granted and that these individuals want to have their priorities and concerns addressed by those at the table currently, as soon as possible. >> this is a phenomenon that's happened a few times now during the biden administration, where progressives are left feeling left out, yet they have nowhere to turn. there's no alternative here. there's certainly not a left candidate that's going to challenge president biden in a primary. senior politics reporter for "axios," good reporting as always from eugene scott. thank you. have a great weekend. it looms as a consequential weekend. the president on the world stage at the g7. ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy now going to head to hiroshima to make an in-person appearance. of course, the backdrop to all that, these debt ceiling negotiations as the default deadline looms. thank you to all of you for getting up "way too early" on this friday morning and all week long. a jam-packed "morning joe" starts right now.

♪♪ good morning. welcome to "morning joe." this morning, a debt ceiling deal seems to be on the right path. house speaker kevin mccarthy had a much more optimistic tone yesterday while answering questions about the negotiations. we'll have those comments for you. it comes as president biden is busy with world leaders at the g7 summit in japan. the group just announced a new round of sanctions for russia, aimed at closing loopholes moscow has been using since the start of the ukraine invasion. meanwhile, ukraine could be receiving more u.s. military aid thanks to an accounting error. we'll explain what happened there. also ahead, the manhattan d.a. shuts down what appears to be a delay tactic from donald trump's defense team. and nikki haley finally pushes back against her old boss. we'll have her response to trump calling january 6th a beautiful

day. good morning. welcome to "morning joe." it is friday. willie, can you believe it's friday? i'm still processing. >> we made it. >> we made it. joe has the morning off. i told him not to come. along with willie and me, we have the host of "way too early," white house bureau chief at "politico," jonathan lemire. former u.s. senator, now an nbc news and msnbc political analyst, claire mccaskill. white house editor for "politico," sam stein. and senior columnist for "the daily beast", matt lewis is with us this morning. willie, i will say, joe was right about messing with bob iger. you just don't do that. >> yeah, governor ron desantis is learning that the hard way right now. this is a move that we've been talking about for a long time. his fight with disney, it's cost his state potentially a $1 billion investment, thousands of jobs, as well. the company, disney, announced

it is scrapping plans now for a new employee campus in florida. in a memo, the chair of disney's parks and experiences division said that the decision was based on, quote, changing business conditions. the $1 billion project would have brought 2,000 jobs, 2,000 jobs to florida from california. a spokesperson for the governor responded to "the new york times" with an email questioning disney's commitment to the project and criticizing the company's financial situation. california governor newsom posted on twitter, "the door is open for disney to bring the jobs back to a state that represents the values of its workers." that's what he said there. donald trump weighing in, as well. he sent out a campaign email highlighting a post on his social media platform last night. he said that disney could stop investing in the state. he called the decision by desantis to take on disney an unnecessary political stunt. here, claire mccaskill, you have

gavin newsom aligned with donald trump in criticism of ron desantis. again, appearing to be, except for a small sliver of the base of voters, a colossal mistake. jobs and money are now not coming to florida because of his fight with disney. >> the obvious hit on desantis for this entire presidential primary campaign is he represents big government. he represents anti-business. he represents telling people what they can read and what they can learn, and all the stuff he thought was going to be his ticket to the oval. as it turns out, he looks like a mini me of trump. you know, if he can't really handle this, i got to tell ya, i don't think there's a lane for him. i really don't think it opens up. i think trump ends up with most of the voters who think it's

really a good thing to ban books and to attack the biggest taxpayer, the biggest business in florida. >> matt lewis, obviously, there's some virtue signaling to a certain portion of ron desantis' voters who support the base, but in the big picture, this remains confounding, this decision to go on and fight with the largest private employer in your state. this icon that has transformed the state of florida. brings all the tourism and money that comes with it. to pick this fight because his feelings were hurt that disney criticized a piece of legislation he put forth last year. is there any explanation for it at this point, other than to just sort of nod to a certain percentage of voters he thinks he needs to keep close? >> yeah, i mean, i think that was initially, right, ron desantis wanted to position himself as someone who was like trump except more competent. more competent in not only

winning elections but executing the culture war. going after disney, i think he saw as -- i don't want to call it a stunt, but something that would boost him, elevate him as a real fighter fighting and winning the culture war. it just didn't work out the way he planned. now, it has escalated, and it's becoming a quagmire. i don't know how he gets out of it. he is now fighting a two-front war, really a three-front war. he's got disney. he's got, you know, gavin newsom, and he has donald trump. everybody is criticizing him. look, this -- when does this end? disney can do this forever. there could always be a big project disney was going to roll out but now they're not going to. additionally, you have people like mike pence who were criticizing desantis publicly. nikki haley offered, you know, "disney, come to south carolina." disney could have some fun with that, too, right?

i don't know where this ends for ron desantis and how he gets out of it. >> at the precise moment when this story broke yesterday, that disney was abandoning florida and ron desantis was taking this hit, where was bob iger? he was at the cannes film festival, standing next to harrison ford at the "indiana jones 5" premiere as they got a standing ovation. that happened at the same moment. bob iger won this round, to be clear, mika. it does seem like this is an unforced error. so many republicans attacking desantis here for undermining the whole credo of the gop as being the party of business. instead, trying to intervene with government. it comes as he is -- his whole pitch is to make america florida. well, he's on the extreme right of so many issues right now, and it seems to really contradict -- which is his other argument, which i know you're about to tell us about -- which is that he is the most electable of the republicans, that he can win nationally and trump can't. yet, he's boxed himself into a

corner on some issues with disney in florida that undermine the whole argument. >> you know, he wants to maybe separate himself from trump, which we'll talk about. at the same time, don't separate yourself even worse. this is a politically, such a rookie move, to do this gesture politics, to try to own the libs and maybe get in a smallubsect of the tampa area. in the end, you cost them jobs. floridians may have different views across the state, but i think they're unanimous in wanting jobs in the state. a total rookie move on the part of this governor who can't see beyond one foot in front of his face. i'm going to do this. i'm going to do that. i'll get them this way, get them that way. then, in the end, loses much bigger, politically but also for his state. malpractice. if you're the governor of the state of florida and you are

driving jobs out of the state because you have sort of petty anger politics? i don't know. i don't know how that plays on the big stage. i think it gives trump a lot of material. meanwhile, though, on a private call with top donors and supporters ahead of his expected entry into the presidential race next week, ron desantis argued he is the most electable republican. a "new york times" reporter listened to the call yesterday organized by a super pac supporting desantis. the reporter quoted desantis as saying, "you have basically three people at this point that are credible in this whole thing: biden, trump and me. and i think of those three, two have a chance to get elected president, biden and me, based on all the data in the swing states, which is not great for the former president and probably insurmountable because people aren't going to change their view of him." sam stein, that may be true.

i'm not going to argue with that. i do think, you know, if joe was here, he would list all the different times trump has lost for the republican party, but ron desantis is not batting a thousand in the state of florida. how does he move beyond that and onto the big stage? >> look, i think he probably is correct in the sort of broad generalization of the race, that he and trump are the most likely to win, and of the three, he, trump and biden, he and biden have the most likely chance to win the general. but there is one sort of major caveat in there that i think goes unaddressed. we were reporting on it. he has to make the case that trump actually lost in 2020. desantis has skirted that issue about whether the election was rightfully won by joe biden. all he said is joe biden ended up president. that's a major hurdle he does have to clear. otherwise, you can make the case forcefully that trump is a loser, if you can't concede he,

in fact, lost. back to the point about disney and all this stuff, i think these are intertwined. i think you're absolutely right. if your entire motis apparandi is to live in an ecosystem, it is hard to achieve beyond that. the disney fight is proof positive of it. if you saw the reaction to it online yesterday after the news, the reaction from conservatives online was actually quite -- they were cheering on desantis. they said, who needs these jobs anyway? we don't want 2,000 people from california coming to florida. there's too much traffic in florida as there is. that is a very short term look at the situation. >> yeah. >> it doesn't appreciate the idea that anyone who is not following this very sort of bizarre fight now will look at it and say, wait a second, they just lost $1 billion and 2,000 jobs. how is that a win for desantis? >> matt lewis, is there another

republican who could jump in and really make an impact in this it shall what appears to be an array of choices that are limited? >> i don't think so. i mean, i like tim scott a lot. i would like to see him in the race. i think it'd be nice to have someone who can offer a more positive, optimistic brand of conservatism. i don't think he can win, but it will be nice to have him in the race. glenn youngkin sent out a video yesterday that looked like a campaign video. i don't know what he is up to. sort of flirting maybe with the idea of running. but i think ron desantis is right about this, that it's essentially, it looks like, a race, a primary between trump and desantis. one question i would have for desantis, though, is, does he think the electability argument is actually persuasive? look, i realize if you're talking to political donors and you're trying to get their money, if you're on a conference call with political donors, maybe it works, right?

you tell them, "donald trump can't win. i'm the only republican who can win, so fund me." it may work with donors. i don't think it works with average voters. i don't think the average republican voter is, a, convinced that donald trump can't win a general election, because he surprised everybody in 2016. i think trump has this magical aura around him amongst republicans. and i just don't know if it is an inspiring message. it may be the best message desantis has, but i don't know if it inspires or motivates actual republican voters. >> so, claire, if you read into this readout "the new york times" had of ron desantis' phone call with supporters and donors, the characterization is he didn't talk about the cultural stuff. he sort of presented himself as the general election candidate, the guy who can beat joe biden, and stayed away from this. a lot of these are big businessmen and women who don't

like he is taking on disney and keeping jobs out of the state of florida. he has to figure out who he is. you can't be one guy in the primary, though you have to win those voters, obviously, first, and try to transform yourself into some sort of guy who flies above it all in the general election. how does he walk that line and go after donald trump while still presenting himself as electable in a general? >> yeah. well, i would argue that is who he is. he is somebody who is going to be what he thinks he needs to be that day. he is a performance politics politician. this is not a guy who has built relationships in the republican party. this is not a guy who has shown the kind of characteristics that most independent voters in america want. here's the thing, willie, that everybody has to remember, he's going to have hundreds of millions of dollars of paid and earned media attacking him in the months to come. he has relatively little baggage

right now compared to trump. but, you know, this has just begun. everybody who is other than trump and desantis are going to attack desantis because it's easier to attack desantis than trump. they're going to try to move ahead of him so they can be the viable alternative. this is a long way from over, and i think desantis has real trouble ahead. because there's a lot to attack him on. >> all right. before we go to break, we are learning that senator dianne feinstein of california suffered more severe health complications than previously disclosed. senator feinstein was taken to the hospital in february for shingles and was absent from congress for several months. she returned to the senate last week. according to her spokesperson, feinstein's diagnosis had triggered encephalitis,

inflammation of the brain, and a syndrome that causes facial paralysis. feinstein says she's recovering and will be taking on a lighter workload. according to "the new york times," some people close to her describe seeing her in her current state as frightening. they worry this will cast a shadow over her legacy and achievements. this is also raising questions about whether the 89-year-old is fit to continue serving for the rest of her term, which ends in january of 2025. but lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have been quick to defend the california senator. feinstein has announced she will not seek re-election and will retire at the end of her term. i guess the question, claire, is, i mean, i'd like to know who those people are who were saying her situation is frightening. sort of in the defense of people who are dealing with issues of aging, sometimes you can look a little different, but you still can function.

you know, that's kind of a cruel word to use. i'm not sure exactly what they mean. they might want to expound upon that a little more. i feel defensive for the senator because it is one's choice, but i also -- i ask where the family is, where the staff is, if the situation is becoming untenable. i mean, there are people who care about one and who should step in. your thoughts. >> well, it's emotional for me. >> yeah, me, too. >> i came to washington, and dianne feinstein was someone who was such a pleasant surprise for me. i had some cynicism about senators, and i watched her. i watched her do the work. she was more prepared. she was more knowledgeable. she was not staff driven. she was really just -- and her strength at various moments, like when the white house was trying to get her to not give a

speech on torture, and anyone who wants to see dianne feinstein in her fame, really at her best, should watch the speech she gave on the floor of the senate about torture. she was such a role model for me, and i think for literally thousands of women in california and beyond. this is really, really hard. >> yeah. >> and i get it, that there have been men that have stayed when they were very ill. but the cognitive issue is real. i think we've got to be honest about that. she is struggling with her cognitive abilities. the thing -- listen, i would stand in front of a train for dianne feinstein. but i care so deeply about her legacy, and i look at all the women who left when they thought it was time, like a barbara mcculski, snow, iconic women who

have known that it's time. and it hurts me to see what happened this week, when a reporter asked her a question and she clearly was not tracking what was going on in her life. that's painful for all of us who care about her, and i do wonder why the people who love her are not more aggressively trying to protect her legacy and protect her at this point in time. >> yeah. that's a tough one because, often, what defines someone and what makes them happy is their work. i just know, from my own personal experience with my mother, that for a number of years, in the last years of her life, she had really lost the ability to talk as much with parkinson's, and her face would appear differently than how she felt, but she could still compute. she still completely understood her vision with her art, and she

still wanted to do it. she just needed help to do it. you know, i think that it's a very difficult line that only the people closest to the loved one know when the actual cognitive ability is going away. because it may look like it is going away, maybe frightening to whatever staffer leaked that or whoever, i mean, yes, when people age, they look different. >> i would make the point, though, your mother's love was creative. dianne's love is a public-facing job, where her ability to communicate is the essence of the job. that's what maybes this so hard, is she cannot be the dianne feinstein we all know she is. that's why it is difficult to watch. >> it's difficult to watch, but there are other members of the senate who are having trouble communicating. >> that's true. >> they're still allowed to do

their jobs. >> no question about that. but it is just -- you know, i'm just being honest about how i personally feel about this. because, you know, she was really very, very important to me. >> yeah. understood. matt lewis, thank you very much for being on this morning. ahead on "morning joe," we're following president biden overseas in japan, where ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy is expected to join the group of seven leaders in person, to seek commitments for more aid in his country's fight against russia. meanwhile, in hiroshima, g7 leaders are also focused on curbing what is being called economic coercion by china. we'll get a live report from beijing about what it means for u.s. business on the mainland. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back.

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♪♪ that's a beautiful, live picture of the white house at 6:25 on a friday morning. president biden has wrapped up his opening day with world leaders at the g7 summit in japan. after outdoor ceremonies in the morning, leaders held a morning lunch while listening to remarks by the japanese prime minister. the war in ukraine is expected to be a big focus of that summit as the group of seven leaders reportedly will impose new sanctions on russia specifically, targeting export controls and russia's ability to sell and ship diamonds, which is one of the few remaining industries in russia not dramatically affected by western sanctions. ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy reportedly will join the gathering in person on sunday. details not yet being shared publicly anyway for security reasons. joining us now, president of the council on foreign relations, richard haass. richard, obviously, ukraine will

be front and center here. what is on the agenda? what should president biden try to get out of this g7? >> well, further support for ukraine, as you discussed, willie, will be on the agenda. it won't change the fundamentals, but it'll be another demonstration of western solidarity. the g7 was created 50 years ago for the major industrial democratic countries. the idea was to bring in japan with the major countries of europe, canada and the united states. in some ways, this entire institution is having a rebirth. we can once again talk about the west. japanese want to put nuclear weapons on the agenda, abolition of them, hence the meeting in hiroshima. the problem is the world is, right now, going through a, if you will, a nuclear boom, no pun intended, in the sense that china and north korea are both ramping up their nuclear weapons as fast as they can. last but not least, the unwritten story of the -- or the background story is what we're talking about here.

it's both the debt ceiling debate and the uncertainty over the 2024 elections. all these other leaders are meeting with president biden, and as they look at him, they're looking at the uncertainty of the outcome of the debt ceiling, what that says about american politics, and whether in two years, they're once again going to have donald trump to meet with. there's lots going on at this g7 meeting. >> before president zelenskyy reaches japan, he's in saudi arabia right now for the arab league summit, including meeting with bashar al assad, who has been propped up by russia this entire time. we'll see what comes of that. but ukraine is a topic of focus at the g7. china, of course, is another. the president has to curtail his trip. he is no longer stopping in papua new guinea and australia, which were specifically about china, because he has to be in washington for debt ceiling discussions. >> china hovers over everything in the indo-pacific. all these countries are worried about the rise of chinese power.

china has become more oppressive at home, much more assertive in foreign policy. we're worried about what china might do against taiwan. they're talking about how they can restrict certain technology getting to china. the leader around the table is economically dependent in one way or another on access to china's market, imports and exports, and there is a tension, a dilemma there. the question is how far they'll sort it out. i'm not wildly optimistic, jonathan. >> richard, talk a little about how excited china must be over the notion that we would default. >> right. >> and what that does for world economics in terms of our long place at the center of all economic activity on the globe, and how china has an opportunity here that, frankly, the crazy caucus and the house of representatives is clearly not

giving much thought to. >> china is excited about two things, to use your word. one is the fact that president biden has to curtail his trip. there is a competition going on. he can't visit one of america's allies, australia. there's competition for the solomon islands, papua new guinea. china loves that. if we're not on the playing field, it is hard to compete with them. there's that. second of all, the default is just the sort of thing, january 6th is on the list, certainly. it's what china points to when they say, the democratic system isn't as good. we're more orderly, can deliver steady growth. democraciesunpredictable, unreliable. the one thing, they're still dependent on the economy global globally. china likes when the united states can't meet their

responsibilities. that said, they're not ready to step up and take our place. their currency isn't convertible. they don't yet have an alternative to the dollar. china's own limits are pretty profound. yes, your basic point is exactly right. whenever we fail, to some extent, they feel it's good for them. >> so while we're on china, earlier this morning, a consulting service, cap vision, became the latest american company to be raided by chinese authorities in what has been described as a crackdown on foreign business entities. joining us now with more on this is nbc news foreign correspondent, janis mackey frayer, live in beijing. janis, what can you tell us? >> reporter: it's definitely put foreign companies here on edge. this latest raid saw chinese security agents crack down on several offices of cap vision. it's a business consulting firm that deals in economic data, which is something that chinese authorities now see as sensitive

information in what is an increasingly restrictive security environment here. staff were questioned. there has been no word on any detentions. bane and company as well as mince group have been targeted in the last month. it creates this contradiction. we're seeing the investigations and this need for national security considerations almost trumping the appetite for foreign investment here, at a time when china is trying to prop up the economy after post covid rules. it's created a lot of confusion for american businesses here and a big risk, because there is no clarity. there is very little transparency, and there is now the legal risk facing american companies. i spoke earlier today with michael hark, the president of amchan china, the american chamber of commerce here. he says the business community

is rattled. >> from our point of view, if you can't do due diligence and can't collect economic statistics, you can't run a business. what we understand is the companies targeted were doing due diligence for potential mergers or acquisitions or collecting data, trying to understand the economics around their business. again, if you can't collect information, how can you run and manage a business? >> if we look at cause and effect, are the raidser espiona precursor to china wanting to decouple from the u.s.? >> it is unclear what is causing the raids. this is a thing that concerns the business community, we don't have clarity on the concerns. we don't think china really wants to decouple. they probably want to derisk. we think the chinese understand the cross-border business is

critical for both economies, so i don't see the chinese having a wide-scale decoupling. >> reporter: state media have been covering the raids, saying that certain western countries have been stealing intelligence about china's military industry, the economy and finance. officially, the ministry of foreign affairs called the raid a normal law enforcement act and mentioned safeguarding national security and development. cap vision hasn't commented yet, neither have the other companies that have been targeted for investigations, but u.s. officials here, and certainly american businesses, are worried. amcham china spent a week in washington, d.c., having meetings with policymakers and ceos. they told me they heard a dozen times from ceos that, quote, they want to come to china. they would like to come to china, but they are afraid to come to china right now. >> yeah. nbc's janis mackey frayer live from beijing, thank you very

much for your reporting. richard haass, i'd love to hear your thoughts on this. certainly, if there's no interest in decoupling, that's a funny way of showing it. >> there is no interest in decoupling. what they want to become is more selective, but i think that's a revealing story, mika. that tells you a lot of what you need to know about xi jinping's china. he's been in power just over ten years, and what you're seeing is, in every sphere of life, he is making questions of his rule, the party's continuity, what they see as national security and their ability to control things paramount. even if that means there's some loss in western economic involvement, which used to be the priority for china. this is very much a different china. control, security, the party, the person, all now come first, even at the cost of a degree of economic growth. that is today's china. >> richard haass, thank you very much for being on this morning. have a great weekend. you can check out richard's

weekly column on substack, "at home and away." it publishes every friday and is available at richardhaas.substack.com. coming up, donald trump is losing a lead lawyer from his defense team. we'll dig into that new development, and the state of the many investigations into the former president. "morning joe" will be right back. trelegy for copd. ♪ birds flyin' high, you know how i feel. ♪ ♪ breeze driftin' on... ♪ [coughing] ♪ ...by, you know how i feel. ♪ if you're tired of staring down your copd,... ♪ it's a new dawn, ♪ ♪ it's a new day... ♪ ...stop settling. ♪ ...and i'm feelin' good. ♪ start a new day with trelegy. no once-daily copd medicine has the power to treat copd in as many ways as trelegy. with three medicines in one inhaler, trelegy makes breathing easier for a full 24 hours, improves lung function,

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one of former president trump's top lawyers had quit. tim parlatore was defending trump against jack smith's investigation into the handling of classified documents found at mar-a-lago, and the former president's efforts to overturn the 2020 election. palatore resigned from trump's legal team this week, saying he informed trump of the decision directly, and he left the legal

team on good terms with the former president. he released a statement announcing his departure. joining us now, john sail and attorney for palm beach county, florida, dav good morning to you both. john, i'll begin with you. he says the right things, that he left on good terms. there was talk that after hearing donald trump at last week's cnn town hall talk so openly, saying "i took what i took" about the classified documents, that he no longer could defend him. what's your reading of this move? >> mr. palatore hasn't said anything publicly critical of donald trump. that would be unethical. we can speculate why he left, but i don't think it matters. what i was thinking when i was coming on this morning is, if we went to hollywood with this

script, a former president of the united states, the front runner to be the republican nominee, and he's already under one indictment, he's likely to be under possibly two, three other indictments, they wouldn't believe it in hollywood. i mean, this is a crazy world. but donald trump has the presumption of innocence by the constitution he wanted to suspend. he can't make judgments about why mr. parlatore left. i don't care what bravado trump exhibits. i represented a lot of people under investigation, under indictment by the manhattan d.a. it is stressful. it is not fun. he is a client that's not going to listen to client. that is very, very difficult, and law the -- law is

independent. if their advice isn't followed, they may move on. if you're running for president, you can't keep your mouth shut. like any client, i'd say, "don't say anything to the media." when someone is running for president, they can't say, "i'm not commenting." it is an untenable situation, unbelievable one. >> jon, also some of the lawyers for donald trump may be in legal hot water themselves. let's talk about the cases. what is your assessment right now? the manhattan one is moving forward slowly. you know, we were all eyes toward georgia in the coming months. where do you think things go from here? >> well, i think the georgia, the fulton county district attorney, was giving a signal to the feds so they didn't make the same mistake the manhattan d.a. made, of starting with the weakness case. she was saying, hey, guys, what i'm going to do, and it is probably going to bring indictments, it's going to be in the summer. if you want to do something first, which may be more appropriate, i'm giving you

plenty of time. in sum, we could talk about the investigations forever, but the mar-a-lago case, it's all about obstruction. everything was fine until they got a subpoena. when they got a grand jury subpoena, that was a game changer. at that point, it was no longer an option to negotiate. the law basically is, you have to turn over everything that's called for unless it is privileged. if something is privileged, there's a procedure. you file a log, it's called, and say, "i'm not turning over this, this, this and this because it's privileged." a judge will decide. what you cannot do is you cannot prepare a declaration like one of the lawyers did and say, "hey, we've done a diligent search and everything has been turned over." you can't dothat unless it's true. what they're investigating is, did donald trump hide, conceal, move documents that were under

subpoena? they've called -- jack smith hasn't been aggressive. i don't like that word. he's been thorough. they've called in everybody. they've immunized some of the lawyers. they called in even the housekeeper at mar-a-lago, the chef. they looked at the surveillance tapes. they want to see if donald trump personally knew they were moved. quickly, the january 6th investigation, the main thing i think there, the main witness to see whether or not donald trump had the requisite intent of the insurrection is the vice president. executive privilege is real. it's a real privilege. the conversations between a vice president and a president are sacred, but it's overcome if it is part of a criminal conspiracy. despite what mike pence says publicly, he talked to the president on january 6th. he talked to him before, and he talked to him after. i think those conversations will show if donald trump is personally culpable. as i said, the constitution that

he trashes, the judges that trump trashes, they're all going to protect him because that's what our system is all about. >> david, sam stein here. to get back to the original story about the lawyer quitting, look, i know you're a prosecutor not a defense lawyer, but i'm curious, have you ever seen a client like this, someone who steps in it in his own legal cases all the time, whose lawyers end up in legal trouble? if you were approached by donald trump to be a defense lawyer, how would you go about even considering the case at this juncture? i'm curious for your thoughts on what he is like as a client. >> yeah, good to be with you, sam. as a prosecutor, i don't have to worry about those things. i've never seen a client like it. jon sale turned down donald trump, so it is good to be with jon. he had his own reasons for it. to me, what stood out with the

departure of tim parlatore, he is the same lawyer that wrote a letter to congress setting up trump's defenses. he said it was trump's aides, not trump, who hastily packed up the boxes and shipped them down to florida. trump's hands were supposedly clean. then trump went on the town hall and said, "no, no, i did it and had every right to do so." i think the reason he withdrew, parlatore, is he was exasperated, and knowing he could be a defendant potentially himself. he testified about it to the grand jury. "the new york times" also reported there were two attorneys left. you have james trusty and john ralley leading the defense. what happened to chris kies? $3 million retainer up front, then he was sidelined by donald trump because trump didn't add grew with his advice.i

kies wanted him to be more -- he's getting closer and closer to an indictment, and his lawyers are dropping like flies. >> the manhattan district attorney prosecuting donald trump has rejected a request from the former president's lawyers asking for more information about the evidence they plan to use against him. in a new filing this week, d.a. alvin bragg denied trump's attorneys what's known as a bill of particulars. where prosecutors provide a more detailed explanation of the allegations against a defendant. according to bragg, trump, quote, already has more than enough information to prepare his defense and will be given even more in the upcoming discovery phase of the case. trump's lawyers were also seeking to learn what second crime the d.a.'s office believes

he committed. that allowed what are usually misdemeanor charges to be elevated to falsifying business records. the former president pleaded not guilty to the charges against him and is expected to appear for a hearing next tuesday by video. definitely want to see what happens there. claire mccaskill, what do you think they're having for constantly? it seems to me that there is vintage trump playing out in all these cases here, which is delay, deny, just push papers around, just drag it out. >> well, it's not surprising that a defense lawyer would ask for a bill of particulars. and it's not surprising that they want to know the underlying felony that elevates the case from a misdemeanor to a felony, because of the way the statute is written. so i don't think there is anything remarkable about them asking. i think what is interesting is bragg is holding the line and saying, "hey, you're going to

get everything you're entitled to through discovery, that is in the process." i'm sure this case is not going to go quickly, but i don't think there is anything donald trump -- i mean, jon might know better -- but i don't think there is anything donald trump can do to make this case go beyond just year's election. that'd be a long time for a state criminal case to linger. this isn't the feds. feds take forever. state prosecutors are used to having to go much more quickly than the federal criminal justice system is. i assume you believe this case would be tried before next november. >> i'm not a fan of that case going first because when you try a former president, you want to go with your strongest case. i think the heart of all of this is him allegedly destroying our constitution. i think that should go first. but a bill of particulars, it's not a delaying tactic. but it's not up to alvin bragg if he gets a bill of

particulars, it's up to the court. it's not a delaying tactic. it is an appropriate motion. but i think it will likely go first, and i think that's unfortunate. you know what? prosecutors should talk to each other. even in el chapo, they talked to each other. they coordinate who should go first. so it is possible that the prosecutors will have a conversation. >> right. >> maybe one of the federal cases will go first. i just think this is so terrible for our system, and the whole thing is like a nightmare. it's like a movie that just can't really happen. >> it'd never be sold because it is so unrealistic. >> every time he goes on tv, mr. trump, he makes matters worse and or for his own cause. >> exactly. >> there's no need to dispute that. dave aronberg, give you the final word. your assessment on the sequence of these cases or the timeline

you see the state investigation going forward? >> jonathan, there's nothing to say that the state case in new york has to go first, though it was the first filed. you could see the feds going first after all. i agree with jon sale, this is the least strong of the four cases. to get back to senator mccaskill's question about the bill of particulars, let me actually say from a prosecutor's standpoint, i think that the prosecutor in new york should give the specifics on what that second charge is. it's important. right now, it's a misdemeanor unless you have a second crime. a bill of particulars is act fact about the facts, not the law. the d.a. should give it up anyway. we're talking about the first time a former president has ever been indicted. this is not the time to play hide the ball. >> interesting. criminal defense attorney and former watergate prosecutor, jon sale. and state attorney for palm beach county, dave aronberg. thank you, both, very much for coming on this morning. before we go to break, sam

stein, what are you working on today? >> i have a couple of weird stories, but mostly we're looking at the debt ceiling negotiations. of course, wondering what's happening in japan. zelenskyy is supposed to go and talk with leaders. what will biden do, and how he comes back and deals with domestic and foreign issues, that will be top of mind for us today. >> all right. sam, thank you very much. still ahead, president biden may have given more than a commencement speech over the weekend. it could be a preview of his 2024 re-election campaign. that is straight ahead on "morning joe."

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all right. few minutes before the top of the hour, time for a look at the morning papers on this friday morning. "the detroit free press" reports

the parents charged in a mass shooting are appealing to the michigan supreme court. prosecutors say james and jennifer crumbley regarded their son's mental health issues and bought the gun he used in the deadly 2021 oxford high school shooting. now, the parents will argue that the shooting was not reasonably foreseeable and that charging them sets a dangerous precedent that will, quote, cause injustices. "the buford gazette" has south carolina advancing to a near total abortion ban. in a special session called by the governor of the statehouse after they approved a six-week abortion ban after debate. they want to include things like the state covering funeral cost ifs the mother or fetus die because they're denied an

abortion. the bill now heads to the senate. we will be watching that. "the atlanta journal constitution" leads with donald trump's visit to georgia. the former president is expected to speak at the state's gop convention on june 10th. this will be his first event in georgia since he launched his 2024 presidential bid. and finally, in connecticut, they highlight a new audit that finds the state's pension system overpaid retired workers by a total of $1.6 million. the audit covered fiscal years 2020 and 2021 and did not include the teachers' retirement fund. officials now recommend the state returns that money and revises how it pays retired workers. yikes. it's just about the top of the hour. jonathan lemire and claire mccaskill are still with us. joining thepulitzer prize winni

columnist and associate editor of "the washington post," eugene robinson joining us. also with us, though i told him to just stay with joe and not to come, msnbc contributor mike barnicle is here. so, i don't know, i guess joe should be here, too. >> yeah. >> willie, why don't you take us to our top story despite barnicle? >> despite barnicle. we love you, mike barnicle. you're giving out dismissals today. i think i'll be next year. let's see. >> after yesterday, yes. >> we probably deserve a day off after yesterday. we earned it. >> yeah. >> let's talk about the debt ceiling. a little progress maybe here. house speaker kevin mccarthy shifted to a tone of optimism yesterday on the negotiations, saying a deal could be made now in time in order to avoid a default. >> i just believe where we were a week ago and where we are today is a much better place because we have the right people in the room discussing it in a very professional manner, with all the knowledge, all the

background, from all the leaders and what they want. i know and i can see where a deal can come together. i think that's important. i can see from our discussions, too, where everybody can get to, where this could raise the debt ceiling, take concerns of what we have about our spending, take concerns about wanting to limit, save and grow. i think we can find common ground. >> negotiators for president biden echoed a bit of that optimism, saying there has been progress made here. the president telling his team to continue to push for programs, as he says, to help everyday americans. that was in a video call from the g7 summit in japan yesterday. jonathan lemire, where is this optimism, this bit of optimism anyway, coming from? where has been the movement as that june 1st deadline laid out by treasury secretary janet yell yellen approaches quickly? >> it comes from a shift of tone from negotiators. they feel they're making progress, but there's no details yesterday. both sides, white house

negotiators and the congressional negotiators, the republicans, have spent a lot of time together the last couple days on the hill working through this process. the president getting updates from overseas. in fact, his white house press secretary, jean-pierre, said he will be leaving a g7 dinner in japan early to get another update from his team. he got the first one this morning. we're seeing it there. claire mccaskill, what is emerging as a sticking point, and we should stress, though there is optimism, a deal is not done and the clock is ticking. it is work requirements right now that are part of this. they're on the table. the president said the other day he acknowledged he could live with it but doesn't want it to be onerous. there has been blowback from the left, fellow democrats on this. where do you see it? >> this is weird. no one is talking about the fact that for all the food programs currently in existence, the two

programs people can get assistance buying food, they already have work requirements. they're already there. all mccarthy is asking for, which is so irresponsible, he is ready to blow up the economy over moving the age from 50 to 55. that's what they're asking for. they're asking that the exact requirements that are there now just be moved up five years. now, i get it, that that's a bad thing to happen, but certainly, you see there could be some room for negotiation. i don't understand why the democrats aren't pushing back and saying, hey, we already have work requirements on food programs. on medicaid, over 80% of the people on medicaid are working, disabled, caring for someone or going to school. there's only 7% of the people on medicaid right now that aren't in one of those activities. by the way, that 7% would only save, like, $11 billion over ten years. compare that to the republican trump tax deal for wealthy

people. >> right. >> it was $3.5 trillion. really, what mccarthy is doing is performance politics around this work requirement. he is not going to accomplish anything. i get it, that the democrats are pushing back. but the next big question, jonathan, we all need to ask, besides the b.s. that the work requirement stuff represents as far as mccarthy is concerned, is how many democratic votes will mccarthy need? >> right. >> he's not going to get everybody. >> mm-hmm. >> if i was in that negotiating room, and i'm sure people that are in that negotiating room are going, okay, if we agree to anything, kevin mccarthy, how many votes are you going to have? how many of our voters are you going to need? how many democratic votes are you going to need to get this across the line in the house? no deal should be cut until you know how many votes mccarthy can deliver. i don't even know he's done a hard count. >> yeah. well, lost in the debate over the debt ceiling is the millions of americans who depend

on the government for health care and basic nutrition. that's the focus of a piece from "the new york times" editorial board member, david firestone. he notes that the bill that speaker kevin mccarthy muscled through the house last month would impose tough, new work requirements on medicaid, food stamps and welfare for needy families. he goes on to write, it's not that there's some crisis or scandal gripping those federal programs. republicans are making these demands simply because the debt ceiling gives them the opportunity to do so. they are going after the same group of people their party has demonized for decades. firestone states, these largely racist attacks, very much including the one now on the table, ignore the little-mentioned fact that the vast majority of the people receiving these benefits are already working or unable to work. he concludes that president biden needs to make it clear that these benefits are

non-negotiable. writing, mr. mccarthy shouldn't be the only one at the table with red lines, particularly when the health of millions of people is at stake. mike barnicle, what's frustrating is, first of all, the debt ceiling, this is money that's already spent. we need to pay our bills. why is there even a negotiation here? don't you think the republicans just as they continue to move forward, trying to push things like this, are highlighting the tax cuts and all the other things that they're doing that will not help them in the election down the road? >> mika, this is an old play playbook that they use. >> i know. >> i can remember ronald reagan attacking welfare queens. that was an exact quote in the early '80s. >> oh. >> the republicans have been using this for decades to sort of twist the political advantage toward themselves, by appealing to people's demons. you know, you're standing in a grocery line and you're

wondering, you know, the poor woman ahead of you using the food stamps. why can't i use? she's buying steak and caviar and shrimp. that's what they used to say. claire, my question to you is -- by the way, you have an astounding knowledge of this system, the way it is working. the numbers that you were throwing out in response to jonathan's question were incredible. i mean, you still have that faculty, even though you're not in the united states senate. but my question to you is the tax package that the republicans managed to jam through under donald trump and the debts they ran up, what amount of money is in there? what amount of money is in that tax package that could have been turned toward better things? >> well, speaking of the republican playbook, this is as old as time. you demonize the poor and vulnerable, and you worship the ultra wealthy. that tax package was all about

corporations and very, very wealthy folks getting a break. it was $3.5 trillion is what they spent on that. they refused to acknowledge -- >> trillion. >> trillion. and this work requirement that he is talking about in medicaid may be $11 billion over ten years. so you look at the disparity. i mean, they're just using this as a political two-by-four to try to make america think that, somehow, people out there that are getting benefits aren't working. they are. they are working. they're going to school, they're working or they're disabled, or they're caring for vulnerable people in their family, including young children. so this is really not something that is anything other than their classic right now, performance politics. it is, hopefully, they are now in the negotiations at the point that what you're asking for is not going to move the needle on

the deficit. it is not going to move the needle on the debt. and it is just performance politics. by the way, we won't even think about it until you tell us how many votes you have. >> gene robinson, we like to believe they're going to get there on this, that there's been a lot of posturing from republicans on this, and that as mitch mcconnell has said, we will not, we cannot default on our debt. this is going to come together. but it is a little rich, is it not, to listen to republicans, who under donald trump, that administration, added nearly $8 trillion to the national debt, in large part because of the trump tax cut that they all voted for, suddenly so deeply concerned and self-righteous about the debt. >> yeah, the shock that spending is going on here in washington, you know, after spending like drunken sailors. you know, we should not be surprised, but we should remind everybody that the cruelty here, the cruelty is not a bug, it's a

feature. it's the whole point right now of what the republicans are demanding is the money. it's being performatively cruel to people they can demonize, that's what they've always done. that's what they're doing now. but that question that claire keeps asking is absolutely the right question. kevin mccarthy could be 20, 30, 40 democratic votes to get it through the house. it is unclear to me that we are as close as they say we are to getting this done. because hakeem jeffries is then going to have to sell these cruel and unnecessary cuts to his caucus or to enough members of his caucus to actually pass this thing. so there's a balance that has to

be struck here, and claire is right. i don't see how there can be a negotiation without some idea of what that number is. because it could be a pretty big number. >> let's bring in pulitzer prize winning author and presidential historian doris kearns goodwin right now. doris, of course, is on to talk about presidential politics, but chime in on this conversation, as well, especially as to how reas republicans are playing these negotiation out. >> you know, you worry that they really might not get to an end on this. we have to figure out something before it actually happens. it may well be that what the democrats have started to do this last week is to select collect signatures to get it on the floor. it's hardly ever been used, but it'd allow the people on the side of the house aisle to decide, maybe they can get five republican votes.

maybe get this thing settled without all these negotiations that are going on, which i think, as eugene robinson said, they're rule. why are we going back toen a an earlier time? i feel we've gone back 50 years. mike barnicle said, this is what we were discussing 50 years ago. we know the people are working. we know they need our help. the idea we're hostage to this that. maybe the discharge petition, it sounds boring, but the civil rights act came on the floor after judge smith wouldn't allow it to come out. they counted it up and finally got the votes, scared him, and he let it come to the floor, and it was the tony-nominated play, the award winning play with bryan cranston playing lbj. it is exciting for history. i say let's go that way. >> we're rolling back 50 years in more ways than one, doris. as it pertains to women's health, not in a good way at all.

meanwhile, president biden gave a commencement speech at howard university. in it, he hit on issues that will no doubt be determining factors for voters as they cast their ballots in 2024. take a listen. >> americans of all backgrounds have an obligation to call out political violence that has been unleashed and emboldened. as was mentioned already, bomb threats to this university and hbcus across the country. to put democracy on the ballot. reject political extremism and political violence. protect fundamental rights and freedoms for women to choose, for transgender children to be free, for affordable health care and housing. for the right to raise your family and retire with dignity. to stand with leaders of your generation who give choice to

the people, demanding action on gun violence, only to be expelled from state legislative bodies. to stand against books being banned and black history being erased. >> as a presidential historian, doris, what are you seeing there? >> i'm seeing that we're rolling back in terms of he has to worry, as he says, that the greatest threat to our homeland right now is the rise of white supremacy. what this reminds me of is that almost 60 years ago, lyndon johnson gave a speech at howard university. we were in such a different place then. the civil rights act had passed. the voting rights act was about to pass. he acknowledged there was racism in the country. he started with this extraordinary metaphor, and i'm proud to say my late husband, richard goodwin, was part of the people who worked on the speech. he said, you can't take a person to the beginning of the starting line of the race, a person hobbled by change, and expect

them to compete and think you're actually being fair. what it was calling for was the third stage of this civil rights revolution, economic and social justice. there was a real chance. he had a dream of the great society, that we might move in that direction. of course, the war cut that short. now, look where we are. even the acknowledgment of racism, which was front and center, that was really where the concept of affirmative action really began, at that howard university speech so many years ago, the acknowledge of it now would be forbidden in florida. i mean, that's what's so incredible. in fact, i even wonder whether talking about white supremacy is something that you could argue, that's something prohibited, because you're not supposed to make one race feel bad about another race. what is going on with the book bans? i feel we've gone way backward in time. you can't even talk about divisive concepts. you can't talk about social justice in some places. there's a chilling factor that's going over these classrooms right now. i heard one teacher in tennessee say that she was even afraid of talking about jim crow.

another afraid of having martin luther king's letter from the birmingham jail read. what is happening to us? librarians are having to take books off the shelves instead of bringing young people in. we have really gone backwards in this country. to think that this is the heart and the beat of the new desantis campaign that's going to be going forward in the country, to make america what florida is. florida banning these books, making libraians afraid, a chilling effect on teachers. we were so far ahead 60 years ago. what happened? how did we go backward in a short period of time? we've gone forward in so many other ways. unless you acknowledge where you are in a country, acknowledge the problems, then you can figure out how to solve them. you know where we are, you can know where we're going to be. to erase them and assume we can't even talk about them, then history has no chance. that's what history is. we decide what we know we are, and we try to feel better from where we are. it is great biden is going after this. it is an important fight to fight, and it cannot be pushed

around. >> gene, listening to doris, she raises so many important points. the most important point, i would think, and i wonder whether you've heard the same thing walking around washington or wherever, the number of people who engage you in conversation, ordinary people engage you in conversation, and they get around to posing the question of what's happened to us? what's happening to this country? we're talking now, we're in the year 2023. we're talking now about portions of books being excised in fifth and sixth grades in some public schools because they mention race and critical -- not critical race theory, but they mention elements of history that have happened, but that school systems are reluctant to approach because of some contentiousness or disagreement over what's woke, what's not

woke. but history is something that has happened. it's a story that, by definition, has already happened. so my question to you, and it is an unanswerable one as doris would point out, it is probably unanswerable right now, what do you figure is happening to us? >> well, i do get asked that question all the time, mike, here in washington, when i'm down in south carolina. i was in philadelphia earlier this week. people stop me and ask that question in that same way. what is changing a bit is progressives. as we see what's happening in florida in terms of denying history, denying facts, denying what happened, to say nothing of its context and importance to the present day. i'm hearing more anger. i'm hearing people saying, "this cannot pass. it cannot be this way."

i'm hearing a step beyond, "what has happened to this country," gone beyond that to, "this cannot happen to this country. we can no allow this to happen no -- to this country. "if the aim of what we all like is to see the country somehow come together and get back to feeling that it is a nation with a shared history and a shared set of facts and a -- and a polity that is an actual polity, i feel like maybe we're still heading in that opposite direction. because there's a reaction to all of this, and i think we're going to see that reaction grow. i think we're already seeing it in some of the off-year election midterms, but i think we'll see it again next year. >> to gene's point about denying what happened and rewriting history, there's a lot of that

around january 6th, of course, namely from former president trump. republican presidential candidate nikki haley pushing back a bit against donald trump's characterization of the january 6th insurrection. in iowa yesterday, the former u.n. ambassador broke with her former boss, who last week called the attack of january 6th a, quote, beautiful day. said that if he is re-elected, he will pardon most of those convicted for attacking the capitol. >> they thought the election was rigged, and they were there proud. they were there with love in their heart. that was an unbelievable and a beautiful day. i am inclined to pardon many of them. i can't say for every single one because a couple of them probably, they got out of control. i would say, it would be a large portion of them. you know, they did a very -- [ applause ] and it'll be very early on. >> it was not a beautiful day. it was a terrible day.

and we don't ever want that to happen again. i think any person related to january 6th should be tried fairly. if they broke the law, they should pay the price. if they didn't break the law, they shouldn't. they should be treated like everybody else. >> claire, we're not going to hand out any profiles in courage here. she's stating the obvious that, yes, january 6th was a terrible day. and, no, people who attacked police officers with american flags and otherwise should not be released from prison by a presidential pardon. this is a change a bit for nikki haley, who in the past, when asked about january 6th and mike pence, criticizing donald trump about it, said, "well, i don't like when republicans attack other republicans. let's talk about the democrats." we're grading on a curve sometimes. january 6th was a terrible day, and it shouldn't be hard to say it out loud. >> this is so ridiculous. we are giving her all this time

because she actually said january 6th wasn't a beautiful day. i mean, talk about a low bar. i just -- this is -- and did you notice the audience when she said it wasn't a beautiful day? half of them were sitting on their hands. this thing that has happened in the republican party is real. watching somebody like nikki haley try to find who she is in plain view is painful. she has no idea who she is. she has no idea if she wants trump supporters or doesn't want trump supporters, whether she thinks trump is a jerk or thinks trump is the second coming. by the way, that's the kind of wishy-washy stuff that makes everybody think politicians just stink. so i don't get how she gets there by doing this. you can't play both sides of this deal. if you do, you're going to get caught in the middle in a painful way and going to be a footnote in history. >> yeah, no profiles in courage.

it's remarkable and, frankly, sad, that january 6th is one of the few topics that any republican is even willing to take a halfway shot at trump about. we've heard pence do that, nikki haley here. trump not just suggesting he'd offer pardons, but even as a presidential candidate at rallies, stands with a choir of january 6th convicts. he's endorsed the behavior there. that was a tepid round of applaud for haley in iowa, saying it wasn't a beautiful day. it was less than the response trump got in new hampshire when he declared that it was. january 6th is emblematic of the dilemma that so many republican candidates find themselves in. they have to separate from trump, but they seem afraid to do it. >> yeah. >> desantis has started to ramp up those kind of attacks, although that was meant to be a private call with donors yesterday. other candidates are getting in the race. senator tim scott, we believe, is jumping in on monday.

desantis will make his campaign official later next week. we anticipate pence will do so soon. new hampshire governor chris sununu is signaling he is probably getting in, too. the field is growing. they have to figure outa way to take on trump. the bigger the field, the better for trump. he's not going anywhere. >> it has to be a strong candidate with really deep convictions and no fear. of the group you mentioned, including nikki haley, i'd put my money on sununu, of any of them. but we'll see. doris kearns goodwin, thank you very much. by the way, you can check out the new three-night mini series produced by doris on fdr. it airs on the history channel starting on memorial day, monday, may 29th, at 8:00 p.m. eastern. thank you very much for being on this morning. still ahead on "morning joe," as doris mentioned, the state of florida has become a

hot spot in the clash over what reading material is appropriate for children. we'll be joined by the head of a leading free speech organization, which along with america's largest publisher, is taking the fight against book bans in florida to federal court. before we go to break, this is big. willie, what do you have planned for "sunday today"? >> got another good one for ya i think this weekend with oscar isaac, who is starring on broadway with rachel brosnahan right now, in the tony-nominated play, which is an amazing show. got the tony nomination. they're great together. of course, oscar isaac, who has been in the "star wars" movies, in a spiderman movie, the list goes on and on. great guy, amazing career, a great conversation with oscar isaac. this weekend over on nbc on "sunday today." we'll be right back here on "morning joe."

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and save at trelegy.com just about half past the hour. live look at ft. lauderdale for you. in florida, a school district is facing a federal lawsuit over its decision to ban books from public school libraries. on wednesday, the free speech group, pen america, along with penguin randomhouse, authors and group of parents filed a lawsuit against the school district over what they say are first amendment violations. since last year, the district and school board have banned or restricted more than a dozen books and are currently evaluating roughly 200 more. the problem, they say, is the, quote, explicit sexual content, graphic language, themes, vulgarity, and political pushes

found in those books. one of those, quote, inappropriate books, is "and tango makes three," a picture book based on the true story of two male penguins from the central park zoo, roy and silo, who raised a chick together. are you kidding me? joining me is the ceo of pen america. thank you for coming on the show. tell us about the suit and what you're hoping to accomplish with it. >> sure. thank you for having me. look, this is outrageous. it's part of a pattern that we're seeing all across the country with school districts pulling books off shelves. overwhelming, authors are of color, lgbtq themes. it's meant to marginalized particular stories, prevent kids

from seeing themselves on the book they find on the shelf. here in the united states, the idea that books are dangerous, that ideas are so dangerous that we should pull them and hide them away from children, that's, to me, unpatriotic. it is un-american. you know, we believe in free speech. we believe that the best answer to something you disagree with is more speech, to deliberate. if you don't like these books, read something different. debate them. but to whisk them away, put them out of reach is unacceptable. we're challenging that under the first amendment and also the 14th amendment. this is a front to equality. if you're targeting specific authors and it has to do with race or sexual orientation, that's unacceptable constitutionally on the 1st and 14th amendment fronts. >> first of all, you wonder why they're not going after, for example, social media companies and twitter, or places where vulgarity thrives.

and hate speech. we'll put that aside. also, i want to ask you about the impact that these bans are having on teachers. it's hard enough to be a teacher or a school administrator or to be a librarian. now, they're scared they're going to lose their jobs, one wrong move. >> it is very intimidating, absolutely. the way these laws work, you have the don't say gay law in florida. they just passed this don't say "they" law, which is banning the discussion of pronouns in schools. for teachers, they don't know where the trip wires are. what book might be on the shelf that can get them in hot water. what book is something that parents can call pornographic. barely a kiss now is treated like pornography. it's a movement to suppress books and ideas, to put administrators and educators on notice, that they may be disciplined or even fired if

they fall afoul these rules. is this the environment we want for our kids in public schools, schools that should be incubator incubators of democracy and good citizenship? we have to push back. that's why our lawsuit and the advocacy we're doing across the countries with partners, parents are standing up. it's about the rights of the majority. where we're suing, it's one teacher, a single teacher has lodged most of these objections. just summasummarily. i don't think she's read the books. there's no detailed analysis. she has instigated so much of this, depriving tens of thousands of students of books under review or have been banned. >> suzanne, we're talking about one county in florida here, but this goes well beyond, as you pointed out earlier. we're talking about an issue where they're banning books, potentially banning books in a

country where too many grammar school students, certainly high school student, as well, can't decline an english sentence, noun, verb, object, period. can't do it. don't know what a modifier is, things like that. the chart we put up with the potential banning of books including "slaughterhouse 5," "the kite runner," ""water for elephants." who makes these decisions? who does this? >> that's one of the most egregious parts of what is going on in the county. believe it or not, they have a review panel that reads these books and makes a judgement about whether they belong on the shelves. there's example after example we cite in our complaint of cases where that panel says "this is value. this is a story kids need to know about," and the school board overrides them. these are the people who read

the books. these are the people who have the expertise, who have been empowered by the board and the community, and their decisions are just being cast aside in the name of frank politics and a campaign to deprive children their right to read. that's what is so stark here in terms of what is going on. those who are actually reading the books are not being listened to. >> suzanne, this is gene robinson. this is a question i've never asked before on "morning joe," but how can we help? how can we as journalists, as people who who have not just a vested interest but a deep commitment to the written word, to the free flow of ideas, to education, civic education in this country? how can we help what you're doing along with penguin randomhouse? >> thank you for asking. this is something americans

should recognize that needs to be above politics. it's not a political issue. it cuts across whether you're republican or democrat. you believe in free speech. americans overwhelmingly don't like book bans. they've been sort of sold on this notion that we have to push back against what ron desantis would call woke indoctrination. in the name of doing that, he is running rough shot over our fundamental freedoms. i've spoken about it, trying to destroy free speech purportedly in the name of trying to save it. it doesn't make sense. we have to call these tactics out for what they are. talk about it, expose it, write about it, engage with readers across the political spectrum so they stand up for their rights. all our rights are at stake here. >> before you go, and we appreciate you coming on, the literary gala was last night. you guys had a very special guest. tell us about him. >> well, it was quite

remarkable. salman rushdie has been an important part of pen. pen mobilized, rose to his side, advocated for him. when he was a free man again, he came to new york and became president of our organization. he's stayed involved ever since. he founded a big festival called pen world voices that we do every year. it wrapped up this weekend on sunday. when he was attacked last summer, it was an absolute gut punch. it was terrifying to think that an authoritarian country could reach right here into the state of new york and launch a murderous attack. he really fought for his life. we didn't know whether and when we would see him again. and so to have him last night come up on stage, you talked about profiles in courage a few minutes ago. this is a profile in courage. to see him stand up there alive and well, he's missing an eye

but not a beat. he was so forceful in talking about book bans, saying, "we fight for free speech all over the world. that is something pen american has always done. now, the fight has come to our own doorstep, and we need to wage it with the kind of frosty that we brought to freeing writers all over the world who are in prison." it really galvanized us for what we're in the middle of, and reminded us of, ultimately, what we are fighting for. the freedom to right, the freedom to read, the freedom to speak. you know, without those, we wouldn't be the country that he found refuge in and that we all value so deeply. it was a really inspiring night, and we were just so delighted to be able to welcome him back to the family and the party. >> ceo of pen america, szanne nassel, thank you for coming on the show this morning. we appreciate it. >> thanks so much. coming up, the

republican-led legislature in north carolina dealt a blow to abortion rights advocates this week when it voted to override the governor's veto of the 12-week ban on the procedure. the mayor of hillsborough, north carolina, will join us to talk about the impact of the newly enacted law. "morning joe" will be right back. when you sleep more deeply, you wake up more energized. introducing purple's new mattresses our unique gel flex grid draws away heat, helping you fall asleep faster. it relieves pressure for less “ow,” and more “ahhh.” and instantly adapts as you move, without ever disturbing your partner.

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>> complete embellishment by james to draw the foul on jokic. >> lebron james drawing a foul, some would say acting afoul, to get the lakers the ball back in a tight game against the nuggets. that was early in the fourth quarter of game two. the game turned in the fourth quarter thanks to jamal murray. denver erasing a deficit. lakers really were in control for three quarters, but murray, 23 of his 37 points scored in the fourth quarter. he'd been ice cold through the first three but came alive in the fourth, fueling a 15-1 run and a 108-103 comeback victory for denver. so the nuggets take a 2-0 lead in the series as the teams head to los angeles for game three tomorrow night. jonathan lemire, this a long way from over, going back to l.a. if lakers lose the series, they'll look back on that game that they kind of controlled three quarters before murray

took over. >> i hope lebron is going to be able to play in game three after suffering that catastrophic injury there, the hard foul. that was really tough to watch. what a flop. this is ridiculous. he's barely touched. yeah, i know he plays in hollywood now, but he looks like he is gunning for an oscar. for sure, the nuggets are so tough at home. lakers had a shot yesterday. it was not a vintage jokic game. both teams were a little sluggish. lebron and a.d. ran out of gas near the end. they let this one slip away. look, l.a. hasn't lost a game at home yet either this postseason. this is probably going to go six or seven games, but they missed their chance, no doubt, willie. >> i have a question for both of you. >> here's mike barnicle. >> i have a question. at this stage of the season, in this playoff environment, who would you rather have on your club, tatum or playoff jimmy? >> that's a tough call. >> going to the east. >> willie, i'll take it first. jimmy butler's postseason record

speaks for itself. tatum still has -- he can get -- he has a higher level than butler, but butler brings it every night. tatum is young and has been inconsistent. butler schooled them in game one, miami stealing that one. celtics have to win tonight. >> yeah. butler is just -- he's amazing. the team, they had a mediocre season, miami, but they've flipped it to a different gear now. stealing game one, like you say, the celtics have to win tonight. >> have to. >> jokic, a lot of people who maybe don't watch him on the east coast are getting a look at him. triple-double, not his best game. >> still a triple-double. >> so fun to watch. one moment from the pga championship yesterday. this is tom kim. >> oh. >> having to -- oh, my goodness, wow, having to clean up in the creek after he fell into a marsh. this looks like mike barnicle every time he goes and plays a round of golf, just wading through the mud, combing through the forest, trying to find his

ball. kim getting a bit of a mud bath yesterday. meanwhile, 34-year-old rookie named eric cole, the surprising solo leader at the pga championship heading into day two up at oak hill country club in rochester, new york. still ahead this morning, steve kornacki will be live from baltimore to break down tomorrow's preakness stakes and give us the odds, as derby winner mage looks to win the second race of the triple crown. kornacki when "morning joe" comes right back.

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state legislature voted to override the governor's veto and born abortion access after 12 weeks of pregnancy. the newly enacted law makes north carolina the latest in a string of states -- look at that -- particularly in the south to ban or severely limited procedure. joining us now, we have mayor jenn weaver of hillsboro, north carolina. thanks for coming on the show. i'm curious if you are hearing from your constituents in hillsboro about this newly enacted ban. >> absolutely. people are very worried. they are very concerned. folks just really anxious about this really important access to reproductive health care that is going to be severely limited starting july 1st. what are the options now? can anything be done at the local level? at this point, you have yet

another state putting into practice a bantha will absolutely impact the lives of women in the state of north carolina. >> absolutely. that's a terrific question. north carolina, the regulatory environment is such that at the local level, we have very few options for how we can help our constituents on this particular issue. our board of commissioners did unanimously pass a resolution in support of reproductive freedom, including the right to abortion care, in opposition to senate bill 20. several of our neighboring jurisdictions have done the same. we hope that other local jurisdictions across the state will also do that. it's important for us to speak with our collective voice to our communities understand that we see and hear their anxiety about this that is very well justified. >> so we have heard stories from states like florida and others

where women have not gotten the health care they have needed. they have been asked to bleed out, get sepsis, have been told they can't have terminations when they have fetal abnormalities that basically the baby will not survive. then, of course, not getting that termination then forces the mother to be in a situation where she -- her body is damaged and she cannot have more children, let alone the trauma and the mental health factors that go along with a situation -- that has played out in real time already in this country because of these bans. we're also seeing data that people are choosing where they go to college as it pertains to these bans. what do you think some of the other consequences of this ban will be in the state of north carolina and in your town? >> well, there's a lot in that question. i will try to get to it all.

first of all, we can expect, i think -- i'm sorry to say -- that we will see much of the same results that you mentioned in our neighboring states when all the aspects of this bill go into affect. the life-threatening at times situations women have found themselves in because they are unable to get the care they need. all of these things we can expect to happen here in the state of north carolina, because they have put this bill -- it contains unnecessary and medically uncalled for barriers to receiving care that people need. when you talk about people making all other kinds of life decisions, i have a daughter, i have a son that will go to college in a couple of years, these are things we will think about carefully for our family. we want the most number of opportunities for our kids as all parents do.

i think this is something i really try to stress to folks is that these really scary situations and events of trauma that happen for childbearing people who can't get access to reproductive care, that includes abortion care, those are so important. it's so incredibly upsetting that those were ignored in the passage of this bill. but i also want people to understand just how normal abortion is, how common it is. when i say common, i don't mean thoughtless. i just mean, this is a medical procedure that all kinds of people need with frequency. there are children living right now whose lives were made possible because their mothers were able to access abortion care at another point in their life. >> the mayor of hillsborough, north carolina, jenn weaver,

thank you. we have a packed hour ahead. ron desantis talks tougher about donald trump. it's not even close to what the ex-president is prepared to say about him in pursuit of the white house. we will talk about the governor's strategy straight ahead. plus, richard haas with his analysis on president biden's trip to japan. ukraine's leader is set to make a personal appeal to world leaders for more weapons. that's straight ahead on "morning joe."

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good morning and welcome to "morning joe." this morning, a debt ceiling deal seems to be on the right path. kevin mccarthy had a much more optimistic tone yesterday while answering questions about the negotiations. we will have those comments for you. it comes as president biden is busy with world leaders at the g7 summit in japan.

the group just announced a new round of sanctions for russia, aimed at closing loopholes moscow has been using since the start of the ukraine invasion. ukraine could be receiving more u.s. military aid thanks to an accounting error. we will explain what happened there. ahead, the manhattan d.a. shuts down what appears to be a delay tactic from donald trump's defense team. nikki haley pushes back against her old boss. we will have her response to trump calling january 6th a beautiful day. good morning. welcome to "morning joe." it's friday. can you believe it's friday? >> we made it. >> i'm still processing. we made it. joe has the morning off. i told him not to come. along with willie and me, we have the host of "way too early," jonathan lemire, claire

mccaskill, white house editor for "poe lit cal" sam stein and matt lewis is with us this morning. you know what, willie? i will say -- i will say, joe was right about messing with bob iger. you don't do that. >> ron desantis is learning this the hard way. this is a move we have been talking about for a long time. it cost his state potentially a $1 billion investment, thousands of jobs as well. the company, disney, is scrapping mrabs for a new campus in florida. the billion dollar project would have brought 2,000 jobs to florida from california. a spokesperson for the governor responded to "the new york times" with an email questioning

disney's commitment to the project and criticizing the company's financial situation. california governor newsom posted, the door is open for disney to bring those jobs back to a state that represents the values of its workers. donald trump sent out an email highlighted a post from last month that says disney could stop investing in the state. trump called the decision by desantis to take on disney and unnecessary political stunt. here, claire, you have gavin newsom aligned with donald trump. money and jobs are not coming to florida because of his fight with disney.

>> the obvious hit on desantis for this entire presidential primary campaign is that he represents big government. he represents anti-business. he represents telling people what they can read and what they can learn and all the stuff that he thought was going to be his ticket to the oval. as it turns out, he looks like a mini me of trump. if he can't really handle this, i gotta tell you, i don't think there's a lane for him. i really don't think it opens up. i think trump ends up with most of the voters who think it's really a good thing to ban books and to attack the biggest taxpayer, the biggest business in florida. >> matt lewis, there's some virtue signaling to a certain portion of ron desantis' voters, his base. in the big picture, this remains absolutely confounding, this decision to go on and fight with the largest private employer in

your state, this icon that has transformed the state of florida, brings obviously all the tourism and money that comes with it, to pick this fight because his feelings were hurt disney criticized a piece of legislation he put forth last year. is there any explanation other than to nod to a certain percentage of voters he thinks he needs to keep close? >> that was initially -- ron desantis wanted to position himself as someone who was like trump except more competent. more competent in not only winning elections but executing the culture war. going after disney, i think he saw was this -- i don't want to call it a stunt, but something that would boost him and elevate him as a real fighter, fighting and winning the culture war. it just didn't work out the way that he planned. now it has escalated. it is becoming a quagmire. i don't know how he gets out of

it. he is fighting a two-front war, really three. he has got disney. he's got gavin newsom and donald trump. everybody is criticizing him. look, this -- when does this end? disney can do this forever. they could always be a big project. additionally, you have people like mike pence who were criticizing desantis publically. nikki haley offered disney, come to south carolina. disney could have fun with that, too. i don't know where this ends for ron desantis and how he gets out of it. >> at the precise moment when this story broke yesterday, that disney was abandoning florida and ron desantis was taking this hit, where was bob iger? at the film festival. he was standing next to harrison

ford. he won this round, to be clear. it does seem like this is such an unforced error. so many republicans attacking desantis here for undermining the credo of the gop as being the party of business. instead, trying to intervene with government. it comes as -- his pitch is to make america florida. on the extreme right of so many issues right now he is. it seems to contradict -- his other argument. you are about to tell us that he is the most electable of the republicans, that he can win nationally and trump can't. yet, he boxed himself into a corner on some issues with disney in florida that undermine the argument. >> he wants to separate himself from trump, which we will talk about. at the same time, don't separate yourself even worse. this is a politically a rookie move to do this gesture politics, to try and own the libs and maybe get in a small

subsection of the tampa area, and in the end you cost florida jobs. floridians, they may have their different points of view across the state, but i think they are unanimous on wanting jobs in the state. a total rookie move on the part of this governor who can't see beyond one foot in front of his face. i'm going to do this. i'm going to do that. i will get them this way. i will get them that way. in the end, loses much bigger, politically but also for his state. malpractice, if you are the governor of the state of florida and you are driving jobs out of the state because you have sort of petty anger politics. i don't know. i don't know how that plays on the big stage. i think it gives trump a lot of material. meanwhile, on a private call with donors and supporters ahead of his expected entry into the presidential race next week, ron desantis argued he is the most

electable republican. a "new york times" reporter listened to the call yesterday organized by a super pac supporting desantis. the reporter quoted desantis as saying, you have basically three people at this point that are credible in this whole thing. biden, trump and me. i think of those three, two have a chance to get elected president. biden and me. based on all the data in the swing states, which is not great for the former president and probably insurmountable because people aren't going to change their view of him. sam, that may be true. i'm not going to argue with that. i do think if joe was here, he would list all the different times trump has lost for the republican party. ron desantis is not batting 1,000 in the state of florida. how does he move beyond that on to the big stage? >> well, look, i think he actually probably is correct in

the broad generalization of the race that he and trump are the most likely to win and of the three, he and biden have the most likely chance to win the general. there is one sort of major caveat in there that i think goes unaddressed. we were reporting on it. he has to make the case that trump actually lost in 2020. desantis has skirted that issue about whether the election was rightfully won by joe biden. all he said was joe biden ended up president many that's a major hurdle he has to clear. otherwise, you can't make the case forcefully that trump is a loser if you can't concede he lost. back to the point about disney and all this stuff. i think these are intertwined. i think you are right. if your entire m.o. is to fight something that's two feet in front of you, to be reactive to the online politics of the moment and live in a conservative echo chamber, it becomes hard to appeal beyond that echo chamber. this disney fight is just proof

positive of it. if you saw the reaction to it online yesterday, after the news, the reaction from conservatives was quite -- they were cheering on desantis. who needs these jobs? we don't want 2,000 people from california coming to florida. there's too much traffic in florida as there is. that's a very short-term look at the situation. >> yeah. >> it doesn't appreciate the idea that anyone who is not following this very sort of bizarre fight now will look at it and say, wait a second, they just lost $1 billion and 2,000 jobs, how is that a win for desantis? >> matt, is there another republican who could jump in and really make an impact in this what appears to be an array of choices that are limited? >> i don't think so. i like tim scott a lot. i would like to see him in the race. it would be nice to have someone who can offer a more positive, optimistic brand of

conservatism. i don't think he can win. it would be nice to have him in the race. glenn youngkin sent out a video that looked like a campaign video. i don't know what he is up to. flirting with the idea of running. i think ron desantis is right about this, that it's essentially a race -- a primary between trump and desantis. one question i would have for desantis though is, does he think the electability argument is persuasive? i realize if you are talking to political donors and you are trying to get their money, if you are on a conference call with political donors, maybe it works. you tell them, donald trump can't win. i'm the only republican who can win. fund me. that may work with donors. i don't think it works with average voters. i don't think the average republican voter is convinced donald trump can't win a general election, because he surprised everybody in 2016.

trump has this magical ora among republicans. it may be the best message desantis has, but i don't know if it inspires or motivated actual republican voters. >> claire, if you read into this readout "the new york times" had of ron desantis's phone call, the characterization is that he did not talk about any of this cultural stuff. he presented himself as the general election candidate, the guy who can beat joe biden and stayed away from this. a lot of these are big businessmen and women who don't like he is taking on disney and keeping jobs out of the state of florida. he is going to have to figure out who he is. you can't be one guy in the primary -- although you have to win those voters first -- and then try to transform into some sort of guy who flies above it all in the general election. how does he walk that line? how does he go at donald trump while still presenting himself as electable in a general?

>> yeah. i would argue that is who he is. he is somebody who is going to be what he thinks he needs to be that day. he is a performance politics politician. this is not a guy who has built relationships in the republican party. this is not a guy who has shown the kind of characteristics that most independent voters in america want. here is the thing, willie, that everybody has to remember. he is going to have hundreds of millions of dollars of paid and earned media attacking him in the months to come. he has relatively little baggage right now compared to trump. but this has just begun. everybody who is other than trump and desantis are going to attack desantis, because it's easier to attack desantis than trump. they're going to try to move ahead of him so they can be the viable alternative. this is a long way from over.

i think desantis has real trouble ahead, because there's a lot to attack him on. >> before we go to break, we are learning that senator diane feinstein of california suffered more severe health complications than previously disclosed. senator feinstein was taken to the hospital in february for shingles and was absent from congress for several months. she returned to the senate last week. according to her spokesperson, feinstein's diagnosis had triggered inflammation of the brain and facial paralysis. feinstein has said she is recovering and will be taking on a lighter workload. according to "the new york times," some people close to her describe seeing her in her current state as frightening. they worry this will cast a shadow over her legacy and achievements.

there are questions about whether the 89-year-old is fit to continue serving for her term which ends in january of 2025. lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have been quick to defend the california senator. feinstein has announced she will not seek re-election and will retire at the end of her term. i guess the question, claire, is -- i would like to know who those people are who were saying her situation is frightening. in the defense of people who are dealing with issues of aging, sometimes you can look a little different but you still can function. that's kind of a cruel word to use. i'm not sure exactly what they mean. they might want to expound upon that a little more. i feel defensive for the senator, because it is one's choice. i ask where the family is, where the staff is, if a situation is becoming untenable.

there are people who care about one who should step in. your thoughts? >> it's emotional for me. i came to washington and diane feinstein was someone who was such a pleasant surprise for me. i had some cynicism about senators. i watched her. i watched her do the work. she was more prepared. she was more knowledgeable. she was not staff driven. she was really just -- her strength at various moments like when the white house was trying to get her to not give the speech on torture and anyone who wants to see diane feinstein at her best should watch the speech she gave on the floor of the senate about torture. she was such a role model for me and i think for literally thousands of women in california and beyond. this is really, really hard. >> yeah.

>> i get it that there have been men that have stayed when they were very ill. the cognitive issue is real. i think we have to be honest about that. she is struggling with hercog -- her cognitive abilities. i would stand in front of a train for diane feinstein. i care about her legacy. i look at all the women who left when they thought it was time, like barbara mcccullski, nancy snow. iconic women who know it's time. it hurts me to see what happened this week when a reporter asked her a question and she clearly was not tracking what was going on in her life. that's painful for all of us who care about her.

i wonder why the people who love her are not more aggressively trying to protect her legacy and protect her at this point in time. >> yeah. that's a tough one, because often what defines someone and what makes them happy is their work. i just know from my own personal experience with my mother that for a number of years, in the last years of her life, she had really lost the ability to talk as much with parkinson's. her face would appear differently than how she felt. but she could still compute. she still completely understood her vision with her art. she still wanted to do it. she just needed help to do it. i think that it's a very difficult line that only the people closest to the loved one know when the actual cognitive ability is going away. it may look like it's going away, maybe frightening to

whatever staffer leaked that or whoever. >> but i would -- >> they look different. >> i would make the point though, your mother's love was creative. diane's love is a public-facing job where her ability to communicate is the essence of the job. that's what makes this so hard is that she cannot be the diane feinstein we know she is. that's why it's difficult to watch. >> it's difficult to watch. but there are other members of the senate who are having trouble communicating. >> that's true. >> still allowed do their job. >> there's no question about that. i'm just being honest about how i personally feel about this, because she was -- she was really very, very important to me. >> yeah. understood. matt lewis, thanks for being on this morning. still ahead, we are

following president biden overseas in japan. president zelenskyy is expected to join the group of seven leaders in person to seek commitments for more aid in his country's fight against russia. in hiroshima, g7 leaders are also focussed on curbing what is called economic coercion by china. we will get a report from beijing about what it means for u.s. business on the mainland. you are watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. from prom dresses to workouts and new adventures you hope the more you give the less they'll miss. but even if your teen was vaccinated against meningitis in the past they may be missing vaccination for meningitis b. although uncommon, up to 1 in 5 survivors of meningitis will have long term consequences. now as you're thinking about all the vaccines your teen might need make sure you ask your doctor if your teen is missing meningitis b vaccination.

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it will include their shipping of diamonds. zelenskyy will join the gathering in person on sunday. details not yet being shared publically for security reasons. joining us now, richard haas. obviously, ukraine will be front and center here. what is on the agenda? what should president biden try to get out of this g7? >> further support for ukraine will be on the agenda. it won't change the fundamentals. it will be another demonstration of western solidarity. the whole idea of the west has come back. the g7 was created 50 years ago for the major industrial democratic countries. the idea was to bring in japan with the major countries of europe, canada and the united states. this some ways, this entire institution is having a rebirth. the japanese want to put nuclear

weapons on the agenda, the abolition of them. the problem is, the world is going through a nuclear boom, no pun intended, in the sense that china and north korea are both ramping up their nuclear weapons as fast as they can. last but not least, the unwritten story of the -- the background story is what we are talking about here. it's the debt ceiling debate and the uncertainty over the 2024 elections. all these other leaders are meeting with president biden. as they look at him, they are looking at the uncertainty of the outcome of the debt ceiling, what that says about american politics, and whether in two years they are going to have donald trump to meet with. there's lots of going on at this g7 meeting. >> we should note that before president zelenskyy reaches japan -- he is in saudi arabia right now meeting with al assad.

the president had to curtail his trip. he has to be in washington for debt ceiling negotiations. talk to us about how china is hovering over what we are seeing there in hiroshima. >> china hovers over everything in the indo-pacific. they are worried about what china might do against taiwan. they are talking about how they can restrict certain technology getting there. every leader is dependent on access to china's market, selling things to china or importing things from china. there's a tension there. there's a dilemma. the question is how far they will sort that out. i'm not wildly optimistic. >> richard, talk a little bit

about how excited china must be over the notion that we would default and what that does for world economics in terms of our long place at the center of all economic activity on the globe and how china has an opportunity here that, frankly, the crazy caucus in the house of representatives is not giving much thought to. >> china is expected about two things. one is that president biden has to curtail his trip. there's a competition going on. he can't visit an ally, australia. there's competition for places like new guinea, the solomon islands. china loves that. if we're not on the playing field, very hard to compete with them. there's that. second of all, the default is the sort of thing, january 6, it's all the things china points to when they say this so-called democratic system ain't so good. we are much more orderly.

we can deliver steady growth. it shows democrat says are unreliable. china likes that. the one caveat is they are still dependent on the success of the world economically, which depends upon the united states. china likes any sign the united states is unable to meet its international responsibilities. they are not prepared to step up to take our place. their currency isn't convertible. they don't have an alternative to the dollar. china's limits are profound. your point is right. whenever we fail, to some extent they feel it's good for them. >> while we are on china, earlier this month a consulting service became the latest american company to be raided by chinese authorities in a crackdown on foreign business entities.

janice mackey fryer is joining us from beijing. >> reporter: it put foreign companies here on edge, this latest raid saw chinese security agents crack down on several offices of a business consulting firm that deals in economic data, which is something that chinese authorities now see as sensitive information in what is an increasingly restrictive security environment here. staff have been questioned. no word on detentions. others have also been targeted in the last month. it creates this contradict, because we are seeing the investigations and this need for national security considerations almost trumping the appetite for foreign investment here at a time when china is trying to prop up the economy after post-covid rules.

it's created a lot of confusion for american businesses here and a big risk because there's no clarity, very little transparency, and there is now the legal risk facing american companies. i spoke earlier today with michael hart, the president of the american chamber of commerce in china. he says the business community is rattled. >> if you can't do due diligence and you can't collect economic statistics, you can't run a business. what we understand is the companies have been targeted were those doing due diligence for potential mergers and acquisitions or collecting data for companies trying to understand the economics around their business. if you can't collect information, howcan you run and manage a business? >> if you look at cause and affect, are the raids and these counterespionage laws a precursor to china wanting to

decouple with the united states? >> it's unclear what is driving this. this is one of the things that concerns the business communities, we don't have enough clarity on the concerns. we don't think china really wants to decouple. we think they want to derisk. we think the chinese under that the cross-border business is critical for both economies. i don't see the decoupling. >> reporter: state media say certain western countries have been stealing intelligence about china's military industry, economy and finance. officials the ministry of foreign affairs called it a normal law enforcement act and mentioned safeguarding national security and development. they haven't commented. neither have the other companies targeted for investigations. u.s. officials here and american businesses are worried.

they spent a week in washington, d.c. having meetings with policymakers and ceos. they heard a dozen times from ceos that, quote, they want to come to china, they would like to come to china, but they are afraid to come to china right now. >> yeah. nbc's janice mas mackey frayer,k you very much. richard, i would love to hear your thoughts on this. if there's no interest in decoupling, that's a funny way of showing it. >> there is no decoupling. that's a revealing story. that tells you a lot of what you need to know about china. xi has been in power for just over ten years. what you are seeing is in every sphere of life he is making questions of his rule, the party's continuity, what they see as national security and their ability to control things paramount. even if that means there's some loss in western economic

involvement, which used to be the priority for china. this is very much a different china. control, security, the party, the person, all now come first, even at the cost of a degree of economic growth. that is today's china. >> richard haas, thank you very much for being on this morning. have a great weekend. check out richard's weekly column entitled "home and away." it publishes every friday and is available at richardhaas.substack.com. donald trump is losing a lead lawyer from his defense team. we will dig into that new development. and the state of the many investigations into the former president. "morning joe" will be right back.

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one of former president trump's top lawyers has quick.

he was one of the attorneys defending trump against special counsel jack smith's investigation into the handling the classified documents found at mar-a-lago and former president's attempts to overturn the election. he left the legal team on good terms. he called the investigation, quote, improper and repeated his criticism of jack smith's investigation in the statement announcing his departure. joining us now, former watergate prosecutor john sale and state attorney for palm beach county, florida, dave aaron burg. he says all the right things, that he left on good terms. there had been talk that after hearing donald trump at last week's cnn town hall talk so openly and saying, i took what i took, about the classified documents, that he no longer

could defend him. what's your reading of this move? >> he has not said anything publically critical of donald trump because ethically that would be inappropriate. we can speculate as to why he left. i don't really think it matters. what i was thinking when i was coming on this morning is, if we went to hollywood with this, the frontrunner to be the republican nominee and he is under one indictment, likely under two, three other indictments, they wouldn't believe it in hollywood. this is a crazy world. but donald trump has the presumption of innocence by the constitution that he wanted to suspend. i don't think we can make any judgments about the fact that the attorney left. what we should focus on is, what are the investigations? i don't care what bravado donald trump exhibits, i have

represented a lot of people being under investigation, being under indictment. it is not fun. it is stressful. he is a client that is not going to listen to counsel. that's very, very difficult. lawyers just -- they are independent. if they give their best advice, if it's not followed, they might move on without any adverse consequence. when you are running for president, you have to -- you can't keep your mouth shut. don't say anything. don't say anything to the media. when someone is running for president, they can't say, i'm not commenting. it's an untenable situation and an unbelievable. >> also, some of the lawyers for donald trump may be in hot water themselves. let's talk about the cases. what is your assessment right now, the manhattan one is moving forward? we were all eyes towards georgia in the coming months. where do you think things go from here?

>> i think the georgia -- the fulton county district attorney was giving a signal to the feds so that they didn't make the same mistake the manhattan d.a. made of starting with the weakest case. i think she was saying, hey, what i'm going to do -- it's probably going to bring indictments. it's in the summer. if you want to do something first, which may be more appropriate, i'm giving you plenty of time. we could talk about the investigations forever. the mar-a-lago case, it's all about obstruction. when everything was fine until they got a subpoena. when they got a grand jury subpoena, that was a game changer. at that point, there was no longer an option to negotiate. the law basically is, you have to turn over everything that's called for unless it's privileged. if something is privileged, there's a procedure. you file a log, what it's called. you say, i'm not turning over this, this and this and this because it's privileged.

a judge will decide. what you cannot do is you cannot prepare a declaration like one of the lawyers did and say, we have done a diligent search and everything has been turned over. you can't do that unless it's true. what they are investigating is, did donald trump hide, conceal, move documents that were under subpoena? they have called -- jack smith has been thorough. they have called in everybody. they have immunized some of the lawyers. they called in even the housekeeper. they called in the chef. they looked at the surveillance tapes. they want to see if donald trump personally knew they were moved. quickly, the january 6 investigation, the main thing i think there -- the main witness, to see whether or not donald trump had intent of the insurrection, is the vice president. executive privilege is real. it's a real privilege.

the conversations between a vice president and a president are sacred. but that's overcome if it's part of a criminal conspiracy. despite what mike pence says publically, he talked to the president on january 6. he talked to him before. and he talked to him after. i think those conversations will show if donald trump is personally culpable. as i said, the constitution that he trashes, the judges that trump trashes, they are all going to protect him because that's what our system is all about. >> sam stein here, to get back to the original story about the lawyer quitting, i know you are a prosecutor, not a defense lawyer. have you ever seen a client like this? someone who steps in it all the time, who is unreliable in terms of paying for his legal counsel, whose own lawyers end up in legal trouble. if you were approached by donald trump to be a defense lawyer, how would you go about even

considering the case at this junction? i'm curious of what he is like as a client. >> good to be with you, sam. as a prosecutor, i don't have to worry about those things. i have never seen a client like it. jon sale turned down donald trump. he had his own reasons for it. to me, what stood out with the departure is that he is the same lawyer who wrote a letter to congress setting out trump's defenses. he said that it was trump's aides, not trump, who packed up the boxes and shipped them to florida. trump's hands were supposedly clean. then trump went on the live town hall meeting and said, no, he is the -- trump did it himself and had every right to do so. i think the reason why he withdrew is because he was exasperated with his client, along with perhaps knowing that he would become a witness and possibly a defendant in the case himself. he testified before the grand jury. here is the other thing that i'm wondering about.

"the new york times" reported that there were two attorneys left. what happened to chris kize? a former solicitor general. well respected. he got a $3 million retainer up front. then he was sidelined by donald trump because trump didn't agree with his advise. he wanted trump to be more conciliatory, more cooperative with doj rather than confrontational. look what's happening now. with each misstep, he is getting closer to an indictment and his lawyers are dropping like flies. >> the manhattan district attorney prosecuting donald trump has rejected a request from the former president's lawyers asking for more information about the evidence they plan to use against him. in a new filing this week, d.a. alvin bragg denies trump's attorneys what's known as a bill of particulars, where prosecutors provide a more

detailed explanation. according to bragg, trump has more than enough information to prepare his defense and will be given more in the upcoming discovery phase of the case. trump's lawyers were seeking to learn what second crime the d.a.'s office believes he committed. that allows what are usually misdemeanor charges to be elevated to 32 felony counts of falsifying business records. the former president pleaded not guilty to the charges against him and is expected to appear for a hearing next tuesday by video. i want to see what happens there. claire, what do you think they are asking for constantly? it seems to me that there's vintage trump playing out in all of these cases here, which is delay, deny, push papers around, drag it out. >> it's not surprising that a defense lawyer would ask for a

bill of particulars. it's not surprising that they want to know the underlying felony that elevates the case from a misdemeanor to a felony, because of the way the statute is written. i don't think there's anything remarkable about them asking. i think what is interesting is bragg is holding the line and saying, hey, you are going to get everything you are entitled to through discovery. that is in the process. i'm sure that this case is not going to go quickly. but i don't think there's anything donald trump -- i mean, jon might know better. but i don't think there's anything donald trump can do to make this case go beyond next year's election. that would be a long time for a state criminal case to the fed. the feds take forever. state prosecutors are used togo much more quickly than the federal criminal justice is. i assume this case would be tried before next november. >> i'm not a fan of that case going first, because when you

try a former president, you want to go with the strongest case. i think the heart of all this is him allegedly destroying our constitution. i think that should go first. it's not up to alvin bragg. it's up to the court. so it's not a delaying tactic. hopefully it's an appropriate motion. i think it will likely go first and i think that's unfortunate. prosecutors should talk to each other. even in "el chapo" they talked to each other and coordinated who should go first. so it is possible the prosecutors will have a conversation. i just think this is so terrible for our system and the whole thing is like a nightmare. it's like a movie.

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time for a look at the morning papers. the detroit free press reports the parents charged in a mass shooting are appealing to the michigan supreme court. prosecutors say james and jennifer crumbly disregarded their son's mental health issues and bought the gun he used in the deadly 2021 oxford high school shooting. now the parents will argue the shooting was not reasonably foreseeable and that charging them sets a dangerous precedent that will, quote, cause injustices. the beaufort gazette has a

feature on south carolina advancing to a near total abortion ban. in a special session called by the governor, the state house approved a six-week abortion ban after 24 hours of contentious debate. democrats unsuccessfully tried to amend the bill to include things like the state covering funeral costs if the mother or fetus die because they're denied an abortion. the bill now heads to the senate. we will be watching that. the atlanta journal constitution leads with donald trump's visit to georgia. the former president is expected to speak at the state's gop convention on june 10th. this will be his first event in georgia since he launched his 2024 presidential bid. and finally in connecticut the greenwich times highlights a new audit that finds the state's pension system overpaid retired workers by a total of $1.6 million. the audit covered fiscal years

2020 and 2021 and did not include the teachers retirement fund. officials now recommend the state returns that money and revises how it pays retired workers. still ahead, we'll go live to japan for an update on president biden's meetings with world leaders at the g7. mike memoli joins us straight ahead on "morning joe." joins us ahead on "morning joe. the promise of america is freedom, equality, but right now, those pillars of our democracy are fragile and our rights are under attack. reproductive rights, voting rights, the right to make your own choices and to have your voice heard. we must act now to restore and protect these freedoms for us and for the future, and we can't do it without you.

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i just believe where we were a week ago and where we are today is a much better place, because you have the right people in the room discussing it in a very professional manner with all the knowledge and all the backgrounds from all the different leaders and what they want. i know we can come together and i think that's important. i can see from our discussions too where everybody can get to where this could raise the debt ceiling -- [indiscernible] >> house speaker kevin mccarthy yesterday with a positive assessment on the debt ceiling negotiations. we'll get a live report from capitol hill on the sticking points that are still holding up a deal. plus, an update on senator dianne feinstein's health. we're learning there were other medical complications that kept the 89-year-old away from washington for nearly three

months. also ahead, florida feels the consequences of a culture war. disney pulls out of a billion dollar development amid the ongoing feud with governor ron desantis. and a prominent republican senator gets candid about donald trump's presidential campaign, saying, quote, the party needs someone who can actually win. we'll tell you who that is and what else was said. welcome to the fourth hour of "morning joe." 6:00 a.m. on the west coast, 9:00 a.m. on the east coast. jonathan, how many hours of tv a week do you do? is it five a day? >> that's about what it works out to be. >> you're nuts. >> we're all very lucky to do this. it's a very important service. we may be tired. it's our last hour of the week. it's friday.

>> let's begin with the opening of the g7 summit wrapping up in hiroshima with the group of seven leaders attending a working dinner together after a full slate of cultural events held earlier in the day. on sunday ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy is expected to join the summit in person to seek commitment for more aid in his country's fight against russia. let's bring in white house correspondent mike memoli live in hiroshima. mike, what's the latest? >> reporter: obviously there's a very jam-packed agenda for the g7 leaders here after the first of three days for this summit. they're talking about everything from the state of the global economy, how to combat inflation, dealing with supply chains, competition with china. at the very top of this agenda has always been the continued battle in ukraine and the ongoing efforts by the g7 and other allies to support ukraine

in that effort. there was a strong statement issued by the g7 leaders pledging continued support for ukraine. the fact that we're confirming president zelenskyy will attend in person, he over the last week has visited france, germany, u.k., even met with pope francis and in saudi arabia attending that arab summit there as a continuation of efforts to continue to build support for ukraine ahead of the spring offensive. we're seeing a continued unified front among the g7 with efforts to target russia where it hurts, both continued efforts to finance the ongoing war but also to get around the evasive tactics russia has been making for sanctions that were already

in place. we also know, of course, the looming debt ceiling crisis back home as also been overshadowing this. we saw president cut short his participation at the g7 leaders' dinner this evening so he can get a fresh update from his team as they start their day back at home friday morning. the president continues to be confident they'll avert a default. in fact, conversations with white house officials speak to that optimism as well. they're not ruling out, in fact, that the president might speak with speaker kevin mccarthy on sunday just before he ends his participation in the g7 summit to head back home. there is that continued optimism. you can understand why the president wants to project that optimism, because a default in the united states would not just devastate our own economy, but would have ripple effects throughout the world, so it's a top concern of the other g7

leaders as well. >> mike memoli reporting live from hiroshima, thank you very much for that report. mike mentioned the default deadline still looming over washington. let's bring in ali vitali with the latest there. >> reporter: as mike said, there's certainly a more positive tone to these conversations. the speaker mccarthy you played at the beginning of the hour seemed like a markedly different person than the plan i talked to on monday morning. at that point, he was pessimistic about the tone of the negotiations. now, though, the number of people in the world is squarely speaker mccarthy's aides and allies at the table speaking to president biden's top aides and veteran allies of his. that has seemed to jog the conversations forward so there's a productive tone to these meetings. we expect if these meetings are going to continue over the

course of the coming days, including today, even though you can tell congress is out of town because of course it is a friday so reporters are left working in this building on that day. but nevertheless the thing i'm looking at that shows these talks may be very productive, you're watching progressives start agitaing on the senate side around the president needing to use the 14th amendment because they don't like some of the things they're hearing about possible work requirements in this deal. on the other side of the spectrum, the house freedom caucus coming out with a statement saying they don't want mccarthy to continue negotiating until they pass a version of their own debt ceiling deal. with both sides angry, that's how you know they might be coming to some consensus. >> that's a great point. it means they might be meeting in the middle. aides tell me that indeed staff

talks continue over the weekend. the president returns sunday. they expect him to jump back into negotiations early next week monday or tuesday and hopefully close this out. i want to return to a story we talked about earlier today, new information aboutanne feinsteinw her health was perhaps much worse than people were initially led to believe. how do democrats approach this? she's says she's not going to run for reelection, but she's not going to resign even though some in her party say she should, that she's not able to serve in her position. what are democrats saying? >> reporter: there's a lot of time between day and january 2025 when her term ends. so the political implications of this would be very clear. i think the news that we got yesterday specifically that feinstein in addition to having shingles, the details of the

complications she was suffering as well, i mean, we saw the impact of one of these when she came back to the hill because of the slight drooping we saw on one side of her face. that's the ramsey hunt syndrome her staff is confirming she had as a complication of shingles, but they say she was suffering from encephalitis as well. we still see the implications of the ramsey hunt syndrome when we see her around the capitol, but it all leads to questions about if she is able to do this job which requires the physical demands of walking around this building, of long days of hearings of dense topics. we've watched men age out of this building less gracefully than this, why don't we give her the time and empathy to do the rest of her job, others say. >> i know there are a lot of sides to this, but at the same time just how brave fighting on

and through the criticism of many of her own colleagues and people in the media. we'll see what happens. i know this is a deeply personal issue obviously for anybody in this situation. so republican senator john cornyn of texas is not holding back when it comes to donald trump's presidential campaign. cornyn yesterday offered his most candid assessment of the former president to date, telling a reporter for the "houston chronicle," quote, i think president trump's time has passed him by. he went onto say, i don't think president trump understands when you run in a general election, you have to appeal to voters beyond your base. cornyn also said the party needs, quote, a candidate that can actually win. he did not endorse any of the current candidates or florida governor ron desantis, but did note that former texas governor rick perry has not ruled out a possible third run.

as for donald trump's likely main opponent in the primary, florida governor ron desantis, he may have cost his state a billion dollar investment and thousands of jobs just because of his feud with disney. nbc news national correspondent gabe gutierrez has the latest. >> reporter: this morning, nbc news has learned florida governor ron desantis is preparing to formally announce he's running for president next week. that's according to two sources close to his political operations. desantis, who's already been making trips to critical early voting states like iowa and new hampshire, is expected to quickly become a top challenger to the gop front runner former president trump. it all comes as desantis is facing new questions over his escalating feud with disney. >> we will fight the woke in the legislature, in corporate america. we will never ever surrender to

the woke mob. >> reporter: the entertainment giant now scrapping plans to build a $1 billion office complex in florida. in a letter to employees, a disney executive writing, this was not an easy decision to make, but i believe it is the right one, citing changing business conditions. desantis's press secretary firing back. given the campaign's financial straits following market cap and declining stock price, it is unprizing they would restructure their business operations and cancel unsuccessful ventures . they are the latest grenades in the war of words between desantis and disney, which is also suing florida for stripping its special self-governing status after the company opposed the state's parental rights in education act that critics call the don't say gay law. disney ceo bob iger responding last week before the decision was announced. >> does the state want us to invest more, employee more people and pay more taxes, or not?

>> reporter: disney is florida's largest single-site employer. also desantis married his wife at disney world in 2009. >> who would have thought that we were leaving disney world as newlyweds that a decade and a half later we'd be staring them down over a fundamental fight about what is appropriate for our kids. >> a fundamental fight about what? nbc's gabe gutierrez with that report. let's bring in andrew ross sorkin. i could be confused here, but i want to do the math. so 2,000 jobs would have relocated to florida. >> right. >> then they would have built this complex that was in the billions of dollars.

how many more jobs would that have been? >> that's real money. this would have been 2,000 jobs and there probably would have been ancillary jobs on top of this, including what are called the imagineers at disney, coming up with rides and products that disney makes. they were going to take that group from california and move them to florida. of course, they're now staying in california. >> andrew, how much exactly has ron desantis cost florida or how much has florida lost out on the opportunity of because of his made-up justifications? >> between the tax piece of what's already happened and this, you could argue it's billions of dollars. i should also say disney still plans to invest another $10 billion in the state over the next decade. they have said that is in the

offing in part because of just the business they already have there. it has a real impact. having said that, to be fair, there is an argument that disney is struggling to some degree right now in terms of the economics of their business, and some of this decision may be a practical one. that is also true. but the question that i would ask from a political standpoint and an economic standpoint is, you know, desantis right now is still trying to raise money. a lot of the business people who have historically supported him have yet to commit to him. i'm thinking of the ken griffins of the world, the steve schwartzmans of the world and the gop. what do they think? this may play to his base, i don't know. but in terms of the economics of being able to carry out a complain, what the business

community and people of means who would otherwise give him money to support his campaign think of this? >> the republican donor class certainly expressed concern about this fight with disney, but also what desantis has said about the war with ukraine where he has not been nearly as full throated in support of kyiv as some would like. we want to turn to the debt ceiling talks. we had supports of some progress, a little bit of optimism. but the deal not done and the clock very much ticking. what's been the reaction so far to the markets? is there a sense as june 1st approaches what moment might the panic set in if there weren't a deal? >> i think so far the stock market investors have been nonplussed about the whole thing, in large part because there's a sense that we've seen this movie before, we know how it ends. yes, it may get tricky towards the end, but rational minds have prevailed in the end. the question is, will that happen again in this instance,

and do you need wall street effectively to send a signal, a message they are scared? in the past that's happened and invariably a deal has been reached. i don't know. there's not a lot of time left. you can look at the market right now, actually quite calm about things. you get through the weekend and maybe to the middle of next week, and we'll reevaluate and see where the stock market really is and the signals it's starting to send. as you get closer, it's going to get harder. there's some expectation you can even go over the june 1st deadline into june 2nd or 3rd. that's when i think you'd see the stock market really start to indicate how anxious it really is. >> cnbc's andrew ross sorkin, thank you very much. >> have a good weekend. coming up, the mayor of los angeles is standing by. karen bass is teaming up with the white house to tackle

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we're back with a new plan by the city of los angeles and a handful of other major cities to tackle the issue of homelessness. the cities are partnering with the white house to tackle the crisis with a new initiative dubbed "all inside." it's meant to allow the administration to work with local officials to help the homeless. the program fast tracks funding and cuts red tape that has hindered efforts in the past. joining us now is the mayor of los angeles karen bass. mayor, good to have you on the show. we appreciate your coming on. could you first define the extent of the problem of homelessness in your city? >> yes.

there are 47,000 unhoused people in los angeles city. now, if you add the county in, we're talking 60,000. and that was last year's count. 2,000 people died on our streets last year. so this is what i believe is an emergency, which is why on day one i declared a state of emergency in los angeles. >> yes, i remember that. how do those numbers corroborate or match with a number of beds in shelters that you have available? >> well, we definitely do not have enough of either, either the interim housing, which is what we're doing here. we're getting people out of tents and moving them into motels. the sad thing is that in los angeles, people say they would rather be on the street than in a shelter because the shelters are perceived as too dangerous. >> that's the question i have in terms of how this initiative with the white house will work. will it address that very issue?

because a lot of people are afraid to bring their children to shelters. they're afraid that they will be demonized, shamed, brought to jail or separated from their family or hurt. how do you address those issues? >> you know, homelessness in this age and not just in los angeles but throughout the country requires something different. in the past, we used congregate shelters, everybody on cots. now we need to develop a system of permanent interim housing. that means hotels and motels and different forms of housing that can be built quickly, modular, prefabricated. so what we're moving to now in los angeles, renting motels is very expensive and it's not sustainable financially. so we're looking now to purchase motels and hotels because we are building as fast as we can. i found an executive director

that expedited the building process and cutting red tape. even as fast as you can build, it's still a lag time, so you need something in the middle, and that's interim housing. that's where we're moving in los angeles. my budget moves us forward in that direction as well. >> homelessness, of course, has been on the rise in big cities throughout the country since the pandemic. also the suggestion is there's a lot more mental health woes since the pandemic. sometimes those two issues go hand in hand. what sort of initiatives can the city try out with perhaps help from the federal government about the mental health component of homelessness? >> well, in our city the county is the one that administers health services and also substance abuse. we know that substance abuse and mental health go together often. so what i've done locally is we

identified money in our budget for the opioid legal settlement and we're going to use that to collaborate with the county. the county the only provide drug treatment for 90 days, so we're going to pay for day 91. we are looking for a variety of out-of-the box solutions. we cannot address this problem the same we we have in the past because it is a huge problem now, reaching a crisis point in many cities. >> please keep us posted on this. we thank you very much for coming on the show this morning. >> thanks for having me on. we are learning new details this morning about the gunman responsible for killing three elderly women in new mexico. police say monday's shooting rampage was random. now we're getting a look at body camera footage of how the scene

unfolded. >> reporter: this morning chilling video of the monday morning new mexico mass shooting that left three dead. the farmington police department releasing body cam footage of the terrifying incident. the shooter's own neighborhood, the sound of gunshots ringing out as he fired at random, piercing homes and cars. >> there were so many shots that it left the impression with some citizens that there were multiple shooters. >> reporter: officers are seen running toward the danger. in this sobering perspective of the moment a sergeant was shot, captured by her own body cam, colleagues coming to her aid. also caught on camera, an officer firing on 18-year-old shooter beau wilson, who was killed by police. >> subject the down. he is secured. >> reporter: police say wilson

was initially wearing a bullet proof vest modified with steel plates, removing it before a standoff. >> he is yelling on the ring footage, "come kill me." it's my belief that he has made a decision he's going to stand and fight it out until he is killed. >> reporter: gwendolyn schofield and her daughter melanie died trying to save shirley voita, who was also killed. wilson was firing an ar-15 assault rifle from his home. as of yet, there's no clear motive. their only clue, this note found on the shooter's body reading in part, "i'm at the end of a chapter." his family says wilson was fighting a battle of mental illness that he lost.

this tight knit community is left to make sense of a senseless tragedy. >> joining us is the governor of new mexico. governor grisham, thank you so much for joining us. what struck me out of this report is so many shots were fired there were people in the neighborhood who thought there were multiple shooters, which gives you a sense of the impact and the terror that these assault weapons rain down on communities when they're being used, 190 bullets discharged by the shooter, a cop shot, three dead. what do you think you can do on the state level to try and attack this problem? >> we have to do everything. it is horrifying. the reports and the data keep coming in. it's more rounds, more shots, more potential risk to another

community who is in grief and suffering, two more mass shootings since that occurred in texas. new mexico has been very robust and that's not to try to defend that we think we're there. we are clearly not until every mom, every dad, every neighbor is safe. we've got protection orders. we have the domestic orders where guns have to be taken into custody coming out of a domestic violence dispute. we have universal background checks. i tried to raise the age for purchasing firearms to 21. i'll do it again. we've asked for a complete ban on assault weapons. we're putting additional school security and safety. all of it, more needs to happen. there is a gun violence, a gun culture and an anger problem in america and in new mexico.

>> it appears to me there needs to be sweeping action to help all of our young people across the country when it comes to mental health. i think our kids are really suffering, in this case, at an extreme level. this gunman left a note that we saw in the report. he was ready, he had a bullet proof vest on that he enhanced. where he would he get an ar-15, and how in the world should an ar-15 be in his hands? >> it shouldn't. this is my point exactly. frankly, no one that isn't in the military, this is a weapon of war or for a trained police department. in my view, no one in america should own an automatic weapon.

there is no reason to own one of those. secondarily, i have an issue with young people about training, having access to firearms at all. we're going to raise that age. we have a safe storage law so that parents are doing all of that work. i think you're exactly right. there is no reason. we're also looking at legislation that didn't pass our last legislative session to go after gun manufacturers. this is an all-of-the above approach. i want fewer firearms on the street. i want no more gun trafficking. i want people held accountable. and what happened to mr. wilson? did he reach out for help in the schools? we need to know that. was there a missed opportunity

for a red flag protection order? i don't have any of those details yet. how things emerged, it looks to me like we have to step up the investments we already have. if you're a mental health provider, come to new mexico. we pay for the infrastructure. i want you, i need you and we'll put you in our schools. we're going to make a difference. >> before you go, i want to talk about abortion. i know that you meet with other governors, especially female governors. there's a good number of them now on both sides of the aisle. do you think there's anything governors can do to push back on what appears could be a national ban. at this point, we're in a very,

very dangerous place for the women of america, many of who will die or will be sterilized or will have trauma or unbelievable mental health consequences because they can't get the health care they need. >> yes. our reproductive freedom alliance are watching the mifepristone debate. they're chipping away at one thing at a time. we're going to make sure these medications are available in our state. we're going to make sure the clinics are available. we're probably going to have to ban together to make sure there is a process and resources for women to travel across the country. because if we are just doing our own states, we're missing the point for every woman and her family in america.

you are exactly right. democratic governors and women democratic governors are going to make sure that women no matter where you are have the ability to get to us for the protections and support you need. my own department of health is looking at launching a national hotline so people know who is standing up for you and where you can go to be protected. >> michelle lieu han grisham, thank you very much for coming on the show and thank you for what you're doing. >> thank you. it was nice to be on. again, my condolences to america and to my wonderful community of farmington. they didn't deserve this. >> thank you. lauren, you have a recent op-ed on the hill entitled "state

republicans have gone from opposing democrats to opposing democracy." you write, too many republican-controlled legislatures have gone from opposing democrats to opposing democracy. this didn't happen overnight. years of investment and aggressive gerrymandering have let to veto-proof super majorities in 20 state legislatures while democrats hold super majorities in just nine. moreover, republicans hold trifectas, governorships and both state houses in 22 states and control 58 out of 99 state legislative chambers across the country. in at least four states, florida, ohio, north carolina and wisconsin, republicans are also profoundly overrepresented in state governments relative to the voter party affiliation. this outsized, unrepresentative power has huge implications for two of the most urgent issues facing the country today, gun

control and abortion access, both life and death issues where americans are largely united. lauren, i will say it for you. we want to get women to run because we see what's happening. a lot of the female governors in office today saw what was happening and said, not going to wait for someone else to do it for us women, going to have to do it myself. we need women to run. >> we really do. what i think is so important is that across the board we need women running in the state legislatures probably now more than we ever have in the last decade. it's critically important and the point that i made in the piece, the democratic party infrastructure supports candidates running in state legislatures. in florida, just as one example, 45 of the state seats in the 2022 cycle ran completely

unopposed. when you look around the country, unfortunately republicans have been way ahead of democrats on state legislatures for years. there's a lot of catchup to be done. republicans outspent democrats 2-1 on state legislature investments in the last cycle. when you look at the gerrymandering that's happened in north carolina, south carolina, ohio, the list is long and it's going to take a massive coordinated effort to make sure the seats are fairly drawn, that democrats are fighting where maps are gerrymandered beyond what is representative of their people. fundamentally, absolutely, we need more women in state legislatures. last thing i'll say, look at the effect of what happened in south carolina. the coalition of both republican and democratic state senators in south carolina that have been instrumental in protecting reproductive rights in that

state. it's never been more important that we focus on these state legislatures that are underfunded and under invested in by democrats. >> it seems to me women are sometimes reticent to step up and don't know if they are qualified and men just jump in even though they're duly unqualified. what is your message to any woman who has the time to run for office, especially in local and state elections. >> i think it's important to do. when i graduated from college, mika, i worked with a community organizer. i was a communications manager in omaha, nebraska. we worked with organizations, entities and also elected officials getting folks on, working with the city council representatives, working with young people who were interested in getting involved in running

for office. what lauren is saying about the state legislatures is extremely important. it wasn't until last year that i heard national figures of the democratic party talk about the importance of state legislatures. i remember my first guest on my show, the first lady dr. biden said we've got to invest in state legislature. i thought, when's the last time we heard that? there is the democratic legislative campaign committee that is focused on that. if you talk to the head of that committee, they would say they don't get support like the over committees like the dnc and others. so supporting the entities for folks out there who are interested, you have to know who are the entities that recruit and help fund some of these elections and have a laser focus for the state and in particular state legislatures because that's where america's policy is made. >> let's talk about the

electorate right now. suburban women in particular seem to be the most important swing group. they voted for trump in 2016 to give him the white house. they broke hard for biden in 2020. is the sense of it that because of these issues like guns and abortion, they'll stay with the democratic center? >> we've been looking at this and especially the right of center women in the suburbs as well as other sort of more democratic leaning. even if you go back to the 2018 election and look at the issue of guns and safety in schools, that was a hugely galvanizing issue in the 2018 midterms. a lot of moms in the suburbs said the lockdown drills were the thing that galvanized them. if you look at the extraordinarily effective organizing power of groups like moms demand and what you've seen

in the backlash against the dobbs decision, polls have been looking at this the wrong way. we got to not just look at what are the top issues, but what are the galvanizing, motivating issues. right now there's no question that both abortion and gun control issues every day these horrific stories of shootings are horrifying to so many voters, especially women, especially moms. they're going to be a force again in 2024. >> certainly the supreme court has become a significant topic of conversation in recent weeks with sort of the ethical questions raised by some of the justices. you look at some of their decisions of late. tell us what you found. >> there are a number of decisions coming down from the supreme court sometime between now and mid summer. i think americans need to brace themselves. there are two cases before the

supreme court that on their face look as though they are looking at the issue of affirmative action in admissions for colleges. but this court has been poised to overreach. remember, the dobbs decision, the dobbs case was not originally about overturning roe v wade. it was about 15 weeks or not in mississippi for abortions, and the court went so far as to overturn the roe v wade decision and send the issue of abortion back to the states. in the particular case about admissions, the supreme court could if they rule in favor of the organization that brought these complaints, the supreme court could say that race-based decision making is therefore unconstitutional. that's everything from special government contracts to minority-owned businesses to programs on the corporations run to recruit at hbcus. both things could be in question. lawmakers could say that african-american history programs, latino-american

history programs are illegal because they are unconstitutional because they are race based. hospitals could have to get creative and find ways to recruit doctors in order to avoid incurring liability. those are just two cases and examples of the real-life implications of what the supreme court could do in just a few months. >> symone sanders townsend, thank you very much. we'll be watching your show weekends at 4:00 p.m. eastern right here on msnbc. and lauren leader, thank you as well. coming up on "morning joe," a traffic stop takes a dramatic turn with an officer hanging onto the hood of a car. we'll have more of this incredible video and the story behind it straight ahead on "morning joe." n "morning joe."

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the officer told the passenger of the car that there was a warrant out for his arrest. the passenger tells the driver to get out of the car. the car begins moving forward as the passenger moves into the driver's seat. the officer in the incident pulls out his gun and gets in front of the car. the car then keeps moving forward, which forces the officer to get on the hood of the car. the driver continues to drive the car at a high speed with the police officer holding onto the roof. the chase lasted a minute before the driver entered a gravel pit where the officer lost his grip and was thrown off the car. the officer survived, but broke his back. the driver of the car was sentenced to five years in prison at a later court date. that is just horrible. coming up, actor harrison

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there was an emotional moment last night for harrison ford at the cannes film festival currently underway in france. the legendary actor appeared to fight back tears after receiving a five-minute standing ovation at the event following the premier of his latest film "indiana jones and the dial of destiny." the crowd clearly happy to see the 80-year-old actor back in action in the fifth installment of the popular adventure film franchise that now spans more than four decades. let's bring in the editor of the weekly online news letter airmail, graden carter. great to see you. i'm loving airmail. >> good morning, thank you. >> you described the outsized role that the cannes film festival has had over the decades, including this anecdote, quote, francis ford

cope la despite his success with the godfathers one and two couldn't find a studio in hollywood willing to finance apocalypse now. the international producers were less squeamish and in 1979 his tumultuous in the making shared the festival's highest honor la palme d'or, give us a sense of the festival's impact. >> it's not the newest film festival. it's just sort of the most exciting one. i know from my experience growing up in canada, seeing bridget bar doe in a bikini is the first time i've actually seen a bikini, i think people think of canne that way, better looking, glamorous people in a wonderful setting with great weather, and it's -- there's something exciting about it.

last night with harrison ford, there's many nights like that in every single cannes film festival. these are people who loved films and loved american films as well. >> what are the other highlights we're looking at this year we'll expect? >> well, martin scorsese has killers of the flower moon and wes anderson has asteroid sea. there's multiple films from various parts of the world. it's just sort of exciting. i went there years ago with a film documentary on robert evans who ran paramount pictures of the 1970s who actually brought the god father to the screen in part. and it was a very emotional night, and it gave him like a three or four-minute standing ovation. and he was near tears as well. it's because these people really appreciate films, and they have very strict clothing rules. men have to be in tuxedos and black leather shoes, and women in long dresses, so we see the

way all those people are dressed. they're not -- they have to follow the uniform of canne, which is old fashioned and pretty strict. >> okay. i really want to know more about what robert evans was like to hang out with but maybe that's like a whole show. >> yes. >> you also talk about bringing your family there, and that this really has lasted through the years this festival. >> well, i know for me i've been coming here for 25 years. i haven't gone to the film festival that much, it's a big chunk of the day. we used to throw a big dinner at the hotel decap, which is right near canne, and it was -- our oscar party was a big global production, and that was a lot of work and a lot of stress, but the canne thing was just fun. it's a beautiful setting and there's boats in the harbor and

everybody's relaxed and the stakes aren't as hike. my children all come, three of them are coming this year. we're doing a dinner again this year, and i'm doing it with david zaslow, warner brothers, cnn, but warner brothers is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year, so that's sort of the theme of the night. >> all right, you can tell zas i have a few questions for him. graydon carter, thank you very much. i appreciate you coming on. you can read more from moerj's "morning joe's" partnership are airmail. 3-year-old chestnut colt mage overcame 15-1 odds earlier this month to win the kentucky derby. tomorrow mage will look to work his magic once again at the 148th preakness stakes, and joining us now with a preview of tomorrow's run of the black eyed susans, nbc's steve kornacki who

joins us live from the pimlico race course there in baltimore. steve, what are we looking for tomorrow? >> reporter: yeah, well, we're looking to see the big question is whether mage the upset winner in the kentucky derby can make it two for two in the preakness and head off to the belmont stakes in new york with a chance to become the 14th horse in history to capture the triple crown. the big news this morning at the track here is the path for preakness may have just gotten a lot easier. there's news this morning that one of what was expected to be mage's biggest challengers in the preakness tomorrow a horse named first mission is going to scratch, is not going to run in tomorrow's preakness. first mission had been the second choice on the morning line. not going to run. that's going to leave a field of seven. mage certainly expected to be a heavy favorite in this race tomorrow, and really, it sets up an interesting piece of drama here because the main competition now for mage in

tomorrow's preakness, at least on paper, may come from a very familiar and controversial name, bob baffert. bob baffert, the legendary trainer has not run a horse in a triple crown race in two years. all sorts of drama surrounding the winner of the kentucky derby in 2021 who was later disqualified because of a violation. baffert is back for the first time in two years. he's got a horse named national treasure. national treasure a lot of folks think will try to go for the lead in tomorrow's preakness and dare the rest of the field to catch him. if mage is going to be stopped, it may be bob baffert tomorrow who has the best chance of doing it. >> the kentucky derby of course was marked by a number of last minute scratches. we're seeing that now again at the preakness, also some rain in the forecast tomorrow. coverage of the 148th preakness stakes begins tomorrow at 1:00 p.m. eastern on cnbc before shifting overrnki, thank you, ey

the race. mika, back to you. >> all right, so jonathan lemire, the very end of y 25th hour of television of the week, i want to see how good you are. what are the big stories that you were looking at today? how clear can you be or are you going to start slurring your words? >> mika,ky do it. the president of course overseas in japan. still the g-7. that's being overshadowed by those debt ceiling talks here at home. staff working now, the president looking to resume negotiations himself when he returns to washington sunday night. >> the kid's pretty good. >> how'd i do? >> pretty good. that does it for us this morning, ana cabrera picks up the coverage right now. hello, we made it to friday. it is 10:00 eastern. i'm ana cabrera reporting from