something that the president and sticking point number admi. obviously everything is colored would love to accomplish and be by the impending return to power of donald trump, and i'm a piece of his legacy, along with funding ukraine, but i wondering if you're a leader of an arab nation who cares about think that the thinking within the west wing is that over time, the palestinian cause, who is looking at not just gaza but what's happening in the west you know, once some time has bank, and you recognize that you passed, people will view this have an incoming president who is more or less going to tell presidency more favorably than they do right now, which was bibby, do what you want for a certainly a contributing factor little bit and then tidy it up. to harris' loss. >> yeah, i think that's right. how does that affect your posture, not just with respect certainly a complicated legacy, to what's happening in lebanon robust legislative record to be sure but then trump's "the wal but on all of these fronts. >> let's do lebanon first, sam. journal." safe travels today and thanks to all of you for getting up "way here i think if you're hezbollah too early" with us. "morning joe" starts right now. up north, you're lebanese, you really want to cut a deal now. on the south launch the >> right. >> and so that is why i think white house, president biden pardoned two turkeys from the ceasefire is moving forward. stepping back a little bit and minnesota named peach and looking at the larger frame of blossom. thanksgiving isn't for three the middle east, the capital that is most disadvantaged by more days, but the turkeys the return of the trump looked at biden and said, we'd administration is arguably not better get this done. kyiv, it's tehran. biden promised that the turkeys and so you're iranian, you

would not get killed this november. probably are looking for ways to democrats were like, hey, that's what you said to us. avoid a sledgehammer coming at you. that gets us to the arab world. here i think you're exactly oh, hey! i hope everyone enjoyed the right, sam stein, meaning that pardoning because next year those turkeys will be matt gaetz particularly the kingdom of saudi arabia, the crown prince, and rule y giuliani. bin salman, the arab world with >> the turkey white house pardon. he didn't exactly pardon him. he just turned the investigation money, are definitely waiting for team trump to come back. over to merrick garland and it they have deep pipe there including financial engagement just petered out. with jared kushner, the that's right. president biden presided over president's son-in-law, who will the annual white house turkey probably ride point for the pardon and granted clemency to administration here in the middle east. so you're holding, holding, beach, blossom, and before anyone noticed, hunter! holding, getting ready to go all >> giving plenty of material for in. all in being defined as finally the late night shows last night. we have a busy tuesday morning, just 48 hours away now from recognizing the state of israel by the kingdom of saudi arabia. that won't happen until after thanksgiving including special counsel jack smith's decision to the inauguration. that's the next big strategic drop both federal cases against muscle movement. donald trump. we'll have expert legal analysis >> admiral, you mentioned kyiv. let's turn to that theater now. for you on this straight ahead and what it means for whether it seems that both sides have

they could come back down the really ramped up the fighting road. meanwhile, the president-elect's promising an executive order here as winter approaches and significantly raising tariffs as also as donald trump approaches, promised during the campaign on both sides trying to get as much canada, mexico and china, the gains as they can. russia even deploying a new impact that could have on america's latest trading missile, it appears. partners and the economy here at what's your analysis as to where home. plus, the latest on negotiations for a ceasefire the fighting could go in the deal between israel and the months ahead before possibly a terrorist group, hezbollah. move to the negotiating table? good morning. welcome to "morning joe." it is tuesday, november 26th. >> i think you categorize it i'm willie geist. exactly right, jonathan, which joe and mika are off today ahead of the thanksgiving holiday. is to say both sides are pushing with us the host of "way too hard for advantage knowing that they are going to be headed to a early" jonathan lemire and managing editor at the bulwark, negotiation, probably mid-'25 if sam stein. donald trump federal election not sooner. and so, on the russian side, you case being dismissed. see the deployment of the new jack smith filed motions weapon. yesterday to drop all federal you indicated a hypersonic, ten charges against trump regarding times the speed of sound, very his effort to overturn the 2020 difficult to intercept missile. presidential election in the you're seeing 10,000 north leadup to the january 6 on the koreans thrown at the battlefield. those are moves designed to enhance a bargaining position. capitol and mishandling of

on the other side, went back as classified documents. hours later u.s. district judge far as a few months ago, the attack into russia by the ukrainians to hold the salient chutkin granted the release of the indictment. around kursk and above all now trump's election victory means the use of the atacms missiles, the justice department's long-standing position that a finally. all of that, both sides pushing sitting president cannot be charged with a crime will apply to strengthen their position. how does it come out? to donald trump once he takes i would guess what you see now office on january 20th. if you got out a map and looked the ruling leaves open the at the battle positions, it's possibility the charges might be refiled after trump leaves going to be pretty close to what office, noting trump's you're seeing now. and that's a tragedy. protection from prosecution only lasts as long as his term. at the end of the day, putin will have managed to bite off as for the classified documents 20% of a neighboring country, case, special counsel regulations require jack smith illegally, immorally and using to file a report to the attorney war criminal behavior. general explaining his charging decisions before he steps down.n on the other hand if that deal is consummated, the rest of ukraine, the 80% is on, the path interference in georgia, but, as you know, that case is currently to the european union. it's not the worst deal in the world. i think that's probably how it comes out. >> and ukrainians fully expect

down the road vladimir putin to come back and for more so they on hold. trump also awaiting sentencings want that path to nato. they want weapons. on 34 felony convictions in new they want to be a harder target york in his criminal hush money going forward. case. just last week the judge issued retired navy admiral james a delay without providing any stavridis. thanks, as always. new sentencing date. we appreciate it. coming up, a closer look at some of the people donald trump has picked to lead the nation's let's bring in our reporters, top health agencies and the vaughn hillyard, legal impact they could have on key correspondent lisa rubin, former issues, yes, like vaccines. "morning joe" is coming right back. u.s. attorney and msnbc contributor, chuck rosenberg and justice and intelligence correspondent ken dilanian. good morning to you all. a good group to sift through a busy morning in the courts. chuck, let me start with you about jack smith basically saying we're going to put this to the side with the attempt to overturn the 2020 election and also with any surprises for you what you heard yesterday? >> not really. i think it was necessary. on three occasions the department of justice under president nixon, under president clinton and now under president

biden have more or less weighed the same question whether a sitting president, in this case a president-elect, can be prosecuted. the answer is no. i think that's correct practically. the smith team moved to dismiss the cases without prejudice, meaning at least theoretically they could come back one day but for now they are gone. i think it was the right thing. some may be disappointed, some elated. as a constitutional and legal matter, as i said, inevitable, necessary and appropriate, willie. >> and, ken, it was worth noting jack smith, when he announced this yesterday, did not say, we're not dismissing the case because we have a strong case that donald trump worked to overturn the 2020 election to interfere in the outcome. we're just saying, we believe, as chuck just said, with the justice department policy that sitting presidents cannot be

prosecuted. how about for you reporting from the inside, how did this come to be, and were you surprised by anything you u saw yesterday? >> not surprised at all. jack smith felt he had no choice but to do this and it was a strategic move on his part. no choice because he's a justice department employee and as soon as donald trump was elected his office asked the justice department's office of legal counsel whether that long-standing policy that presidents can't be indicted or prosecuted would apply to a president-elect before he's inaugurated, and the olc came back and said, yes, we believe it would apply. at that point smith felt he had no choice but to seek the dismissal of the case. he could have potentially resigned first and kept the case around and let the trump justice department deal with it, but he then would have lost control of what he would say in concluding this case. you can imagine a trump attorney general saying, we can no longer stand behind the case. to the contrary, jack smith made

very clear in the filing that this decision does not speak at all to his view of the evidence of the case, of his chance for conviction. they are standing behind the prosecution. and, as you said, he will file a report. now there's some question whether there could be any new information given the compressed time frame here because normally the intelligence agencies have to review, in a case like this, whatever new information is released. they had to view everything that went into the indictments, and there just isn't time for a review like that. i think we can expect not to learn much new information in the report, but we may see a hardy defense, a challenge to the idea this was somehow weaponized or politicized and an explanation of exactly why they brought these cases >> it's just extraordinary that this is where we are. remember those high-profile january 6th house hearings that came ahead of the federal charges there in the election interference case. we remember the fbi search on mar-a-lago and the firestorm that created politically, and yet, after two years' worth,

this all ends, lisa, with a whimper. this goesquiet possible way, donald trump and his legal team played the waiting game, tried to delay, delay, delay, it worked. they pushed it past the election. he wins. these cases now are abandoned. give us your analysis of what happened yesterday and whether or not you think there is a chance, even a slim one, they could be revived down the road once trump leaves office. >> first, in terms of what happened yesterday, i fully agree with chuck this was inevitable and necessary. the department's internal policy did not allow for them to do anything else other than to dismiss these cases. but, in terms of the contingencies, both of these cases have sort of, like, revival opportunities there only if the trump justice department sort of leaves them alone. and what i mean by that is, first of all, jack smith said in his filing to judge chutkan yesterday there's an open question whether the statute of of limitations, could be paused while he takes office.

that doesn't mean, for example, that the trump justice department through their own office of legal counsel couldn't issue a new opinion saying it is unconstitutional and that's a possibility that might happen. with respect to the florida case, that dismissal is, of course, only against president trump not against the two other defendants. but were i the trump justice department, i'd be thinking about pardoned for walt nada and (man) mm, hey, honey. looks like my to-do list grew. "paint the bathroom, give baxter a bath, get life insurance," hm. i have a few minutes. i can do that now. oh, that fast? remember that colonial penn ad? i called and i got information. they sent the simple form i need to apply. all i do is fill it out and send it back. well, that sounds too easy! (man) give a little information, check a few boxes, sign my name, done. they don't ask about your health? (man) no health questions. -physical exam? -don't need one. it's colonial penn guaranteed acceptance whole life insurance. if you're between the ages of 50 and 85, your acceptance is guaranteed in most states, even if you're not in the best health. options start at $9.95 a month, 35 cents a day. once insured, your rate will never increase. a lifetime rate lock guarantees it. keep in mind, this is lifetime protection. as long as you pay your premiums, it's yours to keep. call for more information and the simple form you need to apply today. there's no obligation, and you'll receive a free beneficiary planner just for calling. dexcom g7 is one of the easiest ways to take better control of your diabetes. this small wearable replaces fingersticks, lowers a1c, and it's covered by medicare. for the future. the older you get, the more complications you're gonna see. i knew i couldn't ignore my diabetes anymore because it was causing my eyesight to go bad. for my patients, getting on dexcom g7 is the biggest eye opener they've ever had. i couldn't believe how easy it was. this small wearable sends my glucose numbers right to my phone or my receiver. with just a glance i can see if i'm going high, low, or steady. so, i can make quick decisions in the moment. now, i'm a superstar. my a1c is 5.7. my a1c has never been lower. no other cgm system is more affordable for medicare patients than dexcom g7. don't wait! call now, and talk to a real person. here you go. is there anyway to get a better price on this? have you checked singlecare? whenever my customers ask how to get a better price on their meds, i always tell them about singlecare. it's a free app. accepted at major pharmacies nationwide. before i pick up my prescription the other two defendants. at the pharmacy, i always check the singlecare price. it's quick, easy, and totally free to use. singlecare can literally beat my insurance copay. you just search for your prescription, and show your coupon in the app to your pharmacist. i just show you the coupon and i get this price? that's right! go to singlecare.com and start saving today. ♪ ♪ ♪ something has changed within me ♪ ♪ it's time to try defying gravity ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ something has changed within me ♪ ♪ something is not the same ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ it's time to try defying gravity ♪ we would love for you to be our elphaba. we want you to be our glinda the good. ♪ ♪ third down and two. if you talk to people in trump here is hill. world, john, they are much more he gets a first down, and on he angry about the case and things that went on there than even the goes, inside the 10, end zone, federal election interference case. i think that we can expect them touchdown. justice hill. >> justice hill, juked at the to pardon them because they line of scrimmage, bouncing it outside and turning on the jets don't want some of what happened for a 51-yard touchdown run, there to be rehashed, particularly given the allegations of obstruction of helps the ravens cap week 12 of justice against the former the regular season with a win president as they manifest in over the los ang os angeles cha. the charges against those two individuals. >> a great point about what the justice department may do. lamar jackson accounting for these two cases very much in three scores last night throwing

doubt. the georgia case's future deeply for two, rushing for this one. murky and even though there was a nice little sidestep into the a conviction in new york, it's end zone there. derrick henry did not score. hard to say whether there will ever be a sentencing there. that was the first time he has not scored as a raven, but he that may be tossed aside. vaughn, he got away with it. still racked up 40 yards on the he got away with all of it. ground, having a big year for baltimore. there were four criminal cases coach john harbaugh improving to 3-0 in nfl games coaching against donald trump. they have all now, they appear against his brother who is now to be all on the verge of going the chargers' head coach, jim away. let's talk about the politics of this now. harbaugh, of course. this is now donald trump who has 30-23 was the final score, ravens over the chargers in l.a. emerged victorious electorally and from the legal system. so jonathan lemire, you look at he's going to be emboldened and he might be seeking vengeance. we're now getting into down the stretch here week 12 in the >> when the next generations books. the afc kind of looking the way look back at this in the history books, this will be a twofold it always looks. you have the chiefs, who look a answer as to what happened. little vulnerable. a lot of close wins. number one, when was mounted as you have the bills, of course. a delay in the doj really the ravens are near the top. throw in the steelers. pressing forward particularly but the good teams appear to be on. election interference case. right where we expected them to jack smith didn't get his hands be. >> yeah, that's exactly right. on this case until november of 2022 after the work of the the chiefs have had the remarkable knack of winning january 6th select committee. close games this year, even it was not only until then that against a bad carolina team, but you started to see vice outside of one, they have president mike pence be called managed to pull it off all in and go before the grand jury season long.

and actually talk with the the steelers took a tough one in the snow the other night. prosecutors and answer the ravens closed the gap there. questions. two years, almost two years after the january 6th attack. and buffalo with josh allen, i would say the mvp favorite, and then the second participate looming as well. sam stein, it feels like the nfc part of that who made the is maybe a two-team race? decision to bring these to a close? who was that? it was the voters, americans, one could argue the lions and eagles seem to be clearly ahead who made the decision that the system of justice was not going of the rest of the field, though to see the end in these packers and vikings also in the particular cases. nfc north nipping at detroit's in large part, one year after heels. january 6th, i was out in one team not in the playoff arizona. it was donald trump's return to contention, the new york giants, the campaign trail. who, of course, now have ridded january of 2022 out in arizona. themselves of daniel jones. and at that point in time he was i wonder if he will sign with running what amounted to a the cowboys for the thanksgiving propaganda campaign that the game this week. my question to you is, do you election was, in fact, stolen from him. there were fbi instigators that think -- should it be a fully cleaned house? were involved in the capital do coach and gm need to go, too? attack, not his people. >> you're going to rule out my and when he traveled around the country the last three-plus years, you heard from a giants with tommy devito? significant number of americans that believed it or questioned did you not see us last weekend? its truth and ultimately in i think we scored seven points. november of 2024, what happened, pretty good. we suck! we're horrible. americans said, despite watching >> there it is. >> it's embarrassing. what unfolded on january 6, it's awful. they need to clean house.

2021, that they wanted to return i will say -- i can't even care that much. him to the white house and effectively end these cases against him. i don't know why i am so >> you know, sam, how many times did we hear people say over the exorcised right now. course of the last couple of years with donald trump running did you watch the to get back to the white house, cowboys/commanders game? part of the reason, or perhaps that was incredible the end of all of the reason he's doing the game. this is to become president and that was insane. people in d.c. were sickened by it. keep himself out of jail. i agree with your synopsis. well, it appears he's done that for now. the lions look amazing, just a we'll see if they really do revive these cases down the juggernaut. you know, they have this -- dan road, an 82, 84-year-old former campbell coaching, you know there's going to be a moment in president is sitting there. the playoff where something this is mission accomplished as far as his team is concerned, seems so spectacularly idiotic and they effectively said as to do and he'll be like, yeah, i'm going to do it, and all the much yesterday. lions' fans will be pulling out their hair. my money still has to go with, >> it's four years from now, assuming trump is no honestly, i hate to say it, the longer president four years from now, so i do think he wriggled eagles and saquon barkley. they look really good. out of this one. >> saquon, speaking of salt in it does get to the basic idea the wound for giants fans, trump has this incredible teflon saquon, who we loved as giants about him, and you just can't fans, who never really had a deny it at this point. quarterback or weapons on the and it does raise questions, too, including one i think i outside line, is having an pushed to chuck here which is mvp-style year.

did merrick garland fumble the he went off against the rams the other night. just the raw athleticism. ball? obviouan incredible oh, man, sam, he had a good year, too, for us, but he was number of victims and sentencing swimming upstream with that involved in people who rioted at team. and you're right -- >> you can't feel -- you have the capitol. that's undeniable. nothing but love for the guy. whether those continue to stand he deserves this. once trump gets back into >> agree. >> honestly, we deserve it. office, we'll see. we should suffer. it is also undeniable that they we stink. took a while to go after trump we should suffer. himself with respect to the and this makes it more january 6th case. appropriate. i'm glad he's having a great year. >> let it out, sam. and if you talk to senior let it all out. this is the right forum for democrats now including those in that. this can be your therapy the white house, there is session. totally agree, couldn't be frustration over the attorney happier for saquon. a great giant. general's decision to, what they think is slow walk this. a great guy. good for him. the nice thing, they have the cowboys and giants as that and so hindsight is 2020, but middle game on thanksgiving. shouldn't garland have moved it gives you a nice time to be outside with the family, go play faster on this case to give a little touch football, do whatever you need to do. smith more time? >> i would literally do anything >> maybe, sam. i understand the criticism. else than watch that game. i was a federal prosecutor for a i'll eat more turkey. i'll stuff myself again. i don't want to watch that game. long time, at least in my world, which seemed a little bit more >> you can watch the lions early normal than the one i currently and then take a little break while the cowboys play the

giants and come back and watch the packers and dolphins at live in. precision was more important than speed. night. it's a perfect day. could he have moved faster? >> my thanksgiving nap will be should he have moved faster? four hours precisely right over perhaps. but, at the end of the day, you want to get this stuff right. that game. >> who knows, maybe tommy cut now i've also been a critic just lets comes alive on generally of the special counsel thanksgiving. we'll see. we'll see, sam. regulations, regardless of who the attorney general is and all right, sam, go take a nap. regardless of who they appoint. still ahead, ranking member i always thought that the of the house foreign affairs mechanism was flawed. and so maybe there's a lot of committee, gregory meeks joins us to discuss the controversy blame to go around here, but, at the end of the day, the surrounding several of the department of justice did have a people donald trump has picked special counsel, jack smith and for national security roles in the upcoming administration. his team were diligent and "morning joe" is coming right thoughtful in their work. back. and if you prize precision over speed, then it's hard to say that they were moving too slowly. circumstances overtook them. if you're looking for someone to blame, i guess merrick garland is someone you can blame, but that's not how i think about it, sam. >> it is important to underline, as i said, jack smith says, we believe we have a strong case in both of these cases. we have the evidence. we have the witnesses. we're not not pursuing these

because of that but because of this regulation. i guess it does raise the question about statute of limitations. do you really see a scenario where this case, first of all, the election interference case but also the classified documents case where they do come back some day down the road? >> i don't foresee that circumstance, willie. i think they were smart to leave it open for themselves and leave that contingency. but for the reasons i identified earlier, first of all it i don't know that there will be a political will to reopen these cases with somebody who is well into his 80s. even beyond that, there are steps a trump justice department can take now that make that impossible for future departments of justice, and i expect that they'll exercise this. these are folks who have told us what they want to do at the department of justice, and we would be price to take them seriously. i think there will be some repercussions for folks who were involved in the prosecution of these cases. that doesn't mean i necessarily think that they, themselves,

will be prosecuted, but you can make people's lives extraordinarily difficult and tortured even without pruitting prosecuting them. you can refer them to internal investigation, you can sue them civilly. you can force them to testify before congress. there are any number of ways these people will have to relive the decisions that they made during these prosecutions, and we should trust that that is going to happen. and, on top of that, some of these people may lose their jobs and/or be re-assigned. now is it lawful for them to lose their jobs? not necessarily. in fact, there are lots of civil service protections that would suggest that those who are career staff shouldn't be able to lose their jobs, but do i expect some of them will be fired and will have to force through litigation reinstatement of their jobs? yes. and that's an expense psychologically and literally. >> so after years of meticulous investigation building a case,

the preponderance of the evidence, the allegations now against donald trump, the case regarding his alleged interference in the 2020 election appears to be gone for good. msnbc legal correspondent lisa rubin, former u.s. attorney chuck rosenberg, thank you both as always. we appreciate it. president-elect trump is likely to appoint former u.s. national security council official cash patell to a high-profile position at the fbi or justice department according to axios. patel would be an extremely controversial selection for any leadership role including director of the fbi. patel served as a senior adviser during trump's first term. since leaving the white house he has repeatedly talked about using the justice department to go after trump's political enemies and the media. the president-elect reportedly considering naming patel deputy director or to an appointed investigative role within the doj to avoid a confirmation fight in the senate. trump is expected to fire fbi

director christopher wray whom he appointed in 2017 to a ten-year term. ken dilanian, what more can you tell us. kash patel has been a name floating out there, that some people have been concerned being in an important leadership position in the government, particularly if he were to lead the fbi? what else can you tell us where he may land? it seems they have made the decision that kash patel is not confirmable, particularly after the gaetz debacle. that may not be what he said about going after the deep state. they're all for that. it's the kind of things in his background that have been out there, like, for example, he appeared to have misrepresented his role in the benghazi case. he said at one point he was one of the lead prosecutors, and that's just not true, and other things over the years that have been raised in his background. and so the plan seems to be to install him in an appointed position where he could do a lot of damage and wield a lot of power. let's make no mistake.

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with several health threats including bird flu, whooping cough and a spike in cases of measles. joining us now medical contributor dr. vin gupta. his revenge. he's waged war on the dr. gupta, always great to see intelligence community. you. so we can talk about some of >> let's echo what ken said. these nominees, chief among there's no shred of evidence to them, of course, bobby kennedy any of these accusations. jr. but just broadly as a physician let's dig deeper into who kash looking at the resumes and some of the views of the people who will dictate the way these patel is. he has sworn vengeance against health agencies conduct business those in the department of justice and has suggested that and some of the regulations upon members of the media, by name, us in this country or perhaps taken away, what are some of that he would be on his list as your concerns? well. >> yeah, willie, it depends on tell us more about him but what what they want to do. if they want to focus on things could this mean if he does, as that are not divisive, 95% of you say, get a deputy job at the health care professionals agree department of justice, how could on, they can do that. things like innocentivizing he target these so-called enemies? >> right. primary care, willie, and number one, let's be clear that changing how we reimburse for kash patel is not a veteran of primary care versus specialty u.s. spy agencies or the intel care. community. that would be a smart thing to he did float first trump admini do. tackling chronic disease, what does that mean? the details matter but that

would be a smart thing to do and food safety, maybe separating right hand to the director of the food and drug administration national intelligence and ended up jumping over to be the cheech to one on food and the other on drugs. of staff to acting defense here is the problem. we are all expecting the secretary chris miller during the events of the january 6th negatives to really dominate attack. here. the big one is access to care. we are seeing, whether it's mehmet oz's comments on the this is a political ally of trump's, a loyalist, who has under insured or uninsured and the fact they don't have a right been a frequent presence, for instance, on steve bannon's war to health care access, he's made that comment many times, or room podcast. he is somebody of that ilk who these enhanced subsidies for the has been very open whether it's affordable care act are going to expire at the end of 2025, we criminally or sichl little that they will go after not just should expect people will lose health care insurance by the end folks that were part of the biden administration but also of '25, the end of members of the press. president-elect trump's first year in office. arguing they have been part of that's not a good thing. the conspiracy to undermine cuts to medicaid as well the third biggest line item on the donald trump and the political budget, on the american budget efforts that went forward. to ken's point they could very well use the levers of the fbi every given year. or doj to try to mount and that likely will be on the chopping block. convene a grand jury and try to that means fundamental things about health care access, for seek an indictment over some conspiracy charge that loops in those they want to claim and the press.

it could be a very vast effort support sort of a make america healthy again platform, you they would try to put forward. cannot do that fundamentally if people don't have health care >> and let me just add this is a access in the first place. people will lose their access. larger pattern of potential >> dr. gupta, let's get specific appointees who want to take their institutions and agencies about bobby kennedy jr. and vaccines. and effectively weaponize them against their opponents. he's not alone some of these i was talking to chris murphy, the senator, last week about picks in skepticism, to put it mildly, about vaccines. what he was preparing for and he some have drawn the links very soberly, i'm preparing for despite the evidence we've them to try to arrest lawmakers. talked about for years between vaccines and autism. and, look, it may not happen. for a parent sitting here this it may happen. morning watching this show, the fact they are considering should they be concerned that the possibility certainly is the vaccines they have counted frightening. in recent days the mayor of on for generations and that have denver, i believe, has said i'm revolutionized health care in not going to cooperate with mass this country, measles, mumps, deportation efforts and the rubella, should they be response from trump officials concerned that those could go has been, great, we'll arrest you. and i think that's really away? >> not go away, i think we chilling, honestly, to see that should take a look at the public people will cavalierly throw comments on what he's saying. around the idea that elected what he's doing is undermining officials, members of the fourth vaccine confidence, us doctors estate, could end up in the in white coats don't talk about cross hairs and end up safety. that's false. in 1986 a law, willie, said we incarcerated because they disagree with the administration. that is, willie, essentially the must provide safety and efficacy

through line for a lot of these information directly to our patients when we give them picks, which is that they are there for vengeance and to carry immunization. so he's undermining confidence out the political will of donald on things for which there's trump. >> yeah, and we should take them actually adequate information. at their word and a lot of them, am i worried that more parents as you say, want to use their across the country are going to position for retribution or tear down the departments they're opt out of routine pediatric leading altogether. that's what they've been immunizations like measles, promising. nbc's ken dilanian, thanks so mumps, rubella or the polio much for your reporting this morning. vaccine? absolutely. we're seeing those numbers 8% to we appreciate it. 10%, willie, in places like president-elect trump trump says florida. i can see that number climb up he will have tariffs from china, mexico and canada on his first to 20%, 30%. day in office. what does that mean for parents trump made the announcement on in school districts across the truth social explaining a 25% country? that means dealing with the fact tariff on products from mexico your child might go into a school environment where there's and canada will remain this preventable disease. place until drugs and migrants what we're seeing here is not stop coming over the border, the vaccines being taken away, but way he put it. what we're going to have to the president-elect also threatened an additional 10% contend with is a decline in vaccine confidence and more parents opting out. >> so, dr. gupta, you've touched upon vaccinations. another major headline that's coming from these selections that robert f. kennedy jr., tariff on china saying the fluoride added to the drinking

country's shipping illegal drugs water in many american to the united states. the tariffs likely would have serious implications for several communities. science suggests it's helpful. let's get your take. there are some communities that don't do fluoride. american industries including auto manufacturers and farmers, do you think it is a net just to name a couple. positive for people, particularly children, and what imposing tariffs on canada and would happen if it goes away? mexico would violate the terms >> jonathan, let's look at the of the north american trade agreement trump himself signed in 2020. evidence here. joining us now cnbc rfk jr. has done is cherry correspondent megan cassella. picked one study in a leading good morning. what can you tell us about the actual implementation of this medical general, jama, and said plan and the impact it will have that is proof positive that, on the economy? quote, unquote, fluoride is on its way out. >> good morning. it's a nonstatistical finding, this is president trump vowing that pregnant women exposed to to follow through on those threats he made on the campaign fluoride might give birth to trail, threats that were thought to be bluster. young boys that have lower iq. but what i can tell you based on not statistically significant reporting is that the finding. there are other data points that president-elect and his economic may point to that in other parts team have been focused for months now on finding ways to of the world. again, not strong evidence. impose these tariffs and making so if he came out, jonathan, and sure that they can do it because said we learn need to learn generally presidents aren't able to unilaterally impose tariffs this way, to impose blanket more, but, on balance, there's significant evidence that

tariffs. it's not how trade law is written. fluoride prevents tooth decay, i can tell you they feel they have some options. prevents school absenteeism. the most likely way is he'll that's why the american dental declare an economic emergency on his first day in office. association, pediatric that would then give him special organizations, are all in favor emergency powers that would allow for the enactment of these of it despite looking at the tariffs on these three same evidence. if he said something mellow like countries, on china it's actually even easier because he that, more evidence is better. he's not saying that. he's cherry picking evidence and imposed tariffs, tariffs that claiming that fluoride is, quote, unquote, on the way out, president biden then kept in place. he could turn the dial up and say we need to go higher, it doesn't make sense. if that data existed, we would another 10% higher because of all say the same thing. what he sees as these threats of it just doesn't exist. fentanyl and migrants, as you >> yeah, that's what he does, mentioned, coming across the cherry picks studies and says, border. it's going to have huge economic i'm just asking questions. impact. we're already seeing things happen just a little bit in nbc news medical contributor, canada and mexico, for example, dr. vin gupta, always great to their curran currency is falling have your expertise. against the u.s. dollar, making we appreciate it. their economy shake a little president-elect donald trump is no longer under federal bit. companies are gearing up for this. we've been looking through indictment this morning after the 2020 election interference earnings calls over the past quarter for mentions of tariffs. we see that mentions of it are case against him was dismissed. way up among all sorts of laura jarrett has more on companies and we also found no shortage of companies saying yesterday's move by the justice that they -- if they get hit department. >> reporter: in a striking move,

with tariffs, will pass these the justice department costs on to their consumers. abandoning the federal criminal they're saying it in their charges that had loomed over now earnings calls. it's in black and white so president-elect trump in washington and florida for more higher prices for consumers at than a year. least on. special counsel jack smith most impacted goods. saying his decision does not guys? >> yeah, and president-elect turn on the gravity of the trump also saying he was going crimes charged it the strength to impose a 100% tariff on of the government's proof, or the merits of the prosecution. vehicles manufactured in mexico, but the doj has a longstanding canada and mexico are the two policy against prosecuting a largest trading partners. sitting president and the megan, you touched on it briefly department believes the there at the end of your constitution requires dismissing response, but just in terms of the cases before the defendant the everyday consumer, this is is inaugurated. the judge in washington signing something that all economists off on that. warned about during the the move by smith, while campaign, liberal, conservative, you name it, if you put a tariff expected, a notable defeat after on, it's a tax on the consumer. launching a pair of historic that's just an economic fact. cases, a first of their kind against a former president. always has been. >> we have one set of laws in what is your sense of what this may do to prices in the short this country, and they apply to everyone. term? >> reporter: the trump team >> i think in the short term calling the dismissals a major prices certainly do go up victory for the rule of law as because, as you said, it is a the president-elect had made his tax. everything that comes into the criminal exposure a centerpiece of his campaign. u.s., importers have to pay a >> i'm being indicted for you. higher price. they'll pass that on to don't worry about these fake households. you mentioned the farmers. indictments.

an important point, too, there's it's actually driven our poll numbers way up. likely to be retaliation almost >> reporter: mr. trump often immediately. canada, mexico and china are railing against smith. likely to say if you're putting >> i would fire him within two a tariff on our goods, then we seconds. >> reporter: smith expected to will do the same to yours. step down on his own soon. u.s. agriculture was really, his cases never getting close to really hit in the first term because they couldn't sell as trial, stymied much overseas to the point that some of his efforts to overturn the 2020 election, while in president trump in his first term even sent money to farmers, florida a federal judge found $19 billion, to help them out. so groceries are likely to get smith was wrongly appointed, dismissing the accusations mr. trump unlawfully ordered asoes more expensive, likely to get more expensive. yags it's still possible he doesn't -- associates to unlawfully follow through on this threat. it's something that we saw from keep documents after he left office. >> for more on this story let's the president several times over bring in nbc news and msnbc in his first term, and he's leaving enough gray area in some political analyst, former u.s. of this language, the way the senator and prosecutor, claire threat was written last night to mccaskill, and senior political give himself something of a runway, that maybe any of those correspondent for "the guardian" countries could come back and hugo lowell, out with new say, we will do x, y and z, and reporting titled "trump the tariff never does take officials to receive immediate effect. but we do have to recognize clearances and easier fbi there's some destabilization vetting." here. some uncertainty here. we'll get to that story in just so there's an economic impact a moment. claire, let me start with you on the cases, both the classified even if it never takes effect documents case and the election before. >> cnbc correspondent megan interference case being

cassella walking us through this dismissed by special counsel this morning. thanks so much, megan. we appreciate it. jack smith after years of building that case. vaughn, you're struck seeing what the president-elect has what's your reaction to that news? already announced, the mass >> well, it's sad. deportation, this tariff. you know, haven't all of us gone these are things, the from depressed to sad to angry appointment of some of these choices that he's making, bobby kennedy. and back again over the last go down the line. during the campaign you would several weeks? this is kind of the whipped talk to people and say, oh, he's cream and cherry on top. not going to do that. these are negotiating tactics, a campaign pitch. he's saying these things to win but, as vaughn said in your earlier segment, people voted votes, and yet here we are here and they were fully aware seeing the real world of what donald trump had done and the serious allegations implications of those campaign promises. >> and we've lived this. against him. and the american people decided we covered a donald trump trade war and saw the economic impact to dismiss that, and with that for soybean farmers, corn comes the dismissal of this farmers, lobster farmers in case. maine. we saw their markets not only i don't think anybody should be disappear because of those surprised. obviously i don't think jack smith had much choice retaliatory tariffs so they were considering what the realities are on the ground. not able to export their goods, >> so, hugo, let's talk about but saw their prices significantly drop year over this. this is something that so many year over year and, to megan's people for years had real point, the way donald trump made expectations, a lot of up for those losses with farmers democrats, experts thought these and producers around the country

was by providing $28 billion in two cases, you know, bothrved td subsidies in order to make up for those losses here, and we're talking about mexico and canada, our two largest trading partners and this stuff style of politics we see from donald trump when he's campaigning but then and charged, and we thought we translate into the white house would see a trial, potentially a has questionable benefits. real public spectacle. none of that came to be and, in fact, it goes away yesterday with a whimper. bessent has backed his tariff talk to us about how that news proposals. back to 2019, donald trump is being received in trump justified it to american world, exultant to be sure but producers and manufacturers, the trade war, with the idea the how it might fuel what comes u.s. would strike a major trade next. deal with china ultimately and >> i'm told that trump picked up that china would agree to no the phone and called boris epshteyn, his in-house legal longer go forward with ip theft counsel, immediately when he or providing unfair subsidies to heard the news and he was thanking boris and saying what a their own state-backed companies wonderful job he'd done. and yet what happened they and that basically carried the signed phase one of a trade deal day. there were negative headlines in which china said they would buy a certain amount of goods. including about boris' own they ended up buying only half antics inside trump world. of those in the first year. that is the thing that carried but they never agreed to the the day. other issues that donald trump they were thrilled at the

and the trump administration result. and now it's time for them to look forward, and they think, okay, now that we've got that in justified to americans that this china trade deal would the rear-view mirror, we can push ahead with our ultimately bear the fruits of. i think it's questionable about investigation of the what can mexico, what can canada investigators, the favorite thing trump world likes to do.r actually come through with because this would essentially undercut the u.s. mca trade deal that these three countries negotiated during his first administration. >> yeah, and on the campaign trail donald trump promise pd that tariffs were going to pay for everything from education to health care. that was how he was going to fund everything. it appears anyway for now 25% on canada and mexico. we'll see if it hams. nbc's vaughn hillyard, thanks for your reporting. still ahead on "morning joe," what we are learning about a possible ceasefire deal between israel and hezbollah. nbc's keir simmons has more on that. plus, russia launches a drone attack across ukraine striking critical infrastructure and damaging residential buildings. we'll have the latest on the state of the war there. "morning joe" comes back in 90 second.

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news chief international correspondent keir simmons. keir, good to see you. how close are they here? >> reporter: hi, willie. well, multiple european diplomats and u.s. officials signaling to nbc news that potentially we are on the brink of something, a ceasefire deal would likely, willie, look like hezbollah moving its heavy weaponry behind the litani river and them moving out of southern lebanon. there are major hurdles, not least of which the difference of what the two sides are saying. the leader of hezbollah saying that deal needs to be complete and comprehensive, whereas israel is saying it reserves the right to deal with disruption according to the israeli ambassador to washington. it has been incredibly destructive. we've seen 60,000 israelis not

able to go to their homes in northern israel. 3,500 people killed in lebanon. and the killing and missiles have continued, hundreds of missiles fired by hezbollah over the weekend. more than 30 people killed in lebanon just on monday. this is an escalation. maybe it's the storm before the calm, if you like, but if there is going to be a calm, then certainly the families of the hostages in gaza are saying that they should be included, too. this deal is unlikely to include gaza and the signals are that the idea is you get this done and try to move on to gaza. >> so, keir, the israelis are saying as part of this deal, of course we will reserve the right if hezbollah attacks us, we can attack back, or that we can preemptively attack if we see a threat coming to israel.

that appears to be a bit of a sticking point here. how do they work through that? >> reporter: yeah, it really is, i think, and we'll see. we're expecting, as you say, that vote by the israeli security cabinet in the coming hours. it's possible that israel feels what it's seeing is enousome on israel are already saying that they shouldn't vote for that. one potential way that this is being kind of worked through, if you like, is a collaboration, a coalition of nations, the u.s., the french, that will oversee this. and the french putting out a statement overnight saying that they are clearly hopeful and talking about lebanese sovereignty. so maybe with the french, maybe the british, too, and the u.s., there will be enough confidence on both sides to get a ceasefire deal while both sides are kind

of reserving the right, if you like, to take up arms against each other again. >> the biden administration has been working on this deal for months and months trying to broker something there. we'll see if it comes through. nbc's keir simmons reporting this morning for us from the middle east. keir, thank you, as always. joining us now former supreme allied commander of nato, restird navy admiral james stavridis, chief international analyst for nbc news. admiral, cautious optimism here, it feels, around a potential ceasefire deal between israel and hezbollah. what do you see as some of the sticking points to make this actually hold and preserve a little peace there? >> i'll start with a cautionary note as senator john mccain used to say, it's always darkest before it goes pitch black. and that is certainly the sensibility you've got to have developed watching the lucy with

the football, back and forth on ceasefires. i could count, i think, 20 times that we've talked about a pending ceasefire down south in gaza. two or three times up north. but i think this one probably happens because it's kind of in the interest of the israelis it and what i mean by that is, and sticking point number one, they must get those 60,000 numbers, as high as 80,000, back home. sticking point two is they're clearly going to holding on to the ability to go after individual targets up north, and i think that that is baked into the agreement at this point.

planned this out in a way i don't think people quite appreciate. they have spent so much time interfacing with these prosecutors, they know who they want to go after. and if you think about people

like todd blanche, the nominee for the deputy attorney general position and the principle deputy, they have been interfacing with jack smith's team for two years now. and now they're running the department and they're already planning about how to go after the people that they had to deal with. >> there were quite a few negative stories about boris epshteyn yesterday. let's turn to your reporting about the trump transition team and how they're conducting background checks. there have been real questions raised, including by some republicans, about whether they're skirting the the latest? >> our reporting on this is they will do fbi background checks, but once they take over, once they've installed their key positions, like kash patel and the idea is on day one trump will say, i'm president and i'm going to grant sweeping security clearances to my entire staff and political appoint gees and we'll do the background checks on the back end, so to speak. trump -- the trump team will say this is because we have this deep distrust of the fbi.

during the 2016 transition, they shared all of our records with the then special counsel robert mueller and we don't trust these guys. there are ancillary benefits, right? if they were doing background checks now and the problematic nominees were getting tripped up and they were struggling to complete their background checks, that could be a problem during senate confirmation. if it drags on into the administration, you get the repeat of what happened in 2017 when you have people like jared kushner, rob porter who couldn't complete their background clearance and they want to avoid that as well. there are these ancillary benefits that they gain from pushing all of this into when the admin takes shape and people like kash patel are pulling punches. they want invasive background checks, will they be as vigorous? potentially not. >> claire, there's an assumption when a choice sits down in front of you, you may not like them.

you may not want to vote for them. you may disagree with their qualifications but at least have been through a basic fbi back ground check. we've seen what's happened to someone like matt gaetz, pete hegseth. we'll see what his fate ends up being. they're just doing their own background checks inside the transition team and putting people up on screens for doon t. what's the implication of them just being thrown out there? >> well, there's going to be a lot of senate staffers that are going to be abandoning projects they've been working on and trying to do a much deeper dive into potential nominees that are coming before the senate. but i think really what's going on here is, especially when he pulled gaetz, is recognition that there are some republican senators that are not going to lay down on really outrageous nominees that have to be confirmed. trump will try to put in people

that are really offensive into nonconfirmable positions. and, as was just outlined, he will ignore the necessity for checking into their backgrounds, and that's when journalist also have to kick in. and, you know, willie, we have some amazing journalists at msnbc and nbc that are out there every day trying to find the truth of what's going on. there's a lot of networks that have good journalists that are working seriously to uncover the facts. i would tell everybody to pay attention to journalism over the next four years. it don't abandon it. don't decide i'm going to turn everything off, but rather support those outlets where you see good investigative reporting going on and there's a number of not for profits out there that do great work. has been amazing investigative work. "the guardian" has done good investigative work. support those institutions that have people that are actually digging for the facts because

that's how the american people will know about some of these outrageous people that are going to populate the trump administration. >> more important than much with some of the guardrails that have fallen away, even more so than they did donald trump's first term. stay with us, claire, please. senior political correspondent for "the guardian." hugo lowell, thank you very much for your reporting. we'll be reading it in "the guardian." let's bring in congressman of new york, gregory meeks, a ranking member of the house foreign affairs committee. someone who understands washington so well, has been there for a minute and the normal process people are vetted, the type of people, the qualifications required to be elevated to some of the positions donald trump has made his choices for. what do you make of this round of cabinet picks so far? >> it has been a failure, a

danger to our national security and our interests. basically i represent an airport, jfk airport in new york. you can't get a job at the airport without a background check. those who have our most important information, national security interests, national security data and they don't go through a background check, is a danger to the united states of america. as rapid as this president has been putting these individuals in, he clearly has not done any vetting of any of them. all he does is to see if they will be loyal to who? not the united states of america but to donald j. trump. i hear my republican colleagues say he was there before and he

knows what he wants. he does not want anyone who is mrenged to the united states of america because when he had general kelly and even you look at anybody that was around him previously international issues, none of them supported him in this election. there's a reason for that. in fact, all of them said that he should not be near the white house again. he wants to appoint people now and is putting people in who is the one and only thing he cares about is pledge allegiance to donald j. trump and do what i tell to you do not to the united states of america. >> let's dive into these picks, the president-elect has nominated tulsi gabbard, pete hegseth, have gotten real scrutiny from some of your colleagues. there's another piece of this, too. donald trump did his best to distance himself from project t

having to deal with project 2025 for four years. that's who he is. all of the individuals who put that project together were individuals that worked with trump in the past, and now their plan is to implement it so that it doesn't surprise me at all. look, donald trump won this election for one reason. it's the economy. and we did not come strong enough for people to feel that we understood their problems, the cost of groceries. i felt it and i just thought

about my father, for example, when i grew up in public housing. we had financial crises. he was worp ried about putting food on the table. there was one thing on his mind, how was he going to feed his family? we did not get that message over to our people that we feel the problems that they have. national security was at the bottom of the list. as far as the ranking member on the foreign affairs committee, i could see people glassing over when i talk about it, but that's what we will have to deal with now. he is making a joke of the institution of the united states of america. our guts of the institutions and that's what he wants to destroy, the institutions. the founding fathers for a reason said we don't want a king. we don't want a dictator, but

what donald trump wants to do, just check it out as facts, he wants to emulate vladimir putin or victor orbahn, individuals if you go against them, some of them in russia, they fought out of a window. that is what we're dealing with here. jd vance, he's the one that said trump was like our hitler and the reason he said that was hitler was ed democratically. they know what the deal is and it's going to be up to the republican senators and the republicans in the house to stand up and not to be complicit with the moves and the actions of donald j. trump. >> congressman, looking at what's coming up quickly here, it looks like we have a crash coming on funding the government

and obviously the defense reorganization, both have to be done before the end of the year. what's going on inside the rooms of congress right now? what's going to happen here? will there be a short-term cr and how do you envision the spending stuff going? you have one who says we're going to eliminate all kinds of government and elon musk says we're going to cut 75% of the employees and then you have donald trump pledging that we're going to not tax anything. how will this play out first of the year when they have to reconcile the deficits with what trump was to do with what conservative republicans want to do? >> it's going to be a disaster. we are headed for disaster when you look at all of those things. we can't get any top line agreements. yes, we will probably be headed to a cr, trying to hold off, don't really want to negotiate on the house side with hakeem

jeffries and rosa delaura, head of our committee, because they want to try to wait until after january 20th where they can go on to their disastrous -- they're putting in place when we talk about the average everyday person, it's a club of billionaires who look to reduce jobs so that they can make more money for themselves. and that's the direction of which this administration -- this new administration that will come in is moving forward. it's the same thing because we saw it before. you starve the people so there is a greater amount of money for the wealthy. you look at the wealth disparity, it continues to grow and it will grow even faster under the plans of donald j. trump. people have forgotten because of the -- in large part, when you talk about the economy was related to the pandemic, people have forgotten the chaos and the mess that was donald trump's first administration and it will

be that on steroids coming into 2025-2026. >> congressman meeks, i want to go back to a point you were making about the election, three weeks now removed from election day, so many after action reports, postmortems, what happened on election day, and you've been very outspoken about what you believe happened. this was not just a story about white men supporting donald trump. it was across, even as you know in your district in queens, across race and gender. it was black americans, it was asian americans, it was latino americans who moved in the direction of donald trump. you have 30% of the vote in queens, so in new york city 37% of the vote in queens. so what is your message to the party more broadly about the trends you're seeing just even in your own district that may tell us something about where the country moved on election day? >> again, you have to look behind the numbers.

those numbers clearly indicated two things. people elected donald trump for two reasons. the economy. because when they went to the store, they wasn't looking at the stock market or anything of that nature. when they went to the store, the price for food was more than they could afford. and so you saw people going with non-named -- milk and cheese and things of that nature. that was a problem and immigration, because in new york you had governor abbott of texas, who continually sent migrants to new york unannounced without anything, so that's what they saw. you'll see thanks to hakeem jeffries and governor hochul we won seats in new york. we didn't lose seats in new york. we picked up -- we turned three congressional seats in new york. we won every democratic seat so

it wasn't a complete washout. in fact, when we go back to washington, d.c., there will be more democrats in 219th congress than there were in -- i mean, 119th congress -- than in the 118th congress. so, yes, we have to mack sure we are taking care of our people so they can understand and we can focus on their everyday life and well-being. i think you could also see new york and california where we had seats. we won those back. a one two-vote difference in the house whentalk to the people where they are and need to do more of that, that's important that we are going to talk to the people where they are and let them know that we feel them. as i said before, i think of my he went to the votes, went to the polls finally after he had the right to vote, he made those decisions based upon who on the

table and we've got to make sure we're focused on that. i'll just say this, also, if you look -- because internationally every leadership that was in place during the pandemic whether it was conservative or whether it was progressive, lost, all around the world there were concerns about the cost of food and goods and so, therefore, they were out. who is the quickest to turn around? this doesn't make a difference to people particularly in the campaign but who rebounded the quickest and the fastest? the united states of america. this is still the greatest country this panel has ever seen, and we don't need to go back to old politics and old situations. we're here now for the first time, we democrats and republicans came together. richard nixon, for example,

that's now coming true, if you're the president of the united states and you do -- it's not a crime no matter what you do, as long as you're the president of the united states, and that's the message that is being sent right now that if you're the president of of the united states, as donald trump has said, he can walk down the street, shoot somebody, but if he's the president, he will not get indicted, et cetera, that's where we are now. so the focus will be what will my republican colleagues do, what will the senators do, republican senators? what will the republican members of the house do? will they be complicit with the acts of donald trump or they hold him accountable for those things he's doing and try to destroy the institutions of the united states of america? >> not much track record of holding him accountable. we'll see if they cross him on these choices he's made for cabinet picks. democratic congressman gregory meeks of new york. great conversation this morning. happy thanksgiving, congressman.

thank you for being here. >> thank you. same to you. with millions set to travel for the thanksgiving holiday, our next guest is tackling rising airline fees. senator richard blumenthal of connecticut joins us next with more on that effort. that effort. ♪ limu emu & doug ♪ woah, limu! we're in a parade. everyone customize and save hundreds on car insurance with liberty mutual. customize and sa— (balloon doug pops & deflates) and then i wake up. and you have this dream every night? yeah, every night! hmm... i see. (limu squawks) only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ asthma. does it have you missing out on what you love, with who you love? get back to better breathing with fasenra, an add-on treatment for eosinophilic asthma taken once every 8 weeks. fasenra is not for sudden breathing problems. serious allergic reactions may occur.

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♪♪ a live picture at 7:29 in the morning, rockefeller center christmas tree, the scaffolding is all but down. that big beauty will be lit up next wednesday. a stormy forecast could disrupt plans for millions of americans traveling for thanksgiving. nbc news correspondent adrienne broaddus has the latest. >> reporter: this morning it's the perfect storm for holiday travel headaches, two major weather systems dumping heavy snow and rain from the west coast to the plains to the east coast just as record numbers of travelers hit the roads and skies for thanksgiving. the tsa expecting more than 18 million passengers at airports this week, a 22% jump from two years ago. why did you choose to leave today? >> we were trying to get ahead of all the holiday travel traffic. >> reporter: in san francisco heavy winds delaying nearly a quarter of flights. and in newark, a shortage of air

traffic controllers causing delays. in boston more holdups with two separate airplane collisions within hours at one of the nation's busiest airports. overnight an airplane carrying five people struck by an empty jetblue aircraft being tugged by a tarmac vehicle at boston's airport. just hours earlier at the same airport an american airlines plane clipping the wing tip of a frontier airlines jet preparing to depart with 200 passengers onboard, some frustrated frontier passengers facing waits of nearly two days for a new flight. >> i have no accommodations of where i'm staying or any idea what's going on. >> reporter: there's some good news for he 90% of travelers driving this year. gas prices have fallen to $3.06, down from $3.26 a year ago. >> nbc's adrienne broaddus reporting there.

meanwhile, another factor hampering travelers, particularly those choosing to fly, rising costs. according to aaa airline passengers are expected to pay 2% more this year and more than 10% more than 2019. the high price of flying has prompted senators to look into so-called junk fees that have cost customers at least $12 billion between 2018 and 2023. joining us now democratic senator richard blumenthal of connecticut, chairman of the senate homeland security permanent subcommittee on investigations. senator, good morning. great to have you with us. let's just start, because i'm not sure all consumers realize that they're paying these fees. what exactly is a junk fee? >> you're absolutely right, willie, that a lot of consumers don't know about these fees, and, in fact, may not discover them until after they bought the ticket. they consist of what the airlines call ancillary charges, decisions about where you sit, whether you check a bag, whether you can carry a bag onto the

plane, whether you can be next to your minor child, all of these kinds of junk fees are additional charges, some as high as $300 or more. and what we have found is in this year long investigation by the subcommittee investigation getting documents, interviews and so forth, is that an increasing share of the airline's revenue comes from these fees and, also, that they are now exploring and considering the use of technology, increased use of algorithms to target these fees at individuals based on their personal characteristics. in effect, moving forward the use of artificial intelligence to set fees based on an individual's zip code or other kinds of information. >> senator, i imagine so many nodding along angrily because they've had to pay these fees

which have undeniably risen. is there an enforcement mechanism, something the airlines may voluntarily change or you will have to legislate away? >> we will have a hearing on december 4th. we're going to hold them accountable. we're going to ask tough questions, and we're going to make some recommendations. i have sponsored a measure called the junk fees prevention act which would forestall these fees. there's also the passenger bill of rights, which i have led. i'm not counting on legislation. i'm clear-eyed about the chances of our congress imposing new laws. the department of transportation could use existing authority to do more, but, again, under this new trump administration, which has talked about eliminating regulation, i am going to be very clear-eyed there, too. i think the airlines have to be pressured, and it will be difficult because there has been

increased consolidation, fewer airlines. four of them now have 70% of the market share and they march in lock step often in imposing these kinds of abusive, excessive fees. i think we will have to put pressure on congress, on the executive branch and on the airlines themselves and potentially through the courts seeking more competition which the department of justice has begun doing through public inquiry it's launched literally just a couple weeks ago. >> good morning, my friend. happy thanksgiving to you. >> good morning, claire. thank you. >> i think people don't really know what psi is, and that's the committee that did this important investigation into junk fees. a long history of the psi committee began under president truman when he was in the senate. he uncovered all kinds of waste in government contracting in world war ii and, frankly, made a name for himself.

over the years they've done amazing investigations, a really good staff. i was honored to be part of that committee for many years. tell me what's up ahead with bipartisanship in that important committee because historically, with very few bobbles, there have been republicans and democrats working together on psi to do these important investigations. who is going to head that committee in the next congress? and what hope do you have that you'll be able to work with them in a bipartisan way to get to the bottom of some of the most thorny, difficult, complex problems americans face. >> that's a great question, claire. and you know a lot about this committee because you were a very distinguished leader of it, and it should be bipartisan. it has been bipartisan and the investigations we've been doing on boeing, for example, the safety culture failures there on the saudi takeover of the pga tour, which we have helped to

stop so far, on other critical issues where our investigation will be ongoing as well as on airline junk fees and other junk fees where we need to represent and protect consumers. and i hope it will be bipartisan. the next chairman is expected to be ron johnson, currently the ranking member. i have a history of worksing with republicans, whether it's lindsey graham on ukraine or marsha blackburn of tennessee for the kids online safety act. i'm going to continue to pursue bipartisan topics that will help americans and where the subpoena power of this committee and its fact-finding mandate can help protect americans from these kinds of abusive and excessive practices by big corporations. it's a way of standing up to those corporations. you know about it as a former prosecutor. i do, too, and we need that kind of aggressive and vigorous representation, someone to fight for consumers in the united

states congress. >> senator, we've been talking the last couple of weeks about the qualifications and the character in some cases of the choices donald trump has made to fill his cabinet. you're one of the few people in this country who has a say in the matter with your vote in the united states senate. i'm curious if you think in the case of, for example, pete hegseth, who has been chosen by donald trump to lead the department of defense or tulsi gabbard who has been chosen to lead dni, do you believe there are enough republicans, and it doesn't take many, to cross donald trump, not on all these picks but the ones that are of most concern to you and your republican colleagues that they may vote against donald trump's picks? >> i think there are enough republicans who have very serious questions and certainly at a minimum to require fbi background checks to know more about what these two nominees, very, very questionable in terms of their qualifications, have

done in their past. just take pete hegseth, for example. he is to be the secretary of defense who is one of the final remmers to the president of whether to use military force including nuclear arms, and he has in his background these allegations. a police investigation of potential sexual assault. he is supposed to be leading a department that has a history, very regrettable, of sexual assault in the ranks that we've been trying to stop. senator gillibrand and i have measures that have been adopted trying to forestall continued sexual assault in the military. it's a continuing scourge. and this secretary of defense we have right now, secretary austin, has worked against it, but that's a problem that he is going to be charged with dealing with women in the military, which he has expressed

skepticism about, something that is coming in greater numbers. i think there are sufficient number of republicans who have serious questions. they may not have decided yet that these nominees are in very questionable jeopardy and they have a lot of explaining to do. the burden is going to be on them going forward to justify some of these statements, for example, like gabbard has made about her allegiance to the regime of vladimir putin. i think there are very serious questions they're going to have to surmount to get the 51 majority they need to be confirmed because i think there will be republican colleagues who will oppose them. >> republicans have raised their objections to these choices. now we'll see if they actually cast their votes against them and cross donald trump. democratic senator richard blumenthal of connecticut, happy thanksgiving to you. we'll see you soon.

>> thank you. coming up here, we'll bring you some of the other stories making headlines this morning including one of the world's wealthiest people on getting rid of his fortune next on "morning joe."

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♪♪ a live picture of a rainy morning in new york city. 7:45. with forecasts for big rain for the parade in new york on thursday. let's hope that blows through. weapon see. time for a look at some of the other stories making headlines. the biden administration is proposing medicare and medicaid cover obesity medications. the plan specifies the drugs would treat the disease of obesity and prevent its related conditions. that would sidestep legislation passed 20 years ago preventing medicare from covering drugs intended for weight loss. colleges and universities nationwide are slash being the number of available programs and majors hitting rural students especially hard. the schools largely blaming financial issues for those cuts. roughly 13 million would-be students live in higher education deserts where the nearest university is beyond a reasonable commute away. and investor warren buffett

donated more than $1.1 billion of berkshire hathaway stock to four of his family's foundations. the 94-year-old has said his three children will distribute his remaining $147 billion fortune in the ten years after his death. buffett has long said he has no interest in preserving a family fortune. according to the ap, if buffett and his first wife had never given away any of their berkshire shares, the family's fortune would be nearly $364 billion, easily making him the world's richest man. still ahead on "morning joe," elon musk is turning his political attention to the uk with strong criticism of the prime minister there. nbc's matt bradley will break down the brewing feud and the impact on the u.s./uk relationship during the next trump administration. "morning joe" is coming right back.

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welcome back. our next guests are two "new york times" best-selling authors with two beloved detective characters who are both embarking on new adventures in two brand-new books. here they are, authors james pat patter pattersome and mike lupica, "the house of cross." lupica's is titled "robert b.

parker's hot property." it was first started, of course, by mike's good friend, the late robert b. parker. you have published four books -- >> i have my vanderbilt hat on today, by the way, since joe isn't there and vanderbilt beat alabama. >> it's a safe space to go vanderbilt here. willie is thrilled. yeah, we're not -- we spent many minutes yesterday on alabama's defeat. we'll try to set that aside today. >> i know. we watched. >> per orders of mr. scarborough. you have published four books that you co-wrote together, but this time you're here in what's become a bit of tradition to talk about each other's new works. it's kind of a strange cross promotional buddy cop movie. >> cross promotional, yeah. >> mike, why don't you start by telling us about james' new book? >> it's "the house of cross," and the great thing about the alex cross books, alex cross

came along in the '90s and they have become two of the most iconic crime novel figures of all time. but he is still balancing job and family and that, to me, has always been the foundation of the alex cross books. if anyone is watching the new series on prime video, you're going to want to read this book and then you're going to want to go back and finish "cross" because of the character. all i can tell you about the new cross novel is jim has decided to kill some judges, jonathan. judges are dropping like flies at the beginning of the book. >> way back when, parker won best first novel -- best novel, and i won the same day, which is kind of weird, and that's when i met parker, and i forgot the name of the character.

he said spencer, like the poet kid, that was my initial thing with parker. the thing about "hot property," mike's book, after parker died for a couple books i stopped reading the spencer books, and i loved them, and when mike came back, he has the voice. he has the dialogue, and that was at the hallmark of parker's writing, dialogue that is spectacularly good, funny and, you know, whatever. and the new book has all your favorites, citizen silverman, the love of his life is there. it's a terrific book. i love it. >> you are doing a good job selling each other's books which i have here, but now the question is, you have teamed up so much, mike, are you guys working on something -- another new one together? >> another two of them actually. >> yeah, john, we've had two

jane smith books about this feisty, incredible lawyer, and the third one called "never say die" will come out next summer. renee zellweger has signed up with hbo max to play jane smith on television and because we never close, we have a book that's ready for 2026. i'm just working like this because i'm constantly fearful he'll take on artificial intelligence as a co-writer and say, patterson and a.i. on the cover, and so that's why i'm like a hamster on a wheel working with this guy. >> fear is a good motivation. two of the most productive people in the business, so, again, james' new book "the house of cross" on sale now and mike's new book, "robert b. parker's hot property" also the same. "new york times" best-selling authors, thank you. happy thanksgiving. always fun to talk to you. >> thank you, thank you. still ahead here on "morning

joe," we'll explore the new atlantic piece on the most dangerous cabinet nomination. plus, one of the biggest video games of all time, but it almost never happened. we'll take a look at a new madd video game franchise and hear the never before told story how it became a worldwide phenomenon. "morning joe" will be right back. at balsam hill, celebrate with one of our beautifullly crafted, life-like trees. for a limited time during our black friday sale, save up to 50% off plus free shipping. and start making memories at balsamhill.com after careful review of medical guidance and research on pain relief, my recommendation is simple: every home should have salonpas. powerful yet non-addictive. targeted and long-lasting. i recommend salonpas. it's good medicine. ♪ hisamitsu ♪

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on the south lawn of the white house, president biden pardoned two turkeys from minnesota named peach and blossom. thanksgiving isn't for three more days, but the turkeys looked at biden and said, we'd better get this done. biden promised that the turkeys would not get killed this november. democrats were like, hey, that's what you said to us. oh, hey! i hope everyone enjoyed the pardoning because next year understand trump those turkeys will be matt gaetz and rudy giuliani. >> president biden today presided over the annual white . well, he didn't exactly pardon them. he just turned the investigation over to merrick garland and it just petered out. that's right. president biden presided over the annual white house turkey pardon and granted clemency to

peach, blossom, and before anyone noticed, hunter. >> the turkey pardon at the white house giving plenty of material for the late night shows last night. we have a busy tuesday morning, just 48 hours away now from thanksgiving including special counsel jack smith's decision to drop both federal cases against donald trump. we'll have expert legal analysis for you on this straight ahead and what it means for whether they could come back down the road. meanwhile, the president-elect's promising an executive order significantly raising tariffs as promised during the campaign on canada, mexico, and china. we'll look at the impact that could have on america's latest trading partners and the economy here at home. plus, the latest on negotiations for a ceasefire deal between israel and the terrorist group, hezbollah. good morning. welcome to "morning joe." it is tuesday, november 26th. i'm willie geist. joe and mika are off today ahead of the thanksgiving holiday. with us the host of "way too early" jonathan lemire and managing editor at the bulwark, sam stein.

guys, let's dive right in with donald trump federal election case being dismissed. jack smith filed motions yesterday to drop all federal charges against trump regarding his effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election in the leadup to the january 6 on the capitol and mishandling of classified documents. hours later u.s. district judge tanya chutkan granted smith's motion to dismiss the january 6th related indictment. trump's election victory means the justice department's long-standing position that a to donald trump once he takes office on january 20th. judge chutkan's ruling leaves open the possibility the charges might be refiled after trump leaves office, noting trump's protection from prosecution only lasts as long as his term. as for the classified documents case, special counsel regulations require jack smith to file a report to the attorney general explaining his charging

decisions before he steps down. president-elect trump still faces state charges for election interference in georgia, but, as you know, that case is currently on hold. trump also awaiting sentencings on 34 felony convictions in new york in his criminal hush money case. just last week the judge issued a delay without providing any new sentencing date. let's bring in our reporters, vaughn hillyard, legal correspondent lisa rubin, former u.s. attorney and msnbc contributor, chuck rosenberg and justice and intelligence correspondent ken dilanian. good morning to you all. a good group to sift through a busy morning in the courts. chuck, let me start with you about jack smith basically saying we're going to put this to the side with the attempt to overturn the 2020 election and also with the classified documents case. any surprises for you and what you heard yesterday?

>> not really. i think it was inevitable and necessary. on three occasions the department of justice under president nixon, under president clinton and now under president biden have more or less weighed the same question whether a sitting president, in this case a president-elect, can be prosecuted. the answer is no. i think that's correct constitutionally and practically. and so what the smith team moved to dismiss the cases without prejudice, meaning at least theoretically they could come back one day but for now they are gone. i think it is the right thing for the smith team to do.disapp, some elated. as a constitutional and legal matter, as i said, inevitable, necessary and appropriate, willie. >> and, ken, it was worth noting jack smith, when he announced this yesterday, did not say, we're not dismissing the case because we don't believe the evidence isn't there. we believe we have a strong case that donald trump worked to overturn the 2020 election to

interfere in the outcome. we're just saying, we believe, we agree, as chuck just said, with the justice department's policy that sitting presidents cannot be prosecuted. how about for you reporting from the inside, how did this come to be, and were you surprised by anything you saw yesterday? >> not surprised at all. jack smith felt he had no choice but to do this and it was a strategic move on his part. no choice because he's a justice department employee and as soon as donald trump was elected his office asked the justice department's office of legal counsel whether that long-standing policy that presidents can't be indicted or prosecuted would apply to a president-elect before he's inaugurated, and the olc came back and said, yes, we believe it would apply. at that point smith felt he had no choice but to seek the dismissal of the case. he could have potentially resigned first and kept the case around and let the trump justice department deal with it, but he then would have lost control of what he would say in concluding this case. you can imagine a trump attorney

general filing a document saying, we can no longer stand behind this case. to the contrary, jack smith made very clear in the filing that this decision does not speak at all to his view of the evidence of the case, of his chance for conviction. they are standing behind the prosecution. and, as you said, he will file a report. now there's some question whether there could be any new because normally the intelligence agencies have to review, in a case like this, whatever new information is released. they have to review everything that went into the indictments, and there just isn't time for a review like that. i think we can expect not to learn much new information in the report, but we may see a hardy defense, a challenge to the idea this was somehow weaponized or politicized and an explanation of exactly why they brought these cases and why they thought they were important. >> it's just extraordinary that this is where we are. remember those high-profile january 6th house hearings that

came ahead of the federal charges there in the election interference case. we remember the fbi search on mar-a-lago and the firestorm that created politically, and yet, after two years' worth, this all ends, lisa, with a whimper. this goes away in the most quiet possible way, donald trump and his legal team played the waiting game, tried to delay, delay, delay, it worked. they pushed it past the election. he wins. these cases now are abandoned. give us your analysis of what happened yesterday and whether or not you think there is a chance, even a slim one, they could be revived down the road once trump leaves office. >> first, in terms of what happened yesterday, i fully agree with chuck this was inevitable and necessary. the department's internal policy did not allow for them to do anything else other than to dismiss these cases. but, in terms of the contingencies, both of these cases have sort of, like, revival opportunities there only if the trump justice department sort of leaves them alone.

and what i mean by that is, first of all, jack smith said in his filing to judge chutkan yesterday there's an open question whether the statute of limitations against former president trump, a five-year statute of limitations, could be tolled or paused while he takes office. that doesn't mean, for example, that the trump justice department through their own office of legal counsel couldn't issue a new opinion saying it is unconstitutional and that's a possibility that might happen. with respect to the florida case, that dismissal is, of course, only against president trump not against the two other defendants. but were i the trump justice department, i'd be thinking about pardons for walt anyway nauta and carlos de oliveira. the last thing they want, and particularly if you talk to people in trump world, john, they are much more about the documents case and things that went on there than even the federal election interference case. i think that we can expect them

to pardon carlos de oliveira and walt nauta because they don't want what happened there to be rehashed, particularly given the allegations of obstruction of justice against the former president as they manifest in the charges against those two individuals. >> a great point about what the justice department may do. these two cases very much in doubt. the georgia case's future deeply murky and even though there was a conviction in new york, it's hard to say whether there will ever be a sentencing there. that case might be tossed aside as well. vaughn, as so many have said to me in recent days, he got away with it. he got away with all of it. there were four criminal cases against donald trump. they have all now, they appear to be all on the verge of going away. let's talk about the politics of this now. this is now donald trump who has emerged victorious electorally and from the legal system. he's going to be emboldened and he might be seeking vengeance. >> when the next generations after us look back at this in the history books, this will be a twofold answer as to what happened.

numt one, what was mounted as a delay in the doj really pressing forward particularly on. election interference case. jack smith didn't get his hands on this case until november of 2022 after the work of the january 6th select committee. it was not only until then that you started to see vice president mike pence be called in and go before the grand jury and actually talk with the prosecutors and answer questions. two years, almost two years after the january 6th attack. and then the second part of that who made the decision to bring these cases to a close. who was that? it was the voters, americans, who made the decision that the system of justice was not going to see the end in these particular cases. in large part, one year after january 6th, i was out in arizona. it was donald trump's return to the campaign trail. january of 2022 out in arizona. and at that point in time he was running what amounted to a propaganda campaign that the election was, in fact, stolen from him. there were fbi instigators that

were involved in the capitol attack, not his people. and when he traveled around the country the last three-plus years, you heard from a significant number of americans that believed it or questioned its truth and ultimately in november of 2024, what happened, americans said, despite watching what unfolded 2021, and despite donald trump trying to hold on to power, they wanted to return him to the white house and effectively end these cases against him. >> you know, sam, how many times did we hear people say over the course of the last couple of years with donald trump running to get back to the white house, part of the reason, or perhaps all of the reason he's doing this is to become president and keep himself out of jail. well, it appears he's done that for now. we'll see if they really do revive these cases down the road when an 82, 84-year-old former president is sitting there. this is mission accomplished as far as his team is concerned, and they effectively said as much yesterday. >> it's hard to imagine them reviving these cases four years from now, assuming trump is no longer president four years from now, so i do think he wriggled out of this one.

it does get to the basic idea which is that trump has this incredible teflon about him, and you just can't deny it at this point. and it does raise questions, too, including one i think i pushed to chuck here which is did merrick garland fumble the ball? obviously, look, an incredible number of convictions and sentencing involved in people who rioted at the capitol. that's undeniable. whether those continue to stand once trump gets back into office, we'll see. it is also undeniable that they took a while to go after trump himself with respect to the january 6th case. and if you talk to senior democrats now including those in the white house, there is frustration over the attorney general's decision to, what they think is slow walk this. and so hindsight is 2020, but shouldn't garland have moved faster on this case to give smith more time?

>> maybe, sam. i understand the criticism. i was a federal prosecutor for a long time, at least in my world, which seemed a little bit more normal than the one i currently live in. precision was more important than speed. could he have moved faster? should he have moved faster? perhaps. but, at the end of the day, you want to get this stuff right. now i've also been a critic just generally of the special counsel regulations, regardless of who the attorney general is and regardless of who they appoint. i always thought that the mechanism was flawed. and so maybe there's a lot of blame to go around here, but, at the end of the day, the department of justice did appoint a special counsel. jack smith and his team were diligent and thoughtful in their work. and if you prize precision over speed, then it's hard to say that they were moving too slowly. circumstances overtook them. if you're looking for someone to blame, i guess merrick garland is someone you can blame, but that's not how i think about it,

sam. >> it is important to underline, said, jack smith says, we believe we have a strong case in both of these cases. we have the evidence. we have the witnesses. we're not not pursuing these because of that but because of this regulation. i guess it does raise the question about statute of limitations. do you really see a scenario where this case, first of all, the election interference case but also the classified documents case where they do come back some day down the road? >> i don't foresee that circumstance, willie. i think they were smart to leave it open for themselves and leave that contingency. but for the reasons i identified earlier, first of all, i don't know that there will be a political will to reopen these cases with somebody who is well into his 80s. even beyond that, there are steps a trump justice department can take now that make that impossible for future departments of justice, and i

expect that they'll exercise this. these are folks who have told us what they want to do at the department of justice, and we would be wise to take them seriously. i think there will be some repercussions for folks who were involved in the prosecution of these cases. that doesn't mean i necessarily think that they, themselves, will be prosecuted, but you can make people's lives extraordinarily difficult and tortured even without prosecuting them. you can refer them to discipline at bar committees, to internal investigation, you can sue them civilly. you can force them to testify before congress. there are any number of ways these people will have to relive the decisions that they made during these prosecutions, and we should trust that that is going to happen. and, on top of that, some of these people may lose their jobs and/or be re-assigned. now is it lawful for them to lose their jobs? not necessarily. in fact, there are lots of civil service protections that would suggest that those who are career staff shouldn't be able to lose their jobs, but do i expect some of them will be fired and will have to force

through litigation reinstatement of their jobs? yes. and that's an expense psychologically and literally. >> so after years of meticulous investigation building a case, the preponderance of the evidence, the allegations now against donald trump, the case regarding his alleged interference in the 2020 election appears to be gone for good. msnbc legal correspondent lisa rubin, former u.s. attorney chuck rosenberg, thank you both as always. we appreciate it. still ahead on "morning joe," what we are learning about a possible ceasefire deal between israel and hezbollah. nbc's keir simmons has more on that. plus, russia launches a drone attack across ukraine striking critical infrastructure and damaging residential buildings. we'll have the latest on the state of the war there. "morning joe" comes back in 90 seconds.

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president-elect trump is likely to appoint former u.s. national security council official kash patel to a high-profile position at either the fbi or the justice department. that is according to a new report from axios. patel would be an extremely controversial selection for any leadership role including director of the fbi. patel served as a senior adviser to the acting director of national intelligence during trump's first term.

since leaving the white house he has repeatedly talked about using the justice department to go after trump's political enemies and the media. the president-elect reportedly considering naming patel deputy director or to an appointed investigative role within the doj to avoid a confirmation fight in the senate. trump is expected to fire fbi director christopher wray, whom he appointed in 2017 to a ten-year term. ken dilanian, what more can you tell us? kash patel has been a name floating out there, that some people have been concerned about the important leadership position in the government particularly if he were to lead the fbi. what else can you tell us about where he may land? >> yeah, so it seems like the trump team has made the decision kash patel is not confirmable, particularly after the gaetz debacle, and that may be not so much about what he said about going after the deep state. they're all for that. it's the kind of things that are in his background that have been out there like, for example,

that he appeared to have misrepresented his role in the benghazi case. he said at one point he was one of the lead prosecutors, and that's just not true, and there are other things over the years that have been raised in his background. and so the plan seems to be to install him in an appointed position where he could do a lot of damage and wield a lot of power. let's make no mistake. deputy fbi director, for example, is essentially the chief operating officer of the department. it's a hugely responsible role. or even if they set him loose investigating the investigators because it's clear that that is going to happen in some form, that jack smith and his team will find themselves under some kind of scrutiny. he could make a lot of mischief that way. patel is sort of the personification of maga rage about the justice department and the fbi. he has been the lead in making really what are baseless charges that the fbi has been corrupted, that all these investigations were done with political interference by democrats. i've covered these investigations for two years. there's not a shred of evidence

that hammed. in fact, it's the opposite. merrick garland, as you were talking about before, bent over backwards to stay out of this, to appoint a special counsel, to have the political people play no role in these decisions, you know, to a fault, some people would argue. and so -- but patel has been saying that this is the deep state corrupted the fbi to go after trump and he's going to mete out his revenge, and it looks like he's going to have a job where he will be able to do that. you do equal damage, by the way, at the cia where he's also waged war on the intelligence community for many years. >> vaughn, let's echo what ken said, no shred of evidence to these accusations but let's dig deeper into who kash patel is and what he could do. he has sworn vengeance against those in the department of justice. he's also suggested that members of the media, by name, that would be on his list as well. tell us more about him but, also, what could this mean in

terms of if he does, let's say, get a deputy job at the department of justice, how could he target these so-called enemies? >> right. number one, let's be clear, kash patel is not a veteran of u.s. spy agencies. he did float around during the first trump administration working at the -- to essentially the right hand to the director of national intelligence at the time and then ended up jumping over to be the chief of staff to acting defense secretary chris miller during the events of the january 6th attack. this is somebody who is a political ally. let's be very clear. a political ally of donald trump's, a loyalist, who over the last four years has been a frequent presence, for instance, on steve bannon's war room broadcast, someone of that ilk who has been open whether he be criminally or civilly that they will go after not just folks that were part of the biden administration but also members of the press arguing that they have been part of the conspiracy

to undermine donald trump and the political efforts that they went forward. and so, to ken's point, they could very well use the levers of the fbi or the doj to try to mount and convene a grand jury and try to seek an indictment over some conspiracy charge that loops in the press, loops in other prosecutors from the doj. it could be very vast effort they would try to put forward. >> and let me just add, i mean, this is part of a larger pattern of potential appointees who want to take their institutions and agencies and effectively weaponize them. i was talking to chris murphy, the senator, last week about what he was preparing for, and he very soberly was like, i'm preparing for them to try to arrest lawmakers. and, look, it may not happen. it may happen. i think the fact that they are considering the possibility certainly is frightening. in recent days the mayor of denver, i believe, has said i'm not going to cooperate with mass deportation efforts. and the response from trump

officials has been, great. we'll arrest you. and i think that's really chilling, honestly, to see that people will cavalierly throw around the idea that elected officials, members of the fourth estate, could end up in the cross hairs and end up incarcerated simply because they disagree with the administration. but that is, willie, essentially the through line for a lot of these picks, which is that they are there for vengeance and to carry out the political will of donald trump. >> yeah, and we should take them at their word and a lot of them either, as you say, want to use their position as retribution or tear down the departments they're leading altogether. that's what they've been promising. nbc's ken dilanian, thank you for your reporting. coming up, how the markets are reacting to the plan to impose tariffs on china, mexico and canada. we'll go live to cnbc straight ahead on "morning joe."

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♪♪ president-elect trump says he will impose new tariffs on goods imported from china, mexico and canada on his first day in office. trump made the announcement on truth social explaining a 25% tariff on products from mexico and canada will remain in place until drugs and migrants stop coming over the border, the way he put it. the president-elect also threatened an additional 10% tariff on china saying the country's shipping illegal drugs to the united states. the tariffs likely would have serious implications for several american industries including auto manufacturers and farmers, just to name a couple, imposing tear ifrs on canada and mexico would violate the terms of the north american trade agreement trump himself signed in 2020. joining us now cnbc correspondent megan cassella. megan, good morning. what more can you tell us about the actual implementation of this plan and the impact it will have on the economy?

>> this is president trump following through on threats or bluster but based on reporting the president-elect and his economic team have found ways to impose tariffs and making sure they can do it because generally presidents aren't able to unilaterally impose tariffs this way, to impose blanket tariffs like this. it's not how trade law is written. they have some options. the most likely way is to declare on his first days in office to allow for the enactment of these tariffs on these three countries. on china it's actually even easier because he imposed tariffs, tariffs that president biden then kept in place. he could turn the dial up and say we need to go higher, another 10% higher because of what he sees as these threats of

fentanyl and migrants, as you mentioned, coming across the border. it's going to have huge economic impact. we're already seeing things happen just a little bit in canada and mexico, for example, their current currency is making their economy shake a ar, little bit. companies are gearing up for this. we've been looking through earnings calls over the past quarter for mentions of tariffs. we see that mentions of it are way up among all sorts of companies and we also found no shortage of companies saying that they -- if they get hit with tariffs, will pass these costs on to their consumers. they're saying it in their earnings calls. it's in black and white so we know that, one, effectiveness, higher prices for consumers on the most impacted goods. guys? >> yeah, and president-elect trump also saying he was going to impose a 100% tariff on vehicles manufactured in mexico. canada and mexico are the two largest trading partners. megan, you touched on it briefly there at the end of your response, but just in terms of the everyday consumer, this is something that all economists

warned about during the campaign, liberal, conservative, you name it, if you put a tariff on, it's a tax on the consumer. that's just an economic fact. always has been. what is your sense of what this may do to prices in the short term? >> i think in the short term prices certainly do go up because, as you said, it is a tax. everything that comes into the u.s. from those countries, importers have to pay a higher price. they'll pass that on to households. you mentioned the farmers. an important point, too, there's likely to be retaliation almost immediately. canada, mexico and china are likely to say if you're putting a tariff on our goods, then we will do the same to yours. u.s. agriculture was really, really hit in the first term because they couldn't sell as much overseas to the point that president trump in his first term even sent money to farmers, $19 billion, to help them out. so groceries are likely to get more expensive, likely to get more expensive. it's still possible he doesn't

follow through on this threat. it's something that we saw from the president several times over in his first term, and he's leaving enough gray area in some of this language, the way the threat was written last night to give himself something of a runway, that maybe any of those countries could come back and say, we will do x, y and z, and the tariff never does take effect. but we do have to recognize there's some destabilization here. there's some uncertainty here. so there's an economic impact even if it never takes effect >> cnbc correspondent megan cassella walking us through this this morning. thanks so much, megan. we appreciate it. vaughn, you're struck seeing what the president-elect has already announced, the mass deportation, this tariff. these are things, the appointment of some of these choices that he's making, bobby kennedy. go down the line. during the campaign you would talk to people and say, oh, he's not going to do that. these are negotiating tactics, a campaign pitch. he's saying these things to win votes, and yet here we are seeing the real world implications of those campaign promises.

>> and we've lived this. we covered a donald trump trade war and saw the economic impact for soybean farmers, corn farmers, lobster farmers in maine. we saw their markets not only disappear because of those retaliatory tariffs so they were not able to export their goods, but they also saw their prices significantly drop year over year over year and, to megan's point, the way donald trump made up for those losses with farmers and producers around the country was by providing $28 billion in subsidies in order to make up for those losses here, and we're talking about mexico and canada, our two largest trading partners. and this tough style of politics we see from donald trump when he's campaigning but then translate into the white house has questionable benefits. lutnick and bessent has backed his tariff proposals. back to 2019, donald trump

justified it to american producers and manufacturers, the trade war, with the idea the u.s. would strike a major trade deal with china ultimately and that china would agree to no longer go forward with ip theft or providing unfair subsidies to their own state-backed companies and yet what happened they signed phase one of a trade deal in which china said they would buy a certain amount of goods. they ended up buying only half of those in the first year. but they never agreed to the other issues that donald trump and the trump administration justified to americans that this china trade deal would ultimately bear the fruits of. i think it's questionable about what can mexico, what can canada actually come through with because this would essentially undercut the u.s. mca trade deal that these three countries negotiated during his first administration. coming up, the atlantic's david frum with his new piece, a good country's bad choice. what he says he got wrong about the 2024 election.

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israel's security cabinet is meeting to discuss a potential ceasefire deal with hezbollah in lebanon. it comes as the idf and hezbollah have traded strikes in recent days with the iranian-backed terrorist group launching more than 200 projectiles into israel dubai ic news correspondent keir simsimm. how close are they here? >> reporter: they are signaling to nbc news we are on the brink of something and a ceasefire

deal would likely look like hezbollah moving its heavy weaponry behind the litani river and them moving out of southern lebanon. there are major hurdles, not least of which the difference of what the two sides are saying. the leader of hezbollah saying that deal needs to be complete and comprehensive, whereas israel is saying it reserves the right to deal with disruption according to the israeli ambassador to washington. it has been incredibly destructive. we've seen 60,000 israelis not able to go to their homes in northern israel. and the killing and missiles have continued, hundreds of missiles fired by hezbollah over the weekend. more than 30 people killed in lebanon just on monday. this is an escalation.

maybe it's the storm before the calm, if you like, but if there is going to be a calm, then certainly the families of the hostages in gaza are saying that they should be included, too. this deal is unlikely to include gaza and the signals are that the idea is you get this done and try to move on to gaza. >> so, keir, the israelis are saying as part of this deal, of course we will reserve the right if hezbollah attacks us, we can attack back, or that we can preemptively attack if we see a threat coming to israel. that appears to be a bit of a sticking point here. how do they work through that? >> reporter: yeah, it really is, i think, and we'll see. we're expecting, as you say, that vote by the israeli security cabinet in the coming hours. it's possible that israel feels what it's seeing is enough for it.

certainly some on the right in israel are already saying that they shouldn't vote for that. one potential way that this is being kind of worked through, if you like, is a collaboration, a coalition of nations, the u.s., the french, that will oversee this. and the french putting out a statement overnight saying that they are clearly hopeful and talking about lebanese sovereignty. so maybe with the french, maybe the british, too, and the u.s., there will be enough confidence on both sides to get a ceasefire deal while both sides are kind of reserving the right, if you like, to take up arms against each other again. >> the biden administration has been working on this deal for months and months trying to broker something there. we'll see if it comes through. nbc's keir simmons reporting this morning for us from the middle east. keir, thank you, as always. joining us now former supreme allied commander of nato, retired navy admiral

analyst for nbc news. admiral, cautious optimism here, it feels, around a potential ceasefire deal between israel and hezbollah. what do you see as some of the sticking points to make this actually hold and preserve a little peace there? >> i'll start with a cautionary note as senator john mccain used to say, it's always darkest before it goes pitch black. and that is certainly the sensibility you've got to have developed watching another meta football, back and forth on the ceasefires. i could count, i think, 20 times that we've talked about a pending ceasefire down south in gaza. two or three times up north. but i think this one probably happens because it's kind of in the interest of the israelis. and what i mean by that is, and

sticking point number one, they must get those 60,000 numbers, as high as 80,000 israelis, back home. sticking point two is they're clearly going to hold on to the ability to go after individual targets up north, and i think that that is baked into the agreement at this point. and sticking point number three, back to gaza, i think that deal is next in the queue. those are the three things to watch as we go forward here, willie. >> admiral, sam stein here. obviously everything is colored by the impending return to power of donald trump, and i'm wondering if you're a leader of an arab nation who cares about the palestinian cause, who is looking at not just gaza but what's happening in the west bank, and you recognize that you have an incoming president who is more or less going to tell bibi, do what you want for a little bit and then tidy it up. how does that affect your posture, not just with respect

to what's happening in lebanon but on all of these fronts. >> let's do lebanon first, sam. here i think if you're hezbollah up north, you're lebanese, you really want to cut a deal now. >> right. >> and so that is why i think the ceasefire is moving forward. stepping back a little bit and looking at the larger frame of the middle east, the capital that is most disadvantaged by the return of the trump administration is arguably not kyiv, it's tehran. and so you're iranian, you probably are looking for ways to avoid a sledgehammer coming at you. that gets us to the arab world. here i think you're exactly right, sam stein, meaning that particularly the kingdom of saudi arabia, the crown prince mohammed bin salman, the arab world with money, are definitely waiting for team trump to come back. they have deep pipe there

including financial engagement with jared kushner, the president's son-in-law, who will probably ride point for the administration here in the middle east. so you're holding, holding, holding, getting ready to go all in. all in being defined as finally recognizing the state of israel by the kingdom of saudi arabia. that won't happen until after the inauguration. that's the next big strategic muscle movement. >> admiral, you mentioned kyiv. let's turn to that theater now. it seems that both sides have really ramped up the fighting here as winter approaches and also as donald trump approaches, both sides trying to get as much gains as they can. russia even deploying a new missile, it appears. what's your analysis as to where the fighting could go in the months ahead before possibly a move to the negotiating table? >> i think you categorize it exonathan, which

is to say both sides are pushing hard for advantage knowing that they are going to be headed to a negotiation, probably mid-'25 if not sooner. and so, on the russian side, you see the deployment of the new weapon. you indicated a hypersonic, ten times the speed of sound, very difficult to intercept missile. you're seeing 10,000 north koreans thrown at the battlefield. those are moves designed to enhance a bargaining position. on the other side, went back as far as a few months ago, the attack into russia by the ukrainians to hold the salient around kursk and above all now the use of the atacms missiles, finally. all of that, both sides pushing to strengthen their position. how does it come out? i would guess what you see now if you got out a map and looked at the battle positions, it's going to be pretty close to what you're seeing now.

and that's a tragedy. at the end of the day, putin will have managed to bite off 20% of a neighboring country, illegally, immorally and using war criminal behavior. on the other hand if that deal is consummated, the rest of ukraine, the 80% is on, the path to nato vept eventually, the path to the european union. it's not the worst deal in the world. i think that's probably how it comes out. >> and ukrainians fully expect down the road vladimir putin to come back and for more so they want that path to nato. they want weapons. they want to be a harder target going forward. retired four-star navy admiral james stavridis. coming up, our next guest says pete hegseth is the most dangerous cabinet pick. jonathan chait explains why straight ahead on "morning joe."

let me set the record straight. are people born wicked? or do they have wickedness thrust upon them? oh! -ah! [ laughter ] no need to respond. that was rhetorical. hm, hmm.

♪♪ ♪♪ coming up, elon musk is clashing with britain's prime minister after calling the uk a tyrannical police state. msnbc's matt bradley is live in london and joins us straight ahead on "morning joe."

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what record number of americans traveling, the local news offered helpful travel tips. >> 80 million people will be traveling this thanksgiving. here are travel tips to make things a little easier. pack lightly, check in online to

save time at the airport, use uber pool to practice spending time with people you barely know and don't like, get it the airport three hours early so you are well prepared for your six-hour delay, turn to your spouse in the tsa line and say can't we just tell your parents we got sick. pay a flight attendant $20 to kick you off the flight, get into a brawl on black friday so you can enjoy one night of good sleep in a local joel, accept your fate, and remember, christmas is only three weeks away. >> the no-fly list never looked so good. welcome to the fourth hour of "morning joe." it is now 6:00 a.m. out on the west coast. 9:00 a.m. here in the east coast. i'm jonathan lemire. in this hour for joe, mika and willie. to the headlines. special counsel jack smith filed motions yesterday to drop all federal charges against donald trump regarding his effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election as well as his mishandling of classified

documents. nbc news senior legal correspondent lara jarrett has all the details. >> reporter: first the political victory and this morning a legal one. the top prosecutor overseeing the federal charges against president-elect trump formally asking to drop them. special counsel jack smith writing the justice department's longstanding policy against prosecuting a sitting president should apply to the president-elect as well. notwithstanding the gravity of the crimes charged and the strength of the government's proof. a on the move, which was expected, bringing the final conclusion to an h case accusing mr. trump of a criminal plot to reverse the 2020 election results as he ran for re-election. >> my office will seek a speedy trial so our can be tested in court. >> reporter: never got off the ground, marred in delays and cut down by the supreme court's decision finding some of mr. trump's conduct monsoon from any prosecution at all.

while then candidate trump who pled guilty sought to use his criminal exposure to his political advantage. >> you get indicted for interfering with a presidential election where you have every right to do it, you get indicted and your poll numbers go up. >> reporter: smith is expected to resign before mr. trump can fire him. >> i would fire him within two seconds. >> reporter: moving to disnis charges in florida, accusing mr. trump of illegally hoarding classified documents at mar-a-lago after he left office and obstructing the government's efforts to get them back. >> that was msnbc's lara jarrett with that report. >> joining us now, white house correspondent for politico and co-author of the playbook eugene daniels, washington bureau chief at "usa today" susan page and staff writer at "the atlantic" david fromm. and we will get to that in a

moment. let'start with your reaction to what happened yesterday. predictable as soon as trump won the election, but stunning all the same that these cases, which were viewed not just with expectations but with such history ended up going away yesterday so quietly. >> i want to begin which congratulating the democratic republic of congo and moldova. the clock set to zero. the united states in 2024 will have the first ever peaceful -- continuous peaceful transfer of power. the fact there will be no justice for the authors of what happened in 2021 is really astonishing. more than 1,000 people faced criminal sanctions for what they did on that day. the person who set them in motion will escape all responsibilities. >> so, susan, let's get your

thoughtsen thoughtsen on this. these trials we thought would define this past election. we spoke on this show about the idea, the images most likely of donald trump sitting in a courtroom day after day perhaps shuttling between courtrooms, washington, florida, and the like, that -- but his legal team's strategy of delay, delay, delay paid off because they placed a big bet that he could win and make it all go away, and he did just that. >> this is not the outcome that the department of justice and trump's critics wanted to see. on the other hand, these investigations were not without value. i am eager to see the reports that we expect to emerge before the inauguration about what the investigators found and what they made of it. there is a value in that. but, yes, donald trump had a strategy of delay and re-election, and it worked. i think more successfully than even he probably thought it would because, as we said many times, elections have

consequences, and this is one of them. >> certainly is. so, eugene, reports out of mar-a-lago yesterday just pure exultant reactions, joyful responses from those in the trump team. but now my question to you is, based on your reporting and people you talked to there in the transition team and on capitol hill what do they think comes next? trump promised retribution, promised vengeance. what's the sense as to the next steps as trump pushes to investigate the investigators? >> yeah, i mean, at this point it's unclear because so much of this kind of resides in donald trump's mind, right. and the conversations that he may -- and the conversations with the top, top people he may or may not be having. at this point we should expect and we should believe what donald trump said he what do, right. he said he would investigate the investigators. the republicans have won the house, and so they are -- they have said they are going to do that.

expect that to happen. folks like jack smith should expect -- should believe what they said they were going to do. and i think that's largely -- that's part of the reason why jack smith kind of dropped these cases a little bit earlier than we expected. we expected like another week or so before he did so. part of that could be a lot of folks think is so that he can work on the reports, right, because it's hard to work on the reports and do the investigations at the same exact time. and so once that report is out, then the question is, is there anything different we haven't seen from the january 6th committee or that we haven't seen in any of these indictments that have come out before and how much that angers capitol hill, angers donald trump and whether or not they go back at them. i will say there are a lot of things in the past that donald trump has kind of promised in types of -- sort of retribution, and finds a way to be like, i don't care, i moved on, right. and this may be enough to him --

these things being dropped may be enough to move on. could be. folks should move -- believe what he said. >> a tell might be some of his upcoming staff selections. we talked earlier in the show about kash patel potentially getting some sort of job at doj or fbi. he promised to carry out that sort of vengeance. some of trump's other picks are also causing, creating a lot of headlines. pete hegseth has come under intense skoo crutiny since trum fixed him to lead the pentagon. police in monterey, california, release a report from 2017 which a woman accused hegseth of sexual assault. hegseth, who has denied the allegations, was never charged with a crime. in 2020, while serving in the d.c. national guard, hegseth, a combat veteran, was pulled from active duty before his unit was to be deployed to protect the capitol on january 6th because national guard leadership grew

concerned about pictures of hegseth on social media that showed him having a tattoo that has been linked to a christian nationalist group. hegseth has also come under scrutiny for his recent comments about women in combat. he has a history of making anti-muslim comments. joining us now, staff writer at "the atlantic," jonathan chat. his latest piece focuses on hegseth and deems him donald trump's most dangerous cabinet pick. thank you for joining us this morning. i will put it to you simply. what makes him more dangerous than the rest? >> what makes him so dangerous is he is the embodiment of donald trump us a unfulfilled first term ambition of having a defense secretary willing to use american troops to employ violence against peaceful protesters. trump demanded this of his defense secretary in the first term and those secretaries refused on principle.

but hegseth is, obviously, very, very enthusiastic about this goal and broadly shares trump's world view towards the american left, which he just regards as indistinguishable from foreign enmaes. meece. >> donald trump would name hegseth as his nominee. tell me what you think republicans in the senate are going to do with this. will they demand a fuller background investigation? will someone like joni ernst herself, a combat veteran, stand up? what do we think mitch mcconnell will do now that he will be freed from the responsibilities of leadership? what do you see happening in the senate? >> that's a really good question because hegseth is much more in line with the traditional republican establishment than someone like matt gaetz, who just had so many enemies within the republican party that they personally loathed him and also distrusted him. hegseth used to be a more main

line neoconservative republican hawk. but interestingly, he sort of changed his views at the same time trump was changing his views. hegseth went from someone who was attacking democrats for betraying the country in iraq who shared trump's belief that the iraq war was a mistake, but he just became even more intensely partisan in his thinking and has held on it to this belief that the democrats are a threat to america and have to be suppressed. i think this view really comes through clearly, if you pay close attention to what he has written in his three books, which is what i did to ground myself in this article. >> hey, jonathan, how much concern is there kind of in the national security defense establishment about hegseth's views in, you know, the afghanistan, the folks that were around for the afghanistan pull out, changing the, you know,

importance of dei, all those things that he talked about, do they actually believe he is going to do them, or is it possible that, you know, the fact that he hasn't ever controlled or been in charge of an organization this big, that will take up a lot of his time, are they worried he going to do the things he said he is going to do? >> that's a great question. he claims the military has eviscerated because of the focus on dei and allowing women into combat roles. it seems to be that one of trump's first steps of kicking transgender members of the military out, of disparaging or taken women out of combat roles is going to reduce the combat capability of the military. i further argue there is an irony here, which is that hegseth attacks the dei policies in the military for promoting unqualified or what he believes are unqualified minorities into leadership roles in the

military, but he is the least qualified defense secretary in history. he has none of the bureaucratic experience that anyone has ever brought into this role before. so, you know, his views on merit seem to be inconsistent with his own promotions. >> "the atlantic" jonathan chait, thank you very much. the piece on pete hegseth is online now. and david fromm, questions are surrounding the hegseth choice. now that matt gaetz has withdrawn, hegseth seems to object getting the most scrutiny from republican senators. let's get your take as to whether you think he is perhaps the most dangerous cabinet selection or trump's selection, or is it tulsi gabbard, robert f. kennedy jr.? you have quite a few choices. >> yeah. robert f. kennedy jr. is kind of a lunatic and believes things that will expose more people to sickness and death. he is a top of a giant bureaucracy where he doesn't have a lot of discretionary authority.

tulsi gabbard by opening her mouth can betray secrets to one of the many dictators she is friendly with. she is very dangerous. i think hegseth's role would do this. the big surprise for donald trump about the military when he arrived in office was he thought i'm a big violent bully. general are big violent bullies. generals will like me. he was astonished to discover the senior ranks of the american military are people who realize allies ar asset, not a liability, they lived abroad, they are highly sophisticated about america's interest in the world and he didn't find allies among the four and three stars. if he has to do it all over again, you imagine donald trump would want to hunt among the colonels and one stars for maga types he can promote to three and four star authority. that's where a secretary of defense can be helpful. hegseth doesn't have to be an administrative genius to figure out which of the colonels and one stars like trump will to his

bidding and should be fast track to higher rank to hold important commands or do damage to the security of the united states and the democratic institutions of the united states. i would be worried about his role in promotions. >> we will watch for that. david, turning to your piece in "the atlantic" in which you write this. perhaps americans require every once in a while to be jolted out. complacency learned from their mostly fortunate history. the nation that ratified the 13th amendment in 1865 was, in important ways, the same one that enacted the fugitive slave act in 1850. the nation that generously sent marshall plan aid after the second world war was compensating for the myopic selfishness of the neutrality acts before the war. americans can take pride in their national story because they have chosen rightly more often than they have chosen wrongly, but the wrong choices are part of the story, too, and the wrong choice has been made

again now. so, david, my question for you is, those examples we just cited are moments when the united states in your view made the wrong choice and corrected itself. found itself back to where it needed to be. made the right decision. do you have confidence that they will do so again? >> i hope. isn't that enough? to make -- to say you are confident means that you think of the future as something that exists and that you can make statements about. i think there has -- those people in the united states who were born after the great depression and second world war, grew up when the country became more democratic, civil rights, inclusion of women, prosperity after the war, lived an amazingly fortunate story, maybe the most of any humans in the history of the human race. there is a tendency to sthi that's the way this tas ho be. there are forks in the road where important decisions were made or not made. we have to get back on the right track. nothing is promised and nothing

is guaranteed. i know a lot of people who watch networks like this one are demoralized right now. maybe the way to think about this, say along with the -- whatever you feel about the path the country is on, you have personally been given an opportunity to be an important part of american history and pulling the country back on to the path it needs to be on in the way people before you have. when i talk to the youth groups, i say be grateful to be alive in a time your country needs you because it needs you now. >> thank you very much. we will be reading the new piece online now. and susan page, let's ask you, to you agree with david that this -- that the national story here is one of eventually making the right decision and do you think it will again? >> well, absolutely. i mean, our nation is made a series of decisions that don't stand up to the witness of history, but then done things that are exactly right and we are proud of a and we say is ma

makes us americans. i am truck, i think, by the discouragement that you see among democrats and those who opposed donald trump now. the contrast with 2016 is so striking. then we had all these protests going on and declarations of defiance and the women's march, and now you find, i think, vote for donald trump for president. it's not clear to me what their reaction is. i think you see a kind of retreat from the public debate, at least for a while. and so that is one of the big challenges it seems to me we are going to face as a nation and the trump opposition will face, which is how to engage people in a productive way about the course forward. it's possible that donald trump will help. he may do -- he was elected for some reasons, including concern about the economy and chaos in the world. but he was not elected for some

of the things he says he is going to do, and that may give his opponents a toehold. this seems like sort of dispirited moment, i think, for those who did not support him. >> i could not agree more. that's a conversation i had had with a lot of people in the last couple of weeks. people are depressed dispirited. what could jolt them. the answer many said if he follows through with the mass deportations plan, people are pulled from their home, friends, neighbors are suddenly taken from their homes and being sent out of the country, that might be the moment that sparks the protests. we will see in the weeks ahead. that was a really important conversation. gratitude to all involved. some of the other stories making headlines this morning. walmart rolling back diversity equity and inclusion policies amid growing legal scrutiny and conservative backlash. the nation's largest private employer has joined a growing list of companies, including boeing and ford, that stepped

back from such dei efforts after coming under attack by conservative activithat struck down affirmative action programs at colle elsewhere, macy's said an employee responsible for managing accounting for small package deliveries concealed up to $154 million in expenses over the course of nearly three years. how do you spend $154 million in three years? according to the "new york times," the employee didn't take money from the department store chain and as you might imagine is no longer employed there.del the financial results until they complete a full investigation. and first lady jill biden welcomed the 2024 white house christmas tree yesterday. the tree is an 18 1/2 frazier fir and comes from new land, north carolina. the tree is meant to showcase the resilience of the communities of north carolina who were impacted by the devastating hurricane helene earlier this year.

coming up here on "morning joe," president-elect donald trump has said he plans to impose 25% tariffs on all products from mexico and canada, a move that would have serious implications for american industries and could cripple trade. we'll get wall street's reaction to the promised sweeping actions when we come right back.

welcome back. president-elect donald trump has said that he will impose new tariffs on goods imported from china, mexico and canada on his very first day in office. trump made announcement last nighsocial, explaining a 25% ta on products from mexico and canada would remain in place until drugs and migrants stop come og over the border. the president-elect also threatened an additional 10% tariff on china, saying that country is shipping illegal drugs to the united states. let's bring in cnbc's dom chew

and nbc news senior business correspondent christine romans. dom, starting with you, how is wall street reacting to trump reiterating his intention to put these tariffs in place? >> so, wall street right now, jonathan, is reacting on a more measured basis. markets are still hovering near the all-time highs at this point. but there is a notion at least heading into this that there was a bracing for possibly even worse tariff policy than we are seeing now. of course, this is just rhetoric. we are not yet past the inauguration. but a lot of traders and investors are trying to keep an eye on whether or not we do see any further movement on this kind of thing beyond just the rhetoric. now, when we have a treasury secretary nominee like scott bessent coming had, the hope was that he would have a steady hand on the economy, on the executive branch so that if you do see the forward movement of trade and tariff policy like we're seeing

right now that it would be at least guided by more business and economic principles and that's probably the reason why you are seeing at least some of the more muted moves on wall street at least for now. >> so, christine, dom's right. we don't know. this could be negotiations. it could be threats. it could be rhetoric. "the art of the deal," if you will. say he follows through with these tariffs on canada and mexico, our two largest trading partners, as well as china. what does that mean for everyday americans who are going to be buying goods? >> to be clear, there is no doubt that the entity that pays a tariff is the american importer. the person who is imported the goods or the products from another country. and then they pass that on to -- we heard the companies say in their earnings calls, they pass that right on to the consumer. it would raise price force a lot of things. cars, lumber, oil from alberta, canada, tomatoes from mexico. i mean, you think especially about cars. it's so fascinating to me.

the number of times parts cross multiple borders for the end result of a car made in north america multiple times. dramatically raise the price of a car. a president-elect because americans are sick and tired of higher prices is threatening a trade policy everyone agrees would raise prices. >> christine, one of the interesting things when i'm talking to democrats often is can he actually do it, right. and the international emergency economic powers act, which a lot of people don't know, does seem to give him the power to do so, right? >> yeah, it does. he says he wants to do this directly on day one. important to note, he is not talking about reshoring american production. this is retaliation for immigration and drug policies. so this is a punishment, not an incentive for u.s. domestic production, which is what other times he has championed tariffs for. so i think that's interesting. i also think it's interesting to note that he dismantled nafta and made his own perfect, as he

said, trade deal with our most important trading partners, canada and mexico, and that's the u.s. mca. this actually would gut his own or be in violation of his own usmca. his own trade deal he is seeking to do different trading relationship again with the -- this north american bloc is a very, very important bloc. half the produce that comes in this country comes from mexico. the cross border trade with canada is incredibly important as well. there is also this -- the china angle. if he wants to be a strategic competitor and stand up, right, to china, why go to war with your allies at home when you are trying to counter china? >> tell me what you heard so far about the reaction from china. obviously, important source of goods for -- and inexpensive goods in many cases for americans. they have more distant view of trump -- canada and mexico. how do you think the chinese are

responding this and how would you expect them to respond moving forward? >> formally, it's been very much on the record that they are being measured about this as well. you basically have people from the chinese communist party that the trade representatives over there, people who handle commerce like our ones who handle commerce here are talking about this mutually beneficial arrangement that china and u.s. have regarding trade, working together to make sure the trade imbalances work out so they are in the best interest of both countries. at the same time they are reiterating this idea that they are strong on crime, that they are trying to crack down on fentanyl that's being produced in china and being at least moved to parts of the western hemisphere directly into the u.s. or through places like mexico. all of this is now rhetoric that we can at least see transparently that will hold the same and hold that line until there is a real market reason not to be at least more measured about it. in the coming months, if goods,

that rhetoric probably tends to change a little bit. but what you are seeing right now corporation-wise, many of these companies, based in the u.s., that source their goods from china are trying to hedge their bets a little bit. they are trying to get those goods into the country here before many of those tariffs can be put in place much. for that reason, you are starting to see supply chains move a little bit more. now, for larger companies that may be slightly easier. if you are a smaller or midsize company here or small or midsize business here there is not much you can do if the stuff you sell is sourced in china and you have one supply chain. much of the rhetoric from china and the u.s. is right now focused on, yes, these are the initial stages. that could very well change the moment you have day one of those tariffs go into effect. >> extraordinarily important storyline that we will follow in the weeks ahead. cnbc's dom chew and nbc's

christine romans. thanks to you both. now we'll turn to the latest in russia's war with ukraine, a significant escalation in recent days. nbc news chief foreign correspondent richard engel has the latest from kyiv. >> reporter: russia is advancing at its fastest pace in two years, according to an assessment from the institute for the study of war. moscow is firing swarms of drones daily as well as artillery and missiles. but it was russia's launch of a new kind of missile last week that got nato's attention. ukrainian intelligence clocked it flying 11 times the speed of sound. rauch has the momentum as the holiday season in kyiv begins. >> my gosh! merry christmas! >> reporter: this charity gives psychological support to children whose parents or had t homes destroyed by making cupcakes writing letters to soldiers, and tying bracelets. this is so nice.

and crafting ornaments in ukraine's national colors. i will put this on our tree at home i down to the american flag on the table, their message couldn't be clearer. please don't abandon us. how important for ukraine is that american support? we hope a lot for u.s. support to finally bring us victory, she says. those fears that american support is dwindling coming after president-elect trump at happened to his father? he knows that his dad has disappeared, but every night he hangs up the keys and hopes he'll come home, says tatyana. she lost her faith in the war. i think we are going to lose, she says, and we will be taken over by russia.

ukrainians have held strong for more than 1,000 days, but with russian advances and u.s. policy in transition the stress is showing. >> that was nbc's richard engel with that report live from kyiv. so eugene, as richard mentioned, there is a new phrase, accelerated phase of the war here. what is the biden administration doing to rush as much as it can to ukraine before donald trump comes to power and we assume changes policy dramatically? >> they are trying to figure out how to rush some of this aid straight to them and some of these weapons. changing the u.s. policy on the types of weapons that they can be used -- that can be used by the ukrainian government and how they can be used. and it kind of fits with this, you know, push and pull that the biden administration has done where they say no for a long time and finally acquiesce to the requests of the ukrainian

government. the difference this time is it was pushed by the north korean troops being a part of the russian -- helping the russian military in its invasion, and also donald trump becoming president of the united states, because there are obvious changes that are going to come with that come january 20th. that's how folks here feel and more importantly folks in ukraine feel. there is a frustration around both u.s. officials, so folks in this government, and european officials who are kind of frustrated that it too so long, that the last-ditch effort here to push this along by the biden administration came in some of their eyes too little, too late, right, not anticipating possibly that donald trump could win, and then change it all on day one or day two. it will look like a negotiation, it seems, right, that donald trump is going to force some kind of negotiation between ukraine and russia where ukraine is probably likely, if you talk to experts, going to have to

give up some kind of land, which is what the united states has been finding under the biden administration, ukraine has been fighting. so lots of changes come. a lot of too little, too late from folks that have been watching this very closely. >> yeah, as we heard from admiral stavridis, a sense that the sides need to get to the negotiating table at some point in 2025, even if it's the second half the year. coming up here next, donald trump confidant elon musk labeled britain a tyrannical police state while endorsing calls for a new election and boosting a video from a jailed far-right activist. this comes at a time when the uk is concerned about its standing with the incoming trump administration. we will get a live report from london next on "morning joe."

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what a job he does. happens to be a really good guy. he likes this place. i can't get him out of here. he just likes this place. you know what i like having him here, too. he is good. >> my goal is to try to stay in a good mood about things and nothing is making me feel better than the fact that donald trump got his own donald trump. >> we have to assume that musk is spending thanksgiving at mar-a-lago. we just witnessed his impact on the u.s. election which earned him a role in the upcoming trump administration. now the tesla ceo x owner and spacex founder has his sights set across the pond on british politics. nbc news international correspondent matt bradley joins us live from london to explain. matt, what is elon musk up to now? >> reporter: yeah, jonathan, obviously, spending a lot of

time trolling and not just political figures in the united states, but even msnbc as i know you have been paying attention to over the past week or two. we have been seeing it worldwide, of course he is is buoyed by the recent victory, propping up donald trump and helping him win the election. earlier this month. now we are seeing that elon musk's trolling knows no bounds and no borders. lately he has been turning ire at labor in government, particularly the prime minister keir starmer. he has tweeting against were keir starmer and against the labour government. it picked up the past couple of days. on sunday his tweets, i don't know if we call it tweets, x, a platform that he owns, he wrote, the people of britain have had enough of a tyrannical police state. you see there he was tweeting along with a signatories. this is a petition calling for a

rerun of the elections that brought keir starmer to power in an overwhelming majority as recently as last july. that petition, which had a million signatories when elon musk re-tweeted that, now has 2 million and climbing. so it hacks like it's going to have to be maybe discussed by the parliament as part of those rules. the day before that he tweeted that the voice of the people is a great anecdote, showing the declining popularity levels for keir starmer, whose government, while it was again elected to an overwhelming majority in july, has been facing quite a few problems and quite a few things that caused it to become unpopular. musk then also went a step further and tweeted a documentary by a very famous far-right activist in britain whose name our audience may or may not know. his name is steven lennon, also known as tommie robinson. he is a couple of months into an

18 month sentence for contempt of court for his troll in defaming a child back several years ago. now, he admitted guilt in the case, but his prison -- time in prison, his sentence has still been seen as controversial in the far right in britain and in the united states where he is a well known name. what did 10 downing street stay in response to this hazing the past couple of days? almost nothing. we heard from keir starmer from 10 downing saying that they are not surprised that the people of britain want another election, even though we just had one here back in july, very recently. so actually the prime minister has come into some -- for some criticism from the left-wing politicians here who say that keir needs to stand up to elon musk and just goes to show what has changed. well, elon musk is now very much not in power per se, but he has a very close confidant of

incoming president donald trump who said he wants to impose 25% tariffs on mexico and canada unless they rein in drug imports and other issues, and something like 35% on china unless they do the same thing. now, he hasn't yet, you know, swung his knife at europe and a lot of other countries, officially he is not in office yet. there are a lot of worries in the uk and throughout europe that donald trump could start to levy very, very heavy tariffs on countries that he does not like. and so having a keir starmer, who is out of the white house, who is considered not a friend of elon musk, the president's closest confidant by far, could be seen by many people here as very dangerous. but this isn't the first time we have been seeing all this from elon musk. he has been attacking keir starmer for the better part of the past year, and governments here in europe just a couple of months ago when there were riots, race riots here in

britain. we heard from elon musk. he tweeted out that civil war is inevitable here in britain. this was thanks to right-wing protesters who came out due to misinformation online about the identity of a child murderer who killed three young girls in the town of southport at a dance event, and this has been causing huge, huge protests at least a couple of months ago among the right here, and essentially elon musk was saying that given the amount of immigration here, that civil war is inevitable. if you go back a year, there were four tweets where elon musk had been saying that civil war is inevitable throughout europe. this calling of a civil war is one of musk's favorite games. jonathan. >> nbc's matt bradley reporting live from london. thank you very much. and susan, it's worth a moment just on -- to take time to and perspective on just the incredible influence that elon musk has. we never seen this before.

private citizen, a billionaire many times over. spending the amount of money that he did in the trump campaign. you know, taking over in many ways, get out the vote operations, being lock step with trump, you know, down the stretch, basically moving into mar-a-lago, getting some sort of quasi government post, having the president's ear, and now potentially trying to influence foreign policy. >> it's amazing. presidents have had best friends before, but never a best friend like elon musk given such a central role and without the accountability of an appointment. is more powerful because he not in in a cabinet, not on the white house staff, he is a free agent who has the president's ear. and it's got to be perplexing, now he, we just heard 10 downing is being pretty quiet about respond to it elon musk. they are probably figuring out what to sail. in august when he began to make these very critical statements of the prime minister, the labor government dismissed him.

now they figure that is no longer an option if he is a figure with real power in the new white house. >> all right. coming up, from its archaic eight bit origins to the success as an annual must-have. we will get the story behind one of the top selling sports video games of all time. a look at the new docuseries on the madden football franchise is next on morning morning. you are not going to want to miss that. you are not going to wt anto miss that.

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♪♪ it's one of the bestsellers in video game history. >> welcome to john madden football. >> it's in the game. >> it's in the game. >> a guarantee you, baby, it's in the game. >> this was a piece of culture. it wasn't just a video game. >> one of these guys that got into football through madden. >> my dream is to make it to the

league. >> know what it's like to be troy aikman. >> some of the best players to play. >> if you were starting in complete chaos, we weren't seeing progress. >> most of us wondered if the game would get finished. >> we didn't think it would amount to anything. >> bam! >> we needed firepower. >> john madden was the man. >> ready to completely change the game. >> be i remember john saying, don't do anything to screw up my name. >> so that was a look at the new docuseries that premiers today titled it's in the game, madden nfl. the four-part series goes behind the scenes of one of the most popular video it game franchises of all time. focusing on the figure and namesake at the center of it all. super bowl winning head coach and em in i award-winning broadcaster the late john madden. joining us now is his son, mike madden, along with the hall of

fame coach's long-time agent and friend sandy montag, president of the montag group, which represents prominent sports broadcasters, executive producer of a docuseries. thank you for being here this morning. full disclosure. i have had my time playing madden, mid '90s with was my high day. i revived it to throw deep balls from tom brady to randy moss. let's talk about this, your father's legacy. it is super bowl winning coach, hall of famer, the broadcaster, you know, most famous football broadcaster we ever had. one could argue he is best known for this. talk about this unlikely marriage between your father and this video game franchise. >> well, he thought he was pretty famous when he was, you know, winning super bowls and, you know, winning 100 games in ten years, and then it came to a shock when he was -- he did the miller lite commercial and became the guy that busts through the paper.

and then there was a third leg to his fame when kids in new york city started poking their heads out the windows and started yell, hey, madden! hey, madden! he is like, where is this coming from? he goes, it's the game. it's this video game. he had been deep into his broadcasting career when the game hit its full stride. so, yeah, it took him by surprise. >> sandy, tell us about the documentary series and the origins of this game, which, you know, was not destined necessarily to be a hit, forget the legend it became. >> the game's 40 years old practically. 35, 40 years old. we never thought it would come out. in the late '80s, john and i thought it was a wacky guy who started electronic arts and had an idea for a computer game and wanted to put john's name on it. he couldn't put all 22 players on the screen. it was just something we never thought would happen. to see it 35 years later where

it's sold over 100 million units around the world, it's astonishing to see. i know john was very proud to have his name on it. >> so, eugene daniels, who played college football, has the next question. >> hey, mike, this is making me think of playing tournaments in my college dorm while i was playing football with the guys playing mad nl. when you think about how the game not just changed the gaming industry, but also how it changed an influenced culture, how do you think about it as the son of madden here? >> these things, they start as little germs and then they grow. and so when he started it, it was the late '80s. like sandy alluded to, he was taking this guy trip hawkins would ride with him on the train and it was going to be a computer game. i was a tech player. i was always fighting to get bo

jackson and walter payton. so anyway, to know that dad's game was on a path to kind of replace tech mo-bowl i thought that was ambitious. but the one time it struck me is when the players are playing tournaments and i'm going through my -- scrolling through what i want to watch on a sunday afternoon and there is madden this, madden, madden. i'm like, i had no idea what dad was up to. it had nothing to do with dad. you could watch tournaments on tv. i was like, wow, this is getting pretty big. >> the only other football games that can hold a candle to that franchise. so, sandy, we mentioned it was unlikely the first game came out at all. talk to us a little bit about the struggles at the outset and did john madden need any convincing to do this? >> well, i think the biggest struggle was the technology part of it. it was a computer game that came out on a floppy disc. the biggest problem they had was

getting 22 players on the screen. trip said at one point, we have a seven-on-seven, we are not going to have linemen. john madden was an offensive lineman when he played, he said i am not putting my name on a game unless there are 22 players. the biggest struggle was technology in the beginning, and they were late. they were a couple of years late come out with the game. i remember john telling me, it's not going to happen. doesn't matter what sort of deal we do with the people. the game is never coming out. when it finally did, you know, i think, you know, mike can attest to, john was proud it took years in the making but finally made it. and relieved to have especially this week celebrating thanksgiving, having the documentary come out today, it's something that i know john's very proud of. >> yeah, certainly john madden, associated with thanksgiving and certainly this video game. all four episodes of the new docuseries it's in the game madden nfl are streaming now on

prime video. mike madden and sandy montag, thank you both very much. and that does it for us this morning. we will see you right back here tomorrow at 6:00 a.m. eastern. ana cabrera picks up msnbc's coverage in just 90 seconds.

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