is just, how do you make it past the republican primary, and it's going to be a much bigger problem to deal with that question of january 6th when you're in a general election. >> i don't think, tim, it's 20. i'm arguing against myself. he pitted the electability argument. i don't think it works. i don't think that, if we're arguing about whether mike pence should be hanged or not, it doesn't really work as a response. >> he sounds like a politician. doing the research he don't have to. and that is the mega media's big complaint about this. research. >> that's the maga media's big complaint. he sounds like a politician. we've got the authentic stuff. when a teenager looks more comfortable in his own skin than the answerer, that's not good. he nodes to go in and say i don't think it was a big deal, the election was a fraud or say this is --

>> thank you both. that is "all in" on this tuesday night. alex wagner tonight starts right now with my good friend, alex wagner. good evening, alex. >> good evening, chris. thanks to you at home for joining us this hour. we have breaking news tonight from "the new york times" this evening, some reporting that makes a recently unearthed chunk reporting even more incredible. if you have not yet heard nbc news has independently obtained the audio of former president trump at his bedminster, new jersey, golf club essentially admitting to a crime. here's trump in july 2021 telling a group of people he still has classified information after leaving the white house and then proceeding to destroy his own defense. he explicitly says on audiotape that he could have declassified this when he was president but he did not. take a listen. >> i just found -- isn't that amazing? this totally wins my case, you know? except it is like highly

confidential. >> yeah, yeah. >> secretive -- this is secret information. these are the papers. this was din by the military and given to me. i think we can probably, right? >> we'll have to see. we'll have to try to -- >> declassify it. see as president i could have declassified it, now i can't. but this is classified. september that interesting? it's so cool. and you probably almost didn't believe me, but now you believe me. it's incredible, right? >> no. >> even to someone who did not go to law school like myself, this really feels like a smoking gun for jack smith. you have the suspect on tape not just confessing to a potential crime but also debunking the defense. bring in the cokes, we are done here.

on the heels of that audio, former president trump sat for multiple interviews today, and he was pushing a sort of new defense saying all of this commentary on tape, that was all bravado. quote, i was talking and just holding up papers and talking about them, but i had nodulates. >> and i said it very clearly i had a whole desk full of lots of papers and mostly newspaper articles, copies of magazines, copies of different plans, copies of stories having to do with many, many subjects. and what was said was absolutely fine. we did nothing wrong. this is a whole hoax. i don't do things wrong. i do things right. i'm a legitimate person. >> i do not do things wrong, that defense is pretty funny on its face because it is incredibly well documented how much trump did not handle documents well. but that defense and this video are extra interesting today because of this new reporting

from "the new york times" tonight. "the times" reports that in addition to the search for classified documents down at mar-a-lago special counsel jack smith's team also went over to the bedminster property and went over that with a fine toothed comb. smith subpoenaed surveillance video and after the fbi searched mar-a-lago last summer, they were concerned that trump still had more documents stashed at bedminster. "the times" then goes onto describe yet another document saga much like the one we already knew about at mar-a-lago in which smith's office, again, after having already searched mar-a-lago, asked trump to provide a sworn statement that everything had been turned over. trump refused. smith's office then tried to get a subpoena so that they could search the bedminster property. but minutes -- literally minutes

before his hearing one of trump's lawyers alerted the court that trump's legal team had a team of professionals with military training searching bedminster for classified materials. smith's team got the judge to force trump's legal team to sign a statement saying exactly which parts of bedminster had been searched because we know how it went down at mar-a-lago, and it really looks like jack smith did his homework on this one. here's the thing, at least so far special counsel jack smith does not appear to be charging trump for what it seems he did on that tape at bedminster. there's not a single charge in trump's indictment about the dissemination of classified materials. there aren't even charges for anything that happened in the state of new jersey. so far the special counsel has nost very narrowly charged trump with 31 counts of willful detention of information, two

counts of making false statements to the fbi, and one count of obstruction of justice. and all of that is in the state of florida. so what is special counsel jack smith doing here? why has he at least so far -- why has he not used this case as a smoking gun to charge donald trump with more crimes? well, this is actually one of the rare cases in which we have sort of a hint from the man himself, the man being special counsel jack smith. this is a legal filing written by smith and his team and submitted to the judge in florida last week. in it the special counsel's team describes its case like this. it has only two defendants, involves straightforward liability and does not present liable questions of facts or law. in other words, the case is simple. it is straightforward and there is a ton of precedent. literally last week, just last week a former fbi analyst in kansas was sentenced to multiple

years in prison for the exact same charge that donald trump is now facing, the willful retention of national defense information. that fbi analyst was also keeping hundreds of classified documents in her bathroom, apparently bathrooms are a popular place for classified documents. so as wild as trump's alleged crimes here are, they aren't even original, and it seems that that is the point. the way jack smith's indictment lays out trump's discussion of classified documents at bedminster doesn't seem to be using it as the basis for its own charge. instead the special counsel seems to be using this blockbuster tape, and it is a blockbuster, to bolster his other very straightforward charges with an incredible pretty jaw dropping example of donald trump's intent. joining us now to break down this very interesting series of events and breaking news are two of our brightest legal minds,

former u.s. attorney and msnbc legal analyst joyce vance as well as an attorney who specializes in national security matters. thank you both for being here. joyce, i was stunned when i read this "times" reporting about the degree to which special counsel jack smith has been fighting trump and his team about potential document retention at bedminster and yet there are no charges in new jersey as yet and maybe ever. how do you read the lack of, i guess, criminal pursuit in the state of new jersey on the part of the special counsel? >> sure. so there are a couple of possible explanations, alex, and we don't know for certain which one is the truth, but it's possible based on what we do know that the special counsel's team doesn't believe that they have proof beyond a reasonable doubt. they may not have the document from bedminster, although they have testimony you'd like to be able to surface the document

itself. that's a possibility they just don't have it, that they're comfortable with using the story telling that they have in the tape as evidence to prove motive, opportunity, knowledge in the florida case. it certainly is compelling evidence. there's another possibility here, and there have been folks who have suggested that there could be a case that prosecutors have in their pocket in case anything goes wrong down in florida, separate charges they could ultimately file in new jersey or in washington, d.c. it could be that they are, in fact, sitting on these documents and on proof beyond a reasonable doubt, but they're waiting. the most important thing i think is what you point out. prosecutors are aware that this is a situation where you can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. you need a good case. you need a straightforward case. you need a case that can get tried before the next election, and that's what jack smith seem tuesday have brought down in florida. >> mark, i think it's worth pointing out the timing here,

right? the subpoenas, the attempts to search bedminster, that was all happening the fall of 2022. it doesn't sound like this tape surfaced until the year 2023. what's your assessment of how you saw all this evidence or at least the audiotape we have thus far, could be in a separate criminal indictment? do you think that's a possibility or do you land where voice and i think a lot of other folks are which is don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good, go with mar-a-lago. i think that's the strongest case you have. it's very clear, it's not novel. >> no, i agree 100% with joyce. so one thing we don't know is while there were witnesses clearly because you could hear them on the tape, we don't know what they said. it has been reported that at least one, maybe two or three of them had been brought before the grand jury, but perhaps they testified that they didn't see the document clearly, they didn't know if it had a classified cover sheet, they

don't know if it had any markings, and that would fit within the bravado argument donald trump is making now, that he didn't have any classified information in his possession. that's one possibility. but the reality is this tape has two strong points going for it where it doesn't make a difference whether or not the document was classified. one, first, that a -- trump himself makes it very clear that he understands what his lawful authority was. he could declassify information when he was president. he couldn't declassify information when he was not president. and he at least purports to pretend if not have classified information that has not been declassified in this possession. the second point that will be useful for the jury to hear is the notion of when you hear the audiotape, it certainly gives the impression that trump was holding a classified document in his hand. so now when he claims he actually was not, he was in

effect lying to his closest staff who remain to this day loyal to him. that's going to, i think, undermine his credibility before the jury as well. if he's got to lie to his closest staff and friends, then what's to say he's not lying anytime he opens his mouth? >> i mean the bravado defense, joyce. on the tape he lit raem says these are the papers, this was done by the military and given to me and then refers to declassifying it, and there's a whole back and forth. i mean, i guess that's the best defense here. is that the best defense here, joyce, that it's bravado? >> you know, if your best defense is bravado, in essence you're saying my defense is that i was lying, right? that's a terrible defense certainly for a former president and anyone to make in front of a jury. but there's a little problem underlying this, which is for trump to put on this defense

there's a good chance he would have to take the witness stand, and that's just something he can't do. no lawyer can let donald trump take the witness stand in his own defense without committing malpractice. so perhaps they cobble together some of his television appearances and they put that in front of the jury, but at the end of the day you still have a defendant telling the jury, hey, i'm a liar, so you couldn't convict me. and, you know, juries are smart. and mark knows this like i do, you can put chrontrudictory statements the witnesses make, defendants make in front of juries and they can sort that out. it's a terrible defense here. >> to talk about the asymmetry of the defense and prosecution here, mark, we know from court filings that jack smith, the special counsel's office may bring as many as 84 potential witnesses in the mar-a-lago case. i mean you look at the evidence they're amassing. they have this tape from

bedminster they're not even charging on basically used to show motivation. they have 84 or more witnesses lined up from mar-a-lago, and they're still pursuing this very narrow, not novel charge here, right? willful retention of classified documents. do you think -- i mean is it your assessment? and i know i'm asking you to sart of predict here, but based on the way they put this mar-a-lago case together, do you think the special counsel will be similarly circumscribed in potential charges for the january 6th investigation that's currently under way? >> well, those are very, very different cases. the january 6th case is legally problematic. factually, not so problematic. i mean, look, and i'll fully disclose i'm suing donald trump for the estate of capitol police officer bryan sicknick for

january 6th alleging he could be prosecuted for a crime, but obviously we have a civil burden much, much lower. that would involve some novel application of laws that typically would not have been applied in that situation. we just haven't had that fact pattern. the fact pattern in the mar-a-lago case is exactly what you've described when you reported on the former fbi agent who just got sentenced to prison. this happens i don't want to say all the time but routinely enough that it is very open and shut, black and white-type case. and any case brought against the former president of the united states should be just that. you know, no special counsel or the attorney general is going to want to push such a novel case because the ramifications for losing that case are going to be horrible for the country. i mean obviously the conviction is horrible for the country, but good for the rule of law.

so we'll see what happens with january 6th so i expect the mar-a-lago case or a parallel bedminster or a parallel d.c. case if it goes that way depending on how judge canon rules to stay very steadfast and straightforward. >> i guess, joyce, part of the reason i'm asking how narrow potential indictments can be from january 6th because we have reporting from "the washington post," you know, that special counsel smith's office is looking at potential wire fraud charges in the way the trump campaign solicited donations based on advertisements and messaging about election fraud that didn't exist that they knew didn't exist. i mean, could that end up being the end of the road for the january 6th investigation? what we do know as of a few hours ago is that rudy giuliani was interviewed in jack smith's probe. we know that brad raffensperger is going to be interview by the special counsel's office. what does that suggest to you in

terms of his -- how aggressively he's pursuing this? how broad a blanket he's throwing over the investigation? >> yeah, so prosecutors here look like they're doing what prosecutors do when they're trying to get ready to make a prosecutive decision, and they're trying to get ready to decide whether they have sufficient evidence to indict, do they have that evidence on and what the charges should be, and that doesn't presuppose they've made the decision to go ahead. they're just dotting the i's and crossing the t's. you for instance you have to talk to rudy giuliani. he's either a witness for you or against. you've got to lock him down under oath. and really what's going on here i think is an assessment of what those charges could look like. it could be a very narrow charge focused solely on a conspiracy involving the effort to interfere in the electoral college vote certification, or it could be something much

broader that looks at all the lawyers around trump, their efforts of a larger plan that maybe involve false allegations of fraud, the big lie, the fake slates of electors, and could even go as far as you pointed out towards this notion that trump or someone in the trump orbit continued to use these allegations of fraud even after january 6th to fund raise and to do that fraudulently. you can write a big complicated case, you can write a simple case. it's much the same problem that fani willis seems to be facing in fulton county. do you theredite indict a rico case or something much narrower. and what does justice? that's the ultimate question of january 6th. how do you get justice for the american people? >> such an elusive question. sure to be discussed a lot in

the coming years. joyce vance and mark zaid, thank you for being here tonight. appreciate it. we have more to get to this evening including big surprises from the roberts court. that and the u.s. intelligence community's failure to take seriously the white rage that led to the january 6th attack on the capitol. that is next. the capitol. that is next

it was early on christmas morning of 2020 in nashville, tennessee, when residents saw a mysterious rv pull up to a commercial street. there were gunshots followed by a computerized voice telling

people to evacuate now. a few minutes later the rv exploded. it caused major damage to the surrounding area, and it killed the driver inside. it was later revealed that the man responsible for that suicide bombing, he acted alone. and at the time someone saw the news about that national bombing and became concerned that it might be part of a larger domestic terrorist attack, an attack that person knew was supposed to take place at the u.s. capitol in less than two weeks on january 6th. and so that person sent an anonymous tip to the fbi. quote, they will all be armed. they think that they will have a large enough group to march into d.c. armed and will outnumber the police so they can't be stopped. they believe that since the election was stolen that it's their constitutional right to overtake the government, and during this coup no u.s. laws apply. their plan is to literally kill people. please, please, take this tip

seriously and investigate further. especially after what happened in nashville today, this could be a test run. i think they will have large numbers, and every single one of them is expecting and eager to use their weapons. that tip was one of many examples listed in a new senate report on the intelligence failures leading up to the capitol attack. the report paints a damning picture of the missed opportunities to prevent or prepare for that insurrection. but what might be the most revealing here is that it confirms what many people including president biden -- what many people knew to be true in the moments right after january 6th. >> no one can tell me that had it been a group of black lives matter protesting yesterday there wouldn't have been -- they wouldn't have been treated very, very differently than the mob of thugs that stormed the capitol. we all know that's true.

and it is unacceptable, totally unacceptable. >> according to the senate report in the lead-up to january 6th the intelligence community focused intensely on black led racial justice protests while effectively ignoring threats from right-wing domestic terrorists. in the summer of 2020 just a few months before the attack, protests erupted across the country over the killing of george floyd. according to the senate's report during those protests intelligence leadership was particularly focused on the civil unrest in portland, and everything related to it was treated a egbeing urgent. intelligence collectors were pressured to find evidence to support management's conclusion about the portland protests such as linking the protell uses to antifa despite the fact that overwhelming intelligence regarding the protesters did not exist. following those protests, an internal review at dhs found

intelligence officials had been too zealous to prove racial justice protests were part of some antifa conspiracy. the evidence simply did not exist. instead of redirecting its attention toward real domestic threats like right-wing extremism, the department of homeland security decided it would investigate everyone a little bit less. the report describes a pendulum swing, which in the intel community had a chilling effect on reporting information about january 6th. quote, they thought almost everything was reportable during the portland protests, but they were hesitant or fearful to report information relating to january 6th events. the intelligence community failed to understand the rise of white supremacist violence in america while buying into a false narrative about the violent potential of people seeking racial justice, many of them people of color. my next guest leslie lowery has

just written a really important book on this topic, the rise of violent white supremacy right here in america. he's going to join us after the break. stay with us. ng to join us afte break. stay with us life insurance on a fixed budget, remember the three ps. what are the three ps? the three ps of life insurance on a fixed budget are price, price, and price. a price you can afford, a price that can't increase, and a price that fits your budget. i'm 54, what's my price? you can get coverage for $9.95 a month. i'm 65 and take medications. what's my price? also $9.95 a month. i just turned 80, what's my price? $9.95 a month for you too. if you're age 50 to 85, call now about the #1 most popular whole life insurance plan available through the colonial penn program. it has an affordable rate

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within the racially and ethnically motivated violent extremist i'd say the biggest chunk of that are individuals motivated by some form of white supremacist ideology, and that's the -- that group, the racially

motivated violent extremist has been responsible for the most lethal activity in the last few years. >> in september of 2020 during a house homeland security committee hearing the director of the fbi, christopher wray, warned the threat of domestic violent extremism was growing. three months later hundreds of people violently stormed the nation's capitol fueled in part by the racist white nationalist rhetoric shared by president donald trump and his allies. today we learned that the intelligence community also received warnings that this could happen and that those warnings went unheeded, that there might be armed violence on january 6 wrgt, that the plan might be to literally kill people. and that attempt to topple democracy that is an example of what writer calls white lash. he writes each step towards triumph gained by the

anti-racist side sparks a backlash. lowery posits those white fears the undercurrent of the thrashing of our society, politics and culture. and as long as there are elements within our mainstream politics and media willing to cynically play to those fears we can expect additional bursts of white racial violence, the horrific falling card of our era. joining us now pulitzer prizewinning journalist wesley lowery. such an essential thesis to help understand what's happening in our world today. i mean there's a reason so many of the stories we're covering go back to this central notion of white grievance, white rage, and just the fear and anger towards a changing america. i wonder as we talk about january 6th this contention that

we would have had a vastly different response. i think it was head of the d.c. guard who told the january 6th committee it would have been a vastly different response if those were african americans trying to breach the capitol. do you agree with that? >> i think there's no question. i think what we've seen across history is our institutions charged with defending democracy whether that be law enforcement, the political parties, the press very often have been extremely sensitive to the idea of any fear of revolutionary black movement rising up and has been largely negligent when it comes to undermining, infiltrating, and preventing violence from what is the oldest terrorist movement in the united states of america, the white supremacist movement, people who would preach that americans who are not white are not entitled to full humanity or citizenship. what we see and we know it's not only about race.

right, we know there's a collection of grievances there in the same way the rise of the klan in the 1920s was not only about anti-black racism. it was about the concerns over the urbanization of america and catholics and jews and immigration. and so what we see is that we have movements like this who plan their coups in public and yet still are not prevented. and think it speaks to some of the failings of the institution of this moment. >> i wonder the degree to which we've not only normalized white rage and white violence but institutionalized it as well. when you have a country that is founded that has institutionalized racism, how do you get to a more perfect union, where you can begin to see not just the existence of white nationalism, white rage, white racism but begin to combat it? how do you unwind that? >> i think that -- i think that's one of the crucial questions. i write in the book and

referenced it a little bit that so much of our american history has been a tug-of-war through diametrically opposed forces, the literal foundation of our government that white people are human and other people are not, i think one of our difficulties we ed tend to overestimate or overinflate what they believe the progress towards that has been while other americans, those likely to be victimized by these systems suggest far less progress has been made by their colleaguesch in this moment when we see cultural changes what we see are white americans the majority of by the end of the obama years they may themselves face racial discrimination in the united states of america. white americans believe in essence they're an oppressed racialized group.

>> and don't forget the obama years were followed by the trump years when you have -- and this is kind of a bigger question, but what is -- when you have someone like donald trump who has normalized racist dog whistles at best, explicitly racist language, rhetoric and and calls towards racist violence at worst, how do we as a society deal with that? and i would ask as a journalist and member of the media, right, there's always this tension between donald trump is a front-runner in the 2024 presidential race. what he's saying is irresponsible at best and a directive towards violence at worst. how do we cover him in a way that is responsible to the role he plays as a figure on the national stage but also responsible to the fact he in many ways does incite violence? >> i think it's a complicated question. i think we can be more thoughtful than we have been

collectively. i think the reality is we know that dehumanizing rhetoric and dehumanizing language paints the way towards people who have been dehumanized, right? so if we have a major political figure going to track against such language and be so divorced from reality it's important to not serve as a signal boosting platform for them, not to stream or live tweeting every racist utterance but wrapping those things in context. this is in some ways an incendiary example but in some ways i don't think it is. we would not all day every day be live tweeting everything he says about jewish people. why would we not do that, right? because we understand by the function of that we are just spreading the lies. we are spreading the rhetoric, we are normalizing it. when people see their most base prejudices reflected back on public stages, the permission structure to now express them themselves.

>> and so as we talk about that, there's an explicit example, there's an explicit policy area that's been -- that is kind of like the hotbed of some of the most disgusting and violently racist rhetoric which is whenever you have donald trump or ron desantis talk about immigration, to me on the outside immigration feels like the kind of county fair where republicans are invited in to give their most -- to dehumanize brown and black people in a way that is explicitly racist but is sort of covered by the veneer of questions of legality and what we're going to do about policy, if the northerny issue of immigration. the hall pass you can have to express white grievance and white rage and white racism and directed at a group of brown people while still remaining in polite society and not deemed a racist because you're talking about undocumented people. talk to me about the way in

which you feel -- i mean what do you think of the suggestion that have been made thus far on the part of ron desantis i think it was yesterday announcing his plans to end birthright citizenship for americans born -- well, people born in america. >> well, i think it's an excellent example of what we're talking about where it masquerades as a policy issue and debate, but the reality is the expression of vibes, right? aren't these people scary and isn't the country changing in ways you don't like? let's remember the 14th amendment which legalizes birthright citizen slp was corrective to the dread scott decision. this was literally our remedy to the supreme court saying black people are subhuman was our birthright citizenship creation. secondly, the president can't get rid of it. that's not how the constitution works. this is completely messaging, not actually a policy proposal. i think about the interview newsom did with sean hannity and

newsom goes, well, i think we should solve this and the biggest problem is the brokenness in the system. let's talk about the veegsa policies and let's talk about the process and let's talk about the line. if we want to solve the issue of immigration system not working there are actually bureaucratic things we can do, but none of those things are things our candidates are talking about. i think that gives away the game. it speaks to fact this is about messaging, it's about the feeling, it's about playing on an anxiety. it also cuts to a real rich history. what people forget is when the klan was at its most powerful in the 1920s, it's major victory was an immigration bill in 1924. this idea how do we keep other people out, which makes us think about the birther movement and this black guy elected president is he really one of us, this question of the children of immigrants are they really one of us? it speaks to a base prejudice currently aggravated and

activated among many of our fellow americans. it's effective politics. it's why donald trump was able to get elected. it's why we saw the tea party wave in many places. it's part of what we saw on january 6th but it imperils people and imperils peoples lives. >> i'm with you. i think this is the central argument in american politics and life, which is what country are we, and who belongs here. i think it animates almost everything in our country today. it's such a timely book, it's an essential book. thanks for writing it, thanks for coming on the show to talk about it. wesley lowery pulitzer prizewinning journalist and author of "the american white lash." good luck with book sales and the book tour. >> when we come back supreme court watchers had braced for bad news for democracy and got maybe a pleasant surprise today. what is going on the roberts court? that is next. the roberts court? that is next

today in a 6-3 decision the supreme court shutdown a fringe legal theory largely pushed by donald trump's allies that would have radically changed the way federal elections are conducted in this country. the case, which was brought by north carolina republicans revolved around something called the independent state legislature theory. it's an idea based on a very far-fetched idea of the constitution's elections clause that says the time, places and manner for holding elections for

senators and u.s. representatives shall be prescribed in each state thereof. they believe those words magically gave state legislatures total power over u.s. elections and that their decisions cannot be undone by state courts. so basically that would give, say, a republican controlled state legislature the power to gerrymander maps and the courts would have no power to stop them. today the supreme court decision which was written by supreme court justice john roberts, it poured cold-water on this idea. and it stated clearly that legislatures do not have the power to make unilateral decisions regarding federal election. bad news for state legislators who wanted total control of american democracy. this decision came after the supreme court earlier this month stepped back from the brink of totally gutting section 2 of the landmark 1965 voting rights act.

that ruling held a congressional map drawn by alabama republicans had denied black voters a reasonable chance to elect representatives of their choice. and then in what can only be seen as an immediate effect of that earlier alabama decision, yesterday the supreme court dismissed an appeal coming from louisiana that would have diluted the power of black voters. okay, given the recent very controversial and conservative rulings of this current supreme court like overturning roe v. wade, you may be wondering what exactly is happening over there on the roberts court. writing in slate today mark joseph stern writes the ruling is a paradigm attic example of the court's turn. republican litigants come forward -- roberts joined by the liberals plus justice brett

kavanaugh or justice amy coney barrett or both declines the invitation. in the process this coalition gets to look reasonable, moderate, and independent even though they are just leaving the law where it was before. after the atomic bomb that was dobbs and its ongoing toxic fallout, kavanaugh and barrett must surely be taking some comfort in the shelter justice roberts is offering them. joining us now is mark joseph stern, and he's a senior writer covering the law. let me get right to it. so i think i know your answer, but john raw roberts didn't need to rule on this case, so why did he he? was it murely for lack of a better term optics? >> that's certainly part of it. roberts gets to look extremely reasonable and a kind of compromised justice here which is a good look in his book. i think he was also spooked by donald trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election by

empowering this independent state legislature theory. i think he saw the mischief it could work in the lower courts especially in the election with donald trump which we could be facing, and he wanted today shut it down which is why he left a lot of procedural hurdles to get to the merits and make it clear that state legislatures do not have this sweeping power over election laws. >> what is that? is that an opening for conservatives, or do you think that that is, you know, looking forward to 2024 and saying and the buck stops at the supreme court just in case? >> you know, i think roberts likes to preserve as much latitude and flexibility for himself and his court as possible. he said as a rule state courts get to call the shots when it comes to election law. but if a state court goes really crazy, if it tran grosses the bound of normal judicial review,

we can still step in and be the adults in the room. a lot of progressives are alarmed by that language. i read it more as a statement of principle that federal courts should keep out of these disputes as long as they rule within reason. >> what do you make of his rulings? again this seems a supreme court not particular to the plight of people of color. his rulings in alabama and louisiana that effectively strengthen the voting power of black voters, how does that square with the overall roberts agenda? >> you know, i'll tell you when roberts abolished preclearance and took away a big part of the voting rights act, he said, well this other part remains. section 2 is still in force and redistricting still has to be fair. and in this case just a few weeks ago he kept to that promise. it seemed he wanted to make sure that people didn't view him as the kind of justice who would just pull a bait and switch and

pull the rug out from under litigants. just a few years ago roberts said federal courts couldn't stop jerry manderrers bullet assured everyone state courts should. and that's exactly what he wrote today. i think in part this is roberts looking around and saying i've achieved a lot of my agenda already. i'm going to shore up some legitimacy and support and stretch the law even further. >> shore up some legitimacy. we are awaiting the ruling on affirmative action, and i will keep that phrase in mind. mark joseph sterns, thank you for making the time. thanks for great analysis here, mark. >> thanks so much, alex. we have one more story for you tonight, and it involves this -- this big head. stick around and i will explain. . stick around and i will explain. n ♪ ♪breeze driftin' on by...♪ ♪...you know how i feel.♪ you don't have to take... [coughing]

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one more thing before we go. actually, make that two. there is a person messing tonight from the crackerjack team that makes this show, our very hardworking and deeply beloved executive producer, matthew alexander. this guy. this is how we stay close to him. and the reason why he's missing is because his powerhouse champion of a wife allison, also by the way a former msnbc producer, she's just given birth to not one but two babies. these are the alexander twins, and you should all remember these names well because these kids are going places. helena graham alexander and tolly gayle alexander were born last week on june 22nd.

weighing a powerful 5 pounds, 12 ounces and tallia clocking in at 6 pounds and 2 ounces. way to go, allison. i also want to congratulate julian who is now a big brother to his baby twin sisters and appears to be enjoying the new circus that's come to town and will be staying forever. matthew, enjoy the bliss of being a party of five. and do not worry, the doj is requesting that the mar-a-lago documents trial be pushed until december. stay strong. that is our show for tonight. we'll see you again tomorrow. "way too early" with jonathan lemire is coming up next. are you concerned with your own voice on those recordings? >> my voice was fine. what did i say wrong in those recordings? i didn't even see the recordings. >> are there any other recordings we should be concerned of? >> i don't know any recordings you should be concerned with because i don't do things wrong, o