faith. we'll meet with senators and house members. we'll have a meeting at the white house on wednesday and then from here, we're going to be going to 30 state capitols. where these political coups are happening. where people of color are coming to demand a different focus in this nation. we don't have this many people -- these deaths were prior to covid hear that. over 500 people a day were dying prior to covid we went into covid with people dying you unnecessarily from poverty. and then during covid, poor people died three to five times higher we'll have an assembly and we'll hear more about that but we must face this issue. >> always a pleasure thank you so much. we do appreciate it. that will do it for thus hour. make sure to join us every weekday at 1:00. nicole wallace is up next.

it's 4:00 in the east. a stunning comprehensive brand new piece of reporting that really amounts to a first drafrt of history for merrick garland's justice department a piece of reporting that answers questions we've been asking for years now questions that have dogged doj for many many months why did it take so long for d.o.j. to investigate? the first formal step into probing the campaign to overturn the 2020 election. the criminal inquiry now into the fate of electors did not take place until april 2022 more than a area after the insurrection and well after the january 6th select committee had begun to uncover a complex multipronged plot and democracy with donald trump in the driver's seat. the "washington post" is reporting in the immediate aftermath of the january 6th insurrection, acting u.s.

attorney michael sherwin, senior justice department officials and paul abbate quashed a plan in the u.s. attorney's office to directly investigate trump associates for any links to the riot, deeming it premature that's according to five individuals familiar with that decision instead, they insisted on a methodical approach focusing first on rioters and going up the ladder the strategy was embraced by a.g. garland, lisa monaco and christopher wray they remained committed to it. weeks-long effort by trump and his vilesors before january 6th to pressure state leaders and others to block the certification of biden address 5 to biden's victory a wariness about appearing partisan, institutional caution, and clashes over how much evidence was sufficient to

investigate the actions of trump and those around him all contributed to the slow pace garland and the deputy attorney general lisa monaco charted a cautious course aimed at restoring public trust in the department while some prosecutors below them chafed, feeling top officials were shying away from looking at evidence of potential crimes by trump and those close to him leaders at d.o.j. reportedly shot down plan after plan to look into all aspects of the coup lot the trump adviser roger stone's ties to extremists or into the documents trump used to pressure pence into stopping the certification of president joe biden's election win it got to the point where according to the "washington post," brand new reporting, quote, some prosecutors even have the impression that trump had become a taboo topic at main justice. colleagues responsible for preparing briefing materials and updates for garland and monaco were warned to focus on foot soldiers and to avoid mentioning trump or his close allies. the call to investigate trump

came from inside d.o.j. over and over again it took a combination in the end of public pressure, the public work of the january 6th select committee, and a criminal refer on the fake slates of electors to get d.o.j. leadership to act. and as the "washington post" notes, this may end up costing the department for many months after the attack, prosecutors did not interview white house aides or other key witnesses. that's according to authorities and attorneys for some of those who have since been contacted by the special counsel. in that time, communications were put at risk of being lost or deleted, and memories left to fade brand new blockbuster reporting that pulls the curtain all the way back on the internal divisions debates, delays and decisions that have resulted in d.o.j. waiting more than a year to investigate the trump directed coup plot is where we begin with our favorite reporters and friends. pulitzer prize winning reporter for the "washington post," and msnbc contributor, carol is

here her byline is on that reporting we just read from. also joining us, former impeachment manager for donald trump's second impeachment of pennsylvania, and former top justice department official msnbc legal analyst, honorary co-anchor, andrew wiceman is back you've been on this reporting is ongoing. i feel like we've benefitted from some of what you've been learning and your wise and cautionary notes about the pace of the twin investigations with jack smith at the helm this is the $64 million question where was d.o.j. before the dramatic public phase of the select committee and i'm going to have you test a us through the flash points. just give us a look at what you

and your colleagues are reporting. >> well, first off, i have to say it was really challenging for me on your show week after week we work hard at the post to talk about what we've published not what we're about to publish. i have to say many times, many, many times, had the exact same instinct that i and my co-author aaron davis had. where is d.o.j.? you know, i interviewed dozens of possibly, i would think for this story, more than 100 between the two of us. and so many people just presumed that d.o.j. was on the case right from the word go but actually, the chronology is startling for how little d.o.j. was on the case. let's be clear about the good motives. there was a concern about looking that d.o.j. was going

partisan by going after the de facto head of the republican party. and merrick garland and lisa monaco embraced the strategy of let's do it like a mob case. build up from the riot figure out if there's somebody higher and higher and higher and perhaps it will lead to those individuals around donald trump. perhaps not. let's let the evidence lead us up that ladder the problem is there is no ladder between militia members who are the oath keepers and the proud boys wearing flak jackets and bullet-proof vests and carrying bear spray and emails to mark meadows or donald trump or rudy giuliani about convincing state officials to help them create fake electors to swing the election for trump and away from biden. there is no connective tissue between these folks at the riot and an effort to get the

department of justice under donald trump to falsely claim that there was fraud in georgia. there is never going to be that connective tissue. as it started to emerge in the summer and especially the fall of 2022, still, the d.o.j. sort of turns every turned its eyes away from this until it became a drum beat of criticism, news stories, some of them on this story and some of them in my paper. and a ground swell of concern that the january 6th committee was really without the same kind of power as the department of justice uncovering stunning and worrisome and likely criminal acts >> you just said one of the most important things that you were never going to find from steps to step to step to step all the way from the guys spraying the spray and taking the gun and beating him

with it perhaps to trump telling him to do those things but it was also cleared that he picked him in plain sight. he committed the crime of an official proceeding. even with the limits to their investigative powers, he committed the crimes of insurrection i mean, there were criminal acts that were ignored. and to that now very obvious fact, made painfully obvious by the meticulous work of the 1/6 select committee what does d.o.j. say >> they're really declining to comment on our reporting they've refused to give any public safety and they've declined to let us interview the principals that made the decisions. we had to do our work around them and i understand that garland, the attorney general, has made very clear we only speak through our court proceedings and our filings. but there have been a couple of times where the department of

justice has spoken publicly. now they're really know. i know some of your panelists let them have their thoughts inside the department of justice, there is a great division there were prosecutors more than ticked off they were disheartened about why the department of justice was not looking at this material there were investigators in january and february of 2021 that were trying to get the department of justice to look at what they saw as a coordinated theme. very, very similar elector slates in different states and the department of justice declined to investigate. when they finally did, a full year and four months had gone by that is pain going on inside the building where people felt this desire to not look partisan

meant they were not doing their job. they were not being allowed to look at open source material that suggested a factual, credible basis for believing a crime had been committed that's the standard for opening an investigation i think that another really important thing, any old, which you have really zeroed in on over and over again is the january 6th committee's work the department of justice has said to us, in different ways, this committee didn't influence us at all except when you interview people who were right in the thick of it they said, look, we were embarrassed and goaded into it it was just unbelievable how much that team, many of them, by the way, former federal prosecutors, it's amazing how much work they did in a short amount of time and what they revealed and that pressure was so intense on the department, and the ladder-up strategy was sort of passed to the rubbish

bin because there is no way to continue to justify it when there was open clear evidence of a potential crime. i have to say one more thing forgive me for talking so long >> no. >> one more thing in the department of justice, in fairness to them, i've covered merrick garland as a judge i know what his heart is, i think. and i know what his intentions were and this is not going to be a donald trump d.o.j this is a joe biden d.o.j. where nobody questions whether or not we're doing something for the right reasons. the challenge, however, is that at some point, you have -- and the, the elements of the crime that you mentioned, obstruction, it's not exactly a slam-dunk it's a novel case and it hasn't ever happened in our country, thank goodness for all of us as

americans. this has not happened before in our life times that's not an easy case and if they had dug into it sooner, maybe they would have had a more calm answer. right now jack smith is racing against time to properly answer, is there a crime to be charged here >> the problem with that, i believe everything carol says in her reports and i accept her sort of note of understanding for why we are here. but that is inherently political. where the barr justice department was aggressively proactively political through its actions, the garland justice department has been equally political through inaction and through reluctance if there was truly a culture as carol reports that saying trump was taboo, that they were walking on egg shells because of who had committed the crime,

that is a political culture. and i wonder your thoughts you and i have had had many conversations on and off conversations. >> first, i can't commend more to everyone reading that piece in the "washington post. it's incredible reporting and it is really, i think, a perfect example of, why we need the fourth estate. why we need to have really great investigative journalism that's what we expect from our political leaders. from all sorts of people that they're going to be candid but it doesn't always happen and i am in violent agreement with everything that carol said. and her piece completely rings true to me in terms of knowing the department and even the small pieces of anecdotal

evidence that i've been aware of nicole, to your point, i completely agree that if you have what you think is a noble intent to restore and you're trying to depoliticize what attorney general barr did to the department, the answer is not appeasement. history has never shown that appeasement is the answer. i agree with you that it is taking politics into account when you decide that you're going to create a higher standard before you look at somebody who committed a crime and my word, when you're prosecuting so many low level people for insurrection, the idea that there was so much evidence staring you in the face, but according to the "washington post," over and over again, the department's leadership was saying no to

investigation that is inherently political. obviously, it is not on the same plane. not the same level as barr did where you're actively going arrest people because of politics but not going after people is also a real wrong and we're suffering the consequences of it now because there has been delay and as carol rightly said, there is a race with the clock in terms of what jack smith is doing. >> we also had flash points. carol takes us inside the rooms that we would never get inside of it is a rare and possible piece of journalism. i want to pull you out a little bit on this, andrew wiceman. let's put it out there comey put it out there he's worried they're fighting the last war

because of the impact on the presidential election, he's worried that maybe people overcorrect. that is a real thing inside that building and whether it is justified or not, i'll stay out of that debate but there is a sense of fighting the last war. there is a thing where institutionalists have been heart broken by watching trump destroy institutions so in response they've done abnormal things. my question is to these people for whom are you restoring it? because the people who stormed the capitol, they don't give a you know what whether you restore doj. and the people who would like to he sue it restored would like to see it as if it is truly blind to the person committing the crime. so my question is, who are they acting so hunkered down and bunker mentality in service of jim jordan donald trump who are they looking to to decide who and when they should do something more aggressive

about donald trump, andrea >> well, i think it is useful to about what the at least spatial argument was that we heard from merrick garland and lisa monaco, the deputy attorney general lisa monaco gave a speech at the university of chicago where she talked about how the department goes after people. i'm sorry. goes after crimes, not people. meaning we waon't investigate donald trump until we know we have a crime that is the mantra and then there was a bottom up mantra that we'll investigate this as we do organized crime cases or enron the problem is both of those statements are sort of meaningless because one as carol said, this isn't a bottomless case there was so much happening at the top.

for the same reason the idea that you investigate crimes but not people, fine, there was predication of the crime and as carol laid out, there was sufficient predication and you have people saying fine, we won't look at it i think it was a fool's errand to try to worry about public perception as long as you're doing the right thing, you know, there's a certain percentage of the population you won't win them over. so just depoliticize the department by not taking into consideration politics for the same reason, i don't think merrick garland should be thinking before you charge a former president, gee, what will the people think and for example, do you not charge people in the 1950s for murdering or assaulting members of the black population because you're worried about what the ku

klux klan let's in certain parts of the world what the public let's about a prosecution is not the standard for going forward if you are treating likes alike and i think that it was so wrong-headed and another example. i worked in the mueller investigation. volume ii was all about the former president obstructing justice. but i knew in my heart that there was no way thatthe department of justice was going to go back and look at that on the theory of sort of, let bygones be bygones when the whole idea of somebody who was the president obstructing a special counsel almost by definition needs to be vindicated otherwise, why ever have a special counsel if you're never going to vindicate that crime? so i just think it was really not a wise decision by doj leadership and i don't really blame here the fbi, because they

report in to the department of justice. they're part of the department of justice at the end of the day, the buck really does stop with merrick garland as the person who makes the ultimate decisions about what happened here, or as carol so cogently set forth, what did not happen here. >> carol, before we lose you, i want to go into one of the realms you go into at a meeting in november 2021, thomas windom asked the assistant fbi director to assist in a grand jury investigation which would include subpoenaing the willard hotel for billing information from the time when rudy giuliani was working with trump associates in their war room stone was staying there around january 6th as well in a different state. he was skeptical the investigative track sounded

eerily similar to the proposal that had been shot down. he said i'm not serving subpoenas on willard he said to apparent, you don't have enough to issue subpoenas so take us inside this turning point and pick up on andrew's point about how the fbi, what their mindset was, what they felt limited by. obviously this is ground that the 1/6 select committee pushed into and told us what we know, especially with cassidy hutchinson's public testimony that she was the one warning him not to go down there >> just to take us back to the fall, november of 2021, basically 11 months after the insurrection and the ausa, tom windom has newly arrived in the u.s.

attorney's office. he's come over from maryland he's been prewitting domestic extremists successfully. so he's looking at essentially open source material in books and newspapers i can credit bob woodward and bob costa, they wrote books referencing the willard war room and then my colleagues at the "washington post" who within several weeks in october reported in great detail on how rudy giuliani was running basically an op shop there, pushing fake electors, promoting the rally. so what wind only was doing was saying, here's open source information. and also, it twr tracked with a other things shouldn't we be looking at what they were doing at the willard there were a team of lawyers staying there. they had been there since mid december they mostly reported to trump or to his campaign. they were pushing a lie. they were pushing a rally that

turned into a violent attack on the capitol. they were pushing what appeared to be fake electors. shouldn't we be checking this out? and he is the person for the washington field office in the fbi. so not the headquarters but in charge of one of the most important fbi field offices says, you know, i don't see a factual credit to suggest any of the trump campaign allies have committed a crime because they were trying to keep their guy in office i'm paraphrasing wildly, nicole, but you get the gist and will what is interesting about that, dantono had a reason to be worried. his reason to be worried wasth fbi's previous experience investigating donald trump's campaign in 2016 that investigation came back to burn and basically back fire on many fbi officials, ruined careers, tarnished their

reputations. i could go on and on about the way that investigation was attacked by donald trump later anyway, they had reason to be worried about looking at political activity of political figures. and that is why dantono said according to multiple sources familiar with this meeting, i'm not subpoenaing willard. he didn't want to start pulling financial records. in his mind the bar for looking at political figures had to be higher in reality, later down the road, the fbi and the prosecutors do begin looking at this information based on the same open source material largely, the same open source material so it is really interesting. the way they get into the investigation, of course, as you've described is the fbi finally agrees after lisa monaco makes an

announcement in january 2022, hey, look, we're looking at this stuff that all of you people in the press keep discussing. you keep saying the january 6th committee is investigating this. we're looking at that, too again, i'm paraphrasing. after she makes that quick announcement, the fbi agrees to start looking at fake electors and it is the route in to finally looking at trump's orbit, and an effort to attack our democracy ultimately in a lot of different ways. >> it is such an important piece. i have now read it and listened to it. it is really, to anyone watching who cares about these issues, i know all of our viewers do, i highly recommend it. carol, thank you for being here the talk about it and congratulations on the huge scoop. >> thanks for the great questions. >> congresswoman dean will get in on all of it. she, of course, brought the impeachment case, one of the impeachment managers and one of the first people ever to investigate any of this conduct.

we'll talk to her about all of this when we come back we'll talk about the importance of timing and how that plays into everything the special counsel is trying to do and what it says about accountability in america as well. plus, former president barack obama is calling out the republican party and some of the candidates running to lead it for downplaying the seriousness of racial inequality that exists in today's society, in all corners of it. and later, a chorus of extrump officials calling out their exboss as a threat to national security. that's in our better late than never cat gerry.

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manager lou and i will present evidence of trump's relentless escalating campaigns to fabricate an election victory. by ignoring adverse court rulings, pressuring and threatening election officials, attacking senators, and members of congress. pressuring the justice department and finally, bullying his own vice president donald trump was asking the judiciary to take away votes from americans so that he could steal the election for himself then after losing in all the courts, trump turned to another tactic, pressuring and threatening election officials donald trump was trying to undermine our elections by taking votes away from the american people so that he could remain president

and he was willing to betray anyone, even his own supporters, if they got in the way >> there is congressman dean laying out the waist even at that late hour we're back before the 1/6 select committee dug in and got all of those taped deposition that's riveted us for that committee's existence and all the documents including mark meld owes' dramatic texts, the impeachment managers presented a case with lots and lots of evidence of trump's criminal acts of obstructing a proceeding what is it like to watch the congressional investigation and now doj catch up >> i have to say i feel privileged to be on this panel carol and her colleagues reporting is critical and historic, and andrew, your analysis alongside nicole and

others has been really important for this country i wish more people were tuning in, to be very, very honest. what i will say is from my shoes, from the place i was standing, i was a member of the judiciary committee for both impeachment one and two and then had the solemn honor of serving as an impeachment honor for the second impeachment of donald trump. and i was frustrated because i stood there in the gallery on january 6th as the insurrection took place as i was preparing my own arguments for pennsylvania's electors, i stood there and was told to put on my gas mask get down on the ground and then get out of the room. so for me, it is incredibly frustrating that it has taken so long but you could see what was happening here competing interests. the fbi was reluctant. they resisted, for example, the search of mar-a-lago reluctant to say what would be enough evidence against a former

sitting president and you could see really one of the things i think is at play is where had the doj been it had been in the hands of barr attorney general barr. so i think they tried to be overly cautious. instead of doing what up, fear or favor pursue the facts where they took them the ladder-up approach makes no sense whatsoever we have plenty of evidence of exactly what was going on in the incitement by the president. even in our time, as you point out. we were only days after the insurrection after the attempted failed coup by the expresident we had lots and lots of evidence as we put before the senate and sadly, a trial that not enough senators were willing to talk about the truth and to vote the truth. but what has come now as a result of the january 6th commission, that bipartisan commission that did magnificent

work, using mostly the words of those who surrounded the president, who wanted nothing more than for him to be successful, and now this ongoing reporting. i wish the attorney general, doj had moved so swiftly i fear for what has been lost. because remember, what john adams said we are a nation of laws, not o men. this seems like a calculation for the nation of men. i'm so glad you brought us back in time to the trial. it is so compelling that it ends with mitch mcconnell, voting to acquit but referring donald trump for prosecution. they don't have the you know whats to convict but they refer him to garland at the end of the trial. at the end of seeing the evidence and i'm remembering the smoking gun evidence that jamie herrera butler presents.

of kevin mccarthy's evidence and will kevin mccarthy, we learned through journalism, through liz cheney's work on the committee, he thought the 25th amendment would take too long. an impeachment in the hours and days after january 6th, kevin mccarthy is on an open line with his members talking about how to get rid of him fast enough because he was a threat because of the things he's saying what are your thoughts about how successfully the right move, sort of the overton window nothing happens after that doj doesn't open an investigation into trump all that evidence, merrick garland saying doj should prosecute if there are crimes. they don't do anything what do you think of that? >> you had of the senator standing and voting not guilty, mitch mcconnell, and then 20 minutes later, we were back in our war room where we had done our preparation and i said, listen to this he had a fully prepared speech that said the president was

responsible. and then as you say, refers him to the ag only to have this reluctance strategy. i'm very disappointed about that i will say, i have a certain confidence because the special counsel statute, and now, of course, the appointment and the work of jack smith as special counsel in this case the extraordinary indictment i know you've talked about it. it is such a readable indictment it is a screenplay and remember, folks, really, it's the first 27 pages that paint the picture. i've told everybody on my staff, read the first 27 pages. because it is trump's own words and actions. his own counterparts his own attorney that show the wrongdoing with the documents case and what it reminds me of is what else does jack smith have there must be so much more >> andrew, i want to bring you

in on this i want sty one more thing. my viewers are very well versed in all the details of the impeachments, both of them of the select committee and what has become public in jack smith's investigation. i likeliesta monaco. none of this is personal we live in a country where the world saw an insurrection. they saw it play out they saw the insurrectionists hang out for a long time afterward. like they were at a tailgate, like they were unafraid. while people were bleeding and still dealing with physical, mental, and physical injuries. so far the person liz cheney described as lighting the match and throwing it into a powder keg has faced zero

accountability for his act inbrooking official proceeding and inciting a deadly insurrection that's what carol's reporting is about. that's what these questions are about and that's what this criticism isabout. with that as a wind-up, i wonder what you think happens next? >> to be clear, i have enormous almost for merrick garland and lisa monaco, and their integrity and the fact that the motivations here i don't think are nefarious. but i do think they're as much as it really does pain me. i do think they were wrong and i think the congressmen are bringing us back to what was known at the time and the fearlessness of so many people it is really important for people in leadership to sometimes know that you are in a certain place at a certain time

where you have to just make the right decision and suffer the consequences whatever they are, knowing that you did the right thing. at the fbi, there was an unfortunate phrase that people had within the bureau. which was for agents who didn't really get the purpose of their mission. the phrase was, big cases, big problems little cases, little problems. no cases, no problems. that was for the people who didn't want to take on the big cases. and donald trump made it absolutely clear that if you did that, that you would be subject to being excoriated, whether you are pete strzok or andy mccabe or bob mueller so there was going to be a price to pay if you hadn't prepared to pay that price and do the right

thing, you're in the wrong job where we are is that we do have jack smith on the job. remember, he was in the international criminal court he knows very well what is required here. >> so interesting. >> if could i say, and i agree with andrew also, i give merrick garland great credit what i think is true is that it is a credible argument that you could see that he and his assistant ag made. this might be the better strategy they were dealing with the independence of the doj which had been harmed under the former administration with the likes of the appointment of ag barr so you could see there's logic in what they were doing but it was a misstep. we should not worry about fear or favor do the right thing, as martin luther king. it's always the right time to do what is right.

fortunately, we have this reporting now. we do have the special counsel in place we have the unindictment i'm pretty sure we'll see others right alongside this this man will be held to account. and the only question is what harm does dough to our country in the meantime? >> in the meantime, during and after. i think that is also what happens next thank you. so for being part of this conversation andrew is going to be back in the next hour at the top of 5:00 so thank you for now we'll see you in a bit up next for us on this juneteenth holiday, we'll take a moment to reflect on the challenges that remain present in this country, every corner of it every day, put so well in an interview with former president barack obama we'll talk about it after a very short break. ere, anywhere. ♪ ♪ a beach house, a treehouse, ♪ ♪ honestly i don't care ♪ find the perfect vacation rental for you

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it traces back in part to a real desire to hide difficult truths about our actual literal history from our kids. these manufactured culture wars in turn have completely polluted our politics few people understand these attacks and these dynamics and have lived to tell quite like president obama. he endured two terms of racist garbage directed at him and his family here's what he had to say to david axelrod on the topic of race in the 2024 field for president. >> i haven't spent a lot of time studying tim scott's speeches. i think there's a long history of african american or other minority candidates within the republican party who will validate america and say, everything is great and we can all make it. i mean, nikki haley, i think,

has a similar approach that may come a time where there is somebody in the republican party more serious about actually addressing some of that deep inequality that still exists in our society that tracks race and is a consequence of our racial history. if that happens, i think that would be fantastic i haven't yet seen it. >> joining our conversation is the president and the national action network and the host of politics nation right here on msnbc. the reverend al sharpton also with us, she has served as a political adviser to more than a dozen members of congress including policy work on issues, on equity. you first. it was great hearing the president on this and all manner of topics. i wish i could play the whole thing. he gets at a real invconvenient truth. >> he does that's an inconvenient truth for

americans. republicans like to tell a story about america and who made america that isn't the truth so what president obama is reminding us, there are at love black and brown people complicit in those lies as well. looking ought, tim scott so it will be interesting to see how the conversations around race continue to not happen on that side of the aisle certainly on the campaign trail. this fantasy, the idea that america is a culture that everybody can pull themselves up by the boot straps is one we need to address. the level of inequity we see based on race when it comes to the wealth gap when it comes to educational attainment when it comes to who is running major corporations still running congress, frankly. it is very clear that there is a big divide and a big disparity based on racial lines. only one party wants to have

that conversation and talk about the solutions to address it. the others are in some sort of stick their fingers in their ears and ignore it land. that's what the president was talking about. and i think it has gone farther and more sinister than sticking their fingers in their ears and heads in the sand they want to erase actual history from history books he wasn't explicit the problem is about erasing history. this feels like the conversation we should be having. >> not only is it in my opinion horrific to erase the history. i think it is not even a sound political strategy tim scott is a black senator from south carolina. if he had said that in this state there once was a confederate state and advocated slavery and then later

segregation and because people paid a price, black and white, i am now a black senator from this state and we can make progress in other areas of inequity, it would be an appealing message for many independent voters and even some democratic voters. but cutting off with fantasy talk birx cutting off reality he isolates himself and the party and i've met him he's not a bad guy but they're playing to i akind of monologue that really limits them and it's not true in 2007, nicolle, "the new york daily news" did a family tree search for me. i found out my great grandfather was a slave in edgefield, south carolina for it to go from my grandfather, a slave in edgefield, to see a black senator there is a journey that we can give credit to many of those abolitionists all the way to dr. king and that generation all the way to now but to act as though we're there and that everything is fair and

equal, then how do we say why blacks are unequally unemployed now? why do blacks -- unequal in terms of home ownership? why are we unequal in terms of education? either we're inherently inept and stupid or there is systematic bias that we still need to confront and deal with >> yeah, and i guess, aisha, we can't begin to solve a problem until we all admit we have a problem. and what do you think is at the root of this why not run on solving the problems of these grave inequalities in the country >> honesthonestly, i think we m opportunity to talk about the real problems we still face with inequity and racism and bigotry and bias in this country when we look to a token one, be it the first black president, be it this black senator from south carolina, be it a one black person who somehow becomes a figurehead and a representative for change and we look at that

person and we suggest that all the problems have gone away and that we've made so much progress just because one person happened to squeak through. i think at the end of the day we've got to talk about the fact that for every one there are still a half a million people that are suffering under racism in this country and we need to do something about it. >> and i think -- we'll have to get into this next time, but i think how you change the political incentive structure so that everyone is trying to solve a problem that's clear and plain as day, i think as he often does president obama started a good conversation nikki haley's also going nuts and jumping on every last thing he said. the reverend al sharpton and aisha mills, thank you so much for being with us today. a quick break for us we'll be right back.

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people have zrdescribed hims a horder when it comes to these types of documents but clearly it was unauthorized, illegal and dangerous. >> well, i think he was kind of a collector of things that he

thought were of interest to him for some reason or another clippings, mementos, classified documents. and it was very disturbing >> he is a consummate narcissist and he constantly engages in reckless conduct that puts his political followers at risk. it's like a 9-year-old -- a defiant 9-year-old kid who's also pushing the glass toward the edge of the table, defying his parents to stop him from doing it >> introducing bill barr, the armchair psychologist. hi again, everybody. it's 5:00 in the east. there it was a veritable choir of ex-trump senior administration officials calling out their ex-boss over the weekend. trump's former defense secretary mark esper went first. trump's former national security adviser john bolton was next and former attorney general who can't say enough on tv about donald trump's criminality and storing of classified documents at mar-a-lago.

all of them concluding that the behavior was dangerous and disturbing in a scathing piece titled "the truth about the trump indictment" bill barr goes on and he says this "this is a situation entirely of his own making the effort to present trump as a victim in the mar-a-lago document affair is cynical political propaganda." all of these condemnations are notable. but what's even more notable is where they're coming from now. as our friend charlie sykes writes in the bulwark, "no president has earned the open contempt and denunciation of so many of his inner circle unlike other critiques from the resistance or never trumpers, who have essentially become democrats, these voices are coming from inside the house last week we heard from another individual from inside the house, trump's former chief of staff, john kelly. kelly telling the "washington post" not to fall for trump's tough and confident exterior following his indictment last week quote, he's scared bleepless this is the way he compensates

for that he gives people the appearance he doesn't care by doing this. for the first time in his life it looks like he's being held accountable. up until this point in his life it's like, i'm not going to pay you, take me to court. he's never been held accountable before esper and barr also warning that the current gop presidential front-runner so never, ever hold office again >> do you think trump can be trusted with the nation's secrets ever again >> well, based on his actions, again, if proven true, under the indictment by the special counsel, no. i mean, it's just irresponsible action that places our service members at risk, places our nation's security at risk. you cannot have these documents floating around. >> he will always put his own interests and gratifying his own ego ahead of everything else including the country's interests. >> our country can't be a therapy session for a troubled man like this. >> all of this going down while

procedurally the documents case against trump is moving forward quickly. today magistrate judge bruce reinhart granted a motion filed by special counsel jack smith which prohibits trump and his co-defendant walt nauta from sharing evidence that federal investigators are set to begin turning over as part of the discovery phase of the case. former trump officials warning publicly of their ex-boss's handling of classified information is where we begin the hour with some of our favorite experts and friends former fbi counterintelligence agent pete strzok is here. also joining us former florida congressman and msnbc political analyst david jolly's back former top spokesman for attorney general merrick garland and now msnbc justice and legal affairs analyst anthony colee is back and former justice department prosecutor, former general counsel at the fbi, msnbc legal analyst, my constant wingman these days thank god, andrew weissman's still here. let me start with you, pete strzok there's so much to say, right?

about bill barr going sort of beyond where anyone on the left has even gone in indicting trump's conduct, basically moving on to the sentencing phase and now indicting his mental state declaring -- aw ll but declaring him unfit to serve in office i will say this, trump is unchanged. this is the same donald trump mary trump describes from her childhood. what do you think's going on with bill barr >> i think he's trying to get back his reputation. it's important to note a few weeks ago right before the indictment he was giving a similar interview to -- i think it was cbs and going through the litany of reasons trump is unfit to be president, that he's like a child, that this was a slam dunk, and at the very end of the interview when confronted by the interviewers, okay, so if he's the nominee you're not going to vote for him, right? he nevertheless said, well, if he is the nominee i'm going to support the party. so all these statements from bill barr at the end of the day when posed in a question of a slate with joe biden on the one

hand and donald trump on the other, notwithstanding all of these statements bill barr still is saying that he intends to vote for donald trump. so there's a lot in there that i'll let the political pundits and experts unpack about what that tells us about the state of the republican party at the end of the day but at the end of the day i think it is very important for senior republican officials who served in the trump administration to stand up and speak publicly whatever their faults -- and believe me, i am going to be at or near the top of the list of bill barr's detractors but it is important for these voices to be speaking to republicans in general, to be speaking to the republican electorate, to start throwing this information out into the public debate. you know, do i like the man, respect the man? not at all do i think this is important for him to say unfortunately, yes, i do >> yeah, anthony, as january 6th was happening and i was rushing in to join my colleagues on the air, i talked to former senior intelligence official, former senior pentagon official, and

former national security adviser and i said what are we watching? and he said it is an extremist movement that can only be defeated from within the movement you know, they have to hear from their own. they have to hear from figures within their movement. and that was borne out i think the 1/6 congressional probe showed an insurrectionist saying once trump told me to go home i left. but on the rule of law question it seems that it is of some value to jack smith to have prominent republican national security and justice officials saying the evidence is rock solid beyond any doubt, evidence of criminality i know jack smith doesn't watch a lot of tv. but tell me whether that is important as he goes about doing his work >> it is absolutely important, nicolle. what we heard from bill barr and esper and so many others over the weekend is a realization and a recognition that donald trump

really doesn't have a legitimate legal defense. and in the absence of not having a legitimate legal defense he is using this political rhetoric to try to persuade the court of public opinion but nicolle, you and i have both been a part of political campaigns. i know firsthand that the best political arguments are rooted in facts and the facts here just don't -- the facts here just don't support trump's notion that election interference is at play or that the department is somehow being weaponized against him. this investigation started well before he announced he was running for president. and as bill barr rightly noted, this -- these actions were really self-inflict ed by donald trump. and importantly, jack smith is a career prosecutor. he's part of doj's permanent workforce. the other final thing, nicolle,

i would add if there's time is there was talk over the weekend, or the last few days about pardoning the former president and we're seeing some political candidates, particularly in the lower rung of the party's presidential candidates, use this question of whether or not he gets a pardon as a litmus t test that to me tells your viewers all they need to know about the strength of jack smith's case. people aren't talking about oh, wait until donald trump has his day in court no, they're talking about whether or not you would pardon him if elected >> anthony, i had the same reaction i think it was -- even as his indictment was unsealed, the question started floating around the campaign trail in the republican primary i thought it was almost comical. >> yeah. >> that -- i mean, by then we knew he was going to be charged in miami, likely tried in palm beach by a jury of his

neighbors. and everyone is rushing straight to his conviction in the republican primary field if he had the ability to connect all those dots i think he'd be hate tweeting at all of them >> that's exactly right. donald trump is really -- he's in had place because of his own actions and at the end of the kay i feel good as an american, as somebody who has worked in the justice department, that jack smith appears to be following the facts in this case he's following the law in this case and there doesn't -- according to the indictment, there doesn't appear to be any hand of politics behind his prosecutorial decision >> so andrew weissmann, we're back where we started in the last hour. if you take, you know, the name off the top, if it's just target -- i guess we could use what sdny called trump, individual 1 the facts of his criminality are so braise nen both the documents case and the january 6th case. do you -- let's look forward

i think in the last hour we had to look behind what do you think is happening under jack smith's sort of twin probes one is a prosecution, the other still an active investigation. >> sure. well, one thing that i -- just another data point for you and the listeners is you mentioned that the magistrate judge assigned to the documents case issued this relatively standard order with respect to how the defendants and the defense counsel can use unclassified documents. remember, this is about a standard order for not classified documents how are you going to deal with classified documents will be decided later. and this goes to the former secretary esper's point. even with respect to documents that are not classified, there is a part of that order that is very unusual neither mr. trump nor mr. nauta can even see those documents

without defense counsel being present. they can't take them they can't even take notes that they don't leave with defense counsel. i have never seen that before. and we're talking about a former president of the united states a similar order was entered in the alvin bragg manhattan case so to your point of how we're proceeding, we are proceeding under the assumption that we have a defendant who is perfectly willing to violate the law even at this stage and you have an order from the magistrate judge regarding even non-classified documents how they can be seen because of thinks past actions. so i think we're going to see a lot of activity on that front. sorry about my dog >> no, that's okay that's okay. we love your dog we love you. we love you and we love your

dog. so it's all good i want to follow up on that. what is the impact of all of these ex-officials, what is the impact on trump's lawyers? i mean, some of these people have some of a reputation. when you see bill barr calling him an 8-year-old child pushing the glass off the counter, john bolton saying he should not have classified information, john kelly saying he's scared bleepless, i mean, what impact does that have on people who've decided to defend him sort of in their conservative legal circles? >> well, obviously everybody is entitled to a criminal defense it doesn't mean if you're an individual lawyer that you have to take this case on you'd better have a strong backbone i've talked repeatedly about susan neckless in the manhattan case as somebody who i think is very much up to that job i am very worried about todd blanche. not that i have anything

personally against him but if you leave a large firm and you have one and only one client, you're putting a lot of pressure on yourself to be able to say no to your only client. so it is a very tough situation to be -- to have donald trump obviously as a client. >> yeah. i'm going to let you help your dog there. i read this from pete wehner this morning, david jolly, and i said if there's one person i want to read this to and talk to about this, it is david jolly. let me read some of this to you. he writes in "the atlantic," "morality is for trump what colors are to the colorblind trump doesn't just cross moral lines. he doesn't appear capable of understanding moral categories morality is for trump what colors are to a person who is colorblind but what's true of trump isn't true of the majority of his enablers they see the colors that trump cannot they still know right from wrong. but for a combination of reasons

they have consistently overridden their conscience, in some cases unwittingly and in some cases cynically trump's behavior obviously speaks to his own character. but trump's behavior has also proved to be a test of the character of others, republican politicians and voters, the gop establishment, and the evangelical movement with very few exceptions and to varying degrees they have all failed it. they have turned against or at the very least at the crucial hour they have failed to defend ideals and institutions they once claimed to cherish. donald trump could not have so deeply wounded our republic without his enablers it took a team effort. and i just put that out there, david jolly, because that's what all these men are. that's what john bolton is and i've interviewed him and i've talked to him on and off tv as pete says, they all have their reasons why they went in same with esper. same with barr but they're not able to wash themselves or cleanse themselves

in the cold hard facts of a 49-page indictment they got us here they got us to i point where donald trump could manhandle state secrets. >> that's right. donald trump did not hijack the republican party he walked through the front door and he was embraced by the congregants who said you're our guy and we're going to elevate you and we're going to protect you despite all of your shortcomings in his business life the stories were often told that he approached cheating in business like you do see in some international cultures, different pockets of the world, where if i can cheat you out of a dollar that just means i'm smarter. right? it's a very amoral code of business ethics. but what we have learned is that drives his entire life and it drives his view of public service as well. so people gathered around him and protected him and elevated him. and the question is why? you know, it is difficult sometimes to approach judgment of another person's character. but i think donald trump and the people around him have given us

plenty of reasons to judge their own fitness, their own moral character. we can all make those assessments as we choose to. i think politically the odd thing, particularly if you look at the candidates running against him, do they really embrace donald trump's lack of character? is it pure fealty? is it the fear of the political consequences of challenging him? and i say that because i'm surprised by the lack of imagination, nicolle, of his primary opponents. there are ways to pinch donald trump in this moment you see mike pence talking about due process, maybe the president would be exonerated on the facts. i think that's the right direction. i think we should call for a speedy trial right? if donald trump is so confident the world's been weaponized against him the way to solve that is to have a speedy trial and to beat back the deep state. if i'm a republican presidential candidate you start to put the pinch on donald trump by saying let's have your innocence shown to the world before the republican primary and that's how you can move the

republican field against him because they're not, it goes to the heart of your question why not? is it a lack of fitness or moral character? is it pure political fear? or is it something greater >> as you're talking about speedy trial all i'm thinking of is him wanting to release his perfect call which of course wasn't perfect and they all locked it down and lied about it. the patterns of trump are so abundantly clear to anybody watching i need all of you to stick around we have a lot more developments o'talk about in the documents case aft aer very short break. don't go anywhere. verizon. the network she can count on. and now she has myplan, the game-changing new plan that lets her get exactly what she wants and save on every perk. sadie is moving to the big city and making moves on her plan, too. apple one, on. now she's got plenty of entertainment for the whole ride. finally there! hot spot, on. and she's fully connected before her internet is even installed. (sadie) hi, mom! (mom) how's the apartment? (vo) introducing myplan. get exactly what you want, only pay for what you need. act now and get it for $25 when you bring your phones. it's your verizon.

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their basic argument really

isn't to defend his conduct because trump's conduct is indefensible what they're really saying is he should get a pass because hillary clinton got a pass six or seven years ago now, i think, you know, that's not a frivolous argument but i'm not sure that's true i think if you want to restore the rule of law and equal justice you don't do it by further derogating from justice. you do it by applying the right standard and that's not unfair to trump because this is not a case where trump is innocent and being unfairly hounded he committed the crime or if he did commit the crime it's not unfair to hold him to that standard. >> we are back with pete strzok, david jolly, evan coley and andrew weissman. pete, i also have to play bill barr for you because it ties the brand in a knot, right one, you know, what is he doing? two, how does one man have so much time to do so many interviews about trump's criminality when he helped him by putting his thumbs on the scales of justice so gleefully and so willingly for all the

years he was at doj some and who's he talking to? this is the part of it that i'm most curious about who's he speaking to is he talking to ron desantis? is he talking to mike pence? is he talking to jim jordan? i mean, who is he talking to what do you think? >> nicolle, i think he's speaking certainly to the republican establishment i think he's speaking to people who have an ability to make an impact on whether or not trump in the primary season will gain the nomination i was thinking about your point about looking forward. let's set aside for a moment the politics let's set aside the question of the elements of the crime or what he may or may not have done at mar-a-lago. let's look at trump as he's being described by all these people and let's pay attention particularly to somebody like general kelly, a former distinguished military general officer. let's pay attention to mark esper, the former secretary of defense. the job, one of the primary if not the primary job of the president is to provide for the national defense of the united states of america. the fact of the matter is trump is looking at should he return to office being in control again

of the nation's roughly 3700 nuclear weapons. he is looking to be in charge again of the ability of the united states to deploy soldiers and enter into war he is looking at being the leader of the person who sits down with vladimir putin and zelenskyy to try and do god knows what to end hostilities in ukraine. he is the person likely to respond should china invade taiwan or any one of a thousand other national security emergencies that might unfold between 2024 and 2028. and is the person, the general kelly and mark esper that bill barr's describing, is that the person that the republican establishment wants leading the national security of the united states and i think it's clear from all these comments that no, he's not. so i think that's an internal discussion within the republican right and that's who those comments are aimed at. >> you know, there's something disgustingly arrogant, though, david jolly, because before mark esper mattis quit for cause.

and before mat sxtis and esper t in and took the job gates, secretary gates came out against him. the hubris -- and you can go on and on every agency is like that. literally all the republicans that were on tv sunday were preceded by people that had had their jobs before them telling them exactly what would happen if trump were the country's commander in chief in charge of our national security agencies and because they're some of the same arguments that were made by hillary clinton and democrats they were all discounted until republicans get the job, they see the frankenstein up close, they go holy -- bill barr's favorite word and they come out and get in front of a camera and say don't do this. then there's always another crop of republicans who go in and make all the same mistakes over and over again the ball wark has a great list of all the rensz who've broken with him pence, barr, mattis, esper, pompeo, tillerson, mulvaney, kelly, mcmaster, bolton, pottinger, spencer, alyssa air farrah griffin, stephanie

grisham, elaine chao, mike -- it goes on and on and on. but the problem is the republican party can't break the cycle. >> yeah, and i think all of those defections -- and pete's exactly right. laying on the line exactly what hangs in the balance of re-election of donald trump. puts right in front of us the gravity of needing to topple him politically. but what we have learned i think through all the indictments and through that list of people you just mentioned who have tried to challenge him on substance, is donald trump will not be stopped on substance i'm not even sure he will be stopped politically by any actions that happen in a court of law he might be convicted and still elected president. i think if you are architecting a campaign against him in a republican primary it is a very sober data-driven campaign it it is a delegate slog and in that delegate slog you do nothing to upend donald trump. you can't. there's not a message you can challenge donald trump on substance or ethics or national security threats you simply have to go through

the early states in the delegate slog making the case that you can beat joe biden if we get to that point, where a ron desantis is able to capture iowa, new hampshire, south carolina, some mixture of the two, and be in competition in florida, then you have an opportunity to really discuss substance. but these indictments have proven there is nothing, and in the context pete just laid out, the national security that hangs in the balance, there is nothing that will topple donald trump substantively in today's republican party >> nicolle, i would simply add to that, i grew up in rural north carolina where christian conservatives are very prominent. i grew up in the church. there is also a role here for the christian conservative leadership when donald trump uses language like i am your revenge, when he talks about the final -- this is the final battle, that has echoes of kind of biblical type

of revelations type of language to it. and i feel that type of stuff is completely over the line and it's the responsibility for all men of faith, particularly christian conservatives in the country, to call donald trump out on that. >> andrew weissmann, it's such a complicated picture. none of it i imagine weighs on jack smith, who is sort of what -- and i hate to put too much on him. but what we've been waiting for. right? someone who has a relationship between his mission and the facts and is not going to let any of this noise get in the middle of that that said, he exists in the real world. maybe having come from a posting overseas, he's less steeped in everything that we're all talking about. but you know, again, tying this back to the conversation we started with, it is lisa monaco's job to be aware of the moment and to run the department

and to run the case sxtz prosecutions in the moment in which we live, to respond to jim jordan's subpoenas and to be aware of calls to get rid of chris wray what is sort of the balancing act that has to be done to acknowledge the moment but not bend the rule of law to pander to it? >> so i actually think one of the things that's terrific about having a special counsel right now is essentially the bifurcation of those two tasks in terms of lisa monaco and merrick garland. they have to deal with the incoming from the house and all of that and defending the department and keeping the department on an even keel where jack smith has to keep his head down and do his job. and to the point that i was making in the last segment about it's not just that he came from overseas, so he's not as steeped in the sort of day to day that we're all involved in in terms

of what's happening and the late outrage on the part of the former president it's that he was at the international criminal court he was dealing with people who had violated the rule of law in their countries, holding them to acc account. what we are going through in this country is a first for our country. it is not a first for what jack smith and the rest of the world has gone through so in terms of his keeping an even keel and having -- understanding what his job is in terms of holding even the most senior leaders, whether they're political, whether they're military, to account, i really can't think of anyone with a better background in terms of having that perspective and who you would want to be in the position that he's in right now

without having to worry about running the department and the house and just really understanding the mission in terms of the rule of law so we are actually doing what many other countries in the world have done in upholding the rule of law here in our country >> it is an extraordinary sort of meeting of a man, a human and a moment four of the people i wanted to talk to most today all here at once thank you so much. pete strzok, david jolly, anthony coley and andrew weissman thank you for starting us off this hour. when we come back, how democrats are looking to level the political playing field. their new strategy to win back control of the house that's after aui qck break don't go anywhere.

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democrats aiming to regain control of the house are turning to new liberal court majorities to reverse gop-friendly congressional maps in new york and wisconsin. democrats call it leveling the playing field, and it's being met ironically with the ire of republicans, who wrote the playbook on overhauling maps and drawing extremely partisan districts. even their illegal map in alabama was recently struck down by the supreme court for being discriminatory against black voters there politico reports that this year democrats are, quote, adopting a work the ref strategy that republicans have deployed in the past democrats previously excoriated

gop operatives for plans to seek new maps in north carolina and ohio after a shift in the balance of power in the high skorts of both those states. more from that reporting, democrats often employ high-minded rhetoric about democracy in these cases, but they are keenly aware that even a small advantage can determine who controls the chamber in 2025 optimistic party strategists think democrats could boost their chances of flipping six seats under a new map in the lower hudson valley upstate and on long island joining our conversation is the founder of democracy docket and partner at the elias law group, marc elias he's handled hundreds of cases involving voting rights and redistricting. his law firm represented plaintiffs in that case we mentioned in alabama, the alabama redistricting case also joining us, the editor at large of the 19th, msnbc contributor our friend erin haines so mark, this is just an interesting sort of framing note and i love holding up all this great reporting. we wouldn't know about a lot of these stories except for you and the journalists who cover them

so they're doing really important work but the idea that answering like withlike is somehow stooping t the republicans' level is ludicrous. on the republican side it's all predicated on what even they will acknowledge is a lie. and the idea that democracy shouldn't sort of fight back or fight the fight where it's being waged is really interesting to me >> yeah. i think one of the reasons republicans hate me so much in courtrooms is because i fight hard and i fight to win. and that's what we need to be doing as democrats and as progressives the fact that what republicans are arguing is that the rules ought to be slanted to protect black, brown, and young voters from being able to participate we're arguing that the rules should be open to everybody. they're arguing for gerrymandering to prevent fair maps and to engage in racial and partisan gerrymandering. what we just saw in alabama was the opposite of that it was the application of the

voting rights act to ensure that black voters in alabama have an opportunity to elect their candidates of choice in a second district so there's no moral equivalence. but if we don't as progressives understand that the rules of voting matter and that where you put lines on the map matter, we will be in a permanent disadvantage >> and how -- i'd like to get your assessment of how it's going. i don't always like the answer but tell me sort of the state -- i hate leveling the playing field also because the it not a playing peeled what the right is doing is a distorted reality. it's predicated on a lie about fraud and it's disenfranchisement the democrats are inherently on defense. they have the facts on their side but they're dealing with the asymmetry of what the right is doing how is that going and how do you evaluate the dynamic right now >> yeah, so i think it's a mixed bag. i think on the redistricting front it's actually going pretty

well if you look at the litigation that is currently in court, the supreme court, as you point out, just ruled in favor of progressives and voting rights in alabama that will likely lead to an additional minority opportunity district not only in alabama but in louisiana and georgia. then we see what happens in states like texas and florida. so in redistricting i actually feel pretty good about what's going on there as you point out, my firm is also litigating an important case in new york that should hopefully restore a fair map there. in the area of voting rights, you know, what we continue to see is conservative legislatures around the country continue to enact laws to disenfranchise black voters and young voters principally but not exclusively, making it harder for everyone to vote and some of the words that you hear now mouthed about how, you know, conservatives or republicans are learning their lesson and are now going to engage in pro-voting tactics and

policies like early voting, i just don't believe it. >> erin haines, what are you seeing in terms of the juggling act that democratic activists have to do they have to reeducate their voters in places where the rules have changed, where they've actually criminalized voting they have to navigate all these legal hurdles. and they have to keep energy up ahead of the 2024 election season >> yeah. nicolle, basically what you end up having in most of these recent cycles for these democratic activists is really trying to overcome voter suppression with voter turnout so every election cycle boils down to which of those tactics is going to win, voter suppression or voter turnout look, we know that redistricting is absolutely a political process. this is literally what we mean when we say that elections have consequences this is a consequence of our election system. so the redistricting situation right now, you have one party

that is very focused on maintaining power versus another party that apparently is trying to maintain either restoring norms and restoring fairness, and so that's not really an equivalence, to mark's point, and people like marc are left to kind of be the ones that are trying to level the playing field in a courtroom situation but you know, unless we really take the politics out of redistricting, and that's not something that's going to happen based on either party, right unless we do that really at the federal level this is -- it's going to come down to really trying to figure out how these parties decide that they're going to kind of acquiesce but that or leaving it to the supreme court is really not a solution that takes the politics politics out of this >> the other thing that you're sort of tracking, marc, is vote by mail. and this will date me, that i am old enough to remember when republicans relied so heavily on the mail vote.

but it's like seven life-spans where trump declared war on the mail vote. tell me how that's playing out on the campaign trail. >> so republicans are making a lot of noise in the press that they are now in favor of early voting ronna mcdaniel put out some press statement to this effect apparently, their latest autopsy is going to say this but if that's the case, no one's told the politicians and the lawyers for the republican party. because in courtroom after courtroom around this country republicans are defending restrictions on early voting and vote by mail in legislatures after legislatures after legislatures around this country in the last few weeks and months republicans have passed new laws to make it harder to vote early and harder to vote by mail. so it's time that there be accountability for what the republicans are saying they're doing versus what they're actually doing >> it's so interesting thank you for keeping our eyes on the prize, both of you.

marc elias and errin haines, thank you so much. when we come back, two weeks into their counteroffensive and ukrainian troops are slowly making gains in territory formerly occupied by russia. we'll be back with those updates and a quick break. plus a stunning plot by russia to kill a cia informant right here ioun r country. stay with us for too long, big oil companies have bought off politicians so they can get away with ripping us off. that's changing now. joe biden passed a plan to jumpstart clean energy production in america.

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country, making small gains since launching a counteroffensive last month against russian occupiers. both ukrainian and russian officials said that kyiv's forces had taken another village, making it the eighth settlement to be reclaimed since the offensive began earlier this month. in an interview president zelenskyy said that news from the front lines was quite generally positive but that it's very difficult, end quote, as soldiers await a slow supply of western weapons. the difficult nature of the counteroffensive is highlighted by some new video we've obtained that shows how the ukraine yns are accountively foyting this war. we should tell you this video is difficult to see and to watch. it was blurred before being released so the video that you're seeing now is produced and shot by the ukrainian military the ukrainian military saying it shows special ops troops entering a russian trench and killing russian soldiers we should say that no date was given by the military and nbc news has not independently verified when the video was

filmed joining our conversation, former ambassador to russia msnbc international affairs analyst michael mcfaul thank you so much for being here i feel like so much has happened since the last time we got to connect. the russians by design, by strategic design, didn't say a lot about the counteroffensive but it's clearly under way, and it seems to be going well for the ukrainians what is your assessment, and what is it that we can't see that's happening >> well, before getting to the ukrainian counteroffensive i want to remind your viewers about the russian offensive ha failed we're not good about talking about non-events, nicolle, either in academia or on tv. but remember, nine months ago we were all waiting for that offensive which made some territorial gains in bakhmut, one city, but that was it. so i think that's an important context to remember first. second, i honestly think it's too early to make any assessment about what's going on.

the counteroffensive is on the move president zelenskyy's talked about it his advisers are talking about it but it's very early. and i think we'll measure the results of this in weeks and months before we really know what's happening and the second thing i want to add is there's so much focus on the counteroffensive my prediction is there will be many counteroffensives and the idea that everything is going to be decided with this one moment in time, i just don't see any evidence to support that hypoth hypothesis >> i want to come back to your first point. it's such a good one we do a terrible job talking about things that don't happen but there's something instructive in the patterning. right? so thepatterning, right? the russians have the result, i guess, that they could broadcast around the world of what they did in bakhmut there's an echo to anyone who wants to create one image that isn't representative of how the

war is going you see that in our country's politics as well i wonder if you think there's any recognition in russia that that really was an offensive that wasn't on the part of vladimir putin >> i doubt it. most certainly if you're watching russian television that the kremlin controls, there's not that image there is opposition reporting on that and they will go back even further. remember the battle of kyiv putin putin lost, the battle of kherson, he loves, zelenskyy is still there. demilitarize ukraine, he failed. we're focused on this one counteroffensive and we're losing the bigger context of the war here, which is not to say it's not crucial

i just don't want it to be too crucial as we remember the bigger context of this war >> we can get wrapped up in a tactic or a news cycle, but russia's war against ukraine and against its enemies is global. i want to talk about what it sought to do in florida. will you tell us that story? >> well, allegedly i'm going to repeat that five or six times so i'm not revealing things i shouldn't i used to know about these things when i worked in the government the person that allegedly was a cia, defector from russian intelligence that alleged live knew something about the illegals that were living in the united states, remember back in 2010 when we arrested all these people, i was working at the white house at the time, the americans, the television show was eventually made about them and what was different about this operation was they weren't normal spies under the cover of working at the embassy of russia, they were actually living, pretending to be

americans. that's why they were called illegals it was an amazingly complex operation done over years and years. their children were born here, et cetera. eventually we busted that. we knew about that we did a spy swap and allegedly the person who defected from moscow that tipped us off for this is the person that vladimir putin allegedly tried to kill in miami three years ago. and this is extraordinary, right? when i was in moscow we used to talk about moscow rules, the kind of things we would do, including between our intelligence agencies, certain red lines that you wouldn't cross. if this is all true, and i have no reason to believe it's not, this is really crossing a red line he did it in the u.k., remember, when he tried to kill sergei, one of the spies that we swapped for back in 2010

we thought, okay, your spies are home, our spies are out -- our alleged spies, i want to keep using the word alleged but now to go into the united states and try to kill somebody living here, that is something extraordinary. it shows there are no limits to what putin will do >> it makes it all the more important to continue to track anyone running for president's language and words towards putin and russia you're right, it is an important line alleged lly crossed for the of us paying close attention quick break for us we'll be right back. and save on every perk. sadie is moving to the big city and making moves on her plan, too. apple one, on. now she's got plenty of entertainment for the whole ride. finally there! hot spot, on. and she's fully connected before her internet is even installed. (sadie) hi, mom! (mom) how's the apartment? (vo) introducing myplan.

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to listen wherever you get your podcast. "the beat with ari melbourne" starts right after this.

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