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>> really happy to have you here. it started out as a bill about the rules for being a dentist. and said so explicitly in the title. a bill to be entitled an act making various changes to the laws of dentistry. before reading this bill today, i had never before even thought about there being laws of dentistry. but, there are laws of dentistry apparently, and this new legislation was going to tighten up those laws, laws about, for example, letting you do your dentist exams on mannequins, spelled manikins,

instead of real people. that seems nice for the real people, not mannequins. also laws about letting the powers that be take away your dentistry license on account of your drunkenness. lots of important ways of tightening up the laws around dentistry so that was the bill, and act making various changes to the laws of dentistry and that is how that bill started. but then, it changed. changed a lot. north carolina is one of the states where republicans did not do as well as they wanted to in this past election. yes, trump did still win the state of north carolina, which i think was the thing they most cared about. he won by about three points in the presidential race and carolina but even as trump won the presidential race there, the republican candidate in north carolina for governor, he lost that race in the state of north carolina. the republican candidate lost

lieutenant governor's race in north carolina. the republican candidate lost the attorney general's race in north carolina. republican candidate lost the secretary of state's race in north carolina. also, the republican candidate to be state schools chief, this is a race i was particularly keeping my eye on, the republican candidate lost that race and with carolina come too. the reason i was watching that one closely is because that is the race for the republican candidate for schools chief said she wanted a pay-per-view public televised execution of former president barack obama. she also demanded the execution of president biden, hillary clinton, chuck schumer, anthony fauci, a former new york governor, the current north carolina governor, a member of congress from minnesota. also she wanted to execute bill gates. honestly, it was a lot from her, but she was the republican party's nominee for superintendent of public schools for the state of north

carolina this year, and she lost that election along with almost all the republican candidates for statewide office in north carolina so yes, in north carolina this year, trump won the presidential race but republicans lost almost everything else in the state. heading into this election, north carolina republicans held a super majority in that state legislature but in this election, they lost that super majority. democrats made enough inroads in that state legislature this year in this election that republicans in north carolina no longer have a super majority that allows them to override the veto, for example, from the governor. but, that is where the laws of dentistry come into the story because republicans in north carolina, after this election, where they did not do as well as they wanted to, they know they're about to lose their super majority in the state legislature, and they know that democrats just won almost every

statewide elected office in the whole state. republicans know this is coming and so in the face of that oncoming change, republicans took this bill, making various changes to the laws of dentistry. they took the laws of dentistry bill and they turned it into something very much not that, which is probably good news for drunken dentists. bad news for mannequins, but it is also really big news, audacious news for what republicans are apparently trying to do in north carolina on the way out the door. this is footage from the north carolina state legislature, people being cleared out of the gallery in the state legislature for protesting against what the republicans are trying to do with this bill that started off a dentistry bill, and has turned into something much more radical. republicans took this laws of

dentistry bill. they got it. they took out all the dentist stuff. they then decided they would call it the hurricane relief bill. you remember all the horrible storms in western north carolina right before the election. they said it would be there hurricane relief bill but what the bill actually does is changes the state government in north carolina so all the state government positions that are about to be held by democrats will have their power stripped away from them. the governor of north carolina, for example, would no longer be allowed to appoint judges as he sees fit under this new bill. he will literally be required in certain circumstances to appoint judges that have been approved explicitly by the state republican party. the state republican party has to approve the democratic governors judicial pics. the attorney general under this bill will not be allowed to oppose anything that is done by the republicans in the state legislature, even if the attorney general thinks it is against the laws of the state.

power over the administration of elections in north carolina would inexplicably, under this bill, be moved wholesale into the office of the state auditor. state auditor in charge of elections? why would republicans change north carolina state law so the state auditor is suddenly the person in charge of elections? oh, because state auditor is the one race that republicans won this year in north carolina. >> state auditor candidate dave bolick. he said i'm only in politics for you, sir. where is dave? anybody that would say -- dave you say that. do you mean that? if you mean that, i am for you all the way. he is my endorsement. >> i molly -- i am only in politics for you, sir.

i'm only in politics to serve you, sir. to serve donald trump. that's the only reason i'm running for office, the only reason i'm interested in politics. i'm here to serve you as an individual. that is the one republican that won his race in north carolina, and a statewide race this year. but, because they just have this one guy in statewide office, the auditor, republicans just rewrote the laws of the state so that will be the guy who's in charge of the states elections even though the state auditor job has nothing to do with elections whatsoever. it is like putting the dogcatcher in charge of the water department. there is just no connection at all but he is the one republican, so now he will be the elections guy.

this is what they have done with the dentistry bill. they hollowed out the dentist stuff and this is what they have done since the election and one of the consequences of that thus far is that north carolinians have been turning up at the state legislature, filling the gallery in the legislature shouting down the republicans while they have been forcing through this last minute after the election hijack the dentistry bill to try to make sure they can stay in power even after they have been voted out, to stay in power in the administration of state government and the judiciary. also, to control future elections because relying on the votes of the people of north carolina is clearly not a winning strategy to them so they are trying to work around that so they can stay in power without the people's consent. north carolina also elected state supreme court justices. in this election one democratic supreme court justice appeared to win re-election by a slim margin, somewhere around 700 votes. there is a recount underway in that race right now because it was such a slim margin. in that recount, republicans are trying to throw out 60,000

ballots. they are trying to have 60,000 votes not counted in that race. 60,000, that's a lot of people to take away the vote from, right? i mean, but they think they can do it. these are provisional ballots that they say they don't want counted. part of the reason there are so many, 60,000 provisional ballots in this race is because republicans in the legislature put in place aggressive new restrictions on voting rights in time for this election and that resulted in a lot of north carolina voters having to cast provisional ballots. now, republicans are fighting to not count those ballots at all as a way to try to take that seat on the state supreme court. the people casting their votes just has not been working all that great for republicans in north carolina so now republicans in north carolina are trying to make sure that votes aren't everything. that there are other ways that they can keep and expand their power.

and, we really don't know how this is going to work out in north carolina. this is a live issue right now. there are republicans from the western part of the state who voted no on this bill in part because they were furious that this is what republicans are calling the hurricane relief bill. it is like a quarter of what the government asked the legislature for in terms of hurricane relief dollars. it does not actually move money to for the hurricane hit. it does not move money to the western part of the state, so some republicans from the hard- hit part of western north carolina are balking at this, so far voting no even though they are republicans. the democrats are against this. the protesters in the gallery of the legislature are very much against it, as are groups of north carolina clergy, groups like the poor people's campaign led by the reverend william barber, the democratic governor of north carolina, rory cooper, he is reasonably going to veto this thing and then wait to see whether all

the public pressure against it, whether the revulsion even among some republicans about what they're trying to do here will be enough to allow his veto to stand over the republicans might be able to override that veto in the last days of their super majority before they are pushed out. so, we shall see. this is a live issue right now. and i start with this tonight not just because this is an important story for north carolina, this audacious antidemocratic power grab by republicans. it is not just important for an important state. it is also kind of a character test, right? to see if we really have the stomach right now for this kind of a fight. a fight in a very practical, very blunt sense, for democracy because obviously that is what is being messed with here at north carolina. if you win an election to take

office as an elected official, you winning the election means you should also get the powers of that job, right? there is nothing about administering elections that should be handed to partisan actors so that one party has a leg up in trying to win future elections. that is not the way it is supposed to work, trying to force those things is an antidemocratic power grab. but that happening so bluntly and so obviously causing revulsion and so many people in north carolina, that, of course, is also happening in the larger context of what is happening in the country, and we are seeing with the republican party ascending in washington, we are seeing a

really radical effort not just to advance and advocate for and plan to implement republican policies. we are seeing a really radical effort to change the american system of government, to consolidate power in one man's hands, to consolidate power within the executive branch of government. all the talk you've heard about firing huge swabs of the federal government, firing law enforcement people, firing whole categories of civil servants, all of that is about consolidating power in the executive branch so there is no source of authority or judgment within the federal government except for the one guy at the top, except for trump. specifically, you have heard talk about them firing the fbi director, firing the chairman of the federal reserve. those are jobs that do not turn over when the presidency turns over. they are specifically designed to be independent of the political cycle so that people in those jobs, the fbi and the fed, they do what is right for

the country and not just what is right for any president but this out loud insistence from the republicans that chris ray at the fbi and jerome powell of the fed somehow are going to be fired and replaced by trump because he is coming in as the new president, that is not how the american system of government is supposed to run. that is about him consolidating his power over the executive branch, including the parts of it that are supposed to be independent from his power and control. we are also seeing, even before the republicans take power, efforts to consolidate power over the press. not just threatening and intimidating reporters and news organizations, but now saying they are going to use the power of the government to do it, having their presumptive appointees say that news organizations will be reviewed by the federal government according to their editorial decisions on news issues. we are finally now getting some widespread discussion about their efforts to consolidate power also in just one man over the legislative branch of government, so over the fourth estate, the press, over the executive branch but also, over

congress, trump demanding that the senate not confirm his nominees, threatening to force the senate to shut down so he can install his nominees without any confirmation hearings or votes. that is an effort to consolidate his power in such a way that it marginalizes and renders inert and important legislative branch of government. in that case, specifically, the senate. but, it is not just the senate. with trump's austerity commission headed by eccentric right-wing billionaire elon musk. in order to do that they are reportedly planning on seizing for themselves what is usually called the power of the purse. taking it away from congress, just unilaterally coming and reshaping the whole federal government without congress being involved at all. so, in washington, as trump and the republicans are preparing to take power, trump is working really aggressively to

consolidate all government power in trump's hands. he is looking to consolidate all the power of the executive branch in his own hands. he is looking to consolidate all power in the government over the legislative branch, supposed to be the coequal branch of government, not going to be coequal anymore. is trying to minimalize it, neuter it, tell them what to do and expect them to do it. he is also trying to do the same thing over the fourth estate, the so-called fourth branch of government, the free press. there is also the judiciary. so far, frankly i think he has been delighted how he is being treated by the third branch of government by the courts, by the judiciary so we don't yet see him moving to defy the courts or defy court orders but don't rest on that. it is very possible that is coming. i mean honestly, if you take a wide view of what is happening thus far with trump taking

power, preparing to take power in washington, you see the efforts to consolidate power to limit allies the legislative branch. i think he is ignoring the judicial branch for now but watch for it. obviously, the efforts to intimidate the press. this is all about trying to make sure he is the only source of authority in the federal government. honestly in terms of what to watch for next i think we need to be watching for something they call autocratic breakthrough. autocratic breakthrough is when the party in power uses the power they do have in government to make sure they can never be dislodged from government. a concrete example, you have already seen in the house of representatives now that mike johnson is back in as republican house speaker, the change the rules in the house to make it much harder to remove him as speaker.

so, that is them digging in, planning to stay for the long run. now we are here, you're not going to be able to get us out. we have trump quote joking, about expecting to stay in office for a third term once the second term is up and that is of course, against the constitution, but he keeps repeatedly bringing it up that that is his expectation. trump adviser and onetime campaign manager steve bannon saying things in public about how they are going to be ruling for 50 years. there won't be any way to dislodge them from power. autocratic breakthrough is when they use the powers they have achieved for winning elections to cement themselves in power so that they cannot be removed by future elections or other democratic means. so, we are watching efforts to consolidate power. we are watching for signs of autocratic breakthrough, trying to entrench themselves in power so they can't be removed. this is the way things go. these are the things they are trying. that said, so far it is not clear that their efforts are

going all that great. the fact that they just want these things does not mean that they get them. the fact that they're trying these things does not mean that they will succeed. i mean, we have already seen terrible nominees like matt gaetz been left off of capitol hill and having to have his nomination withdrawn. we are seen senate republicans not yet caving, and not yet agreeing to shut themselves down so trump can have his nominees installed with no confirmation hearings. the press turning out to be yes, weak need and lily livered as you might fear in some corners, but also defiant and professional and aggressive and creative in other quarters. the american free press and thus far, for example, has been doing a great job detailing the astonishing conflicts of interest in self-dealing and deep incompetence and lack of qualification, the salacious

and even allegedly criminal past dealings of the freak show lineup trump has announced as his aunt nominees for high office and we will get to some of those this hour. so, his intentions for who he wants to install and what he wants to do and how he wants to consolidate power so the american government is essentially just the will of one man, those are just his intentions. it is worth being clear that those are his intentions. it is worth reporting on it, following it, being very clear about the fact that is what he is trying to do but just because those are his intentions does not mean those things are an inescapable fate for us as a country. politics still works. gravity still applies. the rules of nature still work. each of these things they are trying is likely to be a fight and the test, and it is not just in washington. it is everywhere there is a push against democracy. everywhere there is a push against democracy, we are seeing that there is a push for it, too. like in north carolina right now. joining us now is north carolina state senator dan blow

, the democratic senator in north carolina. i know the situation in north carolina as well as anybody watching from a national perspective. you obviously are watching it inside and much closer up. what should the american people watching us right now understand about what has been characterized as a power grab by republicans in your state since the election? >> well, you accurately describe it as a power grab but it is something more than a power grab. i think it is an intention by the republican leadership in the general assembly not willing to accept the outcome of an election and not willing to accept the fact that they have lost some of these

elections and now it is consolidating power. it is taking extraordinary steps to basically grab that power for themselves, taking it out of the judicial branch. taking it out of the executive branch. in our case, it happens to be the executive branch trying to seize power rather than the executive branch. it is the same thing you're witnessing all over the country, just led by a different group here in north carolina. >> i was struck by the footage. it did not get a lot of national attention but we were able to look at north carolina media, local news organizations, a bunch of social media stuff posted by a bunch of nonprofit advocacy groups in north carolina and find what i found to be really interesting footage of the pushback by regular citizens. dozens of protesters seemed to interrupt the debate, a debate in which, as i understand it, no republican lawmaker was willing to speak up to defend these changes. we have seen members of the

clergy, groups like the poor people's campaign led by reverend william barber speak against it. how would you describe the attention to this in the state and how your constituents are feeling about this and reacting to the bill? >> there is great attention to it. you describe the marches led by dr. barber several years ago. those people are still around. there watching what is happening with their government. they don't want the powers seized by folk that they don't elect. one of the points that is important is this legislation that was passed last week also takes the power away from the attorney general so that he cannot intervene or get involved in certain cases unless it suits the whims of the republican leadership in the legislature and so people know that the attorney general is supposed to protect their interest and their protesting all of these powers that are taken from the government, all of these powers that are taken

from branches and other places that they have been for a half a century or more, so the decision last week to clear the galleries really took everybody out, people who were not protesting, but everybody coming to visit their government and see how it operates, the legislative branch of government with no effort to sort between those folk but you can rest assured that people in north carolina, the state that started this whole revolution in the united states with the halifax results in 1776, will still be involved in self-governance regardless of what the elected leadership in the legislature, the republican leadership, regardless of what they do, that same spirit that hit north carolina 248 years ago will still prevail. people aren't

going to take it. we believe very deeply in democracy and we are going to fight to preserve the institutions that were created to make sure that democracy still prevails. >> north carolina state senate democratic leader blue. thank you for those closing, rousing comments and thanks for making time to join us tonight. it's good to have you here, sir. >> it's been my pleasure. >> we have much more ahead for tonight. stay with us. des six-times more heart data than any smartwatch. and it detects three of the most common arrhythmias in just 30 seconds, including atrial fibrillation, bradycardia and tachycardia. check your heart with the most advanced personal ekg outside the hospital. our $99 cyber monday deal is here now, our lowest price of the year. for more than a decade farxiga has been trusted again and again, and again. ♪far-xi-ga♪ ♪far-xi-ga♪

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>> here is one of the complaints filed with the better business bureau. after filling out an online form to get health insurance information, within three seconds i began getting bombarded by phone calls. when i asked the representative to stop she said the autodialer would not stop until i provided my information. quote, i don't how to get them to stop after 18 calls in an hour and half. i'm 64 years old and this is causing me unnecessary stress. here is another. insurance agents repeatedly called my 86-year-old father who is deaf, has dementia, and lives in an assisted living facility. this person says this insurance agent somehow convinced his death elderly father with

dementia to dump his health insurance plan he had had for more than 20 years in exchange for a plan that the person on the phone was hard selling him on in these repeated phone calls. the complaint says quote, clearly this company is conducting fraud and financial elder abuse. the company that is the subject of these complaints is essentially a telemarketer that targets people who have medicare, so the company calls people up and tries to convince them that they should dump their medicare plan and instead switch to a private alternative. and, if the telemarketer is successful in convincing or tricking or berating the old person on the phone into doing that, into agreeing, although in the telemarketer collector handsome fee from the new insurance company that they have just done this to sign up for. new york magazine had some great reporting on this today. the company told the magazine they do not engage in this quote , kind of conduct.

nevertheless, this telemarketing firm has had dozens of individual complaints waged against it with the better business bureau. tells you something about how they operate. that said, big picture, who cares about a litany of heartbreaking elder abuse complaints like that when the company also has a powerful and charismatic celebrity endorser. >> hey, everybody. i'm here today with the medicare advantage helpline center in charlotte, north carolina here to meet the team helping folks just like you with their covered options. >> yes, folks just like you. that of course is the tv doctor, dr. oz, and his enthusiasm for this particular company might conceivably have something to do with the fact that he personally holds hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of stock in some

of the companies that provide this private insurance that you might switch people onto if you can convince them to give up their medicare in repeated phone calls. his financial stake in this matter came to light a few years ago back when dr. oz was running as the trump-endorsed candidate for senate in pennsylvania campaigning on a platform to privatize all of medicare. you know, that would have all been a lot of baggage to carry into the united states senate had he won that senate seat. campaigning to privatize medicare for he was financially benefiting from such a policy change with his own personal stock holdings, his promotion of medicare privatization schemes. i mean, perhaps that is what motivated pennsylvania voters to not elect him as their united states senator. it would be quite something to drag all that with you into the senate. it is another thing entirely to drag all that into the federal government because dr. oz is now going to be the person in charge of medicare for the federal government. but that, of course, is what

dark -- donald trump is just announced. he is named mehmet oz as head of medicare and medicaid. he is the doctor that is claimed red onions can prevent breast cancer. coffee beans are a weightless cure. he is pushed the claim that weight loss medicines can treat covid and what you know, he owns a mountain of stocks and related companies including the makers of the malaria drug he was hawking for covid and he is about to be a major decision maker about healthcare in this country in charge of the federal government program he was campaigning to privatize and planning to personally profit from when that happened. on the heels of donald trump picking him to run medicare and medicaid we also got news on

other healthcare pics to run the cdc. trump pick the former republican congressman who for years has crusaded on the false claim that vaccines must be the cause of autism to lead the national institute of health. trumps top candidate endorsed herd immunity. is the best way to address the covid pandemic. just a fancy way of saying let's get everybody sick and see what happens. call the week, call the elderly. then there is trump's pick for surgeon general. the nation's top doctor. she is a tv personality herself. she went to a for profit medical school in the caribbean. she has no public health experience whatsoever but does appear regularly on fox. that is to say nothing of the person considered to be responsible for a totally preventable -- considered to be

largely responsible for a totally preventable health care crisis that actually took dozens of lives in this country and that story is next. 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. ♪ (♪♪) today, you can give a gift like no other. a gift that can help st. jude children's research hospital save lives. i think it's the most worthwhile place

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>> this is the biggest increase in deaths we've seen. the figure of 32 is up from 25

only yesterday. >> i think the hospitals running at 200, 300% capacity speaks for itself. >> that was an australian news station reporting from the island nation of samoa in 2019. if it seems familiar, it may look and sound like the kind of news reports we saw from all over the world in 2020 during the global covid pandemic but this is not about covid, and this all happened before covid. this was 2019, this outbreak in samoa that killed more than 80 people, many of them young kids. the government had to order lockdowns to try to save people's lives. charities from around the world had to ship children's coffins to samoa to deal with the shortage of coffins there for all the kids and babies who were dying. what samoa was experiencing in 2019 was an epidemic of measles, a preventable epidemic and i say that because measles is a disease for which there has been an effective vaccine available for more than 60 years. that entirely preventable

disease outbreak in samoa and 2019 is now newly relevant because one of the factors that contributed to that outbreak was a sudden onset of hostility to vaccination on the island, and that hostility was stoked in large part by robert f kennedy junior, who donald trump has just tapped to lead the department of health and human services. kennedy's anti-vaccine organization, children's health defense very aggressively spread anti-vaccine propaganda not only in the united states, but around the world, and in samoa, they claim that the measles vaccine itself was the cause of the outbreak and not the solution to it. rfk junior personally lobbied the governor of samoa, telling the governor that vaccination was what caused the spread of measles, not what needed to be done to stop the spread. and, that is insane.

as journalist brian dear writes in the new op-ed for the new york times today quote, i was in samoa during that outbreak of part of my more than 16 years of reporting on the anti- vaccine movement. the cause of the outbreak but -- was not the vaccine but most likely an infected traveler who brought the virus from disease and --. new zealand. as the new zealand medical journal reported, quote, increasing circulation of misinformation leading to distressed and reduced vaccination uptake. joining us now is brian dear, journalist and the author of the work, the doctor who fooled the world about the anti-vaccine movement. i really appreciate your taking time to join us today. thank you.

i think that since robert f kennedy junior associated himself both with this presidential election first as an independent candidate then secondly with donald trump now especially since he has been put forth for this powerful health post, americans of started to hear about his troubling role in this deadly outbreak in samoa but i still think the concept of it is fuzzy to a lot of people. can you describe to us the nature of the outbreak, how severe it was and why he is associated with it and thought to be potentially partially responsible for the death toll? >> well, the plot thickens from what you are saying a moment ago in that it is almost certain that the virus got into samoa by a flight from auckland, and just a little while before that , friends of kennedy had been in auckland, in new zealand, with a film which had been

promoted in the united states by robert de niro and got all the attention of the united states, which suggested that there was fraud by the cdc in atlanta. there actually was not, but they have been touring in auckland and south auckland, a lot of pacific islander communities which became very susceptible. it was there for that new zealand saw the biggest outbreak of measles in decades, so it was no surprise really that the virus did get onto an aircraft and got its way out to samoa and mr. kennedy really has questions to answer about his relationship with the people who made that film. it was called " vaxxed" and

people went out to new zealand and australia to promote fear of vaccine so that is where it came from and the catastrophic consequences that i witnessed. i spent much of a week of the time i was there simply talking to mothers about the loss of their children, and it was really awful to listen to them and i found myself at the end of his all -- it all sitting in a theater and crying as the accumulation of pain from these others really consumed me. it was awful. >> why would somebody like rfk junior have influence in a place like samoa as to whether or not people vaccinated their kids? why would his influence in particular be something that perniciously accelerated the risk there? >> well, his name opens doors. he is always known that. he is really not a lot more than his name. he's not a particularly good lawyer.

he pays himself $500,000, half $1 million a year to run children's health defense, which he set up himself but he is not a particularly distinguished man in his own right, but he got out to samoa. he went to visit them. he went to see the prime minister and tried to convince the prime minister that it was in fact the vaccine that was causing the deaths and not the measles virus. an extraordinary thing to do but he has been making this kind of mischief for many years now. >> journalist and author brian deer, author of "the doctor who fooled the world." i'd love to have you back to talk about this in the future. thank you very much for your time tonight. we will be right back. ight. we will be right back. ! plus, score 24-hour flash deals you have to see to believe! and get free shipping on everything!

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>> about 10 days ago the new york times published a profile of a guy by the name of boris epshteyn. they entitled that the trump lawyer who wields outsized influence on the next white house but there is nobody in the president-elect's orbit with this point would doubt the level of mr. epstein's influence. he has quickly become one of the most powerful figures in the early days of the presidential transition. he has become a significant gatekeeper for trump, including shaping some of the information he receives about personnel and cabinet selections. epstein was reportedly pivotal

in securing the ultimately doomed nomination of matt gaetz to be attorney general of the united states. also, the nomination of trump's chosen white house counsel. we have been through one trump transition and one trump administration before, so what comes next is as obvious to you as it is to me in the snake pit of jockey and egos that trump cultivates around himself. you know, if this guy boris is seen as ascendant right now in terms of his influence then of course all of the other snakes are activated. all the other people in terms orbit will soon come for bars. it's inevitable, like the sun rising in the east. somebody is important? not for long. q today's headline. cnn first reports on allegations flying inside the trump transition that boris has been trying to cash in on his proximity to trump. imagine what is described as quote, an internal investigation

, by trump lawyers, reportedly found that epstein asked potential cabinet nominees to pay him for his help getting them nominated, to pay him as much as $100,000 per month. among the people epstein supposedly tried to shake down was trump's ultimate nominee for treasury, trump bessent, reportedly did not cough up the cash. he reportedly did not pay boris epstein before being selected for the job. there is even a report that he possibly in consultation with jd vance's office participated in an amateur sting operation against boris epstein in which he tried to get epstein on tape asking him for money in exchange for the nomination. i should say msnbc and nbc news have not confirmed any of this

reporting period boris epstein, however, tells us quote, i am honored to work for president trump and with his team. these fake claims are defamatory and will not distract us from making america great again. but of course it was going to be like this. of course the trump transition and presumably the next trump term will be a cornucopia of infighting and backbiting and trump sellers all trying to sabotage each other not only in the press, but any other underhanded way they can. of course it was going to be like this. more seriously, though, these allegations that boris was collecting cash or trying to collect cash in exchange for getting people put in the cabinet raises the prospect that trump cabinet offices are for sale. the possibility that people would think there is a possibility of buying one because there at least has now been a published price for what

it takes to get one. the internal review by trump lawyers supposedly found that epstein did not get money from anyone, that he was not able to collect his price for getting anyone installed in the cabinet. we have asked if we can see the supposed review. think they will ever make it public? think they will ever give it to us? watch this space. us? watch this space. philip: when your kid is hurting and there's nothing you can do about it, that's the worst feeling in the world.

kristen: i don't think anybody ever expects to hear that their child has cancer. it's always one of those things that happens to somebody else, but it's definitely feels like your soul is sucked out of your body when they tell you that it's your baby. and you would do anything to get them to the best place that they can be for their treatment. and i knew with everything in my soul that that was saint jude and that we had to get here. announcer: join the battle to save lives by supporting saint jude children's research hospital. please call or go online right now and become a saint jude partner in hope for only $19 a month. hunter: my name is hunter. i'm at saint jude because i had osteosarcoma. osteosarcoma is a special cancer that's in the bone. so they had to amputate my leg. [music playing] you're looking at a hero ♪ it takes a fighter ♪

kristen: good catch! (singing) you're looking at a hero in the fight kristen: my hero. philip: here at st. jude you don't ever have to worry about how much treatment costs. you never get a bill ever for any of it. announcer: when you call or go online with your credit or debit card, you will receive this saint jude t-shirt you can wear to show your support to help saint jude save the lives of these children. kristen: without the donors. saint jude wouldn't be here. hunter: thank you so much. you have saved so many kids. announcer: let's cure childhood cancer together. ♪♪ regina king is in our studio looking radiant as ever. don't cover up your glow. ♪♪ flawless. all eyes on you. skin esteem is a beautiful thing. ♪♪

we have a best new thing in the world today. her name is flynn mary donovan. she has just arrived in the lives of our dear colleague, jen marini donovan and her big wonderful family. look at her. you are perfect, not just because your mom says so. you are plain perfection in your little hospital hat. flynn mary donovan, welcome to the world. best new thing in the world today, god bless you. it evening. tonight on a minute, trump's team sign in transition agreements with the biden