tv Alex Wagner Tonight MSNBC August 9, 2023 1:00am-2:00am PDT
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it'll keep popping a lot more. tonight another turning point, did, miller -- pepper thank you very much. that is all in on this tuesday night, alex wagner tonight starts right now, good evening alex. very much. that is all in on this tuesday night. alex wagner tonight starts right now. good evening, alex. >> chris, to that point i think the polling numbers are almost exactly the same. it's like 57% of ohioans are against ballot issue one and 58% of them support the choice of the constitutional amendment. it tracks almost identically, which means this is very good news for the ballot referendum in november about insidelining reproductive choice as a constitutional right in the state of ohio. >> enormous gap we keep seeing
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time and time again. they won't let it go. >> anyway, it's a good night for people who like democracy and representative democracy. thank you, my friend. and thank you for joining us at home for this hour of television. maybe it's a university commencement, you get the idea and then there are speeches from our most recent former president. before i show you his speech today, i have to warn you it is vulgar, but we are going to play it uncensored for reasons we will outline after we play you this sound. so prepare yourself. >> i'm sorry, i won't be able to go to iowa today. i won't be able to go to new hampshire today because i'm sitting in a courtroom on bullshit because his attorney
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general charged me with something. terrible. >> that was the former president of the united states, president donald trump in new hampshire today calling the multiple criminal indictments against him, very serious charges, that was trump characterizing those indictments as b.s. now i'm not bringing this up because trump was unhinged in new hampshire today but how unhinged trump is might matter. trump poegsed on his website if you go after me, i'll come after you. after he posted that special counsel jack smith asked the judge in the 2020 election case issue what is known as a
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protective order limiting what trump and cannot say publicly. and here was trump today talking about that very same protective order. >> crooked joe now wants the thug prosecutor, this deranged guy, to file a court order taking away my first amendment rights so i can't speak. we don't want you to speak about the case. the case, i will talk about it. i will. they're not taking away my first amendment rights. >> i will talk about it, i will. we should make clear here this isn't jack smith saying trump can't talk about this case at all. this is jack smith asking specifically donald trump not be allowed to do anything that could intimidate or threaten anyone involved in this case, and we do not have to imagine what that might look like. in its own filing yesterday trump's defense team literally crossed out, striked through
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text certain lines of the prosecution's proposed order. the defense doesn't think trump should be barred from publicly releasing things including recordings, transcripts, interview reports, and related exhibits of witnesses. he will talk about it. he will. so today the judge in that case, tanya chutkan, scheduled a hearing at 10:00 a.m. in washington, d.c. to settle this matter, but why question is what happens if trump is ordered by a federal court not to talk abouting something like this but then just does it anyway? presumably there's some legal peril in trump's strategy here, but that does not seem to be stopping the man. in fact, on top of all this, there might possibly be more indictments to come. today the same grand jury that indicted trump last week was spotted meeting again in d.c. grand juries cannot continue meeting on indictments that have already been charged, so this will be something else. this will be something new, and that comes after we got this very great reporting from betsey
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woodruff swan at politico. on monday jack smith's prosecutors had a closed door interview with a friend of rudy, bernie carric. and they asked him how his pac raised enormous amounts of money. you may remember trump raised $250 million in the eight weeks after the 2020 election, and he did so by running ads like this one. >> america deserves an honest election. this is what they got. suitcases of ballots added in secret in georgia, dead people voting in wisconsin, a money have votes scheme in nevada. poll watchers denied access in pennsylvania, faulty ballot drop boxes, and clerks facing felony charges in michigan. the evidence is overwhelming. >> for months well before trump's latest indictment came out we have seen report after report that special counsel jack
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myth was investigating trump's use of false claims about the election to raise money. he even had reporting smith was particularly interested in seeing if any of that activity amounted to wire fraud. and now it looks like we have confirmation that part of jack smith's investigation, the part that deals with potential wire fraud and campaign finance fraud, that that part is very much ongoing. the special counsel may not be done here. >> there wasn't a second of any day i did not believe that election was rigged. it was a rigged election, and it was a stolen, disgusting election, and this country should be ashamed. >> joining us now are betsey
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woodruff swan and co-host of the prosecuting donald trump podcast, andrew weissman. thank you both for joining us tonight. andrew, are we going to see a superseding indictment here, or do you think this grand jury action is about the coconspirators unnamed in the initial indictment? >> well, i think the odds of seeing a superseding indictment in the january 6th case against donald trump are low, and that's because it's clear that the prosecution wants it to go to trial, and they want a trial date and they want it to be either before the election or even before the republican nomination, but what we could see is to your point the coconspirators i think it is highly likely some if not all will be indicted, but that could be in a separate case. and then on the financial piece, that also could be a separate set of charges, and that doesn't necessarily need to go all the way up to donald trump to bring
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that case. remember that case is similar to what we saw with steve bannon and his cohorts which is build the wall, which is basically a fraud case where you raise money for "x" but not using it for "x." that can lead to pretrial forfeiter. you could end up with that pac being frozen. >> the same america pac. >> and what is it being used for? >> legal bills. that is deeply problematic given the fact this is effectively the piggy bank for all the defendants thus far towing the line for donald trump. this is where they lawyers we think are being paid from, so to have those funds frozen could mean significant legal implications. >> there could be funds that are available, but if it's funds obtained by fraud, and obviously the government would have to prove that. there's a shelling that needs to
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be made, but you can get pretrial orders in the special counsel investigation. obviously that all requires proof. it requires the court to do that, but if this is where they're going, you can do that, and it doesn't have to be a charge against donald trump. it could be against the pac itself, against lower level people and still have both civil and criminal forfeiture. >> bernie carrick was meeting with prosecutors. can you tell us why bernie carrick may be the kevin bacon that connects the folks in the wheel? >> yeah, he's a bit of a forestt gump type character. bernie carrick, of course, was the nypd commissioner. he's been very close allies of
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giuliani for decades now. and in that crazy window between election day 2020 and january 26, bernie carrick very much worked hand in glove with rudy giuliani under him on that legal team that was trying to find any sort of evidence, any sort of pretext to make the case that the election had been stolen by so biden. what we also know based on a conversation we had today with bernie carrick's lawyer in the special counsel's team for an interview he held earlier this week is that jack smith prosecutors were very interested in save america, interested in who was making decisions about fund-raising and also who was interested in making decisions about how the money that the pac raised was spent. when it comes to this fraud question, one thing people should keep in mind based on public reporting going back for years now is that a real bone of
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contention between rudy giuliani and people in trump's orbit was the fact that rudy giuliani actually hardly got paid during that window of time. giuliani and his allies were pushing trump in the months or two after biden's inauguration to help pay giuliani for what he had done and to pay him for the exploding legal bills that giuliani was facing. so an outstanding question is not just were the save america pac fund raisers deliberately lying, essentially committing wire fraud in raising money for that entity, but also when they claimed that they were going to use that money, the money people gave very generously, these trump small donor dollars gave in that window, when they said they were going to use that money to contest the election, what did they actually do with it, and what does that mean from the standpoint of the laws governing campaign finance?
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>> there's not been the public suggestion bernie carrick is going to be giving shall we say damning evidence to the prosecution, but it sort of sounds like he might. >> that's right. i'm not aware of any indicators that bernie carrick's testimony was the sort of discussion that would have gotten rudy giuliani in trouble, but he's important, of course, because he just knows so much. when it comes to the question of filling in factual gaps, having somebody who was in the room for conversations, having someone who can explain all the minor characters who played important but perhaps underestimated roles in the machinations that rudy giuliani and sydney powell were involved in, carrick himself provides that valuable insight. he is not indicated in trump's indictment as an unindicted coconspirator, but without a
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doubt he was very close and had detailed knowledge of the activities of rudy giuliani, who of course is one of those unnamed unindicted coconspirators in the indictment. >> andrew, there are a lot of flies on the wall in the campaign in the white house, and a lot of flies -- the metaphor is going to exhaust itself shortly, but before we end the segment i do want to ask about this protective order because it very much remains, you know, unresolved. judge chutkan has said you have come in here on friday, the trump team didn't want to come in until next monday. she's laid down the law. >> she's the judge. >> she is the judge. but i do wonder the behavior of trump on the campaign trail does not show a man particularly concerned with the content of everything he's saying. he's as aggressive as he ever has been. what are the potential outcomes here? >> so one thing i think really important for people to recognize and has not gotten a lot of attention is when you are out on bail you do not have the same rights as the rest of us.
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just remember people await trial at times in jail. >> to say it's restricting my first amendment rights, that's right and at times a judge can do that if it's necessary. here the judge i think is going to be very concerned about the integrity of the judicial process. what i mean by that is making sure donald trump is not using his speech to threaten witnesses. now, we saw that happen the day after the arraignment, when he had sworn he wasn't going to do that. he's out on bail on three cases. if i was a judge, that's the primary thing i'd be worried about, and that's why the government -- this may seem like a small skirmish. it really goes to making sure that witnesses, jurors, judges -- >> judges. >> family members are not going to be harassed and threatened. and it doesn't mean that donald trump is going to do it himself,
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but he is certainly aware that his reckless talk leads to those consequences, and unfortunately the country has seen examples of that. and we've talked about people like ruby freeman and her daughter. and we talked about paul pelosi, fbi offices, that family members of alvin bragg, of the judge in new york all of whom have been actual people who are victims of donald trump's mouth. and saying things he shouldn't. and that is the reason why you have this kind of protective order to make sure this doesn't happen. >> tonight he continued to post on truth social going after judge chutkan impugning her reputation. the deed goes on as it were. betsey, thank you for that great reporting. thank you for joining me tonight. andrew weissman, we're never done with you.
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ohio voters went to the polls today and chose to protect democracy from an all-out assault. breaking election results are coming up. plus when one of trump's defense attorneys tried out a brand new defense on fox news this weekend, was the judge watching? we're going to have more on that coming up next. ah, these bills are crazy. she has no idea she's sitting on a goldmine. well she doesn't know that if she owns a life insurance policy of $100,000 or more she can sell all or part of it to coventry for cash. even a term policy. even a term policy? even a term policy! find out if you're sitting on a goldmine. call coventry direct today at the number on your screen, or visit coventrydirect.com.
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if you were watching fox news on sunday night, you may have heard donald trump's former attorney, a man named jim trusty, you may have heard him offer up a novel theory about the classified documents case against the former president. >> there's a lot of shenanigans in terms of grand jury usage. you don't do a grand jury investigation for a year only to move it to another district unless there's more to the story. there'll be litigation i assume that relates to these issues of how the grand jury was used or abused, but it's certainly, again, new territory when doj shifts an investigation at the last minute to an entirely different venue. >> okay, so that's mr. trusty floating the idea the special counsel's use of a d.c. based grand jury, the one that has heard this case for months, that that is somehow suspicious and that somehow prosecutors abused the use of this grand jury and that that abuse should be litigated before a judge.
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now enter aileen cannon, the u.s. district judge overseeing that classified documents case down in florida. the day after mr. trusty laid out that argument on fox news, judge cannon issued this ruling with no prompting from trump's defense team. she just did it on her own. judge cannon pointed to the prosecutor's use of an out of district grand jury, the one in washington, d.c., to continue to investigate and/or seek post-indictment hearings, and she deemed the use of that grand jury suspicious. judge cannon questioned the legal propriety of that move, and she ordered special counsel prosecutors to explain themselves by august 22nd so the issue may be litigated. so either there is really an unusual psychic connection between the mar-a-lago judge or one of trump's former lawyers or -- back with us is andrew weissman,
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co-host of the prosecuting donald trump podcast and the man credit where credit is due who came up with that theory that judge cannon's surprise ruling just might be related to jim trusty's on-air arguments the day before. also joining us is joyce vance, the former attorney in the northern district of alabama and professor at the university of alabama. andrew, you're the person who put together this appearance on fox news where jim trusty says d.c. grand jury, florida grand jury, these two things can't mix, and then cannon mysteriously coming out with the sort of mirror of that argument in one of her rulings. what's going on here? >> so, first, regardless of how she got there, the fact of what she did is to say the least unusual. she did it as you noted on their own, and it showed a fundamental
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misunderstanding of basic 101 criminal law as to haw grand juries work, which they can continue investigating the ongoing crime of either an existing defendant or other defendants and other crimes that may be committed. so this is a classic case. it is also the case that you can bring the grand jury investigation in any district where the crime may have occurred. remember when you start an investigation, you don't even know if the crime has occurred or who did it or where it occurred, so you're allowed to go to many different district wheres it could be the case as long as you have a good faith basis. this is such a fundamental misunderstanding. i was thinking where in god's green earth is she getting this idea? because it's so off the charts from everything in the record. why is she doing this? it's not like the litigants raised the issue. she's doing it on her own, and
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it's so wrong. and there you have jim trusty, the former president's former counsel raising this issue the night before, and that morning she issues this. so it's a real issue in terms of people who think judge cannon may have learned her lesson and this might be cannon 2.0, she's really changed since the 11th circuit struck her down twice. this suggests -- >> not so. >> not so. this is still cannon 1.0. >> or just cannon 0.0, beta testing. what are the implications here? do the prosecutors face any repercussions here or is this so unfounded or for lack of a better term bonkers no one is going to take it seriously? could this affect any of the materials derived from the closed door testimony of the grand jury in washington, d.c.? >> no, it won't have any impact
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on that grand jury investigation. alex, i think bonkers is a pretty good word to use to describe this argument. and andrew and i -- andrew, we may have been in this situation at one point. it's not unusual to have different district attorney's office commencing an investigation because both of them are seeing some form of crime at the same time. both offices investigate until they bump into each other, and then they'll resolve the issue of which district will move forward with what charges. nothing improper about having those grand juries operating at the same time. but beyond this idiosyncrasy andrew has pointed out in the argument she raises, it's not that she raises it, it's the context she does it in. the government has asked for a garcia hearing. that's a hearing between conflict of interest between one of the defendant's lawyers and his client. this is walt nauta's lawyer, and
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he represents some of the folks or has represented in the past folks who will be witnesses in this case. so the government asks the judge to set what's called a garcia hearing so that they could go into open court and put that on the record with the defendant present. some defendants will hear that their lawyer has a conflict of interest and they might choose to reconsider that representation. you know, i don't want to be too suspicious here. i just find it to be passably odd that the judge has taken a motion that's supposed to be about one thing and she's come up with this crazy theory and instead she's trying to make it about that. so i'll throw a little bit of oxygen onto the flames of the argument that andrew is making. >> well, please do, joyce, because i think even to it layman this seems deeply problematic. i mean it's not just -- it's more than -- i mean this is a judge who has not had almost any trial experience. she's very young, and lots of young people with not a lot of experience do extraordinary
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things. but thus far her batting average is not good, and is there cause to maybe ask for another judge at this point if you're a prosecutor on this case? >> so, alex, it actually gets worse on what we've discussed so far because the government submitted to her some information about these other people who were cooperating for the garcia hearing joyce talked about, and that was grand jury material. and the judge said why was this submitted to me under seal, you didn't setout a basis, and struck them from the record. the basis -- i'm sure joyce and i had the same reaction which was our jaws clattered to the ground. the basis is grand jury secrecy. that is, again, 101 -- i mean there is no more that you need to say. and the second part she then said something about where the other investigation was, which was also grand jury secrecy. so the government has to be
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thinking what do we do at this point? >> yeah, and joyce, to that end the thing that sort of rescued the special master debacle was the 11th circuit not known as a bastion of liberalism. do you think somehow they get involved in this? there's plenty of trump appointed judges involved, but they seem to understand the law in a way judge cannon does not. >> i think we know the special counsel does not want to have to go to the 11th circuit. he's trying to focus straight ahead getting his case to trial, but that said there's some things that happen where you can be forced to take an appeal to the 121th circuit, and it's a court well-versed in handling a prompt appeal. i think we could possibly see an appeal on the issue andrew identified, this notion she won't let them put evidence that has to do with grand jury proceedings into the record under seal. again, that's a pretty standard thing to do, and they may have to appeal her, and an appeal
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like that would be a good time to raise the recusal issue if they're so inclined. but, you know, this is not an inexperienced judge when it comes to the way of federal prosecutors because before she became a judge, she was an assistant united states attorney in the southern district of florida. she served in that appellate division. she knows how a grand jury works. it's tough to believe this was just a simple mistake. >> ooh, a little edge of nefariousness injected in the end right there. andrew weissman, joyce vance, no two better people to weigh in on this topic. thank you both for your time and expertise as always. still more to come this evening. there is a new casualty in florida governor ron desantis' culture war, and that casualty's name is william shakespeare. i'll explain that coming up. >> breaking news out of ohio where democracy itself just won. that's next. t won. that's next. how can you sleep on such a firm setting?
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rejected ballot issue 1 about 57% of the state voting no. now, that number is with about 52% of precincts reporting according to unofficial results from the ohio secretary of state. ballot issue 1 was a measure to raise the threshold for changing constitutional amendments. essentially it would have made those amendments harder to pass. in gerrymandered states especially ballot referendums on constitutional amendments have become some of the only ways voters can make their voices heard especially when it comes to big ticket issues like reproductive choice. not coincidently there is one such referendum on this november's ballot in ohio, one that if it passes could protect abortion rights and stands a very good chance of passing especially with the results we have tonight. and that is why republicans in the state tried to make it harder to get those sorts of referendums passed. now, there has been record breaking turnout in this august election, which is somewhat ironic because earlier this year
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state republicans voted to eliminate august elections citing the traditionally low turnout for elections at this time of year. but those very same republicans changed their minds this summer because presumably that traditionally low turnout would have benefitted them on this issue specifically. having said that, as of last friday more than 578,000 people had already cast their ballots, which is more than twice the number of people who voted early for the 2022 primary. joining me now is katie perris who also opposed ballot issue 1. thanks for being here tonight. i suppose congratulations are in order. this is an issue you guys fought hard for. can you talk to me about what women were telling you about ballot issue 1 and what motivated them to go to the polls in ohio, a state that is reddish if not red entirely?
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>> well, women were very clear in their rejection of extremism in this election, and there's no doubt that our desire, our demand to get our reproductive rights back is a huge motivating force in this election, but voters, suburban women are who we represent, and it's just incredible to see these election results tonight. you know, counties in the suburbs that actually went for republicans for the u.s. senate and governor's race in '22 are voting overwhelmingly no tonight. and we're seeing that in our ex-urban and rural counties too. in my own county which is one of our urban counties where cleveland is but also has tons of suburbs, this is one of the places where we have to go big, and in 2022 our turnout just wasn't enough to carry the
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state, but we are seeing a dramatic difference tonight. just turnout is blowing everyone out of the water, everyone's expectations. it is good to be an ohioen tonight, and i think the ramifications are huge not just for the reduction of extremism in ohio, but republicans they have gone too far all across this country. it's not just trump, and this is a big message against extremism tonight. >> on that note certainly abortion seems to be a driver that continues to bring democrats, independents, and some republicans out to the polls, but this was beyond just that. these were sort of anti-democratic tacticthality were being embraced to make it harder for voters to get their voices heard, and i wonder, you know, how that fit into, you know, the portfolio of reasons why people were going out. i wonder if you heard not just from women but from independents who understood this to be what it is, which was, again, a way of muzzling if not censoring the voices of ohioans who have a tough time getting legislation
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passed given the gerrymandered nature of the state. >> it was very blatant. red white and blue actually a third of our members are former republicans and independents. and if republicans keep trying things like this, those numbers are just going to continue to grow. this is absolutely not just democrats rejecting extremism, this was independents and republicans as well. it was so transparenty a power grab and just going way, way too far. and, you know, not only that i think they really expected, hey, you know, we're just going to sneak this through, this will be a low turnout election, no one will notice. but then they saw these huge numbers coming out in early voting, so they cranked up their disinformation machine. it has been a shame to see what we've seen across the state in the last few weeks. there have been huge attempts to drive fear into the hearts of voters. even my group and me personally, we've been targeted. as these targets of
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disinformation, what we've sean tonight that doesn't work, that voters see through the diore has been backlash to that. i have had women across the state telling me it has motivated them not just to vote but to reach out to their friends and to their family and make sure that everybody is voting no in this election. this is about our democracy. it's about our values, it's about being able to have a voice in our state, and that went bay beyond any partisan lines. >> can i ask, are you assuming are you as bullish on the passage of the ballot referendum in november that would enshrine a woman's right to choose into the state constitution? the numbers track almost evenly in terms of support for that with opposition to ballot issue number one. do you think this is the same sort of turnout will be the case in november? >> i have never been more excited to vote yes in november, and that is what i am hearing from voters across the state
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tonight. you know, we were -- red white and blue was a big part of this coalition across the state collecting signatures. you might know we collected 710,000 signatures to put reproductive freedom on the ballot. that effort started in march. every single voter we cited said okay you've got to vote no in august and then you get to vote yes in november. and we're so, so excited for that opportunity tonight. and we know every poll shows -- i don't trust every poll, but every poll from everyone shows 57, 58, 59% of ohio voters will support this reproductive rights amendment. i mean some of these numbers are just incredible. 85% of independent women support the reproductive rights and ballot initiatives. so, yes, i'm very excited. i'm proud to be an ohioen tonight, and i do expect good results in november.
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>> congratulations tonight. thank you for joining us tonight. >> thank you so much. still to come this evening, it is a comedy of errors but it is not funny. florida schools are bearing the brunt of governor desantis' latest front in the culture wars. we're going to explain all that coming up next. explain all tha coming up next
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school teachers in hillsborough, california, as they head back to class this thursday. according to the tampa bay times english teachers there are preparing lessons for the new school year with only excerpts from william shakespeare's works. if the students want to read a whole shakespeare they have to do it on their own time and that is happening in the new education act brought to you by governor desantis and that law tells schools to steer clear of content in class discussion that is sexual in nature unless it's related to a standard such as health class. a hillsborough school district spokesperson told the tampa bay times they took that law into consideration when redesigning their lesson plans this year, and what they came up with was just teach the non-sexy parts of shakespeare, not the whole plays. as the paper put it, in staying
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with the excerpts, the schools can teach about shakespeare while avoiding anything racy or sexual. so this means that "hamlet" and "macbeth," "romeo and juliet yates, none of them will be played in entirety. they'll be shielded from excerpts like this. >> come you spirits of tender mortal thoughts. >> lady, shall i lie in your lap? >> i think nothing my lord. >> wants montague? it is not hand nor foot nor arm nor face. nor any other part belonging to a man. >> the guidance here is make it
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shakespeare but not. hillsborough county school member -- it feels much of this is intentional, she said in order to cause as much chaos in public education as possible so that the collapse of public education is swift and the agenda of education privatization can move forward with less obstacles. all of that is happening as the governor's presidential campaign is absolutely imploding. the latest on team desantis is coming up next. desantis is coming up next
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if donald trump were to be found guilty by a jury, where do you see this going? >> civil war. civil war. people have had it. we've had it. >> that was a trump supporter in new hampshire today telling nbc news' vaughn hilliard if trump was convicted, there would be civil war. where have we heard this before? meanwhile trump's nearest competitors for the nomination continue to battle themselves. just two weeks after ron desantis laid off a third of his campaign staff, today the campaign is retrenching again. messenger news was the first to report governor desantis has now replaced his 36-year-old campaign manager who had no national campaign experience with a 35-year-old political aide with no national campaign
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experience. desantis' new campaign manager previously served as the governor's chief of staff in florida where he was known as spearheading the state's disastrous anti-vaccine and anti-masking policies during the pandemic. so that's the desantis campaign. meanwhile former vice president mike pence has announced he's qualified for the republican party's first primary debate later this month. it is cause for some celebration in pence world. the former vice president is currently polling at 6%. joining me now to make seps of all this is tim miller, writer at large for the bulwark. i love your news today. you have a novel theory about why some of these shall we call them underdogs may be in the race longer than would naturally make sense. can you talk about that theory? >> well, i mean it's partially a theory and partially based on what desantis super pac told me, and i kind of stopped short when he suggested that maybe his
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candidate and some of these other candidates would stay in the race longer to amass delegates in the possibility that donald trump is convicted, in jail, so ensconced in legal troubles that he could not accept a nomination. to me this feels like it's the bargaining stage of accepting a loss and that it's happening rather early, before even the first debate. the fact these guys are talking about this i think shows how desperate the straits are. is there an outside chance donald trump is in jail by next summer? yeah, i guess so. and we'd all love to grab the popcorn and watch a republican convention floor fight, fighting with his delegates from jail. that seems like the strongest position to which to fight the front-runner. >> if that's your best strategy. having said that also there's the mathematical reality. a lot of republican primary
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states are winner take all, are they not? >> yeah, exactly. there are some proportional, but donald trump has been changing that. there's no way you can get to a majority this way. i think the thinking is right maybe we stay around because if there's negotiation that has to happen they have a stronger hand. it mostly speaks to donald trump's strength and just how desperatethies these campaigns are and how few outs they feel like they have. you mention mike pence, for example. vivek they want somebody maga and vivek is trying to offer a pale imitation of trump.
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they're trying to come up with these cockamamie theories. >> you did say not all his events might be empty but i myself was shocked he could not pack the hall. i mean even with all his campaign shakeups this is person who has a fairly sizable operation. you think his advance team might do something to make sure that was packed. were you surprised? >> i was. i'm not good at crowd guessing, alex. i never like to do that but in this case i got to count the crowd. there were 44 people that showed up and kind of a big barn, and i took a picture like why are they doing this? as if they have this massively funded super pac, it's on the weekend. there were some events that were better, but going back to
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ramaswamy, later i saw him 2 miles away with triple the size of the crowd. it looked a lot better. i don't think it's like the problem desantis is having. >> you know it's bad when we can actually count the crowd. that is our show for tonight. "way too early" with jonathan lemire is coming up next. i will talk about it. i will. they're not taking away my first amendment rights. >> if he continues on his promise and is true to his word today at the new hampshire rally he is going to talk about the case, and if that means talking about whatever evidence is restricted in an agreed upon protection order, we will have a presidential candidate who's campaigning behind bars because he's being held in contempt of court. that's where a slow moving train is now speeding up and headed. >> former president donald trump promising to violate his potential protective
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