con 2ke78ing this indictment. yes, they're allies but seen by many to be a nod towards the far right. senior politics reporter for axios eugene scott, thanks for joining us. have a good weekend. it is going to be an important and newsworthy moment, the first time ever a former president has been indicted on a federal charge and, of course, for donald j. trump also indicted on a state charge. legal peril mounting as 2024 years. thank you so much for getting up "way too early" with us on this friday morning. "morning joe" starts right now. >> i want to say this to the audience, i made my mistakes but in all of my years of public life, i have never profited, never profited from public service. i've earned every cent. >> this is warfare for the law and we can't let it happen. we can't let it happen.

our country is going to hell, and they come after donald trump. >> in all of my years of public life, i have never obstructed justice and i think too that i can say that in my years of public life, that i welcome this kind of examination. >> they're trying to destroy our reputation so they can win an election. that's just as bad as doing any of the other things that have been done over the last number of years and especially during the 2020 election. >> people have got to know whether or not their president is a crook, well, i'm not a crook. i've earned everything i've got. >> so i just want to tell you i'm an innocent man. i did nothing wrong. >> donald trump and richard nixon each proclaiming innocence 50 years apart. nixon was never federally indicted. donald trump was just indicted on seven charges. we'll go through what we know about the federal charges and what happens next in the case.

plus, we'll explain why this indictment from a florida grand jury is significant when it comes to a venue for a potential trial. on capitol hill a predictable response from many republicans who are rallying around the former president blaming everyone but him for this indictment. we'll also have the reaction from trump's republican rivals in the 2024 presidential race. good morning and welcome to "morning joe." it is friday, june 9th, along with joe, willie and me we have former u.s. senator now an nbc news and msnbc political analyst claire mccaskill, the host of "way too early," white house bureau chief at politico, jonathan lemire, former white house press secretary, now an msnbc host jen psaki, former u.s. attorney and senior fbi official chuck rosenberg and presidential historian mike barnicle -- michael beschloss.

a federal grand jury in florida in connection with special counsel jack smith's investigation into his handling of more than 100 classified documents discovered last year at his mar-a-lago resort in florida. two sources familiar with the matter confirm the indictment, one, adding that trump received a summons to appear in u.s. district court on tuesday. this is the first time in american history a former u.s. president will face federal charges. the sources say trump has been indicted on seven charges with one source noting that does not necessarily mean seven counts, because multiple counts can be associated with each charge. a spokesperson for the special counsel declined to comment. a separate source said the indictment is under seal which is why the government cannot yet comment. but sources tell nbc news that the charges include violation of

the espionage act, conspiracy to obstruct and making false statements. willie. >> former president trump is expected now to surrender to authorities and appear in a u.s. district court in miami on tuesday at 3:00 in the afternoon. the u.s. secret service official telling nbc news secret service personnel will meet with trump's team today to begin security and logistics planning for his movement to appear in federal court. this is trump's second indictment just in the last two months. he also faces, of course, state charges in new york where he has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records. in a hush money case that was involving stormy daniels. joe, we'll get into the reaction from republicans and get into the political implications of it. but we have to stop and just say what an extraordinary moment this is that a former president of the united states for the first time in our country's history has been indicted on federal charges and not just a

former president of the united states but a man who now seeks to return to the white house. this is happening in the middle of a presidential campaign. >> and let's be really clear. we've been saying on this show i think since 2019 that if he lost in 2020, he would continue to seek office because he would use it as a shield against any possible indictments. of course, there's the justice department guideline that says if you are a sitting president, you can't be charged with a crime and that acted as a shield during the mueller investigation with mueller saying, well, there are all these examples where he probablied committed obstruction of justice but he's president so we can't charge him with a crime. even before he ran for president we were saying he's going to run and he's going to run if for no other reason and every one of these charges he knew were coming were witch-hunts. the thing is the american people aren't buying that.

if you look at one poll after another and this is so important if you're watching other networks and you're watching people celebrate a man who has led an insurrection against the united states of america, led to a lot of people in riots going to jail, and lied about american democracy, trashed american democracy, trashed the united states military, has trashed america's intel services, yet, they continue to flock around him. maybe they need to know they're doing it because they're scared. a majority of americans think he should be indicted. even 60% said he should have been indicted in the stormy daniels hush money case. in another poll 62% of americans think this is a serious crime, and overwhelming majority believe if he is indicted and charged with a crime and ultimately found guilty, he should not be allowed to serve as president of the united states. now, that's not how this country runs but this is something that

all of these people lining up after everything donald trump has done, after everything that donald trump has done should understand once again they're not with the american people. i do, though, with all that to the side, though, willie, i do want to say that we always say two things could be true at the same time. this could be something that had to be done because in america no man is above the law, and that's extraordinarily important for every american to understand, for every american to know and at the same time we have crossed a line here that is extraordinarily dangerous for the future. and you are now going to see republicans trying to seek retribution, trying to indict a democratic president if

independents run in the future, you may see the same thing, and so it is extraordinarily dangerous, but we are given the worst of two options as a nation and i think michael beschloss, again, i will say, this is a dark day for america and if anybody thinks i'm being glib or or not completely straightforward in saying that, they don't understand, this is something i feared for a long time. i remember having the discussion when people were talking about indicting george w. bush because of supposed war crimes. i said, okay, that's great. what are you going to do four or eight years ago when republicans try to indict barack obama for war crimes for the drone warfare for whatever. but here we are and i'm sure you agree with me, it is a bleak,

dark day for america, but also a day that we knew had to come. i mean, donald trump, i think perhaps one of the most dangerous political and constitutional norms he's broken through is this one, that a former president is actually indicted by the justice department. >> sure is, and, you know, the other thing, joe, is that it's a shame, the reason it's a dark day is because it's come to this. you know, this was not just something that came out of thin air. this is not just a, you know, some d.a. trying to indict dwight eisenhower, one of the most honest leaders in american history in 1958, let's say. there has to be evidence. you and i, mika, willie, everyone else on the pam have faith in our system and, you know, you can't just say that there was no evidence that led

the justice department to be interested in this case or that there was no evidence that led a grand jury in miami in a state that is steadily more of a red state just as you were saying with -- surrounded by trump supporters in the state of florida. if we have faith in our system we have to say, you know, this is a reaction to evidence of a serious charge and if we really believe in our system, then if president trump, ex-president trump is not guilty of what he's being indicted for, then a trial will bring that out and he will be found not guilty. >> yeah, you know, willie, michael brings up such a great point. this is a grand jury, a grand jury in florida that brought these charges, just like when people were talking about a witch-hunt in the e. jean carroll case, that was a jury of donald trump's peers. so these are americans. this isn't like, you know,

george soros and his immediate family or whatever right wing racist anti-semitic theory they want to drum up. these are a jury of peers that are indicting him. >> yeah, remember in the carroll case prominent united states senators questioning the jury system, one of the bedrocks of our jury system because it didn't go donald trump's way. in this case we'll get into it but some of the republicans are painting this as joe biden going directly after his political opponent to try to knock him out of the presidential race when, of course, this not just comes from the juuse saros but an attorney general who separated himself to avoid any appearance of be partial and, chuck, let's get into the legal questions. donald trump's own attorney last night confirmed the charges in here, though, that document the indictment is sealed are around the espionage act.

what else do we know? >> well, so based, willie, on public reporting, the unlawful retention of documents in violation of the espionage act, there seems to be a conspiracy charge and i'll talk about that in a moment and there seems to be also a charge related to an obstruction of the investigation, perhaps even witness tampering. why is that important? well, second thing first, obstruction evinces a consciousness of guilt. one of the things prosecutors always have to prove at a trial is that a defendant acted intentionally, willfully and not by accident or mistake. so if you're obstructing the underlying investigation, if you're concealing documents or urging witnesses to tell a false story, that proves consciousness of guilt and helps prosecutors on the other things that they have to do, proving intent. with respect to conspiracy, i

often charge that as a prosecutor where it was applicable because it gives me certain evidentiary advances. if you and i plot to rob a bank and include mika in the plot and you case the bank and mika waits outside in the getaway car and i go inside to rob it, we're all guilty of a conspiracy because we have an unlawful agreement. and if any one of us takes a step in furtherance of the agreement, the conspiracy charge is complete but it gives prosecutors evidentiary advantages because anything that one of the three of us say,you, willie, mika or me, any one of us and what we say is admissible against all of us so the devil will be in the details. eager to read the indictment, i hope it's a speaking indictment and lays out in some details what the charges are but obstruction, conspiracy and espionage act violations are all

extraordinarily serious and confer on prosecutors some evidentiary advantages. >> so, chuck, let me ask you this. people are looking at this. you can't blame them. it's just the latest in a series of challenges that donald trump has had, whether it's the two impeachments, whether it's the mueller investigation on top of that and, of course, the manhattan charges and add on top of that the e. jean carroll case. very easy to look at it and just another in a long line of legal challenges donald trump is going to be facing for the rest of his life. if you could, i'd love for you to explain how this is so different because it's in federal court. one of these charges, i read this morning, could carry with it a possible eight-year term. donald trump may be typing in all caps right now but understands the gravity of federal charges against him. he also understands he could spend a significant amount of time in jail if found guilty on

all of these charges, which may actually make him a built more flip moving forward in these deliberations because he could spend the rest of his life in jail if charged on all of these counts. could you go through all of that for me, if you will, and explain to our viewers just how different a federal case is than all of the state cases or mueller investigations or impeachments? >> yeah, absolutely, joe, i'll add one word to what you said, it's not just the federal case, it's a federal criminal case so when we think about mr. trump's legal woes over decades, there almost always are civil cases, often brought in state court but they're civil cases and civil cases aren't about liberty, civil cases are about money. right? if you lose a civil case you tend to owe somebody else money. if you lose in a federal case you're talking about liberty. you can go to jail and for a very long time so i don't want

to get ahead of this. he's only been charged at this point, not even arraigned, certainly hasn't been tried or convicted or sentenced, but the reason this is so serious and the reason it is so different, if you lose in court as a defendant in the federal criminal case, you can go to jail and so civil cases are serious. if it was me on the short end of one of those it would keep me up at night. if i was on the short end of a federal criminal trial, i would be a basket case. these are extraordinarily dangerous times in part because of what mr. trump did but also going to be mr. trump in a court of law facing a jury of peers who will face the consequences of what he did. by the way, i agree with something you said at the very beginning of the show. it is a solemn day as prosecutors, i never, never celebrated a conviction or a sentencing. in my view no matter what a defendant did, it was always a

sad day, and this is a sad day, but the person who caused it is mr. trump. >> so, claire mccaskill, then jen psaki, i want to hear your thoughts. an important day, something that's never happened before. if you listen to trump world, you would think that something terrible happened to a great man. at the same time this is a man who's been found liable of sexual assault, defamation, indicted in manhattan and from what we know, the facts in the documents case are very real. >> you know, it's interesting because there's this human cry that somehow he's being treated differently and it's not fair and presidents shouldn't be indicted. i'd like to point out he's been treated differently in this way, they've given him the benefit of the doubt at every turn. you know, for a normal person who would walk out of the scif

with sensitive documents to hide them, to lie about them for a year and a half, that would never happen. they wouldn't take this long. they wouldn't give him every opportunity to give the documents back. they wouldn't give him many, many opportunities to cleanse himself of this very serious mistake. but rather than taking that opportunity, he defied it and lied and brought other people into the plot and what's fascinating to me also is that the republicans that are coming to his defense have no idea what the evidence is. >> right. >> it's very scary. one thing they all have in common that are defending him they're from bright red places. they're living in a primary world, not a general election world. and i need to point out to everyone that presidents, if you become president of the united states, you have to live in a general election world.

you don't win based on a primary and that's the fatal flaw to the trump strategy. >> once again, jen, these republicans who are crying foul right now are the same ones who really don't have an argument, for example, what is it? is biden the mastermind of a doj onslaught against the former president or falling off bikes and unable to complete a sentence? which is it? >> one, i think it's important for people to understand. joe biden respects the rule of law but also respects the separation of branches of power and so when we're looking at how solemn today is, i mean he nominated attorney general garland who is operating independently who also named jack smith. we all got to this moment and the president was criticized by including members of his party for being slow, not pushing the department of justice further. he did that because that's how the system is supposed to work and we are here because the justice department was doing its job. we'll see how it concludes.

we don't know yet, but i was thinking last night about my former white house colleague, my colleagues i spent so much time with, you know, when this news broke at 7:15, 7:30 last night, mika, they didn't have a statement prepared. they weren't in a war room. some of them may have been getting in their cars, that's typically when you finish the senior staff meeting. they did not know this news in advance either. that is how the system is supposed to work and i think it's important for people to understand that. so, yes, what we've seen to just echo claire from republicans who have spoken, some exceptions, asa hutchinson a little bit is this attack of the justice system, attack of our institutions that have been fundamental to our country for so long. they're trying to again delegitimize the system and politicize it which is frankly the opposite of what president biden and the justice department currently is trying to do.

>> to your point there, the only statement the white house put out was to refer reporters to the department of justice. that's all they did. we are hearing from republicans. number one argument for now is this is president biden's doj going after his top competitor. saying he's trying to bring down donald trump before next year's election. also we shouldn't lose the moment in history. this is a federal charge for a former president on top of a state charge and there are probably more coming. georgia estimate looms this summer and don't know where the january 6th investigation may take us to. george, let's bring you in and get your reaction to this historic moment and your assessment of these charges now being brought forth in florida. >> well, i wanted to -- i don't think it's a sad day for the country. i think it's a solemn day. i think it's a momentous day and

important day and significant day and a very serious day, but the sad moments, the sad point was that we had a president who was such a brazen criminal, who inspired an insurrection, who stole government documents, classified documents and then tried to conceal them and tried to obstruct justice and that we have millions of americans who still want to put him back in the white house and we have a republican party where virtually all of its major figures are so spineless they can't simply say we don't support this criminal. and that's -- the sad thing would have been the terrible thing would have been, the worst thing that could have happened to our republic would have been if this man was never charged and let go. as claire pointed out, they didn't want to bring this case. the government dragged its feet. they wanted him to give the

documents back. he jerked the national archives and records administration around for over a year and lied to them and lied to the justice department and concealed documents and moved them around and it took a year and a half to get a search warrant. any of us would have been searched weeks after -- weeks after taking those documents, and anybody else would have been indicted long ago. when we saw the evidence in the unsealed search warrant in -- last august, there was plenty there to charge somebody enough. enough had we been a senior administration official taking that volume of documents to our beach house, we would have been indicted long ago. he's gotten every break they could have possibly given and attorney general garland didn't want to bring this case but he

has to. >> i want to underline what george said. we can tell everybody here because we've seen documents, i did when i was a member of the armed service, i know claire did in the senate. you go in there and they do everything afterwards but hose you down and i'm telling you, it is an intimidating thing, at least it was for me going in there, you understood what you were doing. you understood the importance of keeping that information there, not passing it along. i will tell you there were briefings that i had, armed services briefings that i had in like 1998, 1999, 2000, i still haven't told anybody anything about them. sure, the information was declassified years ago but that's how much it is impressed on members and people in

government about how critical this is. you look at former cia directors that have been charged, you look at former generals that have been charged for doing far, far less than this. you look at national security advisers charged for doing far, far less than this. i moon, it's unbelievable and i do want to say, i do want to add to what george said, this is an extremely sad day for the reasons that i mentioned but want to add what george said. you have a guy that's been charged with violating the espionage act, the espionage act. he knows that he took classified documents he wasn't supposed to take. they know. they know he took those classified documents as well. they know, all of these people defending him know that this guy violated the espionage act and he lied about it.

they know he lied about it to the fbi. they know he lied about it to the doj. they know he lied about it to the national archives. they know he has been lying to them nonstop. they know and they don't care. so while we're adding up all the things that make this a grim day, let's put that near the top of the list and also that 40, 42, 43% of americans now know this guy likely violated the espionage act and they don't give a damn so at the end of the day donald trump is right. he could shoot somebody on fifth avenue and his supporters wouldn't care because what he's done is most likely he's violated the espionage act. we know the fact pattern here.

we've seen it unfold. and they don't care. so, yeah, i agree with george. i agree with george, the majority of americans care and think he should be charged. but way too many americans have no respect for law. they have no respect for justice, and the bitter irony is, mika, the people that have been running around with their hair on fire for the past three or four years yelling law and order are the last people who give a dam about law or order when donald trump does things that would have any of us on this screen in jail already and they don't care. >> well, that's what makes this potentially have some long-range ramifications that this country will have to confront. by the way, merrick garland didn't want anything to do with this. he put jack smith on it and separated himself and we will find out exactly what is in there on tuesday when donald

trump is going to be reporting to the federal courthouse in miami at 3:00 p.m. on tuesday. we've got the brightest minds on this story, chuck rosenberg, george conway, claire mccaskill, jen psaki, michael beschloss, stay with us as we continue the coverage on this historic moment. from prom dresses to workouts and new adventures you hope the more you give the less they'll miss. but even if your teen was vaccinated against meningitis in the past they may be missing vaccination for meningitis b. although uncommon, up to 1 in 5 survivors of meningitis will have long term consequences. now as you're thinking about

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dove invited women who wanted their damaged hair trimmed. yes, i need a trim. i just want to be able to cut the damage. we tried dove instead. so, still need that trim? oh my gosh! i am actually shocked i don't need a haircut. don't trim daily damage. stop it with dove. i can't imagine you ever saying, um, bring me some of the boxes that we brought back from the white house, i'd like to look at them. >> i would have the right to do that. >> i don't think you would do. >> i don't have a lot of time but i would have the right to do that. i would do that.

>> let me move on -- >> remember, this, this is the presidential records act. i have the right to take stuff. did you know that they ended up paying richard nixon $18 million for what he had, they did the presidential records act. i have the right to take stuff. i have the right to look at stuff. >> oh, my god. >> that's the famous interview from march 27th where sean hannity was trying to coach him out of an indictment, out of implicating himself. >> but he indicts himself. >> he went in again and again and keeps citing the presidential records act and did it in that town hall when he said infamously i took what i took saying, yes, i did take all those classified documents. he's completely wrong. he either doesn't understand the presidential records act or just lying about it but that interview was something. >> well, he understands that there's been testimony that he understands extraordinarily well and walked through it with several people who have

testified about how much he understands the process of classification and he just -- i -- well, there's -- he's just not that smart. he's really not. if he's a fascist he's like a "hogan's heroes" type of guard. he's just not that smart. the thing is, the guy says george conway like sean hannity, i know you wouldn't commit a crime. >> i can commit -- mr. president, i know you wouldn't commit a crime. sean hannity says, let's move on. talk about the -- >> oh, my god. >> there is so much there going to intent. time and time again and i say he's not smart because he's said things in the town hall meeting that will get him in legal trouble again. time and again he admits, he

admits the intent to commit that crime publicly in public spaces. >> well, that's absolutely right and the best evidence he has created -- the best evidence against him is evidence he has created by having the documents in his office, by having the documents in his home, by having bash di talking to lawyers, he gets them to do illegal acts and then claiming there is no attorney/client privilege because he was trying to commit criminal acts. he is absolutely not bright at all. he is a dope and -- but he's a stubborn dope and that's the reason why he's here today. he had every opportunity as we've been pointing out to give these documents back. if he had invited nara over to mar-a-lago in the middle of last year, a year ago, we would not

be here today. we might not have even heard about the incident because it would have been just viewed as, oh, well, there were some misplaced documents and he gave them back. it wouldn't be a big deal. >> so, chuck rosenberg, there is such a fog of disinformation just flowing from so many sources over the last 12 hours or so about why this happened, what happened, oh, it's just like what joe biden did, no, it's not and we can get into that, it's joe biden going directly after his political opponent, no, we've just explained why that's not true, and that donald trump had the right to take these records under the presidential records act. that is just not true. we've explained that many times over the last few months. can you explain because we have to re-establish the facts here, can you explain what the presidential records act does say and what it does not say. >> sure. willie, so it is important to establish the baseline. the presidential records act requires that presidents return

to the american people through the national archives documents generated by their administration. this routinely happens at the end of a presidency. the end of a presidency may be chaotic but it doesn't obviate the need for a president and his staff to abide the law, and the law requires, the law holds that the records of a presidential administration do not belong to the individual president, they belong to the american people and the national archives is the caretaker on our behalf. by the way, and to george's point, i think it's an important one, without the obstruction, without counseling witnesses to lie, without hiding documents, without concealing evidence, you may not have a case at all. all of that underscores a defendant's guilt, his intent and when you lie or obfuscate or

obstruct, it suggests that the thing you are obstructing, the thing you are obfuscating was a crime when a judge, a federal judge found that the attorney/client privilege had been obliterated and that the government was entitled to speak to one of mr. trump's attorneys, which, by the way, is an extraordinary thing. i can count on one finger the number of times it happened to me in my public prosecutorial career. that's an extraordinary thing to allow the government to peek behind the curtain. it's because there were underlying acts of obstruction, and so the presidential records act is clear. the records belong to the american people, not to the president and trying to obstruct nara, the national archives in its work to retrieve the documents then counseling witnesses to lie is a serious, serious federal crime. >> yeah, you know, mika, i just -- i'm communicating with

richard haass, and young richard asks this, he says, one big question, why did trump take and hold the documents? >> i know. >> what was the motive? why would he do that? >> why? >> the answer goes back to the first thing we said, he's a dope, right? but also more to the point and this -- he hasn't understood. he doesn't understand where he is now. what arena he's just walked into the middle of. >> uh-huh. >> he thought they were his and he thought that nobody could tell him they weren't his, and when he even -- even though he knew he was violating the law, he thought as a bully that he could hold the documents that he could keep the documents. this is a guy that's bullied people his entire life. he's always stayed five minutes away from imminent destruction,

and he survived it his whole life. and so he thinks this is just like fighting the "new york post." leaking documents to "the new york post" about how he's great having sex, he thinks this is leaking to "the daily news" changing his name and so they could say, oh, that donald trump is a man about town and what name did he use to be -- >> john miller. john barron. >> john miller. >> oh, john miller. >> he thinks this is the mueller report that he can just push all of this aside and i'm serious, he's been doing this since the mid-1970s and he's gotten away with it. any lawyer will tell you, if there is -- if they're a dumb country lawyer like me, especially, there's a reason to stay away from the federal courthouse whenever possible. >> yeah. >> i mean it's frightening when

you walk through those doors. it's all business, it's the reason giuliani would lie outside and make all of these outrageous claims about stolen elections and go inside and the federal judge would you say are you suggesting there's widespread fraud in the election and giuliani would say, no, sir, i am not. trump thought he could bully people. he's now going to find out and be delivered the harshest lesson of his life that you can't pull by federal judges. you can't bully the feds themselves and he's going to pay for this. he may pay for it with his liberty unless he cops a deal. he's going to have to plea or i'm predicting he's going to get charged and very likely will spend time in jail. >> so i want to poke through one thing you said. you know, a dope, a bully, both, potentially true.

but he -- he knew they weren't his. he knew and there's reporting that shows it was explained to him. there are documents he assigned to declassify -- >> right. >> he knew they were not his. >> what i said was he knew -- like in his mind what he said to hannity is how he was thinking. i said right after that, he knew he was committing a crime, but in his own screwed up reality -- >> he can do whatever he want. >> where he bends reality, he thinks he can do it. it doesn't matter. he think the laws apply to everybody else but him. >> so then here's my question, claire mccaskill, as gravely serious as a federal indictment would be, the law has its own time line and then there's the political time line. and i don't think they match up quite well. i think as much as the far right is claiming the doj is being weaponized, i think donald trump

knowing his past patterns will weaponize this himself and drum up the base. any concerns about the time lines? >> i think that certainly the special prosecutor understands what's happening over the next year. >> will they look at that? >> they'll try to move this -- they're ready to go to trial. the federal government never indicts until they're ready to go to trial. >> i know, but then there are all these experts saying it could be a year. >> a lot of that depends on the question, a big question that's not been answered yet. that's what judge gets the case. the judge has more control over the time line than jack smith or trump's lawyers, and the judge, if it is a judge that understands the value of it going quickly, but let me say one thing about why he did this, i think also we need to realize he did a fund-raising plea within an hour of learning he was indicted.

>> that's why i'm asking this. >> usually it's about money. i think in his weird brain if he had documents nobody else had that he wasn't supposed to have that meant they were worth something. >> why does he have them. is it a money thing? >> it's all a grist. >> let's talk more about this point about this comes as a campaign is going on. >> yeah. >> we have had two indictments already. more potentially coming. from the trump perspective, yes, he's going to use it for fund-raising. this might help in the republican primary. some of his rivals are standing up for him. >> a little bit. >> helps them too. the mechanics, how will he campaign next year if he's coming in and out of a courtroom whether it's new york -- >> i think it would be -- >> well, i mean i think he's betting it could be useful to him. it is certainly possible that he could have an ankle bracelet on at the convention, a number of legal experts including the former fbi director said that recently. i want to go back to the documents for a second.

it is true and we don't know this right now and i don't know when we'll know it could be he was showing off for rich donors that he just thinks he lives by a search set of -- >> could be more nefarious. >> richard haass thinks he is making a great deal of money from his financial deals in saudi arabia, what has been reported is that some of these documents he may have showed others are about iran war plans and nuclear secrets. >> that's a whole different ball game. >> guess who cares about those? saudi arabia and a lot of countries in the gulf. we don't know that but that is something that is not a 0% chance that's a possibility. >> joe. >> yeah, i said from the beginning, i know mika has too, with him it's always about the money. always follow the money. it's always about the money. so -- >> it's something he could have sold? >> yeah, i won't speculate on it. i'll just say it's always about the money, and maybe you don't

sell it, maybe you just have it. maybe you just pass on information to other people and that helps you create even a closer relationship so -- but anyway, we won't speculate on what it is, but i do know it's not speculating when you say with donald trump it's always about the money. so, michael beschloss, let me end with you on this very historic morning. morning after, and just get your final thoughts. what should americans be thinking about today as they absorb this news digested? >> they should be sorry that someone like donald trump became president if he is guilty of these charges, and they should have faith in our system. you know, the sad day would be if he did these terrible things he's accused of and our system somehow couldn't get its act together and this guy got off scot-free or got elected again

without coming to justice. you know, the other thing is, this is really surreal. >> yeah. >> the last seven years had who in our group could have imagined we would be talking plausibly about a former president of the united states willfully taking documents, being told they had to come back by the archives, lying about it, saying, no, and we're talking about the possibility that he might have sold these things for money, possibly to hostile countries. if we had brought this up, let's say we were talking in 2015 i would have said, you know, this is fine for some thriller, but that doesn't happen in real american life. look how far we've come. >> i mean, who could imagine, claire mccaskill, that a president of the united states would be charged with federal crimes under the espionage act? that is directly taken from

some, some thriller. unfortunately, instead of a thriller with us, it's a tragedy. >> you know, i've been watching "the plumbers" on hbo and i constantly am reminded it's not the crime, it's the cover-up and that's really this, it is -- it wasn't him walking with those documents, it's how he handled it after the fact, and no one would ever think a president of the united states would be that stupid, that ego centric, that focused on something of value that only he could have that he would do something this serious and that's really what the jury is going to hear about. all it takes is one juror to hang a jury. all it takes is one. so these prosecutors, let's not forget, these prosecutors have a big task, they have to convince all 12 beyond a reasonable doubt

that donald trump did what appears to be obvious that he did, but buckle up, this is going to be quite a wild ride. >> yes, it is, michael beschloss, chuck rosenberg and george conway, thank you all very much for being on this morning. and still ahead on "morning joe," much more on the first ever federal indictment to a former american president including reaction from donald trump's 2024 gop rivals. meanwhile, republicans on the house oversight committee are doubling down on accusations of corruption against president biden and his family. we'll speak with the ranking democrat on that pam, congressman jamie raskin, who says there are no grounds to escalate the investigation. plus, the supreme court delivers a victory for voting rights advocates reaffirming a landmark civil rights law that was thought to be in jeopardy. we'll have the details surrounding yesterday's surprise decision. also ahead, live reporting from ukraine as kyiv launches

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other stories making news this morning, the u.s. environmental protection agency continues to monitor american air quality this morning, as smoke from canadian wildfires drifts across the country. president biden said he's asked transportation secretary pete buttigieg to continue to update him on how the smoke might be affecting u.s. air travel and proactively manage the situation. the white house says americans can check their local air quality at airnow.gov.

people can also look up recommendations for how to stay safe from cdc.gov. but most people say wear a mask outside and don't go outside if it's really bad. a senior officer in ukraine's military tells nbc news that kyiv has officially launched its counteroffensive. "the washington post" reports ukraine's military intensified its strikes yesterday near the front lines in the southeast, as it begins to push into russian-occupied territory. moscow's defense minister said yesterday that ukraine sent up to 1,500 soldiers and 150 armored vehicles into the region of zaporizhzhia, though his claims could not be independently verified. according to the post, that region has long been considered the likely location of a new ukrainian campaign to unfold over the upcoming months. we'll have a live report from ukraine in our next hour. and in a surprise ruling,

the supreme court struck down republican-drawn congressional districts in alabama, as a violation of the voting rights act. the court ruled 5-4 backing civil rights activists who say the new districts discriminat ed against black voters. chief justice john roberts and trump-appointed justice brett kavanaugh joined the liberals in the majority. the map of the seven districts will now have to be redrawn. the white house celebrated the unexpected win and naacp president derek johnson wrote in a statement, quote, this decision is a victory for black america and a triumph for our democracy, a proper democracy cannot function without the black vote. and still ahead on "morning joe," we will have much more to cover on donald trump's indictment in the classified documents case. a federal indictment, including reaction from republicans on

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i have been saying for some time, because people very close to donald trump have been saying a couple of years ago, they did not think that he would seek a second term. he wasn't enjoying the job. >> oh, he's got to. >> now, not only, not only is he going to seek a second term to avoid a jail term, possibly, if you listen to the testimony yesterday, he's going to once again do a win-at-all cost campaign. it may even get uglier in 2020 than it did in 2016, because donald trump's freedom may be on the line. think about that. we've got a guy -- >> nothing to lose. >> that is running for re-election so he won't get indicted and be sent to jail. >> that was joe back in 2019, laying out why donald trump might run for re-election, to shield himself from prosecution. it still applies today now that the former president is facing

federal charges. nbc news can confirm former president donald trump has been indicted by a grand jury in florida in connection with special counsel jack smith's investigation into his handling of more than 100 classified documents discovered last year at his mar-a-lago resort in florida. two sources familiar with the matter confirmed the indictment. one adding that trump received a summons to appear in u.s. district court on tuesday. this is the first time in american history a former u.s. president will face federal charges. the sources say trump has been indicted on seven charges, with one source noting that does not necessarily mean seven counts, because multiple counts can be associated with each charge. willie? >> and a spokesperson for the special counsel declined to comment so far. a separate source did say the indictment is under seal, which

is why the government cannot yet comment, which makes sense. sources do tell nbc news that the charges include violation of the espionage act, conspiracy to obstruct, and making false statements. former president trump now expected to surrender to authorities and to appear in u.s. district court in miami on tuesday at 3:00 p.m. a u.s. secret service official tells nbc news that secret service personnel will meet with trump's team today to begin security and logistics planning for his movements to appear in federal court. this is trump's second indictment in the last two months, as he also facing state charges in new york, where he has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records in a hush money case involving adult film actress, stormy daniels. joe, to go back to your comments from 201 that we played coming into this segment. if donald trump thought running for president back in 2020 or running for president now in the 2024 campaign was going to

shield him and protect him from indictments, he was getting some bad advice. he was sorely wrong as the special counsel is bringing down these very serious charges, taking classified documents. the espionage act, obstructing justice. those come with jail time if you're convicted. and as we've been saying this morning. there is much more to come, still. this is just one piece of the special counsel's investigation. there's the case in georgia, as well. so this is going to get very complicated for the former president in the next year,ust reflecting on you, it gave you a tan. >> speaking of hair, i didn't realize in 2019, it was against the law for me to get a haircut. >> don't think you were wearing

shoes, either, but -- >> yeah, exactly. >> that's every day. >> yeah. >> it's -- that's every day. >> but also, though, how interesting in 2019, what i was talking about, obviously, the mueller investigation showed that he may have committed crimes, may have obstructed justice ten different times. but, of course, mueller said he can't be charged because he's president of the united states. it's a get out of jail free card, and that's what donald trump saw it as all along. a get out of jail free card. he still had, you know, one of his associates, one of his lawyers got sent to jail for the scheme he concocted to pay off a porn star a couple of days before an election. >> just gross. >> so his lawyer gets into jail, why didn't he? because he was president of the united states. we said this in 2019. we also said this at the beginning of 2022. so there was no doubt that he was going to run for president, because he saw that as a get out of jail free card, one.

and two, he also understand that if he was running for president, the second he got these indictments dropped on him, that he knew were coming, he knew they were coming, well, he could just say it was a witch hunt. this is all -- i mean, go back and look at the tape. we weren't the only ones saying this. everybody was saying it. and it's all so very obvious. that's why stupid people getting on tv thinking that they're going to convince stupid people that this is a witch hunt and that they're only doing it because donald trump is running for president, they obviously have short-term memory loss and they don't have videotape. i mean, they can't go back and see what everybody was saying, even a year ago. anyway, let's -- i was reading david rothkopf, a good friend of ours that we have on the show, he wrote this on "the daily beast." why did trump go to such great

lengths to violate the law and put his future freedom at risk, not to mention exposing u.s. intelligence assets to great jeopardy? was it to satisfy his admittedly gargantuan ego. was it to say, look, i was president once, and i can prove it. no, even for trump, that was reckless. he wouldn't have admitted these alleged crimes unless he had a purpose in mind, an anticipated return for investment in time for the risk he had undertaken. we do not know to whom the documents may have been shown. perhaps we will learn that in due course. we do not know and perhaps may never to whom he may have contemplated showing them. but it seems safe to assume he did not hang on to them because he possessed some harlan crowe.

he had shown a complete contempt for our national security, for our products produced by our intelligence community, for the entire concept of protecting vital national security throughout his presidency. he appointed a national security adviser, michael flynn, who lied to the fbi about inappropriate changes he had with foreign enemies. he sought to defense that national security adviser after the crimes were clear and said he would reappoint him should he be elected again. in one of his first meetings in the oval office with russian's foreign minister, he revealed to him the russian ambassador's sensitive classified information that put allied intelligence assets at risk. he ignored the advice of national security professionals and granted his son-in-law and daughter classified clearances they should not have had. he repeatedly attacked and denigrated the intel community,

including one time while standing alongside vladimir putin in helsinki in 2018. he put stooges in high places in the intelligence community to ensure that they would be able to control any revelations they might produce that he saw as threatening. and perhaps to enable him to come up with dirt on his enemies. he said he would fire the professionals in the u.s. government in a clear effort to be able to replace them with those who placed loyalty to him above loyalty to the country or our constitution. now, this is all known. this is all on the public record. he was a threat to national security long before he stole those classified materials and went to great lengths to illegally retain them. and claire mccaskill, add on top of that, on top of all of those crimes against -- political

crimes against our national security interests, add on top of that he, after congress approved weapons for ukraine, add on top of that, that blackmailed zelenskyy and said, you're not going to get these weapons until you give me dirt on joe biden and joe biden's family. add on top of that that marco rubio's led intel community in the united states senate said, let's underline this, donald trump's 2016 campaign posed a direct threat to america's national security. that's just what we know, claire. these people suggesting that he didn't have malicious intent in mind, they're ignoring a very, very long paper trail. >> he is so dangerous, he is so dangerous to our national

security, and it is just fascinating to me that people in congress who understand the consequences of what he has done and how he has done it, continue to defend him. i mean, you know, we've talked about what he would do with these documents. one of the things, as jen pointed out, is that he could use them to continue to curry favor with saudi arabia. and what could saudi arabia do for donald trump right now? they could cut production of oil and raise gas prices. nothing could hurt joe biden more than raising gas prices next year, three, four months from the election. and trump knows that. he is willing to do anything to do two things. promote himself and make money, country be damned. >> yeah, and by the way, the headline, it's so fascinating that you say that, claire, on the drudge report, there are all the headlines about the indictments, but at the very

top, the headline, saudi crowned prince threatened major economic pain on the u.s. amid oil feuds. and by the way, what was donald trump anger about regarding his son-in-law, jared kushner? that jared kushner got 2 billion for his fund from the saudis and he didn't get a cut of it. according to reports, he was enraged that he didn't get a cut of the money that jared went out and raised after he left the white house. maybe this is again speculation, we're not exactly sure why they're not communicating as much, but there was a real bitterness that he didn't get a cut of that money. and there's no doubt he wants a cut, not only of that money, but of saudi money. and let me just say one other thing, too. talking to my sources in the middle east, and i asked them,

after the saudis cut production to raise oil prices, i asked them all, what were you doing? what were you thinking? president biden goes over, he brings -- with political damage done to his political brand in america, he gets the crowned prince out of the corner, goes over, gives him a fist bump. and the crowned prince turns around a couple of weeks later, stabs biden in the back, forgive the -- that description, undermines joe biden. why would he do that? and you talk to oil ministers, talk to other people in the middle east. they were counselling him not to do it. they said it made no sense. and he cut production, prices went down anyway. everything they were warning him about came to fruition. so why in the world would the saudi crowned prince cut oil

production when everybody in opec was telling him not to do it. everybody else in opec was saying, this made no sense. everybody else said that this is not the time well, you all think about it. i think many questions may answer themselves. >> well, the whys and the what-ifs in this now federal indictments into classified documents are horrendous. and we will wait and see. but there are two tracks here. there's the legal track and the political track. joining the conversation, we have nbc news legal analyst, andrew weismann, the founder of the conservative website, the bu bulwark, charlie sykes, and pulitzer prize winning columnist and associate editor of "the washington post," eugene robinson, and roberts chair and american chair at vanderbilt university, jon meacham join us. jonathan lemire and jen psaki

are still with us as well. andrew, let's start with you. and just, if i could ask about the process here beyond tuesday when donald trump has to surrender himself to federal court in miami, there are those who say, for this to go to trial, it could take up to a year. politically, it seems like some argue donald trump is running from the law by running for the presidency. should the timeline move up? >> the timeline could both move up and move back. it so really is going to depend very much on something we don't know yet, which is, who is the judge who gets assigned to it. and he or she is going to have enormous issue on that particular issue, while many people have said by charging the case in florida, which the government may not have had much of a choice there, it eliminates the sort of dispute and

litigation over venue. however, there also will be some delay, because there will be a lot of issues about how to deal with classified documents. and there's a specialized statute called cpa, which will be very much part of the litigation, and that can delay things. it's possible that things can take longer or shorter than one year. but this is where, as you said, the legal issues and the political issues coincide, because if you think that donald trump had incentive in 2016 to become president in terms of his legal woes, that is now so much more apparent for this upcoming election, because he could end up in front of at least two federal -- we know one, but at least that and maybe two federal criminal cases. so, it would be quite important for him, as a matter of sort of getting out of jail, that he

wins or an ally who is willing to pardon him wins. because that will end at least the federal cases. >> andrew, you've been telling us for weeks if not months on this show, that this day was coming. just based on what we knew publicly, based on media reporting, based on what we've heard from the special counsel and the pace of things. in fact, yesterday morning you told us this was coming. so, as you look at now what we know. of course, the indictment is sealed, but what we've heard from trump's own attorney, who was told that this was about the espionage act. this strikes most of us as the most serious charge that donald trump has faced in his life, is it fair to say. and as a prosecutor, can you explain to our viewers just how serious this might be for him? >> sure. so i think there are two types of charges that are incredibly series. one is the retention of hundreds of government documents, including classified documents. and it will be interesting to

see when the indictment is unsealed what it says about the nature of those classified documents. obviously, we have a lot of reporting about how serious the documents are, but it will be interesting to see what the government confirms. the second type of charge that is also very serious obstruction of justice. and there one of the things we did learn yesterday is that it's not just obstruction, but a conspiracy to obstruct. so we're going to learn about who the co-conspirator or co-conspirators, plural, are with the former president. those are two very serious charges. and just to give you one example, just last week, a former member of the air force was sentenced after pleading guilty, which is usually when you get a lower sentence, because you can accept the responsibility, was sentenced to three years in jail for the retention of classified documents. so here the charges seem more serious than that. so this is something that people really do go to jail for.

>> so, jonathan lemire, you know, we've been covering trump, you've written a book on "the big lie," and one of the things that we know is that trump will try to control any part of the situation he can. he can't control the fact that he has to surrender himself tuesday at miami federal court, 3:00 p.m. but the minute this came down or came -- he became notified of this, he started trying to control the narrative out there. immediately. he came out first with the news before anybody else. talk about a little bit what you think he's doing with this and that includes fund-raising, i believe. >> he broke the news with a series of truth social posts last night and he spent all of last night re-truthing, if you will, sentiments of support for fellow republicans, who maels mostly made this argument. this is their early talking

point. speaking about people in trump's orbit, this is not a day that they wanted. they understand this is significant. this is a federal charge, they feel like, yes, there could be some gain in the short-term. yes, he's fund-raising. but they know, this is not a good thing for next year, for a general election. and they also recognize that he's going to have trials, likely have to stand trial, and it's going to be a real burden on him as he tries to seek office again. jon meacham, we often ask you for the historical comparison. well, we don't have to do that. there isn't one. this has never happened before. so you're down -- you want to get just your thoughts here on this moment in our national story. a former president of the united states for the first time is facing federal charges. >> it's a case of democratic, lower-case "d," maturity, i think. we are becoming a country where former leaders are and aspiring

leaders are facing criminal reckonings. and that's a new phase for us. it's a new chapter and it's a test of the capacity of citizens, particularly citizens who are inclined to support president trump, to make the distinction between their partisan passion, their policy preferences, their cultural inclinations, and the rule of law. and thomas paine wrote, even before the declaration of independence, that in america, the law is king. that there is no man who is king. and that this is what we're confronting. and it's not that he had classified documents for all the what about, what about, what about that's going on, it's that

he took active steps to keep them, to hide them. what the indictment says, to inspire to keep them. and as we've been talking about, that raises more questions than it answers. what would -- why -- what did he take? why? what was the point? and a mature democracy, which god willing is not an oxymoron, but we're going to find out, in a mature democracy, we would be able to make these distinctions, to let the law take its course, and to realize, in my opinion, that the constitutional experiment in trying to seek a more perfect union is more important than any single candidate, any single partisan cause, any single party. and that's really where we are. and we don't know the answer. it's a human question.

it's a question, do we have the wherewithal, do we have the fortitude to say about someone we support, eh, that's too far. shouldn't do that. time to move on. people don't like doing that. >> the answer to that question, charlie sykes, from a lot of republicans already, including speaker kevin mccarthy has been, no, they immediately rode to the former president's defense. mccarthy, who's the speaker of the house, implied that it was joe biden himself who was going after donald trump. mccarthy writing, quote, it is unconscionable for a president to indict the leading candidate opposing him. that's, of course, not what happened here. it's from the justice department, which appointed a special counsel, which then used a grand jury to get an indictment. majority leader steve scalise tweeted in part, joe biden is weaponizing his department of justice against his own political rival. elise stefanick titled her statement on the indictment, quote, the unprecedented and

sham indictment of president donald trump by biden's department of justice. a slightly different story in the upper chamber, joe. the republican senate leadership keeping quiet so far. mixed reactions on the campaign trail. asa hutchinson said donald trump should get out of the race. kris christie said, i'm going to wait and see. i want to see the indictment. i don't get my information from truth social, he said. ron desantis, as you can imagine, rode to the defense of donald trump in all of this. but these are starting at the top with the speaker of the house, kevin mccarthy, suggesting he knows better, of course, that it is joe biden targeting a political opponent. they know what donald trump did because he has told us what he did, taking these documents home, obstructing justice, all the rest of it. it raises the question, are they okay now -- these are people with access to classified information. are they okay with people stealing and bringing home with them classified documents. >> you know, this is really so

sleazy. it's as sleazy as marco rubio attacking the jury system in america. it's as sleazy as donald trump attacking the intel community. it's as sleazy as republican senatoring attacking our men and women in uniform, saying that they would rather have russians, because russians were real men and our troops -- i mean, it is so sleazy. all the institutions they're tearing down. now they continue to try to tear down the rule of law. they tried to do it, it's so sleazy. you look at what josh hawley and everybody said yesterday. you look at what they said after january 6th, what they did on january 6th, they have absolute contempt for the united states of america. absolute contempt for the united states of america. and they put their loyalty to donald trump over our military, over the intel community, over the rule of law, over cops on capitol hill. you name it.

and now, look at this, charlie sykes. again, it's not like -- i know a lot of people think, i just fell off of a turnip truck last week coming up from pensacola, florida, they dropped me off in front of 30 rock. but no, i was actually in congress and i was in congress at a time where they called us fire breathers, right? where they said that they were right-wing extremists. and maybe on economic issues, maybe we were. but this would have never happened. this would have not only never happened when i was there in 2000, this wouldn't have happened in 2010 with the tea party. this wouldn't have even happened in 2015. this is -- this is -- this contempt for the rule of law and contempt for our united states, men and women in uniform, for the intel community, this all centers around defending one failed president and failed reality tv show star.

it's just incomprehensible for somebody like you and me that grew up conservative republicans. >> well, you're right, it is sleazy. it is hackey, but it's also politically dumb. i mean, the smart move would have been for republicans to wait and see what cards jack smith is about to play. because as you've pointed out, this is not trivial and it's going to get a lot worse. we're talking about violations of the espionage act, a conspiracy to obstruct, about lying to the federal government. and the smarter move would be to say, okay, let's wait and see how bad it is going to get. and it's going to get a lot worse, before we fire off. but as you point out, the loyalty to donald trump, the need, the impulse, the requirement that they jump to his defense overrides all of those concerns. so it is sleazy, it is stupid, and the question is -- are

republicans really waking up today and looking at donald trump and realizing all the things, joe, that you laid out that he has done and all of the things that are about to happen. and are they saying to themselves, yeah, let's do this all over again. let's chain our political futures to this guy. let's spend the next year and a half spinning all of this. because they know that they're going to be asked over and over and over again, do you support pardons, what do you think about this? you know, is he actually above the law? so i thought it was extraordinary how quickly they jumped to his defense, knowing that, in fact, next week, we're going to learn a lot more about this case. there are a lot of questions that we still do not have answers to and we will find out over the next seven days. >> it also seems important to wait and see what the government has to say, because donald trump has already said what he's done.

he's already admitted to this. he's made up lots of different reasons why he declassify documents in his head, like, do republicans have eyes and ears? he has told you what he's done and now we're going to find out more about it. weeknight wait? joining us now, ranking member of the house oversight committee, democratic congressman jamie raskin of maryland. he also was a manager for donald trump's second impeachment following the january 6th insurrection. so i guess the first question for you, sir, is, your reaction to this federal indictment now of the former president? >> well, i can't say i'm surprised at this point. you know, donald trump entered the presidency violating some essential constitutional norms by saying that he would stay in business and he ended up collecting millions and millions of dollars from foreign

governments, kings and princes in absolute violation of the foreign government emoluments clause, and he left the presidency pilfering hundreds and hundreds of government documents, potentially violating the espionage act, by illegally retaining national defense information. and in between, everything else was a grift and a rip-off of the public. so at this point, the political culture is split, as i think, you know, you and all of your guests were saying. some people are cheering for this incorrigible recidivist and outlaw and some people are astonished saying it's remarkable that we're back in this situation. but i do think he's transformed lincoln's party. he runs it much more like a religious cult, and he dictates to people what they're going to do. and that's the profound

disappointment and shock here. >> and again, jonathan lemire, a lot of the republicans are blaming president biden for master mining this, which is interesting, because they also claim that he can't, you know, walk a straight line. so there's that politically. the way they're using the biden narrative that they've created about joe biden. and also, in many ways, it seems disturbing to me, because they are operating on a completely different set of facts, which has been the whole problem with the trump presidency. if you watch different media outlets, you would think something terrible happened to a great man. and it was like a funeral. and you would watch evangelical leaders coming up saying, we stand for this president. this is a man who's been indicted in manhattan, held liable for sexual abuse, and now indicted federally. you know, i really don't annoy know how far they can push this, but at the same time, here we are. >> some were asking for prayers

for donald trump last night after this federal indictment. congressman, mika's right. the two major talking points we've heard from your republican colleagues in the house so far are number one, this is at the behest of president biden to wipe out a political opponent. let's note that it was president trump who got impeached for doing exactly that, while he was in office. but secondly, they say that this is an effort to distract from their efforts to investigate hunter biden, which involves, indeed, the oversight committee of which you are a member. can you talk to us about that charge. what is actually happening there, sir? >> sure, let me just agree with what you just said. this is an absolute affront to the rule of law when you blame it on your political opponent. and the other point is an absolute projection on their part. what's been taking place over the last week or two is an attempt to distract from president trump's legal troubles.

but they've gone back to a little tidbit that was found in a federal form, in a so-called 5d 10-23, where a confidential source quoted a -- an oligarch from ukraine, who said that there was corruption with joe biden and hunter biden. that was checked out by the u.s. attorney for the western district of pennsylvania, brady, who was appointed in 2020 by donald trump's attorney general, william barr, to head up a task force of lawyers and investigators to check out this tip. and rudy giuliani's allegations that joe biden had been involved in corruption in ukraine. and that assessment of this tip came back empty-handed.

they said, there's no grounds to escalate this from an initial assessment to a full-blown criminal investigation or a

these are the forces that the founders understood. these are the forces that richard hoff steader was writing about when he talked about the paranoid style. paranoid style of this fits what he hoffsteder wrote about when he wrote about there is a certain amount that thrives on persecution, that finds meaning in a drama that there are unseen forces that are

arrayed against them. that is entirely, entirely an element of trump's schtick. you know, he is not a failed reality show host. what he has done is he has taken reality show values and imposed them on the life of the nation. he hasn't done it alone. he has been enabled by a political class that works on fear. you have just shown all of those tweets. and an electorate that, you know, 71 million folks in 2020 looked around at the previous four years in the middle of a once-in-a-century pandemic and, yeah, let's do this again. so to me, to me what this moment is is it is a test of citizenship for everybody, but

particularly because of the nature of our politics, presidential elections are very close. they just are. '64, '72, '84 were big, most are very small. this presidential election coming up will be decided by a couple of million people across five states, and those are the people who i hope pay attention to this and see that america's bigger than, bigger than this fit we are locked into with trump. >> and, jon, not to belabor the point, but this isn't the first time that the margin for survival of this country being a country moving toward a more perfect union has hung by a narrow thread. just anybody read this weekend

and there was light. i mean you and i have been talking about lincoln now for quite sometime. you wrote a book on it. i got all of the coloring books. you will win pulitzer prize for that. i will pass my coloring books on to my kids. but you just look at abraham lincoln's life and you look, for instance not to get too deep here, but the peninsular campaign early in the war. if general mcclelland has pushed harder, chances are the war would have been over before the emancipation proclamation and slavery would have remained an institution in the united states of america. you look in 1864, as we were saying before, even -- i love the quote you had, that a leader -- a republican leader, while abraham lincoln was

delivering gettysburg address smeared and said, "let the dead bury the dead." even a year later republicans were thinking he may not even win the nomination in 1864, and the only reason he got elected, as you and other historians say, is because sherman got to atlanta, burned it down and began his march to the sea. america hung by a thread. if lincoln had lost that race, which a lot of people thought he was going to lose, before sherman entered and burned down atlanta in early september of this year before the election, thought he would lose the election, emancipation would be reversed, slavery would continue as an institution and they would have done with the south what trump wants to do with russia. i mean hanging by a thread. here we are again hanging by a thread. it is a strong thread, mind you, but a thread all the same. >> it is. and even more recently to go

written by truman, the reason dwight eisenhower in 1952 was because taft would not commit to supporting nato. in the early days of the cold war there was an old guard republicanism, resurgent isolationism that was going to pull america back and eisenhower, who had watched and at his command young men had died to try to end fascism, could not fathom diplomatically setting up a situation where it could happen again. there was a woman who left, walked out of the republican convention in '52, eisenhower is beating tafts, and she says of eisenhower, well, this means eight more years of socialism. that's a lady whose

grandchildren who may be voting for trump. it is a perennial force, but guess what? just enough people were with lincoln and with eisenhower, and that's what we have to do. >> and you talked about ike in '52. why don't we talk about truman in '44? fdr, if ftr had kept his vp, wallace, the whole world would have changed radically. truman was called the second missouri compromise. his own chief of staff said, "who the hell is truman" at the end. somebody said, "well, we just picked harry truman because we all were just tired." the difference that made in history, remarkable. jon meacham, thank you so much for being with us. i know everybody loves hearing your insights today. so thank you for being here. charlie sykes, is there any hope for the republican party? is there any hope for conservatives, true conservatives to stand up, and

not -- not say convict trump but just say, let's let the system play out, let's trust the rule of law, let's not attack our court system, let's see whether trump's guilty or not, see what the jury says? >> well, i hope so. i mean it is -- it has been a rough road but i think we are seeing some green shutes and i think we ought to remind ourselves there have been recent surveys that suggest the overwhelming majority of americans think these crimes are serious and disqualifying. we are focused elise stefanick, but recognize how out of the mainstream they are, and also, we're seeing a new willingness on the part of some republicans to go after donald trump. i thought it was interesting that chris christie is doing something this week that nobody did back in 2016. he's going after donald trump, his character, his record, going

after the grift, raising the issue of the saudis. again, it's chris christie, we could spend the whole hour talking about his baggage. i thought it was interesting that mike pence, his super pac, put out a video yesterday attacking donald trump, holding him accountable for january 6th. now pence, of course, is not willing to go the whole way and not willing to support the indictments. but least we're having these voices. i think fundamentally, over the long course as this plays out, there is a fundamental decency among the american people, even on the republican side and maybe it's been abandoned for some time. but as this continues. n abandone time but as this continues. we are not in the beginning of this. we are not ate in the end of th. it is going to get a lot worse and iet think the party is goin to be tested again and again and again. it has failed all of the tests so far but we're not done yet. >> otcharlie sykes, thank you vy much.

stillie ahead on "morning joe,"e will have an update from ukraine where president zelenskyy visited partsid of the country that are dealing with deadly, devastatingad flooding. it comes as ukrainian forces launch a long-awaited counteroffensive. we will get a live report just ahead. you are watching "morning joe." we will be right back. and new adventures you hope the more you give the less they'll miss. but even if your teen was vaccinated against meningitis in the past they may be missing vaccination for meningitis b. although uncommon, up to 1 in 5 survivors of meningitis will have long term consequences. now as you're thinking about all the vaccines your teen might need make sure you ask your doctor if your teen is missing meningitis b vaccination. moving forward with node- positive breast cancer is overwhelming. but i never just found my way; i made it. and did all i could to prevent recurrence. verzenio reduces the risk of recurrence of hr-positive,

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back just back before the top of the hour, two sources in ukrainian's military confirmed to nbc news its long-anticipate it counteroffensive against russia officially has begun. let's bring in nbc news foreign correspondent raf sanchez live in zaporizhzhia, ukraine. good morning to you. what are you seeing so far? what do you know about the counteroffensive? >> reporter: good morning. we have known for months that ukraine was planning, was training, was marshalling its troops and equipment for this counteroffensive, but when

exactly they would launch their attack was one of kyiv's most closely guarded secrets. now a senior ukrainian officer and a soldier near the front lines here in zaporizhzhia confirms to nbc news the counteroffensive is now under way. neither would go into detail about exactly where ukrainian forces are attacking or what the objectives are. but we know from the white house there is intense fighting going on multiple front lines in the east and south of the country and some of the most intense fighting is happening east of where we are in zaporizhzhia. i want to show you some video from the scene there. this is video that has been put out by the russian defense ministry. it is a drone video from east of where we are, and what you are seeing on your screen is a significant moment in this war. two independent analysts tell us

that what you see there are western battle tanks deployed into combat by the ukrainian military for the first time. these two analysts say that these are german-made leopard 2 tanks in action against russian-occupying forces. willie, this is the culmination of what you will remember was a months-long diplomatic and political wrangle between kyiv and the nato allies. the western nations could not agree amongst themselves who was going to supply battle tanks to ukraine, and there was finally that deal back in january between president biden and the chancellor of germany, olaf schulz, where they agreed to supply both the leopard tanks and m1 abrams. we are now according to these analysts seeing those tanks in action as part of this counteroffensive, willie. >> extraordinary pictures to see the western tanks now joining the fight, after as you said all

of the wrangling goat them there. i want to ask you about the dam that was blown up. russian without evidence blames ukraine for blowing it up itself. it is a dam on the front lines that flooded and killed people downstream. what more do we know about that? we know president zelenskyy visited the region a couple of days ago. what do we know about who blew up the dam and its impact on the war? >> reporter: willie, it has been extraordinary watching the ukrainians simultaneously launch this counteroffensive as they are dealing with this unfolding humanitarian and environmental disaster across ukraine. they have evacuated thousands from the western bank of the dnipro river which they say is under their control, but they are very concerned about civilians in the russian-occupied eastern bank who they say have been left to fend for themselves. we have seen extraordinary

pictures of some of these coming under russian shelling as they are trying to get people to safety. the ukrainian military also has been using drones to drop individual bottles of water to families who are stranded on the roofs of their flooded houses inside the zone, who are not getting the help they need. as you said, president zelenskyy was in kherson yesterday, a trip not without risk, just a couple of hours after he was at a civilian evacuation center. that center was shelled. willie. >> nbc's raf sanchez reporting for us from ukraine with new developments on the counteroffensive that appears to be underway now. raf, thanks so much. mika. let's bring in former cia officer who is an nbc security analyst. if you could talk about where we are as this offensive is launched and the members of the coalition stepping up, especially the british. >> sure, mika.

let's start with the british. you know, the u.s. contribution to the war has been, what, about 40-plus billion, the brits maybe 7 billion, but the brits have played an interesting role in they have a different risk versus gain calculus. they are more willing to push the line by supplying advanced weaponry. so whether it is tanks, whether it is pushing f16s, whether it is these new cruise missiles, it is the british moxy i think is quite remarkable. the way i look at this, this is the power of contribution amongst our allies. ukraine is at a point in which they have the resources, they have the weaponry and they're launching an offensive which really the future of european security is at stake, if it takes days, weeks, months or a year plus. it is a seminal moment in the war. >> joe. >> thank you, mark, for your insights on that. let me bring in to this conversation with mark jonathan lemire. jonathan, i'm wondering before

we let mark go, do either you or mark have maybe a reinhold neiber quote since it seems to be popular today and yesterday on the show about the boston red sox? >> yeah, jon meacham has been entertaining us with these quotes in recent days. i believe it is the red sox are a stain on mankind. it is one of his lesser-known sayings, it is not as wildly publicized as some of his wider thoughts on humanity. their losing streak, they've fallen under .500 and they head to the bronx tonight. >> okay. >> they head to the bronx, and if i can have a stat right here, do you have -- oh, here we go. mike barnicle, mark, gave us this helpful stat. our starters have a 5.21 e.r.a. and we only have 15 quality starts in 16 games, a measurement of how good a pitching staff you have.

listen, this was a surprise, it was no surprise at all. the red sox we knew, just like we knew donald trump was going to getting indicted, we knew the red sox pitching staff was going to destroy 'em. we have a fun line-up. i mean we've got some good hitters, some people showing life. i love watching this team. but, man, it is horrible, the pitching. >> well, joe, as i woke up this morning and i was coming onset, my wife said to me "are you going to talk about ukraine or talk about indictment of trump?" i said, "no, it is the red sox therapy session," which for many of us is important. i will be in boston next weekend to see red sox/yankees. they probably will be several games under .500 but i hope to see some of the "morning joe" crew there. it is our annual trip. it is a fun team. the pitching staff, corey kluber giving up eight straight hits yesterday, just shaking my head. >> okay. after that momentary die

version, mark stay with us. nbc news at 2 minutes past the top of the hour can confirm former president donald trump has been indicted by a grand jury in florida in connection with special counsel jack smith's investigation into his handling of more than 100 classified documents discovered last year at his mar-a-lago resort in florida, his home. nbc news senior capitol hill correspondent garrett haake has the latest. >> reporter: this morning an historic first, a former president charged with federal crimes. donald trump indicted over seven federal charges in connection with his alleged mishandling of classified documents. the former president posting on social media that his lawyers had been told he had been indicted in what he called the box's hoax. mr. trump adding later he had been ordered to appear at the federal courthouse in miami next tuesday and releasing a video message to supporters. >> i just want to tell you, i'm an innocent man. i did nothing wrong and we'll fight this out just like we've

been fighting for seven years. >> reporter: overnight one of the former president's lawyers telling cnn how he reacted to the news. >> he said this is just a sad day. i can't believe i have been indicted. >> reporter: the charges against mr. trump remain under seal this morning but include making false statements, conspiracy to obstruct and a violation of the espionage act related to the former president's handling of sensitive national defense information. sources tell nbc news. special counsel jack smith has been investigating mr. trump's handling of classified documents found during an fbi search of his mar-a-lago home last august after the former president and his team repeatedly refused to turn them over for months. the former president has long argued he was not only unfairly targeted by investigators -- >> i have every right to under the presidential records act. i was there and i took what i declassified. >> reporter: and even once suggesting. >> if you are the president of the united states you can declassify by saying it is

declassified, even by thinking about it. >> reporter: nbc news has learned the grand jury heard an audio recording of mr. trump discussing keeping the classified document after leaving office and acknowledging he knew it was classified at the time. mr. trump is facing legal battles on multiple fronts and was already the first former president to face criminal charges in new york city where he was accused of falsifying business records to which he pled not guilty. but the federal indictment is more serious and coming in an election season. mr. trump's main rival for the republican nomination so far siding with him. governor ron desantis tweeting, "the weaponization of federal law enforcement represents a mortal threat to a free society." while former governor chris christie wrote, "no one is above the law." >> that's nbc's garrett haake reporting, it should be noted, what presents a mortal threat to american democracy is contempt for the rule of law that ron desantis just showed there. deeply disappointing. willie, this just being

reported. former president donald trump acknowledged on tape in 2021 meeting that he retained, quote, secret military information that he had not declassified according to a transcript of an audio recording obtained by cnn. as president i could have declassified it but now i can't, trump says according to the transcript. as president i could have declassified it but now i can't. that is, again, pertaining to secret military information that he retained and did not give back to authorities when they asked for it. >> and it is that kind of detail, joe, it is that kind of evidence, potential evidence that's reporting from cnn that should give people pause, people like speaker kevin mccarthy who immediately put out a statement last night defending donald trump and saying it is joe biden weaponizing the justice department and going after his

political rival. as this indictment is unsealed, no one knows what is in it, nobody has seen the evidence. if you hear about a tape where he acknowledges that he could not declassified and still took the documents home with him, that you would assume would be damming to donald trump at a trial. let's bring in nbc legal analyst former acting solicitor general neil catil. you have had about 24 hours to digest this news. donald trump's own attorney acknowledged in an attorney last night it is an alleged violation of the espionage act. so what do you think this morning is important for our viewers to know and understand about what we've heard just in the last few hours? >> so i think the most important headline here is just what these charges say and what they're about because they're not just an important step to protect our national security. they're also critical to

vindicating the whole idea of the rule of law in america. when i was national security advisor at the justice department i handled this kind of classified information. i certainly saw examples of people who mishandled it. those people get indicted every day. i think this indictment makes clear no person, not even a former president, can easily disregard the law without consequence. i love your caution which is news 4's we are just reading based on the publicly available information thus far. to me that suggests charges had to be brought. i didn't think it was a kind of alternative for the justice department since really the day his house was raided. so, you know, it is not surprising to me. i guess trump was surprised last night. that's kind of shocking to me because i think anyone who is in this -- has handled this classified information knows it is not the way to act. if you act this way you are going to face an indictment. >> neal, nbc news learned the

charges include a violation of the espionage act, conspiracy to obstruct and making false statements. that's just what we know so far. there may be more and we should learn on tuesday if that's unsealed in miami in that district court. can you speak to how serious each of those could be for the former president? >> yeah, we are talking about some of the more serious charges in the entire federal criminal code. it is not something like a misdemeanor or some slap on the wrist. these are all very, very serious. they stand in marked contrast to trump's first indictment by the local district attorney alvin bragg in new york which were misdemeanor charges elevated to a felony because of the compound nature of a number of them. that's really a very different set, falsifying business record. espionage act is as serious as it gets. it doesn't mean espionage. it means mishandling very sensitive national defense

information, and if you do that your punishment is up to -- up to ten years just under the espionage act alone and these other charges all carry between 5 to 20 years of jail time. >> so, neal, i want your response. first of all, how will the prosecutors handle the things that he has said like for instance to hannity where he said, yeah, i can take the documents where i wanted to. hannity said, you would never do that, and he goes, yes, i can do it if i want to and hannity tried to change the subject. now according to jeremy heard and paula reed, this just broke, donald trump acknowledged on tape in 2021 he retained secret military information that he had not declassified, and here is his quote for kevin mccarthy to hear. as president i could have declassified it, but now i

can't. trump is heard saying on the tape, secret military information that he illegally took from the white house. >> yes, joe, we will see what exactly that language is and that tape and so on. i don't know. i mean if the tape is being reported accurately, i guess it does show trump can't claim the insanity defense because, frankly, this defense of declassifying in my mind i had the right to, no, it is not how it works. you can't just do something in your mind. you have to actually do it. this has never been a viable defense anyway, tape or no tape as being reported last night or today. it is helpful that the tape exists for prosecutors because it shows even in kind of trump's most claim about his most delusional mind he at other times disavowed that and said he didn't believe it himself, but that has never really concerned

me as a really viable defense for trump in the first place. i mean the fact is he stole some stuff and then he lied about it and obstructed the investigation into it. it is as simple as that. that's what the prosecutors are going to keep their eye on the ball. the idea whether it is classified or not turns out not to even matter. the espionage doesn't use the word "classified." it uses national defense information and that act has been used to prosecute people for taking nonclassified documents in the past. >> well, i understand, neal, you haven't read the charges so you don't know the specifics. let me just ask you though, based on everything that we know what is donald trump's best defense? and if he doesn't have a good defense, if you were his lawyer what would you be advising him to do right now? >> i would have been advising him from day one to be fully cooperating with law enforcement start to finish.

i mean this is not about you. this is about if you are, you know, the subject of this investigation. this is about our national security. the idea that this guy can't even be straight and understand what he has done and how that could jeopardize our sources and methods, you know, people are in the intelligence community may have given their lives for some of this, some of this information may have been generated through allies, through the five eyes programs or others. what kind of message would it have sent if the justice department said, oh, don't worry about it, you can take this information, lie about it, it is your right to obstruction the investigation. of course not. the whole way the system works, look, people make mistake. vice president pence has a document, biden has a document. not on the scale of trump's hundred plus documents but looks like they had some. the difference is they owned up quite a way and said, look, we

made a mistake, please investigate and so on, get to the bottom of this. trump has done the reverse. prosecutors can't, you know, tolerate a group of people or an individual who acts that way. >> former acting solicitor general neal katyal. thank you for your insight. joining the conversation we have nbc news senior executive editor for national security david rohde and staff writer for "the atlantic" tom nichols. still with us we have jonathan lemire, claire mccaskill, jen psaki, eugene robinson and former cia officer mark polymoropolis. i want to send it back to you, gene, concerning the conversation with neal katyal. then you go to republican leaders and others in congress blaming the biden administration for weaponizing the fbi and finding many different reasons for trump doing what he has said

he has done. and looking at the gravity of this, you just think of that line from "succession." these are not serious people. they can't be serious. when are they going to get it? >> yeah. i mean not serious people because, again, as usual, willie, he admits it all publicly. >> all publicly. >> he admitted it to sean hannity. he admitted it at the cnn town hall meeting. we have him on tape admitting it here. ive' got secret military information, trump says. i could have declassified it as president. i can't declassify it now. kevin mccarthy knows that's a crime. kevin mccarthy knows if he did that he would be in jail. stefanik knows if she had done it she would be in jail. josh hawley, mr. yale boy and mr. stanford boy knows if he had

done it he would be in jail. there's a reason why these people didn't do it. because they knew if they did do it, if josh hawley took documents home, you know, to prove his manhood, he knows he would be sent to jail. so i mean there's a reason donald trump's in trouble. these people, they know it is a crime and yet they choose to denigrate our -- our rule of law, our judges, our espionage act statutes, the very things that are put in place to protect the secrets of this country, willie. they know he committed this crime. yet they're falling in line, or at least they know it is likely he committed this crime but they're falling in line. >> yeah, of course they know. many of them have served in congress long enough to see the

consequences of doing this. you can go online and find a long list of people who have gone to jail for stuffing a document into a briefcase or in some cases shoving them down their pants to steal them from the national archives. this is a very serious crime, as neal just laid out. yet, tom nichols, you have people who know better racing to defense again for donald trump, throwing everything they know away, going to the mat for donald trump, a guy that has cost them so dearly i guess because they fear his voters, suggesting in the case of speaker mccarthy that it was joe biden himself who indicted. i mean this is the speaker of the house. who indicted donald trump when, of course, he knows much better than that. josh hawley making up lies on television last night saying that merrick garland signed off on this. merrick garland did not sign on the indictment brought by the

grand jury. how do you explain this group of people who know better still on stuff like this falling on their sword for donald trump? >> because they're afraid of the base. they're afraid of their base voters. they don't want to deal with them when their own primaries come around. there was a time when parties and party leaders used to educate the members of their own party to say, "this is why it stands on x, y and z." this is why, for example i think back to a minute of bipartisanship, when bob dole suspended his political campaign for a moment to say, "i support bill clinton on policy in the former yugoslavia." some say, you know, that guy should beat him for president but i'm with him on this thing. the base has become so insanely oppositional that elected republicans, who as you and joe both noted know better, they

have dealt with classified information, they know the law, they know what trump, if these allegations are true, they know what trump has done, but they can't be seen to waver even for a moment, even for a micro second in front of the republican base because then they will be called quizzlings and traitors. they can say, look, this isn't a partisan issue. this is what the national security of the united states and the rule of law and defense of the constitution, and on that there is no red, there is no blue, there is no party. we have simply all taken an oath and we all swore to defend it, and they can't bring themselves to do that because they fear their own voters and have a certain amount of contempt for them as well. >> uh-huh. so, david rohde, what are your sources telling you and what concerns you the most about what we know so far? >> what concerns me is that the justice department has not moved to unseal this indictment. >> got in front of it.

>> tempo got in front of it in terms of communication and the political battle ahead. to me it is the most pivotal moment for the justice department since watergate, at least in 50 years, maybe in the whole 150 years because for the next months, six months at least the justice department will be savaged by donald trump and they need to get out in front of it. that's why the cnn piece -- >> but how? like how, because it is dicy, right? >> true, but it is their right to ask a judge to unseal the indictment. just the cnn story suggests that the strengths of their evidence is powerful. >> right. >> this isn't some small-fry case they are bringing. i just think it is important bought many americans -- and it is good to distrust the federal government and there is a tendency in the justice department -- i'm writing a book about it -- to sort of think people understand these norms and jack smith is a special counsel and merrick garland doesn't have anything to do with that. kind of the inner workings of the justice department.

>> let's talk about what could be in the documents and the motivation for trump. we don't know if it is a benefit for him to have the documents. we know he would like to show them off. i remember once being in the oval office for an interview with him and him saying, i'm not supposed to show you this but i will and with that a letter to kim jong-un that was classified at the time. he also says this talking to people he is with, pointing to the document, quote, secret, this is secret information. look, look at this. this was done by the military and given to me, which almost seems like to on the nose even for donald trump bragging about that. but this is such dangerous stuff. >> it is really dangerous stuff, and i really just want a moment to also underline what dave just said about doj. in my experience the department of justice is sometimes a little arrogant and they are so busy

protecting the line between talking about a case and proving a case. in this instance i think you are so right about communication. they can say, we're going to let the evidence speak for itself, but they can also repeat the role of the special counsel. they could also remind the american public about how a special counsel works. they could remind the american public about the line of separation that exists between doj and the rest of government that is more political. they can talk about jack smith's, frankly, resume and what he has done, prosecuting both republicans and democrats. he is not a political guy. but, yeah, he is. they're just going to sit back and say, yeah, we will wait for trial. we saw what bill barr did. he violated every norm of doj by getting out in front of the mueller report and characterizing it in a way that was not accurate, and that

stuck. you would think they would learn from that now and do a better job of communicating between now and tuesday about the role of the special counsel. this is no different than when barr appointed durham. it is the same law, but no one is talking about that. meanwhile, they're going to characterize -- the trump forces are going to characterize this as mccarthy already has, this is somehow joe biden doing this. it is frustrating to me and i just wanted to echo your concern about the failure of communication at doj informing the american public about the process. >> david. >> look, the people who work there are very proud. they're very non-partisan, and in the end bill barr did the right thing after the election. he said that trump, you know, had lost. so it is just -- this is a historic moment for the justice department. many people have suspicions about the supreme court, that it has become political. so i think as this trial proceeds it is a huge test of the effectiveness and fairness of the american judicial system,

the justice department, of course, all of our judges. >> we have an expert of communications right here? jen psaki. >> we do. >> hearing claire's concerns, hearing what david is reporting, what would your counsel be to doj? >> i think the one big challenge i don't know the answer to and maybe somebody at the table does is the willingness of the attorney general and/or jack smith to be out in public. because, yes, we can say they should be communicating about the role of the special counsel. i can tell you having a lot of communications roles, it is sometimes screaming in the forest if you are a communication person, if you are doing briefings. i'm sure they are likely doing that. the question is do they need a face and what are the pros and cons of having a face. i think all of you would argue they should have, i think, one of these people out there explaining it to the public. but without garland, without jack smith, again, it is like spokes people screaming in the forest and it is not going to accomplish what you all are suggesting. >> i think they can release the

indictment. >> sure. >> the feds do much longer, it is called spaeing indictment. >> yes. >> the manhattan indictment was brief and without details. you saw when the search warrant from mar-a-lago was released it said person x heard trump say this. they released a photo of the top secret documents. that's the way to communicate. >> that's very powerful, yes, the visual. >> he deserves a fair trial. they should abide by all of their norms but, again, you unseal indictments. you know, let this indictment speak and inform the american public. this is an incredibly important moment. >> at least for now, mika, no public appearances scheduled for attorney general merrick garland today. >> interesting. in light of what you are saying, that donald trump uses his kind of platform as a tool to manipulate information, and then there's a lot of politicians in office right now that are helping him along. mark, just in terms of what we know so far, what do you think

or what concerns you about national security implications here? why did he have these? >> well, mika, we certainly don't know the intent, but i will note that the world is watching. there's absolutely a national security -- to the statement written about in the previous segment. look, we have allies. we have liaison relationships. these are where our intelligence service like the british, like the french, israelis provide us with their most sensitive information, their sources and methods, and they do so understanding we will keep it secure. they look at this and really the credibility of the united states is at stake. it is not just donald trump was a former president who has mishandled classified information. in fact, took it, kept it and refused to give it back. it is also he is deleting candidates to become president again on the republican side and so our allies are watching. for those of us who served, you know, overseas at u.s. embassies, we did a lot of finger wagging at other countries when they didn't up hold the rule of law.

this wasn't a sad or happy day, it was an important day yesterday because, again, the u.s. seemed to stand for something. we lectured a lot of countries on things like this. it is time we practiced what we preach. >> you know, the world is watching and, you know, one question that i have had listening to all of this is, you know, i think claire would know and, joe, you would know. there were classified documents and classified documents, you know. there are classified documents that you could look at and say, see, i wonder why this is so secret and others when you say, holy blank, and i kind of wonder whether justice has taken the degree of sensitivity of the documents trump had into account in deciding to take what is really a fateful step. i guess my question since we were talking about the politics, to tom nichols, is this how the republicans are going to play

this out month after month as we approach the election? are they really going to stand by, blindly stand by donald trump? more information will come out on tuesday, more information as time goes on. it is not likely to be good for trump. can they actually hold this line or are they going to have to change their tune at some point? >> well, you know, you would think rational people facing the kind of information that eventually is going to come out would change their tune. but the republicans have been remarkably consistent in sticking to their narratives about things like the deep state and, you know, the persecution of their leading candidate. i worry -- i was thinking about what claire mccaskill said a moment ago about the way bill barr completely polluted the release of the mueller report,

that this is now going to happen again because, again, people are not -- the republicans will simply kind of smoke screen this and people will really not understand that this was not just a process foul, that this is really serious classified information. i mean most of the things that make it to the president's desk, you know, are not -- are not low-level classified throwaways. the stuff that trump is accused of taking would be incredibly sensitive and, you know, as mark points it out stuff that people could have given their lives for, that our allies gave us. you know, if we don't -- if that story doesn't come out, if we as a people don't understand that, then, yes, gene, the republicans are going to just keep filling the room with static and fog and say "this is all just witch hunt

2.0" on and on and on. so i think that the republicans can do this. they've been remarkably effective at simply ignoring reality and hammering two or three very simple-minded talking points. you certainly would expect it from the house caucus but, you know, to see kevin mccarthy ride out there, ron desantis -- i think ron desantis is going to have to figure out at some point that he is going to have to talk to more people than just the republican base, but, you know, unless more information comes up, explains this to the american people, that just leaves the path open for the republicans to obfuscate and to blow smoke, and i think they can. >> staff writer at "the atlantic" tom nichols. "the washington post," eugene robinson. nbc news senior executive editor for national security, david rohde. former cia officer mark poly

more open lus, thank you for being on this morning. still ahead who "morning joe," we will have much more on the historic federal indictment of donald trump. plus, a look at the other stories making headlines this morning including an unexpected victory for voting rights and an update on the smoke that's covered parts of the northeast for days. but before we go to vote, really, guys, what are your plans for sunday today? >> well, obviously we will go heavy on this indictment that's breaking news, looking ahead to donald trump's arraignment on tuesday. and then a bit of a palate cleanser with one of the most talented people currently walking the earth. the great john legend will be my guest on sunday. >> oh, my gosh. >> he has won an emmy, a grammy, oscar, a bunch of other awards. a talented guy, one of my favorite people to sit down and chat with. john legend coming up on nbc

"sunday today" this weekend. we will be back on "morning joe." from prom dresses to workouts and new adventures you hope the more you give the less they'll miss. but even if your teen was vaccinated against meningitis in the past they may be missing vaccination for meningitis b. although uncommon, up to 1 in 5 survivors of meningitis will have long term consequences. now as you're thinking about all the vaccines your teen might need make sure you ask your doctor if your teen is missing meningitis b vaccination.

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getting with richard hoff, our golf correspondent. young richard asks, one big question mystery, why did trump take and hold the documents? what was the motive? why would he do that? >> why? >> the answer goes back to first thing he said, is he is a dope, right? but also more to the point, and this is what he hasn't understood, he doesn't understand where he is, what arena he has walked into the middle of.

he thought they were his and he thought that nobody could tell him they weren't his. and when he -- even when he knew he was violating the law, he thought as a bully that he could hold the documents, that he could keep the documents. this is a guy that's bullied people his entire life. he has always stayed five minutes away from imminent destruction, and he survived it his whole life. >> yeah. >> so he thinks this is just like fighting the "new york post", leaking documents to the "new york post" about how he's great having sex. he thinks this is leaking the daily news, changing his name so they could say, oh, that donald trump is a man about town. what name did he use to be that publisher? >> john miller -- john baron -- >> john miller. he thinks that this is like the

mueller report, that he can just push all of this aside and let -- and i'm serious. he has been doing this since the mid 1970s and he has gotten away with it. any lawyer will tell you if there is -- if they're a dumb country lawyer like me especially, there's a reason to stay away from the federal courthouse whenever possible. >> yeah. >> i mean it is frightening when you walk through those doors. honest, it is the reason giuliani would lie outside and make all of these outrageous claims about stolen elections and go inside. the federal judge would say, are you suggesting there's widespread fraud in this election? giuliani would go, no, no, sir, i am not. trump thought he could bully people. he's now going to find out and he will be delivered the harshest lesson of his life, that you can't bully federal

judges. you can't bully the feds themselves. he is going to pay for this. he may pay for it with his liberty unless he cops a deal. he is going to have to plea or i'm predicting he is going to get charged and very likely will spend time in jail. >> so i want to poke through one thing you said. you know, a dope, a bully, both potentially true, but he knew they weren't his, he knew. there is reporting that shows it was explained to him. there are documents he has signed to declassify. >> right. >> certain documents. he knew they were not it. >> what i said was he knew there was -- like in his mind what he said to hannity is how he was thinking. i said right after that, he knew he was committing a crime but in his own screwed up reality. >> he can do whatever he wants. >> where he bends reality. >> yes. >> he thinks he can do it. it doesn't matter.

he thinks the laws apply to everybody else but him. >> so then here is my question, claire mccaskill. as gravely serious as a federal indictment would be, the law has its own timeline and then there is the political timeline. i don't think they match up quite well. i think as much as the far right is claiming the doj is being weaponized i think donald trump, knowing his past patterns, will weaponize this himself and drum up the base. any concerns about the conflicting timelines? >> well, i think that certainly your special prosecutor understands what is happening over the next year. >> will they look at that? >> well, they're going to try to move this. they're ready to go to trial. the federal government never indicts until they're ready to go to trial. >> i know. but then there are all of these

experts saying it could be a year before it goes to trial. >> a big question has not been answered yet and that is what judge gets the case. the judge has more control over the timeline than jack smith or trump's lawyers. if it is a judge that understands the value of it going quickly -- let me say one thing about why he did this. we need to realize he did a fundraising plea within an hour. >> i know. >> of when he was indicted. >> that's why i'm asking. >> usually it is about money. i think in his weird brain, if he had documents nobody else had that he wasn't supposed to have, that meant they were worth something. >> i know. why did he have them? >> this is a monetizing thing for him. it is all a grift. >> mmm, mmm, mmm. >> jen, let's talk about this comes as a campaign is going on. >> yeah. >> we have had two indictments already, more potentially coming. from the trump perspective, yes, using it for fundraising. yes, it might help in the republican primary. so far some of his gop rivals

are standing up for him, although it allows him to bring up -- but just the mechanics, how is he going to campaign next year if he is coming in and out of a courtroom whether it is new york or miami, how is he going to do this? >> i think he is betting it could be useful to him. >> absolutely. >> it is certainly possible he can have an ankle bracelet on at the convention. a number of legal experts including the former fbi director said that recently. i want to just go back to the documents for a second. it is true, and we don't know this right now and i don't know when we will know this, it could be he was showing off for a fundraiser, rich donors, he thinks he lives by a different set of rules. >> could be more nefarious. >> what is also true and i would be interested in what the golf correspondent thinks, your thoughts, he is making a great deal of money from his financial deals in saudi arabia. what has been reported is some of these documents you may have shown others are about war plans and nuclear secrets. >> that's a different ball game. >> guess who cares about those?

saudi arabia and a lot of countries in the gulf. we don't know that but that is something that is not a zero percent chance it is a possibility. >> yo. >> joe. >> i said from the beginning and mika has too, with him it is about the money. >> it is. >> always "follow the money." it is always about the money. >> something to great -- >> well, i won't speculate on it. i will always say it is about the money. maybe you don't sell it, maybe you just have it. maybe you just pass on the information to other people, and that helps you create even a closer relationship. anyway, we won't speculate on what it is but i do know it is not speculating when you say with donald trump it is always about the money. michael beschloss, let me end with you on this very historic morning, morning after. just get your final thoughts.

what should americans be thinking about today as they absorb this news, digest it? >> they should be sorry that one like donald trump became president if he is guilty of these charges. they should have faith in our system. you know, the sad day would be if he did these terrible things he is accused of and our system somehow couldn't get its act together and this guy got off scott free or got elected again without coming to justice. you know, the other thing is this is really surreal. >> yeah. >> before the last seven years who in our group this morning could have imagined we would be talking plausibly about a former president of the united states willfully taking documents, being told that they had to come back by the archives, lying about it, saying no, and we are talking about the possibility that he might have sold these things for money, possibly to hostile countries. if we had brought this up, let's

say we were talking in 2015, i would have said, you know, this is fine for some thriller but it doesn't happen in real life. >> coming up, two of our top legal experts are standing by. joyce vance and ari melbourne join us at the top of the hour with new reaction to the federal indictment of donald trump. "morning joe" is coming right back. ef with rinvoq. and left bathroom urgency behind. check. when uc got in my way, i got lasting, steroid-free remission with rinvoq. check. and when my gastro saw damage, rinvoq helped visibly repair the colon lining. check. rapid symptom relief. lasting, steroid-free remission. and a chance to visibly repair the colon lining. check. check. and check. rinvoq can lower your ability to fight infections, including tb. serious infections and blood clots, some fatal; cancers, including lymphoma and skin cancer; death, heart attack, stroke, and tears in the stomach or intestines occurred.

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other stories making news this morning, the u.s. environmental protection agency continues to monitor american air quality as smoke from canadian wildfires drifts across the country. president biden has asked transportation secretary pete buttigieg to continue to update him on how the smoke might be

affecting us air travel and proactively manage the situation. the white house says americans can check their local air quality at airnow.gov. people can also look up recommendations for how to stay safe from cdc.gov. wear a mask outside and don't go outside if it's really bad. a senior officer in ukraine's military says kyiv has officially launched its counteroffensive. the "washington post" reports ukraine's military intensified strikes yesterday near the front line in the southeast as it begins to push into russian-occupied territory. moscow's defense minister said yet that ukraine sent up to 1500 soldiers and 150 armored vehicles into the region of zaporizhzhia, though the claims could not be independently verified. according to the post, that region has long been considered the likely location of a new

ukrainian campaign to unfold over the upcoming months. we'll have a report in our next hour. and in a surprise ruling, the supreme court struck down republican-drawn congressional districts in alabama as a violation of the voting rights act. the court ruled 5-4, backing civil rights activists who say the new districts discriminated against black voters. chief justice john roberts and trump-appointed justice brett kavanaugh joined the liberals in the majority. the map of the seven districts will now have to be redrawn. the white house celebrated the unexpected win, and ncaa president derrick johnson wrote in a statement, quote, this decision is a victory for black america and a triumph for our democracy. a proper democracy cannot function without the black vote. still ahead on "morning joe," we'll have much more to

cover on donald trump's indictment in the classified documents case, the federal indictment, including reaction from republicans on capitol hill. "morning joe" is coming right back. "morning joe" is coming ri back from prom dresses

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i can't imagine you ever saying, um, bring me some of the boxes that we brought back from the white house, i'd like to look at them. did you ever do that? >> i would have the right to do that. there's nothing wrong with it. >> i don't think you would do it. >> i don't have a lot of time, but i have the right to do that. i would do that. enough of this. this is the presidential records act. i have the right to take stuff. do you know they ended up paying richard nixon $18 million for what he had? they did the presidential records act. i have a right to take stuff. i have a right to look at stuff. >> why did you take those documents with you when you left the white house? >> i have every right to under

the presidential records act. i took what i took and it gets declassified. just so you understand, i had every right to do it. i didn't make a secret of it. the boxes were stationed outside the white house. >> the presidential records act, i read it. it does not say you can take documents with you. it says that they are the property of the federal government. >> you negotiate. you make a deal. it's not criminal, by the way. the presidential records act is not criminal. >> it's not that you can negotiate to take the documents with you. >> can i tell you, just so you understand, the presidential records act is not criminal. i took the documents. i'm allowed to. >> donald trump admitting he would take documents from the white house and falsely claiming that what he did was not criminal because they were his documents, all of which is exactly why he is in serious legal trouble this morning.

>> first of all, richard nixon got paid $18 million. it is always about the money. he said i have every right. he said it there. he said it on hannity. even when hannity said you wouldn't do that, i have a right. then he said i didn't make a secret of it. if that were true, we would be talking about the liv golf tournament this morning, but he did. not only did he make a secret of taking those documents, he lied to the national archives, he lied to the fbi, he lied to the department of justice, he lied to his own attorney, he lied to people all around him about still having these documents. and that, and no other reason,

is why we are here today. >> yeah, those are two extraordinary clips. first, watching sean hannity coach donald trump through trying to avoid an indictment and donald trump insisting on talking his way into one. and then also in that second clip in the town hall saying again he's protected by the presidential records act. he is not, plainly. the presidential records act says the documents belong to the national archives and to the government, not to a man, not to a person. this is why we can confirm this morning that donald trump has been indicted by a grand jury in florida in connection with special counsel jack smith's investigation into his handling of more than 100 classified documents discovered last year at his mar-a-lago resort in florida. two sources familiar with the matter confirm the indictment, one adding trump received a summons to appear in u.s. district court on tuesday in miami. this is the first time in american history a former u.s.

history will face federal charges. the sources say trump has been indicted on seven charges, with one source noting multiple counts can be associated with each charge. a spokesperson for the special counsel declined to comment to us. a separate source said the indictment is under seal, which is why the government cannot yet comment. sources do tell nbc news the charges include violation of the espionage act, conspiracy to obstruct and making false statements. former president trump expected to surrender to authorities and to appear in u.s. district court in miami on tuesday at 3:00 in the afternoon. nbc news justice correspondent ken delanian is live outside the federal courthouse in miami. also with us joyce vance, ari

melber, jen psaki. what has been the reaction to this announcement down there, and how do we expect things to proceed from here? >> reporter: good morning, willie. it's all very sudden for the folks down here in florida, because it's only a couple of days ago that we learned and they learned that the center of gravity of this case had shifted from washington, d.c. where the grand jury was hearing evidence to here in south florida in this courthouse behind me in miami where a different grand jury got up to speed, heard from some witnesses and returned that indictment. there's obviously going to be a huge amount of security preparations in advance of the trump surrender and first appearance here on tuesday. this is a pretty large courthouse. they're used to high profile cases, so they don't anticipate much drama around that. what's really interesting right now is the situation where the department of justice, for whatever reason, has sealed this indictment and given donald

trump and his lawyers four days to shape the narrative and talk about their perspective on the case and the doj can't say a word. you're already hearing from former justice department officials urging them, urging the department of justice to reconsider this approach and to go into court and ask the judge to unseal these charges so we can see exactly what this indictment says and what they're accusing the former president of. i've got to say, we've all been expecting this for a long time, but this seems like an even stronger case, even more extensive case than many of us expected. >> you have to sit back and wonder when in the world are these people going to learn? mueller got run over first by trump, then by barr. again, giving trump four days to do this, again, is a serious problem. i hope they will reconsider.

i want to talk about it being in florida and why i personally think -- again, just me, i think that's a good thing in terms of jury pool. talk about whether it's in manhattan, where about 85% of people voted against donald trump. if it were in d.c., about 95% of people voted against donald trump here. in miami-dade, donald trump, i think he won the county or came close to winning the county. he won the state of florida by 4%. it really wasn't close at the end of the day. so trump's not going to be able to talk about a left wing jury a jury pool. this is actually going to be in his back yard and something that actually, if he is convicted ultimately, will probably lend

some credence to that and may actually end up being a good thing, a positive thing that it's in florida and not in places that voted overwhelmingly against donald trump. >> reporter: it's absolutely true that the jury pool on its face would not be as friendly, in theory, to the prosecution down here as a jury pool in washington, d.c. that could be the power of it. we've seen in other cases, remember, there was a paul manafort juror who said she was a trump supporter, but nonetheless had no problem convicting paul manafort of the crimes of which he was accused. if this trial is held here in miami, what we understand is that the jury will come from miami-dade, not from broward or west palm, where it is an even

more conservative political makeup. it's a little more mixed down here. but you're absolutely right. a jury verdict here would have in some ways more credibility, because the first thing you would hear about a case in washington, d.c. from republicans is, oh, a d.c. jury, of course they're going to convict donald trump. the other thing down here is venue. the justice department became worried about a month ago that there were going to be problems if they brought this case in washington, d.c., that there were some valid challenges trump could bring and also some delays. it was kind of an abrupt change. all of a sudden they shifted the case down here. the media didn't catch up to it for several weeks. they clearly read this grand jury into the case and brought some additional witnesses and then pulled the trigger on the indictments. we thought it would come in both places, but as of right now, this is the place they brought

the charges. >> ken delanian, thank you very much for your reporting this morning. ari melber, i see you thinking over there. your biggest take-aways from what we know so far? >> that jack smith hasn't said a word and he has the whole country listening, that he moved quietly, as ken just mentioned. we followed this very closely and didn't even know until recently that he basically opened up the second grand jury, not forum shopping, just following what they believe the facts show. as your archival clips showed, o.j. had the book "if i did it," trump's book would be "i did it." we talked about how he is the worst possible client. he has all but confessed to aspects of this and doubled down on why he claims, most experts think wrongly, that he could continue to act this way and hide it from the doj.

he is legally presumed innocent. we will cover this trial, like all trials, with that legal prin principle. he starts out in a hole that is worst than most. >> joyce vance, your thoughts on what we know so far? do you think perhaps the doj would benefit from being a little bit more transparent, maybe unsealing it? >> i always think doj would benefit from a little bit more transparency. you can't talk about the substance of cases, doj can talk about procedure and what people should expect and charges that have been filed. i think we will hear from this attorney general. i think this indictment will be unsealed and we will begin to get a public education on the process here. or at least i hope that's what's in the work. i've got two real take-aways in this moment. one came together for me watching your opening montage. prosecutors will be able to take clips of trump talking about

this situation and play them for the jury. the criminality is just blatant. at every step, at every time there was a fork in the road, trump took the wrong path, the path towards criminality. he took documents. he lied about it. he refused to supply with the subpoena. he essentially taunted the government, the justice department into indicting him. now he's got what he was asking for all along. this is not a close case on the facts. the other thing that hits me as a prosecutor and i have to say you'll forgive me, but my prosecutor's heart cringes a little bit at this part about picking a jury based on where prosecutors think they can get a conviction, what were the voting rates. as a prosecutor, you charge your case where the criminal conduct occurred. i think prosecutors here did the right thing. but the fact that we are here at all is remarkable. just a year ago on june 9th last

year, we were preparing for the first of the eight packaged january 6th committee hearings. the mood in the countries was so different. i remember no one thought those committee hearings were likely to be a success. there was even less confidence that merrick garland and the justice department could hold trump accountable. the progress we've made in one year is remarkable. we're not all the way there yet. there will be difficult issues. we should have confidence in american resilience and the rule of law. >> it just so happens for venue purposes they're going to bring this in miami. i'm sure jack smith didn't go, what's going to lend the most credibility to a possible conviction down the road. from the political side of it, him being found guilty there miami, florida, in an area where

he wins, i think carries even a stronger message. if a west texas prosecutor decided to go after joe biden, again, i think it lends more credibility to, i think, the ultimate conviction if the facts are the way they seem to be laid out right now. >> i think that's absolutely spot on. donald trump is entitled to a jury of his peers and he is about to get one. in doj we like to say that we are the largest law firm in the country. it's really true. here doj has the ability to bring subject matter experts from nsd and the special counsel's office. these are the folks who will understand espionage and how to use a statute that helps the government protect those secrets at trial. they will be able to draw on the expertise of the miami us

attorney's office. they're very skilled. they know their judges and juries. they get convictions all the time. doj is in the habit of doing public corruption cases. jurors listen to the facts. the facts here are strong. >> very strong. claire mccaskill, donald trump knows they're strong. people around donald trump know this is a very strong case, know he's in trouble. jonathan, myself, other people have been hearing that for weeks now. if you're donald trump's attorney, knowing what he faces, knowing the number of years in jail he could possibly face, would you not be going to your client and saying let's try to get a deal. we can shout and yell and stomp our feet, but behind the scenes let's try to plead this out, because if you go to trial,

you're going to lose. >> good luck with that. i don't think this is the kind of man that -- didn't he say he never had to ask god for forgiveness? >> yep. >> so this is not a guy who has the ability to claim wrongdoing. it's just not in his makeup. i just don't think he would ever do it. so the issue is -- and ari can speak to this as well as i can. the issue is going to be jury nullification. what donald trump is going for is a concept in the law where the jury ignores the facts and the law and decides based on their own biases. you know, you see it back in the day when i was in the courtroom prosecuting cases you'd see it with dwi cases. jurors would say, there but by the grace of god go i. i'm not going to put this guy in jail for driving drunk.

that's called jury nullification. trump is going for that. his lawyers know he's going for that. it will come down to what we call voir dire. that is the technical legal term for picking the jury. when you have to have a unanimous jury, that process in this case will be maybe the most important jury selection in the history of the criminal justice system in america. speak to that, ari, and how they can actually ferret out somebody who would want to insert themselves on the jury in order to hang the jury, refuse to find this man guilty even if the facts dictate they should. >> voir dire is where you say, wait, can you really even be impartial? people have seen in the movies on "south park" the joke is people would pretend to have biases to get off the juror. one of the questions you could

ask this kind of jury is, who won the 2020 election and other factual questions just to start ferreting out are you involved in facts or have you imbibed in a political movement right now where habitual lying is considered a litmus test or a stunt. donald trump has been around the legal process forever. he's been in over 4,000 civil cases. he's now twice impeached, twice indicted, first president ever indicted at the state or federal level. the federal case is obviously much larger. it's what could put him in a jumpsuit in a prison. he has gathered some understanding of how to get out of things without knowing all the technical terms. i think you're right, he may know at the end of the day, yeah, you could find, one, for a mistrial. you could find people who put the facts aside and say i like this person.

of course, he didn't just abuse his power. he's accused of using power he didn't have as a citizen. he's on tape admitting it. we've never had a trial like this, so it's the trial of the decade or century. that jury will have to be carefully selected for what i still think many, many americans are capable of. that includes people who might dislike trump as well. people who say, oh, you thought it was unfair the way he came in in 2016. that is also not appropriate. you need to bring in jurors who can look at the facts, not the politics. in this case, the facts are quite damning. >> the criminality is blatant. he has said it out loud, yet there are republican leaders jumping to his defense. there are evangelical leaders jumping to his defense

passionately. there are trump supporting americans who are upset right now that the government has turned against their guy. there is a whole narrative out there created by donald trump himself. he almost makes the republican party like his one-man laugh track. just like that cnn town hall where he'd be calling kaitlan collins nasty and the audience is laughing with him even though he's doing something terrible. this is a very compelling figure. >> yeah. republicans in the house with one voice last night rushed to his defense before knowing all the evidence we've been chronicling here and saying this is a witch hunt, it's president biden trying to stomp his political opponent. we haven't heard yet from mitch mcconnell, which is interesting. let's talk about the politics of it. we've talked about how trump has been framing the arguments. you pointed out that he's got a rally coming up. >> on saturday. >> he'll be able to do that

again prior to his court appearance. as we look at the campaign trail, how do you foresee the other republicans navigating this? chris christie said i'm reserving judgment until i see the indictment. others seemingly going to trump's defense, how do they play this? on the one hand, this is exactly what they've been waiting for, a legal matter that could take trump out of the race. >> it seems like they're dividing into two camps. one is sort of asa hutchinson. chris christie reserved making comments probably because of his own history. when we learn more early next week, we'll probably hear more from christie. the others are in the other camp or they're not commenting at

all. >> joyce vance, donald trump is a man who has lived his entire life under impunity. he's done whatever he wants whenever he wants and always gotten away with it. now he's facing the most serious charge of his life. if convicted, there's real prison time behind that. it is now just one piece of a larger story, which is that jack smith is still working on the attempted coup against the united states government, efforts to undermine the 2020 election. fani willis the d.a. in georgia is still working on her. just as you look at this from a prosecutor's point of view, how does this all sort of get condensed in the next year, year and a half, which by the way, donald trump will be spending trying to run for president while he's in and out of courthouses? >> trump's dance card is going to get pretty full pretty fast.

prosecutors in court are very good at working together to coordinate these kinds of appearances. there may even be some sort of deal cut as to which case will go first. everybody will have to watch their speedy trial act on the clock and make sure they don't violate the amount of time they have to go to trial. but that speedy trial act clock can be suspended if there are pending motions or other sorts of proceedings. everyone won't have to strictly fight for time. i think we can expect to see federal charges perhaps proceed a little bit more quickly. the federal system is more streamlined. miami is what's called a rocket docket. that means the judges down there are vigilant about their calendars. they don't cut parties a lot of slack, and they really try to push their dockets forward. they don't have these years-long delays we sometimes see in other courts. that's especially true on the criminal side of the house.

two more indictments are possible as we move forward into this summer, and these are all serious cases. i think the final way these cases come together is, if there are convictions in some of the earlier ones, they will amplify donald trump's criminal history when it comes to sentencing. when you're sentencing someone with no prior convictions, you get relatively lenient treatment. but when you have a conviction or two on your side of the scoreboard, particularly in the federal system, your criminal score ratchets up the guideline range you're due to be sentenced in. it's complicated to put a former president in prison. that's something that both state and federal systems will have to grapple with. it gets worse for trump the further into this we get. >> joyce vance, thank you very much. jen psaki, thank you as well. we'll be watching "inside with jen psaki" this sunday at noon eastern. coming up on "morning joe," we're digging into the reported

chaos inside trump's legal team as the former president now faces a federal indictment. plus, we're looking at two supreme court cases, one decided yesterday that hands a surprise victory to voting rights activists, and another surrounding a trademark dispute involving a reference to comments about donald trump's small hands. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. right back. trying vapes to quit smoking might feel like progress, but with 3x more nicotine than a pack of cigarettes - vapes increase cravings - trapping you in an endless craving loop. nicorette reduces cravings until they're gone for good. narrator: the man with the troublesome hemorrhoid enters the room. phil: excuse me? hillary: that wasn't me. narrator: said hillary, who's only taken 347 steps today. hillary: i cycled here. narrator: speaking of cycles, mary's period is due to start in three days. mary: how do they know so much about us?

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why did you leave the former president's legal team? >> as i said at the time, it had nothing to do with the case itself or the client. the real reason is because there are certain individuals that made defending the president much harder than it needed to be. he's not very honest with us or with the client on certain things. there were certain things like the searches he attempted to

interfere with. these are the searches at bedminster initially. there was a lot of pushback from him where he didn't want us doing the search and we had to eventually overcome him. >> former trump attorney on why he left the former president's legal team, accusing trump's legal advisor boris epstein of blocking he and others of getting information to and from their client. joe, a lot to talk about in terms of the jurisdiction where this is playing out and the different players coming out here. >> well, exactly. jonathan lemire, abc news breaking the news that one of two judges that this has possibly been assigned to -- we say possibly. it's breaking news. i would find it really hard to believe they would ultimately assign it to this judge. but judge aileen cannon, who of

course as we remember, made some bizarre rulings in favor of trump when she was appointed special master. the rulings were so bizarre and head scratching to most people, most legal experts, that when it got appealed to the 11th circuit, i said on this show the 11th circuit is extraordinarily conservative, but they are not going to put up with rulings this bizarre. sure enough, she got overruled by the 11th circuit. you talk about, again, if this case ends up going to the same judge that was overruled on bizarre legal rulings that really had no basis in law whatsoever and where she was basically a hack for donald trump. you know, the system is what it is. the question is, though, why in the world would anybody assign this case to her? >> we're looking at that same

abc report. judge aileen cannon will at least be initially assigned to this case we presume tuesday. we don't know if she will be the permanent judge beyond that. as you say she is a trump appointee who gave him and his legal team broad leeway in the early stages of this case, then overruled. ari, let's talk about this. we're just learning about this. we don't know exactly what this will mean. walk us through the process as to how she would have potentially gotten this case, what it could mean going forward, and even she could be in charge of the sentence if he's tried and convicted in her courtroom. >> there's a lot of breaking news, because the former president is facing prison time. abc is saying that sources looking at this. they saw her initials and they have sources who think she would

be involved in the arraignment and potentially more. usually when you start a federal case from scratch, there's a random assignment. that's one of the many ways you assure impartiality. it's possible this is being lumped in with the prior proceedings because of the searches, et cetera, which means it wouldn't be the normal random process. it's also possible we don't know who's been assigned to oversee the trial and this is for the tuesday arraignment. >> whoever the judge is, again, it's the judicial system. if they appoint this judge, i'm sure there will be rulings on either side that will be appealed as they move forward. again, as we've said with juries, we say with federal judges, you've got to respect

the process. my only point here is it would be really strange to appoint somebody who was so embarrassed by a very conservative 11th circuit with the rulings overturned. >> yeah. there's a lot of things we don't know here. first of all, there were two names on the summons evidently, not just cannon, but also reinhardt, who is a magistrate. this may end up in west palm and it may be because of the common practice of assigning a judge a case they have been involved in before, assuming they know the facts and they're more familiar with everything that's gone on in the case, that may be why her name is on this. but i can imagine that there will be some pushing and pulling in the courtroom about her ability to go forward with this

case because of the problems that she encountered making rulings in the last case. this would be a real blow, i think, to fairness if this woman ended up presiding over the trial. >> joining us now, former federal prosecutor and contributing writer for new york magazine, his latest piece is entitled "the chaos inside trump's legal team." also symone sanders townsend. i want to ask you a little bit about your piece. can you describe what trump's legal team looks like when they're talking to the president? i'm just wondering does anyone actually tell him the truth? >> so that is a major problem with the effort to represent the president. it's very hard to get a straight message delivered to him and accurate information delivered

to him. plenty of people are complaining about boris epstein sort of meddling with this process of getting information to and from trump. i think it's fair to say, based on what i've heard in recent days, the effort to defend trump is very haphazard. there are a bunch of different teams spread out across florida, d.c. and new york. across the teams, they know little to nothing about what's happening in the other cases. some of these lawyers have never met each other. they don't keep each other up to date, even though that is vital in a situation like this. candidly, trump is frankly short on the best legal talent in this effort. i don't want to disparage the folks working for him. it's a very diverse group of people with diverse backgrounds, but this is not the team, quite honestly, i would have ever expected to see representing trump in the first ever criminal

indictment against a former president. >> i read your piece. you make a lot of good points. talk about dream teams. donald trump has a legal nightmare ahead of him and not what many experts would call a dream team. there's far above average public sniping, which never seems to bode well. second, now that we have reporting that some of the counts against donald trump in this new federal indictment include obstruction and false statement charges. >> it will be absolutely vital to cordon off anyone who may themselves have criminal exposure or involvement on advising trump on acts that my have been included in the

indictment. parlatori's comments were very unusual. one of the interesting things that came out of my discussions, though, is that some people were eager to talk because they felt he had not accurately represented the full cinco de mayo -- scope of the problem, which is not just that they have trouble getting through to trump, but there's a lack of consistent messaging that can't be laid at the feet of anyone but donald trump himself, the client. the fact that he can't get better lawyers than the current stable he has, in some respects, that's not a problem with epstein. it's a problem with trump. people don't want to represent him in the most prominent law firms . they don't want to get their hands dirty. he's left with a fairly mixed

bag, some fairly capable lawyers and some lawyers who are candidly not the sort of people who are going to talk the justice department out of anything. >> part of the problem is donald trump is known for not paying his attorneys. talk about the difficulty of managing a client like this, someone who blatantly disregards advice. he takes to truth social every chance he can and says things he probably shouldn't. we've been playing clips all morning of things he's said publicly. he has complained he feels like he's not getting great legal advise, that they're underselling the legal peril he's in. >> i truly cannot imagine what it's like to manage this man, in all honesty. i was a prosecutor for a while. this man is totally undisciplined . he doesn't shut up.

it's a problem for his lawyers. to crystallize a point that maybe is worth expounding here, trump thinks that maybe maintaining this adversarial posture is essential to getting reelected. there is this paradox that fighting back may help his reelection prospects. in the near term, this sort of behavior is not at all what someone in his position should be engaging in. we find ourselves in this very strange position where he's conducting himself in a way that's very bad in the near term for his legal situation. it may be the thing that pulls him back into office. it's this crazy push and pull unlike anything we've ever seen in american history or any kind of legal case. >> there's been a lot of biden talk among trump apologists and

leaders in the republican party kind of blaming this on him, biden weaponizing the justice department. what's your suggestion for democrats and for the administration on this? just stay quiet and let it play out? >> look, i think that's definitely what joe biden is going to do. he went to great lengths particularly in the transition to note that he would be a different president than what america saw previously, donald trump as it relates to the justice department, so much so that at the white house there's about three people that are allowed to speak to the justice department. that's not hyperbole. one of which is the white house counsel, the white house counsel's deputy. you just can't pick up the phone and call the justice department if you work at the white house, because there is a concern about the optics. jonathan lemire, you know better than i that there is a real

concern from, i think, the president's team that anything only plays into the hands of their opponents. >> in a surprise ruling, the supreme court struck down republican-drawn congressional districts in alabama as a violation of the voting rights act. the court ruled 5-4, back civil rights activists who say the new districts discriminated against black voters. chief justice john roberts and trump-appointed justice brett kavanaugh joined the liberals in the majority. the map of the seven districts will now have to be redrawn. kavanaugh wrote a separate opinion that leaves future open challenges to the law based on whether there is a time when the consideration of race in redistricting is no longer

justified. the white house celebrated the unexpected win, and naacp president derrick johnson wrote, this is a victory for black america and a triumph for our democracy. a proper democracy cannot function without the black vote. joe. >> you know, ari, this may be a little inside baseball, but i remember last year after dobbs was leaked, i remember thinking how much roberts was going to be pushing brett kavanaugh, come with me, evolution, not revolution, let's take the win in mississippi, the 15-week ban, and we can keep moving in this direction. kavanaugh didn't listen to him. coney barrett didn't listen to him. the consequence was devastating for the court. right now, the court has its lowest approval rating, lowest

confidence from americans in the supreme court since they started polling. also, pro life candidates in swing states get destroyed post dobbs. the entire debate has shifted against what brett kavanaugh would want it to be. so roberts was right. i was asking before this case came out, i said it's going to be interesting if kavanaugh is going to listen to roberts this year or not or whether he's going to make another radical step that's going to further isolate the court. not to oversimplify this, but my gut is kavanaugh actually listened to roberts this time, because nobody expected him to come down the way he did in this case. >> i think you're right. you and i have both been to law school, where there's a lot of cases and rules and frankly jargon. you're talking about something that is more sophisticated,

which is the actual humans. yes, they put on robes, but they're still human beings. the court has been clobbered for a range of reasons as well as clarence thomas's free-ranging multimillionaire ethics scandal. you have a court where the human beings on the court may have other things within the decisions they're going to make. this is also the same chief justice who a decade ago struck out against the voting rights act and the obama administration to drastically limit it. this is kavanaugh, who has never been a particular friend, ally or advocate of the rights of dispossessed minority voters. there isn't a lot of case law on this. you're shining a light on what goes outside the four corners. this ruling is good for democracy. it also happens to benefit black

voters who are basically facing what this conservative court rules was discrimination by republicans. but let's be clear. when the court intercedes to protect democracy, that's not just a benefit for a group of voters, it's also good for all of us. however they got there by the coalition, this is one state that will now not have racist maps, according to the court. >> you're so right. you got nine humans in there. there's a lot of trading going on. there's a lot of politicking going on on both sides. in this case, it seemed to make a difference. it was roberts a decade ago that said, listen, congress needs to step in and update this, let us know where we are at this time. and of course congress hasn't been able to do that, because every attempt has been filibustered, every attempt has

been blocked. talk about this surprising development and how positive it is not only for the state of alabama, but in my opinion, for american democracy. >> this is a very big deal. i think it's important to note that shelby v holder gutted the voting rights act of 1965 that had been reauthorized every year since its inception almost unanimously. it was signed into law by george w. bush. it was bipartisan. it was only up until recent year years there was all the politics around the issue and it no longer became a bipartisan issue, it became a political weapon. the question of section two, if it would not have been upheld, if the plaintiff would not have

prevailed, the voting rights act would have been nonexistent. it's important for alabama. there's a question about maps in florida, for example, drawn by governor desantis. the state legislature drew a map. the state legislature decided to go with governor desantis's map. what could this mean for florida and north carolina and down the line? there's an assault in this country on black political power and essentially the ability for black voters to have representation. we have elected a black president previously. a number of black people and people of color enjoy high stations, if you will. senator scott would like to say, you know, black people are no longer the exception, we are, in fact, the rule.

but institutional racism is still very real and it is embedded in the heart of our electoral politics. we don't need to do a lesson on jim crow. >> symone sanders townsend, thank you very much. always great to have you on. we will be watching you weeks at 4:00 p.m. eastern right here on msnbc. still ahead, we're taking a look at a different case involving donald trump. this one is going before the supreme court and it involves the phrase "trump too small." we'll unpack all of that next on "morning joe." all of that nextn "morning joe." i'm saving with liberty mutual, mom. they customize your car insurance so you only pay for what you need. you could save $700 dollars just by switching. ooooh, let me put a reminder on my phone. on the top of the pile! oh. only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ (man) what if my type 2 diabetes takes over? (woman)ay for what you need. what if all i do isn't enough? or what if i can do diabetes differently?

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imagine you're doing something you love. rsv could cut it short. ♪ rsv is a contagious virus that usually causes mild symptoms but can cause more severe infections that may lead to hospitalizations... ...in adults 60 and older... ...and adults with certain underlying conditions, like copd, asthma, or congestive heart failure. talk to your doctor and visit cutshortrsv.com. he hit my hands. look at those hands. are they small hands? and he referred to my hands, if they're small, something else must be small. i guarantee you there's no

problem. i guarantee you. >> that was then candidate donald trump in 2016 defending the size of his hands after an attack from senator marco rubio. people have actually been poking fun at his hands for decades and now those jokes have made their way to the nation's highest court, not kidding here. supreme court justices have agreed to hear a case from a california man looking to trademark the phrase trump too small. he wants to plaster the words on the front of t-shirts that, quote, some features of president trump and his policies are diminutive. i can't believe i'm even talking about this. let's go to the editor of the weekly online newsletter, air mail. grayden carter. he was the first person to dub him the short fingered bulgarian in spy magazine back in the

1980s. you are the person be to talk about this. what say you? >> i've been an amateur trumpologist. i wrote the first national loop magazine story. he gave me plenty of time. he hated the story, primarily because i said his hands were too small for his body. and he accentuated that by having really large couplings and really large cuffs so the hands could swim in his cuffs. then a few years later spy magazine we had funny epithets. it was short fingered vulgarian. this is the most minor of the legal issues, but i know this drives him crazy. it has for the last 40 years. >> so knowing him for so many decades, what do you make of this moment in time in history?

>> well, we did a number of stories predicting what would happen to trump in his later years, and none of them come close to what he's facing now. i mean, he's -- he's in serious trouble. we sort of treat it as, you know, him as a slight joke but nobody foresaw that he would become the president of the united states, but even this case before the supreme court, which strikes me as extraordinary that it's going before the supreme court, that it is -- it's just yet another thing that drives him crazy because it's out there every day. something about his hands being too small. and i know it bugs him. >> so graydon, as someone who has followed donald trump for so long, what's your prediction, if you will, about how this plays out? how he's going to respond to not the supreme court case, but to this, the federal indictment and maybe more coming before the year is out.

how does he approach this upcoming campaign? >> he's just rolled people for his entire professional life. i never understand his base because his base is made up of people who he spent his life stiffing. he stiffed other colleagues. steam fitters, electricians, plumbers and he would say, look, i'll pay you half and if you don't like that, sue me. so i think that he's so used to getting his way that he thinks he will bulldoze through this and he may very well. >> yeah. never under estimate him. that we have learned. graydon carter, thank you, i think. the new issue of "air mail" posts at 6 a.m. tomorrow morning. let's go to congressional investigations reporter for the washington post jackie alamanian. okay. i just was told that we lost the connection with jackie. right when she had new reporting? that's frustrating.

all right. in our final moments then -- >> i have jackie's story up. i'll summarize it. >> we were talking earlier in the show about the reporting in which donald trump acknowledges that he has classified documents. mika, i'm told we have jackie back. she has more details about how he acknowledges. jackie, if you're there -- there you are. >> hi, jackie. >> i'm sorry, guys. i was on the other line getting some reporting. >> why don't we turn it over to you and you tell us what you just learned. >> well, i can't tell you what i just learned just yet but we did learn earlier today, we confirmed a cnn reporting about some of the exacts that were included in this transcript of trump's 2021 bedminster conversation when he was with a group of people, primarily two researchers for mark meadows who

were writing his biography, and was talking about a classified document that he claims to have. i am not sure of the exacts, i'd need to pull that up, but he did say something along the lines of, as president, i -- i should have declassified this but i didn't. we also have another longer -- i don't know if you pulled that up on screen of what he was trying -- of him trying to describe this document. it's largely unintelligible but very interesting nonetheless. we still don't know all that much around the document, whether or not the national archives or the department of justice or jack smith has it. it's likely that they do, but it is indicative of the strategy and some of the charges that have been brought against the former president. we know that they have been trying to collect as many examples as possible to make the case that trump has been chargeds with, which is willful retention of documents along with a litany of other charges,

seven in total. >> all right. the washington post. jackie alamany, a woman who looks like she's in the middle of hundreds of phone calls and texts coming at the same time. in our final moments. come back if you need to. as we close, claire mccaskill, sum up where we are in the moment in history. >> release the indictment as soon as possible so the american public can learn what the facts are. >> also, it is proven now what he does, what he tries to do with disinformation. that fire hose of falsehoods that he puts forward and so it would seem to me that we're not the only ones who feel that there might need to be some more transparency here. >> the danger of letting trump describe it on his own. >> that does it for us this morning and what a morning it has been. ana cabrera and jose diaz vallart pick up special coverage of the indictment of donald