this doesn't look so friendly. >> not a good sign that she's still down. >> there's a lot of discussion. >> horan doesn't want any part of that. she's upset. >> the best way to send a message is to put this ball in the back of the net if you're lindsey horan. >> ball headed down, tied at one! she did it, horan! >> what a sequence. that is lindsey horan at the united states women's national team tying last night's world cup match after a bruising tackle from her teammate on her club team in france, playing for the netherlands now. that game ended in a 1-1 draw. the u.s. now will take on portugal next tuesday morning. if the team wins that match, the u.s. women's national squad

advances to the knockout round. jonathan lemire, it was an extraordinary sequence. the united states was struggling, down 1-0. lindsey horan gets slide tackled, pushed basically by her friend and teammate. they get into a pushing match there. on the very next play, on the corner kick, she gets fired up and says, "you don't want to see me when i'm angry." she said that after the match. you had that tackle. >> it was a hollywood moment, a sports movie. it was spectacular. this has been a struggle of a world cup for this women's team. two-time defending champions. they won the first match against vietnam, but only 3-0 against a vietnam, far from a soccer powerhouse. the netherlands, this was a rematch of the championship game last time around. it was a tough, tough match. u.s. had some chances late to put in a go-ahead goal. they couldn't. they had to settle for a draw. thank goodness they got the draw. a loss yesterday actually would have jeopardized their ability

to get to the next round. with a win next time around, that he can do it. this is a mix of the old stalwarts from the championship teams and young, up-and-coming players. it's been a struggle to this point, but they got a draw when theypalmieri, you were watching this game. it was looking dicey for a minute. they couldn't get anything going, and it took that moment from the two club teammates who were hugging after the game and made up and were talking side by side at the press conference. they're all good. but lindsey horan just needed that little bit of motivation to get the u.s. women's team where it needed to be last night. >> yeah. i love the u.s. women's team so much, but it is, i mean, a three-peat is so -- it's a hard thing to do in any sport. i saw, you know, i watched the first game against vietnam. they got three goals. it didn't seem like the best outing against vietnam, but england didn't have a great first outing either. some of the -- i was really worried about this netherlands

match. you know, that was the 2019 world cup match, and a draw is like, okay, good. i feel like they had -- they proved themselves in the first round. they did better than some of the other good teams in the fist first round. they got this draw against a really, really good team. i think it is exciting there's new players, too. it's like a new generation of talent coming on. they got to gel and go forward. but it was scary to watch last night. scary. >> close call. on to portugal now. if they get that win, they are on to the knockout round. we'll talk more about this game later. with us this morning, msnbc contributor, our buddy mike barnicle. white house correspondent for "politico" and co-author of "the playbook," eugene daniels. and danny cevallos, legal analyst. we'll get to hunter biden in a moment, but we have developments on a story that broke yesterday. years after rudy giuliani accused georgia election workers, rudy freeman and moss

of fraud during the 2020 election, he is conceding his statements were false. this came in a court filing as part of a defamation lawsuit filed against giuliani in 2021. the case accuses giuliani, who was representing former president trump at the time, of publicizing a heavily edited video he falsely alleged showed the two workers somehow changing votes. >> earlier in the day of rudy freeman and freeman moss and a gentleman passing around usb ports as if they were viles of heroine or cocaine. they were lying. should have been questioned already. their places of work, their homes should be searched. >> one of the videos we just watched, mr. giuliani accused you and your mother of passing some sort of usb drive to each other. what was your mom actually

handing you on that video? >> a ginger mint. >> we had at least 18,000, that's on tape, we had them counted very painstakingly, 18,000 voters having to do with rudy freeman, she's a vote scammer, a professional vote scammer and hustler. >> she was none of those things, of course. in a two-page declaration, giuliani acknowledges he had, in fact, made the statements about ms. freeman and ms. moss that led to the filing of the suit and the remarks, quote, carry meaning that is defamatory, per se. a political adviser for giuliani says that means, quote, giuliani did not acknowledge the statements were false but did not contest it in order to move on to the portion of the case that will permit a motion to dismiss. giuliani says he believes his comments are protected by the first amendment and refused to accept they caused harm to the women. here's what freeman and moss

told the january 6th committee last year about the harm they say they did endure. >> there is nowhere i feel safe, nowhere. do you know how it feels to have the president of the united states target you? the president of the united states is supposed to represent every american, not to target one. but he targeted me, lady ruby, a small business owner, a mother, a proud american citizen, who stands up to help fulton county run an election in the middle of the pandemic. >> a lot of threats, wishing death upon me, telling me that, you know, i'll be in jail with my mother, and saying things

like, "be glad it's 2020 and not 1920." >> were a lot of these threats and vile comments racist in nature? >> a lot of them were racist. a lot of them were just hateful. >> attorneys for freeman and moss released a statement about the development, saying, quote, giuliani's stipulation concedes what we always have known to be true, the allegations of election fraud he and former president trump made against them have been false since day one. danny, let's talk about the legal implications of this. what is all the legalese we heard from giuliani and his team, what does it translate to? >> it seems to me they're stipulating to the underlying facts because in order to get to the motion of summary and judgment phase, there has to be facts. the only thing for the court to decide is the issue of law. giuliani's defense is not so much, hey, what i said about them was true or wasn't true, it's more that it doesn't matter what i said about them, whether it's true or not, i had a first

amendment right to say it. therefore, there is no defamation. that's why it appears that he's making this concession, in order to put issues of fact aside, decide them for the moment, and get to the motion for summary judgment. it is a minor hail mary to try to throw out the case early. that's what summary judgment is, a long shot. odds are, if you're moving to summary judgment as the plaintiff or defendant, you are probably going to lose and the case will move forward. if the only issues are of law, the judge can decide them and everybody can move along. >> eugene, that's the legal aspect, but let's speak about the morality of this moment. this was reprehensible. >> right. >> it was false, it was untrue. as i noted in my book, and others chronicled so well, and we heard emotional testimony

from the election workers trying to do the right thing. frankly, trying to do their civic duty. >> yeah. >> they felt their lives were threatened. they were harassed for months. it's moments like this, repeated other places across the country, there was a chilling effect where local officials were worried they wouldn't be able to find volunteers for the next election. >> people who had said it and done it for years, they love being a poll worker, it gave them a lot of purpose around the elections, are terrified to do so because of moments like this. when we saw these two women lie during this committee hearing, that was one of the most emotional, one of the most interesting aspects of the committee hearing up to that point. because a lot of it was talking to officials and talking to, you know, republicans who were in these rooms. seeing them as they were talking in their testimonies. this was about real people who had -- who were impacted by the lies that giuliani and donald trump and others were telling.

that was one of the things as people were watching, and you saw polling, that people were paying attention to those moments as much as the fact-finding missions. it's just a reminder of how central rudy giuliani and his lies during the 2020 -- the aftermath of the 2020 election and even before, how central they are to a lot of the investigations swirling donald trump right now. >> jen, during the course of your working life, you go out, you meet people on the campaign trail, you talk to them, you look at focus groups. how would one go about today talking about america's mayor, rudy giuliani, and this display we saw this morning, what he did to these two women, what do we say if giuliani is going to skate with no penalty paid, and, yet, the system is going to rigged? we're going to tell people the system isn't rigged for the

wealthy and the connected? how do we do that? >> the way i look at it, mike, i saw tim miller was on the show yesterday, and he referred to the fact-based community. i still think that's a good way to describe the show. it's part of the fact-based community in america. i still look at that ruling yesterday -- i mean, i heard everything danny said, the qualifications about what giuliani wasn't admitting to, but the truth is giuliani did not -- is not objecting to what these women are saying, and that is a win for the fact-based community. that is a win for truth. i mean, i look at it, yes, mike, i guess at some level, giuliani may skate on this, but democracy, if you step back, as i know you do, democracy has been under a major stress test for the last eight years that trump has been part of our political system, right? now is the accountability phase

in the justice, you know, with criminal justice and these civil cases, as well. you know, trump is being held accountable. like, we may get another indictment today. we have already had one federal indictment. we've had the new york indictment. giuliani had to back off on his statements. you saw mark meadows yesterday not wanting to talk about january 6th at all. questions on whether maybe mark meadows is cooperating with the federal prosecutors, too. the people that have lied to the country are having to either back off in some way, or they're being held accountable in some way. i think that that, you know, we don't get an easy win here. it's not the progress as in all linear, but i think what's happening in the criminal justice courts, in the courts in general when it comes to trump, is some accountability that has been lacking, you know, prior to this year. >> yeah. as you say, we're still on

indictment watch, and the federal grand jury expected to meet today. we have our eyes on that, as well. mean while, in a surprise turn of events, hunter biden pleaded not guilty to federal tax charges yesterday after a plea deal he struck with the government completely unravelled in a strange day. the unexpected development came during a hearing in federal court in delaware. hunter had been expected to plead guilty to two charges, failure to pay taxes under a deal he struck with the government last month. u.s. district judge pressed both sides about the terms of the agreement struck with u.s. attorney david weiss of delaware, who is prosecuting the case. both the judge and weiss are trump appointees. the judge expressed concern about two separate deals in her purview over them. she was worried she didn't have the authority to reject or modify the deal and that the gun charge agreement could shield hunter biden against further prosecution over his financial

and tax issues. the parties will reconvene later to hammer out the terms and provide the judge with more information, which could be within the next six weeks. hunter biden is expected to reverse his plea is a new agreement or the new information eventually satisfies the judge. danny, you were here yesterday saying that this was a strange deal, in your estimation, that it was, perhaps, hunter biden getting off a little bit easy. what exactly happened yesterday, though? this is confusing to a lot of people. >> most plea hearings go off without a hitch, but that doesn't mean they're not harrowing experiences. because a whole lot can go wrong during a plea hearing. one of the things it often does, the defendant has a change of heart or he hears this allocution of facts against him, and he wants to say, "well, wait, that's not exactly how it happened." plea agreements can go haywire, but most of them go forward without a hitch. this one was set up for failure. we're learning that more, now that we get a look at things like the plea agreement and the pretrial aversion agreement, which i have right here.

when you look at the language, you can see why both parties were confused. when the defense walked in there, they'd read a paragraph of the agreement that said, to the effect, that if, for example, the united states believes a knowing material breach goes on with this agreement, they could seek a determination by the district judge, that is a problem. it's something both parties should have seen. look, the united states government doesn't enter pretrial diversion a lot. i've probably had 100 in state courts, but in federal court, there's really no low level crimes. this is a misdemeanor and a pretrial diversionary agreement. maybe it could be chalked up to the federal government, federal prosecutors weren't familiar with it. i mean, that's probably not the case, but the bottom line is, a district judge cannot make that determination. that's not her job. it is always the government's

determination. pretrial diversion is their show. they run it. they decide if you violated it. the judge's role is to hit pause in the prosecution until the parties come back and she says, "well, what's the deal?" the prosecution either says yay or nay, we're going to prosecute or we're going to dismiss the charges. the other part of that, of course, is what was the government agreeing to not prosecute him for? the language said, "all the things encompassed" -- a magic word to me -- "by the list in this agreement." if i was the defense, i might have said, encompassed, there's a list of things, we're covered. but in court, you find out, well, the prosecution had a different view of what was covered, and they theoretically could continue to prosecute him. so that is on both sides. they should have hashed this out and known whatwalked in. >> layman's question, just looking at this from a distance.

this is not a case that popped up three or four weeks ago. >> yes. >> this is a case that has been ongoing for years and will probably continue to go for years. so how is it that career prosecutors who have been doing their job, again, for years, and a couple defense lawyers, highly skilled from pretty good firms with great reputations. >> great firms. >> how is it they end up in court with a plea agreement that they think they've agreed to? it's like a house contract. before you sign the house contract, could you fix the boiler? i fixed the boiler. okay, i'll sign it. they have this plea agreement they think they've agreed to, and all of a sudden, it pops up in court, "is he covered for these things?" "no." "no, what happened here?" >> i'm glad you bring up a house contract. who among us hasn't sped through the signing of a house contract or a mortgage agreement or anything like that? it's 200 pages, 50 signatures.

maybe it's as simple as that. both sides didn't fully realize what the terms of the agreement -- or they had a misunderstanding about the terms of the agreement they were entering into. believe it or not, mike, there is a decent amount of litigation on exactly this topic. a defendant pleads guilty, the government prosecutes him again later on, and he says, "you have to enforce the contract. the government said it wouldn't prosecute me." they say, "no, read the language." both sides should have been crystal clear on what they were agreeing to. i also think it could be as simple as, and i've been guilty of this in court, too, that when the judge asks the government on the record, "hey, are you willing to commit that you are not investigating hunter biden ever again? which is it, this is the end?" woe be to that u.s. attorney or ausa who says on the record, commits the entire u.s. government, "we are completely

finished investigating hunter biden." on the other hand, if it was covered by the agreement, it shouldn't have been no problem. i don't think the government was being sneaky, but it was boiled down to, and deserves to be criticized, a misunderstanding. >> take this the next step. i think people were confused by what exactly was happening. what is the next step for hunter biden? >> because this was a combined arraignment and plea hearing, what happens procedurally is the judge has to set a preliminary hearing. if the parties don't work it out, there will be a probable cause hearing. that is several weeks out. what the parties will do in the meantime is probably get together and hash it out. if they are truly in agreement -- and i wouldn't go too much by the frustrated statements the parties made in court yesterday -- i think they are in agreement. when you're in the heat of the moment in court, there's a fear of committing to anything on the record. i'll keep coming back to that

because i've been there. i've been asked a question out of the blue by the judge, and i've done the whole, i don't want to commit to never doing something or always doing something on the record. better to go back to the corners, hammer out an agreement, and maybe in a week you say, "judge, we finally have it." some misunderstandings are understandable. some of the others are odd, the part where the government expected the judge to determine whether he complied with pretrial diversion, that's strange. i think they're going to hammer it out, and we'll be back here. it should go out off a hitch. >> there's a politics of this. republicans making hay of it. we'll talk about that piece of the story coming up later. danny cevallos, who has been spot on through this entire situation the last couple of days. danny, great to see you. thanks so much. still ahead on "morning joe," a difficult moment to watch yesterday on capitol hill, as senate minority leader mitch mcconnell effectively freezes up mid-sentence during a press

conference. what he had to say about it, and how he is doing this morning. wall street looks like it is going to open in the green this morning despite another interest rate hike from the federal reserve. we'll take a look at how much further the fed could go in its fight to bring down inflation. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. this is your moment. critics declare oppenheimer is magnificent. the new york times calls it staggering. it's utterly enthralling and one of the best movies of the century. ♪ with wet amd, sometimes i worry my world is getting smaller because of my sight. but now, i can open up my world with vabysmo.

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i got a great price on it. - did you see my tail when that chewy box showed up? - oh, i saw it. - sorry about the vase. - can we just say vase like normal people? - 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) welcome back to "morning joe." beautiful, live look at the united states capitol, 6:25 in the morning. scary moment in the senate yesterday when minority leader mitch mcconnell appeared to suffer an episode, a medical episode, perhaps. he was speaking to reporters during his press conference when

he froze mid-sentence. >> it's been good bipartisan cooperation and a string of -- >> mcconnell then was ushered away by his republican colleagues and taken back to his office. mcconnell would return about 12 minutes later, saying he was just fine. he also made light of the incident later in the day, joking about the time president biden tripped over a sandbag. >> could you address what happened at the start of the press conference, and was it related to your injury from earlier this year, where you suffered a concussion? >> i'm fine. i'm fine. >> fully able to do your job and -- >> yup. >> the president called to check on me. i told him i got sandbagged. >> oh, nice. how you feeling now, sir? >> huh? >> how are you feeling now? >> i'm fine. >> have you seen a doctor? >> any idea what happened? >> i'm fine. >> dehydrated? >> got to watch those sandbags.

>> in march, the longest serving leader in senate history was hospitalized with a concussion and a broken rib after he fell at a washington hotel. two sources also now tell nbc news mcconnell tripped and fell while leaving a plane earlier this month. he was not seriously injured in that incident. as for yesterday's moment there, a staffer tells nbc news the minority leader, quote, felt lightheaded and stepped away for a moment. they would not say whether he saw a doctor. jonathan lemire, it's truly difficult to watch, and we're glad to hear the minority leader is feeling okay today. it does come in a string of events. the fall in march at the hotel. hearing about a fall on the plane, a fall in february was reported, as well, for the 81 minority leader. we hope he is okay. >> first and foremost, we hope he is okay. this was the talk of washington yesterday when it happened. it was a deeply uncomfortable moment, he seemed to be frozen

for 20, 25 seconds before the senators around him realized something was going on. to your point, the reporter's question, it's been brutally hot and humid in d.c. in recent days, so maybe dehydration is a factor. of course, there are questions about whether this is some sort of aftermath of that terrible fall he took a few months ago, eugene. certainly, those who have seen him in the senate each and every day says he seems a step slower. he's certainly not all the way back as part of his recovery. you know, of course, moment like that fuels the speculation about his future. again, we hope he is okay. already, the senate has begun to prepare for life without him. he's signalled he's likely not going to run for re-election. now, the speculation is only going to intensify as to what the future of the senate, republican senate, will look like. >> this is an 81-year-old man. any fall is concerning. my grandmother is 84. when she falls, everything shuts down in that house, right? it's very concerning. so the questions around it are exactly what we as reporters

should be asking. this is one of the most powerful people in the country. this is someone who is leading the republicans in the senate. at a time where the republicans in the senate have not at least shared with us or the reporters who cover the senate a lot, what the next steps would be. he doesn't seem like he is going to run for re-election, so what does that mean? more importantly, when does that happen? does he step down? step down as leader and continue to be a senator? does he continue until he is done? that is the question a lot of folks have. there are a lot of senate republicans yesterday who were hoping that while they were making light of the subject, both him and his team, that he was actually going to see a doctor, that he was being seen by folks, because of how concerning it was. whether it was him being lightheaded or dehydrated. when folks asked him what it was, he wouldn't say what it was, right? unless a doctor saw you, that's what you'd want, to get that information from. obviously, president biden and him are very close.

the other question, especially for folks who cover the white house, what does the relationship look like with senate republicans if mitch mcconnell isn't there? we still have a lot of time before we have those answers, but those are the questions swirling around washington, d.c. today. >> general questions about the age of our political leadership, from the white house to the senate and house, as well. eugene daniels, good to have you on. up next, russian president vladimir putin plans to visit china in october as russia seeks to shore up its ties with one of its closest allies. richard haass joins us with his analysis. and we'll check in with steve rattner about the fed's interest rate increase. yes, he is at the southwest wall with his charts. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. my asthma felt anything but normal. ♪ ♪ it was time for a nunormal with nucala. nucala is a once-monthly add-on treatment for severe eosinophilic asthma that can mean less oral steroids. not for sudden breathing problems.

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that's a good tune to come

in with at 6:34 in the morning. a look at the white house there. the federal reserve increased interest rates by a quarter of a percentage point, signaling a wait and watch approach to further hikes. let's bring in former treasury official and "morning joe" analyst, splendid in beige, wearing his summer suit and crushing it right now. steve rattner is with us. good morning. >> if barack obama can do it at his press conference, i can do it. i can also moonlight as a good humor man if i have to. >> jack of all trades. let's start with the expected hike we knew was coming, quarter of a percentage point. how significant was it? how do you read into the number? >> let's look at this chart right over here. as a reminder, of course, we've had this incredible string of rising interest rates. yesterday, the fed increased rates to around a 5.5% rate. now, both the fed and the market think we are near the end of this cycle. they're looking at maybe one or two more interest rate increases before it starts to turn down.

getting down here, about 3.5% in about 2 1/2 years. the end may be near here for our tightening cycle, but i thought today we'd take a look at what this means for average americans. so if you go back before covid, of course, interest rates were in a fairly normal range. homeowners paid around 4%. savers and money market funds got between 2% and 3%. then, of course, rates went to zero. mortgage rates came down. now, not surprisingly, they're following the fed up here. here's the fed. here's what mortgage rates are. they poked above 7%. money market funds for the savers out there, close to 4%. bank deposits still haven't moved. banks need the low-cost deposits to create profit margin. for borrowers and savers, it's been a steep climb lately. >> your next chart, steve, you point out the reason for this consistent step up in rate hikes

is because an economy, frankly, that performed even better than the fed expected it to. >> exactly, willie. last month, we added over 200,000 new jobs. the unemployment rate is close to a 50-year low at 3.6%. economists have been bringing up their forecast for economic growth for this year now to 1.5%. not a huge amount, but back at the beginning of the year, people thought the economy was going to be almost at stall speed. that is what has been driving the fed up. as we look ahead, we're not out of the woods yet in terms of the economy. economists have been bringing down their projections for growth next year, really to almost zero. the probability of a recession, i know we're talking a lot lately about a soft landing, but economists still think there is a 60% or better chance of a recession next year. so we're at a crossroads in the economy at the moment. >> steve, it was significant the fed said yesterday in announing its rate hike that they've taken

the threat of recession way back from where they believed it was, that they were not projecting a recession next year. >> that's right, willie, powell pulled back the projection forecast. we have a greater probability of a softer lander than we had a few months ago. the economy remains strong. inflation has been coming down, perhaps a bit faster than we thought, but we're not out of the woods yet by any means. >> in your last chart, steve, you're looking at inflation. obviously, key to all of this and what the fed will be watching. >> exactly. powell made a point yesterday of saying the fed, as they say often, is data dependent, and what happens going forward will depend on a number of things that are representative on these charts. first, of course, is inflation. the cpi, which everybody focuses on, is the shaded area. of course, we all saw the 3% cpi number come out recently, and that was very encouraging. the fed looks at a different measure of inflation, and i

won't get into the weeds, but it's the dark line here. this headline includes food and energy, which has driven a lot of the inflation during the past cycle. when you take food and energy out, which is what the fed and most economists do, what we call core has not been as inflationary, but the pce, again, is sitting at 4.8%. we're going to get a new pc number on friday. the hope is 4.2%. that'd be really great. that's one of the things the fed is watching, to get down to the 2% level. it wants to be at 2% before it really starts cutting interest rates. the biggest driver of inflation is wages. we all want wages to go up. we want people to earn more, but you have to have a happy balance between wage increases and wage increases that create inflation. again, wages were rising at a fairly normal rate. we know they jumped up. interestingly, this light blue line is if you quit your job and take another job, you'll have a

bigger pay increase than if you stay in your job. pay increases have started to moderate, but they're only down 5.5%. we have 1.6 untilled jobs for every american that's looking for one. we still have almost $10 billion untilled jobs in this country, and that is going to keep pressure on wages. so the fed needs this to come down to between 3% and 4% to have a hope of 2% inflation. >> steve, maybe you can help us out with a per -- perplexing question -- there, i got it out -- and the question would be that the economy seems to be doing fairly well, seems to be fairly healthy. unemployment is at historic lows, yada yada, inflation has been cured for a bit. why is it so many people are walking around the country saying things are terrible, "things are terrible for me, the future is bleak"? what's the contrast? why? >> mike, it's a great question. we've talked about it on this show before. i haven't had a perfect answer before. i'm probably not going to have a

perfect answer now. i think there's a few things. i think there's still -- it takes a long time for people to get over economic shocks of bad news. we did go through a rough period, and i think people are still thinking about that. secondly, i do think -- and i think many people think inflation is what people really care about. when they see a lot of inflation, they assume it's bad for them. they assume they're after inflation incomes will go down, purchasing power is going to go down, and that bothers them. there's much longer term, broader issues, the question whether their kids will live as well as they do. polls show people think it won't happen, that'd be the first time in american history. there is a lot of history around this, and there's also the need to get this inflation number down, i think, for people to really feel better. >> fascinating stuff, as always, and done in beige. he pulls it off so beautifully. steve rattner, a man of summer, a man of charts, a man who commands the southwest wall. steve, thanks so much. we appreciatepalmieri, put your

communications director hat back on if you're in the white house. jerome powell pulled back his recession forecast, great news for the country. you have inflation ticking way down, more than expected a couple weeks ago. you have unemployment at historic lows, job creation, everything else. it seems like, despite what mike says and people feeling the economy isn't going well, it seems an economy the president who has been running the economy could run on this. >> people kept hearing reports for the last year and a half that we were headed into a recession, right? just pause and think how often in your daily life do you hear people say, "i have to brace because i know we're headed into a recession"? that kind of fear, plus, i think, the stress from covid, the overhang that steve talked about, that's really held

biden's economy numbers down. so i think what the white house can do now, it's a big deal that the fed said that, that they kind of -- that the recession cloud is breaking up. they can say, not that everything is great, but that the plan is working, right? inflation is going down. we're no longer worried about a recession. we have incredible job numbers. we also have on the horizon a lot of great projects and infrastructure, rebuilding a foundation for the economy, the chips bill that's going to make us more competitive. they have a great argument to make. people may not all feel it yet, but it's working. that kind of credibility -- establishing that kind of credibility, i think, is important for the president, not just on the economy, but just sort of overall. that's his fundamental argument, right? i'm the credible, capable one, and trump is chaos. the government can work for you. fundamentally, all elections come down to the economy, so

they have a great argument to start making. as i recall when i worked for president obama and he was wearing a tan suit at his summer press conference, it was because we had him do it, even though the suit was kind of questionable and, actually, really didn't fit him well because it was an old suit, i think that was more the problem than the color, but we had some good news. we wanted to get the good news registered in the press prior to him going to martha's vineyard. didn't really break through on what we wanted to, but biden has a great chance to do that now. >> one of the enduring legacies of the obama years. >> oh, my gosh. >> the tan suit, brought to you by jen palmieri. let's bring into the conversation president emeritus of the council on foreign relations, richard haass, great to have you. >> not in a tan suit. >> we're boring. steve inspired me. watch tomorrow, something

exciting. i know you want to talk around aaron judge. >> saquon barkley to the giants. >> this upstart yankee group, they may not have the biggest payroll in baseball. >> the second. >> but they're scrappy and hanging in there. >> scrappy. >> please. >> alone in last place, they'd better be scrappy. >> stop it. >> let's talk about some real news so we don't have to talk about the yankees. the kremlin announced this week russian president vladimir putin intends to travel to china in october to attend a forum for china's belt and road initiative, a major global infrastructure project led by china. there, putin is expected to meet with president xi for the first time since xi visited moscow in the spring. significance of this, richard, is what? >> there actually isn't that much significance, at the risk of -- this is a loveless relationship. i have to tell ya, you talk to the chinese about russia, they're really dismissive. you talk to the russians about china, you know, they don't take

seriously the quote, unquote, chinese peace plan. this is a relationship, remember, the current phase that was hatched or launched just before the russian invasion, about 17, 18 months ago. clearly, xi jinping thought this was a winner, like someone says, "you want to invest in this, can't lose." guess what? it hasn't gone so well. china finds itself alienated from a lot of europe, which it doesn't want to be right now. the europeans are saying, "why are you helping the russians? they're the biggest threat." this hasn't worked out. it's not a natural match. yeah, they're going to have this meeting, but all these fears that somehow these two countries were getting close together, this was going to move the strategic center of gravity in the world, not so much. meanwhile, china's company is not doing -- you know, it is barely growing. 20% of young people are unemployed. this is, in a funny sort of way, almost a -- it's just not big news, and it's not going to change the fundamentals, either on the ground in ukraine. the only thing to look for,

willie, is whether china is willing to up its help for russia. lots of dual use things. they haven't seemingly done military things yet. that's the one thing to keep an eye on, to make sure china doesn't cross that line. >> they are offering some support, not military, but certainly supporting russia, on the wrong side of the war. >> diplomatically, they're a purchaser of russian energy, dual technology. the question is will they go further? >> president xi seems to be one of the few people on earth who could lean on putin a little bit and encourage him to step away from the war. he hasn't shown the willingness, fair? >> totally fair. if putin is watching the american political cycle and waiting to see if trump were to win, that'd obviously bring about a potential major change. i don't think the moment is right. the real question would be, sometime whether at the end of this fighting season, the end of next fighting season, after our election, that'd be the moment i think you'd see a full-court press by the united states on china to finally call in some of

those chips with russia. i think the day will come. >> what is the present status of the relationship between the united states and china? there is a big conference this fall, i believe, coming up, with president xi and president biden attending. what are the odds there will be a face-to-face meeting between the two of them? >> i think the apex summit is this november in san francisco, i'd be very surprised. there has been an uptick. janet yellen, gina is going there. china dismissed its foreign minister, so wang yi is with three hats, the interlocutor for tony blinken and jake sullivan. there's a bit more interaction, mike, but there's still not substance. john kerry was just there. no breakthroughs on the climate

front. we haven't established a floor in the relationship. >> do you think the sanctions we imposed upon china are hurting the chinese economy? >> it is hurting them economically a little bit, and also psychologically, they are persuaded that the united states is now determined to stop china's growth. they think we are embarking on economic warfare. they're meeting american economic officials, european leaders, people like bill gates. why? they want to try to maintain some sort of an economic relationship, try to avoid growing technology limitations and so forth, where we're unwilling to export or allow certain things to be exported to china. yeah, i think we're hurting the chinese economy. probably not as much as the chinese themselves are hurting the economy through their policies. but they are persuaded that it is our goal to keep them down economically, and some of the policies and pronouncements by

this administration reinforce that. by the way, there's very little difference between the last administration and this administration on policy toward china. if anything, it's gotten tighter. >> jonathan lemire, i'll kick it to you in washington. as we go to you, to your point, richard, front page of the "wall street journal," "unemployed youth cast poll over china ease youth." >> no doubt, the white house is watching the numbers. richard, we were showing footage of putin at the russian africa summit in st. petersburg, but photos emerged of another attendee at this russia africa summit. prigozhin is there, yet another twist here in what has been happening since his failed mutiny of about a month ago. curious, i mean, we know the wagner group plays a big role in africa, so that would explain why he is there, but why he is allowed to be there is another matter all together. what's the latest you have heard in terms of what is prigozhin's

standing, what is his reality right now, and what does it say about putin in this moment? >> there seems to be some kind of a deal to allow prigozhin to continue the wagner group, as you correctly say, jonathan, which has played a large foreign policy role. not just for himself and his bankroll in africa, but also russian foreign policy. that seems to be continued. maybe that's part of the deal. you don't challenge me at home, and i'll let you continue to do your stuff overseas. that's my own sense of it. i don't feel confident in sitting here and giving analysis of what is going on there. the old line that churchill used about the soviet union, a mystery wrapped in a riddle wrapped in an enigma. that's something to be said for the putin/prigozhin relationship. the fact that prigozhin still lives, is still able to do things, suggests to me that i kind of gone back to the old arrangement, with the understanding that, you know, prigozhin will not be a domestic challenge. putin will seemingly forgive him

for that. wagner group is not central to the war in ukraine for the time being. they'll continue their lucrative overseas operations, which is pretty consistent with what putin wants to do in africa. >> richard, before we let you go, i have to ask about what is going on in israel. protests in tel-aviv, across the country about the supreme court being stripped of its power to be a check on the government. what we're seeing in the streets, what does it say about israel. >> the supreme court is now being asked to rule that what the israeli parliament did was unconstitutional. i'll be surprised if they did that. that'd be a real frontal challenge. you know, this happened. the vote passed. nothing is going to -- new votes won't happen again until after the jewish holidays in the fall. the question from the netanyahu government is do you continue to strengthen the canessa and weaken the supreme court?

they haven't made it clear, whether they'll do that. this is more than an immediate battle over the court. i'd argue the only way to argue this is there has been a power shift in israel. politically, you have the most right-wing government in israel's history. then demographically, this reflects the changes. ultra orthodox have large families. immigrants coming to -- conservative immigrants from russia, from the middle east. the israel of almost the movie "exodus," the western, more secular, liberal israel are increasingly losing political power to the right wing, the cultural and political right. so people are in the street not just over judicial reform, not a technical issue, but it's a question of the direction of israel. what is the nature of israeli society? what is the role of religion? is there going to be any willingness to accommodate palestinians to come to some kind of peace? what is the future? the fact the israeli markets have tanked the last couple -- there's a lot of people in

israel who make israeli society, the people in technology, a lot of people in the reserves, the military, you know, the pilots, they are worried about the future direction of the country. that's what this is about. as significant as judicial reform is, this is really a fight for the soul of almost its political character. what is going to be the nature of modern israel after 75 years? that has come into play in ways, quite honestly, we could have a version of it here after september -- after november next year. it's a fight for the character of the country, politically, culturally, and what's the relationship between the government and the society? this is really worth watching in terms of, you know, this important country but also for democracies in general. >> is netanyahu their donald trump? >> to some extent, yes. i think netanyahu, like donald trump, is worried about losing political power. he is worried about the legal ramifications. you know, one of the things i

wrote about, at the risk of being self-referential here, in my last book, is in a democracy, you need people to put the country before either their party or their personal situation. i would say with netanyahu and donald trump, what they have in common is both of them put their own personal situation before they put their country. that is what is so unfortunate about both men. >> thousands of military reservists in israel say they're not showing up if called up in protest to this. this is reaching a boiling point. richard haass, thanks so much, as always, covering a lot of ground. appreciate it. >> thanks. one of the highlights from a highly anticipated hearing in the house on ufos, which included some ominous testimony from a former navy pilot. tell you what he said. plus, some house republicans upset with speaker kevin mccarthy, accusing him of putting far-right priorities ahead of actual legislativere o ""morning joe."" ing app makes trading easier. with its customizable options chain,

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have you testified before the grand jury? >> i don't talk about it. >> do you feel it is appropriate, the investigation? >> in watching the video, that looks like somebody who is cooperating with the federal government. that, to me, mark meadows looks, to me, like a federal witness under a cooperation agreement. my guess is that's what we're going to find out he is. >> that is presidential republican candidate and former u.s. attorney chris christie speculating on why donald trump's former chief of staff was tight lipped yesterday. this comes as special counsel jack smith's grand jury is expected to meet again today in washington. we'll see if any news comes out of that. welcome back to "morning joe" on this july 27th, wednesday. i think it's thursday. jen palmieri and mike barnicle and jonathan lemire still with us. it's thursday. tim joining us at the table.

also, former senator and msnbc and nbc analyst, claire mccaskill. tim, great to have you in new york. >> thanks for having me. >> we haven't talked to you since your senate race in ohio. you ran a hell of a race, great candidate. lost by six points. as you look back at it with distance, what do you take away from it? what does it tell us about the politics not just in ohio, but where things are in the country and what we should look for next year? >> we got a lot of crossover vote, i think 400,000 plus people who voted for the republican governor and voted for me. our democratic candidate was over 20 points. there's room for people to heal, to have unity. people are looking at that, and it's what it told me. democrats, we have to build the party in states like ohio. same happened in wisconsin, which they have a phenomenal party there. you have to build the infrastructure there to be able to win in the off year.

>> if you're in a meeting, let's say, with president biden's team, running for re-election, trying to snatch ohio or run in the midwest states, you have to win michigan, wisconsin, the states we talk about, pennsylvania, what are you telling them right now? >> you have to run a very high energy campaign. i think you've got to be able to communicate to people what they have been done. i think, you know, jen mentioned it earlier, the chips about. in ohio, for example, intel is putting a huge chip manufacturing plant there. data centers are coming. hundreds of millions, billions of dollars are going to be spent in ohio because of the infrastructure bill, because of the inflation reduction act, auto plants, battery manufacturing. this is all happening in ohio, around the country. you have to go out and you have to hammer that. but you have to bring a sense of stability. i mean, the anti-democratic forces are still out there. the bottom line is, you have to take them on and fight 'em. >> tim, we sit around here at this stable both days, and we

talk about national issues that affect people, or we think affect people, but it's sort of like talking about issues at 50,000 feet. >> yeah. >> you've got a 9-year-old boy. he's in basketball camp. you're taking him to basketball camp. you do your own grocery shopping. what do you hear? what's important to people in ohio that talk to you, that they talk to you about? >> i think what rattner was putting up there, the numbers, the inflation, the high economic conversation, it's about gas prices. it's about the prices of food. it's about people still feeling like they can't get ahead. i think things have been so tough for so long, 30, 40 years in youngstown, ohio, the ohio river, toledo, the working class areas where things have been tough, it is hard for people to say, "it is going to be good for a while. i can breathe again," because they've never felt that sense of security, really in our lifetime. it wasn't your general motors or u.s. steel and you're going to

work there for 40 years and you're good. that level of insecurity is still be, but it is pocketbook issues. people couldn't withstand a $400 emergency. you blow a tire, you're screwed. that's a reality for most americans. i think that's what president biden has to overcome, the level of insecurity people have economically. >> you were talking about this stuff on the campaign trail. your opponent, jd vance, is not alone in this, but talking about cultural issues. we're hearing it from governor desantis and others, wokism, hunter biden and his laptop. is that a good strategy for republicans? in other words, they're not as much talking about what you just laid out, which is inflation and all that. it's the issues that seem to sound good in the media echo chamber and on twitter, wherever they're getting the feedback loop. >> yeah. >> but are the people, to mike's point, at the gas station or the people at your kid's basketball camp, are they talking about hunter biden, about these

things? >> no. >> exactly. >> i mean, people are living their life. they're working hard. they're trying to make end's meet. they're taking their kids to basketball camp. >> yeah. >> they're playing, you know, travel baseball. they're at the park. you know, it's just -- i think they're getting down a rabbit hole here. but the problem is, it's america. you never know. like, people don't like biden, it's neck and neck, who knows what can happen? that's why i think we have to be very vigilant as we move be into the next election. the cost of losing, the cost of, you know, the maga movement taking shape again in the united states, i mean, thinking about if they got control of the levers of government, the goofballs you guys report on every day, these guys have no business being in government. think of president kennedy, even ronald reagan, the democrat and republican over the years, and you think about these guys.

i'm watching my language. >> i saw that. >> goofballs, haven't said that in years. trying to be nice nowadays. an impeachment inquiry may be launched into president biden. mccarthy told members of his party they can only launch a probe if and when they secure enough evidence to justify one which hasn't happened yet. it's according to lawmakers in the room. they say mccarthy was warning republicans not to reveal what has been uncovered so far in their investigations of the biden family. some members, though, say they didn't want to hear all the impeachment talk, calling mccarthy's latest move a political game to distract the public. >> this is impeachment theater. we're starting the appropriation s process, and there is not a consensus on the republican side about what the number should be. kevin mccarthy promised when he was running for speaker one set

of numbers, and then he made an agreement with president biden for the debt ceiling increase on another set of numbers. right now, he has got to convince the public that he is credible and republicans have a duty to follow him. the party itself is not in agreement, and we're going to have some real trouble passing appropriations bills. >> i just want to make sure i understand what you're saying. it sounds like you're saying that the speaker is talking about impeachment to try to distract conservatives like you from spending bills you don't like. >> not just me but the public. he is saying, there's a shiny object over here, and we're going to focus on that. we need to get these things done to focus on the shiny object. most of us are concerned about spending. it is an existential threat to this country, so we want to move forward with the spending bills in a responsible way. >> that is republican congressman ken buck of colorado there. other republicans also beginning to question the potential impeachment inquiry, saying it could impact elections,

especially for those in swing districts. claire mccaskill, as we hear this talk and listen to speaker mccarthy try to walk the line, entertain it a little bit, say we're going to open an inquiry to see if there is the evidence to impeach him, what are they up to, other than a distraction? >> well, listen, i will not say i agree with ken buck, but i will say this, kevin mccarthy has a real problem. that problem is how does he hold on to power in light of so many districts that went republican that are actually joe biden districts? as tim ryan will painfully tell you, majorities are made in the middle. majorities are aren't made on the far right or the far left. majorities are made when swing districts in congress and swing states like ohio and missouri and pennsylvania -- i mean,

missouri, it is hard to call it a swing state, but some senators are up in states that are very, very difficult. so what these republicans are saying, these republicans in swing districts are saying to kevin mccarthy, "cut it out. we are not going to go for impeaching biden with no evidence. quit catering to the marjorie taylor greenes and the far right of this caucus because you're going to lose the speakership, not because they abandon you, but we'll no longer have the numbers of majority after next fall." >> tim, speaker mccarthy became speaker by the skin of his teeth, the agonizing vote after vote after vote. he knows he owes some of that to, as you point out, some of the, let's call them, the extreme wing of the party. how do you assess his role right now and his job as speaker, which is sort of trying to keep them pleased, but also he has to hold it together? he has a very slim majority.

>> his problem is he has no backbone. he has no conviction. he has no governing philosophy personally, i think. he's in it for himself, the title, the portrait, the gavel, the retirement, whatever his reasoning is. speaker pelosi, she has conviction. so when we were pushing a piece of legislation, she knew where we were going, and we elected her and, you know, we were moving in that direction. so when she was making an argument, it was like, this is what we stand for. this is what -- a million times in our caucus, she'd say, "this is what we believe in. these are our values." what's kevin mccarthy saying? what are your values, kevin? he doesn't have any. when you're trying to govern a caucus that's always going to be unruly, and you have no center, you have no spine, you have no backbone, you have no conviction, it's very difficult. i think this is going to be a complete disaster for the next year and a half with him.

>> jen, certainly no white house ever wants to go through even an impeachment inquiry, even if that's what it is, as you well know. those around president biden, though, say, look, they'd see political benefits here if one were to happen. weigh in on that. also, just isn't this underscoring the difficulties that house speaker mccarthy is going to have, where he is facing open rebellion and really frank criticism from both sides of his conference? >> tim is right, i mean, it's not just that mccarthy doesn't have principles himself that he is trying to drive the caucus to. this caucus doesn't have anything in common. there's not anything other than being against biden or being against democrats that binds them together. other than wanting to be in the majority. so you're going to have this problem with mccarthy, where there's not anything that he can drive the caucus to, because there's not anything that they

all agree on. there's not. there's not anything they all agree on. other than they want to be that shall -- other than they want to maintain power. mccarthy is talking about impeachment because it keeps some of the freedom caucus members that are unhappy about appropriations bills, agreements on defense, keeps them happy for a while. but making that kind of talk in terms of holding on to the majority come 2024 when the democrats only have to win, i think, five seats back, it's pretty risky. for the white house, yeah, don't want to go through impeachment inquiry. it's clear the republicans are beating up on biden as is. they're getting whatever benefit you have to get from that. you're getting it if what the house republicans are already doing. but if it comes to that, there are -- you can -- there are ways you can make that work for you. i'm here doing my job, economy is doing better, i'm able to

talk about it. you're seeing the impact of the accomplishments we've made along the way. we have a good theory. we're doing better than all the other countries. it's working. look what they're focused on and what they are doing to me. that alone could cost kevin mccarthy the house. >> tim, i want to talk about we the people action fund. it's a new group that you and some others have founded here. >> yeah. >> i love what you say, you are the voice of the exhausted majority. >> yeah. >> boy, is that true. i feel it, too, when you go out there, they go, "ah." they're just exhausted by the last eight years. the daily churn of politics and the rhetoric and the hate that we're seeing spewed all over the place. they almost just want politicians to get out of their lives and get out of the way. what is the objective with this group? >> we want to be a home for the exhausted majority, and we want to elevate the conversation going on in the country. we're going to highlight the good stuff going on. there's so many ordinary people doing extraordinary things around the country.

there are innovative solutions around how we heal our vets, how we heal addiction with cannabis. how we can have an energy policy in the united states that includes natural gas with renewables to displace coal. there's, like, real solutions out there to rebuild the middle class. it gets drowned out by the toxic conversation we're having in the country. we the people action fund, and people can go to wethepeople250.us, and basically, what we're trying to do, we're going to use the 250th anniversary of the country to say, we want to usher in an era of responsibility, reform, civic engagement. it's not going to be outsourced to washington, d.c. it's going to be done by average people doing extraordinary things, working together, and getting past the toxic conversation we're having. >> tim, speaking to that point about average people working together for the country, last month, a section of i-95

collapsed in the middle of philadelphia. >> yeah. >> it was hysteria, how will people get around the next several months? 12 days, 12 days later, they had it repaired. it was a combination of another normal guy, the president of the united states who is normal, like you, the governor of pennsylvania -- >> low bar these days. >> well, it is. it is. the governor of pennsylvania, the philadelphia mayor, 12 day, they repaired i-95. how are you translating normalcy, competence, effectiveness to people like in akron and toledo, that the job can be done and we can do what we used to do? >> highlighting examples like that. i mentioned the economic development happening right outside of columbus, ohio. auto plants. things are happening because we took a stand. we passed the infrastructure bill. we passed the inflation reduction act. we passed the chips act.

two of the three of those were bipartisan in nature. republicans not screwing around trying to say, "hey, we want to impeach the president," but saying, "hey, we have to reshore chip manufacturing in the united states. it was stupid for us to let it go to asia in the first place. here's the policy in a bipartisan way that we can bring it back." i think highlighting those things and campaigning on those things, because that's what the average person wants. just go do your job. i get up every day. i go do my job. i bust my rear end to make end's meet for my family. if you're in government, go do your job, too. that's what we want to highlight with the we the people action fund, is to say, who is out there just slogging away, like, trying to make a difference? there's a great group calls maps. they've been doing research around healing vets for the last 25 or 30 years. they are healing vets with post-traumatic stress. they need resources. they need money. it's an innovative solution. who is not for healing vets?

like, we know natural gas and renewables together can displace coal and significantly bend the curve on carbon in the world. let's get this stuff done. let's heal people. underneath all that, there's great school programs that i've talked to mika about. mindfulness-based, trauma-informed care in our schools, healing kids with trauma. it's working. i think that's why people are so frustrated. they see little things here or there are working in the country,y et the toxic conversation, the impeachment, mark meadows all this b.s. we hear every single day. i want people to come to we the people action fund and help us celebrate those people. we'll have compelling videos. now, we will take on and we will be hostile to the anti-democratic forces in the country. because there is no growth, there is no innovation, there's no blossoming of these ideas if

those forces are taking root. it's a virus in the country, and we can't host that virus. viruses need a host. we can't host it. that's what we the people action fund is going to do. i think the average person in youngstown or akron is going to resonate with what we're doing. we're going to celebrate this country. we're going to usher in an era of reform and responsibility. new civic engagement. hopefully create a new politics. >> pretty good platform. you should run for something. >> no, thank you. been there, done that. >> claire, i'm sure whether you're at a cardinals game or at the lakes of the ozarks, you're hearing from the exhausted majority, too. >> i think that phrase is really -- talk about resonate, that exhausted majority is right. tim, i'm curious. there are groups out there, and some are taking incoming like no labels. i think it's created a sense of distrust around people who could potentially donate to this effort. can you be specific about what you're going to do with the

money you might raise in this effort that you're undertaking? i think it is important for people to get an understanding, is this just about messaging, or are you actually going to fund political campaigns or some of these projects that you are lauding this morning? >> yeah, this is going to be issue advocacy organization. we want to advocate for some of the issues that i just mentioned. again, we do want to take on the hostile, anti-democratic forces in the country. we will be very, very firm in our approach in how we do that. we really want to build out, claire, across the country, an organization. you know, we saw, and you see this, too, over the years, jen has seen it, we spend billions and billions of dollars on political campaigns. volunteers, digital, all that stuff. when the campaign is over, everything washes away like a sand castle on the beach that

gets hit by a wave. we want a sustainable organization. we want a we the people representative in all 3,143 counties in the united states. we want to begin to stitch together in local communities with volunteerism and getting people engaged with what's going on in different communities across the country. it's going to be an organization that through compelling content, compelling videos, advocating for these ordinary people doing extraordinary things, these ideas that are out there that aren't getting any oxygen, we're going to give it oxygen and then advocate for how we pass, support and fund those kind of things. we've been in contact with artists, performers, musicians, bands. we're going to do concerts across the country in the coming years. we want this to be a celebration. this country will be 250 years old. it is a minor miracle we've made it this far, and we want to say, okay, we want to do another 250 years. we better get our act together.

that will mean an era of responsibility, increased civic engagement. at all corners, we the people is going to be pushing toward those efforts. we're not going to be a political party. we're going to be an advocacy group. >> you're happy coaching flag football. no chance you get back to politics? >> no time soon. i'm enjoying -- it's just nice. like, you know, i hang out with my family. i get to hang out with my kid. i'm, like, taking him to basketball camp. i took him to a mark price basketball camp. >> great mark price. >> mark price is the best, right? i'm sitting there with mark price, now 60 years old. i'm 50 years old. he's coaching my kid. i'm like, nothing better than that. i'm enjoying it. i want to stay engaged. i spent my whole adult life serving through congress, and now i'm a private citizen. i want to, you know, continue that service. >> still doing your part. the new political action committee is called we the people. if you want to get involved, the website is wethepeople250.us.

looking ahead to the 250th anniversary of the country. congressman time ryan of ohio. >> great to be with you again. >> come back soon. >> thank you. i'll wear a tie next time, i promise. >> don't. >> you're always good here. >> thanks. ahead on "morning joe," the judge in hunter biden's case stunned the legal world yesterday by putting the plea deal on hold as she raised questions about the agreement. we'll speak to reporters who were inside the courtroom. and next, us-aid administrator samantha power will join us. she returned from odesa, ukraine, where russia continues to bombard the city with rockets and drones. what she saw when "morning joe" comes right back.

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unidentified aerial phenomena. a former officer and intel official spoke on the topic. former plot ryan graves also testified about the stigma of reported sightings. listen. >> i was informed in the course of my official duties of a multi-decade uap crash retrieval and reverse engineering program, to which i was denied access when i requested it. i made the decision, based on the data i collected, to report this information to my superiors and multiple inspectors general. and, in effect, becoming a whistleblower. >> uap are in the air space but grossly underreported. air crew and commercial pilots,

trained observers are frequently witnessing these phenomena. the stigma attached to uap is real, powerful and challenges national security. >> if you believe we have crashed craft, as stated earlier, do we have the bodies of the pilots who piloted this craft? >> as i stated publicly already in my news nation interview, buy logics came with the recovery. >> were they human or non-human? >> non-human, and that was the assessment of people with the direct knowledge of the program i talked to, currently still on the program. >> non-human buy logics. a spokesperson tells nbc news the claims are false, and the cybersecurity's chris krebs tweeted, quote, non-human buy logics are literally every other carbon-based lifeform on earth. for example, drones plus bird strikes equals crash sites and biomass. pump the brakes here. people saying, oh, there were aliens on the ships.

claire mccaskill, you're clear of your time in the senate and can be forthcoming about what you know about aliens. what do you make of this hearing? >> oh, man, color me skeptical. you know, en would the government have to gain by not being transparent about this? what would they have to gain in terms of safety in the skies? by the way, it was convenient that every time these witnesses were pressed about evidence, they said, "oh, i can't talk about it" or, "oh, it's too sensitive." i was in a lot of classified briefings. i served on the armed services committee for 12 years. i am not convinced that there is anything the government is hiding in this regard. i think the pentagon got it right. i think these guys found a couple of witnesses that were willing to kind of feed the masses in terms of what is a growing sense out there, that -- and there may be other life somewhere, but it's just hard

for me to believe in this day and age, when everybody had a camera, that if there were crashing of alien spacecraft around the world, we wouldn't be getting realtime video of it. it doesn't make sense to me. >> certainly, the prevalence of cameras, and also the prevalence of other things in the sky, drones, weather balloons, things that belong to our government, other governments, things they may not want to expose. the key witness also said publicly he believes that ufos, there was a vast conspiracy by mussolini's government in italy and the vatican to therefore repress the truth about ufos. >> i've heard that. >> craft near italy in the 1930s. he is someone who has a lot of outlandish beliefs and i think questions about his credibility are quite fair here. >> exactly what they want you to think, mike barnicle. >> oh, i've heard that a million times.

>> all right. put that story to the side for now. let's turn to russia. in recent days, that country has intensified attacks on ukraine's port cities. the city of odesa has been struck by missiles or drones nearly every day since russia left a key multi-nation grain deal last week. us-aid administrator samantha powers is back from a visit to kyiv and odesa, announcing support for ukraine. thank you for being with us. if you could, tell us what you saw on the ground here now almost a year and a half into this war. how are the ukrainian people holding up? >> maybe i'll start in odesa. i arrived in the port city, first senior u.s. official to get down there, and the port which had been buzzing with life just a couple days before was just dead. in as far as russia pulling out

of the deal the day before i arrived meant none of the ships, none of the workers, none of the economic life that is so central to odesa's economic survival, alongside its physical survival, all of that had gone quiet. so that was something that, of course, everybody was lamenting. they had expected it. russia wants to destroy ukraine's economy as a way of forcing it to surrender, since it is not going very well for russia on the battlefield itself. i'd say writ large, you know, they're digging in for a long winter ahead. i think there had been hope that the war would end sooner, but now they're thinking about, how do we protect our energy infrastructure? now we know going into the winter that putin is going to weaponize the cold, as he weaponizes food. it is a pragmatic mindset. i wouldn't say morale is thrilled that the war is dragging in halfway through its second year, but you sense no

diminishment of support for president zelenskyy and such a dedication to the so-called patriots or heros who are going and fighting this really tough counteroffensive which, of course, is grueling because of the russian defenses that have been set up, including minefields, booby traps and the like. >> samantha, to the point you raised, we showed a clip of you meeting with president zelenskyy a couple seconds ago. you've been to odesa, met with the ukrainian people, met with many veterans of the ukrainian war, people who are fighting the war each day. president zelenskyy came under some controversy a couple of weeks ago, implying that he wasn't grateful enough to the united states and to nato for the equipment and ordinance that have been shipped into ukraine. but what if we take a pause here and think about the fact that perhaps it is us, the united states and the free nato countries who ought to thank the ukrainian people for what they're doing, fighting russia.

>> yeah, i mean, i have to tell you, every meeting you have when you're over there is the first five minutes is this, "thanks." usa, we can provide budget support, which keeps the government going, allows teachers, firefighters, health care workers, who are needed in a war, allows them to continue to be paid, allows pensioners not to go cold in winter. they say thank you, and you feel super awkward. what? no, no, "thank you, thank you, president zelenskyy. thank you, mental health care workers," those who are helping with bringing the perpetrators to justice ultimately. i feel the same way you do, and i can assure you that in my meetings, there was no shortage of gratitude. there is also always a list. this war is not easy. russia is bringing everything at the ukrainian people, not just

on the military battlefield but, you know, by attacking citizens. zelenskyy is very eager to do everything he can to protect civilian infrastructure, to protect civilian population centers like odesa, which is now a target, really for the first time in more than a year. so we talked about that. but the other thing i would say is, zelenskyy is very focused on resuscitating the ukrainian economy. apart from security asks, his number one non-security ask was support for small and medium sized enterprises, which i think might surprise an american audience. you know, he wants business to boom and the tech sector has grown 6% or 7% over the course of the last year, actually since the war started. that's something usaid is looking at, how do we attract back refugees, mainly female, as the men stay on the front? part of that is by supporting agriculture, smes, and really

backing the entrepreneurship that we see on the battlefield, but that actually they're bringing, as well, to business and to the private sector. >> it's jonathan lemire. i wanted to go further with what you just brought up there. obviously, the focus is on the military fight, the military funding. ukraine's counteroffensive has ramped up in recent days. of course, there's also the need to rebuild the country, an effort that can't wait until the fighting stops. can you put into perspective for those watching today, just the sheer enormity of the reconstruction project that lies ahead for a war-battered nation? >> well, i mean, the estimates go up every day of the wartime damage that putin has inflicted. we, usaid, in support of the ukrainians, we operate in the here and now, and think about the long-term reconstruction. in the here and now, every time putin hits a grain silo, the ukrainians want to patch it up and make sure that it's ready

for the next harvested crop to come and store that crop. you might have seen earlier in the week that grain infrastructure was hit, not only in odesa but for the first time in the river ports, which usaid has helped expand the use of, so that the ukrainians are not only reliant on the black sea. of course, putin knowing they're using the ports more and more hit those. it looked like that was going to be very damaging, but within 24 hours, those ports were up and running as if nothing had happened. i want to stress that reconstruction is happening now. usaid invested $400 million in the winter on energy infrastructure repair, but we just met in london. secretary blinken attended for the united states, with the donors who are already thinking about what the scale of that mammoth enterprise, when the war is concluded. again, we're trying to attract the private sector now. there are large parts of the country that are peaceful. there are business sectors that are growing or that we need to

sustain, like the agricultural sector. we have to do repairs in the moment, and then bring in the multi-lateral development banks, the private sector and other donors in the long term for that much, much more substantial enterprise. >> all important work. usaid administrator samantha power, thank you for being here this morning. we appreciate it. >> thanks, willie. claire, we're told at nbc news that donald trump's legal team is preparing for the possibility of an indictment coming down today. a federal grand jury is expected to meet. could happen today. we don't know for sure. as a former prosecutor, what are you looking for, any telltale signs here what may happen today? >> well, it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when, i think, for both fani willis in georgia and for jack smith in terms of a federal indictment. what i'm going to be really interested in is who appears on the witness list for the government. who has been given immunity?

who has been told, "we will not prosecute you, but you've got to tell us honestly everything that happened. you can't hind behind this fifth amendment." the question is, everyone working for donald trump right now, have you requested and received a writer on your employment contract, that you get $1 million a year for legal fees? because if you add up the amount of money that people who foolishly went to work for this guy are spending on trying to keep themselves out of jail, it's a huge number. mark meadows is one that has been mentioned earlier on the program. i think that is somebody who was in the room and listened to donald trump during the hours when he was doing nothing when police officers were being attacked, people were being shot. he is the one who was in the room when they tried to get the votes out of georgia fraudulently to deny the people of america a fair and free election. so it is one of those things where i think the witnesses, who has been given immunity, will

tell the tale over how much difficulty donald trump will have. >> there was damning testimony, viewers will remember, last summer during the january 6th committee hearings about how the chief of staff mark meadows performed that day, sat back and let it happen. we'll see if he is involved in this. claire mccaskill, thanks. we'll see you soon. a frightening moment in new york city yesterday. a construction crane comes crashing down, injuring several people. hits a building, down into the street. we'll have the latest on that story. also ahead, new developments with rudy giuliani's false claims of election fraud around the 2020 election. he's finding conceding he made false statements about two poll workers in georgia and made their lives difficult and dangerous. much more on that when "morning joe" comes back.

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that is a live picture of a cab of a construction crane about 24 hours after it caught fire, leading to the collapse of the crane down onto the street about nine blocks from where we're sitting this morning. right in midtown, manhattan, the crane burst into flames yesterday, then crashed to the street, injuring dozens of people. nbc news correspondent kathy park has the latest. >> reporter: this morning, investigators in new york city are trying to figure out what sparked a fire on a construction crane, leading to a slow-motion disaster more than 40 stories up. witnesses capturing the sky-high drama. the metal boom snapping, followed byeighboring building, crashed to the ground below. >> 550 10th avenue reporting a

crane on fire. >> see it coming down full of concrete, big explosion. saw running. >> i thought it was another terrorist attack or something. >> reporter: eldridge smith was on the 27th floor across the street when -- >> all of a sudden, i heard kaboom, and all of my windows in my apartment shook. >> reporter: in all, a dozen people injured. three fire fighters and nine civilians. fire officials say all of them are expected to recover. the frightening scene unfolding in one of the busiest corners of midtown manhattan, blocks from times square. >> this could have been much worse. we are extremely fortunate, number one, that we were not during the busy time of the day. >> reporter: authorities say the crane operator had been lifting a 16-ton load of concrete when he saw the flames and tried putting them out himself. when that didn't work, he had to leave. >> i told the guys, "that's a bad sign." if he can't extinguish it, he's the only one who could at the

point. he wasn't able to, so the best thing he did was exit. >> reporter: while rare crane collapses in manhattan have taken a deadly turn. in 2008, two construction workers were killed on the city's upper east side. more recently in 2016, a collapse in lower manhattan killed a med. >> pedestrian. >> the danger so many are willing to put themselves through. let's never forget, especially for the men and women out there building these. >> nbc's kathy park reporting. mike, i mean, i saw the crane after the fact yesterday. it is, as the mayor said, a minor miracle that this wasn't worse. thank god the dozen of people who were injured look to be okay and released from the hospital. think about the operator of the crane, first of all, that he is okay, and all the people that must have been below on a busy new york street at 8:00, 8:30 in the morning yesterday, thank god nobody was hurt more seriously. >> there is that miracle that you just spoke about, willie, and defined it quite well, the number of people on the ground

who were not injured compared to the people who were injured. but there's the other miracle that we take for granted each and every day, the first responders. i mean, firefighters, new york city firefighters put that fire out. >> yeah. >> i mean, how do you do that? look at that. >> building across the street. >> yeah, incredible. they do it every day. took little notice until something like this happens, then we see them in action. on the ground, as well. >> they are the best in the world, and they prove it every day. coming up next here on "morning joe," yesterday's rematch of the 2019 women's world cup final. team usa versus the netherlands. it was a tight one. we'll have the story behind the u.s. team's game-tying goal. "morning joe" is coming right back.

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the back of the net if you are lindsay haran. >> and they won. she did it, haran. >> don't poke the bear. she ties last night's key world cup match after a bruising tackle from her club teammate. they played together in france. now on opposing sides in the world cup against the netherlands. the game ended by that score, a 1-1 draw. now the united states takes on

portugal tuesday morning with a win they automatically advance to the knockout round. joining us is the commissioner of the soccer league. i was up last night watching that. hoping -- it was agonizing because it was 1-0 forever and ever, and everything turns on that one moment, the tackle that lit a fire under the team. >> they really got their momentum going after halftime through the second half, and we're just so proud. 22 of the 23 players on the u.s. women's national team call the national women's soccer league their home, and we're watching them and cheering them on with immense pride and joy. >> and if you look at the first game by their own admission, the team said they didn't play their best. they won 3-0 against vietnam. this game was tough. another hard one against portugal. i think for winning this tournament is incredibly difficult although our women seem to make it look easy the last couple of years. what's your assessment so far of the way the team's played?

>> looking across the entire world cup, we see that we actually have players not just on the u.s. women's national team, but spread out across 16 of the 32 teams that are competing on this international stage, and what we see happening across the globe is represented in our country which is that women's soccer is exploding globally right now, and the talent globally is exploding, and because of that, we're seeing a much tighter competition at the world cup which is a good thing. the rising tide is going to lift all boats. >> it's so fun to watch. the players are so good and so talented on both sides. jen palmeri, what was so good about that was you could see lindsay horan. she was upset with her friend, and moments later she scores the game-tying goal and then after the game, the two of them are laughing and hugging and doing interviews together. so water under the bridge for the club teammates. >> sportsmanship, and you just love -- it's so rare that life

delivers you that moment where you're, like, i want to nail this, and lindsay was able to just nail it, you know, just, like, seconds afterward. it's just amazing, but commissioner, how much is the -- after the 2019 world cup and the u.s. women, they just keep on winning. they just keep on winning world cups. they just can't stop winning. did that -- did you see within the league -- did you see a big increase in audience? do you expect that to happen now? how much does the world cup matter in terms of driving more people to the games? >> we feel like the world cup is a punctuation on the incredible momentum we're seeing across the league. just in the first half of our season leading into the world cup, we have a 50% growth in attendance year of year. >> wow. >> and we believe that this is just going to infuse an incredible amount of the momentum into the final most important parts of our season, when the players come back from the world cup. we're actually going to be going into our playoffs and our championship which is on

november 11th, and historically we've always seen that momentum from the world cup infuse into our league and we think this year is going to be unlike anything we've seen in the past. >> you know, the clips that we have been showing show something remarkable that's too often unfortunately taken for granted. so you think lindsay is down and maybe she won't come back into the game, but the focus and intensity of an athlete that occurs during the course of the game, will be lost momentarily when she's injured, but to regain that focus and intensity so quickly is remarkable. >> it really is, and these athletes and in particular the u.s. women's national team, they are the most resilient humans not just athletes. they have had to fight for every single thing that they've achieved in their career, and against all odds in many instances, and so don't count them down when they're down on the field. they come back with a vengeance, and these players, they came to play, and they came to win, and

we're super excited to be cheering them on and watching the incredible athleticism on the pitch. >> we could not be more proud of them on the pitch, but also the way they carry themselves off the field as well. commissioner of the national women's soccer league, jessica berman. congrats on the success of the league and attendance growth. that's amazing. we'll be watching. >> thank you so much for having us. >> good to see you. still ahead, rudy giuliani admits to making two false statements about two georgia election workers. we talk about the legal implications for giuliani and his legal team. plus, the latest reporting on how hunter biden's plea deal fell apart today, and where his plea deal stands this morning. we're back in just two minutes. plea deal stands this morning. we're back in just two minutes that's my boy. ♪ stay off the freeways! only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ first, there's an idea and you do something about it for the first time with godaddy. then before you know it,

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♪♪ welcome back to "morning joe." it is thursday, july 27th, and we begin this hour with new developments on the story that broke at the end of our show

yesterday. years after rudy giuliani accused georgia election workers, ruby freeman and shaye moss of fraud during the election, he is conceding his statements were false. this came in a court filing, part of a defamation lawsuit freeman and moss filed against giuliani in 2021. the case accuses giuliani who at the time you'll remember was representing former president trump of publicizing a heavily edited video he falsely alleged showing the two workers somehow changing votes. >> taped earlier in the day of ruby freeman and shaye freeman moss and one other gentleman purr repetitiously passing around viles of heroin and cocaine. they're still walking around georgia lying. they should have been -- should have been questioned already in their places of work and their homes should have been search sgld in what we just watched,

mr. giuliani accused you and your mother of passing some sort of usb driver to each other. what was your mom actually handling you on that video? >> a ginger mint. >> we had at least 18,000, that's on tape, we had them counted very painstakingly, 18,000 voters having to do with ruby freeman. that's -- she's a vote scammer, a professional vote scammer and hustler. >> she was none of those things, of course. the two-page declaration, giuliani now acknowledges the statements he made about them carry meaning that is defamatory per se. a political adviser says, that means, giuliani did not acknowledge the stachlts are false, but did not contest in order to move on to the portion of the case that will permit

them to dismiss. he believes his comments are protected by the first amendment. here's what freeman and moss told the january 6 committee last year about the harm they say they did endure. >> there is nowhere i feel safe, nowhere. do you know how it feels to have the president of the united states to target you? the president of the united states is supposed to represent every american, not to target one, but he targeted me, lady ruby, a small business owner, a mother, a proud american citizen who stands up to help fulton county run the election in the middle of the pandemic. >> a lot of threats, wishing death upon me, telling me that,

you know, i'm -- i'll be in jail with my mother and saying things like, be glad it's 2020 and not 1920. >> were a lot of these threats and vile comments racist in nature? >> a lot of them were racist. a lot of them were just hateful. >> attorneys for freeman and moss released a statement about the development saying, quote, giuliani's stipulation concedes what we've known to be true. the allegations of election fraud made against them have been false since day one. let's talk about the legal implications of this. what is all that legalese we heard from giuliani and his team? what does that translate to? >> it seems to me they are stipulating to the underlying facts because in order to get to the motion for summary judgment phase, there have to be no issues of fact. in other words, all the facts are conceded and the other thing for the court to decide is an issue of law, and giuliani's defense appears to be not so much that, hey, what i said

about them was true or wasn't true. it's more that it doesn't matter what i said about them, whether it's true or not. i had a first amendment right to say it. therefore, there is no defamation, and that's why it appears that he's making this concession in order to put issues of fact aside, decide them for the moment, and get to the motion for summary judgment, and really it's a minor kind of hail mary to try and throw the case out early. that's what summary judgment really is. it's always a long shot. the odds are if you are moving for summary judgment either as the plaintiff or the defendant, you're probably going to lose, and the case will probably move forward to trial. you can get rid of a case that only has issues of fact or law. if the only issue is of law, then the judge can decide them and everybody can move along. >> eugene, that's the legal aspect of this, but let's speak about the morality of this moment. >> right. >> this was reprehensible. this was something that was false, it was untrue, and as i noted in my book and others have

chronicled so well, and we heard that emotional testimony from these two election workers who were just trying to do the right thing, trying to frankly do their civic duty. >> yeah. >> and they felt like their lives were threatened. they were harassed for months, and it's in moments like the repeated in other places across the country, have had a chilling effect where i know a lot of local officials are worried they're not going to be able to find poll workers and volunteers for the next election. >> people who have said and done it for years, that they loved being a poll worker, that it felt like it gave them a lot of purpose around the elections, are terrified to do so because of these moments like this, and i will say when we saw these two women lie during this committee hearing, that was one of the most emotional. it was one of the most interesting aspects of the committee hearing up to that point because a lot of it was talking to officials and talking to, you know, republicans who were in the -- in these rooms, and these were real people who

were impacted by the lies that giuliani and donald trump and others were telling, and i think that was one of the things that as people are watching and you started seeing polling, that people are paying attention to those moments just as much as the fact-finding missions and it's just a reminder how central rudy giuliani and his lies during the 2020 aftermath of the 2020 election and even before, how central they are to a lot of the investigations swirling donald trump right now. >> so, jen, during the course of your working life, you go out and meet people on the campaign trail. you talk to them and look at focus groups. so how would one go about today talking about the -- america's mayor, rudy giuliani, and this display that we saw this morning, which is about these two women? how do we convince people, normal people, that rudy giuliani's going to skate on something like this with really no penalty paid, and yet the

system isn't rigged? we're going to tell people the system isn't rigged for the wealthy and the connected? how do we do that? >> the way i look at it, mike, tim miller was on the show yesterday and he referred to the fact-based community. i still think the show -- that's a good way to describe the show. it's part of a fact-based community in america. i still look at that ruling yesterday -- i mean, i heard everything danny said, all the qualifications about what giuliani wasn't admitting to, but the truth is that giuliani did not -- he's not objecting to what these women are saying he's done, and that is a win for the fact-based community. that is a win for truth, and i mean, i look at it, yes, mike. i guess at some level, giuliani may skate on this, but democracy, you know, if you step all the way back as i know you do, democracy has been under a

major stress test for the last eight years that trump has been apart of our political system and now is the accountability phase in the justice, you know, with criminal justice in these civil cases as well, and, you know, trump is being held accountable, like, we may get another indictment today. we've already had one federal indictment. we have had the new york indictment. giuliani had to back off on his statements. you saw mark meadows yesterday say not wanting to talk about jan 6 at all, the questions about maybe mark meadows is cooperating with the -- with the federal prosecutors too. the people that have lied to the country are having to bat -- either back off in some way or they're being held accountable in some way, and i think we don't get an easy win here. it's not that progress is all linear, but i still think what's happening in the justice courts, is happening in the courts in general when it comes to trump

is some accountability that's been lacking, you know, prior to this year. >> yeah, and as you say, we're still on indictment watch in that federal grand jury expected to meet today. so we have our eyes on that as well. meanwhile in a surprise turn of events, hunter biden pleaded not guilty to federal tax charges yesterday after a plea deal he struck with the government completely unravelled in a strange day. the unexpected development came during a hearing in federal court in delaware. hunter had been expected to plead guilty to two charges of failure to pay taxes under a deal he struck with the government last month. u.s. district judge mary ellen noriecca pressed sides with david weiss of delaware who is prosecuing the case. both the judge and weiss are trump appointees. the judge expressed concern about two separate deals and her purview over them. she was worried the agreement on the tax charges did not give her the authority to reject or modify the deal, and that the

gun charge agreement could shield hunter biden against further prosecution over his financial and tax issues. the party wills recon seen later to hammer out the terms and provide the judge with more information which could be within the next six weeks. hunter biden's expected to reverse his plea if a new agreement or the new information eventually satisfies the judge. so danny, you were here yesterday saying that this was a strange deal in your estimation, that it was perhaps hunter biden getting off a little bit easy. what exactly happened yesterday though? this is very confusing to a lot of people. >> yeah. most plea hearings go off without a hitch, but that doesn't mean that they're not harrowing experiences because a whole lot can go wrong during a plea -- a hearing, and one of the things that often does is that the defendant has a change of heart or he hears this allocution of facts against him and he wants to say, wait. that's not exactly how it happened, and so plea agreements can go haywire, but most of them go forward without a hitch. this one was set up for failure, and we're learning that more --

now that we get a look at things like the plea agreement and the pre-trial diversion agreement, and when you look at the language, you can see why both parties were confused. when the defense walked in there, they had read a paragraph that said to the effect that if for example, the united states believes a knowing material breach goes on, they can seek a determination by the district judge. that is a problem. it's something both parties should have seen, and look. i'm maybe being glib here, but i think part of the reason, is the government -- the united states government doesn't enter into pre-trial diversion very often. in state court, it happens all the time. the reality is in federal court, there really aren't any low-level crimes. this is a rare instance of a misdemeanor and a pre-trial diversion agreement. maybe it can be chalked up to they were not familiar wit.

-- with it. that's probably not the case, but the judge cannot make the determination. it is not her job. it's their show, and they decide if you violated it. all the judge really does, her role is to hit pause in the prosecution until the parties come back and she says, well, what's the deal? then the prosecution either says yea or nay. we're either going to prosecute him now or we're going to dismiss all the charges, and then the other part of that, of course, is what was the government agreeing to not prosecute him for? the language said all the things encompassed -- that's a magic word to me, encompassed by the list of this pre-tile diversion agreement. if i was the defense, i would have read that and said, there's a list of things, we're wofr covered. then you find out the prosecution had a different idea to of what was covered. that is on both sides. they should have hashed this out and should have known what they were entering into with they

walked in. >> layman's question, all right? just looking at this from a distance, this is not a case that popped up three or four weeks ago. >> yes. >> this is a case that has been ongoing for years, and will probably continue to go for years. so how is it that career prosecutors who have been doing their job again, for years, and a couple of defense lawyers, highly skilled, from pretty good firms with great reputations, how is it they end up in court with a plea agreement that they think they've agreed to -- it's like a house contract. before you sign a house contract. did you fix the boiler? yeah, i fixed the boiler. all right. i'll sign it. then all of a sudden, this pops up in court. is he covered for these things? no. he's not? what happened? what happened here? >> i'm so glad you bring up a house contract. who among us has not sped through the signing of a house

or a mortgage agreement or anything like that? it's 200 pages, 50 signatures. maybe it's as simple as that. both sides just didn't fully realize what the terms of the agreement -- or they had a misunderstanding about the terms of the agreement they were entering into, and there's a decent amount of litigation on this topic. defendant comes in and pleads guilty to a plea agreement. the government prosecutes him later on and says, wait a minute. judge, you have to enforce this contract. the government says you would not prosecute me, and the government says, no, no, no. read the language. we've covered something else, and i agree with you. both sides should have been crystal clear on what they were agreeing to, but i also think it could be as simple as, and i have been guilty of this in court too, that when the judge asked the government on the record, hey. are you willing to commit to -- you are not investigating hunter biden ever again. this is it and this is the end? woe be it to that u.s. attorney

or that, that commits the entire u.s. government to, we are completely finished investigating hunter biden, but on the other hand, if that was covered by the agreement, that should have been no problem. i don't think the government was doing anything sneaky here. i think this is boiled down to, and something that is fair to criticize, a misunderstanding that should have been worked out well in advance. >> so what happens from here, danny? take this now the next step. i think they were confused. a lot of us were confused by what was happening. what is the next step for hunter biden? >> because this was a combined arraignment and plea hearing, what happens procedurally is that the judge has to set a preliminary hearing. so in theory if the parties don't work it out, the case would go forward to a preliminary hearing which is a probable cause hearing. that is several weeks out, and what the parties will do in the meantime is probably get together and hash it out. if they are truly in agreement, and i wouldn't go too much by the frustrated statements the parties may have made in court yesterday. i think they are in agreement,

and i think when you are in the heat of the moment in court, there's a fear of committing to anything on the record. i'll keep coming back to that because i have been there, and i have been asked a question out of the blue by the judge and i've done that, i don't want to commit to never doing something or always doing something on the record. better to go back to your respective corners, hammer out an agreement, make sure everyone is on the same page and come back in a week and say, judge, we finally have it. some of the misunderstandings are understandable. some are where they expected the judge to look at that. that is strange, but i think they will figure it out and hammer it out and we'll be right back here, and it should go off without a hitch. coming up, the latest on senate minority leader mitchell mcconnell's condition this morning after he was escorted away from cameras during a very scary moment on capitol hill yesterday. "morning joe" is back in a minute. yesterday. "morning joe" is back in a minute or an unbearable itch.

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it's a scary moment in the senate yesterday when minority leader mitch mcconnell appeared to suffer some kind of an episode, a medical episode perhaps. the 81-year-old was speaking to reporters during his weekly press conference when he just froze mid-sentence. >> this week there has been good bipartisan cooperation, and a string of -- >> mcconnell then was ushered away by his republican colleagues and taken back to his office. mcconnell would return about 12 minutes later saying he was just fine. he also made light of the incident later in the day, joking about the time president biden tripped over a sandbag. >> could you address what happened at the start of the conference and was it related to your injury from earlier this year when you suffered a concussion? >> i'm fine. >> you're fine? you're fully able to -- >> yep. >> do your job? >> when the president called to

check on me, i told him i got sandbagged. >> oh, nice. how are you feeling now, sir? >> huh? >> how are you feeling now? >> fine. >> any idea what happened? >> huh? >> any idea what happened? theredehydrated? >> got to watch those sandbags. >> in march, the longest serving leader in senate history was hospitalized with a concussion and a broken rib after he fell at a washington hotel. two sources also now tell nbc news mcconnell tripped and fell while leaving a plane earlier this month. he was not seriously injured in that incident. as for yesterday's moment there, a staffer tells nbc news the minority leader, quote, felt light-headed and stepped away for a moment. they would not say whether he saw a doctor. so jonathan lemere, this comes after a string of events. we're hearing about a fall on a plane, a fall in february was reported as well for the 81-year-old minority leader.

we just hope he's okay. >> yeah. first and foremost, we do hope that he is okay, but despite all that's going on, willie, this was the talk of washington yesterday. >> yeah. >> when this happened, it was a deeply uncomfortable moment. he stood there seemingly frozen for 20, 25 seconds or so as the senators around him finally realized that something was going on, and to your point to that reporter's question, it's been brutally hot and humid here in d.c. in recent days, so maybe dehydration is a factor, but there are questions about whether this is some sort of an aftermath of that terrible fall he's taken -- he took a few months ago, eugene. some say he seems a step slower and some say he's not all the way back as part of his recovery. a moment like that fuels the speculation about his future, and again, we hope he is okay, but already the senate has begun to prepare for life without him. it's likely he's not going to run for re-election and that speculation will only intensify,

so what does the future of the republican senate look like? >> this is an 81-year-old man. any kind of fall is concerning. my grandmother is 84. when she falls, everything shuts down in that house, right? it's very concerning, and so the questions around it are exactly what we as reporters should be asking. this is one of the most powerful people in the country. this is someone who is leading the republicans in the senate, and at a time when the republicans in the senate have not at least shared with us or any other reporter that is we know have covered the senate a lot what the next steps would be. he doesn't seem like he's going to run for re-election, and so what does that mean? more importantly, when does that happen? does he step down? does he step down as leader, continue to be a senator, or does he continue all the way until he's done? that is the question a lot of folks have, you know, there are a lot of senate republicans yesterday who are hoping that while they're making light of the subject, both him and his team, that he was actually going to see a doctor, that he was

being seen by folks because of how concerning it was. whether it was him being light-headed or dehydrated because when folks asked him who it was, he wouldn't say what it was. as a doctor, you would want to get that information from. obviously president biden and him are very close. the other question, especially for folks that cover the white house, what does that relationship look like with senate republicans if mcconnell isn't there? we have a lot of time before we have those answers, but those are the questions that are swirling around washington, d.c. today. coming up, the federal reserve has raised its key interest rate to the highest level in more than 20 years. steve ratner is here with charts and will explain what this latest hike could mean for the u.s. economy. "morning joe" is coming right back. economy "morning joe" is coming right back it was time for a nunormal with nucala. nucala is a once-monthly add-on treatment for severe eosinophilic asthma that can mean less oral steroids. not for sudden breathing problems. allergic reactions can occur. get help right away for swelling of face, mouth, tongue, or trouble breathing. infections that can cause shingles have occurred. don't stop steroids unless told by your doctor.

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looking great, my friend. >> if barack obama could do it at his press conference, i could do it. >> a jack of all trades. let's walk through some of these charts, steve, starting with the respective hike. what was the number? >> let's look at our chart right over here because just as a reminder, we have had this incredible string of rising interest rates and yesterday the fed rose --. this gets here down about 3.5% in two years. the end may be near here for our tightening cycle, but i thought we would take a look what the

this means for average americans and so if you go back before covid, of course, interest rates were a kind of fairly normal range. homeowners paid around 4%. savers and money markets got between 2% and 3%. rates suddenly went to zero. mortgage rates came down, and now they're not surprisingly following the fed up here. here's the fed. here's what mortgage rates are. they poked above 7%. money market funds for the savers out there, close to 4%. bank deposits still really haven't moved. they don't move that much. banks need these low-cost deposits to create that profit margin. for borrowers and savers, it's been a steep climb. >> you point out the reason for this consistent step up in rate hikes is because an economy frankly that is performed even better than the fed expected it to. >> exactly, when last month we add ed over 200,000 new jobs and the employment is close to a

50-year low at 3.6%, and economists have been bringing up their forecast for economic growth for this year. now to 1.5%, not a huge amount, but back at the beginning of the year, people thought the economy was going to be almost at stall speed. so that is what has been driving the fed up, but as we look ahead, we're not out of the woods yet in terms of the economy. economists have been bringing down their projections for growth next year. really, to almost zero, and the probability of a recession, i know we're talking a lot lately about a soft landing, but if you ask economists, they still think there's a 60% or better chance of recession next year. we're on a crossroads in the economy at this moment. >> what's significant was not what the fed said yesterday in announcing its rate hike that they have taken the threat of recession way back from where they believed it was, that they were not projecting that. >> powell be pull back his forecast.

we have a greater probability of a soft landing than i would have said to you a few months ago. there's no question that the economy still remains strong, and inflation has been coming down, perhaps a bit faster than we thought, but we're not out of the woods yet by any mean. >> in your last chart, steve, you're looking at inflation. obviously key to all of this and what the fed will be watch sglg exactly. powell made a point yesterday of saying the fed as they say often, is data-dependent and what happens going forward will depend on a number of things that are really represented on these two charts. first, of course, is inflation. the cpi which everybody focuses on is the shaded area and we saw that 3% cpi come out recently and that was encouraging. the fed looks at a decent measure and we'll get into the weeds on, that but that's this dark line here, and this is headline. this includes food and energy which we've talked about before, has driven a lot of the inflation during this past cycle. when you take food and energy

out which is what the fed and most economists do, what we call the core has not been as inflationary, but the pce again is still sitting here at about 4.8%. we'll get a new number on friday. the hope is for 4.2%. that would really be great, and that's one of the things the fed's watching to get down to this 2% level. it wants to be at 2% before it really starts cutting interest rates. the biggest driver of inflation is wages. we all want wages to go up. we want people to earn more, but that -- you have to find the happy balance between wage increases and wage increases that create inflation, and so again, wages were rising at a fairly normal rate. we all know they jumped up. interestingly this light blue line is if you quit your job, you will get a bigger wage increase, but wage increases have started to moderate, but they're only down about 5.5%. we have 1.6 unfilled jobs for every american looking for one. we have almost 10 million

unfilled jobs in this country, and that is going to keep pressure on wages. so the fed needs this to come down to between 3% and 4% to have a hope of 2% inflation. >> so, steve, maybe you can help us out with a perplexing question. there, i got it out, and the question would be that the economy seems to be doing fairly well. it seems to be fairly healthy. unemployment is at historic lows, and inflation has been cured for a bit. why is it so many people are walking around in this country saying, it's terrible? things are terrible for me. the future looks very bleak. what is -- what's the contrast? why? >> you know, mike, it's great question, and we've talked about it on this show before. i haven't had a perfect answer before, and i'm probably not going to have a perfect answer now. i think there's a few things. i think there's still -- it takes a long time for people to get over economic shocks of bad news, and we did go through a rough period, and i think people are still thinking about that, and secondly, i do think drn and

i think many people think inflation is what people really care about. when they see a lot of inflation, they assume it's bad for them. they assume that after inflation, income will go down, and their purchasing power will go down, and that bothers them, and then there's much longer term broader issues. the question of whether their kids are going to live as well as they do, all the polls say people think that's not going to happen, and that would be the first time in american history. so there's a lot of -- there's a lot of history around this, and then there's also the need to get this inflation number down, i think for people to really feel better. >> fascinating stuff as always, and done in beige. he just pulls it off so beautifully. steve rattner, a man of summer, a man of charts, a man who commands the southwest wall. steve, thanks so much. we appreciate it. so jen palmieri, if you look at these numbers, i'll ask you to put your old communications director hat back on, if you are in this white house, yesterday, jerome powell the fed chair pulled back his recession forecast. that's great for the country.

you have inflation ticking way down more than expected. you've got unemployment at historic lows, talking about job creation and everything else. it seems like despite what mike says the economy is not going well, it is something that a man running for president and has overseen this economy could run on. >> yeah, and the -- i think part of the reason why people have not felt that the economy was doing well was they kept hearing reports for the last year and a half that we are headed into a recession, right? i mean, we just -- just pause and think how often in your daily life do you hear people say, i have to brace because we're headed into a recession? that, and that's really held biden's economy numbers down and i think what the white house can do now is -- that was -- it's a big deal that the fed said that, that they kind of -- that the recession cloud is breaking up,

and they can say not that everything is great, but the plan is working, right? that inflation is going down. we're no longer worried about a recession. we have incredible job numbers, and we also have on the horizon, a lot of great projects and infrastructure, rebuilding a foundation for the economy, the chips bill. that's going to make us more competitive. they have a great argument to make. people may not all feel it yet, but it's working, and that kind of -- establishing that kind of credibility i think is really important for the president, not just on the economy, but just sort of overall because that's his fundamental argument, right? i'm the -- i'm the credible, capable one, and trump is chaos, and the government can work for you. fundamentally, all elections come down to the economy. so they have a great argument to start making, and as i recall in -- when it was president obama and he was wearing a tan suit at his summer press

conference, it was because we had him do it even though the suit was kind of questionable and actually really didn't fit him well because it was an old suit and i think that was more a problem, but we put him out because we had good news and we wanted the get that registered in the press prior to going to martha's vineyard. that didn't work it and break through on what we wanted to, but biden's got a great chance to do that now. coming up, new reporting on the push to bring accountability to the lawyers who tried to overturn the 2020 presidential election. that story is ahead on "morning joe." ♪♪ with fastsigns, signage that gets you noticed turns hot lots into homes. ♪♪ fastsigns. make your statement. struggling with the highs and lows of bipolar 1? ask about vraylar.

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the kremlin announced this week that vladimir putin intends to travel to china in october to attend a forum for china's road

initiative. that's a global infrastructure project led kbhoin. putin is expected to meet with president xi for the first time since xi visited moscow in the spring. significance of this, richard, is what? >> there actually isn't that much significance at the risk of -- this is a loveless relationship. i got to tell you. you talk to the chinese about russia, and they're dismissive and you talk to the russians about china, and they don't talk about the peace plan. this is a relationship you remember the current phase that was hatched or launched just before the russian invasion of ukraine. so it was about 17, 18 months ago. clearly xi jinping thought that was a winner. it hasn't gone so well, and china finds itself alienated from a lot of europe which it doesn't want to be right now because the europeans are saying, why are you helping the russians? they're the biggest threat.

it hasn't worked out. it's not a natural match, so yeah, they're going to have this meeting, but all these fears that these two countries were getting close together and this was going to move the strategic center of gravity in the world, not so much. meanwhile, china's economy is not doing, you know, it's barely growing. 20% of young people are unemployed. so this is -- this is in a way, it's almost -- it's just not big news and it's not going to change the fundamentals either on the ground in ukraine -- the only thing to look for is whether china is willing to up its help for russia, and lots of dual use things. they haven't seemingly done military things yet. that's the one thing to keep an eye on to make sure china doesn't cross that line. >> if they are offering some support -- it may not be military, but they're supporting russia on the wrong side of the war -- >> they're a purchaser of russian energy. the question is they don't go farther. >> president xi is one of the few people on earth who could

lean on president putin a little bit and try to urge him away from this war. he's not showing the willingness to do this yet. fair? >> fair, but it might be premature. he's saying he wants to see -- if trump were to win, that would bring about a major change. i don't think the moment's right. i think the real question would be sometime whether it's at the end of this fighting season or next fighting season after our election, that would be the moment i think you would see a full court press by the united states on china to finally call in some of these chits with russia. we're not there yet, but i think that day will come. >> what is the present status of relationship between the united states and china? there's a big conference this fall, i believe, coming up. >> mm-hmm. >> president xi and president biden will both attend. what are the odds they'll be face to face? >> i would be surprised if they weren't face to face at this apex summit. it's in san francisco this summer i believe if i have my dates right. there's been a slight uptick.

janet yellen was there. the secretary of state was there. secretary of commerce is going there. it's a little bit awkward right now. china just essentially dismissed its foreign minister. so now one man has three hats and he's in for tony blinken and jake sullivan. there's a bit more interaction, mike, but there's still not substance. john kerry was just there. no breakthroughs on the climate front. we haven't established a floor in the relationship. >> do you think the sanctions that we imposed upon china are hurting the chinese economy? >> a little bit, and i think it's hurting them economically a little bit and psychologically, they were persuaded that the united states is determined to stop china's growth. they actually think they are embarked -- let's be blunt on it -- on economic warfare. china's big goal, it's interesting. they're meeting economic officials and they're meeting european leaders. they're meeting people like bill gates. why?

they want to try to maintain some sort of an economic relationship, try to avoid growing technology limitations and so forth where we're unwilling to export or allow things to be exported to china. i think we're hurting the chinese economy, probably not as much as the chinese themselves are hurting the economy through their polpolicies, but they are persuaded that it is our goal to keep them down economically, and. so of the policies and some of the pronouncements by this administration reinforce that, and by the way there's very little different between the last administration and this administration on policy towards china. if anything, it's gotten tighter. >> john lemere, i'll kick it to you in washington, but the front page of "the wall street journal," unemployed youth cast this over him. unemployed employees, 21%. >> the white house is watching those numbers. while you were talking just now, we were showing footage of vladimir putin at the russian africa summit that's in st.

petersburg, but photos emerged of another attendee of the summit. evgeny prigozhin is there. this is after what happened in his failed mutiny about a month ago. we know the wagner group plays a big role in africa, so that would explain why he's there. what's the latest you have heard in terms of what is his reality right now and what does that say about putin in this moment? >> this used to be some kind of a deal to allow prigozhin to continue. the wagner group has played a large foreign policy role not just for himself and his bankroll in africa, but also for russian foreign policy. that seems to be continued. maybe that's part of their deal, that you don't challenge me at home and i'll let you continue to do your stuff overseas. that's my own sense of it. i don't feel confident in

sitting here and giving analysis of what's going on. the old line that churchill used about the soviet union, a mystery wrapped in a riddle wrapped in an enigma. that's something to be said for the putin/prigozhin relationship. it suggests to me that they've kind of gone back to the old arrangement with the understanding that prigozhin will not be a domestic challenge. they'll continue their lucrative overseas operation, which is pretty consistent with what putin wants to do in africa. >> i've got to ask you about israel this morning, protests across the country about the supreme court effectively being stripped of its power to be a check on the parliament, on the knesset. what does that tell you? >> the supreme court is now being asked to rule that what

the knesset did was unconstitutional. i'll be surprised if they did that. that would be a real frontal challenge. the vote passed. new votes won't happen again until after the jewish holidays in the fall. the question to the netanyahu government is, to you continue to strengthen the knesset and weaken the supreme court? they haven't made clear whether they're going to do that. i would argue the only way to understand this is there's been a real power shift in israel. politically you have the most right-wing government in israel's history. this reflects the changes. ultra orthodox have large families, conservative immigrants from russia, from the middle east. the israel of the movie "exodus" sort of western, more secular

israel are increasingly losing political power to the right wing, to the cultural and political right. people in the street not just over judicial reform. it's a real question of the direction of israel. what is going to be the nature of israeli society, what is the role of religion? is there any willingness to accommodate palestinians? what is the future? the fact that the israeli markets have tanked, there's a lot of people in israel who make israeli society, the people in technology, people in the reserves, the military, the pilots, they are worried about the future direction of the country. that's what this is about. as significant as judicial reform is, this is really a fight for the soul almost of its political character. what is the nature of modern israel after 75 years? that has come into play in ways that quite honestly we could have a version of it here after next year.

it's a fight for the character of the country, politically, culturally and what's the relationship between the government and the society. this is really worth watching in terms of this important country, but also for democracies in general. >> is benjamin netanyahu their donald trump? >> to some extent, yes. i think benjamin netanyahu, like donald trump, is worried about losing political power because he's worried about the legal ramifications. i wrote in my last book in a democracy you need people to put the country before their party or their personal situation. i would say what benjamin netanyahu and donald trump have in common is both of them put their own personal situation before their country. that is what is so unfortunate about both men. the biden administration set to announce new plans today for lowering housing costs. hud secretary marsha fudge joins us with a preview. y marsha fudgs us with a preview.

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just about a minute before the top of the hour as the sun comes up over los angeles. 9:00 a.m. here on the east coast. welcome to the fourth hour of "morning joe." jonathan lemire and mike barnicle are back with us for the hour. we begin with the unexpected development out of wilmington, delaware yesterday, hunter biden pleading not guilty to federal charges after a plea deal he struck with the government completely unravelled at the last moment. ryan nobles has the latest. >> reporter: mary ellen noriega, a trump-appointed federal judge refused to accept the plea

agreement with biden, telling them, i'm not in a position to reject or accept this plea agreement, so i'm going to defer it. both sides were expecting biden to plead guilty on two misdemeanor tax charges and agreed to a diversion program for a separate gun charge. the judge pressed prosecutors to reveal their investigation into the president's son wasn't over, asking u.s. attorney leo wise, is there an ongoing investigation, to which wise responded, yes, there is. the two sides not on the same page for what the plea deal would mean for biden's legal future, leaving the judge to get them to agree that it would only absolve biden of legal issues between 2014 and 2019 and only on drug, tax and firearms charges related to the specific gun in question, meaning, biden's business deals, which republicans continue to probe, are still a possible avenue for future federal charges.

>> there shouldn't be two justice systems in america. >> reporter: it means that hunter biden continues to be a political headache for his father, that republicans are still leaving the door open to launch an impeachment inquiry. it is a topic the white house refuses to engage on. >> the president, the first lady, they love their son and they support him as he continues to rebuild his life. this case was handled independently, as all of you know. >> let's bring in two reports who were in the courtroom yesterday, tom winter and betsy woodruff swan. good morning. all of a sudden into frame comes running tom winter yesterday. tell us what you heard in that

courtroom. what happened yesterday? >> i think the judge had some questions. she raised some questions as far as it being an unusual type of agreement with respect to the pretrial diversion. she asked him questions is there any case precedent for bringing in the judge for the pretrial diversion agreement? the judge usually never sees these agreement. you have your first appearance and then you're out the door on your way. as long as you follow that agreement, you're probably going to have your case dismissed. all of a sudden, she's asking questions, wait a minute, why do you want me to one day rule that it's possible that hunter biden could have violated terms of this agreement should she do it? she asked questions, are you bringing me in here to be a gatekeeper for prosecutors to file charges in the future?

she says from a separation of powers standpoint, from a constitutional standpoint, i've got some problems with that. that's not up to the bench to make determinations as far as whether charges are filed. typically with a pretrial diversion agreement, if somebody were to break it, prosecutors might file charges and then you would go through the normal trial process and have it dismissed. she telegraphed right away in court that she had some questions and she raised this early. it wasn't a surprise to any of us that this was not going to be a rubber stamp. >> what was it like inside the courtroom? it appears everyone was caught off guard by it. they thought they had an easy day and it became something completely different. >> i've never experienced something like that in 12 years covering high profile cases for nbc. it was really a surprising day, because you don't typically expect judges to get into the

real details. they have an absolute responsibility to look out for hunter biden, to make sure he understands the terms of that plea agreement. all of a sudden, she's getting into the contract language between hunter biden and the government of the united states. she's pulling this apart. all of a sudden you saw a real gulf in the understanding of what does this plea agreement cover with respect to immunity to future charges? and all of a sudden you had the prosecutors and attorney for hunter biden having a serious disagreement about what that's about. at one point in one of the areas, you have chris clark coming over to the prosecution table, standing not far from the distance between you and me and saying, look, we'll rip up this agreement. they've been working on this for over a year. this is a five-year-long investigation. you can imagine the type of feeling they had. you could tell as the day

progressed the tone in hunter biden's voice really started to drop as the enormity of i thought i would put this behind me and i've got a clean bill of health before me legally and all of a sudden this is melting away before my eyes. there was a real sense of, whoa, this is going off the rails fast. i talked to a number of legal analysts. they suggested these were questions the judge definitely should have asked. i haven't heard anybody say yet that the judge herself brought it off the rails. it seemed like there was some language in here that perhaps should have been thought out ahead of time and perhaps can be corrected with discussion between the two parties. but once you start opening up a contract, all of a sudden people are going to have their say. >> a quick note that you made, which is that every time we talk about the judge in this case,

they say she's a trump-appointed judge, which is true. it means it's difficult for trump and his supporters to go after her. but she's not exactly a ride-or-die maga republican. >> she donated at one point to hillary clinton, to john mccain, mitt romney, not exactly the hard core members of the freedom caucus and no donations that she gave to donald trump. i think it is important for people to keep that in mind. >> betsy, you were there yesterday as well in the courtroom. your impressions of what you saw and where this leaves hunter biden now? >> it's a big mess for doj. i was sitting right behind a group of hunter's lawyers. i saw hunter biden and his team sign the pretrial diversion agreement. david wise signed that agreement as well before the hearing

began. over the course of the hearing hunter's lawyers and justice department lawyers both reiterated that the pretrial diversion agreement was a binding contract between doj and hunter biden. before the whole hearing mess unfurled, they had signed that contract. in the words of doj's own prosecutors, they had entered that contract. so what exactly did doj sign onto? last night i obtained a copy of the contract and published it at politico. the copy shows that david weiss, hunter biden and chris clark all signed that contract. the question that came up was just how broad was doj's promise in this contract not to bring

future charges against hundre hunter biden? on paragraph 15 of the pretrial agreement, it's clear in very simple language that the justice department is promising not to bring charges against hunter for everything detailed in what's called the stipulation of facts, the statement of facts. that's also part of those filings now. the statement of facts about hunter's tax charges, again, as put forward by the justice department and hunter's legal team, includes lots of details about hunter's work for burisma, the controversial ukrainian energy company and cfc, a chinese company hunter worked with at that time. the document itself shows that the justice department is promising not to bring charges against hunter related to those companies. in court, doj lawyers said they

believe they could still bring charges related to allegations of illegal foreign government lobbying. if you read the document itself, it's pretty clear doj signed onto something much broader than what they said in court they signed onto. it's a mess for doj. >> on behalf of the people trying to follow this at home, how is it that in a courtroom yesterday in a case that didn't begin a month ago, a case that's been ongoing for years and in the public eye for years, how is it that a specific prosecutor in the us attorney's office in a group of high-powered, quite expensive lawyers for the defense could not have figured out that there might be some discrepancy in the agreement that was about to go forward at the midnight hour that they didn't do this prior to then? how is it that happened? >> mike, it's such a good

question. that's why yesterday, in retrospect, i believe will be seen as a little bit of a moment of the justice department kind of stepping on a rake. verbally in court we saw this bizarre disagreement over what's arguably the single most important piece of this deal, just how much protection does hunter biden get? remember, that disagreement is just a conversation about a contract. the language in the contract itself is very clear. doj promised hunter biden broad immunity. here's the other piece that puts doj in such an uncomfortable spot. justice department lawyers signed off on the pretrial diversion agreement, but hunter biden himself pleaded not guilty. this was supposed to be a two-parter for doj. they were supposed to promise protection for hunter in exchange for a guilty plea.

but the prosecutor signed off on his piece of the deal before the hearing started, assuming the hearing would go in a predictable, normal, boring way. then during the hearing right off the bat things really went sideways. now doj has made a broad promise of immunity for hunter biden. the language itself is clear. at the same time they haven't yet gotten what they were hoping and expecting hunter to give to them that guilty plea. it's an extraordinarily uncomfortable moment for the justice department. it's unlike anything that legal experts i've spoken to have seen. >> how does this shake out now? >> we haven't seen these documents uploaded to pacer yet. she's obtained a copy. what i'm not clear about, the judge did not accept or reject the plea agreement.

we don't know about the pretrial diversion agreement. is that even in effect? is any of this in effect, is the question. i asked a couple of our legal analysts this morning. i said, can any of hunter biden's statements yesterday or the fact that they all signed this plea agreement be entered into a future proceeding against him in case that it does go to trial? chuck seems to think that it can't because of federal rules of evidence. the trial clock has started. there's an exclusion for the speedy trial act. there's a pretrial release. this is acting right now as if the case is going to trial. i think it's likely they get to a point where there's a deal here again. it's not at all clear to me what has actually been accepted and what is actually in play.

it's interesting that there were more broad protections in the pretrial diversion agreement for hunter biden than what we saw in the plea agreement. were they trying to hide the ball here as far as the scope of the future immunity for hunter biden? why did they do that? it's unusual the judge pointed that out. why not just put that in the regular plea agreement? i want to get a better handle on the documents. we're attempting to get some of those details today. there's more reporting to be done. where this goes from here and what all these things say and what's in effect is really important. >> chaotic day and still a little bit confusing. let's talk about what's happening in washington while all this is going on. republicans seizing on this as somehow vindication as, yes, this was a deal where hunter biden got off free and it

doesn't make sense on people and continuing their attacks on hunter biden. >> it's a political mess. republicans have indeed seized on it. they see it as evidence that the fix was in, in that hunter biden was getting off easy and it took this heroism of this judge to save the day and squash this sweetheart deal. they argue the department of justice appears to be on the verge of being ready to indict donald trump again, maybe as soon as today in the january 6th investigation. this is going to stay with us. it weighs heavily on the president of the united states. joe biden has said over and over how deeply worried he is about his son. they thought this was finally going to be behind them. there are still ongoing investigations of some nature into hunter biden, sort of

guarantees this is going to remain a story line. of course, the republican house has made clear they're going to keep working as well with their own probes and even pointing to this matter with the plea deal, to the claims from the irs whistleblowers that hunter biden was getting off easy because of the influence of his father. so a political firestorm, to say the least. we have new details on a developing story involving rudy giuliani, who's conceding his statements made against two georgia election workers were false. giuliani accused ruby freeman and shea moss in the 2020 election. they say giuliani publicized a heavily edited video and falsely alleged the two workers were

changing votes. they were not. now giuliani has acknowledged he did, in fact, make statements about freeman and moss that carry meaning that is defamatory per se. giuliani still believes his comments by the first amendment and refuses to accept they caused harm to the women. they did. the latest piece in politico writes, slowly there have been modest signs of a reckoning within the legal profession. the 65 project is a legal advocacy group created to pursue accountability for the lawyers who sought to subvert democracy in the 2020 election. the group has become something of a boogeyman to the trump figures being targeted. it broadly track asset of rules prepared by the american bar association, such as, lawyers are not allowed to engage in

dishonesty, fraud or deceit. public messaging is central to the group's interest in creating long-term deterrent effects that will lead lawyers in the future to think twice before supporting an effort to overturn election results. rudy giuliani was and is an attorney. in his role as a legal advisor to donald trump around the 2020 election, that's how this defamation suit came up. as you read his comments about, yes, my comments were defamatory towards ms. freeman and moss, how much trouble does that put him in? >> i don't think his concession was actually that significant in this particular case, because he had accused these people of engaging in criminal conduct nap is defamatory, per se, under the law. these are not public figures.

the standard those plaintiffs need to establish to determine liability on the part of giuliani is much lower than the standard we're used to talking about in defamation cases in the media. when the plaintiff is a public figure, they have to establish actual malice. for private, non-public figures like these two, the standard is much lower. they have to establish that the comments were false and negligently made. i don't see any practical defense giuliani would have had. the things he said were clearly false. he said them over and over again, and they were very, very serious allegations. now he's apparently trying to move past this and shift the focus to these other defenses he may have. we'll see whether or not he's able to prevail on any of those. he would have been facing a real uphill battle contesting the notion that he hadn't defamed these people. >> shea moss and ruby freeman

have documented in great detail the ways they were harmed by his comments. giuliani, sidney powell, this group of attorneys that sort of coalesced and came up with these quack theories about the 2020 election, prevailed on president trump at the time to pursue them. are they in any trouble? are their legal careers hurt by this? >> you know, it's interesting. we're 2 1/2 years out, and yet this area is still quite unsettled. we've seen the wave of actions, which are still in their early stages. sidney powell has been sanctioned, rudy giuliani's law license appears to be in jeopardy. jenna ellis was publicly censured. the then there's this whole other universe of people much less well known. the 65 project has filed

complaints against those people. that process is moving quite slowly. if i had one message to deliver to anyone responsible in any of these jurisdictions, it would be to speed up that process. it's going quite slowly. most of their work has still yet to be adjudicated one way or the other. the one proceeding they did bring to fruition was that they did obtain a public censure of jenna ellis on the part of the top disciplinary judge in colorado. other than that, it's very interesting how frightened, quite honestly, republicans and conservatives are. john eastman gave me some very inflammatory comments about the group which i thought for absurd. but conservatives are quite worried about this, not just the retrospective part of it, but the notion that they want to have a long-term effect

including for the 2024 election to prevent these lawyers are doing it all over again. >> any of these people, john eastman, sidney powell, lynn wood, anyone disbarred? >> lynn wood gave up his law license because i think he was on track to be disbarred. everybody else has their law licenses at the moment, but that will ultimately be up to the relevant authorities in those jurisdictions to determine how they want to proceed with those complaints after their complete their investigations, which, again, i hope they speed up. >> the bar for disbarment is pretty darn high. thank you so much. we appreciate it. let's look at the federal grand jury we think convening today, could be a third indictment, a second federal indictment, third overall for president trump. what should we be looking for? how soon are you expecting to hear something? >> i think if anybody shows up

for the grand jury, we've had a couple of days where we anticipate they are going to be sitting but we haven't seen anyone appear before the grand jury. there's a lot of attention being paid to this. grand juries can be used a couple of different ways, to lock in stories of people to box in their testimony. they certainly can obviously be used to elicit testimony that can lead to an indictment being handed up. but it's also a tool for law enforcement to go out and talk to people. we've reported richard donoghue, the acting deputy attorney general at the time when all this january 6th stuff was going on, he's been talked to by the fbi, reported that rudy giuliani met with prosecutors over the course of two separate morning meetings several months ago and had discussions with them about what went on. so it's not that everybody here

who could be a player in this case is appearing before the grand jury.'s a lot going on behind the scenes. one thing that's clear based on people we've spoken to, it does appear that they've developed a significant amount of new information in detail about the events leading up to january 6th than what is contained in the congressional report. in some ways, that's not surprising. they've had more time. they have law enforcement tools that congress doesn't have. on the other hand, i think it's important for us to know by the time we hear about things and we start to report things, they're typically moments in the past. i think things are much more advanced than perhaps we know. i think that's a reason why, to your point, there's definitely a feeling that something is in the wind. as garrett haake and john reported last night, there's definitely a feeling in the trump camp of needing to be prepared for the possibility of an indictment today, though they

have not had any direct communication that's going to be the case. >> a lot of body language experts watching mark meadows walk swiftly into a federal building in washington suggesting that his unwillingness to comment, that maybe he's cooperating in some way. what are you hearing? >> there's long been speculation and concern in trump world that mark meadows is cooperating. that's been a source of significant agita for people around the president, if only because meadows knew everything. he was present for so much of the moments that were crucial for the lead-up to january 6th and for the way that violent day itself progressed. i'll leave it to the body language experts to tell us what exactly his pace and gate walking into the courthouse means. body language expertise is above

my pay grade. it's certainly important to see him going in there participating in some capacity. there's no doubt he'd be at the top of the list for jack smith in terms of people whose brains he'd want to pick. >> he was literally in the room where it happened on january 6th, has quite a story to tell. betsy woodruff swan and tom winter, thank you both. i expect we'll be talking a lot in the coming days. up next, the gdp numbers are out. the united states economy grew at a rate of 2.4% in the second quarter, a stronger pace than analysts anticipated. andrew ross sorkin has a live report. plus, the los angeles angels seem to have made a decision on whether they're trading shohei ohtani. and a fairy tale makeover to the tune of britney spears' music. spears' music.

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breaking economic news, the u.s. economy grew at 2.4% last quarter, faster than economists expected. let's bring in andrew ross sorkin. andrew, read into this number for us. what does it tell you? >> it tells you this economy is buzzing much stronger than people expected. the expectation had been about 2%. it does raise all sorts of questions about for the last couple of years the federal reserve has been doing everything it can to tamp down growth. what's really behind all of this, a lot of the things they were doing is a blunt instrument. there's a fascinating piece in the "new york times" that say

maybe it hasn't been the fed that's lowered the inflation in this country, but really coming out of the pandemic, getting the supply chains back online and giving more credit to the biden administration for many steps they have taken. having said that, they put manufacturing back on the table and all sorts of things that would have inflated the economy. it's not to say the fed shouldn'tenoing what it was doing, but a lot of people giving credit to the fed for what's happened in the economy, but there might be other things at play here. >> let's talk about how this is impacted by the fed, what this means for the fed, which raised interest rates by .25% yesterday. chairman powell called off the fed's recession forecast for next year, suggesting things are going better than the fed thought. >> that's the big deal here.

by the way, because of this morning's number, a potential thought of does the fed actually raise rates one more time this year or not. by the way, as of yesterday afternoon, it seemed like they were unlikely to. he left open the possibility that he might. if you really understand the folks on the federal reserve board, you can tell they would actually like to. the stronger the economy we have, the likelier that they will do so. again, there becomes this question as to what the fed is doing and whether what the fed does is actually what's changing the dynamic in our economy anymore or whether it is a supply chain story, which is that so much of the economy has opened up in a post pandemic world. i don't think you're going to see any call for increase in rates until potentially this fall at the earliest. the good news is, as you said, recession right now seems like

it's off the table, or at least that's the fed's view of it. >> 2.4% growth, recession forecast called off, unemployment at historic lows, inflation ticking down in that number we got a couple of weeks ago. is wall street finally happy with the state of the economy? >> wall street is very happy with the state of the economy. the last ten days the market's been up. if this continues, i think this would be the first time in 20 years the market's been up steadily day after day after day. maybe it's a political question, if there is no recession and if there is a soft landing, what does this look like next spring, summer and fall going into the election? that's always been one of the great questions. the fear that the biden administration had throughout all of this was the expectation that maybe we were pushing recession off but that recession

was going to be a 2024 situation. maybe that changes the different arguments you're going to hear from the democratic side and the republican side about where our economy is. >> again, national gdp grew at 2.4% in the second quarter. despite expressing optimism about the chances of avoiding recession, federal reserve chair jerome powell did temper expectations about the housing market cooling down any time soon. >> i think we've got a ways to go to get back to balance. existing homes, there are many people who have low rate mortgages whereas they might want to sell in a normal situation, they're not going to because they have so much value in their mortgage, which means supply of existing homes is really tight, which is keeping prices up. >> a new program aims to lower housing cost and boost supply.

let's bring in secretary of hud marsha fudge. tell us more about this program and how it aims to make housing affordable for more people in this country. >> everybody in the country knows we have a crisis of affordable housing, but the only way to get costs down is to assist developers and builders in building more homes. if we don't put more supply on the market, the pressures are not going to go down. what we're announcing today is that there's going to be another funding for $85 million for communities to apply to say help us find ways to deal with our zoning and restrictions so we can streamline the process. yesterday i was in birmingham, alabama, to one of the cities where we're giving out grants to

revive neighborhoods. in birmingham alone, it's going to put a thousand new homes on the market. we are looking at ways to reduce interest rates for builders. we have resources to maintain and preserve the housing we have. the white house is going to show people that bidenomics really does work. we are finding ways to build more housing. we are 1.5 million housing units short in this country today. the only way to get the cost down is to build more housing. >> what is the impact of the housing shortage? in other words, in a community like birmingham, how does that impact a city? >> without the housing, there are a number of things. one is young people are not buying homes. young people can't even rent anymore, so they're staying at home with their parents. you have more people who are rent burdened, who are spending

as much as 50% on rent or mortgages. it is also pushing some people to the streets. people can't afford to live in major cities like this one or los angeles or san francisco or washington, d.c. it is a major problem. it is creating for people the inability to do anything else, because they're spending all their money on rent. >> jonathan lemire has a question. >> i wanted to return to the topic of homelessness. it's not just a more visible problem. the numbers back it up. it's on the rise in many, many major cities across this country. can you walk us through some of the plans that hud has to try to deal with homelessness to provide shelter for these people? >> the president in the american rescue plan put $10 billion into addressing homelessness.

then we put vouchers back on the street. we are talking with communities every day about how we can assist. when you talk about the sheer numbers in the greatest nation in the world to have 500,000 people sleeping on the streets is a lot. we are putting resources to shelters and tens of billions of dollars are being put toward resources. every single agency that can help is helping, whether it be epa, to green and retrofit some places. we are talking about transit-oriented building. we are talking about the hhs with services. we are working across every single agency to address the problem, because it is a major problem. people don't like to talk about it, but it is a major problem.

think about senior citizens who are on fixed incomes. we don't have enough senior housing. and the housing we do have, people can't age in place because of the way it was built. we need to get communities to build more homes in more dense communities. it's a difficult situation. that's why we're putting out this $85 million notice of funding today, to say to them you can make building homes for seniors better, you can make building homes for families better, because families and children are living on the streets. >> all kinds of groups can apply for this funding. it's called the pathways to remove obstacles for housing or p.r.o housing. coming up next, the u.s. women's national team had to settle for a draw last night against the netherlands. we'll show you how one tense

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not a good sign that she's down. she doesn't seem to want any part of that. she's still upset. >> the best way to send a message is to put this ball in the back of the net. >> tied at 1-1! >> what a moment and what a

sequence. last night's world cup match tied after a tackle from her club teammate. they play together in france when they're not playing against each other in the world cup. the game ended in a 1-1 draw made possible by that header. the united states takes on portugal tuesday morning. if they win that game, automatically advance to the knockout round. in major league baseball, the los angeles angels are signaling they are focused on making the playoffs this year. they made a deal with the white sox to acquire giolito in exchange for top minor league prospects. the deal means shohei ohtani is off the trade market. the angels have not been to the post season since 2014. they're four games back of a

wildcard spot, tied with detroit for the longest current playoff drought. good news at least for a few more months that shohei ohtani will be there. for all of our complaining about our team, the boston red sox are only a game and a half out of the playoffs right now. >> yeah. the yankees are a game behind them. they're still very much alive. as for ohtani, this was the number one story line across baseball. they very much want to resign them in the off season. dodgers, mariners, giants also in the mix. i'm sure the new york teams will make a run for it as well, but there is a sense that ohtani wants to stay on the west coast. if you're the angels, this is

the right thing to do. even if they fall short in the playoffs, you give your fans two more months to watch this guy. ohtani is chasing history, both pitching and hitting. he has a shot at the a.l. home run record. even if he does walk away this off season, i understand the instinct to go forward one more time and let your fans continue to watch him. >> if he wants to play for the yankees, what would be a routine pop fly in some ballparks, it's a home run here in the bronx. next, a new broadway musical where all of the classic fairytale princesses are friends but they don't know each of their prince is the same guy. it's all set to hit songs of britney spears. two of the show's stars join us

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♪♪ britney is on broadway. some of the pop stars best hits provide the soundtrack for "one upon a one more time." joining us now is briga heelan who plays cinderella and justin guarini who plays prince charming. congratulations on the show. >> thank you. >> people are loving it. they love to hear the music.

tell us how this came to you and what you thought when you heard about a musical with britney spears music. >> i was in disbelief. i was like is this a joke? it's all of my dreams put into one thing. i thought i was being pranked. the first time i read the script i thought it was so beautiful and exciting. just something i thought i had to do. >> cinderella and britney in one package. >> and it's hilarious. >> justin, tell us about prince charming. >> what i love about prince charming that i get to play is he gets to go on the journey from understanding that maybe this thing i've been considering charming isn't the most charming thing in the world. maybe it was 500 years ago when the story was written. times have changed and women have changed and the world has

changed. it's about his journey and being a person of color it's awesome to be able to represent prince charming. >> briga, we don't want to give away too much and we want people to be able to enjoy the twists. a little version of this cinderella/prince charming story. >> don't mess it up. >> a lot of pressure. i feel like the pressure should be on you. >> take it together. >> prince charming and cinderella start out in the conventional way you know them. then you realize his world may be a bit broader than hers. >> nice dodge. that was well handled. justin? >> for sure. it's just the journey of understanding in this story that's been the story that everybody knows, that these characters and the people watching are able to write their own stories. we wrap this up in this fun,

party atmosphere. so many people say, i didn't know what to expect, but i didn't know it was going to be this. it's just a party. it's fun. >> this show has britney's blessing. she's a producer on it. i understand she came to see the show. >> she came to see a workshop. >> what is it like to look out into the audience and see britney spears? >> i didn't have that experience. she came before i was on board. she was one of the last people cast. i dream about that certainly and just to know -- >> we're working on it. i got to do the workshop where she came to see it. she was excited. like us, when she read the script, she was so excited. we're excited to see how her songs get woven into the script.

the writer has done a great job of taking this fairytale world and her songs and bringing them together. >> as someone who grew up in the new york area and went to broadway shows as a kid, it's so great seeing it come back. what's it like for you? >> it's so exciting. the crowds this show appeals to is so exciting. you have young kids seeing their first broadway show and they don't even know the britney music and they're moved and touched. then you have britney hard core fans like myself and my peers saying, i wish i had this when i was younger. i wish i had this version of these fairytales. >> how much fun is it to be on that stage, justin? >> it's so much fun. during rehearsals i said i wish

we could see ourselves doing the show. it's like a concert experience. getting to be on that stage -- i've been fortunate to tour around the country and this is the closest i've ever been to having that summer concert experience on stage. >> a sing along for the audience. it's "once upon a one more time." briga heelan, justin guarini, congratulations. thanks for being here. >> thank you. that does it for us this morning. ana cabrera picks up the coverage after a final break. why didn't we do this last year? before you were preventing migraine with qulipta®? remember the pain? cancelled plans? the worry? that was then. and look at me now. you'll never truly forget migraine. but qulipta® reduces attacks, making zero-migraine days possible. it's the only pill of its kind

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lower prescription drug prices. and prices are already starting to go down. the out-of-pocket cost is dropping for 27 drugs. [narrator] learn how the inflation reduction act will save you money. right now, there's movement at a courthouse in washington. our team on the ground reporting that members of grand jury impanelled by the special counsel to investigation election interference have arrived. what does that mean for a potential vote on a potential third indictment for donald trump? plus, how the former president's team is preparing. a fumble at the one yard line. hunter biden's plea deal derailed. what happens now? plus, the hottest month ever. the world meteorological organization announcing