that will do it for me. thanks for watching. i will be back next saturday and sunday at 6:00 p.m. eastern. follow us using the handle @weekend k part. charles coleman jr. is in for ayman next. good evening. tonight on ayman, team trump has

reportedly told his cabinet nominees to stay off of social media. what does the gop civil war tell us about the chaos to come? that. plus, what's ahead for democrats as the party gears up to fight trump and redefine themselves before the next election. and we're live in new orleans where the fbi has revealed new details about that deadly new year's day attack. i'm charles coleman jr. in for ayman, and we have a lot to talk about. let's do it. ♪♪ welcome. donald trump is the king of chaos. he was the chaos candidate. he was the chaos president and chances are his plan so to revive his role as chaos agent in chief again. trump thrives on drama, but only reserved for him and the rest of team trump doesn't get to meyer in the muck apparently. why else would his cabinet nominees be told to stay off of social media?

according to sources speaking with "usa today," trump's incoming white house chief of staff sent out a memo to trump's nominees. the text of the memo, read to "usa today" by one of the sources, stated that nominees are asked not to post on social media without approval from trump's white house counsel. now, think about that. what must be going on? seriously, how bad must it be when the king of social media, he tells his own team, y'all got to chill on the socials? maybe the reasoning is simple and donald trump doesn't want a repeat of matt gaetz doomed attorney general nomination as several other more controversial nominees like pete hegseth, tulsi gabbard, and robert f. kennedy jr. face scrutiny for scandals or controversial views. and when senate gop majority leader john thune was asked by kristen welker if he is a yes on all of trump's nominees, here's

what he had to say. >> you prepared to vote yes on all of the nominees? >> well, that's a process. and we are going to -- what i promise is a fair process. as they go through the process, there will be opportunities throughout that where members, senators have opportunities to make sure they are getting their questions answered and we'll see. >> that's not exactly a ringing endorsement, my guy. like, it's not. you would think after trump's victory it would be smooth sailing for the republicans, but as inauguration day comes closer and closer, trump world is instead rife with infighting. take the maga civil war between first bro elon musk and steve bannon. musk has gotten ire from bannon and laura loomer for his support of h-1b visas. even after donald trump took musk's side in the feud, bannon had this to say. >> don't come up and go to the

pulpit and your first week here and start lecturing people about the way things are going to be. if you do that, we are going to get and rip your face off. because you can't beat us. >> you can't beat us. don't get fly up here. then there is the drama in the house. house speaker johnson barely managed to win re-election with one republican defecting congressman thomas massie and already johnson has the far right house freedom caucus breathing down his neck. they wrote that he has to prove he will not fail to enact president trump's bold agenda. johnson already has a slim house majority to deal with. if he didn't please the hard right liners like, well, we know how that resulted for kevin mccarthy. and so here we are. once again with one party in full control of government, or at least about to be. it's just that if only they knew how to actually govern and get

along themselves at that, much less with those across the aisle. and as for the incoming president, it appears he is learning some big lessons, too, that eventually the fowl born from your chaos can come home to roost and there is power in vetting a candidate instead of nominating them solely on where they land on your loyalty scale. with me to unpack this is thomas nichols, staff writer from the atlantic and former democratic senator barbara boxer of california. good evening. thanks for being here. tom, this report from susie wiles and where she is basically telling trump's nominees to stay off of social media ahead of their senate confirmation hearings, given that donald trump is kinda sorta like the sing of social media trolling, where do you think this is coming from? >> if you have a bunch of controversial cabinet nominees, you don't want them in the public eye every day. one of the things i think that

has always worked to the advantage of trump and his -- the team around him is that they -- at certain times they go quiet and let people fill in the blanks about what they think trump is saying or what they think issis people his people w his administration would be about. the only thing that can ruin that is when someone actually says something. so i think what they are doing, and i think it's actually smart to be honest, is they don't want pete hegseth or tulsi gabbard to say something that will remind people that they are pete hegseth and tulsi gabbard. they want all of that previous time as public figures to fade away and let them create themselves again as serious nominees for the cabinet. so it makes sense for the president-elect to say i can get away with this on social media,

but you can't. and it's better for everybody if you just lay low and get through your confirmation, which, you know, is probably pretty good advice to most cabinet nominees at most times, but especially now. >> barbara, you have been through this process before. you know what it is to confirm nominees to these very, very prestigious and important positions. take us through what the average senator is actually paying attention to in terms of the information that out there, particularly for the more controversial picks and some of those who have allegations standing against them. >> it's a great question, and i'll tell you it's very different for the democrats than the republicans. the republicans are trying to find every reason in the world to confirm these people despite some of the outrageous things that are already in the record, and tom is right. for the short term, keeping them off social media is smart, but if you listen to what senate majority leader john thune said, he said, i promise them a fair process.

trust me. that's going to be problematic because even if they stay off social media in the short term, there is enough out there on these people that a fair process, which i believe there will be, is going to bring the fore. and whether it's rfk jr. with his crazy stories of killing animals and putting them on the top of a car or, you know, his brain worm experience or saying maybe we shouldn't have polio vaccines, all of this is going to come out. tulsi gabbard with her friendship with syria, that monster. so, yeah. it's going to be something. >> i shudder to think how much worse it could get. tom, as we have seen, the door seems to be flying off the hinges here and maga seems to be splitting the seams. how likely is it that steve

bannon, elon musk, vivek ramaswamy are all going to stay under the same tent as their views begin to diverge into terms of how to go about executing this new agenda that donald trump, the heritage foundation, whomever is trying to advance around the rights mandate? >> they are not under the same tent now and they are making it clear that they are not. they are already publicly fighting with each other. the reason this happens is because trump ran for reasons that had -- and this was just an unfortunate truth during the entire campaign. trump ran for reasons that had nothing to do with policy. when you see congressmen saying we must enact trump's bold agenda, you know the first question anybody should ask, what is that exactly? because he ran for vindication. he ran to prove that he could win again and he ran to stay ahead of all of the legal processes that were catching up with him and that potentially threatened to put him, you know, in court and in prison. the rest of it is up for grabs.

so of course they are fighting with each other because there is no real content to this other than, you know were, the usual kind of trump agenda of giant tax cuts for people that want them, for the, you know, wealthiest people that don't need them, a kind of generic cozying up to authoritarians wherever they might be. but beyond that, there is -- everything is open. so, of course, you know, when trump says -- he thought deeply about, you know, immigration and h-1b and all that stuff, trump really, i think we saw this in the first time hasn't thought deeply about anything related to policy. of course people are scrambling to see what pieces they can grab and fighting about each other over it. >> barbara, tom just really encapsulated all of the disarray with the gop. but i think that there is still some soul searching happening on the other side of the aisle. how much pressure particularly in the senate is on senate democrats to try to take

advantage of this moment and how do they do that? >> that's another great question. sometimes you step back and let these people go at it. imagine one maga bully, bannon, saying he is going to -- what did he say? take off the face of another maga bully, musk? i mean, i'll tell you something. if it musk was an elected official, the secret service would be out there right now arresting bannon for that. this is unbelievable. and we cannot normalize it. but here is the deal. the american people, not a majority, but enough of them, voted for trump. and trump said, american jobs will be for american workers, and people bought it hook, line and sinker. bannon is running with it, but musk knows he wants for his benefit and the benefit of the other billionaire corporations,

they want these farmworkers, can keep them cheaper as inden shurd servants, there must be a million doing really good work. when i was there i voted for the original plan to bring in these smart people p but bottom line is, you had to prove that you couldn't hire an american worker. so now they are bringing in people just with, you know, a college degree. the last point i'll make, the other side of the coin is they are going to go after and deport the agricultural workers. so now all the jobs that open up are going to be, you know, picking tomatoes in the california ag sector and all around the country, and working in slaughterhouses and you name me how many americans want those jobs. so this is really serious. this is serious because it goes to the heart of what trump said. americans, you are going to have great jobs and we will get rid

of those people who are taking your jobs. yeah, it's not happening. >> tom and barbara, stay there. next, we are going to talk about democrats and their plan to navigate a second trump term and beyond. you're watching ayman on msnbc. c at betmgm, everyone gets a welcome offer. so whether you're courtside trying to hit the over... or up here trying to hit the under. whew! or, hitting that win with your crew. ohhh! yes, see defense! or way up here with a same game parlay. yaw! betmgm's got your back. get your welcome offer.

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♪♪ welcome back. with mike johnson re-elected as speaker, the democratic party is turning their attention to fighting trump and the next election. on february 1, less than two weeks after donald trump is inaugurationed, democrats will be deciding on the new leaders of the democratic national committee. it comes as the party is grappling with how to move forward in the wake of the presidential election and what the party's core message will be as we enter a second trump administration. msnbc daily writer pinpoints a challenge democrats are facing, the party painted itself into a corner. quote, the trump era marked a

reversal relative to republicans. the democrats now appear as defenders of society as it is whereas the republicans position themselves as agents of change. so, how do democrats reverse course and become the party of social change again? adam, running for dnc vice-chair, said that the path forward runs through rural america. >> we've lost the ability as a country, but especially as a party that used to be there, focusing on the people producing things. labor producing steel, producing manufacturing, people that are in the energy sector. and ranchers and farmers putting food on people's plates. we have lost the ability and the connection with them. we need to figure out how to get that back. >> tom nichols and barbara boxerer back. i want to get, tom and barbara, your reaction to that sort of snippet and the notion of the democratic party's future

running through rural america. >> well, i don't think it's true. the idea that the republicans are the party of, you know, change, they are the party of social -- you know, i say this as a former republican when they say make america great again, they mean make america 1954 again in on a idealized image if their mind about what things were like. if you talk to people who voted for donald trump, and i knew many in both elections, they often said, you know, things were so much better and then they'd pick a date when we were kids in the '60s or when my dad, in the '50s. so the idea that the republicans are about social change i find a little bit mystifying. but i do think that there is a problem that democrats, because their party leadership and so

much of their voting base has become college educated, and talks -- it's a group of people that talks among itself in terms they understand, i think that the concerns about the inability to talk to everybody else in america are legitimate concerns, not everybody is a college educated pre-professional living in suburb or a city. with that said, i still think that some of the structural divisions between rural and urban america are going to be difficult to overcome for the democrats no matter what they do. but i think that they could do a better job of realizing that a college educated party leadership doesn't mean that the party itself shouldn't broadly pro labour party, which i have found kind of surprising, again watching the democrats from a different vantage point of how much it used to be about unions

and labor and -- as the other speaker said in the segment about people who produce things. we have moved towards a knowledge society, but not everybody is there, and a lot of people feel left behind. >> i want your reaction to that. to piggyback on what tom said, this critique of democrats not understanding or not being as fluent in the language of the boardroom, more fluent in the language. boardroom than the barbershop is not new. this is not a new conversation. we have heard this and it has led to somewhat of slips with respect to latino voters, with respect to black male voters, marginally, and also with overall working-class americans. so you know better than anyone else, where within the democratic apparatus is the breakdown occurring such that this connection isn't being made? >> you know something?

i won 11 straight elections. i lost the first one. that was rough. but i did it because i never gave up on anybody. and people have a hard time even believing this, that every time i ran for senate out of the four times, i got a nice percentage of republicans, which i guess republicans like tom used to be. so i think you don't give up on anybody, and we definitely have colleagues all over who can feel comfortable in the barbershop, who can feel comfortable on the farm. and we need to listen to them, and we have to be a party of hope, opportunity, and fairness. that's how i always ran. and it doesn't matter, you know, whether you are a college graduate or you are not. you want opportunity, okay? it's vocational school, that's fantastic. if it's making sure your kid gets a decent student loan wherever you are, that's great. but i have always believed you don't give up on anybody and that people really want the same

things. they want the chance to do well. they want a chance to have their kids do better than they did. and so it's basically going getting back to that. the last point i make is this. there has been a lot of talk about sleep and not up and not woke. and red and blue and right and left. i want to go back to something really simple. right and wrong. i tell you something. we've lost that. we've gotten confused, not only just democrats, the whole country. what's right and what's wrong? it is wrong to give huge tax cuts to billionaires who already are thriving and to not pay, many of them, a real tax rate as high as a nurse or a firefighter. that's clear. so let's go back to that right and wrong. it's wrong to do away with health care like they are saying they are going to do. it's wrong to cut social security.

it's wrong to give good jobs to, you know, people who come in from abroad when you are taking them away from the american people. i think we got to get back to that, and i think we are going to do great. i really do. two years from now. >> tom, you and barbara laid out some very interesting points. you have diagnosed the problem with the party and then senator boxer laid out a wonderful prescription. given those two things together, do you have a pick in terms of who is currently in the race who might be best positioned to lead the party going forward as dnc chair? >> well, i'm going to stay out of that. i am neither a democrat nor a republican. i am going to say, however, that i think one thing that has changed in america that we haven't thought enough about, and this gets to barbara's point right and wrong, left and right, so on, is that we have a tendency to think, you know,

urban educated well off, rural and poor. and one of the things i think that's really striking is how much of this is not about economics. and i think the democrats are kind of captured by a kind of economic determinism. it's not social progress. it is not the party of change to give giant tax cuts to billionaires. that's the old-school, you know, that's the old medicine. but there is cultural difference. you have people living in areas. >> and again i spoke to them, i talked to some of them at the time, who are really quite well off, but live in rural areas, and feel culturally disconnected. i am not sure that there is a lot you can do about that except to again speak that language, be a little more fluent in that language in the way that i think republicans have given up on speaking to urban voters or suburban voters. that's the big rift is that the republicans have figured out

that this is kind of the electorate they want to corner and the democrats talk to people who are already democrats. but this is not always about economics because you really do have people, you know, people that i knew personally making six figures, very well established in life, and yet nonetheless voting for trump because they had a lot of cultural grievances that were really not amenable to policy solutions. they were things that had to be argued out in a certain kind of way with people that, again, would talk about things like right and wrong and to use very blunt language, i think, to have an honest conversation. to i so the idea this will be overcome by better policy to deal with, you know, this schism i think may not be the most productive way to go, if that's going to be objective. >> tom nichols and barbara boxer, a lot to think about and helping us get started on this sunday evening.

thank you. coming up, we go live to new orleans where the fbi is releasing new information about the deadly attack on new year's day. there is more "ayman" coming up after a short break. t break. with its customizable options chain, easy-to-use tools and paper trading to help sharpen your skills, you can stay on top of the market from wherever you are. e*trade from morgan stanley. power e*trade's easy-to-use tools make complex trading less complicated. custom scans can help you find new trading opportunities, while an earnings tool helps you plan your trades and stay on top of the market. e*trade from morgan stanley. ♪♪ always dry scoop before you run. listen to me, the hot dog diet got me shredded. it's time we listen to science. one a day is formulated with key nutrients to support whole body health. one a day. science that matters. for more than a decade farxiga has been trusted again and again, and again. ♪far-xi-ga♪

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♪♪ we're back with breaking news from new orleans and the investigation into that new year's day attack. the fbi says the investigation is expanding beyond louisiana to other states and abroad. the agency also shared new details about the suspect's whereabouts in the weeks leading up to the attack. nbc's kathy park is standing by in new orleans tracking all of it. get us up to speed. what's going on? >> reporter: charles, good evening to you. so the fbi provided a significant new update regarding the ongoing investigation here related to the terror attack on new year's day. first off, we know that jabbar act alone. we also saw chilling new images of the attacker's movements back

in october using meta glasses. take a listen to what fbi had to say about that. >> jabbar made at least two trips to new orleans in the months prior to the attacks. one in october and the other a month later in november. during that time, jabbar using meta glasses recorded a video as he rode through the french quarter on a bicycle. meta glasses appear to look like regular glasses, but they allow a user to record videos and photos hands free. >> reporter: and in addition to those images that you saw captured on his meta glasses, there was a point where we see jabbar taking a glimpse at himself in the mirror. in addition to that footage, the fbi released additional surveillance footage in the area on the day of the attack. it appears to show jabbar

actually placing those two coolers filled with ieds on durbin street. those ieds fortunately did not go off. the travel history of the suspect is also being closely examined. he traveled domestically to several other locations in the united states, but also abroad, including cairo and ontario. we should also point out the atf says that they will retest explosive materials they first believed to be extremely rare but now they think it was a more common compound. charles, as you know, there has been a lot of scrutiny here on bourbon street in the wake of this attack. the mayor saying that she, the safety and security of new orleans, especially bourbon street, a top priority and she has already requested a tactical expert through the white house. >> nbc's kathy park, thank you for keeping us updated. coming up, wedding vendors

are stepping up support for lgbtq couples while they still can. we will talk about what that looks like in a moment on "ayman." an."

♪♪ welcome back to "ayman." i'm carls coleman jr. in tonight for ayman. now, when donald trump won in november among the myriad of reactions were there from the lgbtq community worried about potential attacks on marriage equality once he is back in the white house. right now that right to marry is protected by the supreme court's 2015 ruling. but if the conservative supermajority on the high court overturned the case, it would be to make up -- the states would have an opportunity to make up their own policies. much like what we have seen after dobbs and the fall of roe v. wade. currently, most u.s. states have

a constitutional ban or statute barring same-sex marriage, which could become activated if the landmark ruling was reverse. it's that what if that triggered action the morning after the election by wedding photographer deedra austin. she told "the new york times" she felt helpless but decided to act by offering queer couples eloping at new york city hall through the end of 2024 a free wedding day photo shoot. writing on instagram, quote, for queer joy, for persistence, perseverance, for our lives and the lives of so many that aim before us that sacrificed so much. she extended that through the presidential inauguration on january 20th and has photographed dozens of lgbtq couples getting married before trump takes office. she is also started hearing from other vendors interested in getting involved, and she is colaunched a spreadsheet with names of colleagues in the wedding industry across the country.

that spreadsheet now has the name of -- names of 167 vendors that are offering free or discounted services to lgbtq couples who want to take advantage of their right before it is potentially taken away. and joining me to talk about it is deedra herself, a wedding photographer based in new york who helped launch this initiative. deedra, you very quickly jumped into action after trump's election and it snowballed into a bigger movement. what has it meant for you to be able to offer free wedding day photo shoots to queer couples in new york? >> it's been just the biggest honor of entire career. i feel so immensely passionate about getting to help other queer couples get to have this kind of celebration and celebratory moment in the wake of something that's potentially a little bit frightening for people. so it's just been such an honor to get to, like, celebrate with

people and give them these memories that they get to keep forever because a lot of people are planning on shorter timelines and with very little budget. so photography is not necessarily something they are able to afford on such short notice. being able to give them this gift is such an honor. >> is seems like since the spreadsheet was created, you now have 167 names on it. these are vendors that go from florida, north carolina, to michigan. struck you how quickly the momentum built and being able to connect with the vendors who wanted to support in the same way that you are? >> well, i feel as if i didn't realize that i, a small little new york wedding photographer, would have the impact that i did. i don't have hundreds of thousands of followers on instagram. my reach is only as far as my instagram following goes. so having so many people come out of the woodwork and pass it on to other people they know and then pass it on to other people they know has been really

outstanding to watch the community kind of come together all in the name of celebrating queer joy and making sure these couples get get married in case their rights get taken away. >> such a small idea, having such a huge impact. this is really instructive to everyone watching and thinking about how they can get involved. i want to ask you, how in this moment does this effort resonate given the larger picture and backdrop of what your community may be facing going into this new administration? >> i think this is just another opportunity for us to be able to demonstrate persistence and perseverance in a time that is very challenging for a lot of people. i think that it feels immensely powerful to be able to spearhead a movement that gets to impact so many couples across the country, and i think that we

definitely need something like this in this time in order to have a brighter outlook on the future. >> as you are doing the shoots and having these conversations with these couples that are getting married, what are those discussions like? how are people feeling as we get closer and closer to inauguration day? >> oh, gosh. at first it was a scramble. it was sort of i was getting dozens of dms, a lot of people that didn't end up following through. i am sure they made other plans or found different vendors. but so many -- a flood of dms at the beginning of people just kind of terrified and upset and feeling wounded by the system. and after i got -- after the dust settled, people started getting into the celebratory mood and, i mean, as you can see by the photos, the couples are so happy. the joy was not taken away at all from the day. it was still this bright beacon of love and hope and light and

happiness that i feel like really permeated the entire vibe of the day. and the time that i spent with them. so it really transformed from something that was reactionary and frightening to something that ended up being what it should be when you are getting married to the person that you love more than anyone else, is a celebration. >> these are fantastic photos. and i think one of the things i enjoy most about them is you are capturing in many ways the spirit of what it is to be in new york city in so many of them. you have the couple on the subway, a couple crossing the street. really showing what it is to be a new yorker in this moment, which i think is great. you have got this database now, the spreadsheet. we know the inauguration is skom, the administration is coming. what plans to do you have to sort of keep this network alive even as we move forward and are looking at this new administration and what could potentially happen? >> that's a great question. i think for my personal self, i can't speak for the other vendors on the list, but i know

that a few of my colleagues have sort of expressed similar ideas. i can't confirm whether or not they are planning on doing it, but i plan on offering pro bono rates for queer couples, not -- sorry. like discounted rates for queer couples through the next year so that they still have the opportunity to get married before anything is potentially overturned. >> pro bono, that's my language, but not really, because no. but deedra austin, fantastic job and great work you are doing out there. thank you so much for joining us on "ayman" tonight. >> thank you. and coming up, you know it's ladies night. ladies night discrimination lawsuit forced a family-run restaurant out of business. has wokeness gone too far? stay tuned for more "ayman." we'll see you in main.

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♪♪ ladies nights and mother's day promotions, some men are called gender-based discrimination. i wish i was kidding. it's 2025 and this is real life. so much so that a family owned restaurant in the bay area had to shut down after it settled a ladies night discrimination lawsuit at the heart of the suits are staged public accommodation laws which explicitly prohibit discrimination by business establishments based on sex, sexual orientation and gender identity. according to the movement advancement project, more than 20 states one territory and d.c. have this law on the books. now, in theory out las vegas gender-based discrimination is a good thing. but this interpretation of the law appears to be taking it just a little too far. no? it's trolling wokeness and it's giving weak sauce and it doesn't just stop with ladies night.

a san diego lawyer spent the last several careers going after all and any women centered events, such as a baseball team for giving out swag on mother's day and a fire agency for hosting a girls empowerment camp. how are lawyers getting away with weaponizing wokeness? well, here with me to answer that question and others is msnbc legal analyst melissa murray, a law professor at nyu and former law clerk to justice sonia sotomayor. how are lawyers being successful here? i need to understand this. >> charles, the question here is the difference between the letter of the law and spirit of the law. if you take these laws on their face, these public accommodations laws, they are clear that you cannot discriminate on the basis of gender. but they weren't thinking about just any kind of gender discrimination. they were thinking about circumstances that kept women out of public life for many,

many years. they weren't thinking about ladies night or actual opportunities for women to pool their resources and empower each other. i think what you have here is sort of the difference between a kind of rigid formal equality and a more flexible kind of equity that better striving towards in a more pluralistic society. the difference between discriminating on the basis of gender as a classification and the idea of discriminating against people because of their gender for the purpose of subordinating them. i am not entirely unnerved by the prospect of not having ladies night. but the fact that these public accommodations laws can subsequently be weaponized to prevent girls empowerment camps or salary negotiation workshops for women who historically have been victims of a gender wage gap, those are the real issues that i think are aggravated here. these lawsuits, as you note, have been brought by men's rights advocates who argue that this kind of gender

discrimination is plaguing men. men who historically have enjoyed most of the advantages in our society. >> now, you raise a good point because i am glad you pointed out that there is a bigger picture here other than just a single ladies night or promotion at a ballpark that this can be used and weaponized to fight against. when you are talking about that, how much legally do you have to show a particular group is prejudiced before this law is enforced in a way that basically makes someone liable for violating it? >> this is the difference between constitutional law and statutory laws. these are statutes. we are basically just looking at the text of the statute and some cases the spirit, the purpose. statute. here these laws make clear you are not permitted to discriminate if you are a business, of public accommodation, you serve the public, you can't discriminate on the basis of certain protected characteristics, race, gender, religion, things of that nature.

that means a man could say, hey, you are doing something here that's only for women. so you are hosting a women's workshop for salary negotiations or teaching women how to play golf so they can be more successful in business. i am not allowed because i am a man. that's gender discrimination and based on the letter of the law that's correct. but based on the spirit of the law, that's not what the laws were intended to affect. those laws were intended to remedy the historic exclusion of certain groups like racial minorities, like women from public life. not to simply level the playing field so men could come to a golf workshop for women. >> let's talk solutions or responses. you have sort of two tracks that you can potentially take with something like that. you would look to the judiciary to interpret on the basis of the spirit of the law or somehow look to the legislature to try to sort of carve something out that may make sense. in your opinion, which of those do you believe is the most efficient given where we are right now?

>> well, let's say a lot of these lawsuits are being brought, they are not intended to go very far up in the legal system. they are actually intended to force these businesses like that concord, colorado, restaurant to settle. otherwise, if they pursue the lawsuits, they will if out of business because they operate on thin margins. the better is a legislative fix. in november, new yorkers passed an amendment to the new york constitution that provided for equal rights on the basis of gender but that amendment had a provision included in it that said it could not be used to attack or to be weaponized against programs that were intended to remedy historic discrimination against certain groups. so a woman's empowerment workshop or golf shop for women entering business would be okay even under this new equal rights amendment. >> melissa, what can businesses who are concerned about this do to protect themselves if they still want to try to offer different promotions to

different groups or other groups besides women who we know have been historically marginalized. >> i think the whole ladies night thing is a little antiquated. i can understand why it's appealing for businesses to bring in women and subsequently to bring in other patrons. but one thing that you could do is perhaps check into your liability insurance. to you have enough insurance to cover a lawsuit of this sort. perhaps make sure that you are not giving the same, like a broad discount that makes it substantially more expensive. i might stay away from ladies night and check my liability insurance. >> last question. you talked about the fact that a lot of these lawsuits are not really built to last, if you will. is there any chance, do you think, we might see something potentially build like a groundswell, like a brown v bored of ed after a number of consistent legal fights in different districts it's elevated and the suits become a bigger issue? >> i hope not because if they do

become a bigger issue they are headed to the federal courts and perhaps to the united states supreme court which i think takes a much more formalistic based view of these questions. this is not that different from the fearless fund case we were following last year where a civil rights provision that was passed in the wake of the american civil war for the purpose of bringing black people into public life and allowing them to make contracts was used against a group of black women hosting a contest to help other black women give a -- in venture capital. i am not particularly, i guess, excited about the prospects theechz lawsuits in the federal courts of i prefer to see them stay out of it entirely. >> melissa murray, thank you for being with us on a sunday night. you a new hour of "ayman" is going to start right after this. s going to start right after this. ! that's why visionworks makes it simple to schedule an eye exam that works for you. even if you have a big trip to plan around. thanks!

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