enforcement, i.c.e., is getting ready to retire. >> his name is taye johnson, if you don't know much about him it's because he's been in the department for more than 30 years, this is not a political job for him, this is his job and he's spanned the end of trump and the beginning of biden. he's been preparing to retire for quite a while. the problem is that no one can get actually confirmed as i.c.e.'s director and this has been the case since 2017. there is another concern which is at the border, just a week ago u.s. border patrol chief raul ortiz also announced his retirement. between i.c.e. and the border patrol you have two really high-profile vacancies at clearly a really important time both for immigration challenges and national security protection so it's a concern. >> and it comes a month after title 42 expired. margaret talev, thanks for joining us this morning and thanks to all of us for getting up way too earl with us on this tuesday morning. "morning joe" starts right now.

my brother need not be idealized or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life. to be remembered simply as a good and decent man who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it. those of us who loved him and will take him to his rest today pray that what he was to us and what he wished for others will some day come to pass for all the world. as he said many times in many parts of this nation to those he touched and who sought to touch him, some men see things as they are and say why, i dream things that never were and say why not. >> that was senator ted kennedy at the funeral of his brother

bobby. second funeral he would have to mark and today is june 6th. david ignatius, two monumental things happened on this day, of course, the assassination and the death -- the assassination and the death of bobby kennedy on june 6th, 1968, a day that really marked in many ways a low point, the chaos of the 1960s and i must say also a day that many say this country still has not recovered from politically. and the second actually a glorious achievement and that was 79 years ago today more than 160,000 american, british and canadian troops landed in nazi-occupied france during world war ii and the largest air, land and sea invasion ever. i've been to normandy so many

times and still every time it's incomprehensible that these 18-year-old kids, 19-year-old kids, the boys scaled the walls. as i said the day they were going in there, you are going to liberate the continent from nazi tyranny and that they did. >> joe, i remember being with you on one of those anniversaries in normandy and looking with you out across that field of memorials, crosses and stars of david, and then looking at those cliffs and seeing what those young men, they were mostly men, had to contend with, how they had to fight up those cliffs in the face of overwhelming fire, and they did that on that day, and i remember

talking and thinking about how our world really is built on the courage and sacrifice of those people. the other thing we celebrate today, i remember vividly, i was a young man of 18 when bobby kennedy died and there was a way in which life seemed to break in that moment. he was a person whether because of his family or the change that he had gone through to -- >> an extraordinary change. >> he had been a very conservative guy, conservative voice in his brother jfk's ear, but he became somebody who identified with all the progressive things happening in america's civil rights movement, needing to end the vietnam war. it is true that day when he was shot, it was as if the hope that he embodied had gone away. so it's good of you to mention these two anniversaries, one that makes us happy, d-day,

pride for our country, another that's still painful even though. >> and, gene, the fearlessness of bobby in his final years, the extraordinary ability to grow from somebody that worked, actually, for joe mccarthy and was the hard, tough voice in his brother's ear when he was attorney general to this extraordinary man who, of course, we remember the most eloquent words spoken after the death of martin luther king, bobby kennedy in indianapolis and jeff greenfield who said he followed him around as a speech writer during the entire campaign. he said that night when he's quoting greek poets. >> he quoted escolis. >> in indianapolis, that night i said, well, did you help him with that speech?

he said the son of bitch wrote it in the car going in. he said -- he said maybe one of the great speeches in a half century, you know, these speech writers, he wrote it in. i always tell the story because it says all you need to know about bobby kennedy that night, the indianapolis police said we can't go in with you it's going to be too dangerous. we can't go in. everybody told him to stay out. bobby went in and bobby delivered an extraordinary statement that night on the night of april 4th. in 1966 on this day he was in south africa telling the young people of south africa you have the power in your hands. this generation, to change things. and that was the generation that ended apartheid, that freed mandela, that changed the world. >> he was such an important figure. i don't know if people today who don't remember that day

understand who he was and what he did and what he was going to do. i mean, it was his trajectory that everybody was following. i confess that, you know, by the time he was assassinated i was almost numb in 1968. dr. king had been killed just a couple of months earlier and a couple months before that in my hometown there had been the orangeburg massacre where three young black men within sight of my house had been killed by white state troopers in a demonstration, three unarmed men, 27 other people shot and injured. by the time we got to june, it was too much. it was -- in 1968, it was too much. >> and, willie, we going back to d-day and young men there, i remember on the 60th anniversary of d-day going over there just

walking through the cemetery with by then the old men who had charged those hills and at one point they're telling me these extraordinary stories and i just said, man, what were you thinking? and he said, that's the thing, we were 18 year olds, we weren't thinking. they told us to go up the hill, we said okay. he said it's amazing. he said -- he said that when he came back to the states a few years later, when he was 23, 24, he thought to himself, he said, i would have never done that at 24, at 25. not in a million years. he said, but at 18 i knew i could do it. >> yeah, you know, i was there last summer with my kids, i took my kids over there to see it and they're old enough to appreciate it, and just walking through the american cemetery where there are more than 9,000 americans laid to rest, a cemetery that was established, by the way, on june 8th two days after d-day in

1944 to start burying our dead. you just look at the ages and they are high school kids, they're either the age of somebody who is still in high school or who just graduated and you go, my god, they walked across a stage somewhere across our country, went to basic training and then got on boats and went to liberate europe. it's an extraordinary thing to absorb and use the right word earlier, it is, it's overwhelming to think not just the scope of the military effort and what they pulled off and what eisenhower pulled off, but the will. the will of the world. the will of the west. the will of these kids, and they were kids, to go over there and fight an enemy that wasn't really on our shores, you know, there was a threat that it could come, but it was to liberate people and to stop evil. you ask yourself as you walk through that cemetery do we have that will today? i think the answer for me is yes. a whole bunch of people signed up and put on packs after 9/11, went and fought in afghanistan. look what we're doing with

ukraine right now, to stand up for freedom and to stand against evil. but that place, normandy, for me, will be one of the two or three most special places in the world in terms of just witnessing what we can do when we come together and to witness the sacrifice of an entire generation of young americans. >> and what was at stake, george, i mean, earlier in year we went to auschwitz, did the show from auschwitz, saw what happened there. was back over in warsaw for the 80th anniversary of the liberation -- not the liberation, but for the warsaw ghetto uprising. just the pure evil and the heart of europe, that's what these kids were doing. >> it's so important to think of everything in a historical perspective, particularly today with ukraine. i mean, ukraine, i mean, that is as good a -- not good, but as black and white of good and evil, good versus evil, as we

have seen since that time. you go to afghanistan and iraq and there were ambiguities there, we were aging in essentially what were civil wars where one party is fighting another party for control of the country, as opposed to an outside aggressor trying to squelch freedom in the country. >> also with us this morning we have jackie alemany of the "washington post." while we are on the topic of ukraine, ukraine is accusing russia of wrecking a major dam and hydro electric power station near kherson while russian state media accused ukraine of the attack. hundreds of residents living downriver have had to evacuate due to floodwaters. the country's nuclear operator is warning destruction of the dam could have negative consequences for the nearby zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant but calls the situation controllable at the moment at least. u.s. officials say it appears that ukraine's counteroffensive

is under way as "the new york times" reports the stepped up activity includes increased artillery strikes and ground assaults. but the fighting is focused east of where most experts predict it had would begin. experts say ukraine's forces can still push south from that location in order to cut off the land bridge connecting occupied crimea to mainland russia. u.s. officials tell the "times" their assessment is also based off satellite imagery which indicated increased movement within ukrainian military positions. >> david, what can you tell us? >> so speaking last night senior administration officials said first, yes, this long awaited offensive has begun. they stressed that in their analysis the principal movement is south toward the coast. there is action in the northeast in the donbas area, but the principal focus is to try to cut

the so-called land bridge linking the donbas to crimea, to the other areas that russia has seized. what's interesting about the offensive as it's unfolding is that it is a long multiple axes and because the ukraine's finally have the ability to move back and forth, they're probing, testing, seeing where the russians are weak, the idea that if they find a weakness they can move in and exploit t move fast and hard. the progress in this first day was described to me as better than expected. at some spots along this line the push went as far as 10 kilometers, doesn't sound like much but they're going through mine fields, heavy fortifications, this is tough ground to break through. i think the u.s. view would be after the first day this offensive is off to a powerful start with lots of different opportunities for movement.

>> all right. we will be following this. we are also following this morning more new developments in the investigation into former president donald trump taking classified documents with him to mar-a-lago after leaving the white house. nbc news has confirmed that attorneys for the former president met with justice department officials yesterday, including special counsel jack smith at doj headquarters in in washington, d.c. attorney general merrick garland and deputy attorney general lisa monaco did not attend. the meeting comes as the grand jury investigating trump's handling of classified documents is expected to meet again this week after a weeks' long hiatus. the meeting also comes nearly two weeks after two of trump's attorneys sent a letter to the attorney general asking for a meeting to discuss what they call jack smith's unfair treatment of trump. moments after trump's attorneys

were seen leaving the doj the former president took to social media asking, quote, how can the doj possibly charge me, who did nothing wrong? >> willie, it's tough. it's tough in mar-a-lago. the caps lock apparently -- >> it's stuck. >> it's stuck. >> might have been the pool water. i don't know. >> it has been all weekend. >> very moist. >> maybe he had all of his electronics in one room -- >> i hate it. you can't get the "f" -- >> you get water damage on those things. >> what happened to the documents that were in the empty folders. >> anyhow -- >> a scene out of "caddyshack" draining the pool. more on that later. nbc news has learned a federal grand jury in jury -- this is a bit of a twist -- will meet this week to hear witness testimony in that classified documents case in florida according to a source familiar with the investigation. "the new york times" reports at least one other witness already has appeared before the florida

grand jury. at this point, though, not clear how the court proceedings in florida relate to the work of the separate grand jury in washington. the "wall street journal" reports the florida grand jury appears to be an effort to tie up several loose ends that's according to people familiar with the process. so, john, put all these pieces of together here, we don't know exactly how the florida grand jury relates to the one in washington, but clearly with donald trump's attorneys sitting with jack smith, we're getting close to something here. >> yeah, there's no question there. we are not quite sure what the timetable s but we seem to be in the end stages of this investigation, whether that means this week, next or a few more, we don't know, but it's clear that there's an acceleration here. the grand jury is meeting go then week in washington after several weeks that they've been down they're ramping back up. we have this development now, learning about this separate grand jury in florida, we're not quite sure how they're connected but there is a sense also of course about the mar-a-lago documents case. this is the meeting that the trump attorneys wanted. we remember trump posted on truth social during one of his

other all caps screens in recent weeks that he posted this letter as well saying that they wanted to meet with the investigators. that's often what happens in the last stage before charging decision where the attorneys for the would be defendant ask for charges to be dropped or at least lesser ones be brought and it's not clear that -- through reporting that they made any progress with that yesterday. we are now the world is watching as to what is next, but certainly as i've reported, i know joe has heard the same, there is a sense of real panic growing at mar-a-lago, reflective in trump's truth social tweets but also those calmer heads in the room say, look, we're concerned w we feel like a charge could be coming and coming do you know. >> what does it signal that trump's three attorneys were at doj headquarters yesterday about where we are in this process? >> we are approaching the very end. i kept hearing this ear worm in my head as i was coming to the studio this morning, this is it, make no mistake. this -- we're getting down to

the final strokes of this race and what's clearly really remarkable about it is that of all the things that this man has done, eight decades of lying and cheating and stealing, this case, this documents case, is probably the easiest, shortest, simplest and yet carries the most severe penalties of -- likely penalties of any of the cases -- any of the legal issues that he's ever faced. now, people will say, you know, he really in a just world he would go to jail for what he did on january 6, the weeks approaching january 6 and i kind of agree with that, but for this man who is basically a nihilistic moron, for him to go to jail potentially for a long time, these espionage act charges bring very heavy sentences to potentially go to jail for something so pointless

and silly and useless as keeping these documents is actually kind of -- >> once again, there is also the potential narrative of people very, very low under trump following his orders. is there the potential that there could be others swept into it? >> absolutely. >> there any potential the florida venue has something to do with that? >> this isn't a hard case. it's almost like a buy and bust drug case because it's so simple -- >> charging document is going to be i understand most likely going to be very short, very to the point. >> right. >> straight line. >> very clean. >> a lot of the facts are still out, they don't need to tell the world what happened here it's very, very simple. but the thing is you've got acts that were committed in florida, criminal acts committed in florida, committed in d.c., committed in florida that were directed at d.c. and so under the 6th amendment, 6th amendment requires that all criminal defendants be tried before a jury of the state and district in which the crime is committed. there is a tricky -- there is a

tricky aspect of this about what the proper venue s even for trump, but certainly if there are lesser characters who had no involvement, no connection to anything that happened here in the district of columbia, then they would have to be charged in the southern district of florida and that could be the explanation for that grand jury. >> jackie, what are you hearing? >> a lot of different things. i'm still processing you saying the word "moist" on television, but we are nearing the end but it's a matter of what happens between now and the end because as george indicated the department of justice is wrapping up a lot of loose ends right now, dotting the i's, crossing the t's. it is possible that they are going to check off a box, bring in some other witnesses before charging decision lands, prosecution memo most likely still being written. there are auto number of things,

again, that could happen, including any charges against the lower tier people who might have been involved with the obstruction track of this case as we are looking at sort of two tracks that jack smith has narrowed the mar-a-lago case down to which is the classification issues, did trump willfully, knowingly retain classified information and then the various pressure points of obstruction along the way. so i think i will be watching sort of these, you know -- these supporting actors and characters in the meantime, but all signs point to a decision coming imminently and we've been told that trump advisers are expecting that as well and that the meeting yesterday which was sort of a front for them at least for raising grievances with jay brat and jack smith for some of their more aggressive tactics in terms of obtaining evidence and waiving attorney/client privilege and

fighting for evidence, but also to make one final plea and ask not to indict their client. >> one final plea also playing to their audience of one, donald trump. go up and scold the doj or whatever. you know, gene, of the many political and constitutional norms that donald trump has violated and the damage that he has caused, the scar tissue on our political system, i think actually one of the most extreme will be one of the ones that he loathes the most and that is a former president not only being indicted and charged but probably convicted. that is a line that scares the hell out of me, that as america crosses t again, i think he's put the judicial branch in no other position but to do this, but as you've written quite eloquently, this is not a good day for america regardless of

how you feel about donald trump. this is a very sad and i would say dangerous day. >> right. i don't want us to have to go through with this, but we do have to go through with it. >> i think it's an important day. >> he is the one that brought us here. this is his fault. he did this stuff and -- >> no man is above the law. >> he has to be held accountable. he is no the above the law. but it is -- it is a sad thing that we have to contemplate, you know, the trial and possible conviction and then punishment of the former president and that will be a traumatic thing for the country to go through and it's -- again, it's his fault. it's not jack smith's fault, it's not joe biden's fault, it's donald trump's fault. but this is yet another horrible legacy that he's going to leave to this country. it's just amazing. i just had one question for george which is that -- so jack

smith is driving this bus. >> right. >> in the end does the attorney general have any role to play in this decision or is it basically up to jack smith? >> under the regulations, i'm mean, these are the regulations that were drafted after the original ethics and government act, independent counsel was struck down, the ag is supposed to supervise the special counsel and has the obligation to and he could veto in theory a prosecution. he could direct the special counsel what to do because the special counsel is an employee who reports to the attorney general, but i think, you know, the purpose of the whole exercise is so that garland can say i did not influence this decision. i allowed a professional to make the assessment and i think that's -- he's going to let the chips fall where they may. i think he knew that was what he was going to do when he appointed jack smith. >> we put garland in an

uncomfortable position. he would have to go to congress and explain a position for veto. all signs are that he is risk averse. >> david, looking down the road, let's look -- and i agree with you, no man is above the law, no person is above the law so i understand we are left with little choice. as a country that said, david, the consequences are pretty rough. it's always been maddening when a single district court judge in texas could stop democratic legislation or a single district court judge in california could stop republican legislation and then you would have to try it out. now in this age of political figures, donald trump mainly being indicted, now we're hearing of, you know, prosecutors wanting to read charges against joe biden. we heard yesterday a sheriff in san antonio wants to bring charges against ron desantis for

the martha's vineyard flight. you know, you're going to have a lot of sheriffs, a lot of local people that are going to be bringing charges against national figures and it could lead to a pretty chaotic situation. >> and that's one of the dangers of the moment is that people will respond what we are expecting will be the indictment of trump with capricious use of our legal system, our precious legal system, our legal system that got us through in my judgment the nightmare of the 2020 election, the sensible judges who ruled, many of them republicans, that we will enter a period in which people -- this legal system has been weaponized and we are going to use it to -- i think it's important that the jack smith case be as jackie and george were saying narrowly focused. there is a difference between the classified document issues that are often handled

administratively and what seems to be the evidence of deliberate obstruction, deliberate acts to conceal things from the justice department as it was investigating. this isn't like hillary clinton's email server. this isn't like anything else you have read about. this is a deliberate, willful attempt to manipulate and conceal. i think it will be easier to prosecute, easier for the country to i can it in. >> it's the line, it's the construction, it's the sort of thing if anybody else had done it they would be in jail and that certainly is the case that jack smith has to make. it should be clear and to the point. >> all right. still ahead on "morning joe," two more republicans are officially jumping into the 2024 white house race. how mike pence and chris christie's candidacies could impact the field. this as republican governor chris sununu decides not to run,

saying beating trump matters more. also ahead, attorneys for donald trump ask a judge to stop writer e. jean carroll's defamation case against the former president. we will have the latest on that legal fight. and house minority leader hakeem jeffries is our guest this morning on the heels of congress averting a debt crisis. you're watching "morning joe." we will be right back.

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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. ♪♪ with fastsigns, signage that gets you noticed turns hot lots into homes. ♪♪ fastsigns. make your statement. the investigation is not dead. this is only the beginning. it appears this investigation is part of an ongoing investigation which i assume is in delaware.

>> the part about ongoing investigation -- >> okay. then i must have missed that because i have not heard that this is part of any ongoing investigation. what i know is that the fbi, department of justice team under which will i can't think barr and scott brady in the western district of pennsylvania terminated the investigation. they said there were no grounds for further investigative steps. i would hope my colleagues would think long and hard before holding the director of the fbi in contempt for what the trump administration and william barr did back in 2020. >> maryland congressman jamie raskin the ranking democrat on the oversight committee responding yesterday to the chairman of the house oversight committee kentucky republican james comer after both men received a briefing with fbi officials over a document related to an investigation into the biden family business dealings. jackie, can you explain what's going on here?

>> what was comer saying? >> this briefing that happened about this form that contained unsubstantiated allegations about joe biden and his family is what james comer had subpoenaed for, they finally got a review of this form yesterday and they were briefed by fbi officials. james comer, jamie raskin in the same room with the same people getting the exact same briefing. we have sources that independently confirm that the fbi actually had looked into this 1023 document that records allegations made by a confidential informant. it was closed. this all happened under bill barr. our sources say it was related to rudy giuliani's allegations all surrounding burisma, when will barr opened up this field office in pittsburgh at the end of 2020 to field all of these really conspiratorial claims that were being funneled into the fbi but they were being vetted and checked out and sort of -- and crossed off the list. but james comer has tried to

dredge this up and his readout, we are told, is inconsistent with what actually happened. he claims that the investigation is still ongoing. we haven't gotten clarity on what that investigation s he also claims that this information that was included in the 1023 form is also being used in an ongoing investigation. we've also been told that that's not accurate. >> it really is unbelievable. i mean, the -- george, i mean -- >> i'm sure bill barr was covering for hunter biden. >> of course. it's just unbelievable. time and time again comer overpromises, underdelivers. got the same thing of course with that poor special -- what's his name again? durham. durham who, again, overpromised, underdelivered, lost everything that he took into the court. and in this case you've got comer who, again, has been trying to do things -- even the "wall street journal" editorial page saying no smoking guns.

>> these people just get out over their skis, they are so desperate to distract from the issues that face the former president, frankly, and others. they will just take anything, any scrap of information and will twist it and combine it with other scraps of fake information or real information and turn it into something and there's nothing there. >> jackie, these conspiratorial wanderings by comer, that's different from what the fbi is investigating on hunter himself, right? >> it is. but it is possible that any and all information that has ever been submitted to the fbi would need to be given to any ongoing investigation related to someone. that being said, we can definitively say that these claims did not check out and that the fbi did close their review and assessment into the claims that the confidential

informant had provided to this fbi agent -- sorry. the confidential informant as jamie raskin noted in his statement had received tips and allegations from his or her sources in ukraine and then reported that back to the fbi. those allegations are moot. >> right. willie? >> john, we should also point out that james comey and other republicans have given away the game on several occasions saying out loud on broadcast interviews look at what's happened since we started this investigation, biden's poll numbers are down, cherry-picking a poll that shows that donald trump is leading joe biden saying effectively our work -- it's working, the thing we're trying to do which is to drag joe biden down during a presidential campaign is working. contrast that with going back to benghazi where republican leadership took great pains to say this is the investigation of the death of americans, it's not about taking down hillary clinton, though most people believe that was part of it as

well. >> it wasn't a one time slip of the tongue. they have repeatedly said we're doing this to try to attack president biden and his poll numbers. other times he's said they've lost the informant and key witnesses. we've heard from senator grassley complaining about fbi director wray and admitting that he had seen the document that he was looking for and that it didn't matter whether or not it showed any wrongdoing or not, that wasn't the point, it's all about the process. with he should note that kevin mccarthy got in trouble post benghazi for acknowledging look at the toll that it took for hillary clinton's poll numbers. this is not a new play for republicans, but it just goes to show the efforts, again, to muddy the waters, to try to make things equivalent and right now as donald trump the leading voice in the republican party faces all sorts of legal peril, they're trying to gin up smoke to say, look, joe biden does, too. >> during the benghazi hearings, during that investigation, kevin mccarthy was made to apologize

publicly by republican leadership for suggesting it was about hillary clinton's poll numbers. >> but that was old kevin, this is -- of course we now are into like statesman kevin. >> new kev. >> this new kevin. >> just kev. >> no, you're exactly right. what an unbelievable change when kevin mccarthy goes on television and says, well, benghazi hearings, the proof is in the pudding, hillary clinton's numbers are going down and he was actually chided by his caucus for that. many people believe that he wasn't named speaker because of that. now of course they wallow in it. they wallow in it. you have, gene, you have grassley going on tv going, we don't care whether biden did anything right or wrong or not. >> exactly. >> it doesn't matter to us. >> exactly. it's the process. >> again, they've given up the game on this. >> i know. they really have. it's so transparent.

this is today's republican party. it's just very different. even for the republican party of 2016. i mean, come on. but it is. all right. the "washington post," jackie a.m. mainy thank you for coming on. the look behind the desperate effort to rescue america's past time from irrelevance. the new cover story by the atlantic on how baseball saved itself. >> i wish the red sox could. >> not happening. "morning joe" will be right back. not happening "morning joe" will be right back when migraine strikes. are the tradeoffs of treating worth it? ubrelvy is another option. it quickly stops migraine in its tracks. do not take with strong cyp3a4 inhibitors. allergic reactions to ubrelvy can happen.

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joe." >> yeah. >> the 6th of june. again, extraordinarily momentous day. >> yes, it is. >> momentous day because of d-day. >> oh. >> we remember bobby kennedy every year on this day, june 6th, but also momentous day in your household. >> yes, it's my daughter's

birthday today. she's 25. what happened to time? carly. >> it keeps slipping. >> happy birthday. >> we have chris matthews here. >> okay. >> i was telling everybody on the table again mika -- our days, wherever we were would stop, if we were out -- >> it's true. >> if we were on maine on a lobster boat at 6:30 she would go we have 30 minutes, we have to go. >> i can't miss the lead line. >> we would get in, we would run for the tv set, 6:59, turn it on and there would be chris that would be, bar fight. >> that was a good one. >> one of mika's favorite. >> we filed the heat. >> bar fight. let's play hard ball. >> i tried to send chris submissions, but he has his only thing. >> that's like sending headlines to the new york post. i mean, come on. >> all right. chris matthews is here. former vice president mike pence is officially entering the race for president. pence filed paperwork yesterday declaring his candidacy.

he is expected to formally announce his white house bid at a rally outside des moines, iowa, tomorrow. also former new jersey governor chris christie is expected to launch his 2024 presidential bid tonight. he is scheduled to hold a town hall event at st. an sem college in new hampshire where he will make the announcement. new hampshire governor chris sununu has announced he will not be running. >> so we've taken the last six months to really kind of look at things, where everything is, and i've made the decision not to run for president on the republican ticket in 2024. obviously a lot goes into that decision, but it's been quite an adventure, but not the end of the adventure by any means. >> governor sununu goes on to explain his decision in an op-ed for the "washington post" entitled "i'm not running for president in 2024: beating trump is more important."

>> chris, we have had a boat load, speaking of lobster boats, a lobster boat full of republican candidates jumping into the race. what's the impact? do you see christie or pence breaking through? >> not breaking through, they are on in the on deck circle, aren't they? they're waiting for something to crack. >> oh. so they don't have to do it. >> in' 24 it will be a different year than '23. if there's convictions with these indictments and they are all going to come perhaps before march even some of them, that it's going to be a different world out there. you're not going to crack that 30% probably of the trump people but you're going to crack around it a lot and make people second guess. i think they are all hoping for something new. >> yeah. >> trump -- if trump is in full power he will be dangerous to them personally, but i think they're willing to take the short-term risk of facing the chance to be president of the united states. it's still an amazing goal to be

president and i think they think they can beat joe biden. >> so, willie, chris christie took it upon himself last time to be the prosecutor, to take down marco rubio. the political prosecutor gets rubio and he did it. he destroyed him in a debate, destroyed his chances if he ever had them. i am wondering has he been waiting three and a half years to do the same thing or -- i'm sorry, seven and a half years -- to do the same thing to donald trump? >> yeah, i mean, he knee capped marco rubio in that debate to the benefit, though, of donald trump. not really to his own benefit. he just helped donald trump get somebody else out of the way. we'll see. chris christie beyond new hampshire, john, remains to be seen what his appeal s what the case for this is, but as chris matthews points out, i think a lot of people are getting in and the field is big now.

we have to say for this big bad behemoth of the republican party, donald trump, they sure don't seem to be afraid to get in and run against them, at least to take a shot at it because of everything that may be coming down the pike. you're not going to break his base, it is his base, they are not going to leave him, he has suggested he could win from a prison cell probably among his voters but they're hoping perhaps that enough people want something else that they will be the one if not ron desantis. >> christie skipping eye warnings his candidacy seems tailor made just for new hampshire, speaking to independent voters there. i think we should be careful, let's remember, he also served donald trump pretty faithfully until the end, he was part of his general election debate team in the fall of 2020, in fact, got covid and was hospitalized because of that. his turn on trump is relatively recent. yes, he has shown he has the ability, he has the rhetorical skills to deliver some blows, whether he does it in trump's face or not remains to be seen. we don't know what debates will

be like, whether christie will qualify for a debate, whether trump will participate in a debate. the more candidates that jump in the better it is for trump because we know his base will stay with him and now this is getting to be a pretty -- a pretty crowded field and i think we should also watch to see how vice president pence tries to handle this. who is trying to put a happy warrior face his team says as a contrast to the anger we heard from trump, the grievance we hear from desantis but he is somebody polling in the low single digits, someone who trump's base has not forgiven him for january 6. he is's betting conversely with christie betting on iowa. >> george, you had two potential candidates, governor sununu making the case making the case a lot of people made, we don't need more people in this, splintering up the anti-trump vote. chris christie making the case, we have to get in and try, who knows where this goes with donald trump and all his legal problems. which of those cases strikes you as more compelling? >> well, i like both of those cases. i like both.

i like what those two have been doing. i like the fact that sununu dropped out. i think he didn't have a chance. i think the problem we have here is 2016 redux, which is that there are too many people running against donald trump and they're all going to take shots at each other. chris christie on the other hand, the difference between him and chris christie's 2016 and everybody else in 2016, he's going to go right after trump. they all should be going right after trump and they need to go after him, not just because to point out all of his flaws, which everyone really even the republican electorate knows very well, but to trigger him to engage in, you know, conduct that will turn people off. he has to be triggered. >> yeah. >> david ignatius. >> i want to ask chris if he thinks looking at the political race broadly we're seeing what might be called a renormalization of politics. >> yeah. >> president biden is trying hard to be that bipartisan guy in the middle and the republican

field, you know, people aren't quite so afraid of trump and trying to talk to normal republican politics. what do you think? is that what's going on and will it last? >> let's talk about chris christie. i think he's fascinating. one night on -- i had the program, i said something, pleasantly, let's talk about something, and he said, well, i don't like you. just so chris christie. i don't like you. can we have dinner tonight? what did that all mean? i thought, this guy -- he likes to be fighting. he reminds me of one of my dad's old knights of columbus buddies, you know, italian guy, from the big city, he sees very big time new york and he's, like, this is the kind of guy that the republican party needs to go for. this was their target, the republican party. we're going to get those guys on the democratic side, they're going to vote republican, this time for ronald reagan and that's our party. and that was the whole idea of it.

christie is a classic example of a 19le s republican. people like the guy. and when they went after him for being overweight in that corzine ad, when i saw that ad, i don't know about you, i saw the tv ad they ran against him, i said corzine is going to lose. i was hoping it, because i thought it was dirty politics. i think christie has this personality and then joe manchin, talk about personality this week, did you watch him dancing on the third party thing in the new labels thing? i won't say anything good about trump, i mean about biden. he's too far left. and he's been pulled too far left. i want to be a third party candidate, another problem for the democrats. >> it certainly is. so, gene, talking about republican candidates, i saw tim scott yesterday on "the view." chris reminded me because chris was talking about christie saying i don't like you, let's go to dinner, and tim scott was

in iowa going i hate "the view" and yesterday i'm on "the view." i can't ever say this on twitter because people are so -- it is everything is black and white on twitter. so if i say this on twitter, people are, like, oh, you're for abortion and, like, the first -- whatever. for abortion bans the first week and whatever. so, but let me just say, tim scott, i saw tim scott, a clip of tim scott in iowa, and i saw him on "the view," which should have been a very hostile situation and the clip i saw because i was traveling was he and sunny talking at the table. like two very different views of race in america. both extraordinarily respectful and it was one of those moments two things can be true at the same time. tim scott's argument made extraordinary progress on race in this country. my grandfather in south carolina had to step off the street when

a white man approached and couldn't even look him in the eye. my mother in south carolina, when she went to high school, only 10% of black americans were going to high school. when i graduated, 90% -- and talked about unemployment being at 5% and sunny talked about the long road we still have, being a more perfect union. >> which is very fair. >> extraordinarily fair. but i will say, first time -- tim scott went in there, talk about a happy warrior, smiling, they were coming at him hard, he was so polite, differential. do we have the exchange? >> roll it. >> you say that your life disproves leftist lies. and my question to you is i'm the exception, right? you're the exception. maybe even miss whoopi goldberg

is the exception. but we are not the rule. and so when it comes to racial inequality, it persists in five core aspects in life in the u.s., economics, education, healthcare, criminal justice and housing. at nearly every turn these achievements were fought, threatened, and erased, most often by white violence. you have indicated that you don't believe in systemic racism. what is your definition of systemic racism? >> let me answer the question that you've answered -- asked. >> does it even exist in your mind? >> let me answer the question this way. one way i think about and one of the reasons i'm on the show is because of the comments that were made on this show that the only way for a young african american kid to be successful in this country is to be the exception and not the rule. that is a dangerous offensive disgusting message to send to our young people today, that the only way to succeed is by being the exception. >> is that all you have?

is that all you have? that's like cutting the gettysburg address off with -- and then lincoln said -- >> it was good. it was -- >> i can -- >> hold on a second. you need to get a lot more of that because it was really good moving discussion between both of them. and, gene, my only point is that they had a great honest discussion on race and tim scott actually did what no republican i've seen do effectively in a long time, go into a hostile environment, be respectful and get his message across. >> my question is, will republicans vote for him. and where does that get him in the republican primary? and i wonder about that. i wonder about that. you know, i would have debated him on some of his points, having also grown up in south

carolina, a little bit older than he is, but i have a somewhat different view. but i would agree with you that he came across well in that exchange. and in his demeanor, in the fact that he went there, and he had, you know, a civilized discussion on "the view." that's to his credit. my question to chris, you're a great evaluator of horse flesh, who do you see? what do you think of scott? what do you see when you look at nikki haley, when you look at the republican field? >> he had the guts to take the flag down at the right time and lindsey graham went along with her. that's leadership to know that timing to do the right thing. and she did both. i think that -- i think that tim scott is going to be a figure because i -- the more i dig into it, the more i listen to republicans talk about it, he's

for real. you can question the racial attitudes. you can do it. always question that anywhere in the country. but i think they got it. they got something about this guy. i think he's a guy that gives them credibility. i can see trump if he survives putting him on the ticket with him for sure. he's been very careful not to attack trump. i think he'll give the best speech at the republican convention whether he's nominated or not for either office because i can hear him. the guy is going to have a message. and his message is i'm me. i'm me. you can talk about other people, what other people are, you can talk about identity politics all you want, i don't believe in identity politics. i'm proof there is -- because i'm here. a lot of them have racially tinged views of a lot of things, immigration and crime and all that. i think he's the proof positive we're not like that. you like that? do you like the way i said that? >> i hear the narrative. i think that will be the

narrative. i think the narrative is open to challenge. >> it should be open to challenge because there is systemic racism in america. but i will tell you this, not from white people telling tim scott he doesn't really understand what it is like to be a black man. that is deeply offensive. >> this is where i draw the line. no one can tell tim scott how to be black. you know. so, no, i -- >> there is that element. >> people say he cannot have these views because he's african american. of course he can have those views. he can be wrong, you know. >> his view of reality, i don't think you can be wrong about his own reality. if he believes what he believes about his experience, there are a lot of people who would say the same thing as tim scott. i guess the main thing is, though, again, it opens up a good opportunity for a great respectful debate on race where

people have different viewpoints and tim scott, i have no doubt the republican party, there are a lot of people in the republican party that are not enlightened on race, who appoint tim scott and say look at us, look at us, look at us. i understand that part of it. but also i understand the offensiveness when pundits mock and ridicule tim scott, like he doesn't have a right to talk about the black experience in america because he's a black conservative. >> i hear him and people allied with him complaining about that a lot. i don't hear that a lot. i don't hear -- >> they're friends of mine. it does happen. >> in philadelphia, we saw the piece in your paper yesterday about the low turnout, 32% in the mayor's race. i'm thinking about that. there is a real problem for bobby casey and president biden that the nominees, the party, and i think there is going to be an excitement. if you have a black man on one

ticket, and a woman, an african american background, indian background on the other ticket, i think the turnout will be pretty good. i think it will lighten up people. excite them about this election. >> interesting. >> i think it is going to give it something super charged about this election. >> first time i've been really excited about the 2024 election race in a while. you think this is going to be so grim, replay of -- and, you know, as chris and gene and all of us talk about it, it is going to be an interesting election, new personalities, and a fuller, richer debate than we had in a while. >> a return to gravity here as far as you look at trump is still there, but what from -- from what you and i have heard talking to people who voted for trump and -- there is an exhaustion. trump may still win the nomination. this is not 2006. >> i studied this exhaustion,

just anecdotal conversations with trump's supporters, i wanted to ask you about this. where really the all in could never vote for biden, trump supporters, local business owners, and people i've known for a long time, from maine to florida, and across the board they have told me they're exhausted, you know, if i ask them, will they vote for donald trump again, but then the answer is they could never vote for biden and then the answer on top of the answer is disinformation, which there is the part where the conversation separates us, where they are going down rabbit holes, it is a witch-hunt, joe biden took documents, he should be in jail and just sort of -- and i just listen to that part and would you vote for him again? they get to yes.

>> but -- >> hold on a second. this is important. we're talking about in a general election against joe biden. >> right. >> they want to vote for somebody else in the primary. >> before we get too optimistic around this 2024 election, if donald trump is the nominee, that election is all about trump. it is all about donald trump. if ron desantis is the nominee, it is all about anger. it is about being mad. >> yeah. >> that's right. >> and getting revenge. and those are the two most likely outcomes right now. so -- >> i would only -- i think my question is this, if donald trump wins the nomination, the election is about donald trump. if anybody else wins the nomination, the election is about joe biden. and when people are talking about donald trump, democrats win. people are talking about joe biden, republicans win.

and that's -- that's the thing -- i get what you're saying about ron desantis and the anger and everything else, but, man, it is -- it is just like 2016, that race wasn't about -- race wasn't about donald trump. that race was about people going i am not going to put another clinton and another bush in the white house for the 34th year out of 40 years. >> i think it is about that. i think it is about the establishment, call it what you want, the big city establishment against people in pennsylvania and virginia who visited from voting for al gore to supporting joe manchin or justice. i think the country is right down the middle. we saw this in 2000, we saw it in 16 and '20, it wants to get back to 2020, it wants to get back to close. we everything we fight and argue about in the discussions in

washington and elsewhere about how we divide over this or that or woke this or woke that, which is made up a lot of it, and it comes down to the fact there is a lot of people that don't like us, that don't like the big city democratic liberals, they don't like them, they talk about -- i got cousins like this. i've got two brothers like this. i know what they're talking about. it is the us thing. and they're not one of us. they're opposed to us. >> so, donald trump is asking a judge to stop writer e. jean carroll's second defamation lawsuit against the former president. carroll sued trump in 2019, shortly after she came forward with allegations that he raped her in a new york city department store. carroll claims trump defamed her after he called the accusation totally false and said carroll was not his type. the writers lawyers amend the lawsuit to seek $10 million in damages following trump's appearance during a town hall last month, where he again denied carroll's allegations and

called her a whack job. trump's comments came a day after a jury found him liable for sexual abuse in a defamation and a separate civil trial filed by carroll, while trump is appealing that verdict, his lawyers argue the jury's findings favor trump's position in this pending lawsuit because they rejected the rape claim. carroll's lawyer, however, disputes that claim, writing in a statement, quote, the jury's verdict makes complete sense, it concluded that trump knowingly lied about me, miss carroll when he claimed otherwise. so -- george, it is -- he went like this. >> it is just another more bs from the trump side. the reason why the jury presumably rejected the rape thing is because of the definition of rape under new york law requires certain kind of penetration as opposed to the manual -- the sexual abuse he

was actually found to do. even that was a basis for the defamation liability because she -- he basically said he didn't touch her, he didn't see her, he didn't meet her, and he engaged in a -- what was clearly sexual abuse, rape in other states. there is just no -- the notion that because the jury didn't find by preponderance of the evidence that the technical rape charge wasn't sustained doesn't help donald trump. i mean, the fact of the matter is he lied about whether he groped her, he lied about whether he touched her, how he touched her, which was absolutely horrible, and he lied that he said that he never -- he never met the woman. >> there you go. chris matthews? >> i had her on the show many times. i think she's great and tells the truth. e. jean carroll. i just know her. >> well, she's not over yet. she's coming back with another defamation suit. chris matthews, george conway, thank you both very much for being with us. great to see you both. still ahead, we'll be joined

by the top democrat in the house, congressman hakeem jeffries. we'll ask him about the debt ceiling deal and the next legislative priorities for the party. "morning joe" is coming right back. the party. "morning joe" is coming right back power e*trade's award-winning trading app makes trading easier. with its customizable options chain, easy-to-use tools and paper trading to help sharpen your skills, you can stay on top of the market from wherever you are. e*trade from morgan stanley.

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♪ live your best day, every day with the power of the gelflex grid. sleep better. live purple. welcome back to "morning joe." it is 13 minutes past the hour. interesting. joining us here in washington we have leader of the house, democratic caucus, congressman hakeem jeffries of new york. also new to the table, washington bureau chief for "usa today," susan page is with us. and white house editor for politico, sam stein. how are you feeling this morning, sam? >> great. >> sunny, optimistic? you're not really -- >> sunny optimism. >> not that much. >> never. >> sam and i like to

catasthrophize. >> we talked about different issues here, issues that most likely people will be voting about next year, has to do with the economy. got some inflationary pressures going down some. but the jobs numbers, just exploding, explosive jobs numbers report, where is this economy and is it doing as well as the job numbers suggest, and if so, why don't americans feel it? >> well, good morning, joe. great to be with you, great to be with you, mika. i think that, one, president biden has done a tremendous job on the very difficult circumstances. this economy has emerged from covid stronger than any other economy in a developed world. doesn't mean we don't have challenges. of course we do. but when you think about it, more than 13 million good-paying jobs have been created during the biden administration, that is a record. unemployment i think has now

been under 4% for 16 consecutive months. >> by the way, we look inward, you compare our numbers to the rest of the world, you compare our numbers to europe, they're really good. >> that's great. that's exactly correct. but we still have challenges. we have to fight to lower costs, you know, we continue to fight to make sure there is economic opportunity in every single zip code. the president is committed to that. he is committed to building an economy that works for every day americans, from the middle out and the bottom up. and that's what the election i think is going to be about. he's got an incredibly strong track record of success to build upon. and just help to avert a manufactured default crisis that would have hurt everyday americans. >> how does that come about? >> well, i think from the very beginning, you know, president biden had made clear we won't default. senate democrats made clear we won't default. house democrats made clear we won't default. and we understood that the

consequences of that would have been catastrophic. what was challenging is that there were some extreme maga republicans in the congress who made the political calculation that if we default, it will crash the economy. >> we always talk about the extremists, the whackos, the freaks who say the most offensive things that carry around guns in photos, threatening other members who pose with their children. all these extremists that we pay so much attention to, they ended up legislatively getting crushed. what does that say? >> well, hopefully it is a blueprint for the future. but, of course, it took leadership to bring that about. because we were in a hostage-taking situation. there were extreme maga republicans who basically said, you know what, we can use the threat of default to try to extract painful deep cuts that

we know we can't otherwise achieve through the normal legislative process because we know that democrats, president biden, folks in the house and the senate, we're team reasonable, we're team normal. we're team get stuff done, and we're dealing with team extreme who might just be willing to default and crash the economy. but president biden found the path. he held the line, but then defended these basic principles that were important to us, while, you know, finding a way -- finding enough common ground to get something done. >> in the end, there were 314 votes for the debt ceiling bill in the house. which is pretty extraordinary. i mean, the most bipartisan thing i've seen out of the house of representatives in a long time. around 150 votes or so, i think a few more democrats maybe. >> 165, but who is counting?

>> you're counting. >> so how did -- hakeem jeffries is counting. >> how did that come about, in terms of your relationship with speaker mccarthy, and in terms of getting a lot of democrats to vote for stuff that, you know, they weren't that wild about, tell us how that worked. >> you know, clearly there were a few skirmishes in some areas where there was concern, whether that was in the permitting space or around the snap program, the biden administration did a tremendous job of negotiating, you know, a resolution that actually because of the increased exemptions related to veterans or people who were homeless or people who were aging out of foster care that actually more people will be eligible to snap, not less. so that was good. but i think we basically took the position that we'll allow everyone to evaluate the resolution on the merits, make sure there is real engagement between the administration and

house democrats, every step of the way, including when a resolution had been reached and when that happened, people concluded averting a default was incredibly important. protecting social security and medicare and medicaid and veterans and education and public safety and protecting the american people against these draconian dramatic across the board 22% cuts, that was incredibly important, and taking us out of this hostage situation for the balance of this congress by suspending the debt ceiling until the early part of 2025, that was important. and as a result, we got a strong democratic vote. those who voted against it also voted out of principle object to the hostage taking moment that we were in, but what was important is that everyone supported president biden's leadership. >> willie geist. >> leader jeffries, good morning, good to see you. after this deal was put together, after the president signed the legislation, he took

great pains to thank speaker mccarthy, to talk about the spirit of bipartisanship that he actually ran on during the presidential campaign of 2020. it sounds like you're labeling that republicans of team extreme that that spirit may have dissipated already. do you take anything away from that process with hopes that more things can be done in a bipartisan basis or is that a one off because the stakes were so high for the economy? >> not a one off. i think what we have seen going back to the last congress through this congress is that we'll continue to take the following approach, which is to say we're going to find common ground, whenever and wherever possible, with the other side of the aisle. for the good of the american people. that's what we as democrats do. we want to advance the ball for everyday americans. to do that, particularly in the biden government, you got to find common ground. at the same time, as we said from the very beginning of this congress, we're going to push back against extremism whenever necessary. we can strike that balance. and if you think about the track

record of success in the biden administration, bipartisan infrastructure agreement, bipartisan gun safety legislation, more needs to be done, but bipartisan gun safety legislation for the first time in 30 years. bipartisanship to bring domestic manufacturing jobs back home to the united states of america. bipartisan reform of the electoral count act. bipartisan legislation to make sure we respect the right to marriage for everyone and now a bipartisan resolution in saving our economy from a catastrophic default. that's a great track record of success that president biden can take to the american people and democrats will remain committed to finding that bipartisanship in the house whenever possible. >> jonathan lemire. >> leader jeffries, your response to a formal partisan endeavor, some of your republican colleagues' efforts to investigate president biden and his family. we heard from congressman comer in recent days disregarding what

he -- made clear that polls are what is driving some of this investigation. and now an effort from some republicans to hold the fbi director in contempt. can we get you to weigh in on that, sir? >> i think what we have seen is that individuals who pretend to be a party of law and order are really just a party of lawlessness and disorder. joe has done a great job of pointing this out every step of the way. these are people who supported a violent insurrection, where there was an assault not just on the capitol, but on capitol police officers and they refuse to recognize their service, their bravery, their valor. this is just part of that lawlessness and disorder that i think we have seen coming from far too many extreme maga republicans on the other side of the aisle. they want to defund the fbi. they want to investigate fbi agents. now they want to hold the fbi director in contempt. by the way, an fbi director that was appointed, nominated by donald trump. >> susan page.

>> you managed to raise the debt ceiling without default, congratulations on that. that was a test for president biden. also a test for speaker mccarthy and there was some doubt beforehand that he could deliver his troops to do that. and stay in office and avoid a motion to vacate the chair. what did you learn about speaker mccarthy through this experience and what does it tell us about politics going forward? >> well, kevin mccarthy and i had a very good relationship from the beginning. open, honest, communicative relationship. and that started back in november. and we'll continue, i believe, as we continue through the rest of this congress. i think we both concluded, yeah, there will be a lot of times where we can agree to disagree. strongly disagree at times. but without being disagreeable because for the good of the institution, for the good of house democrats, house republicans, most importantly for the good of the country, we should continue to find ways to work together in order to get things done. and that's been a commitment that i think speaker mccarthy

has had with me, certainly a commitment i had with him, and one that i believe will sustain itself. >> i'm tempted to ask you about your footwear. we'll leave that for -- >> no. >> his footwear choices. >> i like it. >> no. on the oval, it's okay. you touched on what i think is kind of the central dichotomy of the biden presidency, which is -- and kevin mccarthy said this too, in private, this guy is a deft negotiator, he's tough. the republican caricature of him does not always portray that. i'm wondering if you can talk about that dichotomy. poll after poll after poll shows that this president is not exciting the democratic base. it changed but it is true right now. at the same time, you listed all these achievements. you talked about how good he was in the negotiations. what does he have to do? what does the white house have to do to translate that success

that you're laying out right here into something that is tangible for the voters of his own party? >> i think as we get closer and closer to the presidential election of 2024, and the biden administration and president biden himself gets out in the campaign trail, takes his case to the american people, we'll see what alternative emerges on the other side. but it is going to be an extreme alternative. and he'll be able to point out that, you know, he's going to continue to build this economy, that works for everyday americans, he's going to fight for reproductive freedom because we believe in a woman's freedom to make her own reproductive healthcare decisions. the other side wants to criminalize abortion care and impose a nationwide ban. we actually believe in democracy. we want to protect and strengthen social security and medicare. the other side wants to end those things as we know them today and they will continue to try to do that. we believe that everyone should pay their fair share. president biden continues to make that point. the other side, you know, is going to try to dramatically cut taxes for the wealthy, well off and well connected as they did

with the gop tax scam. i think once there is a clear alternative in terms of what is the other vision for moving the country forward, president biden will have a track record and a vision that i think will be very compelling to the american people. >> a choice for the opposition and not a referendum on his own record? >> well, i think what we also saw during the midterm elections where the expectation was that this will be a referendum that will result in a red wave for the other side of the aisle in 2022, once again, president biden defied expectations. it was barely a ripple when you think about it. we picked up a seat in the senate. won governorships across the u.s. and arizona. flipped seats including michigan and in pennsylvania. and the other side barely held on to the house of representatives. >> kevin mccarthy had promised 50 seats a year earlier. and if the new york state legislature knew how to redistrict, democrats -- it just

comes down to that. democrats would be in control of the house too. i want to pick up on something that sam said, mika, that i think is so important and again -- >> sam? >> something that sam said, please. >> just checking. >> so, this is so important i think for people to understand that don't know what goes on behind closed doors in washington, d.c. joe biden, as you all have said, joe biden behind closed doors negotiating is as tough and as agile as any president i've ever heard of, in negotiations. and i was talking to -- talked in several foreign leaders and also talked to an aide that was with macron when they came here and the aide said we went in, we didn't know what we were going to get, because what we saw on tv. we have five points.

president macron was pretty angry with the united states. and there were five really tough complex points. and they weren't really sure how joe biden would respond. if you like donald trump and reagan in his later years and not be able to keep up with the pace of everything. they said point by point by point, not only was biden right there toe to toe with him, but also he understood some subtleties and nuances that they didn't even. that they weren't even prepared for. i only say this to say this is the overwhelming consensus of domestic politicians, foreign leaders, that go into joe biden, joe biden is a tough negotiator, he is cogent. i will say publicly especially when he's tired, he does not

present well. just like george w. bush, you walk in george w. bush's office, that's the coolest guy in the world, he goes out into the east room, and he gets inside of his head and he says things that he, you know, his aides would say he'll walk off stage making fun of himself. sometimes biden gets in his head. not making any excuses for him, but there is such a dichotomy is the perfect word. there is an extreme dichotomy between the joe biden in front of the cameras and the joe biden in front of the negotiators. >> but compared to -- i will say, compared to what? donald trump? >> i'm comparing him to himself. compared to how he's being judged. >> he will say himself that he, you know, he is who he is. he actually struggled with a stutter. these are things that are just -- they -- when people are constantly putting the camera on him, you'll capture these moments, you'll get them. that doesn't define his ability to negotiate behind closed doors

and if he's laughing at you, you're in big trouble. if he's, like, really having a great time and is chuckling, you're in big trouble if you're trying to negotiate something. he has a real way of doing it. >> there are political consequences and susan and gene will certainly remember this, bob dole was another guy. bob dole one on one in his office, wow, get him in front of a tv camera, he's bad. >> i will say this, president biden certainly incredible leader, incredible negotiator, incredible strategist. and he's strong, brilliant, understands nuance in those conversations, some of whom -- i was with him and, you know, the legislative leaders and saw it firsthand. in a high stakes circumstance. but also, if you think about perhaps president biden's biggest moment in front of the american people this year, which was his state of the union address, he delivered, he delivered in a big way. and it wasn't just the script. he had to face a hostile crowd

of people on the other side of the aisle and faced them down, came off the script, did it spontaneously and got them to publicly commit to take social security and medicare off the table. joe biden and his finest, in a public way, and in a very high stakes environment. >> thank you so much for being here. >> great to have you. >> we greatly appreciate it. we know you got to go, do some work. unfortunately, we still don't have to work. we'll let you sneak out. i'm going to keep talking here. i want to talk to susan for a second here, thank you so much. susan, you wrote about joe biden's brand going into the -- the brand right now is compromised. that ain't cool in a lot of primary contests, but that is his brand. he actually gets things done. >> he actually got this done. and not everybody was sure where we were going with this debt ceiling deal, including some democrats who had questions about whether the white house was selling their message in the right way and it turned out he

was extremely deft in that -- in getting this to happen in a way that was pretty smooth and not actually -- we didn't go over the cliff and didn't go over to the last day. i was surprised by that. we weren't dealing with this on sunday night. that is who he is. that's who he was for years during that last campaign as well. and it is what some democrats think you need to have to actually win against donald trump. that was the conclusion last time that they might prefer other democrats, other democrats might be younger and more vibrant or more interesting or more appealing to progressives. but joe biden was at that commitment to bipartisanship that was forged in his decades in the senate was what was going to actually appeal to the american people. that is the bet the white house is making now. >> and, gene, this is a president who has been mocked, ridiculed, underestimated. >> every day. >> told by his own party when he came into office, basically, old man, come on, you can't deal

with the republicans. you're dreaming. this isn't 1974. this isn't 1975. wake up. you got to go to war with them. and here we are, two, two and a half years later, he signed 350 pieces of bipartisan legislation, putting him -- i mean, my god, what do we go back to? maybe lbj? 350 pieces of bipartisan legislation? >> you know, so far, his theory of the case is pretty much proving out. and, you know, what you just said, joe biden being underestimated time and time and time again. he loves to be underestimated, you know. it is a great position for him to be in. i've seen that sort of sharpness that he has. his command of issues and also i've seen him on days when he was at the end of a very long day, when he was tired. and when he was -- he was that

joe biden and so, you know, the american people are going to look at him in 2024 and they'll see a man who is, you know, 80 years old and will make a judgment about that, but it will not just be a referendum. i do believe it will be a choice. and i believe that insofar as it is a choice, based on issues like women's reproductive rights and gun violence and many other such issues, you know, i like biden's chances. >> it was the context of that election that helped him so much, covid, trump, people really wanted some stabilizing force, someone who could actually unite the parties together. and if joe biden was sort of the emblem of that. and i wonder to a degree if he's

going to be a victim of the successes he had in office. if you get away from the chaotic years of trump, the more you get away from the chaotic years, the more you put covid in the rear view mirror, the case becomes somewhat less compelling for the need for this stately old democratic figure to come in office. and, you know, look, i think his achievements, yeah, they're there, obviously. we list them through. but so too are the doubts. and, you know, leader jeffries made a compelling point, you can say, hey, look what could happen again. but he does bring to this campaign some real vulnerabilities based mostly on his public appearances. those will not get better. so democrats are very -- >> will we see robert f. kennedy jr. doing better in polls than we would have expected from his primary challenging? cornell west announcing he'll run as a third party candidate, the people's party candidate. he has this -- president biden has this appeal to the center.

he has some problems, i think, on his left flank, with progressives who are not happy, we're not happy with the debt deal and might be prone to peel off to a third party candidate. it doesn't take that many to peel off to create a problem. >> you look at joe biden and donald trump and the very things we're talking about right now, democrats are standing by joe biden because they think he's the person best suited to beat donald trump. donald trump, of course, wanting that rematch with joe biden and some weird way, i don't know what super hero movie it is, they are connected. everybody says they don't want them, but it is these two guys that are somehow strangely -- maybe it is harry potter and voldemort that the last fight, a part of them got connected, because it is a battle, again, without donald trump, joe biden probably would not be running again and vice versa. >> yeah. this is something of a mission for joe biden. he's aware of his age.

he's aware of the talk around his age. he's aware of the criticism of his age, even from members of his own party and all those concerns. but his theory of the case is i beat this guy once, i beat him in 2020, and he's only weakened since then in terms of his support among suburban voters, among women, you can go down the list, and they really believe that they have -- donald trump makes it through and is the nominee, which at the moment, it looks like he will be with a long way to go, but joe biden can and will beat him again and he, john, you know, as you cover the white house, views this in many ways as a duty, almost a patriotic duty, sure. he's of an age where he would be happy to sort of step off the stage and hand the reins to somebody else. he believes because he's done it once and can do it again, he can stop donald trump from sitting in the oval office. >> there are people in the biden family who do view this as a duty, who recognize that, you know, it could be a personal significant sacrifice for a man who would be 86 years old, but this is something he feels like

he needs to do, he needs to run there one more time because he believes he is the guy to beat donald trump and the only democratic candidate who can beat trump. and that's the other part of this, there is not much faith in the democratic bench right now. there rut doare doubts in the p. they feel like president biden needs to be the person to do so again. the dynamics would change if the republicans end up with a candidate who is not donald trump. and biden has to face a fresh face or has to go up against someone who is decades younger than he. but right now, white house officials they expect it to be trump, they feel like -- they feel very good about their chances in that potential fight. >> great conversation. susan page, thank you as always. great to see you. and still ahead on "morning joe," the latest from ukraine amid signs the country may be launching its long awaited counteroffensive against russia.

plus what we're learning about a federal grand jury in florida. testimony about donald trump's handling of classified documents. ken dilanian joins us ahead with new reporting on that. but first, mark leibovich joins us with his new cover story for "the atlantic," how baseball saved itself. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. d itself you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. the chase ink business premier card is made for people like sam who make...? ...everyday products... ...designed smarter. like a smart coffee grinder - that orders fresh beans for you. oh, genius! for more breakthroughs like that... ...i need a breakthrough card... like ours! with 2.5% cash back on purchases of $5,000 or more... plus unlimited 2% cash back on all other purchases! and with greater spending potential,

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trying to bunt for a base hit and they better hope this one goes foul. and it is not going to. that will be a bunt single for pena. >> yeah, that's toronto blue

jays pitcher alec manoa trying to blow a bunted ball foul. he allowed six earned runs in less than a single inning of work against the defending world series champions, recording one out in the 11-4 loss and devastating jonathan lemire's fantasy team. >> killing them. >> that game took over three hours to finish, with 15 total runs scored. but games that long have been rare this season. overall, the average length of a nine-inning baseball game is down 26 minutes this year. look at that number. 2:37 following the implementation of several new rules in the off season. let's bring in staff writer at the atlantic, mark leibovich, out today with a new cover story for the magazine titled "how baseball saved itself." good to see you this morning. love that you wrote this piece. we have been talking about it on this show for several months now. i don't think we fully appreciate when they announced the new rules how quickly and dramatically it would improve the game of baseball. when you go and sit at yankee

stadium and i went to a 9-8 game, a lot of runs score the, a lot of pitching changes, just over three hours, they had a huge impact and heightened interest i think in the game. >> no question about it. it is -- i was talking to gene during the break, it became unwatchable after a while. i grew up loving baseball. i didn't miss a game into my 30s and then all of a sudden, you know, they started taking forever. average length of a game couple of years ago was three hours and ten minutes, nine minutes, something like that. >> the yankees/red sox games all went over four hours. >> they did. and it was sort of nice for like a really small niche of i guess red sox and yankee fans. but for everyone else, it would go on -- >> excruciating. >> i was ready to write this obituary and it coincided with this kind of manhattan project that baseball was putting into place. and they did all this market research and they did some quite radical things and it was really kind of fascinating to be inside for that. >> so, mark, you got a great

line from the commissioner where he talks about over the years getting these morning reports about how long the games were. and he says in your piece, quote, it was not a good story. last year was so depressing, i just stopped doing it. the games were getting so long. so what prompted all of this? how long has this been in the works? and how did they get umpires, teams, players to get on board with it? >> well, it is mostly the players. the major league players association is an extremely powerful sports union, the most powerful, but very change averse. they are very, very protective of the routines that players become accustomed to, especially when it affects their livelihood, could affect wins and losses and so forth. what happened, the key there, baseball has been wanting to do this for a number of years. what made it possible was when they had a new collective bargaining agreement put into place last year, and early 2022, they actually started a new committee where actually they

could put these things into place. and lo and behold they did, and then, you know, players were a little bit resistant at first and remain a little bit resistant, but everyone else loved this. >> two questions for you, sorry, john, jumping in front of you here. one is -- >> wow. >> what was that? >> what happened there? >> whoa. >> well -- >> geez. >> where is viewership at? and i'm fascinated by the rules here. he did not come up through baseball. he's an executive. he was there for the collective bargaining strike in the '90s, but maybe he was the person who could -- only the type of commissioner they could use because he didn't have that kind of affinity for the classic virtues of the game and he was willing to usher in some sort of changes to the sacred values of

baseball. >> yeah, well, to take your first question, or did you have another one? >> no. >> data is very much on the side of the game speeding up. they actually literally had gone -- they're faster by 27, 28 minutes. attendance is up, ratings are up. so on the first few months of the season, certainly has been indicated. manford is a -- he's a deeply unpopular commissioner. as most sports commissioners tend to be. he's been around baseball for a long time. he's very, very savvy. but he's also, i mean, i think it does help that he, for many years now, he's been sitting in the chair for, you know, at least five, six years, he's been getting just his ears taken off by owners, just, like, people have been yelling at him, this is untenable. and the numbers and the rate vgz have been speaking for themselves. the players said, hey, maybe, not only are we part of the problem, but we actually could be hurt by this in the long run

because of the overall health of the game is deteriorating. >> i think we're ready to kick it to lemire at this point. >> wow. >> do you have a question for -- >> sam, you're sure you're done? are you good, sam? are you sure? if you need to interrupt me at any point, just jump in. just jump on in. that's fine. that's fine. so it is not just about the games getting shorter. i'm going to yankees/red sox on friday and will get a four-hour throwback. but the game itself has changed. they made other rules. they eliminated the shift, the bases have gotten bigger with an effort to get more balls in play, more action, so it is not just strikeouts, walks. what is the early feedback among the game as to how that's going too? >> that's less definitive. i think, you know, the big thing is the pitch clock. i can't emphasize. there have been other things put into place, like the elimination of shifts and so forth. but the pitch clock is the radical thing here.

everyone for years said baseball is a clockless game. we mustn't ever put a clock on the game. lo and behold they're doing that. they're regulating dead time. they're not regulating -- a game, you still need 27 outs or more if there is extra innings to end the game. a pitcher cannot depend on a clock to bail himself out. but, you know, the other problem with this is that the game has actually gotten quite pitching dominated, also boring. and these money balls or these new metrics things have made a lot of walks, the pitching dominance has made a lot of strikeouts, so not a lot of balls have been hit into play. that's less definitive so far. but there has been more offense. and i think people want to see that trend moving in that direction over time. >> gene, i you would see with these shifts, you would see -- >> i hated the shift. >> it was over shortstop, that's a base hit. there would be 12 guys there. >> exactly. five or six guys. >> it was everything that we were taught to do, how to hit a

baseball, how to drive it in a certain direction. it ruined the game. i love the pitch clock. but i love no shifts as well. >> batters can't spend a full minute doing their batting gloves and adjusting themselves in other ways. >> what other ways? >> how do you players react? >> they were reluctant at first. ultimately, it is their job to adapt. their basic philosophy almost across the board is, tell us what the rules are, we will adapt. i don't think they love it. but their job is to do it. it's not like they're going to say, if i complain enough, they will go back to the old rules.

maybe they will make exceptions for me. that's not how this works. there are other things they're going to have to look at, which are pitching injuries which seem to be trickling up a little bit. for the most part, the reviews have been good. >> interesting stuff. thank you. great to see you. >> good to see you. >> see you soon. coming up, live to paris where crowds are gathering for a national day of protest. it all stems from the controversial change to france's retirement mad. >> they moved it up to 24, i think. they are mad. can you believe they are that outraged it moved up to 64? >> that's next on "morning joe." from prom dresses to workouts and new adventures you hope the more you give

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the america we love and drain the washington swamp once and for all. and i will tell you, that swamp is much worse than i thought when i was out here innocently campaigning. let's drain the swamp. that swamp is a lot worse than anybody ever thought. that swamp is a dirty swamp. >> drain the swamp! >> that's donald trump in manchester, new hampshire, on a cold february night in 2020. "washington post" reporter ben terrace details the stories and how they changed the face of power in washington. ben writes, shortly after donald trump left washington, i set out to write a book about the government town he left behind.

i spent two years getting to know an eclectic group of people who are trying to make washington's new normal, whatever it was, work for them. there are those who would argue the chaotic presidency fundamentally changed the place by remaking the rules of who could become influential. others would say, trump years revealed washington for what it had always been, a city filled with people willing to do what it took to get in the game. ben joins us now. it's great to you have. congratulations on the book. >> thank you. >> you went into poker rooms, the smoke-filled rooms we hear about. you touched on it there in the excerpt. what did you seek to find by writing this book? what did you hear? >> of course, when biden won, there was this idea we could return to normal. people thought, things are going to be normal again. after covering washington for a decade, i looked around and i could tell that things were not normal. it's not a normal place after trump.

i wanted to find the people who were trying to take advantage of that normal. if i thought of the places like a new frontier, these were the people trying to get their big break in that frontier. it was an interesting place. >> it's so interesting. the day ahead of the inauguration, going to the lobby of trump's hotel to interview someone. it was populated with new characters, people who were new to washington who effectively were celebrating saying, this is our town now. we will change the way this town is run. who were some of those fascinating characters you met? did they change the town? >> a lot of people came in and they were different kinds of characters. they absolutely had a different view of how power would work. they had never been successful in washington before. they could come in and think could do new things. when they got there -- washington has a way of changing people as much as people have a way of changing washington. when the trump crew came in, a lot of them found that the way they wanted to do things didn't

necessarily achieve change. a lot of people were able to come in and make a lot of money. >> what is washington now post-trump? that hotel is not trump hotel anymore. there's no safe haven for that maga group. but people who got power, wealth, influence because of trump, some are still in town. some preparing for a potential return. >> absolutely. the way i think about it is, washington is a broken place right now. it's broken people, broken politics, broken relationships. it's a bunch of people who are still trying to figure out what the new normal is. trump changed the place and changed the way people do their jobs. but people are still figuring out how to actually do it, how to actually get things done. it's not easy when it seems like all the rules have changed, but it's not clear which ones have. >> take us inside one of the rooms. who were some of the most fascinating characters you got to sit with? they talked. they knew you were a reporter writing a book.

they just talked. what did you hear? >> i couldn't believe some of the rooms i was able to get in. one of my favorite stories -- it opens the book is a character who was a young democratic pollster, a hot shot, rising. the white house would tweet out his polls. he was helping work on the john fedderman campaign. he would have poker nights with mid-level democratic staffers. what was surprising is he would bet on politics. he conducted polls, but he would also gamble on them. >> actual money? >> actual money bets with friends, on anything from legislation to elections. watching that i was like, some people will do their scandals out in the open now. that's a trump thing. here is a thing i'm doing. >> sam stein is in washington with a question for you. >> ben, i really have enjoyed reading parts of the book. i'm curious how you feel about

this theory that washington, regardless -- obviously, who is in power matters. it attracts people who share your ideology. fundamentally, the people who inhabit this town professionally, who are in the business of politics, and other parts of the town that are not politics, in the business of politics, it is a magnet for the same type of individual, it's the ambitious, slightly socially awkwar who has a view is that their view is the right world view. they might have different ideologies, but those are the types of individuals that come to d.c., populate city and make government work. always, no matter who is in office, you have a kind of weird city of misfits. >> yeah. first of all, i think there's a lot of different types of people that come to washington. there's focus on the brand builders and the people who are on television and people who write columns. they make a name for themselves. those people can be similar

pre-trump, post-trump. in some ways donald trump fit that -- ideological malleable do whatever it takes to get attention. there's people who come to washington to do the work. put in long hours trying to make change and pass legislation. they think what they're trying to do is important. it's hard to say washington is filled with one type of person. i tried to find as many types of people i could to profile the city. >> the vast majority of people in washington are not there to get rich and famous. they are there to change the country, in their view, to the country. great new book. ben, congrats and thanks for being here. we are just past the top of

our third hour. we begin with the anniversaries of two events that changed the world. >> my brother need not be idealized or enlarged what he was in life. to be remembered simply as a good and decent man who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it. those of us who loved him and who take him to his rest today pray that what he was to us, what he wished for others will some day come to pass for all the world. as he said many times, in many parts of this nation, to those he touched and who sought to touch him, some men see things as they are and say why.

i dream things that never were and say, why not. >> that was senator ted kennedy at the funeral of his brother bobby. second funeral he would have to mark. today is june 6th. two monumental things happened on this day. the assassination and the death of bobby kennedy on june 6th, 1968. a day that really marked in many ways a low point, the chaos of the 1960s. i must say also, a day that many say this country still has not recovered from politically. the second actually, a glorious achievement. that was 79 years ago today, with 160,000 american, british and canadian troops landed in

france in the largest air, land and sea invasion ever. i've been to normandy so many times. every time, it's incomprehensible that these 18-year-old kids, 19-year-old kids, the boys scaled the walls. as ike said the day they were going in there, you are going to liberate the continent from nazi tyranny. that they did. >> i remember being with you on one of the anniversaries in normandy. looking with you out across that field of memorials, crosses and stars of david, and looking at those cliffs and seeing what those young men -- they were

mostly men had to contend with, how they had to fight up those cliffs in the face of overwhelming fire. they did that on that day. i remember talking and thinking about how our world really is built on the courage and sacrifices of those people. the other thing we celebrate today, i remember vividly i was a young man of 18 when bobby kennedy died. there was a way in which life seemed to break in that moment. he was a person, whether because of his family or the change that he had gone through -- >> an extraordinary change. >> conserative voice. he became somebody who identified with all the progressive things happening in america. the civil rights movement, need to end the vietnam war. it is true that day when he was shot, it was as if the hope that

he embodied had gone away. it's good of you to mention these two anniversaries. one that makes us happy and another that's still painful even now. >> the fearlessness of bobby in his final years, the extraordinary ability to grow from somebody that worked actually for joe mccarthy and was the hard, tough voice in his brother's ear when he was attorney general, to this extraordinary man who, of course, we remember the most eloquent words spoken after the death of martin luther king, bobby kennedy, indianapolis. jeff greenfield said he followed him around as a speechwriter throughout the entire campaign. he said, that night when he is quoting greek poets, in

indianapolis, that night, did you help him with that speech? he said, the son of a bitch wrote it in the car. he said maybe one of the great speeches in a half century, all these speechwriters, he wrote it then. i tell this story because it says all you need to know about bobby kennedy that night. the indianapolis police said, it's too dangerous. we can't go in. everybody told him to stay out. bobby went in. bobby delivered an extraordinary statement that night, the night of april 4th. in 1966 on this day, he was in south africa telling the young people of south africa, you have the power in your hands. this generation, to change things. that was the generation that ended apartheid, that freed

mandela, that changed the world. >> he was such an important figure. i don't know if people today who don't remember that day understand who he was and what he did and what he was going to do. it was his trajectory that everybody was following. i confess that from the time he was assassinated, i was almost numb in 1968. dr. king had been killed just a couple of months earlier. a couple of months before that in my hometown there had been a massacre where three young black men had been killed by white state troopers in a demonstration, three unarmed men, 37 other people shot and injured. by the time we got to june, it was too much. it was too much. >> willie, we were -- going back

to d day and young men there, i remember on the 60th anniversary going over there and just walking through the cemetery with the old men who had charged those hills. at one point, they are telling me these extraordinary stories. i said, man, what were you thinking? he said, that's the thing. we were 18-year-olds. we weren't thinking. they told us to go up the hill. we said, okay. it's amazing. he said that when he came back to the states a few years later, when he was 23, 24, he thought to himself, he said, i would have never done that at 24, at 25. not in a million years. he said, but at 18, i knew i could do it. >> i was there last summer with my kids. i took my kids over there to see it. they are old enough to

appreciate it. just walking through the american cemetery where there are more than 9,000 americans laid to rest, a cemetery established, by the way, on june 8, two days after d day 1944 to start burying our dead. you look at the ages. they are high school kids. the age of somebody still in high school or just graduated. you go, my god, they walked across a stage somewhere across our country, went to basic training and went to europe. it's an extraordinary thing to absorb. it's overwhelming to think not just the scope of the military effort, what they pulled off, what eisenhower pulled off, but the will. the will of the world, the will of the west, the will of these kids -- they were kis -- to go over there and fight an enemy that wasn't on our shores. a threat it could come. it was to liberate people and to stop evil. you ask yourself as you walk through that cemetery, do we have that will today?

i think the answer for me is, yes. a bunch of people signed up and put on packs after 9/11. fought in afghanistan. look what we are doing with ukraine, to stand up for freedom and stand against evil. that place, normandy, for me will be one of the two or three most special places in the world in terms of just witnessing what we can do when we come together and to witness the sacrifice of a generation of young americans. >> what was at stake? earlier this year we went to auschwitz. saw what happened there. in warsaw for the 80th anniversary for the ghetto uprising. the pure evil and heart of europe. that's what these kids were doing. >> absolutely. it's important to think of everything in historical

perspective. ukraine, that is as good -- not good, but black and white of good versus evil as we have seen since that time. go to afghanistan and iraq, and there were ambiguities there. we were engaging in essentially what were civil wars where one party is fighting another party for control of the country as opposed to an outside aggressor trying to squelch freedom. >> we have jackie alamany. ukraine is accusing russia of wrecking a major dam and hydroelectric station while russian state media accused ukraine of the attack. hundreds living downriver have had to evacuate due to floodwaters. the country's nuclear operator is warning the destruction of the dam could have negative consequences for the nearby zaporizhzhia nuclear power

plant. calls the situation controllable at the moment at least. u.s. officials say it appears that ukraine's counteroffensive is underway. the stepped up activity is increased artillery strikes and ground assaults. the fighting is focused east of where most experts predicted it would begin. experts say ukraine's forces can still push south from that location in order to cut off the land bridge connecting occupied crimea to mainland russia. u.s. officials tell "the times" their assessment is based off satellite imagery which indicated increased movement within ukrainian military positions. >> what can you tell us? >> speaking last night, a senior administration official said this long-awaited offensive has begun. they stressed in their analysis

the principal movement is south toward the coast. there is action in the northeast, in the donbas area. but the principal focus is to try to cut the so-called land bridge linking the donbas to crimea, to other areas that russia seizeseized. it's along multiple axis. because the ukrainians have the ability to move back and forth, they are probing, testing, seeing where the russians are weak. if they find a weakness they can move in and exploit it. move fast and hard. the progress in the first day was described to me as better than expected. at somespots it went as far as 10 kilometers. they are going through mine

fields, havy fortifications. the u.s. view would be after the first day, the offensive is off to a powerful start with lots of opportunities for movement. >> we will follow this. we are following this morning more new developments in the investigation into former president donald trump taking classified documents with him to mar-a-lago after leaving white house. nbc news has confirmed that attorneys for the former president met with justice department officials yesterday, including special counsel jack smith at doj headquarters in washington, d.c. attorney general merrick garland and the deputy attorney general did not attend. the meeting comes as the grand jury investigating trump's handling of classified documents is expected to meet again this week after a week's long hiatus. it comes nearly two weeks after two of trump's attorneys sent a letter to the attorney general

asking for a meeting to discuss what they called jack smith's unfair treatment of trump. moments after trump's attorneys were seen leaving the doj, the former president took to social media asking, how can the doj possibly charge me who did nothing wrong? >> willie, it's tough. it's tough at mar-a-lago. the caps lock is apparently -- >> it's stuck. i don't know. very moist. >> maybe he had all of his electronics in one room when he -- >> then you get -- you can't get the -- >> you get water damage on those things. >> anyhow -- >> scene out of "caddyshack" draining the pool. more on that later. a grand jury in florida will meet to hear witness testimony

in the classified documents case in florida, according to a source familiar with the investigation. "the new york times" reporting one other witness has appeared before the florida grand jury. at this point, not clear how the court proceedings in florida relate to the grand jury in washington. "the wall street journal" reports the florida grand jury is an effort to tie up several loose ends. that's according to people familiar with the process. put all these pieces together. we don't know exactly how the florida grand jury relates to the one in washington. clearly, with donald trump's attorneys sitting with jack smith, we are getting close to something here. >> yeah, there's no question there. we are not quite sure what the timetable is. but we seem to be in the end stages of the investigation. whether this week, next or a few more, we don't know. it's clear that there's an acceleration. the grand jury is meeting in washington after several weeks they had been down. they are ramping back up. we have a development learning about the separate grand jury in florida. we are not sure how they are

connected, but there is a sense about the mar-a-lago documents case. this is the meeting the trump attorneys wanted. trump posted on truth social during one of his all caps screams in recent weeks saying that they wanted to meet with the investigators. that's what happened in the last stage before a charging decision where the attorneys ask for charges to be dropped or lesser ones be brought. it's not clear that they made any progress with that yesterday. we are watching as to what is next. certainly, as i reported, joe heard the same, there's a sense of panic growing at mar-a-lago, reflective in trump's truth social tweets but those calmer heads say, we are concerned. we feel like a charge could be coming. >> what does it signal that trump's attorneys were at doj headquarters yesterday about where we are in this process? >> we are approaching the end.

i kept hearing this earworm in i had head as i was coming to the studio this morning. this is it, make no mistake. we are getting down to the final strokes of this race. what's really remarkable about it is that of all the things that this man has done, eight decades of lying and cheating and stealing, this case, this documents case is probably the easiest, shortest, simplest and carrying the most severe penalties of any of the cases that he has ever -- any of the legal issues that he has ever faced. people would say, he really -- in a just world, he would go to jail for what he did on january 6 and the weeks approaching january 6. i agree with that. but for this man who is basically a nihilistic moron, for him to go to jail

potentially for a long time -- the espionage act charges bring heavy sentences. to go to jail for something so stupid and pointless and silly and useless as keeping these documents is kind of dumb. >> there's the potential narrative of people very, very low under trump following his orders. is there the potential that there could be others swept into this? >> absolutely. >> is there potential that florida venue has something to do with that? >> absolutely. one of the -- this isn't a hard case. it's almost like a buy and bust drug case because it's so simple. >> the charging document is going to be most likely very short, very to the point. >> straight line. >> very clean. >> a lot of the facts are out. they don't need to tell the world what happened. it's very simple. the thing is, you have got acts committed in florida, criminal acts. criminal acts committed in d.c. criminal acts committed in

florida directed in d.c. you must be tried before a jury in which it was committed. there's a tricky aspect about what the proper venue is. if there are lesser characters that had nothing to do with what happened herein d.c., they would be charged in florida. >> i'm still processing the word moist on television. we are nearing the end. it's a matter of what happens between now and the end. as george indicated, the department of justice is wrapping up a lot of loose ends right now, dotting the is, crossing the ts. it's possible that they are going just check off a box,

bring in other witnesses, before a charging decision lands, prosecution memo most likely still being written. there are a number of things that could happen, including any charges against lower tier people who might have been involved with the obstruction of the case, as we are looking at two tracks that jack smith has narrowed the mar-a-lago case down to, the classification issues, did trump knowingly retain classified information and the various pressure points of obstruction along the way. i'm watching these supporting actors and characters in the meantime. all signs point to a decision coming imminently. we have been told that trump advisors are expecting that as well. the meeting yesterday, which was sort of a front for them at least for raising grievances

with jack smith for some of their more aggressive tactics in terms of obtaining evidence and waiving attorney/client privilege and fighting for evidence. also to make one final plea and ask not to indict their client. >> one final plea playing to the audience of one, donald trump. go up and scold the doj or whatever. the many political and constitutional norms donald trump has violated and the damage he caused, the scar tissue on our political system, i think actually one of the most extreme will be one of the ones that he actually loathes the most, that is a former president not only being indicted and charged but probably convicted. that is a line that scares the hell out of me, as america crosses it. i think he put the judicial

branch in no other position but to do this. as you have written eloquently, this is not a good day for america regardless of how you feel about donald trump. this is a very sad and i would say dangerous day. >> right. i don't want us to have to go through with this, but we do have to go through it. >> it's an important day. >> he brought us here. this is his fault. he did this stuff. >> no man is above the law. >> he has to be held accountable. but it's a sad thing that we have to contemplate the trial and possible conviction and then punishment of a former president. that will be a traumatic thing for the country to go through. again, it's his fault. it's not jack smith's fault. it's not joe biden's fault. it's donald trump's fault. this is yet another horrible

legacy that he is going to leave to this country. it's amazing. i have one question for george, which is, jack smith is driving this bus. in the end, does the attorney general have any role to play in this decision or is it basically up to jack smith? >> under the regulations, this is the -- these are the regulations that were drafted after the original ethics and government act. the ag is supposed to supervise the special counsel and has the obligation to. he could veto, in theory, a prosecution. he could direct the special counsel what to do, because the special counsel is an employee who reports to the attorney general. i think the purpose of the whole exercise is so that garland can say, i did not influence this decision. i allowed a professional to make the assessment. i think he's going to let the chips fall where they may.

i think he knew that's what he was going to do when he appointed jack smith. >> it would put garland in an uncomfortable position. all signs point to him being risk averse. >> david, looking down the road, let's look at -- a degree with -- i agree, no person is above the law. we are left with little choice as a country. that said, the consequences are rough. it's maddening when a single court judge in texas could stop legislation or a single district court judge in california could stop republican legislation and you have to try it out. now in this age of political figures, donald trump mainly, being indicted, now we are hearing of prosecutors wanting

to bring charges against joe biden. i heard yesterday a sheriff in san antonio wants to bring charges against ron desantis for the martha's vineyard flight. you are going to have sheriffs, local people that are going to be bringing charges against national figures. it could lead to a chaotic situation. >> that's one of the dangers of the moment is that people will respond to what we are expecting will be the indictment of trump with capricious use of our legal system. it got us through the nightmare of the 2020 election, the sensible judges, many of them republicans, that -- this legal system has been weaponized and we will use it to -- that's why i think it's important that the jack smith case be as jackie and

george were saying, narrowly focused. there's a difference between the classified document issues that are handled administratively and what seems to be the evidence of deliberate obstruction, deliberate acts to conceal things from the justice department as it's investigating. if that can be clear to the public. this isn't like hillary clinton's email. this isn't like anything else you read about. this is a deliberate, willful attempt to manipulate and conceal. it will be easy for the country to take it in. >> it's the obstruction, it's the sort of thing if anybody else had done it, they would be in jail. that certainly is the case that jack smith has to make. it should be clear and to the point. still ahead, two more republicans are officially jumping into the 2024 white house race. how mike pence and chris

christie's candidates could impact the field. this as republican governor chris sununu decides not to run saying beating trump matters more. you are watching "morning joe." we will be right back. back. can be the most thrilling thing in the world. there's an abundance of reasons to get started. how far we take an idea is a question of willpower. because progress... is a matter of character. ♪ limu emu & doug ♪ what do we always say, son? liberty mutual customizes your car insurance... so you only pay for what you need. that's my boy. now you get out there, and you make us proud, huh? ♪ bye, uncle limu.

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welcome back. the 6th of june, again, extraordinarily momentous day. >> it is. >> because of d day, we remember

bobby kennedy on this day every june 6th. also in your household. >> my daughter's birthday. she's 25. what happened to time? >> it keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping. >> happy birthday. we have chris matthews here. our days, wherever we were, would stop. if we were out -- if we were on maine on a lobster boat at 6:30 she would go, we have to go. >> i can't miss. >> we would run for the tv set. 6:59, turn it on. there would be chris. bar fight. >> that was a good one. >> we followed the heat. >> bar fight. let's play "hardball." >> i tried to send submissions. he has his own thing. >> that's like sending headlines to the "new york post."

>> chris matthews is here. mike pence is officially entering the race for president. he filed paperwork yesterday declaring his candidacy. he is expected to formally announce at a rally tomorrow. chris christie will launch tonight. he is scheduled to hold a town hall event in new hampshire where he will make the announcement. governor chris sununu will not be running. >> we have taken the last six months to look at things, where everything is. i made the decision not to run on the republican ticket in 2024. a lot goes into that decision. it has been quite an adventure, but not the end by any means. >> governor sununu goes on to explain his decision in an op-ed

entitled "i'm not running for president in 2024, beating trump is more important." >> chris, we have had -- speaking of lobster boats, a lobster boat full of republican candidates jumping into the race. what's the impact? you see chris christie or pence breaking through? >> not breaking through. they are in the on deck circle. aren't they? they are waiting for something to crack. >> they don't have to do it. >> in '24 it will be different than in '23 if there's convictions with these indictments. they will come, perhaps, before march even some of them. then it's a different world out there. they will not crack that 30%. but you will crack around it a lot and make people second guess. i think they are hoping for something new. if trump is in full power, he will be dangerous to them

personally. i think they are willing to take the short-term risk of facing the chance to be president of the united states. it's an amazing goal to be president. i think they think they can beat joe biden. >> willie, chris christie took it upon himself last time to be the prosecutor, to take down marco rubio politically -- the political prosecutor against rubio. he did it. he destroyed him in the debate, destroyed his chances if he ever had them. i am wondering, has he been waiting 3 1/2 years to do the same thing -- well, i'm sorry, 7 1/2 years to do the same thing to donald trump? >> yeah, i mean, he kneecapped marco rubio to the benefit of donald trump. we will see.

chris christie beyond new hampshire, john, it remains to be seen what his appeal is, what the case for this is. as chris matthews points out, a lot of people are getting in -- the field is big now for this big, bad republican party. they don't be afraid to run against him, take a shot at it. because of everything that may be coming down the pike. you will not break his base. they are not leaving him no matter what. as he suggested, he could win from a prison cell, probably, among his voters. they are hoping, perhaps, that enough people want something else that they will be the one if not ron desantis. >> chris christie is skipping iowa. he is made for new hampshire, speaking to independent voters there. we should be careful. he also served donald trump faithfully until the end. he was part of his general election debate team in the fall of 2020. got covid and was hospitalized because of that. his turn on trump is recent. he has shown he has the ability,

the skills to deliver some blows. whether he does it to trump's face or not remains to be seen. we don't know whether chris christie will participate in the debate. the more candidates jump in, the better for trump. we know his base is going to stay with him. this is getting to be a pretty crowded field. i think we should watch to see how vice president pence tried to handle this. he is trying to put a happy warrior face, his team says, as a contrast to the anger from trump, grievance from desantis. he is someone polling in the low single digits. trump's base has not forgiven him for january 6. he is betting on iowa. hard to know where that goes. coming up, i sat down with diego luna for a deep dive on the defining roles. i mean, how extraordinary? that's ahead on "morning joe." that's ahead on "morning joe."

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who else knows? >> about what? >> that you were born in kanari? >> you don't want to hear what happened? >> we will get to that. who knows? who have we told? >> i don't know. >> we said, it always said you were born on fest. you have said anything other than fest? >> people, yes. >> how many? >> i don't know. it's not something i have been keeping track of. >> everyone i have told is dead. >> that's ridiculous. >> family. >> if we are making a list, we are making a list. >> it's all the women i'm worried about. >> stop, stop. >> there's some i don't know. h it. >> that would be me. >> more than four decades after the original "star wars" movie changed the course of film last

year's critically acclaimed tv series "andor" proved there were still stories to tell from that galaxy far, far away. he evolves from an orphan smuggler to an ill-fated hero. we have diego luna. thank you so much for being with us. "andor" is one of the surprises of the whole star wars universe. >> thank you very much. it's been quite an interesting ride. i think we come at the right time. it was meant to be different. it was a film that had a beginning and an end, characters were different, regular people, like people you could connect

with. with "andor" i think we took that to the next level. it's a story about what oppression does and how regular people can be part of change and can do extraordinary things. that's what's interesting about it. it's patient. it's intimate. it does have what "star wars" always asks for and it has that adventure. but at the same time we're a very intimate personal show of people trying to survive oppression. >> after i saw "andor" i wanted to read more about it. talk about that patience and that pacing that makes it so special. >> the idea of approaching a project where we know the ending, it's about detail. it's about small things. the beauty of this show is

there's no judgments. we get to see both sides of the equation. we go to also see the life of people working for the empire and see that they also have issues and stuff going on. if you're not patient, there's no way to actually get deep into the needs of people. >> here's another clip i want to play for the audience where cassian lays out his bold plan to steal from the empire. >> which is it? >> i know you bribed quarter masters to leave valuables on the ships before they come in with scrap, but this isn't that. >> no. i went in and got this myself. >> how? how is this possible? it was sealed on the imperial naval base. >> you get the money, i got the box. what else is there to talk about? >> i give you another thousand

credits to talk about how you got it. >> another thousand? >> done. how? >> you just walk in like you belong. >> takes more than that, doesn't it? >> to steal from the empire. what do you need? a uniform, some dirty hands and an imperial token. they're so proud of themselves, they don't even care. they're so fat and satisfied, they can't image. >> can't imagine what? >> that someone like me would ever get in their house, take their gear. >> you have an amazing chemistry together. looking at your acting there, it reminds me we're coming up on awards season. there's a lot of talk that

there's a possibility that you could be the first latin man to win in your category, i guess, ever. >> when i learned that in this category there hasn't been a latino nominated in more than 20 years, i was shocked. i couldn't believe it. to me, what really matters here is the opportunity to find the audience and to connect and to tell a story where people talk like me that grew up watching "star wars" like i did from where i come from suddenly can see in the screen someone that looks like them. they can connect in a very special way. that means a lot. i'm glad to see lucas film and disney are aware of this and they've been doing this for quite a long time. rogue one is a film about

diversity. it's about that. it's about what a team with that diversity is capable of. i think we just have to keep sending the right messages and making sure that we all get an opportunity to connect with stories and to feel represented on the screen. >> i will be cheering you on. what you did, you just connected in a universal way. i wish you the best. i just want everybody to know the entire first season of "andor" is streaming now on disney plus. diego luna, thank you so much. >> thank you so much for your words. >> we'll be right back with more "morning joe." be right back wie "morning joe ."

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welcome back to the fourth hour of "morning joe." it is 6:00 a.m. on the west coast, 9:00 a.m. here in washington. there's a lot to get to this hour. we'll go live to paris, where unions are calling for a nationwide day of protests against the law raising the retirement age. also ahead, the new developments in the classified documents case. this is really heating up after a meeting yesterday between trump's attorneys and the department of justice. plus, we'll look at a few important cases still on the docket for the supreme court. and we'll be joined by a former speech writer for president bill clinton who just wrote a book on how the high court divided america. and later this hour, tony award nominee victoria clark is our guest. she's starring in the hit musical. ukraine is accusing russia

this morning of destroying a major dam and hydroelectric power station near kherson, while russian state media accuses ukraine of the attack. hundreds of residents have had to leave evacuate down river from the flood water. >> reporter: drone video showing the dnipro river gushing through a critical dam and hydroelectric power plant. this video shot from the banks showing huge chunks of the dam destroyed. ukraine blames russia for blowing up the dam overnight, which is under russian control in the kherson region. president zelenskyy calling it a terrorist attack, while russian state media accuses ukraine of attacking the dam without providing any evidence. the reservoir is in effect the front lines. it's one of six dams on the

dnipro river and supplies drinking water, power and cooling for the nearby zaporizhzhia power plant. >> we have a good level of water, which will help for, at minimum, one month to operate the cooling system. >> reporter: it's estimated by tonight some 300,000 civilians will be without clean drinking water and some 500,000 will be affected by loss of power and flooding. your biggest fears? >> fresh water supply and power supply for people around dnipro. >> reporter: ukraine's hydro power company said an explosion inside the engine room at the plant caused the destruction. the station cannot be restored. the strategic fears surrounding this dam date back months, back

in may the water levels reaching 30-year highs. back in october president zelenskyy warning that russia had mined the dam. this morning 80 settlements and tens of thousands of people are in the rapid flood zone. to politics at home now and a growing 2024 republican primary field. former new jersey governor chris christie expected to launch his bid tonight, while another potential contender stands down, warning too many candidates will help former president trump. gabe gutierrez has more. >> reporter: this morning, more candidates lining up to challenge former president trump for the 2024 republican nomination. former new jersey governor chris christie expected to kick off his run in new hampshire today. a one-time trump ally turned critic, he's blasted other republicans for not taking on the former president directly. >> they cozy up to him and hope

if they're nice to him, they'll inherit his voters. >> reporter: former vice president mike pence filing papers to make his run official ahead of an announcement tomorrow in iowa. >> i believe we have to resist the politics of personality and a siren song of populism unmoored to timeless conservative principles. >> reporter: ten candidates are expected to be in the race by week's end. some primary voters in new hampshire we spoke with are looking elsewhere. >> 2016 trump was making his issues about the american people. 2024, i think trump is making it about him. >> reporter: you're ready to move on? >> i'm done. >> reporter: a distant second in the polls, florida governor desantis. >> i don't think the polling matters right now. >> reporter: south carolina tim scott on the governor's ongoing feud with disney. >> our young kids and what

they're being indoctrinated with, i thought he started off on the right foot on that issue. [ crowd reacts ] >> i'm sorry sir. do not boo. >> reporter: new hampshire governor chris sununu now saying he won't run, saying he believes candidates with no path to victory should drop out so as not to divide the republican opposition to trump. >> trump's message, his style, his brand have cost us dearly and he doesn't represent the republican party. >> joining us now we have the host of "the last word" lawrence o'donnell, white house correspondent for politico eugene daniels and editor in chief of the cook political report amy walter joins us, and ken delanian. we want to take a look at the growing republican field.

we'll do that in just a moment. first, we can't ignore that the frontrunner might be a little triggered by what might have happened at a certain meeting yesterday at the department of justin. we can only surmise that his all-cap screed and this video he did calling joe biden the real criminal and that he did nothing wrong is a response to what happened at that meeting. can you bring us up to date on the mar-a-lago document. we're hearing things about pools being drained and all sorts of different things. next thing we know it's going to be bedminster and conspiracy theories there. what's real? >> it feels like we're seeing the proverbial tips of the iceberg surfacing in the ocean. a trio of trump lawyers show up at the justice department yesterday morning, walk in, has a two-hour meeting.

we learned that jack smith, the special counsel was in that meeting. >> i wonder what that was like. he's like that coach on ted lasso. >> merrick garland and lisa monaco chose not to be in this meeting. that's consistent with garland's hands-off approach to this investigation. it seems like the classic example of defense lawyers coming in to appeal because there were senior career doj officials in the meeting and to complain about the prosecutors making the case. the lawyers left without commenting. now we're reporting this morning there is some testimony expected later this week in a grand jury in florida in this case, which could mean a lot of different things. >> i have a wild guess. >> please. >> it was about two hours. for those two hours, the trump lawyers were saying he's not guilty and jack smith was saying

uh-huh, and that was it. >> that was it? >> yeah. >> uh-huh is washington for nothing. you say uh-huh every time someone says something. >> they might have had an ask. it doesn't seem like it went well if you look at donald trump's social output. he was in all caps saying are they going to charge me, why are they charging me. >> exactly. >> that might have spilled the beans, no? >> he's the great leaker of everything on the trump side. that is actually the best evidence we have of what happened in that room. >> exactly. >> every single time we were working on a story he would just tweet it out. >> he accused joe biden of being a criminal, of being the one who's really guilty. is it fair to say at this point

one could be on indictment watch? >> yes. >> there seems to be two jurisdictions. does that involve trump going to both, or do you think other people -- there is this whole pool draining situation. cnn has reported about that. >> both things are possible. it's entire they could bring this entire case in the district attorney district of florida. they have a much more favorable jury pool in washington, d.c. it's also possible that the butler, who we believe has given different stories to investigators about whether he moved documents, could be facing criminal charges of making false statements. that would have to be in florida, because that's where it would. >> rapid fire, really quick, if he gets indicted this week or

something, how long does the process drag out? this is federal court. >> if it happens in washington, it would be under seal and he would make a first appearance sort of like what played out in new york, a surrender to a courthouse. then the indictment would be unsealed when he appears in that courtroom. >> what's the possibility other people are going to be charged as well who work for trump? >> it's hard to say. walt seems like he has some significant problems. >> that's his sort of body guy. >> the pool guy is checking for a local criminal defense lawyer in florida. it's the first time draining the pool might be a crime in florida. >> oh my god. amy, how could this impact the republican field? it looks like something might be happening with the documents case. >> we still have georgia, fulton

county. >> i know. i'm not even going there. >> the summer is the time we're going to see something. we've been making this assumption that everything like this helps donald trump. whenever he has an actual opponent who's not himself, when he gets himself in trouble, he is his own worst enemy. when he looks at somebody and says it's your fault, it's your fault, it rallies the base. at the same time hearing that voter in new hampshire in that package of i'm kind of tired of it, he's focusing on himself, i think that's real. i think there is an exhaustion level among republicans. what they haven't heard yet is somebody making a clear and consistent case for why they would be the better candidate and why they should take a risk at somebody who hasn't been president. >> they all need to make a pact. >> they need to make a pact to what? >> just eliminate this one

candidate. why not? >> like they did last time in 2016? >> well, they didn't have one. they're incapable of doing that. >> so much of the problem with one of the candidates at the politico offices yesterday. we asked him about donald trump, we asked him about ron desantis. he would attack ron desantis. he said there's a difference between the two. when it was about donald trump, he would not. that is going to continue to be the problem for all of these other candidates. none of them over than chris christie seem comfortable with attacking donald trump head on. they want to go after desantis. you hear frustration that all of these folks want to be the number two because they assume all of these indictments at some point are going to take out donald trump and if you take out desantis, when you're number three. if the base doesn't turn against him after the indictment, any possible indictments, he's still likely to be the nominee.

that is where the republican party is struggling right now. >> okay. >> it's kind of a rerun of last time. chris christie decided to get tough on marco rubio in 2016 when they were running and no one wanted to get tough on trump. >> at this point, it's your party. it's your party, guys. get it back. ken, i want you to help me out with a friend of mine who has a candy store and he has a tv in it. he's probably watching about right now. in just a second, i need you to explain something. first, jonathan lemire, i believe you have a question for amy. >> that's a great tease about the candy store. we're very curious where this is going. amy, let's talk specifically about a couple candidates jumping in the race. of course, former vice president pence made it official yesterday. chris christie tonight jumping in new hampshire.

what lane, if any, do you see there? and candidates are not going to form an alliance against donald trump now and maybe ever, but right now there's no real harm in candidates jumping in as long as they get out before the vote starts again potentially to consolidate the anti-trump movement. any chance that pence or christie could be the trump alternative? >> i just don't understand how they do this, because the lane they are in is so narrow. 10 to 15% of the republican electorate is never trump. that's the lane they are going for. if you want to consolidate that 10%, that's great, but i don't think it's going to get you very far. chris christie is the least liked among republican voters of any candidate right now running. mike pence probably comes in second. what they're trying to sell is

just not what republican voters want to buy. i don't think it does very much. does christie come in and take whacks at trump and takes him down a peg? no. it just rallies folks. as a messenger christie is not a credible messenger to make the case. >> because he worked for him and kept his mouth shut for the longest time. >> now he goes on tv every day and bashes trump. why would republican primary voters take christie's attacks seriously? >> he has to get on the debate stage and debate trump. >> primary voters believe conspiracy theory, they believe it's a witch hunt. they believe donald trump is being unjustly pursued by the fbi and by whatever, the fake news. >> i just wonder if there is an

indictment with credible allegations of obstruction of justice and it's there in black and white, will the rest of the candidates get on board with that? >> here's the candy store question. i have a couple of friends who are trump supporters who i like to gauge every year. they range from maine to florida, different places where i live and go. i check in and i say who are you going to vote for in 2024. the answer was trump, but there is an exhaustion among some of them. it's just a lot. the answer was i could never vote for biden. i could never vote for biden. these are trump supporters. the one candy store said all of the other guys took documents as well. ken, can you explain the difference between biden's classified documents and mike pence's classified documents? i believe there were some

situations in the past where classified documents had to be returned. what's the difference here with the mar-a-lago documents? why is it serious? >> there is a perennial problem with classified documents finding their way to places they shouldn't be, for example, mike pence's house. he was just cleared. the doj said we're not bringing any charges in that case. they're still investigating how classified documents got to joe biden's home and office, but nobody thinks that was anything more than inadvertent. in the case of donald trump, we don't know exactly why those documents got to mar-a-lago, but the elves suggests he took active steps to keep them from being returned to the government when the government first asked for them back. >> what is that action when you take active steps to keep classified documents from the government? >> so it can rise to the level of obstruction of justice, particularly after you get a grand jury subpoena demanding those documents. there's no wiggle room. you got to give them back. >> they don't belong to him. >> exactly. >> they are stolen.

there's an impact on our national security as well. >> if you show them to other people, which there's been some reporting he did that, that's dissemination of classified information. this is just much, much different. the reporting on these documents is they are very serious and contain significant secrets. >> lawrence, last night you spoke to three members of president biden's debt ceiling negotiating team and asked them about what the talks were like at the time and their confidence in being able to strike a deal before the u.s. defaults. here's what two of them had to say. >> the stakes were very, very high, and a default would have been catastrophic for the economy, for the people we cared the most about, for middle class families, for working families, for people in need. so i think upper most in our minds the entire time was we really do need to find a way to

get this done. >> the house is the wild wild west, but these two know that i love it. a lot of them are familiar, the speech-ifying, the things, we ignored that. remember, i worked on the corporations committee. it always has to work. no one thinks it's going to work, then it always magically works. i never had the luxury of working in an environment that we had a chance to fail. we had to do it, meaning, we found the middle ground that no one else thought was possible. >> lawrence, if the house is the wild, wild west, is president biden john wayne? >> looks that way on that deal. it was so interesting. they refused to claim a victory.

my judgment of that was a biden victory all the way. they can't really do that, because they know they have to go back and do business with kevin mccarthy and republicans again. when you reach a bipartisan compromise deal like this, you're not supposed to go out there and say, wow, we really beat them and got much more than we ever expected to. it's the most impressive team i have ever seen in that kind of negotiation. just a word about louisa terrell, who's the person you didn't hear from there. she has the most astonishing relationship with the president that i've ever known in someone working in the white house. she met joe biden when she was in kindergarten. she was a kindergarten classmate of beau biden. she worked for other senators. when joe biden talks about her, he gets emotional very, very quickly.

you get the feeling this is in certain ways the beau biden in the white house. >> that's a beautiful story. impressive team. then look at his foreign policy team. they're not too bad what they're doing on the world stage with ukraine. i have to be partial, because my brother is in poland. but it really is quite amazing the wins this president has gotten. >> there was a photograph shown last night of the negotiating team meeting with the president and the white house chief of staff. in a lot of previous negotiations, especially when you don't have, say, a war going on in ukraine, the white house chief of staff would have been in the room for a lot of that. with this team, they're so good that he could let that be delegated to them. he was up to speed on it every step of the way, just like the president was, while he was traveling around the country.

that's the value of a great team, where you don't have to have every major player in the room at every moment. >> lawrence, thank you so much. we're going to be watching "the last word" tonight. among your guests will be democratic senator raphael warnock of georgia. sometimes i tell you who's going to be on your show. you're the last to know. >> that's why i'm here in washington, because senator warnock is going to be sitting right at this table. >> we'll be watching. lawrence, thanks for being on. amy walter, congratulations on you're amazing. ken delanian. coming up on "morning joe," we'll get a live report from paris as demonstrators gather for a national day of protest against the change to france's retirement age. plus, the supreme court has about a month left in its current term to issue decisions

in dozens of high-profile cases. we'll have a look at what's on the docket. also ahead, actress victoria clark joins us to talk about her leading role in the broadway musical "kimberly akimbo" which has earned her eight tony nominations. you're watching "morning joe." we will be right back. g "mornin" we will be right back.

we moved out of the city so our little sophie could appreciate nature. but then he got us t-mobile home internet. i was just trying to improve our signal, so some of the trees had to go. i might've taken it a step too far. (chainsaw revs) (tree crashes) (chainsaw continues) (daughter screams) let's pretend for a second that you didn't let down your entire family. what would that reality look like? well i guess i would've gotten us xfinity... and we'd have a better view. do you need mulch? what, we have a ton of mulch.

at dawn, on the morning of the 6th of june, 1944, 225 rangers jumped off the british landing craft and ran to the bottom of these cliffs. their mission was one of the most difficult and daring of the invasion, to climb these cliffs and take out the enemy guns. 225 came here. after two days of fighting, only

90 could still bear arms. behind me is a memorial that symbolizes the ranger daggers that were thrust into the top of these cliffs, and before me are the men who put them there. these are the men who took the cliffs. these are the champions who helped free a continent and these are heros who helped end a war. >> the iconic speech from president ronald reagan 39 years ago today in normandy france, written by the great peggy noonan. 79 years ago today, more than 160,000 troops landed in nazi-occupied france in world war ii in the largest air, land and sea invasion ever undertaken. the liberation of europe began

on d day. now in france, authorities are deploying thousands of police officers including 4,000 in paris alone in response to what unions have called a nationwide day of protest against french president emanuel and the law raising the retirement age from 62 to 64. let's go to matt bradley. what does it look like on the ground there today? >> reporter: this protest has only been in the mix for about an hour and already we've gotten our first taste of tear gas. there's kind of a whiff of desperation in the air too. this is probably going to be the last of these protests, the 14th and also the last protest against the raising of this retirement age. this has endured for months against emanuel macron's efforts to try to reform the retirement system. now it has become law.

now it looks like starting this fall, those workers who are 62 years of age are going to be obliged to work for another go years if they can expect a full pension from the french government. so this is a demonstration that's trying to reverse a law that is already in place and approved by all branches of government. that is kind of an effort to reverse the law in the national assembly. so far, it looks like there are constitutional provisions that are actually barring this law from going anywhere. this isn't actually going to be heard in parliament in the national assembly on thursday. so, again, this is something that even a lot of folks here, some of the leaders have been telling french media that this battle has already been lost,

but the war is beginning. that's because there really is an effort here to try to maintain the energy and the solidarity of all of the french workers' joins and the leftist political parties to try to maintain their unity going forward to oppose what they see as emanuel macron's imperious presidency, one that has railroaded through changing the pension system and one they hope will persist as they see emanuel macron trying to make further, more liberal oriented, more sort of right wing reforms in this country. there's a lot of anger on the street, and they're hoping the anger here will persist. >> matt, 62 if you look across the western world is a pretty low age for retirement on average. what is the case president macron has tried to make in defense of raising it up to 64?

it's an economic question, he says. >> reporter: yeah. i mean, this is something that a lot of people here have pointed out. actually, there isn't a real issue. there is enough money in the coffers to continue providing this cash to people who are trying to retire at an earlier age. we have to remember that for so many people here, this goes beyond finances. this is a symbolic issue and one that points to emanuel macron's efforts, again, his imperious presidency to ram through legislation that remains unpopular, that's more market oriented into bringing france into the rest of the western world fold kind of loosening a lot of the social system this country has become so famous for, the massive support that so many people here receive in comparison to the united states or even germany. this really is about checking that reform and trying to say they are standing against it, trying to bring in solidarity for some of the socialist

parties, the left wing parties, the trade unions that are now all together fighting this. some protest movements under previous governments have lasted for months longer than this. so this is something that really is trying to look towards the future, trying to create a new movement out of the ashes of the pension reform movement. guys. >> matt bradley right there in the middle of the protests in paris, we appreciate it. some other stories we're following this morning, members of the union that represents more than 160,000 film and television actors voted last night to authorize a strike two days before negotiations begin on a new labor deal with hollywood studios. 98% of sag members voted to authorize a strike if they cannot reach a deal with studios over a new contract by june 30th. actors are calling for higher ages and the industry's shift to

streaming and regulations over the use of artificial intelligence. the vote comes as writers enter their sixth week of a strike that has already shaken the industry. allstate has stopped offering insurance coverage to new california commercial and property owners. it stopped accepting new policies last year, explaining the cost to insure new home customers in california is far higher than the price they would pay for policies due to wildfires, higher costs for repairing homes and higher reinsurance premiums. allstate is california's fourth largest property insurance provider. state farm made a similar decision last week. and two port terminals in california have shut down amid stalled labor negotiations.

the organization representing shipping companies and port terminals says the union is staging, quote, concerted and disruptive work actions that have slowed operations. that includes some members not showing up for work. now, the terminals in los angeles and long beach are closed. closed. they handle nearly 40%

maisha: shared leadership has to do with... michael: acknowledging parents as equal partners. narrator: california's community schools. grant: community schools lift the voices of folks that have traditionally not been heard whether they're parents, students, community groups. john: it's shared decision-making with parents. they're saying that these are the priorities that they want to see for their kids. wendy: it allows us to create the school that our students deserve. rafael: community schools are innovative, and they're working. narrator: california's community schools: reimagining public education.

issue decisions on 27 different cases. topics before the court range from affirmative action to student loans and follow a controversial slate of decisions in 2022. in west virginia versus the environmental protection agency, the court rolled back the epa's ability to regulate the energy sector. in new york state, the court ruled against a law that required people applying for a license to carry a gun outside of their homes to have proper cause to do so. in the beginning of the year, the court voted to block president biden's mandate that would have required employees of major companies to either receive a covid vaccine or be tested weekly. and, of course, the court voted to overturn roe v wade last summer, going against 50 years of precedent.

what is going on with the court? joining us now, the president of the brennan center for justice, michael waldman. his latest book out today is entitled "the supermajority, how the supreme court divided america." i've got a lot of questions for you. i have clarence thomas questions for you. tell us about the book. what did you set out to do? >> i wanted to look at this first year of the supermajority of six very conservative justices, mostly lockstep, mostly working together, because they have enormous power. that's the way it works in our system. we give the court this power. they wound up being very extreme, very high impact in the rulings they made. the dobbs case overturning roe v wade, the case that was by far the most sweeping second amendment ruling in the country's history, a case that made it much harder for environmental protection and other protections to happen, all

in three days. they crammed decades of conservative social policy into those three days, and they've got more to come. i think this is a big issue for the country. i wanted to understand how it happened, what happened in the past when the supreme court overreached and what we can do about it. >> we were talking about how 27 decisions in the next few weeks. what did you learn about how they get along? >> one of the things is that they depend on this kind of silence to be seen as oracles. but over the last year they've been attacking each other in public. you had the leak of the dobbs issue. it looks like there might have been a breakdown of trust in the court. some of it is the intensity of fighting over the issues, over the big rulings coming up. a little bit of it is don't save your work for the last minute. >> there used to be a world in which any one of those cases that have been decided over the

last year would have been the last thing and there would have been one or two of them. it's happened over and over. what does that tell you about the court system in this country? >> right now, these justices are feeling their oats, and they are using their power and they're being very aggressive in how they're pushing this conservative agenda. part of the challenge is, the supreme court in our system has this power because we, the people, give it that power. the part of the constitution that deals with the courts is only one-tenth the length of the part dealing with congress and the presidency, but we have to rely on them to be above politics. they're acting very political right now. the dynamic that we have is the country is moving in one direction. a lot of these opinions are very unpopular, and the court and these justices are moving hard in the other direction. that creates a crisis of confidence and a political crisis. >> what are some of the biggest challenges for the supreme court in the years to come given the

scenario you're describing? >> public confidence in the court, according to all the polls, has collapsed to the lowest level ever. but they don't seem ready to stop. it looks like they're going to endffirmative action in higher education. these are big political, not legal decisions. these are nine government officials with lifetime terms and they're not elected. that's a challenge for our democracy. >> do you see anything coming of the harlan crow situation with clarence thomas where he funded a lot of his lifestyle? there's a problem. >> some of it did violate the meager rules in place. >> yeah, but what does that mean? >> this is not just an ethics question. this guy was subsidizing his lifestyle. when it was revealed by the "los angeles times" two decades ago, he just stopped disclosing it.

i think congress should investigate. i think there's all kinds of legitimate ways to hold them accountable. one of the answers is, the supreme court should have a binding ethics code, just the same way every other court in the united states, federal and state does. no judge is so wise that they should be the judge in their own case. >> exactly. the new book is entitled "the supermajority, how the supreme court divided america." we really appreciate your coming on. president of the brennan center for justice, michael waldman. thank you. and politico's eugene daniels, thank you as well. coming up, tony nominated actress victoria clark joins the table. she is a favorite to win best lead actress for her starring role in the broadway musical "kimberly akimbo." "kimberly akimbo." (man) what if my type 2 diabetes takes over? (woman) what if all i do isn't enough?

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♪♪ ♪ cocktail dress and a pair of jimmy choos ♪ ♪ i'll run from paparazzi ♪ playing at broadway's booth theater. she plays the title character a teenager who lives with a rare diseases that causes her body to age four times the normal. the show is up for eight tonys. so great to meet you. congratulations. >> thank you. i'm excited to be here. i'm a superfan of the show.

thank you for the work you do. it's really important. >> we appreciate you watching. >> eight tony nominations. there's something very special about this show? >> this show, think it's my favorite show that i've ever done. my 13th broadway show. and what the playwright and the composer have done is so extraordinary. it's a vehicle for telling audiences about the preciousness of life and how we only have a limited number of days on this earth and to go for the gusto. >> i understand when this idea came to you, not that you rejected it you said help me understand how i'm going to play a 16-year-old. what was your hesitation? >> the writing is so extraordinary, that's what

convinced me. because it's so hilarious and it does have a lot of -- so much humanity and the ups and downs aspect of life and it was daunting to think about playing a teen believably because i have to alter my speaking voice, so i just wanted to make sure i could pull it off. >> it's grueling, is it not, this is something more grueling. >> the young people forget that i'm actually in my 60s. the other day one said, can we hurry up on the stairs? i wanted to turn around go, i'm not really 16. yes, people tend to forget. i forget myself. which is the most beautiful thing about it, for me, i'm swept up in the story also and i -- it has taught me also the preciousness of life. >> so tell us a little bit about

the crowd's response. it's great to see the audiences going to theaters again. what does that moment feel like, that energy, the connection with the audience again? >> the response has been overwhelming. people come back four, five, six, 11, 12 times, because i think there's -- there's a little bit of everybody in the show. we have some crazy people in the show. we have, you know, some very sweet moments in the show, so i think everybody seems themselves as a three-generation cast. lot of audiences are coming with their children and grandchildren, several people with real diseases, my disease in the show is made up, it's loosely based on progeria. many people with illnesses and debilitating issues are seeing

their own story and seeing someone play who's young but also dealing with some real medical concerns. >> you didn't fully anticipate, to be such a touchstone for people. >> the people thank me and the cast, they feel like they're being seen, that's all we want to be seen and understood. also, they thank us because of how the funny show is, at the base of everything there's humor in beauty in our lives and this is what the show really points to. let's take another look at the show. i believe you auditioned with, laid the ground work to victoria's return to the broadway show. take a look.

♪♪ ♪ you see when you look at me ♪ >> my poem. >> oh, that's awful. i like the way you understand, i like the way you think, a little weird, a little wise, a little loud, i think. >> forever ever clever, wait a minute. limber, kimberly. kimberly -- turns into.

>> victoria, i'm curious, i want to ask you a 50 over 50 question buzz i'm reading some of your quotes in "the new york times" you had some self-doubt about taking on the role and that you had to sort of regain your confidence after menopause. i hit menopause, my voice went through a lot of changes because that's what happens with most women, woman actresses don't talk about it much, it feels a are the of us with incredible terror and you talk about having to sort of fall in love with yourself again and figure out this new voice. so talk about the long runway but the changes along the way, how did you do it? >> first of all, thank you for 50 over 50, i remember the day you announced the initiative. i was dancing around in my living room. because this is exactly what we

need to do. after this we need to do 60 over 60. 70 over 670. just keep inspiring people to find their voice. i have sung since i was 6 years old. but you know there has to be respect that goes along with a gift like this, right, so when we age the vocal cords are muscle so they also change when we age, so the joy of this part of the journey has been rediscovering my sound and appreciating it for what it is. >> that clip we just looked at, the young man who plays across him, also nominated for a tony, his first broadway show. >> yes, he's nominated for a tony. and this is his first professional job. bobby milligan who plays my scheming aunt is also hilarious and also nominated for a tony.

>> nominated for eight tony awards. it's called kimberly akimbo playing now. victoria clark, you play a great 16-year-old. >> thank you so much. >> thank you for being here. good luck with the tonys on sunday. >> thank you. that does it for us and ana cabrera picks up the coverage in 90 seconds. econds ♪ my doc and i agreed. ♪ ♪ i pick the time. ♪ ♪ today's a good day. ♪ ♪ i screened with cologuard and did it my way! ♪ cologuard is a one-of-a kind way to screen for colon cancer that's effective and non-invasive. it's for people 45 plus at average risk, not high risk. false positive and negative results may occur. ask your provider for cologuard. ♪ i did it my way! ♪ if you have heart disease and are on a statin, lowering cholesterol can be hard. and diets and exercise add to the struggle. it can feel never-ending.

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