that could change the course of the war joining us now elaine cooper on the story since it broke jeremy bash who is still with us and now with historic viewing of this, takes through your reporting? >> any, nicolle, nice to see you, hi, jeremy. >> you, too. >> this broke on thursday, when we got -- we heard from a couple of analysts who just sent us a picture of a telegram, you know, telegram of a social website going have you seen this and we looked at it, and there were at that point, four

documents, but they all had the joint staff top secret label on there, and they looked legitimate we then went to the pentagon and to the administration and the white house, and they immediately started asking us not to publish, which is the first sign that these are legitimate documents they started asking not to publish. and we started looking into it they didn't want us to publish the actual documents, the slides of the documents, because they were revealing about revealing sources and methods. so the first story we did on this -- we didn't -- even though the argument we made this is already on telegraph, and turns out it was on twitter as well. by friday, they had dumped 107 new documents which is an astounding number on to post to a website, discord, kind of a gaming site, if your teenager in

the house uses to go into chat rooms and stuff like that. and the scale of the leak, as we trickled into the weekend became more widely known. and this is kind of mind-boggling. there are two different, you know, some of them -- the documents that were put up were joint staff, offices of joint chiefs of staff and the directorate there. where they disbursed emails widely to hundreds if not thousands of people, these daily updates that are sort of american intel assessments what's going on around the world, particularly ukraine. but then some of the documents that have been leaked are from the cia. and they're draft documents that only go out to a few -- a few people, a few meaning maybe 100 or few meaning, you know, dozen. so what we've seen is sort of the kind of straw view of the american assessment, as of march 1st, of primarily what's going

on in ukraine from a variety of agencies, a variety of intelligence agencies, that put together these assessments and these drafts for american officials to sort of -- it's not exactly the pde, but a version of the presidential -- but it's another version of the president daily briefing so it gives you very much how americans see the war but the big thing that jumped out at me about this is how deeply, deeply compromised the russian military is it showed just how many holes -- just how accurate the american intel on russia is, how compromised the russian military is and just how many different ways we have into the russian remote. and it's kind of ironic it took an american intel breach to sort of tell us, and tell russia, just how deep we are, how deep

our intel agencies are, into their apparatus. >> say more about the substance. i have a million questions how this could happen and what they're doing to try to sort of figure out that they know everything that's out there. seems like that could be a very involved process i don't want to get distracted from the substance tell me more of the substance of what's in the documents. >> it's so funny that you asked, because, i, too, have been struggling with the substance versus the actual leak itself and that's a tough balance to draw >> they're making it like an irresistible story, right? >> yeah. >> i feel as a journalist, we have this glimpse into, even though they don't want to us see it on some of these gaming sites, let's respond to what we're digging into what we're learning? >> substance is this a war that's going horribly for russia, of course to american intelligence assessments, but it's not going that well for ukraine either the substance is that, for instance, on the ukraine slot,

ukraine was on march 1st, and again, we have to keep remembering that this leak is a dr straw view this is from american intelligence assessment as of march 1st. on march 1st, american agencies believed that ukrainian, for instance, expenditure rate for their air defense systems were too fast that they were going through stuff too quickly. and that they were in danger of using up their air defenses which are what basically has kept them -- the russian air force out of this war. vladimir putin has not sent in his fighter jets and his migs and his bombers because he's afraid they're going to get shot out of the sky, taken down, because the ukrainian air defenses have been performing so well, that they're, as of march per tom performing so well, but as of march 1st, they were running very low, shooting things down shooting things down, using too many munitions to shoot down things it was a -- that russia was

sending so many strikes and attacks into ukraine as a way to get them to deplete their air defense. so you've seen the west. you've seen nato and the united states really ramp up air defense munitions to ukraine president biden just last week ano announced another $2.6 billion and a lot was air defenses another snapshot is there are a lot of different windows into the wagner group and going, the wagner group for instance going to turkey and trying to get them to help them with weaponry for both ukraine and for mali. there was stuff in there about south korea and their secret ammunitions to ukraine one of the things that i found striking in this is just all of the information we had about in

there about when russia was about to strike, we knew before russia we knew russia was launching a strike at ukraine at about you know, sometimes even before they launched it and we have been telling ukraine in realtime, they call this realtime battlefield intelligence it's basically look, they're coming over. they're about to hit in about 13 minutes, there's going to be a russian air strike at so and so place. that's hugely helpful for ukraine for them to get these air defenses going to protect themselves from it, but that also shows that we have ways into the russian military apparatus, the gru, the all the different you know, russian military units, that you know, if i were the kremlin, i would be very, very concerned that the united states is so deep into this russian military apparatus. >> jeremy bash >> couple of thoughts.

first, thanks for that great reporting. i don't think we know enough at this hour to say who leaked it, whatever it was leaked purposely or hacked. why the person did what they did. what their motivation was and how they accomplished this i don't know if we know at this hour whether all these documents are real or whether some are doctored i just don't think we know enough about the damage assessment that will be unfolding at the office of the director of national intelligence i think it's important and imperative that the pentagon and other agencies keep close tabs on social media and the deep and dark web because in there's a leak like this, it's going to show up there first. so that early indication and warning is going to come from of all places, open sources i think in terms of the substance, helene hit on some of the points i also think one of the challenges is the collection we've done against our allies

and partners that's what is most difficult for u.s. officials to explain. >> right that's what sort of leads into a diplomatic crisis. not necessarily military or intelligence there's so much more to this story. i would like both of you to come back keep your schedules free from the 4:00 p.m. hour tcoo ntinue this conversation. we have to sneak in a quick break. there's so much more ahead don't go anywhere. ♪ what is it about the first warm breeze of the season that makes you feel lighter than air? ♪

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hi again, everyone it's 5:00 in new york now and we are following breaking news on that monster $1.6 billion with a b defamation lawsuit against fox news it is expected to get underway in six days. we are officially in the

pretrial home stretch legally. jury selection starts in less than 48 hours. shortly before we came on the air, one of the last pretrial hearings wrapped up with some fiery moments in court jeremy peters of "the new york times" was inside the courtroom today. he writes this, quote, the judge ruled that fox news could not argue that it broadcast false information about dominion voting system on the bases the allegations were news worthy limiting a key line of defense for the network as it faces the beginning of a potentially costly defamation trial next week quote, the judge also ruled din yan could not reference the assault of the capitol saying he did not want jurors to be prejudiced di events that were not relevant to the central question in the case did fox air wild claims about dominion's reported involvement in a conspiracy to steal the

presidential election knowing that they were lies? judge davis said he would allow lawyers to ask jury yors about their cable news viewing habits. he will not permit questions about how someone voted. that is just the tip of the iceberg. university of utah law profes is with us by phone, jeremy peters. that was his great reporting we read from. with me at the table for the hour, boston globe senior column list and co-host of a podcast, kim atkins store jeremy, take us inside what happened today >> so i just left the courtroom where judge davis in delaware

superior court handed fox a pretty significant legal setback though it wasn't all bad news for them today the big headline for fox that was not good for them is that the judge has effectively told them you can't tell the jury that these allegations were news worthy and therefore that's why you covered them he said that's irrelevant. and this is significant because for months, fox lawyers have argued in court, in their filings, in interviews with me, that the reason they gave people like sydney powell and rudy giuliani a platform is because they were making inherently news worthy statements and there was nothing more news worthy at the time than the president of the united states claiming the election wasn't free and fair. the judge said you can't tell a jury that because those statements were false. that's all that mattered he told fox that it matters only

that they were the broadcast erat of these statements they gave powell a platform to lie and that's all that matters as a matter of law you know as you point out, the judge did limit how domainion is going to be able to make its case and ruled they cannot talk about january 6th except in limited, limited ways and they wanted to use this issue of january 6th as a way not to say fox caused january 6th, but to show fox had pivoted its coverage around president trump and hosts knew and were privately disgusted by many of the president's actions. so a mixed day of decisions but certainly the judge all in all was tougher on fox than he was

on dominion and at one point, actually admonished lawyers for fox for withholding information about rupert murdoch's involvement in fox news that made it seem like he had a far left significant role in managing the network the junl said at one point to a fox lawyer, i have to be able to trust that when you talk to me is true and what you said wasn't in fact true >> what is the status of whether murdoch will testify in this trial? >> oh, he will the judge has said that fox can, sorry, that dominion can compel both murdochs to testify and that also they can compel suzanne scott, the chief executive of fox news, to testify as well. i think that's something we are virtually guaranteed to happen and it will be as you know, an

incredibly compelling and dramatic moment. >> i understand that the topic of death threats against fox news has come up and fox wanted to block dominion from mentioning some of the more dramatic personal testimony we've heard from the head of dominion that the death threats anja and harassment of their employees has been rampant the judge said no. that those would be allowed. what's the significance of that, jeremy >> well, that's right. because what dominion has done as far as making a case and a major reason for the whopping $1.6 million ask in damages is that its employees received death threats. people recently have even shown up outside of the dominion headquarters in denver carrying guns

people left voice mail messages threatening to blow up the dominion offices and dominion wanted to be able to use some of that in its arguments before the jury but what the judge said is okay, you can talk about the threats you've received, but it has to be in very general and vague terms. you can't get into the specifics of those threats you can't say that somebody left a message saying they wanted to blow up the headquarters because fox shouldn't be held responsible for the third, the actions of a third party like a crazy person who's called and issues a death threat. >> jeremy, having watched this pretrial period as closely as just about anyone, what is your impression as we head into the final news cycles or days or i guess in the eyes of fox and dominion, these are their final legal cycles ahead of a trial? >> exactly

so fox is really back on its heels much more so than it already was. the judge has significantly limited avenues for mounting the kind of legal defense it wanted. first, there was a decision last month or much earlier this month from a judge saying that basically half of what dominion has asked for he was granting them and he was only leaving one issue for the jury to decide and that was the issue of whether or not fox acted with actual malice. meaning it knew it was putting lives out there. really, dominion has a much, much smaller job to do now then you have today that really limits what fox is going to be allowed to tell a jury and i think that you know, if i

were looking at this on a scorecard, i would say that going in to the trial that starts on monday, dominion is up a few points >> and jeremy, you said that rupert and loughlin murdoch will testify. suzanne scott will testify paul ryan who sits on the board will testify former justice department official, now the fox corp.'s chief legal officer are testify. did dominion lose? is everyone that they wanted to testify going to testify >> all of the big names. not every single one the judge didn't grant them every single ask, but those are the ones you just mentioned. you are also going to see hosts like hannity and jeanine and tucker carlson called to the witness stand. those will be equally just as

compelling >> jeremy, there's some reporters who have been tweeting about this that have talked about the judge's disposition or potentially the impression that the judge was exasperated by fox. programs particularly around questions about murdoch's testimony. was that something you witnessed and anything you can tell us. >> absolutely. the judge hit limit of his patience with fox lawyers at times. at one point, he admonished them about how he would interrupt them and tell the jury to disregard fox lawyers if they pursued a certain line of argument he was very firm about that and very stern and you just referenced fox only recently disclosed in the last 48 hours that rupert murdoch is

legally an officer of fox news now that means that he has more legal exposure that he can be called as a witness. and that dominion should have received more from his personal communication than they have already. the judge said look, this is a really big deal. you can't hide the involvement of the chairman of the company and say he's one thing when he's not. say that he has a much smaller role he's not really involved well now fox is admitting that in fact murdoch is more involved than they let on and the judge was not happy about that he made that very clear. >> unbelievable day of fireworks. in a really crucial point in this whole process ahead of the trial. six days ahead of the trial. jeremy peters, i know you've had

a long day we're grateful to grab 12 minutes with you between you're being in the courtroom and covering it and everything else that you have to do today so thank you very much for making that time for us i want to bring in ronell and kim in kim, i'm tempted to put a political frame about this, but they're serious legal equities to have a judge so angry, jeremy said he was hiding the involvement over murdoch in the dealings at fox news sounds like a big and hugely important setback. >> it does and it also seems that judge davis is being very, very clear and careful here in making sure that what goes before the jury once it's impanelled is what is most salient to this case he's keeping the sensational ism out on both sides. limiting what dominion can say about january 6th. but clearly making it very, very

concrete that saying hey, i'm a news organization, this is our job to air this stuff, that this is not a defense in the face of what he's already found as a matter of law to be false, defamatory information that was broadcast repeatedly on fox news there's only so many defenses to that and what fox news continues to try to throw at the wall he's not allowing to stick. >> we try to track this as it emerges publicly and to my recollection, fox has been deprived of a defense of oh, it's news worthy fox has also been deprive of the ability to say we didn't know it was false because of the thousands of communications between dominion and fox and acknowledged receipt of said communications tell me what the questions will be before the jury >> well, the win nowing of these pretrial motions means the

checklist dominion had to tick off has a number of boxes already ticked what remains on the list to be argued before the jury are really two things. one is the question of knowing falsity. as you noted, falsity itself has been decided so the jury won't hear arguments about whether what was said about dominion was true or false. we start from the position that it was false but the question of knowing falsity and particularly knowing falsity throughout the organization, the connecting of the dots between who knew that it was false and who was responsible for the creation of the content and the broadcast of the content. those are the two things the knowing falsity question and the connecting of those dots within the corporate structure about who's responsible for the creation and the arguments are going to be shaped around those two things and nothing else. what we see in these pretrial

motions is this judge really leaning on the parties to emphasize to them that things that have already been resolved may not make their way in through a back door or resurrect themselves in front of juries. so this judge has already handled the question of falsity that any suggestion that this wasn't false is not going to go before the jury. this judge has already handled some of those key defenses that fox attempted having to do with neutral reporting or fair reporting privilege and because of has been rejected, the judge is very sensitive to the lines of questioning and evidence that might try to reference those and he's made clear here today that if he starts to see that sort of thing happening, he will interrupt and emphasize to the jury himself that fox can't argue those things >> if you step back and try to process in the context of our

politics, the statement that falsity has been decided, it's off the table. paging mar-a-lago. we still have a giant chunk of the country for whom falsity has not been decided s >> yeah and i think that's one important part of this case. i'm not a part of dominion's legal team, but i guess that's why they didn't intertanl any settlement offers, which i'm sure fox news put forward. they want to say in a clear, public way, this is false. we have our date in court. we are going to take our day in court to prove not only were these false things that were said, but there is evidence it was either done at the very least recklessly, but more likely knowingly that actual malice standard they need to prove in order to win this case but that is also crucial for the amount of damages. they're suing for over a billion dollars. if it is found that everyone in fox, the witnesses you talked

about, if they knew this to be false and continued to put that out there, that can leave fox open to a very large punitive damages award as well that would serve a purpose to say look, news organizations cannot get away from doing this they cannot use this news privilege to put forward something that is this damaging to an organization >> haven't we already seen a lot of that evidence rupert saying oh, shawn's getting mad. we're going to have all three of them come out and walk back the lies all of tucker's tweets and e-mails with his producer back and forth about how crazy and nutso powell is. haven't we seen a lot of the evidence that shows that they knew damn well that these were lies that they broadcast them in some cases they rebroadcast them and we know the motive as well the smoking gun evidence that ratings were driving everything has been presented in communication after communication after

communication. >> yes dominion previewed in many respects what we will see at trial in the motion for summary judgment which was i think all scholars and commentators in the space agree quite remarkable and rare. it's rare in one of these cases that requires a showing of knowing falsity to have a body of evidence that includes internal communication saying things like this is a lie, this is ludicrous, this is crazy. the key pieces that are going to remain are the question of connecting that material to the actual decision to create this content about this company it isn't enough for purposes of this suit to show that fox news had an awareness generally that the election wasn't stolen or that it leaned into election denialism as a coverage

decision these particular statements about this plaintiff were knowing lies or told with reckless disregard for the truth. that's the task that lies ahead in the trial next week >> and that's where the thousands of communications from dominion directly to talent and producers and board members and others at fox comes into play. that they don't deny receipt of those. >> that's right. the -- and we should note as we talked about on this program before, key witness may well turn out to be a producer from one of those shows who has now launched a suit of her own against fox news, who may connect some of those dots she may be the person who indicates the relationship between the wider corporate structure and some of the decisions made at the show level in ways that are really critical to dominion's claim. >> just an unbelievable sort of

development six days out from the trial. thank you so much for making sense of it for us when we come back, the perilous political waters republicans now find themselves in thanks to republicans and the hard right and hot button issues. things like abortion access and guns plus, calls are growing for an ethics investigation into clarence thomas. that's after new reporting and revelations that he took very fancy vacations with a billionaire republican donor one of the democrats in the senate judiciary committee will be our guest she's demanding action later in the hour, one of the expelled tennessee state lawmakers is back on the job the other could join him as soon as tomorrow and both return to that body as national figures. how the latest antidemocracy move by republicans backfired

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over the last few years have we seen this really rise quickly and i think it's because the right wing is now understanding that time is not on their side that this new generation of voters, young millennials and gen z are overwhelmingly voting for democratic candidates who care about their future. a future where there's no gun violence, where we work to prevent the climate crisis and we work on the issues of our time >> very inconvenient truth for

republicans. the newest generation of voters know exactly what they want and it is not what the gop has offered up instead of trying to broaden their appeal or coalition, today's republican party is firmly entrench nd the delusions of its extremist fringe base, fanning the flames of the culture wars, enacting unbelievely punitive bans on abortion and reproductive healthcare and refusing to do and saying out loud there's nothing they can or will do about the raging epidemic of gun violence that is plaguing every community in our country it's a political strategy we know it's bombing based on new reporting in "the new york times. quote, some republicans are warning that the uncompromising position of their party's activist base could be leading them over an electoral cliff next year. when it comes to abortion, their ongoing republican efforts to enact extremely strict bans.

ones that eliminate all exceptions like in florida where a six-week ban already passed the state senate house is zooming through the house. take a vote on it this week. meanwhile, the liberal candidate in last week's wisconsin state supreme court election campaigned heavily on abortion healthcare and she won in wisconsin by 11 points that loss for the gop was described by the editorial board for one large paper as a five alarm warning to the gop wrote this, quote, republicans h had better get their abortion position straight and more in line where voters are or they will face another disappointment in '24 a total ban is a loser in swing states republicans who insist on that position could soon find that electoral defeats will lead to ooe more liberal state abortion laws than under roe guess where that came from conservative publication "the wall street journal.

can't make this up anymore, guys joining us, chair of the african american department of studies at princeton also, political strategist and msnbc contributor, matt dowd kim is with me onset matt, this story sort of writes itself, right? but it's already etched in stone. republicans are already for this, republicans made this happen republicans pushed through the six conservative justices who already sit on the supreme court and as their popularity and trust and integrity in the eyes of the american people plunges, the republicans are tied to them so too do they >> yeah. and i think your set up piece is a very accurate portrayal about the circumstances that are faced in coming in the future electoral cycles i think we have to be careful. i think we have to be careful

that all of us know and the polls say it that all the positions on these issues the republicans have are out of step with the majority of the country. completely out of step with the skrort of country, but, but we have a structure in our country that doesn't always reveal and doesn't always implement what the majority of the country wants. and that's through a combination of gerrymandering and sorting and geographic distribution and all those other things that are in the course of this. but in the short-term, can the republicans survive in the short-term they can probably survive. that's my fear is they win a few races and they still continue to think this is okay in the long-term as we embrace and are more in the middle of a multiculture democracy where the views of the younger voters are actually what the views of everyone are they can't survive my thinking is republicans know

this they have to know this but they're willing to sort of sacrifice the long-term for any short-term gain they can get on an ideological position. >> 93% of all americans oppose abortion bans that eliminate the exception of life for mother 85% of all americans oppose abortion bans that eliminate the exception for rape and incest. republicans are so far beyond that, they are now looking at criminalizing abortion in some southern states. and it's again, it's already happened i'm just struck by the fact that republicans need and it's not just democrats it's independents and a lot of republicans, to look at these issues desegregated. they need women to look at abortion as one issue. young people and moms to look a guns what has happened and you can't

manufacture this in an ad lab. what has happened is that events have revealed they're all one story. >> yes, what is also happening is that these are things that touch people i think republicans had victories with culture wars and things like the muslim ban as sein phobic as that was and pushing back against black lives matter and other things that could gin up the base, but it was personally removed for most voters i think most people understand what mifepristone is because they've either had someone in their lives or they themselves have suffered a miscarriage or was assaulted or something else and needed this care and the idea that it will no longer be available. keep in mind, it's only fda approved up to ten weeks very early first trimester here. >> used for 23 years >> so this is something that people understand and touch. when they see their students on

lockdowns in college and they're saying oh, this is the second or third time i've experienced this since elementary school. they understand and they feel that so when it comes to anti trans attacks and things like that they understand, especially young people and the lgbtq community. so it pushes this strategy that worked donald trump got more votes in 2020 than he did in 2016 almost 10 million more but it's reaching its limit when it's reaching into places in order to appease white evangelical base here, this state here, these very like extreme portions of the base in other places trying to pull that together is really running a risk of pulling apart the other parts of the electorate that they will need and energizing democrats to vote against the people who support these policies in a way that could be really perilous at the next election. >> speaking of great point about people's lives touched

these extreme policies they're not abstract i saw a story that one in five americans has been touched by or knows someone impacted by gun violence in the country. it's not disconnected from the conversation we had yesterday that we continue to sassemble t talk about things in the news and the conversation continues to be replaced by coming on the air and having to cover another mass shooting in america >> yeah, yeah. i've been thinking about our conversation yesterday in relation to this one one of the things that i think kim and matt are right about what they're saying, but i think we have to think about this outside of election victories. and understand that there are people in the country, particularly in the republican party, who are acting in light of what they perceive an existential threat to the county treme what we're seeing over and over again, a relitigation of the 1960s. assault on voting rights

assault on women's rights. assault on the women's liberation movement. assault on the gay liberation movement so we saw among the republican party a relitigation of that period in u.s. history because i think those folk believe that the country they feel a sense of possession of has been lost and so we, it's right for us to read it in terms of electoral politics, but we have to understand i think the underlying sense of what's motivating the base and that is what they perceive to be the fight over the soul of the nation >> i want to read one thing, i want to get the last word in this conversation to molly who writes this. republicans have run into a ditch. their base gets high off displays of authoritarianism so they've taken up an agenda that targets fellow americans, inflicting real harm on

communities with race baiting tactics. after narrowly eking out a win in 2016, republicans foun themselves defendant on that base for turnout now they find themselves staring down an intractable death ray with crushing defeat unless that is they change the rules and keep minority rule. ties together everything you said i need you guys to stick around a little longer because when we come back, new pressure is being applied by senate democrats to crack down on a blossoming ethical scandal surrounding the united states supreme court. that's next. (vo) with verizon, you can now get a private 5g network. so you can do more than connect your business, you can make it even smarter. now ports can know where every piece of cargo is. and where it's going. (dock worker) right on time. (vo) robots can predict breakdowns and order their own replacement parts. (foreman) nice work. (vo) and retailers can get ahead of the fashion trend of the day with a new line tomorrow. with a verizon private 5g network, you can get more agility and security.

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a new reporter reveal that is over many decades, clarence thomas has secretly accepted luxury trips from a major job donor and he insists they doercht count saying we have been friends for over 25 years okay, but you've been on the supreme court for 31 years oh, it's not a bribe he's my friend oh, how did you guys meet? he was bribing me. yeah >> the ridiculousness of clarence thomas' attempts to defend or explain away and conceal really 20 years of refusing to abide by the few rules that do exist, disclosing

luxury gifts from a republican megadonor. every since it was reported on his failure to disclose ak tepting tens of thousands of dollars in gifts and travel over decades, there have been renewed calls for investigating thomas and implementing stricter ethical rules for the justices who sit on the supreme court today, democratic members of the senate judiciary committee sent a letter to chief justice john roberts. writing this, quote, if the court does not resolve this issue on its own, the committee will consider legislation to resolve it which you do not need to wait for congress to act to undertake your own investigation into the reported conduct and to insure it cannot happen again. joining our conversation, amy klobuchar, a member of the senate judiciary committee thank you so much for taking

time to talk to us >> it's great to be on >> what are you going to do? what is congress going to do the senate going to do >> a number of us have been pushing this for a long time i'm glad the judicial conference clarified they have to report some of this stuff now but you think about the fact that decades ago thomas reported tires as gifts and a bible as a gift a bible from the same person and then suddenly he's on yacht trips and they're not being reported we have a breakdown of trust right now with the u.s. supreme court. and they should want to change that and so our first ask is of chief justice roberts saying put in place these rules. but guess what, meanwhile, while you're debating this, we are going to have hearings on this so expect that to come soon on the senate judiciary committee and we have a bill already led

by chris murphy that a number of us are on that basically puts forth a set of ethical rules they should have the same set that other judges abide by >> were you called thomas and crow >> as witnesses, i'm not going to reveal what we're exactly doing as witnesses until it goes public, but clearly senator durbin, the chair, will make those decisions. but i think we need to have a thorough hearing to get to the bottom of what went on here and how this went down as well as what the solution is i have already called on the court to get ethical rules in place after we found out that thomas did not recuse himself from insurrection cases despite his wife's involvement and that's what really bothers me he once recused himself from a decision on a case involving a school where his son went and now he didn't recuse himself from this. all this cries out not just for

the rules, but also cries out for having an enforcement mechanism, someone to investigate them as they do with the other federal judges again, i'm all about that this court has to have the same ethics rules that everyone else does >> the letter makes it sound like the senate judiciary committee could live awith roberts doing this on his own. is that on the table or are you prepared to legislate a solution >> i'm on the bill so obviously if i could wave a magic wand, i would put forth a bill and get that bill passed, right? the bill we have now, we should pass it, but in the meantime, what we're pushing for is him to put the rules and himself and get the court to sign on they all have an interest in this it isn't just one judge. >> i mean, i guess i ask because jus justice alito said it risks the

assassination of the court's conservative justices. and they weren't interested in an actual leak investigation they used their internal security do you think they're actually interested in being held to any of the same standard that is you are as a member of congress? >> by the way, one other thing i'd add is televised hearings so we can actually see when they're debating things so an elite group just doesn't get to go in and watch. i don't think that's fair either >> cameras in the supreme court. absolutely >> i think we should change -- cameras in the supreme court i think that we should change these rules. now i want you to picture us enacting this. first of all, we have to get the house to agree then we have to pass that and then of course they would decide whether or not it's constitutional so all that being said, this is time for them to act and i think the hearings will shed a lot of light on this and

i'm looking forward to that. >> the other reality is the political reality, right the supreme court is now a drag on the right being associated with them, creating them trump suffering for it his picks have now resulted in the most unpopular united states supreme court in american history. a piece of that is its decision to overturn roe versus wade. what do you miake of the analysi that all of these extreme positions are a real political deadweight for the republican party? >> i really enjoyed your last discussion because as more and more young people are able to vote, as they get turning that magic age, you're seeing a shift and i think it is a drag this is not where they are and once they lost that presidential election in states like as you know, and some continued in the midterms in states like arizona and states like nevada and georgia, instead

of changing their candidates and their policies and putting forth and agreeing with us on some of these great judges that we've put forward, what do they do they double down and try to change their voters with voter suppression laws that's my problem. and certainly this latest decision on the district court level with this one judge in amarillo is going to give them an opportunity, let's call it an opportunity, to actually make clear what the law is, which is that this decision is basically crazy and absurd and out of line with precedent >> your former colleague, claire mccaskill, expressed kpas ration with the pace of don firming joe biden's appointees is there anything you can say about that >> i would change the rules on this i've made it clear i would actually speed up the time it takes for the non cabinet positions and i

would put it in place for whoever the president is we have literally half of the people positions in the government roughly are still open that is crazy. he has put forward people for a number of these positions and they sit and i would just change the rules. take them out of congressional confirmation not the cabinet members, not the judges, not the deputies, but so many people await senate confirmation senators don't like to give up that ability to hold that over an administrators head if you have that ability, you better be reasonable about it and i'm just tired of this because i think it makes it difficult for a president to do their job so i share her frustration. >> we should have a longer conversation we'll bring her back because i think people have no idea >> that would be fun >> how hamstring any frustration is by this process >> and some of the positions

that have been left open i think that would be great. you know claire and i are friends. >> i think the two of you could solve just about anything. thank you for spending time with us on this we are grateful. >> great to be on. thanks when we come back, justin jones is now back in the tennessee state house. former representative justin pearson is on his way back the third member of the tennessee three will be our guest after a quick break. don't go anywhere. if you have this... consider adding this.

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i want to thank you all, not for what you did, but for awakening the people of this state, particularly the young people thank you for reminding us that the strugglefor justice is fought and won in every generation. >> wow, that was tennessee state representative, again, justin jones returning to the house floor last night thanking the chamber, the white majority republican state legislature for what has become a national -- international story and outrage. attention over his expulsion just four days ago, jones and former representative justin pearson, both democrats, both black, were expelled after leading chants for state gun safety legislation days after yet another deadly mass shooting, this one at a school just a few miles away. as we watched live, the

nashville counsel voted to reinstate jones. state representative gloria johnson, who survived her own expulsion vote led him on to the floor. she is here now. thanks for being here. >> thanks for having me. glad to be here. >> we were captivated by your fight. you survived the vote, but all the same, they voted to expel you. do you think the body, people actually in it who voted to expel representative pearson and jones, is changed in any way >> you know, i don't know. i would like to think that that's something that's going to happen that maybe they will think about the situation, think about what they did, what it

looked like, what it was, quite frankly. because we have had worse behavior on the floor, and we're likely to have more bad behavior in some respects, you know, just based on what has come before, where no one -- absolutely no one was punished at all, and so in this instance, where they tried to expel three members for breaking a single house rule, and the majority of the time we were in front of the body, it was during a recess. so it was something way out of the ordinary i hope that my republican colleagues will think about that issue, think about what it looked like to america because it was not a good look, and the people spoke loudly and clearly, and thank goodness for these young people who continue to come every day. they're so organized they're so smart

they are not going to let this issue go away, and we need young voices like representative jones and representative pearson to lift those voices. and they are desperately needed in the tennessee house right now. >> you used your voice to say that the reason you survived and they didn't in the moment was because of race. do you think the body is at all chastened, could behave in a way that is less racist on the other side of this >> sometimes when say something is racist people think, i'm not racist, but i hope they think, listen to the questions they asked, listen to the tone they used and kind of understand that racism is -- that tone was very, very clear in the questions to my younger colleagues. it was demeaning to me, but it

was a different tone still yet and tinged with racism, and that was very clear and i know sometimes people don't like to think of themselves as being racist, but, you know, it doesn't necessarily mean you have to wear a white hood >> powerful words from you every step of the way. what will it feel like for the three of you to be reunited in the chamber in. >> i'll be going to memphis tomorrow to be there, for that vote it's just -- like i said, it's so critical and important to this body that we have those young voices it's very, very smart men who really understand the issues, are passionate about the issues, and they're passionate about their community and they're passionate about making sure that we take gun violence

seriously and do something about it you know, that's one thing that we all shared. we've wanted to make sure those people outside that building, our constituents back home who wanted us to do something about gun violence, that we lifted their voices, stood up for them, and their voices were heard on the house floor, and that's what was in our hearts when we went to the well. we were all compelled to make sure those voices were recognized, and so that's what we did, and we need voices that are unafraid and willing to do whatever they need to do to bring those voice of their districts to the forefront >> tennessee state representative gloria johnson. we hope you'll constant to be part of our conversations. thank you for being here with us thank you for spending time with us today quick break for us we'll be right back. you can make it even smarter.

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