while others are off. >> pomeranz is no longer in the d.a.'s office so might there be a way for jim jordan to speak to him that wouldn't interfere in the current investigation? >> right i think there might be pomeranz has written a book. it would depend, of course, on how jordan framed it because he does not have oversight of the manhattan d.a.'s office. he can't interfere to try to get information that would benefit his friend and ally, the former president. but congress does have a broad scope. and we need to be careful of being consistent whether we like the person issuing the subpoena or not, congress is an institution, has important power. >> joyce vance, thank you so much for coming on and explaining the weird logistics for a case like this appreciate it. and that's going to do it for me today. "deadline white house" starts right now.

hi, everyone i know that we say this a lot these days but buckle up it's 4:00 in new york. we're following breaking news on that monster $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against fox news just a little bit ago we received word of a bombshell of a plot twist during what was supposed to be the last pretrial hearing before jury selection begins. here's that headline the judge has sanctioned fox news and its parent company, fox corp, for withholding evidence in the dominion defamation suit and said he is considering further investigation and censure. he is considering appointing a special master to investigate the fox local team's actions now, the breaking point today appears to be surprise evidence that was introduced in court today when this happened, quote, lawyers for dominion voting systems played recordings that fox news producer abby grossberg made during 2020, which were not handed over to dominion's

lawyers during discovery we have a team of experts and friends to help us make sense of this legal curveball, including jeremy peters of "the new york times. jeremy was in court yesterday and here's some of his reporting on today's explosive new development. quote, the rebuke came after lawyers for dominion revealed a number of instances in which fox's lawyers had not turned over evidence in a timely manner that evidence included recordings of the fox news host maria bartiromo talking with former president trump's lawyers, sidney powell and rudy giuliani which dominion said had been turned over a week ago. the judge, quote, was very concerned that there had been misrepresentations to the court, saying, quote, this is very serious. a lawyer for dominion told the court that they were still receiving relevant documents from fox with the trial just days away. as for that surprise evidence, those secret recordings provided

by former fox producer abby grossberg, about them "the new york times" writes this. quote, in one of the recordings from november 8th, 2020, maria bartiromo asks rudy giuliani about the dominion software. he says this, quote, it's being analyzed right now when she asks him about a false connection to nancy pelosi, giuliani says, quote, yeah, i've read that. i can't move that yet. i can't prove that yet, or ever. and now just moments before we came on the air, bloomberg news is reporting that rupert murdoch himself could take the stand in this trial as early as monday. b bloomberg's reporting goes like this rupert murdoch is expected to be called to the witness stand in the dominion voting system's defamation lawsuit against his company as soon as monday. that is according to people familiar with the matter murdoch would be the second witness called, people said,

meaning he would likely testify on monday or tuesday bombshell legal developments in this dominion $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against fox news is where we begin with some of our favorite reporters and friends. as we mentioned, "new york times" political reporter and msnbc contributor, jeremy peters is here. also joining us, ronelle anderson jones, law professor at the university of utah and a first amendment scholar. with us at the table, molly john fast, but former state attorney for palm beach county, florida, dave aaron berg is here. jeremy peters, i didn't think there would be twists and turned separate from the jaw-dropping reveals in the internal communications at fox news but this is an obstructive legal act. explain what happened and what was revealed today

>> this case has taken so many turns, nicolle and the ones over the last 48 hours have surprised even dominion, which has been reviewing the text messages and emails, tens of thousands of them for months, and it all. what happened today is significant not only legally but because it appeared to so anger the judge, judge eric davis. it's not good ever to be a defendant in a case going into a jury trial where you have the judge mad at you, because even though the jury will ultimately decide whether or not dominion is liable for defamation, the judge still has extraordinary power to shape the case and to limit the way fox can present its defense. what fox had initially told the judge and argued repeatedly in court and in interviews with reporters like me is, look,

rupert and lachlan murdoch as the two executives responsible for the fox corporation, the parent company of fox news, don't have much to do with fox news they're too busy running the broader, larger parent company they don't meddle in the affairs of this news network but what we learned yesterday is that that's just not true as far as it relates to rupert murdoch. and that's significant because it allows dominion to go after fox corporation, especially on damages if fox is ultimately found liable for this. it's a much bigger case that way. but delaware law is such that it's very hard to hold a parent company responsible for the actions of a subsidiary unless there's a very strong connection between those two entities now we know that connection

exists, and that's very potentially damaging for fox >> jeremy peters, let me ask you about this recording i understand it was played in court. this is rudy giuliani's voice on tape saying what we read from the transcript i don't haveany evidence yet >> exactly right and the fact that he admits this and maria bartiromo and others at fox not only host him but continue to host him repeatedly and to make this claim about nancy pelosi, a claim which some fox news anchors then echoed themselves, it just goes to how much evidence dominion has pointing to recklessness and actual malice. and that's ultimately what the jury will have to decide little pieces of evidence like this just keep piling up and they show us that what fox was saying behind the scenes and what its anchors and guests were telling its audience are two

very, very different things. >> ronelle, this seems to go to the heart of knowingly broadcasting false information, seems to go to the heart of the shallowness of the claims and knowing that they weren't true before they put them on the air, but it also, and i use this word in the context of our coverage of trump, it suggests an obstructive act has taken place in obstructing the discovery process or standing in the way of turning over things that should have been turned over can you give us an explanation of the significance of each? >> sure. i mean this is an unenviable position to be in on the cusp of any trial in any case, but it's a particularly unfortunate one in a case that rises and falls substantively on a claim told k lies so no litigant wants a few days before trial starts to be in a

position where they're receiving sanctions and being scolded and sort of schooled by the judge in the case for what the judge thinks of as misrepresentations or a lack of honesty the judge here was quite clear, said specifically omissions in this context are lies. and it's uncomfortable to him that these sorts of withholdings have happened. we wouldn't want to see that as a lawyer on the eve of any trial, and you certainly wouldn't want to be heading in with any sort of indication to the jury that you had engaged in that kind of behavior. but it might be particularly unfortunate in a case in which the main question that the jury needs to decide is whether this organization has engaged in a pattern of knowing fault it's a real complexity right at

the moment that the trial is about to begin. >> can you explain whether this process that the judge ordered is concurrent with the trial let me read what that process is as reported by jeremy in "the new york times." the judge said that he would likely appoint a special master to investigate fox's handling of discovery of documents, and the question of whether fox inappropriately withheld details about rupert murdoch's role as a corporate officer at fox news. the judge told fox's lawyers to retain all internal communications between themselves relating to the officer issue from the time of march 20th he said he would weigh whether any additional sanctions should be put on fox. does that happen on a parallel track to the actual defamation lawsuit that is slated to begin monday >> so i don't think that we know immediately what this will do to the timing of this suit. i assume that in the coming hours and days, we'll get clarification about whether there might be a delay in moving

forward. the judge did suggest that dominion is probably entitled to some additional discovery here, now that it knows things that it didn't know before, to look into those things before it launches into trial and that it could engage in that discovery at fox's expense as a part of the sko consequences here. we don't know yet from dominion whether they will take the judge up on that offer so we think that piece of it remains to be seen it's interesting because this all came about as a result of this producer, who used to work for fox news, who has now left and is suing fox herself over what she says was a toxic work environment, those of us who have been watching the case quite closely have said all along that she was likely to offer some really important insights into the goings on at fox news and an important gloss on the evidence that had already

been gathered in the case. but i don't think any of us could have ever have expected there would be this significant of a development because the evidence that we're talking about here is evidence that we would have expected that if anyone at all at fox knew about it, it would have been revealed months and months ago in this process. the rules of the game here are quite simple it is that you have the power as the attorney in a particular case to argue the consequences or to shape your argument around the facts that are before the jury, but you don't have the power to keep from the jury relevant facts and it's quite clear you can see the judge saying that it's quite enclosure that some of this evidence is really pertinent to the core claims that are being made by dominion, and so it does have the right heading into the trial to explore them in more detail. >> ronnell, does it taint the

discovery process to learn that fox didn't abide by it what is the remedy other than a slap on the wrist, which it what it sounds like happened today? >> certainly to hear judge davis today suggesting that he had that same kind of anxiety. remember, the jury trial that is coming upis nothing close to the first proceeding that has happened in this case. in fact, we already have from this judge response to and an order on motions for summary judgment the judge has already decided some key pieces of this case in advance, and he said in court today that there is a little dis-ease here about whether that's problematic in terms of him not knowing the full scope of the factual background as he was making those sorts of considerations you can see that he's certainly going to be sure that prior to moving forward with key pieces of evidence before the jury, that dominion has everything

that it's entitled to have and i think that's been made clear to fox in today' hearing. >> ronnell, are you aware of any other news organizations withholding information during this discovery process that's essential to both proving the intent to publish and broadcast false information as well as enclosure clearly responsive t discovery >> one of the things that we've been saying all along here is that these sorts of cases don't move to trial in any event the constitutional bar is so high here and the difficulty of showing actual evidence of knowing falsity on the part of a news organization is so staggering that we don't have that many examples to draw from when we're trying to compare this situation to other situations involving the media this is a unique case start to finish, and this most recent development just makes it even more staggering. >> but, molly, there's some

things shockingly similar. the pattern of someone from inside, i think comey called it the family that ends up on the outside spilling the beans and revealing incredibly damaging evidence about what's happening inside the family. >> when i saw that abby grossberg was going to sue, i knew that was going to be a disaster for them. an it mimics the trump organization where they would provide the lawyers for the witnesses. >> cohen is abby, weisselberg is sitting in prison. he's the others who are still toeing the family line. >> usually with the trump organization, there's a lot of money that rupert murdoch has. and i think dominion is really hell hath no fury like a voting machine company scorned. >> what do you make the legal strategy that we expect to have rupert murdoch on the witness stand in the first or second day of trial he'd be the second witness

called. >> rupert murdoch in his depositions was very forthcoming. yeah, we should have done it differently. yeah, we should have told the truth. it's good to put him on the stand. he's still the boss man. to me the biggest question is why hasn't fox news settled because every day more damaging stuff comes out. how many times do you have to step on a rake before you get hurt i think they haven't settled because they'd have to go on and say we were wrong, the election was not stolen, go on with your day. they are so worried about losing their audience with newsmax, they'd rather go down with a sinking ship than make those admissions. >> i think we said you were the former state attorney, you are the current state attorney for palm beach county. >> i live in florida, so former could happen any day now. >> i want to ask you if you could address that question from a strategic level, jeremy peters this continues to get worse and worse. and to molly's point and dave's

point, if abby wasn't another inflection point where they considered settlement? >> so i've been hearing for some time that fox is already focused on a possible appeal inside the network, that's where executives are looking because they realize that it's going to be a tough case for them to win in delaware. they also -- that's exactly right, this point about having to apologize dominion wants not only a lot of money from fox but they want an apology. they want an acknowledgement from fox that it was wrong to report what it did about voter fraud and its machines they are not going to get that absent some major, major change in thinking inside fox that i'm just unaware of. i'm not even aware of any kind of discussions taking place around that. so this case, i think, is going

to be with us for a while. and it's just the lack of a settlement so far is just one more way that is so extraordinary. you just don't see cases like this go to trial you don't see cases like this where there are reams of damning evidence that points to actual malice in the way that there is in this case so this one is one for the books. >> let me read a statement that's just come out from fox news about today's developments in court this is from the fox pr department quote, as counsel explained to the court, fox produced the supplemental information from ms. grossberg when we first learned it and a reminder on the statement, which is also relevant, rupert murdoch has been listed as executive chairman of fox news in our s.e.c. filings for several years and this filing was referenced by dominion's own attorney during his own deposition this sounds like a little bit of

covering your you know what, ronnell. are we to assume this is just in the absence of anything else, this is what they're putting out there? >> well, presume blow a piece of this is what a special master would look into if the judge ultimately appoints one. if there's a they said/they said dispute over whether information was withheld or whether information was simply unavailable. that's something that a special master would certainly get to the bottom of. on the question of the revelation that fox only recently made about rupert murdoch's more central role as an officer of fox news, there's a little bit of a complicated story line here. one of the explanations that was given in court today was that murdoch himself and the lawyers themselves weren't fully clear on that. that they themselves had not

been aware that he held that role but a separate explanation that seems to have been made is that it was clear to everyone, including dominion, that it was listed in the s.e.c. filings and so those are the sorts of tensions and facts that the judge or a special master appointed by the judge will probably need to get to the bottom of. >> and it sounds like the judge for his part, jeremy, isn't buying it at all >> nicolle, one thing we've seen over and over again throughout the course of the run-up to this trial is the judge has grown increasingly exasperated with fox's explanations and its conduct in court, with its numerous, numerous objections. you know, he's put them on notice he did this in yesterday's hearing. he did it again today in a much firmer and more explicit way, saying, look, i may order a

special master investigation into this, and i am holding open the possibility that you could be subject to further sanctions. as i said, you don't want a judge mad at you if you're a defendant in a $1.6 billion defamation trial a few days ahead of opening arguments it's become clear that fox -- just watching the conduct of the lawyers in the courtroom, from both sides they're very respectful and very deferential to the judge but fox's counsel much more than dominions to my observation can tell they are on thin ice. i can see it in the body language when they interact with the judge, i can hear it in the tone of their voice. i think the apologetic way that they often carry themselves when speaking to him. so they know that this could get

even worse for them. >> unbelievable twist ahead of jury selection and an expected trial start on monday. jeremy peters, ronnell anderson, thank you very much. dave and molly stick around. we'll return to this story at the top of the next hour but we are going to turn to extraordinary reporting that prosecutors have been asking witnesses in that jack smith-run classified documents probe whether donald trump has been showing like show-and-tell style a map with accsensitive classifd information on it to people. we'll tell you all about it. you have to hear it to believe it. plus expelled tennessee lawmaker justin pearson was reappointed today. we'll show you that. later, the disgraced ex-president is once again singing the praises of autocrats

like vladimir putin and kim jong up what it says about the gop given that he's the front-runner for their own party. all those stories and more after "deadline white house" continues after a quick break. don't go anywhere. (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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ensure max protein with 30 grams of protein, 1 gram of sugar and nutrients for immune health. ♪ another story breaking late this afternoon, you can imagine what our meetings were like today, fresh reporting in "the new york times" that offers a very rare peek at a consistent line of behavior and questioning about it across multiple witnesses in special counsel jack smith's investigation into the classified documents taken and stored at mar-a-lago citing four sources familiar with the matter, "the new york

times" reports that federal investigators are asking witnesses whether donald trump showed off to aides and visitors a map, a map that he took with him when he left office that contained sensitive intelligence information. now, the nature of the map and the classified information it contains is not yet clear, but still, it might serve as a clue that it is now possible investigators for their part have successfully moved on from establishing the facts in this case to a point where they're focused in on proving intent in a case that could result in obstruction of justice charges for the twice impeached ex-president joining us now, "new york times" washington correspondent and msnbc contributor mike schmidt, palm beach county state attorney currently dave aaron berg is here, molly is still with us as well mike, take us through what your colleagues are reporting this afternoon. >> here's what i think is significant. if you're going to make this case and take this extraordinary decision of charging a former

president, yadda yadda. >> the second after bragg. >> first time federally. >> this is a slightly less extraordinary move, but still extraordinary. >> you're going to want to know why he did what he did not just why was it that they provided the justice department with misleading, inaccurate information about whether they had the documents, but why was it that he took the documents. and that was something that we saw in the hillary clinton email investigation. why was it that she had used the email server because at the heart of that question gives a larger explanation for whether and what the criminal intent may have been in this in the hillary clinton email investigation, they were never able to get beyond the idea of convenience. here, if you have a former president of the united states with documents that are marked classified showing them to people like they are trophies or in some other way, hey, can you

believe what this says or whatever, it sort of -- it leads you down a path where you have a better understanding of why he was doing what he was doing and saying, man, this really doesn't make any sense it's not like, oh, my gosh, i took this home by mistake. i need to give this back to the government i can't believe i just found this in my desk. it's like -- >> it's a trophy. >> -- look at what i found. >> his son kills elephants and he's got classified maps do you think there's any connection to this line of jack smith's probe, which is still largely opaque to us except for reporting like this and bill barr sounding like he's more certain than andrew weissmann or neal katyal that trump will and should be indicted for obstructing in the investigation of the classified documents? >> i understand why people wanting to make a lot out of bill barr's takes on different things. >> just this one. >> this comes up a lot it comes up a lot.

>> really just this one. he sounds like he's testified himself. he sounds so invested in trump being held accountable in just the obstruction prong of the documents case >> this isn't an answer to your question, but there was -- covering the trump presidency and all the investigations, out of all of the players on the field, there was no one that i saw maybe besides don mcgahn that had the ability to move around on the chess board and had the political instincts to do it and the savvy to do it than bill barr so i would just say that when bill barr is out there saying things like that, you have to look at them through the lens of someone who has tried to politically ma soneuver this fo himself in many, many different ways bill barr is not the attorney general anymore so i'm not sure why it matters. >> no. look, it's a fair warning that his motives i think are always a wrinkle in anything that he's saying publicly.

a lot of these comments were made on fox news i think over the weekend they were made on abc he seems to play to audience and relish his role as a subject in the january 6th probe, saying bullshit over and over and over again hoping we'd repeat it and he'd curry some openness what do you make of what appears to be the strength and the intensity of the obstruction investigation? >> obstruction is the big whammy here because it's punishable by up to 20 years in prison there's also something else at play here. i agree with everything that michael said but i think the reason that they asked about the map is another statute, 18 usc 719 e, the espionage statute, says that someone who is unauthorized to have possession of a map and then shows it to someone who can't see it violates that statute. so they're not just going after him for obstruction, but also espionage, which is punishable boy up to ten years in prison. that's why there's a lot of trouble ahead.

that's why bill barr is saying, hey, this is the tough one it's not new york that will do in the former president, i think it's the mar-a-lago documents because there's a direct tie between the former president and the alleged criminality there. >> you haven't heard of any parties where maps are the party favors >> trump likes to be the big showman, the boss, the big baller that's why he has a big shoe from shaquille o'neal that he keeps in his office to show off to guests. what's better than a shaquille o'neal shoe? how about some sensitive mamps, nuclear secrets. >> the other part of this is the national security concerns let me show you what sue gordon had to say on this show. >> the first thing i say, there is zero defense. i cannot imagine a defense for the situation in which we find ourselves. there's just none. there is no justification. there is no excuse no defense, zero, from a

national security and from a person involved. motivation is a much harder thing to ascribe i'm usually loathe to say what i think other people are thinking. my experience is, is that the former president has his agenda, and he will use whatever is at his disposal to advance that >> she chose her words very carefully. that was sue gordon, the former deputy director of national intelligence saying something so carefully it sort of froze me in my tracks. but he has his agenda. it may be showing off next to the shoe, it may be something else, we don't know, but it's clear jack smith is going to answer that question. >> yeah. and i mean, look, trump has a lot of -- there's always been a

lot of smoke, right, and there's never been -- just like with fox news, there's always been smoke, but with some of the stuff you definitely see this -- you're starting to see the outlines of fire so i do think there is a lot -- i mean it definitely seems like he's got an idea of where he wants to go, jack smith. >> mike, there was a frame through which we tried to understand the mueller probe as proceeding along the coordination with russia and actors like paul manafort, george papadopoulos and trump's own conduct and their contacts and coordination with russia do you get the sense that this is proceeding along two tracks in the documents probe or is the only bifurcation mar-a-lago and january 6th? >> i think mar-a-lago and january 6th, because i think they're all sort of intertwined. you have to understand why he took them, how he took them, what he did with them when he took them, and then why they

provided the misleading account. it's all tied in together. so i think that they're all sort of one of the same there was a line in the story by my colleagues today in "the times" about the map in which they said that they thought that all the witnesses had been spoken to who could really provide any information here now, it's very, very difficult to predict the future about whatever, but that sort of shows a progression in the investigation. i don't think we're at that point in the january 6th investigation, as there are still witnesses whose testimony is being litigated, worked out, et cetera, who have still not gone before the grand jury so that was a tidbit halfway through the story that was sort of like, hmm, okay, well, things are moving ahead here. now, does that mean that we're like imminently sitting on anything who knows. i think it's very, very difficult and dangerous to try and predict and read the tea leaves of what's going on inside

as we've covered all these investigations it's just -- you know, you think you have some sense of it but you really don't know what's going on behind thoseclosed doors. >> there was a sense that the bar rosenstein, o'callaghan, chain of command over the mueller probe looked dism dismissively as obstruction of justice as a criminal bucket dave's comment is that's where a lot of the heat is how do you think this justice department looks at trump's efforts to obstruct efforts to regain possession of national security documents >> i don't now i think if -- this is another thing here where we're trying to predict, how does merrick garland view the world when he doesn't really say much. if merrick garland is a person as an institutionalist trying to reset the norms, the only thing i can take away from that is

that if a special counsel said they wanted to bring charges in something, he probably would go along with that, sort of following the norms of, okay, well, i appointed this special counsel to do an investigation they're an independent investigator who has found this thing, you know, would merrick garland override that. at the same time merrick garland will be in a position where he has to decide whether to charge the likely republican nominee against the president of the united states who will be running against him, he'll have to decide whether it's in the best interests of the country to do that. and i think that's a very easy thing for people to throw around and say, well, if the facts are there, whatever. but my guess is that's a humongously extraordinary decision that's exponentially bigger than we think it is and will probably define merrick garland. >> is that how merrick

garland -- just as a prosecutor, is that how it should be made, that this is a huge decision for the country, or should merrick garland look at his line prosecutor and follow the facts? what -- in your world what is the correct way to handle wherever the evidence leads jack smith? >> as a state prosecutor you follow the evidence and the law. when you're the u.s. attorney general, you also consider what's best for the country. i didn't think merrick garland wanted to be here. he was slow rolling this investigation from the beginning and he was pushed into putting jack smith, a pit bull, in charge of the investigation only because donald trump committed an unforced error. he announced for president so early to try to intimidate merrick garland, to try to dissuade him. >> well, it worked merrick garland hasn't touched any of the trump cases. >> he put jack smith in charge instead of a person being a bit timid in merrick garland, you've got this bulldog in jack smith who is ready to go if merrick garland declines to

prosecute, he has to explain it. there's got to be a report and the public will know is that the legacy he wants. >> next to the shelf on the mueller report people have been investigating trump and finding criminality for seven years now. what do you think the stakes are of jack smith's work and merrick garland's treatment of it? >> i would just add that what we saw last week is that trump had one of his best fund-raising weeks since he left the oval so i do think -- >> second to the insurrection. we have to be honest about what else really rated in maga world. it was the coup and the insurrection after the coup >> and the base -- i mean the loser with the donald trump indictment last week was ron desantis so trump really killed it in the polls and it really helped him i think another one of these -- and again, that's not what you should -- you should not focus on the craziness. >> no, but it's part of it my demented brain is how is ron

desantis trying to get arraigned and arrested now all right, mike sochmidt, thank you for being here. after the break, you can't expel hope that is what one of the tennessee three had to say at that after he was reinstated as a tennessee state representative returning to the body that expelled him days ago. we'll bring you the latest, next >> woman: why did we choose safelite? we're always working on a project. while loading up our suv, one extra push and... crack! so, we scheduled at safelite.com. we were able to track our technician and knew exactly when he'd arrive. we can keep working! ♪ synth music ♪ >> woman: safelite came to us. >> tech: hi, i'm kendrick. >> woman: replaced our windshield, and installed new wipers to protect our new glass. that's service on our time. >> singers: ♪ safelite repair, safelite replace. ♪ mara, are you sure you don't want -to go bowling with us tonight? -yeah. no. there's my little marzipan! [ laughs ]

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>> same ole, same ole politics same ole, same only politicians. we've got those who are willing to fight for justice, vote for justice and in that spirit which i will head back to nashville with, we do not speak alone. we speak together. we fight together. so the message for all the people in nashville who decided to expel us, you can't expel hope >> you can't expel hope was the last thing we played there for you. the scenes out of memphis today were extraordinary that, of course, is state representative justin pearson. just in the last hour, he delivered that message for the state republicans who expelled him last week. moments earlier in a special meeting, memphis area officials reinstated pearson to his -- it had become a vacant seat because he was expelled from his seat

last week. that vote was unanimous and none of the board's four republican members even showed up pearson's return to the state legislature comes after representative justin jones was reinstated two days ago. both men had been removed by the majority republican, majority white state legislature for protesting for gun safety legislation days after a deadly mass shooting at an elementary school in nashville. imagine that let's bring in my colleague, blayne alexander, live from memphis. blayne, there's such a sense that representative jones before him and pearson today have a real connection to their constituents as well as an eye for the history that has been made and that they are making in all of their public speeches i heard that again from representative pearson today. >> reporter: and i think we saw every inch of that on full display today, nicolle

i think the fact that they started the day really with a very well attended, very busy rally not too far away from here, about a mile and a half away at the national civil rights museum, there was a lot of symbolism in that it's the civil rights museum at the place where dr. martin luther king was assassinated that's where they chose to gather and begin the day there were about 300 supporters there, all of them came out on this rather warm day here in memphis, to hear representative pearson speak. to some of them chant themselves and to walk the mile and a half distance and gather here in front of the shelby county commission building and ultimately fill that chamber i think a couple of things that were interesting is we saw people of all ages i spoke with one woman and i asked her what brought her out today. she said she doesn't necessarily live here. she drove from nearby because she wanted to support. she thought when it happened, expelling those two members, was so egregious in her words that she wanted to be out here today to show her support. now, one thing we have been watching, i spoke with a couple

of commissioners before they took that vote the vote wasn't unexpected they expected that he would be reinstated by vote of the commission the makeup of this commission is nine democrats, four republicans. as you mentioned, four of the republicans were absent but so were two democrats they didn't go into this thinking they would have any issue with that. the question would become what would the swearing-in process look like. he's going to head back to nashville and be sworn in tomorrow the session begins at 9:00 a.m. local time it's very likely that he and representative jones will both be able to be walking into their seats and essentially be re-established, resworn in as full members and participate in session tomorrow but it's very clear that this isn't over remember, there's still another election that has to come. there's still a special election that both of them have to do they have made it clear they want to run. the state democratic party is already raising money to help them do that, but certainly another hurdle they have to cross before they're permanently reinstated in those seats. >> blayne, representative jones

said something the day of the expulsion vote his speech was about the world watching and i know that has borne out. this is a national story, a big national political story that's also been covered overseas and it appears that the three, gloria johnson and representatives pearson and jones have an eye toward that. any sense that the rips realize the world is watch and their position both on guns and silencing peaceful protests is out of step with the majority of tenn tennesseeans and americans >> i think the spokesperson for the republican speaker was very quick to make it enclclear thate plan to reinstate whoever they sent back. they wanted to push back on that notion of will they, won't they be seated. they tried to make it clear, yes, we're going to seat whoever comes back i think what's remarkable here, when i've spoken to people here, democrats, leaders of the tennessee black caucus, all of

them have tried to make it clear, yes, watch this and in one person's words, this kangaroo court, but don't lose sight of what led us more in the first place which is the conversation over gun laws and gun control in the state of tennessee. and to your point, nicolle, what happened yesterday with the republican governor taking some steps was very remarkable. that was something that was very notable. an in the back and forth of who's being reinstated that may have gotten lost in this conversation but the fact that he signed appear executive order to strengthen gun laws and is calling on his own party to pass red flag laws is something notable and something representative pearson in an op-ed to "the new york times" called a small win or small victory, nicolle. >> you're so right to bring it back to why they were there, why they got into good trouble in the first place. it was to raise the voices of people of all parties, all ages, all races who were protesting for gun safety legislation we'll have that conversation at the table after a quick break.

blaiyne alexander, thank you so much for making some time for us we'll be right back.

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it's very interesting to see i think these two young justins have a bright career ahead of them they are really gift edgifted. again, people want sensible gun control. republicans are just so dug in on this. >> to the point of reporting, an incremental win because of the spotlight is to their credit, right, they are uniquely effective at speaking for their constituents, especially in a deep red state, but also the public is demanding that we do more than the gop stated position, which is, quote, probably nothing >> this is what happens when you live in a political bubble you have republicans in their safe districts talking to people who sound like them, listen to new programs that use al alternative facts. they don't have to see that expelling these two justins could create a backlash. they talk to people who think

and look like themselves when they get out into the real world, it explodes is in their face. >> we were supposed to have -- you were supposed to join us when we were many miami. trump was indicted that day. it feels like the world has changed. is that something people talk about in florida >> all the time. there's consternation amongst anti-trumpers, saying that new york shouldn't have gone first because it's the weakest of the four cases it's the least strong of the four cases doesn't mean it's weak for all the people upset that alvin bragg went first, a lot of that will be washed away when they prosecute him over the "find the votes. i think those are coming soon.

>> i have -- i guess i defer to prosecutors to offer analysis that political people shouldn't. the idea that all of this is orchestrated is ludicrous. people have a case that's ready, they go to grand jury and they go so much is the vacuum created by merrick garland. the hush money case was basically investigated and all but charged by sdny. they named him as an unindicted co-con co-conspirator bragg is the second one to find him chargeable trump doesn't stay in power if he just steals georgia the notion she could go first is an unbelievable legal scandal. >> that is certainly a big question is why is he -- again, it goes back to what mike was saying that merrick garland is known as an institutionalist there's probably anxiety all of these people work in the federal government think of themselves as non-partisan

they want desperately, i think, to get america back to what it was pre-trump. i'm not sure that's how you do it. >> right by letting him committee more brazen crimes. it's nice to have you both here. please come back we have another hour of news thanks to both of you for spending this hour with us the next hour starts after a quick break. don't go anywhere. ? - if i would've used kayak to book our car, we could have saved on our trip instead of during our trip. ughh - kayak. search one and done. i have moderate to severe plaque psoriasis. now, there's skyrizi. with skyrizi 3 out of 4 people achieved 90% clearer skin at 4 months, after just 2 doses. serious allergic reactions and an increased risk of infections or a lower ability to fight them may occur. tell your doctor if you have an infection or symptoms, had a vaccine or plan to. ♪♪ ♪ it's my moment so i just gotta say ♪ ♪ nothing is everything ♪

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hi it's 5:00 in new york. an extraordinary and unexpected twist transpired today in a

delaware courtroom in that $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit that is now engulfing fox news and its parent company fox corporation. here is the headline that judge has sanctioned fox news for allegedly withholding evidence and is considering appointing a special master to investigate fox's handling of discovery documents and questions surrounding rupert murdoch's role that comes after dramatic new recordings were played in open court today, regardings made by former fox producer abbey grossberg of conversations with rudy rudy giuliani. he hedged when he was asked about proof of certain claims he was making about dominion. that's a little harder, giuliani replied. a little harder? i bet. now comes reporting from bloomberg along these lines, quote, murdoch is expected to be

called to the witness stand as soon as monday murdoch would be the second witness called he would likely testify on monday or tuesday. this dramatic and unexpected pre-trial hearing has just wrapped up it's where we start the hour joining our coverage, katie phang. also joining us, george freeman, vice president of the "new york times. he was the legal department's primary first amendment lawyer and expert, if there is one. katie, take me inside what was supposed -- my understanding is this was the last pre-trial hearing that we were supposed to move to jury selection it sounds like this recording played in open court blew things up take me inside what went down today. >> it's a bit of procedural

background when you are preparing a jury trial, there's a trial order that sets forth deadlines and cutoffs for things like discovery. when you are litigating in good faith, if somebody turns something over absent evidence that something else might exist, you believe that they have turned over this information in good faith discovery cutoffs, they are far enough in advance of a trial date so you can be prepared for anything and everything that comes your way there's no, quote, trial by ambush in any jurisdiction across the united states in this particular instance, to have recordings, which i think are more than damning in this case, email correspondence and other evidence that was not timely disclosed, from what we understand, dominion's lawyers are getting these things in terms of evidence from fox turned over a week before trial is supposed to begin, it creates a serious quagmire for dominion. the judge we will force fox to

turn maria over in terms of making herself available we will make fox cover the afees and costs that come from doing it at the last minute. do you delay going to trial next week after all of this trial prep, or do you bite the bullet and move forward it's a critical problem as well for fox's lawyers. the judge saying that, omission is a lie he has a problem with the lawyers for fox. not only is there a trial readiness consideration on dominion's side. if you are fox news, you are looking at the fact that you have lawyers representing you going into a jury trial when a judge doesn't believe they are credible on both sides, they have a lot to consider. maybe it includes a settlement >> the only reason this tape was revealed is because one of the witnesses who was previously a fox witness is now suing fox she's a dominion now

how do you know that all the other fox witnesses who are still on team fox aren't hiding damaging recordings of rudy admitting there's no there there with the allegations >> that's a really important point. but for abbey coming forward and fighting jesus, she figured out that she got her own counsel, she's now made claims she was unduly prejudiced and pressured to be coached in terms of her deposition testimony that is why judge eric davis who is overseeing this, he is saying, i may appoint a special master at this point in time to see how prejudice d d dominion. what else is there what does that mean? you could get deeper into i will call it the bowels of fox corporation. this good faith litigation

process means we do our own research as the lawyers for fox and we turn it over to dominion. if a special master thinks there's something untoward going on, which judge davis pretty much found at this point, the judge may say, fox, turn over all your hard drives, servers, all this information and allow dominion to look into the serious recesses of what happens in your company. if you are a company, you don't want the other side ever looking and seeing what's going on >> george, i know general counsel of the "new york times." pretend you are the general counsel at fox news. i apologize in advance just from being in my own news organization, if a producer was sitting on a recording of a subject who appeared on her boss' show and that guest is rudy giuliani, it seems possible that shows like lou dobbs and tucker carlson who showcased

powell and giuliani and pur purveyors of this, how do you make sure you are being responsive to turning over all of the evidence? >> that's exactly what you have to do at this point, go back, go over it all again. both so as to try to placate the judge, but also to cover yourself in terms of doing everything you can at this point since these problems have surfaced the only thing i would say on fox's behalf is that there has been a tremendous amount of documents transferred in this case hundreds of thousands if not millions of documents. many have been really, really damaging to fox. it's not like fox has had a campaign of not turning over documents. what we have seen so far has been a pretty thorough discovery

process. i would halt before saying that any of this was intentional. with all the documents that have existed so far, it's really hard to say that things couldn't have fallen through the cracks. although, some of these documents that came up in the last couple of days seem to be pretty darn important. >> i guess, george, abbey is just an important figure to have been sitting on a recording of giuliani admitting that he had zero evidence that dominion machines malfunctioned or had ties to nancy pelosi do you think they would want to make sure that witnesses other than the one turned on her employer, like abbey did, didn't have similar such evidence >> given the time constraints, i'm not sure a special master can go through the entire discovery process at this point so that it still would have value before the trial on the point you raised earlier,

if i were dominion, i would not want to delay in the trial, even though there is this now added artificial problem that has arisen, because the plaintiff never wants delay. too many things can go wrong the more things are put off. i saw today that former president trump asked for a delay in his defamation case they want to delay the day of reckoning. plaintiffs want to get to it given the money that has been spent in this case and the money that will be spent at a trial, having even more lawyers go through this discovery problem and perhaps added depositions while the trial is starting is not a totally unique situation that has happened before in this sort of situation i think with a number of lawyers involved it can happen here >> katie, the head of steam is apparent in dominion's thinking

as they race toward monday as bloomberg is reporting, plan to have rupert murdoch as the second witness that testifies. something that could happen monday or tuesday. why would dominion, to george's point, want to delay that spectacle? >> specifically, if you will recall, judge davis and his order on summary judgement that was entered a couple of weeks ago, maybe ten days. the news cycle has been so long. who knows? if you recall, the judge is saying in his order that dominion carries a large burden of proving fox corporation, the parent company of fox news, dominion carries the burden of proof to show that fox corporation had its paws and fingerprints all over this as well the rupert murdoch angle is critical from what we learned, there's been discovery that was admitted vis-a-vis communications that had to do with him if you put him on the stand, this 92-year-old dude, we know

what he has disclosed. to george's point, there's been damning evidence also recall, there's a lot of evidence we haven't seen, we being the public fox has been pushing redactions. they have been making sure the american public hasn't seen a lot of stuff i think there's a lot more smoking gun evidence that's there. abbey has it i'm sure there's more of it. when you focus on rupert murdoch, if you are dominion, you want as much of a link between him and fox corporation and fox news as possible so that the jury basically says, parent company, subsidiary fox news, they are all liable. you will not parse out liability. go big or go home. you want fox corporation and fox news held liable >> it seems from -- you both talked about how much evidence has spilled into the public view from the legal process ahead of the trial. among that evidence is rupert murdoch's clear acknowledgement that the election was over on election night, that joe biden

was the incoming president and his clear acknowledgement sean hannity had a problem quitting him and they should do joint statement, which i don't think they have done for anything, acknowledging the election was over and that joe biden had won, not trump. george, how is that evidence further -- how does it further dominion's case that fox news the election was fine, that there was no fraud, that the voting machines hadn't malfunctioned in any shape or form, and that they were in receipt of over 2,000 communications from dominion before, during and after all their segments broadcasting the lies how does that get presented to a jury >> i think it's critical but i think in all the things you just mentioned, that involve murdoch, the most incriminating probably is the fact that he said he could have done something about it or he should have done something about it it seems to me that places him

in the line of command of fox news whatever his title is. he seems to have a title in both companies. whatever it is, if he says himself that he is responsible in the end for the news coverage and could have done something about it, i think dominion is a lot of the way there, because of that admission >> how do you -- i'm glad you made this more broad how do you evaluate, george, what is publically facing in terms of the evidence that fox knowingly broadcast and in some of the shows that are under scrutiny rebroadcast lies about dominion >> well, i think the critical thing that's happened in the last few days is that the judge has ruled last week and repeated it again yesterday in stronger terms that fox's general defense -- this is what they have been saying from a pr point of view since day one.

that this material was newsworthy it was said by the president and his acolytes all along in november and december. how is a good journalism institution -- how can we not repeat what these people were saying about a presidential election they said that from day one, that's their defense the judge ruled last week that the newsworthiness defense, which is what they are talking about -- it's the legal privilege called neutral reportage, he said that defense was dismissed, could not be in the case yesterday he went further and ruled that just talking about newsworthiness as such, as a rationale for what they put on the air, couldn't be even talked about to the jury. that really is a very stinging ruling, far greater than i would have expected, that handicaps

fox in what they want to put on. what this case is about is a place where the law and journalism diverge you aren't supposed to put on the newsworthy statements of people saying things you don't believe, even when the allegation itself is what is news as journalists, we do that all the time it's done all the time as a lawyer, i told "the times" they have to do that that's their job legally, if you don't believe it's true, you can be liable for actual malice. the defense should be, yeah, but it was newsworthy, so i have to put that on. there's a privilege called neutral reportage that comes with conditions. those conditions are, was the original speaker responsible did you repeat it neutrally rather than endorsing it i thought that's what would come down to be the key issues for the jury in this trial the judge has taken that away,

take than out of the case. it seems to me that really handicaps to a huge degree what fox was going to offer to the jury >> as a less neutral observer as what fox has done, i'm thrilled by that. i have to say, it seems the legal standard, that high burden george is talking about, has been met by the ee ggregiousness and the communications from dominion, a former senior bush official, to every level of fox news, and that the actual malice will come in the knowing broadcasting, knowing they were not true by the way, i think donald trump had more than 45,000 lies recorded by "the washington post" fact checker before he started lying about dominion it seems that there are all sorts of things that make this an historic set of facts legally. i wonder if you, katie, as we process this news about the

surprise recording, where your thought are about the overall strength of dominion's case. >> i have always believed that dominion was in the right by bringing this litigation a lot of us wondered why fox didn't settle or why dominion didn't settle. there has to be good faith that goes into the settlement process. it makes you wonder if there was anything going on with fox in that regard. i think there's also another important point to kind of dovetail with what george said, which is a judge has found as a matter of law that all of the statements that were put forth by fox news concerning dominion were lies. he found that it was critical clear that none of it was true to the extent that dominion pretty much shows and holds up fox as the banner example of how not to do the news, how not to do journalism, how not to do reporting, good for dominion it's coming at fox because it

was damaged. damaged to the tunes of billions of dollars there was a ruling by the judge concerning whether or not the threats -- that's important for people to remember it's not just voting machines were pulled from jurisdictions and not being used it was death threats that were made to employees at dominion. it's the damage to the reputation for the company where the company may be hobbled to the extent financially, it's not being able to move forward i think it's fox -- fox did itself in. nobody made fox do it they knowingly put forth lies. you actually have somebody like paul ryan, for example, who said and begged rupert, do not allow these election fraud lies to be broadcast to the viewers yet, they continued to do it.an, said something that was important. endorsement. that's what rupert murdoch said in his deposition under oath he said the hosts were endorsing the lies it wasn't just saying, here,

viewers, take it for what it is. it was an endorsement. that's why their own words will do them in at this jury trial. >> we are so indebted to both of you for helping us understand the complicated and in some instances counterintuitive nuances of this. thank you for starting us off today. when we come back, when you hear the disgraced twice impeached now indicted ex-president praise some of the world's worst authoritarians, it might be understandable why so many in his party have fallen in love with authoritarian tools. it's easier to silence the press when your leader is gushing about dictators. that conversation and what trump said on fox after a quick break. later, domestic blow back over the leaked intelligence documents. why those opposed to helping

ukraine prevail over russia should not use those documents to argue the war is not worth supporting "deadline white house" continues after a quick eabrk. don't go anywhere.

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hi, i'm katie, i've lost 110 pounds on golo in just over a year. i was a diet soda addict, and i needed to have a diet soda every morning as my eye-opener. with the release, the cravings are gone. golo worked for me when i thought nothing would work for me. the first few weeks were really astonishing how quickly and how easily it came off, how much better i felt, what a change it made so fast.

i feel like anything is possible after accomplishing what i've done with golo. in life and in politics, you can tell a lot about a person by the company they keep or in the case of the twice impeached disgraced now indicted ex-president, the people they praise loudly on fox news. for years, donald trump has lauded enthusiastically authoritarian rulers last night on fox he did it again. >> they are top of the line.

our guy is not top of the line never was. these are top of the line people at the top of their game president xi is a brilliant man. if you went all over hollywood to look for somebody to play the role of president xi, you couldn't find them there's nobody like that the look, the brain, the whole thing. we had a great relationship. how smart is kim jong-un top of the line. people say this and that really smart putin, very smart. [ laughter ] >> i don't even know where to start. no one called you top of the line ever. our friend charlie sykes wrote this war crimes, genocide, murder, not something thefrontrun frontrunner seems to care about. we knew that we don't amplified trump's wild rides or anything that's on fox news but in covering the tennessee republicans, in covering the

restrictive bans on abortion, covering the 400 voter suppression laws, it's important to know they are not burping out random policies. they are following their leader, who is following the world's most heinous authoritarians. we showed you that to show you just how dangerous his rhetoric is as applied from the top to the bottom at the national, state and local level of the republican party in america. it's that message and that firm embrace, no dog whistles, top of the line, these people are top of the line, they are at the top of their game, literally no one in hollywood is good enough to play them in the movie what movie that is the message the party is getting from their leader. we know how indebted they are to him. it's no surprise they are moving away from democratic norms, not just american democratic norms but the world's democracies have

a set of norms republicans are not so into them anymore. they are engaging in authoritarian practices, like enacting inhumane abortion bans, expelling political opponents from serving in state legislatures and targeting reporters. joinin ing our coverage, ben rhodes, plus david jolly, katty kay is here. they are all msnbc contributors. i will say this to you, david jolly. he is such an idiot on top of all else he sounds like such a bleeping idiot. >> yeah. listen, it's somewhat easy to absorb his ignorance six to seven years in question his intent. right? here is the thing. it's very dangerous what he just did. we kind of -- he has been normalized but understand even his comments about president xi jinping of

china, right now, in the world, in the region, china has just finished a very aggressive exercise where they surrounded taiwan the u.s. is on the eve of an escalated exercise in response, much larger than past years. this is a critical geopolitical national security region when donald trump as a former president says, our current guy, joe biden, doesn't know what he is doing, and the president of china really does, that actually has significant reverberations lloyd austin, the secretary of defense, called what's happening in the region a really big deal. in the past, former presidents would have kept their mouth shut or would have backed up the sitting president. we live in a world in which donald trump goes into these interviews and whether it's ignorance or intent leaves a very dangerous message on the world stage. we have to call it out when we hear it. >> we have to continue to wreck on with the fact that as a country and as a democracy, ben

rhodes, we have not held trump accountable for brazen crimes against our democracy. there are some who are uncomfortable with the focus on this when the political parties are corrupted from the top to the bottom, whetn they call an insurrection a tourist visit, when mitch mcconnell gets up and says, well, there's always the criminal justice system, he can be held to account there, fairly or not, it all falls to the rule of law to hold the democracy together how are we doing on that front >> i mean, incomplete. watching this clip -- i wrote a book about this. the reason it's important is in addition to expressing his admi admiration, trump and the republican party that implemented some of the changes, they have copied the playbook of

people like vladimir putin himself in terms of rolling back democratic protections, treating the rule of law as something you can -- like a menu you choose it when you want to use it and you discard it when you don't want it. what is proven is if you don't stop that power grab, there's no reason to think that the autocratic party will stop itself there's not any precedence look at all these systems that have moved in a more autocratic direction, it's not that the parties that have made a decision to go down this path of undoing democratic norms and undermining the rule of law, they don't stop themselves they need to be stopped. they need to be stopped at the ballot box and by the enforcement of the rule of law i think this speaks to that. by the way, this is clear to people in other parts of the world. david skjolly mentioned asia another thing was macron going

to china a lot of people wondered, what's he doing this for in the middle of the war in ukraine? he is doing it because he and every other democratic leader feels that they need to hedge against donald trump coming back as long as they are looking at the republican party and seeing what's going on in this country and knowing that there's roughly 50% chance in the divided country that we will get trump or somebody like him again, they will not trust the united states, even with joe biden in there, without hedging and goin to xi who donald trump calls top of the line. keep in mind, donald trump never praised our democratic allies. it's not like he calls macron or merkel top of the line he has nothing to say nice about small d democrats. if they see a u.s. system incapable of holding people accountable when they violate the law and try to overthrow the government, they will wonder about our system >> katty, i would go further on

the autocratic point, i think there's this sense that we have time we don't have any more time. republicans are wrapped in -- cpac has been held there for years. the seal is broken they have shown us who they are. the people who want to continue to live in a democracy i think feel like there are other fights they are all the same fight. the other side has wrapped all of their efforts to disenfranchise voters, to make sure anyone and everyone who wants a gun can get a gun and no one can ever have access to health care if they are a woman. it's all part of a piece on their side, in their telling i worry sometimes that people think, democracy will deal with that later we have to fight for this first. do you feel like the fight is a fair one in our country? >> i just came back from a few weeks in europe.

it was really noticeable the degree to which europeans are looking at what's happening inside american politics having thought that the country would change after donald trump left office. they have been really struck by how little it has. how much the rollback of rights or the disconnect between the will of the american and the government on things like guns or things like abortion seem to be incapable of addressing america's problems there seems to be a systemic problem with american democracy. whoever is sitting in the white house. that's the thing that alarms those europeans, particularly those who looked to america for leadership of course, you know america has led on ukraine europeans are grateful for that. they acknowledge that. there is something about america's inability to deal with problems that the american public tell pollsters they want

dealing with that is alarming whoever wins the next election, because the country doesn't seem to be able to deal with those problems >> i think our politics get pushed through a business as usual. if it's a rematch of joe biden and donald trump one will make sure everyone lives in a democracy. one is interested in making sure everybody in this country has access to government supportive public services. the other is for burning it all down i feel like we are precious in princess and the pea looking for something perfect. the democracy is on fire >> yeah. democracy is on the brink in 2024, truly. if we see the return of donald trump, who has promised to be an agent of retribution or one of his acolytes in ron desantis and others reflecting the norms of

today's republican party, there are actors in toeday's republicn party who will sh rred the constitution to get the result they desire. it reflects in authoritarians around the world it quiets speech, diversity of thought. it's hardly -- or very hard anti-immigration it quashing fundamental rights that's the end and any means are justified to achieve those for today's republican party after the leaders of today's republican party, i don't think any other republicans are smart enough to see their own movement within their own party they are tribal about it which is why going into 2024, the most important coalition in the united states is a coalition of democrats, interests and disaffected republicans led by today's democratic party i just have to call out, in this moment, the movement to try to run a third party or intedependn

presidential party could be disastrous it's critical they prevail >> you gave me a chill since we have been on, another state -- i don't want to get it wrong -- has banned drag shows no child has been killed in elementary school by a traveling drag show. it's insane. no one is going anywhere, not today. when we come back, we will bring into the conversation congressman jim himes and the domestic blow back around the leaked intelligence documents. that's next. don't go anywhere. save up to 30% on moving and storage until april 17th. and see why pods has been trusted with over 6 million moves nationwide. save up to 30% now until april 17th. visit pods.com today! if you have moderate to severe crohn's disease skyrizi is the first and only il-23 inhibitor that can deliver clinical remission and endoscopic improvement. serious allergic reactions and an increased risk of infections

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let me say with regard to, broadly, allies and partners, and these documents, we have engaged at high levels over the past days, including to reassure them about our own commitment to safeguarding intelligence and, of course, our commitment to our security partnerships. i'm not going to comment on specific actions that ukraine takes when it comes to defending its sovereignty. but we are determined to assist ukraine in the efforts that it's making to regain the territory that's been seized from it >> that was our secretary of state, anthony blinken, as he continues to reassure our allies

after the leak of classified documents. despite the damage control, public and private, that's being done with our allies, there's also the question here in this country about how some of the documents could be viewed by those who, shall we say, are pessimistic about our country's involvement in the war in february, a group of house republicans led by the likes of marjorie taylor greene and matt gaetz and lauren boebert proposed a bill calling for the immediate end of u.s. aid to ukraine, claiming support for ukraine's defense is inadvertently contributing to civilian casualties, with some of the documents leaked providing a grim assessment for the outcome of ukrainians, might some of those members try to use them and continue to say and try to rally support on the right for not supporting the war joining us now, democratic congressman jim himes of connecticut.

thank you for being here >> thanks for having me. >> have you had a briefing separate from what you read in the papers about the leak? >> yeah. we had a briefing this afternoon. it was a telephone briefing. it was unclassified. i will tell you that we learned very little, because, of course, the dod and others are continuing with their investigation. it's also really hard to talk about this stuff in an unclassified environment i must tell you, i left the briefing a little more upset than when i started. you heard the secretary of state just now, for whom i have infinite respect, speaking in soothing tones about reaching out to our allies. we have a huge problem as a member of congress, it's our job to do oversight, to make sure these problems never happen again. i really wish i was hearing more kind of hair on fire stuff inside the administration. this is a very serious leak. we don't know exactly what's authentic or what's been altered. i have been paying close attention to this since the

snowden disclosures. these can change for the worse action on the battlefield. i'm not saying it's going to happen not only -- if i were a u.s. ally right now, i wouldn't want soothing tones, rededicated statements of how we will work together i would want to know, what are you going to do to make sure the secrets we share are protected i'm not hearing that yet >> say more about your concerns about the battlefield. >> again, it's a little hard to speak with any specificity it would appear some of the documents may have been altered. we just don't know i know the pentagon said some appear to be authentic the point is that if they are authentic, it's not hard and there's a reason why they stay classified, it's -- i don't want to give you the impression i know what the danimage assessme is, because i don't. it's not hard to say, look at this how did they figure this out all of a sudden, we can't figure this out anymore they shut off a source or a

method of collection that will mean pain and tragedy on the ukrainian battlefield maybe we will get lucky on this one and this won't result in adverse affects on the ukrainian battlefield. i will be the first to say, we are second to none in helping the ukrainians fight this fight which is so important. as somebody who is charged with oversight of the executive, i'm not very happy until i fully understand what happened here and how i can be made comfortable that it's not going to happen again. >> you were mentioning something that has been reported on that there's some evidence in the leaked documents -- we should stipulate what you stipulated, some are authentic, some appear to be manipulated. they are in all sorts of chat rooms. there could be different versions that in some instances come out accurate and that are altered before they are reposted in some of the other sites

there's things out there, authentic and inauthentic. none of it good. you just got at the crux of it from an intelligence angle it indicates we have a lot of visibility into the russian military is that your assessment? >> i can't go there. as you might imagine, collecting on the russian military effort in ukraine is a very high u.s. priority right now it's no secret that along with the weaponry we provide, we are providing them with assistance on other things like what the russians may be up to. i think i'm not disclosing anything when i say that we spend an awful lot of resources to try to understand what our antagonists, our adversaries are doing through the fine work of the men and women of the intelligence community which is why, again, when intelligence is disclosed on one end of the spectrum, people can

be killed. we gather human intelligence we rely on people to assist the united states. they can be killed if we are not careful about our secrets. on the other end, look, if we have some technical method of collecting information, they can probably figure that out and shut off the tap there's nothing good about this. as you know here, we have a pattern. we found documents at mar-a-lago and in two vice presidential residences this is something that as a matter of processes must be improved within the united states government. >> we want to ask you about a story we were just talking about. i don't know if you caught the ex- ex-president on fox news he described some of the world's most notorious uautocrats as top of the line. stick around with us

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we are back with congressman himes, ben rhodes, david jolly and katty kay. donald trump last night said this about president xi, kim jong-un and vladimir putin, quote, they are top of the line. they are people at the top of their game he went on to denigrate joe biden. what impact does that have on your work? >> we know that donald trump has

an adjective problem he called the phone call with president zelenskyy when he extorted him, he called this a perfect phone call it's not he thinks they are top of the game. we know what donald trump is thinking what he loves about putin and xi and kim jong-un is that they are unconstrained. right? if vladimir putin has an opponent, that opponent falls out of a seven story window. worse to the opponents of the north korean leader. donald trump loves that idea he was the president of a system in which in this country in which the president is constrained by the constitution, by laws, by congress, by the courts that's a terrible thing for a fundmentally undemocratic person like donald trump. you scary -- you asked about my workplace what remains scary is the hold donald trump continues to have over a sizable portion of the republican party what that means is my colleagues in these halls, my republican

colleagues can't say what they think about donald trump because they know to do so wind up with adam kinzinger and liz cheney, their careers over it doesn't lie within donald trump, it lies within the spell he has cast over the majority of the republican party. >> that's that hold. i want to bring ben back into the conversation ben, you chronicle this on what hopefully could be averted, on the path to autocracy. it's not just the figurehead, which is trump i guess, in this parallel, but it's the grip, the fear that he has that and the congressman's telling is as strong as ever. >> well, no, a whole ecosystem grows around a person who has that grip. if you look at viktor orban, you have -- corrupt around the leader you start having judges who will find in favor of the power grabs. you start having an ecosystem

that exists to extol the virtues of the leader. attacks online on the on anyone who easy tos the leader. us, the true hungarians or in this case, the true americans against them, the immigrants, the liberal elites george soros featured prominently in hungary there is a far right nationalist playbook, and trump is the frontman for that, but all of the wiring of democracy that is being undone at the local, state, and sometimes federal level is being done by the political party on his behalf and on behalf of the party itself so we can't just see this as a trump problem. the problem is that for whatever the incentives the people are seeking, they're acting in a demand that's a counter to democracy and favoring the politics we've seen take root in country after country. very different countries

hungary, but also in phil philippines. we saw it in brazil where they had their own january 6th. these are different places, but common playbooks, and that's what we're looking through right new in the united states of america. it's not something in the next election, it's something we have been going through. >> katy, this is something you've brought our attention to, fights within countries. we're so focused on our own and ourselves, but this plays out all over the world, as ben just said. >> yeah. there had been some hope populism was ebbing but it doesn't take much to come back again. all you need is some sense of economic crisis or check we're getting that around the world with the fallout from high interest rates and high inflation, widespread immigration and migration of peoples, check, we're getting that global warming is not helping with it. but wars around ukraine and afghanistan and the fallout of that and people moving from those countries.

and you have those factors that are there, and people can lead it, populist leaders with stoke those and produce a litmus test or loyal people. when you hear trump praising those leaders it almost is like a lit test if you look at what's happened in the republican party, there's been partisan support for opposing china and opposing president xi, and then trump comes along and praises him, and there is silence from his party. and they will support trump over this rather than go the way of congressional hearings. >> that's the silence you talk about. congressman, we'll give you the last word. >> i would strike -- this conversation's been enormously pessimistic, and i would say we have to be on our guard, but let's look at the other side i had a lot of faith restored when after donald trump in 2016

wins the college but not the popular vote, loses the senate, the house of representatives and gets his doors blown off in an election the courts stood up for our democracy. all the absurd claims that there was fraud in the election -- there were some 60 lawsuits -- all of them were tossed out, including by trump appointed justices so my final closing word could be, i'm not ready to give up on the fundamental decency and democratic instincts of the american people, but we do need to remain wary and find ways to reach out to fellow americans who have been so warped by this demagogue, so warped and i really believe as somebody who's practicing politics, if we condemn them, say they're stupid, we're making the problems worse as a society, we've got to figure out a way to have conversations that restores normalcy to our politics. >> you said your colleagues don't speak up against what they

know is wrong because they're afraid of trump. how do you find optimism working with people, grown men and women, who can't tell the truth about working with trump >> look, they are -- they paid the price. they were supposed to win a very substantial majority in the united states house and wound up with a three-vote or four-vote majority right? they were supposed to take the majority in the senate they failed to take the majority in the senate, and the reason for that was the candidates they put forward. the kari lakes, the mastrianos of pennsylvania. when you put forward candidates and your ideas are unpopular, ranging from we should put a total ban on a women's reproductive choice and abortion, cut taxes to the wealthiest to deny climate change -- i have some faith in the american people who will say, hey, we're not buying that at ballot box. >> we'll let your optimism be the final word another break for us we'll all be right back. they customize your car insurance.

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our thanks to ben rhodes, david jolly and katty kay for spending so much of this hour with us. "the beat" with ari melber start right now. hi, ari. >> welcome to "the beat. i am ari melber. we have breaking news right off the top of the program a new threat has just been discovered and reported out sent to the manhattan d.a. alvin bragg's office we're just learning about this from nbc's jonathan dietz who has reporting from authorities that an envelope was addressed to bragg, that it contained white powder the nypd is