with -- according to some experts -- air traffic controller shortages. and so these two things couldn't come at a more difficult time. we expect travel to break some records starting tomorrow. so experts are warning people, if you need to get on a plane in the next couple of days, show up to the airport very early. if you can, add in another travel day for the potential that you might be staying overnight someplace like an airport. if you don't want to be one of those people, try your best to plan ahead. >> load up your car and just drive there. antonia, thank you very much. that is going to do it for me today. luckily i'm not taking a flight home. "deadline white house" starts right now. ♪♪ hi there, everyone. it's 4:00 in the east. it's one of those days, no time to waste this afternoon. there's a lot going on incluing our top story, rudy giuliani and his attorney robert costello meeting with special counsel jack smith's investigators in

the january 6th case that could be approaching its end game. plus, in the classified documents investigation, previously unreported details on a subpoena for surveillance footage, not from mar-a-lago this time, but from donald trump's bedminster golf club. first, though, something exciting to share that's a little closer to home. tomorrow on this very program at this very time, president joe biden will join us in what will be his first live sit-down interview since becoming president. we don't have to tell you there is a ton to ask him about and talk to him about. you won't want to miss it right here at 4:00 tomorrow. but after i pick my job off the floor that i just actually read that, we'll go back to our top story, rudy giuliani, mr. four seasons total landscaping himself met with special counsel prosecutors in recent weeks. nbc news confirmed that he did that with his own political adviser, ted goodman after earlier reporting in the day from cnn. crucially, goodman insists the

appearance, which also featured attorney robert costello was, quote, entirely voluntary. and before we talk about what that might even mean, recall why giuliani is such a vital witness in the first place. in the aftermath of the 2020 election that trump lost, giuliani essentially becomes trump's glorified door to door coup salesman acting on behalf of trump and at trump's direction traveling state to state pitching the big lie and persuading skeptical legislatures to send fake slates of electors, trying to convince them that they had power that they really never had. remember this from georgia in december of that year. >> you are the final arbiter of who the electors should be and whether the process is fair or not, and the other way to look a it, it's your responsibility if a false and fraudulent count is submitted to the united states government. >> remember, he's saying that

after that state's republican secretary of state had said there was no fraud. but even more important perhaps than what giuliani said there or what he was asked about by jack smith's investigators is that the meeting happened at all. giuliani's critical role in the plot and plan to steal the election suggests jack smith and his team could very well be nearing the conclusion of that investigation, meaning donald trump could very soon face brand new additional criminal charges. that is where we start today with some of our favorite reporters and friends. "politico" national correspondent and msnbc political contributor, betsy woodruff swan is here. also joining us former u.s. attorney and former deputy assistant attorney general, harry litman is back. and former rnc chairman michael steele is here. michael steele, i have to start with you because i feel like knowing rudy before he was this rudy makes his appearance before jack smith's investigators in the january 6th coup plot very

interesting. what do you surmise is going on here? >> yeah, you know, it's -- rudy's kind of been this interesting cog in the wheel that once he goes out and is seemingly doing trump's bidding and saying all kinds of crazy, and then in other moments, you know, you really wonder, okay, how deep is he in the roots of this thing? how much of a connection he has. and i think at the end of the day, you kind of realize that he was the guy that trump sort of pushed out there to sort of, you know, put in place the cover to give a narrative, and certainly to give instruction to a lot of the various -- as you saw in that video there. making that connection to trump through rudy to the various entities and players that the president wanted to touch but didn't want to necessarily have

his fingerprints on, and that's the problem. you can't break that connection. rudy's only in those rooms and saying those things because trump has directed him to, and that's what the federal prosecutors want to get at. how were your instructions laid out to you. and when you said this, where did that come from? because it does not marry up with some of the other things you were saying. >> yeah. i mean, and i'm thinking of the rudy giuliani who becomes the only trump surrogate who's willing to go on the sunday shows after the "access hollywood" tape comes out. trying to flip the ticket and put pence at the top, chris christie's zooming back to new jersey, refusing to go on the sunday shows. nobody else wants to touch it. rudy giuliani says take me, i'll do it. i'll defend grabbing women in the bleep. it's like he waited for this job the whole time, michael steele, and he wasn't invited. he wasn't with the cool kids on election night. he becomes trump's coup

implementer by default. >> because he's the only one who will do exactly what you just said. he's the guy who's going to go out and defend the indefensible, and while others are scattering to the four winds, rudy's in the room going put me in coach, i'll do it. what do you want me to say, and how many times do you want me to say it? to whom do you want me to say it? whether he's sweating motor oil or not, the reality of it is rudy's going to be that guy that trump comes to rely on when everyone else scatters. so his role by default becomes much more important because he also -- it comes almost as sort of a keeper of what trump is thinking. he becomes a keeper of what is the impetus behind the words that he's sharing, when he's in that room and he's telling people why they're so important, well, the federal prosecutors want to know what's the back story there? we want to know why were

these -- why was this important for you to tell these people this particular thing? why did you go to the four seasons parking lot to say and do what you did there. and a lot of that narrative you're not necessarily going to get from the reince priebues who are like i don't know. rudy was the guy who was like tell me and i'll go do it. >> yeah. harry litman, what does it mean that his folks are saying that he went in, quote, entirely voluntarily? >> i think it's dissembling at best. first, giuliani's waist deep in everything after the election, but he is neck deep in the false leb tors. -- electors. he ask trump together badger rusty bowers. he goes down to georgia and tells a whole pack of lies. he is exactly where smith is otherwise in the investigation talking to raffensperger and the like. here's what it means. he's gone in with a proffer. that means he has given

information but under circumstances where they won't hold it against him. they'll just evaluate whether they want him, want him for what? give him immunity or an easy deal, and then what's he giving in exchange has to be information about donald trump. so this -- the proffer, yes, he didn't -- doesn't have to do it. you can call it voluntary in that way, but don't think that he's like a good citizen just finally getting this all off his chest. he's trying to cut a deal, ask he knows the time is very short. >> harry litman, let me play that sound you just alluded to, rusty bowers describing rudy's role in the arizona plot. >> my recollection, he said we've got rot lots of theories. we just don't have the evidence. and i don't know if that was a gaffe, or maybe he didn't think through what he said, but both myself and others in my group, the three in my group and my counsel both remembered that specifically and afterwards kind

of laughed about it. >> i mean, this is the -- i don't know if he meant to do this. i'm pretty sure he didn't, harry, but he just summed up rudy giuliani. i don't know if it was a gaffe, i don't know if he meant to do it, but we walked away and we laughed. you know, part joke, part court jester, but he flirted with criminal exposure for the duration of the trump presidency, probably the closest he inched was during the first impeachment for his role in sort of running an off book u.s. foreign policy that involved maligning and defaming marie yovanovitch. it's very clear that information is being assembled about the illegal fake electors plot. and i wonder, harry, if you were making sort of a guess how you would stitch together a voluntary meeting that comes in the wake of pence and meadows already testifying before the grand jury? >> yeah, so really important that pence and meadows have.

it seems to me in the last couple of weeks that smith has made very meticulous use of the electors themselves, including one in nevada who supposedly spoke to trump personally. and now he has jumped the divide, and he is in the circle. i mean, judge is one arm's length away from trum. so if looking to make a discreet false electors case, and we've been thinking this for some time and it's been my surmise, he is really close because you're not going to call trump in. he's really in the final circle that starts in the hinterlands with false electors and ends up in the oval office with the former president. >> betsy, let me play more of what the 1/6 select committee developed in terms of evidence about rudy giuliani's role in quarterbacking the fake elector's plot. thing includes that plot in pennsylvania. >> another legislator, pennsylvania house speaker brian

cutler received daily voice mails from trump's lawyers in the last week of november. >> mr. speaker, this is rudy giuliani and jenna ellis. we're calling you together because we'd like to discuss, obviously the election. >> hello, mr. speaker this is jenna ellis, and i'm here with mayor giuliani. >> hey, brian, i really have something important to call to your attention. >> cutler felt the outreach was inappropriate and asked his lawyers to tell rudy giuliani to stop calling, but giuliani continued to reach out. >> i understand that you don't want to talk to me now. i just want to bring some facts to your attention and talk to you as a fellow republican. >> this bordered on pathetic and desperate and real harassment, but at its root, it was the same thing, frankly, ginni thomas wanted them to do.

they wanted them to put the party ahead of the country, to place some political value on doing something knowingly illegal and knowingly false. and i wonder how you think it works out that rudy giuliani is now we're learning voluntarily heading in to talk to jack smith's prosecutors. >> there's no question that this was an uninterrupted pressure campaign targeting state legislators nationwide. the fact that rudy giuliani has participated voluntarily in this interview is extremely interesting for, of course, the obvious reason that often when people go into these type of proffer sessions, prosecutors are looking for help building cases against somebody slightly higher up in the architecture than they were. and rudy giuliani was answering directly to trump. does that mean jack smith is going to charge trump? of course we don't know that, but there's no question that smith and his team are asking a

wide variety of detailed questions about the former president. rudy giuliani's particularly interesting also because we know that jack -- that the fbi and the justice department have looked at people in his wider orbit, in particular a woman who formerly worked for giuliani who's now suing him for sexual harassment said in court filings that fbi agents showed up at her family's home looking for her, and she's -- and she has said in these filings that giuliani told her not to talk to the fbi. we don't have a ton of detail about what those fbi agents who according to these filings showed up -- who showed up at her home were asking about, but it certainly suggests that federal law enforcement's interest in rudy giuliani has been sort of multifaceted and multidirectional. what's also interesting about giuliani is that jack smith's team is said to have asked him about sidney powell, and one piece of this that we know that

in retrospect sounds totally bizarre, there was actually some tension between sidney powell and her allies in those final last days of trump's presidency. and rudy giuliani and bernie kerik. the view from rudy giuliani and bernie kerik's side was sidney powell was even too crazy for them. powell was pushing the notion that hugo chavez and chinese thermostats had somehow intervened with election machines, using cyber techs. rudy giuliani and jenna ellis and others were running this very aggressive nationwide pressure campaign going straight to these state lawmakers to try to lobby them to get on board with pushing, of course, the vice president to invalidate the election. so one person in addition to keep a close eye on, a name to keep a close eye out for as jack smith's parallel probe shall we say progresses is sidney powell and the extent to where she

continues to ask a lot of questions about her. >> betsy, let me just follow up on that. trump is the connective tissue between both. i mean, it's trump who at the peak of covid -- this was pre-vaccinated america is calling state legislatures. some of those calls have gone on through biden's presidency, but trump is the connective tissue, and the analysis is almost like what's happening in russia, right? the hard-liner and then the super hard-liner. there's no -- rudy wasn't exactly pumping the brakes on any of it, but trump is the connective tissue between the super duper crazy venezuelan stuff that sidney powell is talking about and the extra crazy and illegal stuff that rudy's doing. it's trump that has a hand in both buckets. >> that's right. no question, and what trump was looking for at that point towards the very end of his presidency is anybody who would tell him what he wanted to hear, and that's why so many of the people particularly who came to that infamous oval office meeting where they discussed using the military or dhs to

seize voting machines, that's why so many of the people in that oval office meeting weren't actually government employees. weren't actually people working for the white house. because even the folks who stayed with trump through the very end of his presidency, through the final days despite everything, even many, many of those people, in fact, the bulk of those people at the senior level said, whoa, nelly, this is too much. we're not on board with this, and that's why you have this cohort of outsiders coming in and pushing this insane, dangerous, extraordinary plan to overturn the election. which of course as they pushed it, trump at the bare minimum was absolutely all ears. >> so michael steele, one of the people who was there until the end is cassidy hutchinson and the country and jack smith benefitted from her intimate knowledge of rudy's intimate knowledge of trump's desire to be at the capitol. let me play some of the evidence developed by the select committee. >> as mr. giuliani and i were walking to his vehicles that

evening, he looked at me and said something to the effect of cass, are you excited for the 6th? it's going to be a great day. i remember looking at him saying, rudy, would you explain what's happening on the 6th? and he had responded something to the effect of we're going to the capitol. it's going to be great. the president's going to be there. he's going to look powerful. he's going to be with the members. he's going to be with the senators. talk to the chief about it. talk to the chief about it. he knows about it. >> michael steele, according to rudy, the president's going to be there at the capitol. he's going to look powerful. he's going to be with the members. he's going to be with the senators. all that's missing is, you know, we got him a horse to ride on. i mean, it's so crazy we sometimes discount it, but it is rudy as a direct witness and planner of trump's plan to travel with his armed supporters. we know that by then they also knew that the people that were

coming were people armed and ready for a fight. he was going to be going with them. >> yeah, he becomes sort of the field marshall for that day in many respects, at least trying to stage, understand where everybody's going to be, you know, the excitement clearly was uncontainable when talking to cassidy about all of this, and the idea that he actually thought that everything that had happened from the election day to that point, that he was involved with was coming together, that the plan that they had contrived, the elements of it, the personnel, the various agents and agencies out there from the proud boys and the oath keepers, that network, everything was in place. and at the center of it was this guy, the former america's mayor. the guy we knew from 9/11

standing there at the epicenter of orchestrating an overthrow of america's government. and so now he finds himself up against a wall in which his best outlet is to go and voluntarily tell people what he knows. and that -- and i'd be interested to hear what others think about this is rudy now trying to reframe the conversation, and i bet in so many ways diminish the role that he actually played, you know, or at least say i was instructed by the president. but he was there. he was there, nicolle, and he seemed to be damn proud of being there and very excited about what was going to happen on january 6th, and i think, you know, jack smith and others want to know, tell us, rudy, in detail what you thought was going to happen on january 6th. >> right, and i mean, the other piece of it when you get to

probing the violence is what did you do once it became deadly? did you go on tv and tell them to leave? did you send out a tweet to your followers telling them to go home? once you saw what was happening and you had good reason to know what would happen, what did you do? and i'm guessing that jack smith knows the answer to that question, but i'm going to push all of you on that as well as the willard hotel meeting, which is back in the news today. no one is going anywhere. when we come back, donald trump who's made a career out of living in the muck is getting a taste of his own medicine. what chris christie said in response to a fat attack next. plus, new reporting on this weekend's coup attempt by the armed mercenary force wagner group fully intended to capture russian military leaders and that some of those closest to putin knew about it. the very latest reporting on that as the world watches for how the russian leader is going to react there and around the world. and later in the show, as we mentioned at the top, it is not just mar-a-lago.

there are new details in the classified documents case surrounding donald trump's bedminster club. all those stories and more when "deadline white house" continues after a quick break. don't go anywhere today. ere tod.

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and we'd have a better view. do you need mulch? what, we have a ton of mulch. hi, i'm katie, i've lost 110 pounds on golo in just over a year. a literal ton. golo is different than other programs i had been on because i was specifically looking for something that helped with insulin resistance. i had had conversations with my physician indicating that that was probably an issue that i was facing and making it more difficult for me to sustain weight loss. golo has been more sustainable.

i can fit it into family life, i can make meals that the whole family will enjoy. it just works in everyday life as a mom. betsy, harry, and michael are all back. harry, i want to ask you to pick up where michael steele left off and plug in some indication that the willer may also be of interest to jack smith. we know that cassidy hutchinson's dramatic testimony, today is the one-year anniversary of her dramatic testimony. had a lot of ties to mark

meadows, to all the individuals in there. they are the hub from which the spokes that plug into the extremist groups themselves as well as the president's words and desire to go down to the capitol. just talk about why that might be of interest to jack smith. >> yeah, you've been listening to andrew weissmann, he's totally right. it's that kind conspiracy where someone's in the center and everybody is joined. as i said, giuliani is everywhere and the willard forms this kind of war room that extends all across january 6th. i think the immediate focus is the electors, and which maybe brings in mike pence. but i want to zero in on this word proffer because it's a term of art that prosecutors know and it illuminates, i think, the false impression that they're trying to make that, you know, it's just rudy has refound religion and is coming in with law enforcement to cooperate. it is proffer session, he comes in with his lawyer. his lawyer says this is what my guy would tell you, and then

they turn to giuliani. they can ask him things. they won't use what he says, although if he lies to them, he can be charged, and he gives what he knows in order precisely to try to get better treatment than he expects he's going to get. so he is, yes, walking in of his own two feet, but because he feels the fire at his heels that he's maybe looking at being charged. as he -- by the way, remember he's a target in the georgia case. he's been told that which is very similar. and one last point on, that he suggests that he's not a subject, no way in the world rudy giuliani is not a subject of this investigation. what's probably happened is his defense attorney knew not to ask that question so they could come out and say it. giuliani is clearly a person of interest, and he's just hoping to basically now turn and cooperate. >> harry, if jack smith has already had mike pence in to

talk to him for a full long day, if jack smith has already had mark meadows in to talk to him in front of a grand jury, if jack smith has already been with those men, who's left? i mean, who -- i mean, i guess that leaves trump, eastman, and rudy? >> well, yeah, but first it's a very good point because, you know, if giuliani's lawyer says can i come in and talk to you, they'll say sure. they'll hear him out, but if they -- if he's too late, if they already have what they need, you know, no deal for rudy. but in terms of the coat ree you're talking about that really were talking directly with trump, and he seems to during this period have been unabashed about picking up and calling electors and people in the states, but eastman certainly figures in, maybe jenna ellis who seems to have had this relationship with him. just this final, as michael said, you know, at the end,

anybody who would tell him what he wanted to hear, those were the people who had his ear and in turn, you know, had their ears to hear what he said. so that's the kind of final circle it seems to me we're in. first and foremost to me, i've been saying this for months, mark meadows, and now that he's testified, you know, that really gives smith a lot to work with. we don't know what he said, just like we don't know a lot of the cards that smith is holding right now. but it's a high hand. >> and we have seen a lot of mark meadows' text messages sent and received on that day and leading up to it. so if we imagine jack smith to have a gazillion more stuff like that, you're right, he has a lot. i want to switch gears with you, betsy and michael, and sort of get at what trump is facing. i know there's a temptation to cover trump as though it's a static thing in our politics, but he's never run for president with jack smith and chris christie both taking aim at him, one for his criminality and the other for this. let me show you this.

>> once trump started hitting back at you on a number of fronts, he took aim at your weight. what was your reaction to that? >> oh, well, like he's -- please. you know, look, howie, there are tens of millions of americans out in your audience watching right now who like me have struggled with their weight. i continue to struggle. i continue to try to do better and still today. and what's that got to do with my competence for office? i ran the governorship of new jersey for eight years i think in an energetic successful way, responded to hurricane sandy working 20 hours a day for weeks. i don't know what his point is. you know what it is? it's like a child. it's a bully on the schoolyard who teases you or makes fun of you. here's my message to him, i don't care what he says about me, and i don't care what he thinks about me. and he should take a look in the mirror every once in a while, maybe he'd drop the weight thing off of his list of criticisms. >> so betsy, there's no part of

that that's going to make trump more mad than being called by chris christie. nothing he said is going to bother him as much as being called not a greek god. trump has never had to run for president against chris christie. chris christie didn't lay a glove on him in '16. he was an enthusiastic supporter of his all through the first presidency, was offered some pretty high profile jobs for a complicated set of reasons never really went in, but remained his close friend and outside adviser. that is his baggage or whatever you view that as as the general election candidate. but trump has never had to run against him before, and the hits come. they're frontal. they're backed up with facts, and this one is sure to hurt donald trump's feelings. >> yeah, and trump is obsessed with physical appearance, obsessed with the physical appearance of the people around him. it's something that has long shaped his hiring decisions,

something that shapes how he presents himself publicly, who he wants in the background of camera shots. it's something he's really obsessive about. he would often compliment men he golfed with and say that they were handsome. he would choose how he hired based on how they physically appeared on tv. it's so front of mind for him the looks of the people who he hires and gives jobs to, and the way that other people perceive his appearance, what other people think about the way that he looks. those images are absolutely preeminent for him. so to have someone like chris christie, who was long one of his close advisers really influential ally who brought some conservative bona fides to trump at a moment in the campaign when he really needed them, to have chris christie now sort of saying if trump's going to dish it out, he's going to need to be able to take it,

there's no question that that's something that the president would find deeply unpleasant to have to listen to. those are the kind of comments that get under trump's skin in a really unique way. >> you know, michael steele, this has a sort of frivolous feel to it, right, to men jabbing each other about their appearance. it's so beneath the kind of problems that most americans deal with in their lives, bus but there is a more profound piece. trump's obsession with appearance has extended to men and women in our country. there's been great reporting about the generals contending with moving wounded warriors out of camera shots just as betsy's describing, the people that were behind him. this is a sickness that he has. this is knowable. this has been reported, and if chris christie is knocking on this door of his vanity, there are a lot of political vulnerabilities there with groups that trump pretends to care about.

>> absolutely. betsy, i love the way she did it. she was so polite about it as a seasoned, well-read reporter would be. let me break this down a little bit further for you. trump ain't ready for what's about to him hit. weight is just the tip of an iceberg that he's about to run into. he will not be able to avoid it, and i think to your point in the lead in here, he has not had to run against anyone who's not afraid of him, and that's different. everyone kowtows to trump from the speaker of the house on down. and they have. he watched 15 other men and women stand on the stage in 2016 and lick every inch of his boot. and it hasn't changed since then, and the fortunes of the last cycle were such that

instead of focusing on him, you know, christie focused on rubio and took rubio out. did trump a solid. well, guess what. that's not happening this time around, and it's going to be dynamically different for trump, who is all about the facade, the image. behind it is an afraid little man who is obsessed about how he looks and uses others to sort of project an image of himself that he sees in his mind. meanwhile, it's like looking at -- it's like looking at a flower bed and noticing, oh, i see my dog was just here, if you know what i mean. [ laughter ] >> and so it is a very clear space. it not something that is unobvious to the rest of us. and how trump is able to handle this in this cycle is going to be interesting. does he go after full frontally

go after chris christie? wouldn't advise it. how else does he go after him? he may be able to get others to comment christie, particularly now that he's moved from 1% to 5% in polling and in a lot of polls he's in the third position in this race. that's only going to change, and if he's on stage, i guarantee you in august donald trump will not be there. >> wow. betsy woodruff swan, harry litman, and michael steele, thank you so much for starting us off with these headlines today. we're really grateful to all of you. up next for us, there is brand new reporting this afternoon on how one russian general had advanced knowledge of this weekend's day-long rebellion against vladimir putin. the reporter on that story and a correspondent on the ground in the region join us next on the big developments there. don't go anywhere. s. tourists taking photos that are analyzed by ai.

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matching your job description. visit indeed.com/hire fundamental freedoms are under attack in our country today and there is a national agenda at play by these extremist so-called leaders. it will be a national ban on abortion. it is the tradition of our country to fight for freedom, to fight for rights... to fight for the ability of all people to be who they are and make decisions about their own lives and their bodies. and we will fight for the ideals of our country.

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- fine. - i always wondered what it would be like to have a tail. - maybe you did one time. and maybe a thousand years from now, i'll be tail-less using that chewy app to get you great prices on treats. - i'm pretty sure it takes more than a thousand years- - vase. - pets aren't just pets. they're more. - vase! - [announcer] save more on what they love with everyday great prices at chewy. (air whooshing) (box thudding) we have new details this afternoon about the stunning mutiny inside russia that we all watched play out on our television sets on saturday. it was spearheaded, of course, by yevgeny prigozhin who shocked the world when he marched his mercenary wagner group up toward moscow last weekend, cheered on by people this the streets before then abruptly calling it off. according to some fantastic new reporting in "the new york times," quote, a senior russian general had advanced knowledge of yevgeny prigozhin's plans to

rebel against russian military leadership. that's according to u.s. officials briefed on intelligence on the matter. the officials said they're trying to learn if general ser sergei surf rof kin. the spokesman for the kremlin calling it gossip and speculation. they are kremlin spokespeople, you know, and if surovkin was involved in planning prigozhin's rebellion, it would potentially mean that dissent reached all the way into vladimir putin's innermost circle. despite prigozhin's claim that he did not intend to overthrow putin's regime, "the wall street journal" is reporting that prigozhin had planned to capture military leaders, the latest evidence indicating that this was a full-fledged attempt at a coup. as michael mcfaul, the former u.s. ambassador to russia told "the new york times," quote, there were just too many weird things that happened that in my mind suggest there was collusion that we have not figured out.

think of how easy it was to take rostov, mr. mcfaul said. there were armed guards everywhere in russia, and suddenly there's no one around to do anything? let's bring in "new york times" pentagon correspondent, helene cooper and joining us from kyiv, my colleague ali velshi. it's an incredible piece of reporting from you and your colleagues. take us through it a little bit further than what i read. >> hi, nicolle, thanks for having me. hi, ali. it was such a weird weekend. i mean, you really felt like you were watching history unfold. it sometimes felt like 1917, but on monday we went -- eric and i went into the pentagon, and we were talking to some officials. we talked to other officials in other buildings, and we started to hear the gist of, you know, different officials within the u.s. government apparatus saying that we're not sure that this

is -- it started off as, we're not sure that this is over yet, and it developed into their other members of the russian military who are quite sympathetic to prigozhin and asking, you know, there are many officials asking the question of how -- why is it, just as you quoted mike mcfaul saying, why was he able to zoom up to moscow without anybody trying to stop him, and so once we got that, we started asking, focusing sort of our reporting on that question of are there other generals, other members of the russian military who indeed did support prigozhin and the first name that we were given was -- if there -- i know a few russian generals. i don't -- i won't pretend that i know that many of them.

it's a different military, but sergei surf vee can is anyone who covers them knows. he was in charge of the russian war effort in syria back in 2015. he used to deal a lot with american officials on the whole deconfliction thing in syria, but he is very much a well-known russian general. he was fired by value valerieger ros move because gerasimov took over the ukraine war effort at that point, and survikan was not happy about that. there's a lot of bad blood between gerasimov who's basically the head of the russian military. so the fact that it's been well-known, i was still sort of surprised when we were first

told that name because that's a big deal. this would be the equivalent of not a general mark milley supporting a march on biden, but it would be pretty close to milley. this would be like during the iraq war, petraeus decided that he was going to, you know, attack the president or support an attack on the establishment. so it's a big deal. >> so helene, what explains putin's response to something that's such a big deal? i mean, he doesn't seem -- he hasn't -- you know, when there are anti-war protesters in the streets of russian cities, they are rounded up and jailed. there were pro-coup cheerleaders who are anti-putin cheerleaders in the streets all the way along the route, and there are no reports of any of them being rounded up. what explains -- what do they make of putin's response to all of this? >> it's such a good question, and i would -- i do want to correct myself because i said

supported, and what we're told is that surovikin knew about the plan before it happened. there's not exact -- there's no surety at this point that he actually supported it, although intel assessments do think that he did. but to come back to your question, which is an excellent question. at this point, this is just conjecture from me because the officials i've talked to say they don't know. what many of them think is that this is a case where the war -- the russian military is, first of all, a mess. you and i have talked about this for the past year and a half. there's so much infighting going on in the military, and you have a military that has been shedding blood. you have casualties of, you know, american estimates put killed or wounded heading towards 200,000 in ukraine over the last year and a half. morale is horribly low, and there is very much a risk that putin could be afraid that he's

losing the rank and file. some of that infighting, a lot of anger towards -- towards gerasimov and sergei shoigu who's the russian defense minister. you're looking at a case where if vladimir putin, for instance, kills prigozhin for this -- for this -- for this mutiny, he instantly makes him a martyr. he could further alienate his rank and file, and that's, i think -- i think -- this is not -- this is based on conversations with american officials, no one's saying this for sure, this is conjecture, but i think that that's part of what you're seeing playing out. if you're a dictator, one of the last things you want to do is lose your military. and if you start rounding up popular military leaders who rank and file soldiers think have their back, you put yourself in a precarious position at a time where the

russian military is in trouble to begin with. that's not to say he doesn't go after them at some point. many people who we talked to over the last few days said they think prigozhin is a dead man walking, but i think there has to be some consideration on the part of putin that, you know, the last thing he needs right now is to martyr somebody like prigozhin. >> ali velshi, take us inside your understanding of this moment in moscow as well as what you're reporting there on the ground in kyiv. >> reporter: yeah, well, fantastic reporting from helene, you and your team. that was great stuff, and i think the -- you know, to put a little bit more meat on those bones, surovikin is somebody who shared prigozhin's criticism of the way this war was being prosecuted in ukraine. he felt that there should be a stronger effort, that the

military should be more effective. remember, prigozhin thought himself the tip of the spear. he thought himself more effective than the russian regulars. so the idea that he may have had tacit support becomes interesting. what as helene says, what does putin do about that? does he -- does he say to these folks who are saying that they're not doing the war, they're not running the war well, that we're going to show you how tough we can be and become more aggressive and that's where it becomes relevant to ukraine. does ukraine get the heavy end of that because putin has to show that, yes, in fact, i am being as brutal and tough as prigozhin and surovikin think i am, or does he start rounding them up. surovikin put out a video while this mutiny was underway in which he ostensibly called upon troops to not support prigozhin, to not support the rebellion. nobody was taking anybody's names for some reason. there are people who looked at that video who said for some reason it seemed off. it didn't seem like he really meant it. there's a lot of speculation

here. we're not sure who's on whose side or what's happening. there's inside information in the russian military and the russian intelligence apparatus and the russian government that knew that this thing was going to happen, and that there's a lot of dismay and frustration with the military establishment. and it does seem that a guy as decisive as vladimir putin is not making decisions right now because of what helene said. do you risk alienating the troops that you got, and as you know, it's very hard for russia to get troops trained and out there to fight. they're using conscripts and prisoners. they've also lost a lot of those wagner group ssoldiers. what do you do next to show that the strong man vladimir putin is still a strong that's why we're seeing this indecision and these questions coming up. >> ali, i think it's an important note, and lots of people gave it to me on saturday, that this is -- there's no one to root for here, right? putin is someone who has awarded the highest military honors to

the slaughterers and butchers of bucha. and the wagner group is even more brutal than them, right? so my question is -- >> yes, correct. >> in ukraine are they rooting for instability, are they rooting for one over the other? is there any power center in russia to hope prevails or is everyone just on the outside looking in? >> reporter: right, the one group of people who are not involved in this are those people who would like a democratic russia, right? they don't have a voice in this thing. nothing's good for them no matter who prevails here, and the one thing that the prevails thing that the u.s. government, the pentagon has said, careful when you root for the stability it's a nuclear country is it the devil you know more than the devil you don't know? and surovikin and prigozhin, they're not hey, you guys aren't doing the right thing. they think russia should be tougher on ukraine. ukraine is thinking they're a

mess over there. you sake some solace in the fact that they're a mess. now, they have to be careful. and vladimir putin needs to decide and prove to the world to nato that he is a strong man. and more missiles can fly here, more drones. in fact, what's happened, they attacked a restaurant in eastern ukraine. killed nine people, hit a whole bunch of other people, hit 60 houses, a lot of people were injured. is that what happens? do they become more aggressive? that's why this is really interesting and something we should all be watching, because if the russian government is getting weaker, we don't know whether that's a good thing or bad thing and that's why it's important to see what's going on in moscow and how they're responding. >> helene, what is the view from u.s. military on that question on instability and dangerous to ukraine? >> ali is completely right. there's a lot of worry about instability. this is not the case where the

enemy of your enemy is your friend. the united states' intel community and military community do not like surovikin, they respect him, but he's known for brutal tactics, and he's particularly known for pushing for a tougher tactic in ukraine itself. we've been listening to him for the last year and a half. u.s. intel agencies have been in, you know, in all of his communications. and he's known for being frustrated, as ali said, with the military establishment. and wanting to use tougher tactics. same thing with prigozhin. so, this is not a case where either of those two guys are guys who are necessarily -- or in any way, actually, friends of the united states. instability in russia is a scary thing. this is something the pentagon takes very, very seriously. then on the other part of your question, what does it mean for ukraine? i think, again there, ali is

correct, that putin wounded bear could end up lashing out. but the reality is russia's been lashing out against ukraine for the last year and a half, you know. >> yeah. >> uh-huh. >> and then turns it up, this is something that ukraine can -- ordinary ukrainian citizens and civilians have been, you know, going through for a year and a half now. and it certainly could get worse. but, you know, it's almost -- i asked that question yesterday to one official. and sort of got a shrug. it's like, yeah, but, you know, these people have been going through it to begin with. and they haven't fallen in on themselves yet. so, at some point, yeah, it will be interesting to see if putin does lash out even more against ukraine. >> yeah. i mean, the ukrainians will say, you know, so a successful putin is emboldened and more dangerous to us and sun successful and

humiliated putin is more dangerous to us. a defeated putin -- i think you're right. their view is he's dangerous in any mental state, helene cooper and ali velshi, the smartest people on all topics, especially this one. thank you so much. it's great to see both of you. a quick break for both of us, we'll be right back. e weight. in studies, the majority of people reached an a1c under 7 and maintained it. ozempic® lowers the risk of major cardiovascular events such as stroke, heart attack, or death in adults also with known heart disease. and you may lose weight. adults lost up to 14 pounds. ozempic® isn't for people with type 1 diabetes. don't share needles or pens, or reuse needles. don't take ozempic® if you or your family ever had medullary thyroid cancer, or have multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome type 2, or if allergic to it. stop ozempic® and get medical help right away if you get a lump or swelling in your neck, severe stomach pain, or an allergic reaction. serious side effects may include pancreatitis. gallbladder problems may occur.

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aspire to live up to the name of this very program "deadline: white house" from the white house, we will welcome president joe biden to the program tomorrow for an exclusive live interview. this will be his first live interview since becoming president. as we like to say on "deadline: white house," these are extraordinary times. we hope to bring you a conversation with the nation's commander in chief that are as enlightening as the program is. when we come back, jack smith has his sights set on bedminster. we'll tell you about it, next. ir we'll tell you about it, next. so we're back with tide, and the clothes are clean again. do 3x the laundry and get a tide clean. it's got to be tide.

♪♪ these were the papers. this was done by the military and gimp to me. oh, i think we can probably -- right? >> i don't know. we'll have to see, we'll have to try to -- >> declassify. >> yeah. >> see as president i could have

declassified now i can't. is that interesting? >> yeah. >> this is so cool. i mean -- you probably almost didn't believe me, but now you believe me. >> no i believed you. >> it's incredible, right? >> no. >> bring some jokes in, please. >> it's one of those things that gets more insane every time you hear it. hi again, everybody, it's 5:00 in the east. one of the hallmarks of trump's misconduct and criminality is the ever-changing defense that always seems to follow it. there was the fbi planted the classified documents in mar-a-lago in defense a few minutes ago. then came the rather extended phase i can declassify things by thinking them declassified. that went on for a bit. it was followed, though, by what is still sometimes intermittently trotted out there, i have every right to take documents under the presidential records act defense. but now, that we've all heard him on tape, the defense changes

one more time because the tap annihilates all of those other three. what defense do you turn to when the audio of your own voice renders everything you've said so far meaningless, mute. of course, you say, you're bluffing all along. in an interview last night, trump said i would say it was bravado, if you want to know, i was talking and holding up papers. but i have no doubts. i didn't have any documents. i just held up a whole pile of -- my desk was loaded up with papers. i have papers from 25 different things. so that's where we are. the i didn't even do the thing that i previously said i did that i've been owe defensive about. as the disgraced ex-president navigates which excuse he will turn to next, two pieces of stunning reporting in "the new

york times" and "washington post" zeros in on bedminster, donald trump's bedroom where that was recorded. prosecutors went so far as to executing a search warrant at bedminster, that's according to two people briefed on the matter. and that prosecutors issued at least one subpoena for surveillance camera footage from bedminster. "the washington post" reporting paints a detailed picture, of a man, donald trump, who always wanted to have his important stuff with him. quote, trump's behavior in new jersey is yet another data point showing that the former president did not simply stash the boxes of sensitive documents unopened and untouched, in the basement of his florida club and forget about them. instead, advisers say he was personally attached to and hyperaware of the boxes. instructing that at least some of them accompany him from place to place and appeared aware of

what was inside. authorities asked extended questions about activities at bedminster including about how the documents were packed, sent and returned. people familiar with the matter said. the closer look of trump's handling of classified information at his bedminster club is where we begin the hour with our favorite reporters. from "the washington post" congressional investigations reporter jackie alemany is back. the byline on that reporting. the reporter for u.s. department of justice, mary mccord is here. and rick stengel is here. jackie alemany, we have entered the classified documents in his boxes were his phase where he needs them to feel safe what? what? what? what are we? >> yeah, nicolle, in trying to piece together the various defenses that donald trump has thrown at the wall in the past few days since the audio recording came out, and none of

them have really seemed to stick. as this audio recording undercuts most of them. the fact that he acknowledges he didn't declassify everything before leaving office. that he acknowledged that he did take documents with him and have them in his possession that were sensitive materials post leaving office. and to the fact that he was aware of the kinds of materials that he took with him, after feigning ignorance about what was in the boxes, claiming there were newspapers, clippings, papers, whatnot. of course, we have not quite figured out what exactly this sensitive material that trump claimed to be brandishing is. but you've got to assume that jack smith the special counsel and prosecutorial team who have been extremely strategic and put together a really strong case so far wouldn't have allowed such a hold to have formed in terms of putting forward such a critical piece of evidence. throughout the course of our

reporting, leading up to the publishing of our piece yesterday, my colleagues josh and spencer, sue and i, have heard from sources when smith did ultimately uncover this piece of evidence, this audiotape of the 2021 meeting at bedminster where trump is bragging and brandishing what he claims is a top secret, classified document about iran, he -- sorry, i lost my train of thought. but this piece of evidence for the special counsel's team was really critical and actually sort of helped get them over the finish line and push them closer towards charging the former president. it was found later months leading up to the 39-page indictment that we saw last month. >> jackie alemany is smoother

when self-reports losing their train of thought than i am with teleprompter. in 2022 trump hired an outside team to conduct searches of his property beyond mar-a-lago. it was being pressed by a federal judge in sealed proceedings to contest that it had fully complied with the may grand jury subpoena to turn over materials. the trump lawyers clashed with searching bedminster, and other lawyers favored the new jersey search, and at least three of them have quit since then, citing differences with boris epshteyn. jackie, this reporting goes a long way in connecting the dots between departure of lawyers, mr. palatori, in searching bedminster, to maybe not in

corcoran's shoes having penned an attestation, even if christina bobb signs it at the end of the probe. >> yeah, this was a part of the investigation and throughout, this is largely explaining where trump is today facing the criminal charges. that's because he was very reticent all along, as was one of his colleagues boris epshteyn, with taking the posture with the federal government, with the national archives, in returning these materials that they have demanded repeatedly over the course of really a year and a half. so this time period after the justice department and the fbi executed a search warrant of mar-a-lago, and december, when investigators were still skeptical that trump had returned all of the materials is a really important one. and three of these lawyers

rowley, trusty and paratori who are no longer on the team were in favor of cooperating with the justice department by hiring this outside legal team. but i think what the "times" piece and our piece comes to the conclusion of, had prosecutors, despite still not able to execute a search of bedminster because of a lack of probable cause and the fact that most of the evidence pointed to the bulk of the material being at mar-a-lago still had lots of suspicions, rightly so, that trump was continuing in carrying over some of these habits and record keeping practices with regards to classified information at his new jersey club. >> and i think, jackie, you and your colleagues have done great reporting with him traveling with his boxes. and it's clear that those patterns and habits didn't change. i want to read a little color, too, about how his aides viewed

the crazy quotient different in jersey as opposed to mar-a-lago. quote, aides preferred when trump vacationed at bedminster than mar-a-lago which he frequented in the winter months. one adviser said there were, quote, fewer crazies at the less flashy new jersey club and fewer opportunities to bend his ear around the pool about their pet issues. does that extend to, you know, maybe fewer concerns about the documents themselves? or is that more just, you know, the kind of people that circulate there? >> that's a really good question, potentially, that's not something that we have yet seen. but it undoubtedly jack smith has mountains of discovery that both the defense and prosecutors are now all piecing through. and i'm curious to see what else they might have scrounged up about trump's behavior at bedminster.

regardless of the lack of so-called crazies, as one of the advisers told us, the former president still managed to, you know, corral different characters and show off whatever materials he wanted. but i think what this really speaks to is this idea that trump tried to re-create the trappings the white house outside of the white house, post-presidency. he did it at mar-a-lago. and he continued to do it at bedminster. it was just a little bit of a different and more polished crowd that was regularly frequenting the club. >> mary mccord, you were here on friday when we all heard sue gordon speak in deeply personal terms about what -- about what's in the boxes. classified documents, in the case of this audiotape, it is alleged to be a war plan for attacking iran. and here she is talking about

how that changes the calculation now and in the foreseeable future. >> if you are an intelligence officer, whatever president holds the office, you share with them all of the intelligence, information they need. and you do that for every single president. i've done it for many. i would do it for the next. and that's the way the system works. how is the system going to work if intelligence officers are going to try and decide whether this president is going to be trustworthy? how does that work if those people who are honor-bound to give it to the president now say, you know, but i don't know whether this guy can be trusted. he might take it. do they start making choices about what they share and what they don't? so, the whole system breaks down. >> and, mary, i keep coming back to it, because at the end of the day, trump's on his 11th defense

because he clearly has no defense. something that bill barr and chris christie seem to be making pretty loudly that may be getting out his skin. at the core, it's about what we do next, right? what happens in this case, whether jack smith is successful or not holding the one time most powerful person in the world for mishandling classified documents what answers sue gordon's question. what happens to the system that had to not necessarily be interested like this. this is an extraordinary test, can an ex-president be trusted not to challenge the allies and agencies around the world. that's an open question right now. >> i think this ex-president can't be trusted but sue gordon's point is so valid. like it can't be the role of members of the intelligence community to do their own personal assessment of, you know, each president who they may brief over the course of

their careers. and whether they trust that president will keep secret the very important national security information that they're sharing with that president. and, you know, we've never really been particularly concerned about that in the past. we're concerned about it now, because we see how absolutely carelessly trump has handled that type of national security information. and he would be hauling it around with him, kind of like linus and his blanket from the "snoopy" comic strip. everywhere he goes on planes and boats and automobiles, it's such a -- it's deeply concerning and i'm sure does cause members of our intelligence community t worry about, certainly, about whether mr. trump might ever be back in the oval office. but there will be others that take this as a sign it's okay to be this cavalier with our nation's most guarded secrets. you know, i do agree with sue,

is it would not be appropriate for our intelligence officials to make their own assessment. although i do think we can also look back at instances at the end of the last administration, january 6 being one, where i'm glad that some of our highest officials in the department of defense were really exercising some caution. and in the secret service, for that matter, exercising some caution with respect to things that mr. trump wanted to do, cassidy hutchinson testified that mr. trump wanted to go to the capitol and pressure mike pence himself not to count the electoral ballots. at least she recounts a real struggle with the secret service driver there. who think had a rationale it wasn't safe for this president to do this off-schedule detour but i think it's an instance of some people make something judgments. and i understand that.

and i understand why some of the -- some of those people made those judgments. and it's hard to criticize that. and i try to separate that from briefings of the intelligence community. and i also think that one of the important things here is the people around mr. trump. i think they were trying, to the extent that they could, to ensure that the classified information was protected, right? they were trying to keep him -- to leave it in the sit room, right, and collect it later even if he had taken it to his personal quarters. as we now know, many, many documents exceeded the efforts of our intelligence community to keep them safe. >> mary, one of the first people trump showed classified materials to that jeopardized definitely sources and i believe methods was sergey kislyak who hadn't been in the white house and found himself walking the red carpet and at the elbow at

trump's presidency. i thought about that as i watched him anchor live events and events in russia. it's deadly serious. to have anyone in american politics who is a threat to classified documents. what did you think when you watched the events in russia over the weekend? >> well, i thought the same thing, i thought imagine if mr. trump had access to the intelligence leading up to the original invasion. and, you know, since then, our support for the ukrainian troops and our own sharing of intelligence and having intelligence shared with us about troop movements and russia's plans. and how i can imagine for his own political purposes or to look cool or to buddy up to putin, i mean, you know, very troubling to think about what he might have done with some of that intelligence, if he had had access to it. i think that's why, you know, every time we talk about this, it's so important to make sure the american public is aware.

and people other than you and me and those on this show today, people you mentioned on friday and on monday, you know, people like bill barr. people like our former highest level intelligence officials like sue gordon, john brennan, et cetera. people who even those who don't trust john brennan, for example. people who they will trust, maybe chris christie, maybe asa hutchinson. you know, more and more need to be able to speak out because mr. trump is a national security threat. there's no question about it. >> wow. so, here we are, rick stengel. trump is a threat. he's a threat, that the department of justice actually tried to deal with it not in a public way. counterintelligence investigation is opened into him by then acting director, or deputy director andy mccabe. in 2017. it shut down. the questions were never answered and it becomes a

political cudgel that is wielded to given who tries to ferry off the troops that he's a national threat. how confident are you, rick stengel, that the issues will be front and center, as the months move forward as trump tries -- i mean, i think the idea that he's on excuse or defense 11 proves one thing that there is no defense to what he's done. he's caught dead to right as bill barr and chris christie keep saying. but what do you think we can sustain as a country in terms of focusing in on a threat to national security? >> it's a good question, nicolle. and if i can chime in to what you and mary were saying and you in particular, nicolle, we have to do a better job, more constant job in explaining why this is a national security risk. why it threatens every american and why it's so extremely serious. it's not only the example of the

russia invasion, but i'm sure everybody here has been in the lobby of the central intelligence agency where it's the famous wall of men and women who have died in the line of duty gathering that information which donald trump then so cavaliere tossed in front of people with secrecy and power. i think the government has to explain that. and i sometimes think the case to a jury, even a jury of public opinion is the obstruction charge, rather than the charges under the espionage act. to go back to where we began in bedminster, one thing that i am curious about, and jackie touched on it is, i don't understand why there isn't cause for a search in bed minute sterp bedminster when you have a tape of him ruffling documents and the document of iran.

probably the most secret document there is. and speaking of bedminster, why jack smith didn't include the statute about the delivery and communication of national defense material to unauthorized people, which is obviously an example of what he was doing in that tape. >> jackie, do you want to take a stab at answering that? >> yeah, but those are really good questions, and one with the details and the "times" coverage of bedminster, it was that at one point, you know, the justice department gave a subpoena surveillance footage of bedminster. so, you know, i think, honestly, we did not report that detail, and i don't necessarily know what came out of that coverage. but we do know when they subpoenaed the surveillance footage at mar-a-lago it was included in depth and in detail, in the indictment. and was in part one of the reasons why they ultimately

executed the search warrant in august. so, you know, potentially, there wasn't evidence of any obstruction taking place, in bedminster. maybe they have footage of the boxes being loaded back on to the plane going to mar-a-lago. but what sources have indicated to us is that the bulk of the material, fbi agents and justice department prosecutors knew was at mar-a-lago and that there was problematic behavior that has been listed as criminal, but not charged in new jersey. >> uh-huh. >> there was not, again, enough probable cause, not enough, as one of my sources said to me, the juice wouldn't be worth the squeeze in executing such a high-profile and controversial search to actually conduct one again at one of the former president's different properties. >> it's also an interesting, we know, into how high the

standards are that jack smith's prosecutors and investigators are holding themselves, right? >> yeah. >> an effort of that too, it has to be a sure thing. and surely at mar-a-lago, it was things that they saw with their eyes. jackie alemany, congrats on reporting. mary mccord, thank you for starting us off this hour. rick sticks around for the hour. when we come back, how president biden is calling what was once an insult against his economic plan as an advantage to be used against republicans in his bid for a second term. what president biden said about bidenomics and where he can convince americans it's working for him. plus, the supreme court's decision to reject a theory that could have been used to overturn presidential elections. it takes away one tool from the toolbox. it's bad news for allies like the disgraced ex-president, including ted cruz.

and who is running against ted cruz for the united states senate will be our guest later in the forecast. "deadline: white house" continues after a quick break. don't go anywhere. we used to struggle with greasy messes. now, we just freak, wipe, and we're done! with mr. clean clean freak, conquering messes is that easy. clean freak's mist is three times more powerful, and it works on contact. clean freak, just freak, wipe, done.

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that's what i thought. introducing the next generation 10g network. only from xfinity. bidenomics is working. when i took office the pandemic was raging and our economy was reeling. today, the u.s. has the highest economic growth rate leading the world economies since the pandemic. the highest in the world. as dick said, it's 13.4 million

new jobs, more jobs in two years than any president has ever made in four. in two. and, folks, it's no accident. that's bidenomics in action. president biden earlier today in chicago. it's a speech he may hear a whole lot of in the coming months. the president championing his economic plan. he's calling it bidenomics. the administration says it plans to highlight the president's goal of an economy that works from the bottom up instead of the top down. but the president has been claiming a term used by republicans as an insult in attempt to talk down his economic agenda. the speech intended to mark a new air la for president biden in taking openly credit for what the administration has called historic economic achievements. to talk about this, white house correspondent in chicago today, and the u.s. correspondent for

bbc studios, katty kay is with us. and rick is still here. mike memoli, you're the most astute watcher of this president, but this white house. it's not just the speech, but this election to reach as much voters between now and election is as important as anything else? >> yeah, that's absolutely right, nicolle. and the strategy of trying to turn an attack line into an offensive move here is one that many biden advisers are familiar with. in 2010, democrats were losing double-digit margins in the house of representatives and races across the country, as republicans campaigned against obamacare. and two years later, president obama was re-elected as his campaign was selling "i love my obamacare" t-shirts. it's politics 101 but there's an interesting dynamic at play which i was talking to one of president biden's closest

adviser, the mood is sour coming out of the pandemic. and campaigns tell a story. this is the beginning in a citiy president biden will come to accept his party's nomination for the second term, begins to tell the story not just what he's done the last 2 1/2 years, the infrastructure law, the c.h.i.p.s. bill, the inflation reduction act, but more importantly why he's done it, the voters he has in mind, the kinds of people at the root of his economic philosophy. he likes to chide his economic advisers for coming up with facts and figures to define what it means in the middle class. the president said the middle class is able to bring in your parent if you need to take care of them. to go to a park in your neighborhood that's safe. so, this is the beginning of an effort as they enter campaign mode to begin telling that story and to try to resolve that really difficult disconnect between the public disapproval numbers which remain.

the right track/wrong track which remains in that direction for the president. and because of what he's done in office. >> mike memoli, you mentioned the date day, and the cabinet out with the data and the statistics, the president for his part seems to understand it's not a matter of getting more facts in front of people. it's a matter of making them feel that it's working. what role does he play in pulling his team and the cabinet out of this data-driven, let me show you a chart, into sort of speaking to people where they feel their economic anxiety? >> well, there's a great illustration of that something we just saw and the president talked about it today in the philadelphia area, right? as important as it is with the president what the president has done legislatively, he thinks in office so far, it was almost more important to take a highway collapse and try to fix it as quickly as possible. i was told by a senior white house officials just how laser focused and personally involved

the president was in coordinating a federal response to that. because, yes, he's going to talk about his accomplishments in office to voters next year, but that is a very tangible example in a neighborhood and city he knows very well of government working. and that's really part of the story that the president wants to be able to tell. at a time of cynicism coming out of the trump administration in particular, the president feels one of his most important responsibilities is trying to restore america's confidence in governing. and sometimes, that's giving a big speech to an audience that was maybe more media than the general public. and sometimes, that's just fixing a highway in pennsylvania. and it was interesting to see a poll come out in pennsylvania today, it's a dead heat if we have the 2024 election in pa-p between trump and biden but governor shapiro who was right there with the president dealing with the highway collapse has approval rating upper 50s. a strong number. and that speaks to the personal engagement that the president

showed that the governor wants to show as well. >> it's such an interesting apparel. katty kay, i think josh shapiros's pillars what the president likes to talk about, democracy, and freedom, women not having the right to choose and competence, and i think you can sum up the president's week, it's the competence stupid. you know, it's what mike is saying, we can do big things, we can do hard things they might not grab everybody's clickbait tendencies, but he's doing big things. >> yeah, he's going to have to go around the country selling that message. after pumping $800 billion between the c.h.i.p.s. act and the i.r.a. into the american economy, people aren't feeling it yet. some of the problem, it's taken a long time for the money to get out, it hasn't actually been

disbursed from the two big pockets of money. i know the president is wanting that to happen as quickly as possible. you know how successful it was for barack obama in 2008 to go around the country, i remember standing in front of the bridge brought to you by the recovery act. or this proceed brought to you by the recovery act. that is something the president would love to be able to do, he can't do it yet because the money hasn't been disbursed and the applications aren't processed. in a way that's to advantage, because if the money goes out next year, you'll see real tangible returns from the public sector money. there's already still returns from private sector matching funds but they hope come next spring, come next summer, you have those panels saying this is a bridge brought to you by -- and that would be hugely beneficial to the president as well. >> rick, you know who will knows how politically powerful joe biden's agenda is? mitch mcconnell and the other republicans who have hopped on the plane to go stand with him

as they do what katy just described. i mean, there's a reason that donald trump had infrastructure week on the schedule every week. he ended up blowing it up himself with stupid tweets. but infrastructure is something that donald trump wants to do every week of every year with his ill-fated presidency. and it happened with this president. which is why republicans want to be part of the unveiling of some of these shovel-ready projects. what do you make of sort of setting off on this part of communicating with the country the economic speech today? >> yes, as you said, nicolle, i mean, he passed a trillion-dollar infrastructure bill that was bipartisan. that's why mitch mcconnell likes and plenty of other republicans like it. but problem we have and i'll go back to something mike said, i mean, this is something we talked about for the last five years, the lack of knowledge how

civics work in america and government would, people feel like you pass the bill, where is the money. well civics 101 is how a building comes along. it takes a long time to get the money out there. the government has to explain that, it's not short-term advantage or short-term money, this is long-term advantage. the broadband bill, the c.h.i.p.s. bill. all of these things will not only help you, it will help your children it will help your grandchildren. and i think biden needs to take a page from bill clinton who i remember, i covered him for years, no matter what the event was, he began by saying here's what i did for you today. that's what biden has to do across the country, as katty has to say, here's what we're doing for you every day. here's what your government is doing for you every day. this is going to benefit you in the short term and the long term. that's the campaign message. >> it's interesting listening to all of you talk, there's a

reason when a republican attacks on the president a personal and not necessarily against some of these figure legislative bipartisan legislative accomplishments. mike memoli, thank you, i hope we get to see you tomorrow. katty and rick aren't going anywhere. potential strike against coup fighters. congressman allred running against ted cruz after a short break. k. doctors. business leaders. we see your ambition. your desire to succeed. which is why we are investing in your future. ...empowering the next generation to reach the c-suite and elevating women's golf. because you may not always see yourself in the world, but we see you.

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the news this week about jack smith and his investigators clearly ramping up their probe of the 2020 fake electors plot. in the very same week that the supreme court rejects a fringe right-wing legal theory that would have given unchecked power to state lawmakers and state legislatures over federal elections. it appears some of the tools in the maga toolbox for the next coup were slowly being weakened. some stripped away. it is important because many of the ex-president's coup-plotting allies are still there. they're still in office. take ted cruz, for example, caught on tape by abby grossberg, she used to work on fox news telling fox news maria bartiromo about the exclusive plan to force a disruption of joe biden's win on january 6 and a whole made up commission to seize power over the election. listen to this. >> i think that the country

deserves to have have a credible assessment of these claims and what the evidence shows, and the mechanism to try to force that is denying certification on the 6th. >> who's deciding who gets inaugurated? >> it would be the results of that commission and what they found. and if they found credible evidence of fraud that undermines confidence in the length tomorrow results in any given state, they would report on that. >> never mind that while he was saying that, bill barr was calling it all bull pucky. joining the conversation, congressman colin allred in texas running in texas against that guy, ted cruz, katty and rick are with us as well, for the questioning. congressman, where do you think we are, not asking you to peek

into opaque investigations being run, but as a democracy, in answering a question whether there are two systems in the rule of law, one for the powerful and one for everybody else? >> also, i'll just add to you what you were saying about setting up some taped commission, dozens of states and federal courts, some that had trump appointees had already reviewed those claims, and he was still trying to overturn an election that he knew better. listen, i think that it's important in a democracy, that when you have something as serious as an attempted coup that there's a response. or when you have something as serious as highly sensitive and really important documents that can lead to american troops being placed into harm, being used in ways that are irresponsible, that there's a response to that, regardless of who you are. and so, to me, what we've been seeing is a justice department that has tried everything it can to separate itself from the

politics of this issue. that's appointed a special prosecutor to look into this, that left in place the hunter biden case hold over from the prosecutors to look into that case has done everything they can to keep this on the level and try to enforce the law legally. what we're seeing is spin from my republican colleagues who i think know better. >> yeah. i mean, you are -- i think you've been singled out, as one of the more bipartisan members of the house. ted cruz, this is dating myself, but when i was a republican, was disliked and distrusted by other republicans. just put what you're talking about in the context of ted cruz isn't far right, he's part of the extremist political movement in the country? >> that's right. ted cruz is a threat to our democracy, and he knows better. he's doing it out of a cynical power grab. he's doing anything he can to try to stay in office or maybe

become president himself. i think that's something that he'll never stop trying to do. but, you know, it is true, some of these things, they're not equal. you know, when i hear president trump saying all presidents do this, all presidents take home all of these documents. i represented george w. bush the last four years, i guarantee he didn't do that. certainly, barack obama didn't do that. we have to enforce our laws, otherwise, they don't matter and you do fall into a two-tier system of government. we know we can do better in texas than ted cruz, if folks want to hem us, we could use your help @colinallred.com. hem us out. >> what do you think the opportunity is for somebody as comfortable as you said, my old boss george bush, not running from -- bipartisanship used to be a calling card. it used to be a brand enhancer. but it seems with republicans

this is not a problem i would tag both sides with, but republicans are so afraid of agreeing with the facts and they have to go along with the propaganda. what is the opportunity in texas which is thought of as red. i don't think it's quite as red as people think it is, what's the opportunity to sort of usher in something better in a place like texas? >> it's such a good question, nicolle. in my congressional race i ran between a 22-year republican in office, in a tough re-election. i've seen this happen in realtime and in real elections. but there are texans who are looking for somebody who is not a part of the problem, but who can be part of the solution. we all recognize, i think, that our politics are so much worse than our people. >> yeah. >> and that might not apply to any state worse than texas thus having to deal with ted cruz. he's not who we are in texas,

nicolle, you know that. he also disagrees with his own senator john cornyn on issues. the approach he takes is bad for our country, it's bad for our state, and we can do better. >> i want to bring my friends and colleagues rick stengel and katty kay on the questioning. rick stengel, you're first. >> that's well done on challenging senator cruz and giving up your congressional seat. here's my question for you, i believe a recent poll has shown that hispanic voters are the larging voting bloc in texas. and polls have also shown there's kind of a slow trend of hispanic voters moving to the republican party, away from their kind of classic allegiance to the democratic party. i remember ronald reagan used to say that hispanic voters are republicans, they just don't know it yet. what can you do to kind of stem that change and appeal to that voting bloc? because you need to really do really well among them to beat

senator cruz. >> well, we have to do well everywhere, and we have to appeal to everyone. you have to meet folks where they are, and you have to do things that matter to him. in my time in congress, we tried to focus on those things that we can bring them together and common ground. and voters are no different than anyone else, they want someone who can actually deliver for them. right now, we have a senator in ted cruz who is podcasting three times a week who does everything he can to get on fox news. who is more of a media personality than doing anything to help the 30 million texans that need him to go to work for hem. i'm raised here in dallas by a single mother, fought my way into the nfl to become a civil rights lawyer. and worked to expand the rights in texas. and of course in congress, i tried to find the areas where i said we could help all texans. that's going to every every single area and every single person in our state.

>> katty kay. >> congressman, one of the things i will hear from voting rights groups, latino voting rights groups, including texas is that democrats only show up every four years when they want votes and beto o'rourke famously came as close to taking that seat as any democrat and it was largely that texas wasn't ready yet. do you think, what's the big difference between you today and beto o'rourke in 2018, in terms of yourself and candidacy, but also the state? >> well, we're going to build on what beto did. particularly in 2018, what he showed that texans want to replace ted cruz, if they want to move past this, that's why he was elected by 2 1/2 point which is, to be honest, folks in the country did not ever think was going to close. it's continually, we're rapidly evolving as a changing state, we're a dynamic state, we're a

diverse state. we have to make sure our electorate looks more like our state. and that's folks like me doing everything we can to help people comply with the terrible, quite honestly, voting laws. listen, we're ready to not have six more years of ted cruz. that's the key here. what we're talking about here is a senator who is not doing the job. and somebody in me who is showing a very different type of leadership, one that brings very different folks together but that can be effective. so folks out there agree, i hope, go to my website get inv with us because we need your help and we can do it. >> i want to ask you about a story that read like it was from the onion. it was so brutal and so cruel and inhumane, it didn't seem real, but i'm going to share it with everybody because it is real. i'll ask you about that on the other sidef a break. no one's going anywhere. stay with us. anywhere. stay with us os that are analyzed by ai.

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the new law labeled the death star by its democratic opponents would preempt a broad swath of ordinances including those affecting labor, agriculture, and natural resources. it's expected to nullify regulations such as those dealing with payday lending, puppy mills, sanitation and other practices. it threatens water breaks. what is going on? >> well, it's just the callousness of some of the republican leaders that we have in the state. i think, look, folks should understand texas is about to be hotter this week than 99% of the entire world. only the saharan desert and the persian gulf will be as hot or hotter than we are right here in texas, and it just makes obvious sense that while we are booming in our population growth and while we're trying to build buildings and highways and deal with this growth and help welcome folks to our state, that they should be able to have a little bit of water while they're doing that. and listen, we've got a lot of tough guys here who like to talk

tough, nicolle. who you can see over my shoulder i know what it's like to actually shower after work instead of before it, to use your sweat equity to try and make your living. it's hard and it's hot and it's difficult. and the least we can do is take care of these folks who are literally driving our economy right now. i mean it's just wrong in so many different ways but also a perfect incapsulation of what we're dealing with here right now. >> you have not lived until you've been in to waco in the summertime. it is hot. congressman, thank you so much. >> i can agree. >> exactly. thank you so much for taking our questions on a risk of topics. thank you for spending some time with us today. another break for us. we'll be right back. s today. another break for us we'll be right back.

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finally for us if you missed the top of the broadcast today, we shared a very special announcement. we think it's special. tomorrow here on "deadline white house" we'll be joined live by president joe biden. we'll have a chance to ask the president for something we talk about every single day for us here and abroad. at 4:00 p.m. tomorrow eastern. we invite all of you to tune in for that. thank you for letting us into your homes during these extraordinary times. we are grateful. the beat with ari melber starts right now. >> i'm very curious your mind-set and prep for your interview tomorrow. i don't imagine you'll release your questions for