such as a sport but an art form. you can see why they do that. there are nine judges. and they have five different criteria. i'm going to read them off. technique, vocabulary, execution, musicality, and originality. so they are going ton judged on all of those. it's a head to head battle. each dance has a minute and don't know the music beforehand. that's the setup. unfortunately for the u.s. women, they did not have the success they were looking for they did not qualify for the final. the men still have to go. >> stephanie gosk, thank you. i know you and i are both look ahead to the women's soccer game on saturday. we'll be cheering together. >> it's going to be so fun. >> so good. that does it for me. "deadline: white house" starts right now. hi, everyone.

happy friday. it's 4:00 in the east. and we head. we're counting down to a night of dualing rallies out there. kamala harris and tim walz are heading to the sun belt for a rally in arizona. while the disgraced, four-times indicted ex-president finally leaves mar-a-lago, where he's been holed up all week to head to the not known to be battle theground state of montana. we'll talk about split screens around here, but this might be the ultimate political split screen news cycle. one side is executing political strategy through battleground states, while the other has been mostly out of sight this week. hanging out at mar-a-lago. one side offering powerful, infectious, joyful, warrior vibes. the other offering whatever they call donald trump's rambling,

lie-filled, divorced from reality message yesterday. to i say nothing of the glowing enthusiasm, tonight's rally in arizona caps off a week of rock star receptions for the democratic ticket. every battleground state they have set foolt in from pennsylvania to wisconsin to michigan, harris and walls have commanded crowds that donald trump makes clear he still dreams of. people standing in line for hours walking miles to get to their rallies, crowds so enormous they spilled out across airplane hangsers. there's a different reception on the ground to tell you about. today in arizona, the local papers are waxing poetic ab the political phenomenon that is the kamala harris and tim walz ticket. here's one of those headlines. there's never been something like this. that's referring to tonight's rally outside of phoenix. and this, the energy level is just out of this world. meanwhile over in montana, the local press there reporting out stories about how trump still

hasn't paid his bills from the the last time he came to town. or consider that kamala harris is racking up endorsements from lifelong republicansscottsdale, this moment as a sea change in attitude in arizona adding, people are just joyous. people are so confident of the job that vice president harris can do that there's room the for joy. there it is again. the j word. joy. there's also the historic political endorsement today from the nation's oldest and largest la tee know civil rights group. the league of united latin american citizens, which endorsed kamala harris and tim walz, it's the first time in the organization's 95-year history that it has made a presidential endorsement. in a press release, they sited the urgent need to put a stop to this. the politics of hate mongering latinos and immigrants. and trump, he seems to be

experiencing whatever the opposite of momentum is. struggling with the furthest corners of the maga movement like the podcaster joe rogan and so the split screen is not so subtle today. contagious enthuiasm and the competent strategy being executed versus one week in mar-a-lago culminating turning on the candidate. maybe it could be boiled down to the politics of joy versus the politics of retribution. "the new york times" writes, harris is positioning herself as the smiling trooper asking voters to choose between the future and the past. we are not going back, she tells her large crowds, and they respond with chants repeetding it back. it's no accident that joy -- a battle-tested version of it hch has become.

we will be joined beto o'rourke in a few minutes. but the reverend al sharpton is with us, host of poll politics nation." and charlie sykes is back. and all dear friends of this broadcast are here. michael steele, i start with you. i keep saying this because i worked on a campaign that tried to manufacture some of these things. momentum, movement in the polls, it cannot be manufactured. it can be executed, and we should say this campaign is execuing at every level, but this kind of enthusiasm is phenomenon level. your thoughts? >> it is. organically, you can't make people like you. you just can't. sorry. you can have all the bells and

whistles. you can open up an airplane hanger, but that doesn't mean people will show ugh. they won't show up to the extent we have seen with kamala harris having open up hangar two. you touched on this i think earlier in the week. and you emphasized it again in the lead in. and that is the j word. joy. that's something that's so coming out of the gut that people feel this sense of relief. that there is relief here. i don't have to live in a distoep yan world where donald trump is telling me you're going to be my dictator. meanwhile, leaving on the table all these other issues that are important to me. and therefore, i have to wait until you get done with the retribution to address the cost of goods and services, my

ability to grow my business, how i'm going to educate the kids in an environment where education maybe tricky. you have crt that you're telling me is bad, but i don't think that's a problem because my kid isn't in that grade. all these things. and all that pressure, kamala harris has found a way to pick a pin in that and break that pressure valve open for folks. and you're seeing it. folks coing out, they are smiling. they are happy. they are anticipate toir. and there's not a campaign on the planet that can manufacture that. people don't feel it, they won't give it. and they give it freely when they do because you're the candidate that brings that out of them. and i think that's something that kamala has been able to do. so the more they level up bogus voting charges against her vp

choice, the these people fall back on joy, and they are like, i like this feeling better than the crap you're serving. >> rev, there's a thing, i think, that women really are feeling. that is the politics of being underestimated. vice president harris has been criticized for laughing. it seems that she is, pun intend ed, having the last laugh. let me read this reporting. adopting joy as a political shield has allowed ms. harris and mr. walz to throw some bare-knuckled punches at jd vance. both do it with a smile and the crowd eats it up. there's no mistaking the sharpness and specificity of their attacks. they do not slide over to his supporters something that people have grappled with for nine

years. they are surgical strikes against trump and mr. vance. >> very surgical, very strategic. and i think that what is most impressive to me is they refused to fight his flight plan. trump is used to setting the pace, setting the tenor of any political battle. and people react to him. what vice president harris has done and governor walz has done is set their own pace, their own tempo, and they are not reacting him. they will just kind of deflate it, maybe give a one or two-sentence answer and keep going with a positive agenda and saying we're not going back to the days of segregation, misogyny, before pre-dobbs decision, voter rights and the like. and as long as you don't fight

another person's fight, they become off balance and don't know what to do. trump has spent the last two weeks trying to get his footing on how to even fight this political battle. because he trained for one person, he ends up with a total different person. he can't intimidate them. everything he uses is not working. it's like training to fight joe frasier and you get muhammad ali. now what do you do? >> instead of compliments on top of compliments, the point, i think, is that it's working. let me show you how the political report reclassified some of the battleground states the nonpartisan report reclassified three key swing states. arizona, nevada, and georgia, from leaning republican to toss-ups in its latest analysis. this is the piece that i think

makes it news. that the politics of joy are working. i think it gets at what everyone is talking about. relief. it gets at her being underestimated. it also gets at the sail yans yens and the vastness of not just the democratic party and the democratic ticket, but how many other people want to find a place inside the pro democracy coalition. >> absolutely. and to quote jay-z, men lie, women lie, and numbers don't. that's what we're seeing in the polls going up, the cash that's being raised and the cash on hand. and the turn out at the rallies, which is unprecedented. we have to remember the last i would say deade really.

even going back to 2008 no now, we have seen a significant enthusiasm on the democratic side around the democratic process generally. and have had had massive turnout, whether it was obama, literally the day before the inauguration of donald trump, we saw the largest global gathering and movement and march ever in the women's march. it was flooded. people were participating. you have now gen z, a whole new group of voters who are going to cast their ballots that are argably one of the most engaged and active young generations we have seen in 40 or 50 years. they grew up in the wake of gun violence. they grew up in this crazy radicalization of the maga era. they grew up in a way that they get their vote matters. they get out in the streets and demonstrate. they are protesting against police brutality. so you seat numbers happening.

but you also have folk who is are really are pro democracy and who want the to be involved, who have been itching for something to come out and be excited about and not just to be mad and angry and protest, but to be celebratory and joyful and to come out and to say, you know what, i know that my presence here matters and my vote is going to count. i see a new day that is bright, that is full of sunshine, and i'm going to bring that forth. it's exciting to remember. in this moment, as much as donald trump and maga wants you believe that everything is dark and gloomy, the majority of the people are positive and enthusiastic and participatory. that's what we see playing out right now. that's why kamala ultimately, in my opinion, is going to win. you can't bottle up that energy and put it back. you can't push that back. that's why we're not going back. >> let me bring in beto

o'rourke. we have spoken about so many of these sort of flash points. and i wonder what your take is having a campaign through the trumpier ro and been face to face with so many voters. what do you think is happening on the ground? >> whatever it is, it makes me so happy. i have not felt like this in a really long time. if i'm anything like millions of other democrats, and probably millions of independent and probably even millions of republican voters across the country, we just didn't know how badly we needed this right now. you can poll test certain messaing, you can look at the metrics in dollars raised or crowd attendance, but something that transcends all of that is the subject of your program today, which is the the joy that i see in the harris/walz

campaign. and as many have said before me on the show, they are no longer playing defense. there's not that sense of fear or even doom about all these terrible things that donald trump is going to do this to country. and he will do these terrible things to the country if he's elect the, but it's almost as though we swept that aside to fiercely focus on the future. it really beautiful future for this country. an ambitious future. there's hope. instead of grievance, there's aspiration. that's really america at its best. i kapt tell you how proud i am of vice president harris and governor walz, for finding this moment and getting kind of past the stuff that gets cooked up in political laboratories or the corporate side of our politics. just finding away is fundamental to democracy, which is people being with people, finding connection and joy in that. and that, i think, more than anything else, is going to power their victory in november.

>> i obviously track some of my former colleagues from it feels like another time when there was a republican party that hadn't imploded and rotted from the inside. some of the arguments from david french and charlie sykes, adam kinzinger, are the most aggressively pro harris/walz arguments out there. and i wonder how much of that you chalk up to how brazenly autocratic and negative trump is or how ripe this moment was for the leadership of someone like kamala harris and her running mate tim walz. >> i think it has to do with trump for sure. i think it has to do with the democratic ticket. it's not used to news to anyone there was uncertainty about this ticket, even as recently as a

month ago and the prospects of president biden winning reelection. despite the extraordinary record he was able to put together in three and a half years. arguably, the most effective president of my lifetime on this planet. i think there was some open questions about vice president harris to be honest. but i think she's answered those. the bounce in her step, the smile on her face, the confidence with which she moves right now, the command and control that she has on the issues, on the people she's gauging with, on her ability to work with the press and really kind of dismiss the bizarre behavior of donald trump is really something. and i also think it's meaningful that as you pointed out in the opening that trump is in montana, of all places. is that because they feel like they have to play defense in a place that should have been reliablely red, but i can tell you in texas, which barack obama lost by 16 points in 2012. hillary clinton lost by 9 points in 2016. joe biden only lost by 5.4% in

2020. this is really the sleeper battleground state. the last time i saw reverend al sharpton before this show today was at the celebration of life services for sheila jackson lee, one of the most extraordinary champions for civil rights in this country. and at the end of reverend sharpton's speech, that entire congregation in the sanctuary was on their feet, rising to the occasion, both in memory of sheila jackson lee and everything she's done to bring us to this moment, but also in the recognition that we're on the precipice of something absolutely amazing. and just think about 40 electoral college votes in texas. if at a min mim we can get trump to play defense here, it's going to open up other possibilities in other states and some day sooner than later, and maybe it's 2024, we win texas. >> i am not a skeptic of the

inevitability of that. because i think what you're seeing at the national level is there a ceiling to the politics of hate and division. and i like that cam describes herself as the underdog. that's the right way to run any race, but especially this one. but i'm excited to see governor walz at some high school football games in the great state of texas. tell me about tim walz you know. >> so got to know this guy serving on the house veterans affairs committee. as yo know, 24 years in the army national guard. rose to the rank of command sergeant majd, the highest rank for an enlisted officer in the history of the united states congress, 240 years plus. but also just a genuine guy, a wonderful human being. reverend sharpton knows this, your other panelists know this.

most politicians will storm into that committee room and give a speech for five minutes and make sure it pops on social media and then they will leave the room. walz was the first guy there shaking the hands of every veteran, every service organization that would come in the room. he was the last guy to leave. he would bring republicans and democrats alike together to work on legislation to, for example, open up more mental health access at a time that veterans were taking a their lives at an alarming rate. who signed that legislation? it was none other than donald trump. this guy can work with anyone, any time, anywhere. to meet him is to like him. it gets back to this idea of joy in the campaign. could kamala harris have picked a better kron trast to jd vance, who i think in opposite to walz, to know that guy is to detest that guy. at a minimum to wonder what that guy is for having previously

referenced donald trump as america's hiterer. and to change his stripes so blatantly in the service of his own personal ambition. that's not going to rally voters. so we're really lucky to have governor walz, who in addition to all of his likable characteristics has done some amazing things in minnesota, like making sure that hungry kids can eat. like putting a billion dollars into affordable housing, one of the most significant challenges that we have as a country right now. and making sure that he uses political capital to help people who desperately need it. that's what this country wants, deserves, needs, and we'll get when harris/walz win in november. >> i hope you'll come back and talk to us. we miss talking to you. it's great to have you. you obviously know and feel a lot of what these two are doing

all across can the country. thank you for making time for us today. >> any time. thank you. and the panel sticks around. we didn't get to charlie sykes yet. we'll do that when we come back. also much more on the news about trump's far right support starting to ebb. trump, who has doggedly defended every last corner of his coalition for more than nine years, is maybe losing some of the more questionable elements of that coalition. perhaps another sign of political frailty. that's ahead. and later in the show, fact checking the lies and outlandish claims from donald trump as quickly as they come. no public figure has ever lied like he does before. so just how do you do it? yesterday the harris/walz campaign showed us all how to do it. they are ready to call him out on each and every one. plus that includes his remarks yesterday that reproductive rights will only be in his view a small issue in

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brought my plus-one. jamie? when you're raised by an immigrant mother, you learn what's possible with determination. >> and determination is how kamala harris went from working at mcdonald's to prosecutor. >> state attorney general. >> u.s. senator. >> and our vice president. >> in only one generation, and with that same determination, she always defend us. >> as a prosecutor, she

protected us from violent criminals. as attorney general, she beat the banks that kicked families out of their homes. >> as our vice president, she fights for women's reproductive rights every day. >> she beat the pharmaceutical companies to lower costs for insulin and prescriptions. >> as our president, determination is how she will stop the corporations who gauge our families on rent and groceries. >> she won't stop fighting until we win. because she knows that determination -- >> when we fight, we win. >> i'm kamala harris, and i approve this message. >> we're back. we're all back. charlie sykes, what's amaizing to me is kamala harris has stolen the brand of the fighter from the guy who if he could would bathe in the sweat from all those wrestling things he likes to go to, and she's done it without resorting to identity politics, without resorting to cheap attacks, but by telling her story in this sort of vein of -- i think her slogan is when

we fight, we win. >> that's an effective ad. i want to go back to this discussion about joy and reframe it just slightly because it has a surprising -- i think as a surprising setting, you can just sense that people were taken aback by what's been happening. it's not just joy. when you break it down, what she's offering is optimism, hope, and i think this is the most surprising thing of all as an incumbent vice president. they have now become the ticket of change. they have become the ticket of turning the page. now think about that. hope was the slogan that barack obama used in 2008. and it swept aside the republicans back then. in 1980 ronald re began was a change agent, but was also known for his sunny optimism. but i think that this is the thing that's really kind of --

i've been trying to sort it out because normally, an incumbent vice president is saddled with all of the baggage of the incumbent party. and she still has to carry all that, but when voters go to the polls in november, they are going to be thinking, do we want to turn the page. do we want to look ahead. and that would be not four more years of donald trump. and the contrast that they have created is the fact that tim walz is likable. he's normal. he's like an everyday guy opposed to this weird guy that the donald trump has chosen for reasons that are not clearly clear anymore. so it's not just joy. they are tapping into all of the themes that have been markers for some rather significantly

historical successful campaigns. and again, none of this was inevitable. and again, you have talked about the split screens a lot. so you have this sort of hopeful optimistic future-oriented campaign on the one hand. then what happened yesterday at mar-a-lago, this dark, distoep ran, apocalyptic parade of grievances and really the contrast could not be any better, which then feeds into the phenomenon of the enthusiasm that you have been talking about on today's show. >> so i'm going to pull back the curtain because you just said to me, charlie sykes, can we go back to joy. in the break, my executive producer said, you want to come in on the tim walz joy sound byte. and i said, no,s we have been talking about joy for 30 minutes. i tell this story because you cannot move off this topic. it's not just who the candidate and her running mate are. it's not just what they are

message is. it's the most basic textbook, political lesson that you were taught when you first started interning for no money on presidential campaigns. that the campaign that grabs the mantle of being optimistic and sunny and about the future always wins. with 2016 as an asterisk. i want to show you what i had said i'm not going to play, but because you, charlie sykes, turned this conversation back to joy, i'll show you governor walz on joy. >> the one thing that i will not forgive them for is they tied to steal the joy from this country. they try to steal the joy. but you know what? you know what? our next president brings the joy. she emanates the joy. >> i think it was peggy newman

that wrote a column about kamala in a scathing manner. she's had to apologize for having bringing happiness to the campaign trail. i think lifelong democrats will talk about how much better she is as a candidate than she was when she ran her own campaign. you learn more from losing. i have been on winning and losing campaigns, and that's always true. and it is also true that the most successful campaigns do what you're doing. they are a message and a messenger and a moment. i want you to say more about this moment. i think the permission structure to feel hope again is as big of a propellant politically as anything else that's happening out there. and to the degree that there were other movements, maybe pent up resentment toward other parts of the country, there's a

pent-up anguish at watching our democracy literally ransacked by trump supporters and directed by trump. there's also a pent-up despair at the lack of accountability. so to take this moment where the only people are the voters and tap into it with a positive message just feels like political gold. >> it does. and i think what your previous guest said, we didn't know how much we needed all of this. we had gotten so used to anger and despair and outrage that when this came along, and i don't know whether the theme of joy was preplanned or anything, but it is that relief. and i think part of it is we had spent most of the year thinking this was going to be this grim long slog to november of voters had made it clear they dreaded the idea of a biden vs. trump. it really did feel like this

dark cloud over america. i think a lot of people were going, you know, maybe our fellow americans are not who we thought they were. maybe we are not quite as exceptional. it was dark. and donald trump's whole message is anger and division and fear. suddenly now, it's shifted. and we're experiencing, i think, kind of a sensibility that we haven't sensed in more than a decade. which is so it comes as a surprise to us as individuals. people should ask themselves. did you notice that weird feeling, that mood that you had that you thought might have been something? no, it's actual hope, optimism, a belief that the worst is not inevitable. three weeks ago. every one of us thought that, oh, my god, this is going to happen again. we are stuck in this cycle of distoep ya. we're going to elect a convicted criminal. somebody who tried to overthrow

the election. how did america get to this place? and suddenly, there's a moment we're saying, okay, maybe let's completely turn the page. maybe let's start believing in good things that will happen again. let's be hopeful again. these are super powers. and as michael steele said earlier, this is organic. you can't manufacture this. there's no amount of money that is going to inject this into the electorate. and yet there it is. and so it is surprising and remarkable. if she can keep that momentum going and become not just the candidate of joy and optimism, but also the candidate of change, that's going to be a very, very potent message and a very dangerous one for 78-year-old donald trump. >> michael, how do you do that? >> charlie framed that as charlie always does so expertly,

and i appreciate that. just to pull back a little bit on what he just said and sort of going a little bit into the change piece. i appreciate the analogy between 2008 and today, the hope and change narratives vs. the change narrative. one of the things that i know very well from that period since i was politically very involved in shaping some of the political arguments that were born out of the 2008 cycle, leading into the 2010 success of the gop, barack obama offered up hope and change. everyone bought into the hope. but what was not clarified by his administration at that times was what was the change. everyone was allowed to define the change for themselves. so my change was different from what charlie would offer up as the change he was looking for

versus the change you may have been looking for. i think what the vice president has a chance to do is to define what that change is in this moment. and to get us al to buy in together on what the change is. and you have heard her begin to frame that when she talks about affordable child care, affordable health care, access to women's reproductive health, and it's odd that in one sense that that last piece is a change piece because back in 2008 that was accepted. no one was talking about abortion as something that we had to rally around to change the political discourse and environment for. now we do. so i think the campaign, if they are careful, in sort of leveling up the hope/joy piece, which is very important because that gets the initial buy in, that they then define for the country what the change is. knowing that not everyone is going to be on the same page,

but at the end of the day, it goes back to the question that we saw emerge this week around criticism about governor and the policies he had in place at the time governor wells, he's so progressive. his response was, okay, so feeding children is now a progressive thing. >> his line was what a monster we have to have this conversation because i think as sort of having been at the campaign for cycles, there's such a natural political gift to saying, you want to push those things through a negative lens, go ahead. but i'm going to defend my record of feeding children and ensuring the dignity of all kids. we need to bring you in on that. i have to sneak in a break. we'll be right back. stay with us. k in a break we'll be right back.

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we're all back. iesha, there is this ability that governor walz has to turn around a political attack. there will be attacks that land, i'm sure, in the next 88 days, but the attacks on his record really haven't because when accused of being too progressive, he says, yes, what a monster. feeding children, protecting and

preserving their dignity, and by the way, a top five state in the country for businesses. here he is signing into law the nutrition legislation. he turned it around on a reporter and said, what a monster. i think full bellies are important for learning. how important is that? the lack of any sort of self-consciousness, the proudly progressive persona? >> don't you just want to hug him? i wanted to be a part of that hug. that's the thing that you walk away from when you see him, when you hear him, and certainly, watching him to his work and engage with constituents, and especially the young people. look, all of the haters are going to hate. and the reality is that the trump/jd vance playbook is one that uses, literally, first and second grade name calling in

order to try to define people. the bullying tactics are so rudiment the ri that they don't even know how to come up with a substantiative assault. so all of that just naturally is going to bounce off of this ticket. because kamala harris and coach walz have so much of a record to stand on that is difficult to poke deep holes in it. at the end of the day, i think the ability for someone who feels like the guy you want to hug, the neighbor who wants to cut your grass, to throw a little shade and have a clapback, that makes it all the more merrier to watch, frankly. and really, i think it flips on its head the idea that you either have to be a brute force bully and jerk and have determination around preserving and protecting america, or you're completely soft on all

the things and can't be trusted to have the type of strength and fortitude required to lead. when you see walz be able to really quickly and sarcastically or with a little bit of bravado as a military man be able to clap back, it shows us that you can be kind, you can be compassionate. just the other day at that rally when he stopped because someone was clearly having what might have been a medical issue and said, wait a minute, do you need some water, let's get somebody over here. then carried on. to be able to be a, frankly, man of a certain age demonstrating that kind of dignity and compassion and tenderness and then also say i'm still hard and tough and you're not going to be able to poke holes at me, that's exactly the model that we need to have out there, one of masculinity to contradict what we see on the other side, and certainly, of humanity that is the aspiration of who we all

want to be and the kind of person we want to be around. i don't see any way that you can uproot the energy of these two at all, no matter what nasty names you call him and what foolishness you want to try to throw at them that is generally a lie. and this idea of leaning into being progressive, we're not going back. we want progress. we want to move forward. that is not a dirty word. >> rev, i think iesha is getting at this thing. if you had young kids over the last eight years, it's been jarring to say don't do what the last president did. don't do anything on social media the last president did. don't be a cyberbully. to have -- and president biden has run on and traveled all of the distance he promised in restoring the soul of the

nation, but to the points that everyone has been making, it felt like it was all along the line in november. talk about what is being modelled in terms of sort of humanity and decency as part of this pack act of this ticket with all the momentum right now. >> i think the package is in and of itself, its story. when you see vice president kamala harris walk on any platform, thousands of people of all races, of all genders cheering, here is a black asian woman with a man of 60 years old coming out of nebraska and became governor in minnesota walking there together with their hands together, this is the america that many people from the baby boomers down to gen x wanted to see.

and they walk in it. you talked about obama's hope. we are always driven by what we want to be. a lot of what we want to be kamala harris is that in high heels. and walz is that with a sweater on like grandpa. that's what helps the message of joy become legitimate from anyone else would appear phoney, but if you are the personification of what the average person want wants, walz doesn't have assets, but he can be a governor and maybe the vice president of the united states. that gives you hope. not a billionaire who tried to beat everybody he dealt with that is sitting there with 34 felonies. what is there to celebrate about that? why would i want to be that? so i think the hope is that they represent the hope of the people that fought for roe v. wade and

voting rights act that may have thought all of that was lost. now all of that comes back and we can look at them because they themselves physically represent the hope that our grandparents and parents had. we can do it again. >> a super panel for a super extraordinary week of political news. thank you all so much for spending more time than we originally asked of you. thank you all so much. don't miss "politics nation" on saturday. his guests include former governor jesse ventura. up next for us, the incredible shrinking trump coalition. once you lost some of the african jiest of the far right fringe, where does an autocrat go next? we'll ask vaughn hillyard next. t go next? we'll ask vaughn hillyard next

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boys -- >> proud boys -- stand back and stand by, but i'll tell you what -- >> perhaps no moment revealed donald trump more than that one right there. given the opportunity to disavow and condemn white supremacists or the proud boys or any of the racist and vile groups, white supremacists, he couldn't do it, couldn't do it. told to stand back and stand by instead. so it is noteworthy today to inform of you who is pulling the plug in support of donald trump. some of those same white supremacists, one of whom dined with donald trump at his club at mar-a-lago, coming out and declaring war today against his campaign. nick fuentes now says trump isn't living up to the america-first values that fuentes and his band of white supremacists expect, adding this, quote, without serious changes we are headed for a catastrophic loss. at least he can read a poll. joining our coverage nbc news correspondent vaughn hillyard.

what's going on in maga world? >> reporter: this is the difficult part is when a clear delineation is not made, and nick fuentes ultimately makes his way to your dinner table at your private estate alongside the likes of kanye west, suddenly there are some added expectations. let's be clear, nick fuentes has been a longtime figure calling for grape war nation, white nationalists, he's called christian white males the secret sauce of america. he said january 6th did not go far enough, and so in his eyes donald trump who has been atop the republican party for eight, nine years now, there was a higher set of expectations. and donald trump in his view is not wholly fulfilling them. at the same time, i want to be clear here, donald trump, earlier this week, nick fuentes went and had dinner at mar-a-lago in 2022, it was the

likes of kanye west who earlier this week kind of got lost amid everything else here. but donald trump said about kanye west, it was specifically -- saying that he was complicated but, quote, a really nice guy, quote, he's got a good heart. and so yet in a lot of ways, that's still not good enough for people like nick fuentes. >> what's trump doing in montana today? why is he there? >> reporter: he is here for tim shehe, the senate candidate, who is running to take down incumbent senator john tester. of course, if donald trump wins the white house, j.d. vance would be the president of the senate, he would be the tie breaker vote. so they would only need one or two senate seats. and they believe that with joe manchin leaving senate out of west virginia that republican jim justice is going to take that seat. and in a scenario that they need to pick up another seat, this would be a good place to begin looking because democrats are on defense in a great number of states, pennsylvania, ohio, wisconsin, of course in arizona,

ruben guego looking to take over kyrsten sinema's seat. democrats, there's only one major potential pickup opportunity, and that would be in the state of texas where colin allred is trying to take on ted cruz. donald trump understand the importance for him if he does win the white house to push through his trump agenda. it would be to have control of not only the house but also the senate, and that's why you see him here in bozeman, montana, along the senate nominee who he's backed. >> vaughn hillyard, thank you so much for your reporting and for joining us. i'm sure we'll be talking to you as all these days go on. thank you for being here today. up next for us, how does the harris-walz campaign go about fact checking someone like donald trump? now we know how -- with truth, with elookrity, with humor, with levitt. we'll look at how it's done after a quick break. quick eabrk. what does a robot know about love? it takes a human to translate

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everything he just said is absolutely false, but i'm not surprised -- >> really? >> the fact is that everything he's saying so far is simply a lie. >> he's averaging an incredible 13.5 false claims per day. >> trump's spewing this blatant lie -- >> i counted at least 22 false claims from donald trump. >> he managed to pack five lies into 140 characters. >> they are the same lies over and over again. >> you're entitled to your point of view, mr. president, but you're entitled to your own set of facts. >> hi again, everybody. it's 5:00 in the east. throughout donald trump's time in our politics, there has been an added responsibility, burden really, placed on anyone opposing him and everyone covering him. the responsibility to fact check the lies he spews at a high and growing rate. trump lies about things big and important and small and meaningless. the size of his crowds, the

results of the 2020 presidential election, immigration statistics, covid statistics, economic indicators, the fact that mexico would pay for his wall, his knowledge or familiarity with project 2025 crime rates, and what actually happened on january 6th. you get the picture. "the washington post" counted that trump lied more than 30,000 times while he was president, and the rate of those lies, as we said, increased as the years went on. trump's lying has of course continued since he's been out of office, defeated by joe biden. at the debate against president biden in late june he lied more than 30 times in 90 minutes. it was barely mentioned in the coverage that ensued. and there was yesterday's incoherent rambling, nonsensical, grievance-filled press conference yesterday at mar-a-lago that garnered wall-to-wall media coverage. in it trump uttered more and more lies, including the outrageous false claim that more people attended his january 6th

insurrection in washington, d.c., than were at martin luther king jr.'s "i have a dream" speech. he said that. our network fact checked him immediately, which is no easy feat considering the sheer volume of lies. and very soon after the networktheir fact check -- networks did their fact checking came the fact check to end all fact checks from the harris-walz gain. a thorough, itemized, pithy takedown, not just with the facts, but with the evidence and the receipts and a bit of cleverless and humor. an epic and important trolling of the ex-president that we can only assume made his blood boil. the list the harris-walz campaign provided, we read most of it on the air, was 31 fact checks. it was important for a lot of reasons, not just because it got the truth out immediately. but it's a really important and healthy display of this campaign's competence and strategy for the next 88 days. be quick, be straightforward, be

accurate, mix in a little bit of humor, and wouldn't hurt to be a little sharp edged while you do it. they called it, quote, donald trump's very good, very normal press conference, and proceeded to say, quote, we work to pin down reality so donald trump, bless his heart, doesn't have to. here are a few of their fact checks again. people have spoken to bigger crowds than donald trump. obama/clinton, literally anyone at lollapalooza, coachella, the world cup. trump said they have commercials at a level no one else does. he's being drastically outspent on the airways. governor josh shapiro is a great guy. trump said he was not complaining. he, in fact, very much was. trump does not know the difference between asylum seekers and an insane asylum. after birth abortion does not exist. minnesota and virginia are not the same. there are no polls that say donald trump is going to win in a landslide. this afternoon the campaign pushed their fact checking endeavors even further putting

out a second press release on what they called trump's temper tantrum. this time with many visuals and many quotes from publications further correcting and pushing back against his copious lies. as we take stock of the powerful display by the harris-walz campaign, begs the question has trump finally met his match as a liar? questions where we start the hour with some of our favorite experts and friends. staff writer for "the atlantic" author of "autocracy inc., the dictators who want to run the world" anne abelbaum, and president of media matters for america is back, and former rnc spokesman, host of the bulwark podcast, msnbc political analyst tim miller's here. anne, i want you just to help us understand why the truth is such a lethal threat to a wannabe autocrat. >> so what autocrats do is they seek to shape reality in a way that suits them. and this has a couple of

purposes. sometimes the person lying does so not in order to convince people but just to show how powerful he is. he's so powerful, he's so important that he can lie, he can shape reality, nobody can stop him, nobody can prevent him. and that's something you see in dictatorships all over -- all over the world. another purpose sometimes is to create the sense of uncertainty and unclarity that makes people feel we don't know it's true and what's not. if you keep lying repeatedly, over and over again, contradicting yourself, saying first one thing, then another, eventually you give people the feeling that they'll never know what's true, and why should they participate in political life if it's just full of lies and crazy stuff that they can't understand? it's a way of making people feel apathetic and making them feel like they don't want to be part of politics. and you know, these are tactics used in russia, they're used by dictatorships all over the world, and they are also used by

donald trump. >> donald trump i think first displayed his commitment to the first thing you're explaining to us, this alternate reality, when he went to the cia of all places. like an institution rooted in truths that protect the lives not just of americans but of our allies around the world, and stood in front of the wall that honors those who have lost their lives anonymously serving the cia, and talked about his crowd size. and i remember watching it -- i think i was on the air live. i remember watching it with my jaw on the floor. but it gets at the second thing you're mentioning, the lies so audacious and things previously sacred that they're disorienting. talk about that as a tactic. >> it's a tactic used to, as i said, to make people feel like there's no point in participating. it also makes people who are part of government institutions unsure of what their jobs were

going to be. i mean, the lie that i remember really well at the beginning of the trump administration was when he claimed that his crowd size on the mall during the inauguration was the biggest ever, and he tried to get the national parks service to lie about it. and that's -- >> yeah. >> that's one further step. you know, that's getting people whose job it is to monitor crowds and to take care of -- keep the grass clean and people who are dedicated to protecting our national parks and who have environmental training, that's trying to get them to participate in his fantasy. and that -- that is an extraordinarily dangerous thing to do. it was a little thing, it was stupid, and people laughed at it. but it was an attempt to bend reality so that he would both frighten people and scare people aware from politics. >> angelo, let me show you

something extraordinary last night. let me play a little bit of it. >> it was 2016 all over again today. donald trump spoke at his home in florida for over an hour, and all of the cable news networks including this carried it live just like they all did repeatedly in 2016. it would be hard to find a sentence in what donald trump said today that did not include at least one lie. we went back nine years in the press coverage of the campaign, the media coverage. donald trump gets credit from the people he lied to today for lying to them. they appreciate it. reporters understandably and incorrectly believe that the most important thing a candidate can do is answer their questions. but they don't know what an answer actually is. word spoken after their question marks are not necessarily answers and are never answers when they come from donald

trump. >> i play that because harris actually did answer questions yesterday. she walked to the press before she got on the plane. she answered all of their questions. i don't think they were shouting at her when she walked away. and i don't know that everyone was even sitting in her live events. we were because we heard they were happening when we were on the air. but just explain to me in any way you want to, annecdotal, systemic, why the press is still struggling with how to cover donald trump. >> i mean, in part i think -- a few reasons. one, in part it ties in with what anne was talking about before. this is what happens when you're confronted with this avalanche of lies. you flood the zone, and then they drown. they haven't adapted. that is a physical euro -- a failure of the industry to figure out an approac that is professional. and another is muscle memory. keep in mind this is the first

election in 30 years, first election in 30 years, where rush limbaugh's not the single largest get out the vote operation. i'm using that as an illustration to point out that we've been dealing with for decades a massive right-wing media echo chamber that has not just been an amplifier of lies and false narratives and misinformation, but has also repeatedly beaten up the press such that they in an attempt to inoculate themselves from cries of bias have actually started to privilege all kinds of misinformation, false narratives, and have adopted a double standard as a matter of course. and there's all kinds of examples of that. in the weeks after donald trump became the presumptive nominee, he didn't do any sit-down interviews except for one with fox, but he didn't do a real interview. there wasn't any clamoring in the press asking why he wasn't doing interviews. yet there have been clamorings this week and criticisms of harris that somehow she's not doing something for major publications by not sitting down

for an interview. that's a double standard. or how about in may when donald trump made -- reportedly made an offer to oil executives to spend $1 billion on ads, in exchange he would roll back a bunch of environmental policies. the only network, national network that covered that was msnbc. and then if you look on social media, every single major news channel and news operation that week on their social media chanlsz covered the fact that vice president harris said the "f" word, but not a single talked about that deal and the report about donald trump. so i think that's what's going on here. it's they're confused and disoriented, and there's muscle memory here that's been built up over decades. >> the asymmetry, angelo, has been i think the biggest dynamic that has aided donald trump. and i remember talking about it on the "today" show and the 2015 republican primary. the asymmetry. i think it was mitt romney who wrote an op-ed and called on trump to release his taxes.

maybe that was the beginning of 2016. the double standard that the press -- either accepted or didn't know how to sort of find the strength to push back and required the same standard for trump as everybody else. do you see any signs -- i see signs in this fact check that happened yesterday that the harris campaign may be the first institution to try to push back against that asymmetry. do you see any signs that make you think maybe this gig is up for trump? >> yeah. i mean, i think usually when we talk it's about something sort of a little depressing and unsettling. but this is a -- >> totally. >> this is -- this is a positive thing, and this is a real positive thing. one of the thins the right wing has is -- things the right wing has is their audience has baked in this amplification narrative. not only do their people lie, but they repeat that. they amplify it, they saturate it.

then you have the media that's out playing this referee. what the harris campaign has done really effectively so far is they understand that these packages are not only for news outlets. they're also for their audience, their people, who then go and can take that content and amplify it. they want to amplify it. it's designed in a way to actually empower individuals to share it to others. it's fun to share. not just to stick it to them because it's tomb truth. and -- actually truth. and there's a saying of how a lie can get halfway around the world before the truth can get its boots on. the only way to counteract that asymmetry because lying is a cheat -- it is an advantage, is to actually do this not only because it allows people to spread it but generates a backboard effect on traditional news outlets. if they have not adapted to be the vanguard, they can be the laggard by covering the effective work that the campaign is doing. they can't ignore it because their people are helping saturate it. i think it's a really positive thing. >> tim, it is all of our job,

right, to defend and protect the truth. my colleague, rachel maddow, led her show with a really powerful monologue about how the rule of law needs to be defended. and about how it is mortal. i think you could extend that to the truth. the truth is to be defended. it is all of our job. but for reasons that anne has articulated, share in -- people are a combination of numb and disoriented in some ways by trump's lies. i want you to build on what angelo's saying about these real signs of life in the harris-walz campaign -- it looks like something very different. and i know you were on one of those republican primary campaigns that ran against trump in '15 which was sort of the first patient zero in terms of dealing with his lies that weren't checked by the press and weren't really held -- wasn't held to account by the voters ever.

but i wonder what you see when you look at this harris-walz campaign. >> yeah, i agree with angelo. look, we made a bunch of mistakes in counteracting trump in 2015. i think we deserve some grace because it was an effort to dealing with this monster, frustrating to see subsequent campaigns make the same mistakes. some we've talked about here and in commentary about how to combat this. it's important to fact check, the truth is important. but it's also important to mock. and mock him and belittling him in a lot of ways is more powerful than fact checking. in part because of what angelo says, it's more fun for people to amplify and share that are on her team. but also because it takes away his power in a certain way. and just like, for hypothetical example, you know, if yesterday during the press conference he's out saying, well, the economy's terrible. okay, well one way to fact check that would be to say something like, you know, people's take-home pay has increased slightly more than inflation has. so it's not terrible, it's doing

pretty good. that's true, that's a true fact check, but is that that compelling? that kind of plays into his hands in a lot of ways. you're now talking about inflation. now think about a different one where he lies about how his crowds were apparently bigger than mlk's "i have a dream" speech. responding by saying, you know, little donnie trump's having a temper tantrum because his crowds are so small. which one of those feels more powerful? right? feels childish, i get it. we want to take the high road, be serious. as a political matter it's more effective to take away his power by belittling him and fact checking and including humor with the facts, and not letting accusations go unchecked. all that has to happen. i think it's been encouraging that harris' campaign has been able to do it. i also think the fact that she's a woman and a woman of color makes it even more powerful for her to make those attacks against him because they sting more for him. you know, if he's all about in

machismo, the belittling, you know, coming from a strong woman, a vice president, i think carries a lot more oomph. i think that's another reason why it's worked a little better than it has in some of the other cases. >> tim, you went for sort of being on a campaign against trump and dealing with all the frustrations against the press to being part of sort of the press that covers our politics. what is your sense of -- i hate to lecture anybody else in the press because we're all doing our best. but what is your sense of the opportunity, if you will, that the harris campaign has to sort of build on or learn from the lessons where other campaigns have come up short? >> yeah. look, i maybe have a little different view than some others about yesterday's press conference. look, i think showing donald trump as this ranting, raving, grumping grant grandpa is good. i think where the press goes wrong is where they sanitize

donald trump or they hide donald trump. like the thing that makes me the most critical about the press is when donald trump has a raving press conference and the headline the next day in the paper is like, you know, donald trump criticized his foes about economy. no, that wasn't the news. an insane person compared himself to martin luther king jr. favorably, and also made up a ridiculous lie about how willie brown told him some scandalous stuff about kamala on a helicopter. when like that never happened, right. so the real headline is, a liar that might be mentally declining goes on an angry grandpa rant. that was the resign yesterday. and so i don't mind people seeing that stuff live so much as then in the post, how do you handle it, how does the media cover it, how do they speak truth about what really was happening without sanitizing it, without making his words sound better than they were, and how it the other campaign amplify the craziest parts so that people can see it. and i think that that latter part is what the harris campaign has done well, and that first

part is what the media kind of gets a mixed grade on. >> yeah. this is a conversation to be continued. it's not always the most comfortable conversation to have. but i really appreciate all three of you. thank you so much for starting us off on this. anne, angelo, to be continued, tim sticks around a little bit longer. when we come back, despite some rent love from far right extremists, rfk jr.'s campaign is disappearing before our very eyes. he stopped opening any political events. he's plunging in the polls. and his bizarre and deeply disturbing story about leaving a dead bear cub in central park because he thought it would be funny could be the final nail in his coffin. that's next. plus, the disgraced ex-president saying reproductive rights will only be a, quote, small issue in this year's election. it is delusional thinking from the guy who brags about ending roe v. wade once and for all as voters of all stripes have stepped up to protect abortion rights and abortion health care

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get the fastest connection to paris with xfinity. opening her -- there are a number of colorful word to use to describe the independent presidential candidacy of one robert f. kennedy jr. bizarre, confusing, unsettling. but successful does not appear to be one of those words. our nbc news campaign calls it rfk jr.'s incredible disappearing campaign. polling is way down. money is tight. kennedy's not yet on the ballot in all 50 states. there are ongoing legal challenges seeking to prevent

him from appearing on ballots in new york and pennsylvania. and public events, ones he puts on, the last event was one month ago today. even when he has received attention lately it's been for all the wrong reasons. that includes what we'll shorthand the bear story. a recent admission from rfk that raises more questions than it answers. that reads like a bizarre fever dream, but the short story goes like this -- in 2014 on the way to do some falconry, as one does, rfk jr. says the car in front of him hit and killed a bear cub. with the intention of skinning the bear cub, he threw it in his vehicle. but the day went late, then dinner went late, and kennedy decided to ditch the bear cub carcass in central park in new york city, to be funny so he could catch a flight.

don't think about it too hard because everyone is just as sickened by the story as you are. about that story and the future of rfk jr.'s bizarre presidential bid. joining our coverage, "new york times" investigative reporter suzanne craig is back with us. tim is still here, as well. sue, i didn't think the dead worm in the brain scoop that you had could be outdone in terms of bizarre political headlines in this cycle, but it has with the bear. i won't ask you to speculate about any correlation, but just tell me sort of this -- the state of the rfk campaign. >> yeah. i mean, diminished is right. this just gets stranger every day. when these stories start to come out, as a journalist i think what's going to happen next, what's he going to do to top the bear? and i think that his motto seeps to be any press is good press at

this point. the campaign is very diminished. you mentioned the money is tight, they're losing staff. and when i think about the campaign now -- i've been following it and following and sort of doing some investigative work on bobby since last year -- i think of it very much as any resources that they have are going into ballot access. they are trying to get access on every ballot, they may not get it, but they've secured it in 16 states, and they're in progress in a number of other states. it's been very rocky. they're sitting in new york, and they've got -- they're fighting to get on the ballot here because he's claimed that he lives in new york, and there's a court fight going on about whether or not he does. and if he loses that, that could lead to lawsuits in other states. but this is -- it's important to watch this lawsuit. but you know, stepping back, he's -- doesn't have -- not a lot of people are giving him money. in is just very much -- this is

just very much any money they get goes toward this ballot access fight. that's why you're not seeing him on the campaign trail. >> and see, it seems like the harris-walz ticket has made clear that the rfk voter is sort of a disaffected trump voter. what is the campaign's sense of acknowledgment of what appears to be the political reality from the polls? >> right, there's been all this debate about bobby kennedy and who will he pull votes away from. are people who -- you know, is it trump, was it biden, is it now harris? there's a poll out that says -- and the numbers are interesting. it says now that kennedy winds 8% of democratic leading independents compared with 23% of republican leading independents. so it's looking more now like, you know, he's drawing -- the vote here is more the trump --

you know, the trump voters are more likely to vote for bobby than the other way around. so it's -- it's good for kind of harris at the end of the day. >> sue, what is the -- the sort of state of -- i mean, i keep thinking of trump's american carnage frame. it fits over the rfk candidacy, too, right? his family came out and disavowed him. all of his legal woes are giving fodder i guess for any journalists who are tasked with covering him. what is the sort of state of political wreckage around this candidaci? >> i mean, it's been like watching a car wreck, it really has been. he is having some success on the ballot, access is what you want, you got to get on the ballot to get votes. around it is just this side show culminating with this crazy story about the bear, and it's not even just crazy, it's upsetting to think that this

happened. >> yeah. >> we only have his version of events. but let's talk about that for a minute. he is coming from an event with friends, he says he's in a car and the car in front of him hits the bear. so did he -- he get out and picks up this cub, saying that he plans to skin it and eat it later. right away, in order to do that in new york state, you need a permit, and you know, you have to get a tag to do that. he didn't do that. so right away there's the violation of the law. he's a lawyer in new york state. he has a master's in environmental conservation. he has taught that subject. this is somebody who knows it, and he's smart enough to know that the statute of limitations has passed on that. but then he goes and he dumps it in -- he has to go for dinner. there's a lot of things that don't add up. he goes to dinner at peter lugar's. he has to catch a flight, but he's so late he drives into the city. peter lugar's is in brooklyn.

he dumps it in central park with his friends thinking it would be funny. he said he thought it would be funny or something. it's not. dumping a bear in central park is problematic. i mean, it just -- layers upon layers of bad judgment on this. and we've seen it with other things. i don't know if you remember but there was a "vanity fair" story where there was a picture of him eating either a goat or a dog, we're not sure. but the picture was horrific to look at. and this just keeps coming back to this issue of judgment. you know, bobby kennedy has said he thinks the media is overblowing these things. i think there's a conversation to be had, and we've been having it for a while with bobby kennedy, but about his judgment. >> yeah. i mean, tim, i think sue's being diplomatic and journalistic which are her calling card. i can't say on tv what people who know him and know his wife say about him. you know, it starts with sick and rhymes with duck. i mean, this is sadistic,

disgusting, unrelatable at the least behavior. and i think that if anything the media is under covering it because he's not politically viable. but if we had the bandwidth in this extraordinary political season to shine the political lights on him that he warrants, it would not be pretty. i guess my question here is, what is getting him, you know, this sort of second look from pretty powerful voices in the media landscape like joe rogan? >> yes, the joe rogan video other day saying that he -- not endorsing bobby kennedy but saying that he's the one that's speaking truth. to me, this is just a bunch of contrarian cranks. if you look at i had poll numbers -- his poll numbers, they reed issed down to the contrarian cranks. he was benefiting and getting attention earlier in the summer from what we call the double haters. this was anybody who watches political shows, hearing that phrase a lot lately, double haters. it was voters that didn't like

trump or biden. and so they were just parking in their support for bobby kennedy, not because they're into his weird desire to skin baby bears or his other strange eccentricities, that was the way of saying i'm unhappy with my choices. i'm going park my answer over here in option c. and now that, you know, democrats obviously have a choice they're happy with, maga republicans at least have a choice that they're happy with, his numbers have gotten down to just these sort of contrarian crank podcast bros. as sue says, the data that you look at shows that that takes mostly for trump. so his campaign is now just -- like a rump campaign with a very small support staff. and you know, we could do i think a whole 20 minutes on the bear story. but just since sue is -- in the media, the real reporter, as a point of personal privilege i'm hoping that somebody, maybe her, would ask the campaign when he showered that day. and maybe seems like a small thing to me, but he's falconing,

going to dinner, taking a dead bear, and getting on a plane. there was no discussion of going home. a pretty gross day for bobby kennedy. >> do you know more about the timeline, sue? >> no, i mean, a lot of the timeline doesn't add up, especially the trip that he's -- late for a flight and sitting at peter lugar's and you're going to enter manhattan and drop a bear and take time to take photos you and the bear and separately you happen to have a -- some sort of bike in your trunk with the bear. like -- i just -- i remember the moment i was -- it was a sunday when the "new yorker" broke that story and bobby went and got ahead of it. and he put out a tweet of i can't wait to see "the new yorker's" spin on this. then we have this crazy video of him talking about it with roseanne barr. i'm like, you're right, i can't

wait to see the "new yorker" spin either. there's no spin on this. this is just bad. and roseanne barr made a comment later that i read that said -- she said, well, to the effect of, you know, at least it's in the press and bobby's getting mentioned. i don't know where this ends. like it's really something. and bobby himself has said he's got a million skeletons in his closet or something to that effect. maybe there is a lot more to come. >> sue craig, it's wonderful -- wonderful to see you. and it's important to understand the story. so we're grateful to have you talking us through it. tim miller, thank you for spending the better part of the hour with us. always great to have you. when we come back, the disgraced ex-president who paved the way for dismantling roe versus wade could be in for a big political shock this november if he believes what he said yesterday -- that reproductive rights and access to health care are a, quote, small issue. that story's next. ext.

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i think the abortion wish has been very much -- issue head been very much tampered down. i think abortion has become much less of an issue. it's a -- i think it's actually going to be a very small issue. >> so what do we think? he's either lying, being lied to, praying or panicking. whichever way it is, he's not living in the same reality as millions of americans.

men, women, voters from all across the ideological spectrum who now live in states with abortion bans that he made possible. that was donald trump at his incoherent, dishonest, hail mary press conference yesterday falsely claiming that abortion, quote, isn't a big issue politically anymore. despite abortion being one of the biggest and most consistently motivating issues for voters since roe was overturned. he also in a muddled answer signaled that he's open to banning the most common form of abortion, the drug mifepristone nationwide, something which happens to be a key policy priority detailed in black and white in the text of project 2025. you know, the far-right blueprint that trump says he never heard of until two weeks ago. one thing is for sure -- trump's hope that abortion won't be a big issue in this election couldn't be more of a fantasy as voters continue to learn even more about the devastating reality, again, that he made

possible for every american woman and family. a new report by house democrats found that donald trump has created a maternal health crisis with dobbs as doctors flee states with abortion bans, with women unable to get the health care they need including patients now in america, in 2024, dying of sepsis. whereas the harris campaign put it in the fact check, we showed earlier, quote, abortion is not less of an issue for voters. it is not subdued. it is not a small issue for voters despite how much donald trump wants it to be. let's bring into our coverage president of reproductive freedom for all minnie timaraju, and former trump representative -- the delusion -- i think there's a theory when trump lies he accordions. there's a tell when trump has

been lied to. it's the head cock. it's clear someone said don't worry, it's not such a big issue, nothing could be further from the truth. >> good to be with you, nicolle and minnie. i have to tell you, i read his statement, the transcription of his statement, it made no sense. it was incoherent. and the lead up saying it's a small issue, that tells you everything you need to know about donald trump. it's a small issue to him because he doesn't care about the truth, the facts, or anybody else. it is not a small issue, i'll tell you, to my constituents. it's not a small issue to me and my three daughters-in-law and my three granddaughters. this is an extraordinarily important issue. but donald trump in his rambling incoherence yesterday, i don't think he knew what they asked him about mifepristone, i don't think he understood it whatsoever. what i decided to do was look at my copy that i'm trying to get

through of project 2025. and sure enough on page 457, on around abortion pills, reverse approval of chemical abortion drugs and stop the mail order use of chemical abortion drugs. so his team behind him who is using him as this large orange puppet knows exactly what they're trying to do. donald trump doesn't have a clue. >> minnie, actually -- i love that you have your stickies in yours. i have stickows mine, too, with -- stickies on mine, too, with little notes. and i'm sure we've read more of it than donald trump. he's certainly as attached as could be to it. minnie, i want to show you one of the harris campaign's first messages to their -- to voters. >> we who will fight for reproductive freedom knowing if

trump gets the chance he will sign a national abortion ban to outlaw abortion in every single state. but we are not going to let that happen. and when congress passes a law to restore reproductive freedoms, as president of the united states, i will sign it into law. [ cheers ] >> we've talked a lot about the political power in terms of turning voters against republicans. you've got the extreme bans that are opposed by 87, 93, and 97% of all americans depending on what they ban abortions in the case of rape and incest, abortion in the life of the mother. some republican states go that far, and they're super polarizing. but trump seems especially deluded about the power of being for protecting access to health care. what do you make of the opportunity the harris-walz

tickets has in the next 88 days? >> yeah, no, it's really exciting because voters really need not just to be opposed to something, they need motivation to get off the couch, right? and we've seen in poll after poll and in real-life elections when abortion's on the ballot in these ballot measures in tough states, voter turnout is surging, particularly around hard-to-reach voters like 18 to 35-year-olds, voters of color, women, soft republicans, independents. we know abortion is a motivating issue. we know that it's a voter turnout issue. and with kamala harris and her robust issue and the advocacy of the biden-harris administration on it's an exciting time. you add tim walz with his personal and compelling ivf story which really, i think, resonates with a lot of new demographics who may not have seen such a compelling voice from a white midwestern

governor, and couple that with the fact that, you know, he -- minnesota under his leadership was the first state to codify federal right to -- sorry, statewide right to abortion post dobbs. we have an opportunity to drive a proactive, positive message about what democrats will do, to fix this mess. and i think that's going to seal the deal and really be a capstone to a lot of the important strategic contrast work we've done to nail republicans and show what donald trump was responsible for doing which is overturning roe v. wade. >> so interesting you mention governor walz on ivf. i'll share with everyone, my theory is that on this issue there's a hidden male vote. so i'm going to -- i have that sound of governor walz on ivf. i have to snea in a break. eak.

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[ applause ] you have my pledge, as long as i'm a governor, ivf will be a lifeline. >> we are back. congresswoman, it's hard to put into context how extreme the republican vision is in terms of eliminating not just access to abortion but access to ivf. your thoughts on having this midwestern former football coach as a messenger on the dangers of the republican ticket. >> what a beautiful man and what a beautiful statement. i couldn't be prouder of the choice kamala harris made in choosing governor walz. look at how he personally connected on the issue of ivf, on the issue of infertility and the struggle. i take it as personally as he

does. it matters to my family also. so when you have a small person like donald trump say it's a small issue, donald trump is about to learn that he is absolutely wrong on this. you take a look at this ticket. kamala harris and governor walz, they are brightness, they are hope, they are talking about our future, all of our futures, freedom for all of us, not half of the population or one portion of the population. the other side, it is entirely darkness and lies. even look at the rhetorical setting yesterday of the meandering press conference. darkened room that is gilded. not responsive to the needs of the american people, to the needs of the voters. i just so honor governor walz and mrs. walz who let their personal story come forward so we will do our part. we have to do our part to protect reprductive rights and

freedom. this election matters from the top of the ticket to in my case senator casey being re-elected to the senate and bringing more democrats to the house who are going to assure us that we will pass legislation that will protect reproductive rights. >> congresswoman, thank you so much for spending time with us. another break for us. we will be right back. ack. started disrupting my day. td felt embarrassing. i felt like disconnecting. i asked my doctor about treating my td, and learned about ingrezza. ♪ ingrezza ♪ ingrezza is clinically proven for reducing td. most people saw results in just two weeks. people taking ingrezza can stay on most mental health meds. only number-one prescribed ingrezza has simple dosing for td: always one pill, once daily. ingrezza can cause depression, suicidal thoughts, or actions in patients with huntington's disease. pay close attention to and call your doctor if you become depressed, have sudden changes in mood,

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those pillars of our democracy are fragile and our rights are under attack. reproductive rights, voting rights, the right to make your own choices and to have your voice heard. we must act now to restore and protect these freedoms for us and for the future, and we can't do it without you. we are the american civil liberties union. will you join us? call or go online to my aclu.org to become a guardian of liberty today. your gift of just $19 a month, only $0.63 a day, will help ensure that together we can continue to fight for free speech, liberty and justice. your support is more urgently needed than ever. reproductive rights are on the line and we are looking at going backwards. we have got to be here.

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a warning, these images could be triggering to anyone watching who is worried about his crowd size. stunning pictures coming out of arizona of the wildly, seemingly endless lines of people waiting to get into the harris-walz rally in arizona today. the campaign had to hand out water and gatorade to the supporters, braving the blistering 105-degree heat to get inside. vice president harris and governor walz will deliver remarks in just a little over one hour as part of their nationwide tour of battleground states this week. it's harris' third time in arizona since march. it comes on the heels of her getting an endorsement from a group of arizona republicans, including the mayor of the city of mesa, arizona. a long line. wow. another break for us. we'll be right back. 'll be righ. the right ingredients make all the difference. ♪♪ herbal essences sulfate free is now packed with

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