of help in southern california today with donations. >> literally the basics underwear, a pair of running shoes, socks. >> everyone here around us is family. like a blanket of warmth, and it keeps me going. >> in pasadena, volunteers and citizens donating blankets, food and air filters to the humane society. knowing every little bit helps. >> people are good, you know, with all the bad stuff that's going on. >> people are good, and it's great that the community is helping each other. >> it's. >> and saturday we heard this message from a malibu resident who tried to fight the flames at his girlfriend's home. in the end, everything was lost. >> so much important to stay really positive through this and just, you know, look, look to the future and be the phoenix that rises from the ashes with with change comes opportunities and everybody who lost something needs to mourn. but also

embrace. >> good one. alec, we believe in you, los angeles too. that's going to do it for me on this edition of alex witt reports. we'll be back next saturday and sunday, 1 p.m. eastern time. weekend is next. >> it is official. history will show that today donald j. >> trump, the former and future president of these great united states, became the first american president to hold the title of convicted felon, the first american president, as the new york times reports, to, quote, carry that distinction into the white house. end quote. we are, of course, talking about the long delayed sentencing in donald trump's election interference case last spring. a

jury of his peers unanimously found donald trump guilty of 34 felony counts. >> and this morning, in a brief but remarkable hearing, judge juan merchan imposed a sentence of so-called unconditional discharge. >> that means no jail time, no fine, but a sentence that formalizes a place in history for donald trump that no american president has ever gone before, that no american president has ever wanted before a convicted felon. >> for six weeks, while donald trump's trial was underway, there were no cameras in the courtroom. >> there was no audio equipment allowed in the courtroom for any of the proceedings. >> all that changed today, and for the first time in this hugely consequential historic case, we, the american people, could hear with our own ears how the rule of law played out. >> and because of that, it is important today at least, to listen. >> this is what it sounds like

when a once and future president of the united states of america is informed by the court clerk, just like any other criminal defendant would be, what his rights are. >> donald trump will be sentenced following the conviction by trial to 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree before being sentenced. the court will allow your attorney and assistant district attorney an opportunity to address the court with any matters relevant to sentencing. >> and this is one of the lead prosecutors in court today laying out why this matters, why it is so important that the unanimous conviction by a jury of donald trump's peers be upheld, if for no other reason than to preserve the rule of law in america. >> the verdict in this case was unanimous and decisive, and it must be respected, as this court has observed, quote, the sanctity of a jury verdict and the deference that must be

accorded to it is a bedrock principle in our nation's jurisprudence. the defendant's conduct before, during and after this trial also merits consideration. instead of preserving, protecting, and defending our constitutionally established system of criminal justice, the defendant, the once and future president of the united states, has engaged in a coordinated campaign to undermine its legitimacy. far from expressing any kind of remorse for his criminal conduct, the defendant has purposefully bred disdain for our judicial institutions and the rule of law. and he's done this to serve his own ends and to encourage others to reject the jury verdict that he finds so distasteful. he has characterized these proceedings as corrupt, rigged witch hunt,

or a sham too many times to tabulate. he has been unrelenting in his unsubstantiated attacks upon this court and its family. individual prosecutors and their families, the witnesses, the grand jury, the trial jury, and the justice system as a whole. as this court has noted, the defendant's conduct, quote, constitutes a direct attack on the rule of law itself. moreover, the defendant has publicly threatened to retaliate against the prosecutors who have sought to hold him accountable in this and other matters, and the courts, who have endeavored to fairly and faithfully adjudicate these matters. such threats are designed to have a chilling effect to intimidate those who have the responsibility to enforce our laws, in the hopes that they will ignore the defendant's too

powerful to be subjected to the same rule of law as the rest of us. put simply, this defendant has caused enduring damage to the public perception of the criminal justice system and has placed officers of the court in harm's way. >> enduring damage. >> this is judge juan merchan. judge juan merchan is a judge who has been systematically, almost since the beginning, singled out, maligned and threatened. >> he has seen his family, his daughter, maligned and threatened. this is him in his own words today, explaining the sentence and speaking directly to the defendant and now convicted felon donald trump. >> never before has this court been presented with such a unique and remarkable set of circumstances. >> indeed, it can be viewed fairly that this has been a truly extraordinary case.

>> there was unprecedented media attention, public interest, and heightened security involving various agencies. >> and yet, the trial was a bit of a paradox, because once the courtroom doors were closed, the trial itself was no more special, unique or extraordinary than the other 32 criminal trials that took place in this courthouse at the same exact time, the same burden of proof was applied and the jury, made up of ordinary citizens, delivered a verdict. >> and it was all conducted pursuant to the rules of procedure and guided by the law. so while one can argue that the trial itself was in many respects somewhat ordinary, the same cannot be said about the circumstances surrounding this sentencing. and that is because of the office you once occupied, and which you will soon occupy again. to be sure, it is the legal protections afforded to the office of the president of

the united states that are extraordinary, not the occupant of the office, despite the extraordinary breadth of those protections. >> one power they do not provide is the power to erase a jury verdict. >> it is clear from legal precedent which until july 1st was scarce, that donald trump, the ordinary citizen. donald trump, the criminal defendant, would not be entitled to such considerable protections. this court has determined that the only lawful sentence that permits entry of a judgment of conviction without encroaching upon the highest office in the land, is an unconditional discharge. therefore, at this time i impose that sentence to cover all 34 counts. sir, i wish you godspeed as you assume your second term in office. thank you. >> i wish you godspeed on your second term.

>> words that speak not just to this moment, but to this judge's character, this judge's professionalism and patriotism. words that fly in the face of the smears donald trump and his allies have sought to perpetuate about him on a near-daily basis. it is a day of great import for the rule of law and this great nation. it is where we start today with some of our most favorite reporters and friends with me at the table. new york times investigative reporter, author of lucky loser. susanne craig is here. she was inside the courtroom for today's sentencing. we're also joined by msnbc legal analyst, former top official at the department of justice. andrew weissmann is here. the reverend al sharpton joins us. he's the president of the national action network, the host of msnbc's politics nation. here at the table with us, nbc news correspondent vaughn hillyard is here. vaughn hillyard, i start with you. >> everything about what happened today was something that trump sought to offramp himself from. >> he sought to delay. the trial

had some success. it was delayed. but it happened. sought to have the incoming deputy attorney general of the united states. i think todd blanch, his criminal defense attorney, have it thrown out before, during and after he did not succeed. there were efforts to shape the outcome as it was ongoing. there were efforts to intimidate at least some of the witnesses while it was ongoing. there was an extraordinary intervention by the united states supreme court, including by four of them yesterday. donald trump didn't want what happened today to happen, and it did. >> the supreme court last night, justice amy coney barrett, justice john roberts, they did not intervene and stop today from taking place. and i think when we take a step back in american history and look at that decision last night to not intervene, it allowed this process to take place not just for us to all look back at the actual verdict that this jury made and the sentencing, but also the message it sends to donald trump ten days before he

is about to go back into the white house, into future presidents of the united states. over those seven weeks, we all listened to testimony from these witnesses inside of that courtroom that testified that donald trump, in the lead up to the 2016 election, attempted to improperly influence the outcome. and he won that election. but then we also heard testimony that while he was in the white house, he, with michael cohen went and falsifying business records. they had a meeting at the oval office in february of 2017, and he went and put his name on checks that served as hush money payment to stormy daniels. and coming off of the supreme court decision here this summer, there are serious questions about the repercussions that would have if donald trump were to win this november election. it would have in 2025 to 2028. i think today was a statement that donald trump or any political candidate during your run for the presidency and while you are in the white house, while your official acts may be protected, a decision is made in there are consequences. you can still walk

away out of a courtroom being a convicted felon. i think today's sentencing and seeing this process to its end, he has the opportunity to appeal. but i think that this is a statement not just about donald trump, but also the presidency for generations to potentially come. >> you were there. tell us what it was like. >> well, i was just thinking about just preserving history. >> it's sort of an overused statement. and we report on history every day. but today was about actually preserving it and the gravity. you felt it in the room, but it was you also felt it was interesting just seeing each side and how frustrated all of them were. it really came out. >> and i was really glad that you played a lot of the audio, and that we actually have the audio available for people to listen to. that was a first, but there was a lot of frustration, and i don't i think a lot of people were saying even today might not have happened. >> there was there was questions about whether it would up until last night, but also there was questions about should the manhattan da in september have have said, yeah, okay, we'll put it off until until later. maybe it should have gone ahead then and then for the judge to do this, i think it was very

important for him to preserve it. >> but one one other thing that really came through and just reflecting on the judge's words and what he said as i was leaving the courtroom, this is this was about the office of the president today, donald trump. >> and he said it was he said, donald trump, the ordinary citizen, donald trump, the criminal defendant, would not be entitled to the protections of the presidency. but it was the office today that shielded him. and this is not only a distinction that will now carry him into the white house. it is a stain. and that is now for the record. and it's been it's in the record and it's there. he can appeal it. but he made it official. >> yeah, yeah. >> that's in some ways this is a great day. and in many ways it is just an incredibly sad day for the country. and i think the great day is that it happened. is that is that in spite of enormous adversity, a credit to alvin bragg, a credit to judge merchan, to the prosecution, to

the jurors, to the witnesses that this happened and to all of the lawyers, the defense lawyers and the prosecutors on the on the case. and a credit to the supreme court last night, at least five of the justices saying he's going to be treated like everyone else, which is that, you know what? it's this is not alice in wonderland. everyone, you go through the trial, you get sentenced, and then you appeal, not in any other order. so that's all the good news. the bad news is, is when prosecutors steinglass said the defendant, the once and future president that what that signals about this country. what it signals to the rest of the world in terms of who we are, in terms of the rule of law in this country. the sentence was obviously not the sentence that donald trump deserved. but for winning the election, many people are looking at this thinking it's not really justice

by putting this off, by having it sentenced. now he got away with it and he, you know, the judge made it perfectly clear that it was only because of the presidency, not donald trump, that he was getting this. and all of that is an undermining of the rule of law. it's an undermining of who we think we are in this country, but also in the rest of the world, which i think was going to have lasting damage. >> born during the trial as a criminal defendant, one of the things donald trump did was to recirculate a social media post of a baseball bat at the head of alvin bragg. >> now that he is the president elect of the united states of america, and something that displeases him has come to pass, what threats would you suggest we gird ourselves for everyone involved in this process? >> he had suggested that there would be protests in the streets back in march of 2023 if he was indicted. we didn't see that happen. and i think that that is one important part of this is

that while a plurality of americans did vote him into office, donald trump has tried to wield influence and power over not just those closest to him. we saw that in testimony from hope hicks, from michael cohen. they put out a statement there right before the 2016 election that there was no knowledge about the payments to karen mcdougal or stormy daniels. of course, we know that's false. so we know on the public record now that donald trump is willing to lie in order for his personal gain. but in terms of the threats made to district attorney, bragg made to judge merchan made to these others. jack smith i think that a moving back to washington, d.c. week, and i'll be covering all of this up close from down there. and i think that we have seen a willingness over the last two years for donald trump. effectively, we should note, effectively be able to go and undermine the credibility of politicians. liz cheney, jack smith, district attorney bragg, fani willis. and that's not to say that there's some legitimate

questions sometimes about individuals. that's how this process plays out. but i think donald trump in these last two years was successful in many cases in smearing the names of some of these public servants who were not worthy of those smears. and of course, not for everybody in america. but we're talking about millions. and i think that there's a question as to what extent do republicans on capitol hill does the department of justice, people like todd blanch, who and emil bove, they're going to be the number two and number three at the department of justice. the two men who were there representing him today, to what extent do they stand up in defend the justice system, the judges and the prosecutors against those smears? i'm not sure. we didn't see much resistance the last few years, but when donald trump is in power within the biggest office, what does that look like? >> because in part of your new assignment, you have other duties, reporting duties. so we're going to let you go. thank you for starting us off this hour. and keep your dance card free between 4 and 6 every day from down there. my friend, i want to bring you in on this because i think that vaughn is putting his finger on why this

matters to every american piece of this, right? >> because i think in the credibility piece, if you're a donald trump fan, you've heard him smear all of the parties now for years and years and years, including michael cohen, including stormy daniels, including the witnesses who the jury was able to hear from, you know, firsthand in the courtroom in that way. >> and i love that. judge mershon said. >> there were 32 other trials going on at the same time. this was like similar to all of those. but there is a very real populating of the department of justice with criminal defense attorneys who they didn't quit when he threatened juan merchan. they didn't walk away from the case when he circulated a picture of a bat held against the head of alvin bragg. and there are instances of tragic and dear friend of this program. mr. salas had an assassin show up at her home and murder her son. there have been threats levied against judges appointed by democratic and republican

presidents. >> and all of it is ghastly and ghoulish and a horrific sign of a growing amount of people who tolerate and traffic in threats of and acts of political violence. >> but to see all these people go into positions of extraordinary power, i mean, to be the attorney general, the deputy attorney general and the fbi director, and to have not only agreed with trump's imagery and dissemination of images of violence, but to have not walked away from someone who tolerates political violence and helps normalize it, is an ominous sign for what's about to happen in ten days. >> it is a very ominous sign, and it is very it's scary, frankly, because these people will be in charge and they have a man who is vindictive, who has said he's going after his political enemies and others and has no boundaries. the good news was, and i was pleasantly

surprised to see justices roberts and barrett stand up and block all that happening. in this case, i think that the breath of fresh air we had is the supreme court that he felt. i put three of y'all there. they were already two conservatives. this is not going to happen. and i'm i'm sure he was stunned that they didn't. and i think it's going to come down to people showing us who they really are. are they in position for the country and to uphold the law, or are they in there to bow to donald trump? the other problem he has is this is he can appeal it, but this is a state conviction. he can't pardon himself. this is not a federal conviction. so he can't pardon himself. he's going to pardon scores if not hundreds of people that rioted and hurt people. he's showing the world who they are. and i guess the minister side of me looks at the whole

world, looked at america at its best yesterday as we paid homage to a president that rose from poverty, that rose from a peanut farmer to becoming president of the united states, and then a servant of the people. you have another president a day later that did the opposite, born to wealth and went to the gutter and is trying to take the country with him. >> that's such an amazing frame. >> i the only place. and this is why you're so much savvier than i am. i'm shocked that for supreme court justices thought today shouldn't happen. i mean, i agree with you. the news is, is that two didn't, but that we've so normalized the idea that anyone would. i mean, i think that's a very, very ominous way to start a second trump term. >> i said exactly that last night, which was that the well, the supreme court decision, you know, should have come out the way it did, that the bad news is that it should have been nine

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constitution? >> do you still believe that the collapse of the regime is inevitable? >> what's your level of concern and fear for your own future? >> america is dealing with many issues, from grocery prices to gun violence. >> it has been over 400 days since the war in gaza started. >> you're watching trump hire a fiercely loyal staff. >> much more to come here tonight. >> stay with us. >> joining our coverage is congresswoman laura friedman of california. parts of her district have been under mandatory evacuation. congresswoman, thank you so much for being here. tell us how your constituents are doing and what it is you need from the federal government and from the general public wanting to help. >> thank you. well, first of all, my constituents are heartbroken. they're heartbroken seeing the same images that you're seeing of people who have lost everything. people have lost their homes, their businesses, in some cases their lives. so the whole community is grieving and no one is sleeping. well, we're still not out of the

woods. we still have huge fire risk because of the drought conditions and the wind is picking up. so we have fires, as you said, in the station break ringing our communities. and so people are very nervous and they're very on edge. and now the task is to make sure that we keep everyone safe for now. at some point we'll be assessing the damage, of course, and my job is to help get relief to the people who need it, namely our first responders at the moment and soon. to all of those people who had terrible losses. >> congresswoman, can you explain the santa ana winds? i mean, i think people have more familiarity with the hurricane season than they do with the winds, which, you know, even if they go down to the point where they can get aircraft in the sky to fight the flames, it just takes one ember, as every californian knows so well to, to do more damage. just explain how long it will be before you really exhale and your constituents really feel like they can. as you said, sleep at

night. >> so i've lived in los angeles since 1992 and i have never seen one like this. i've lived here for dozens of years, and many of us have said the same thing over the last few days. we've experienced santa ana as we experience them every year, and this is when the winds shift from coming in from the ocean from the west to coming across the deserts from the east, and they can be fierce. you know, we get a lot of fierce santa ana winds that will blow trees around, knock things over. but this time we had winds that were up to 100 miles an hour. >> we had hurricane force winds. >> now it's january, and normally when we get the santa ana's in this time of year, we've also had quite a bit of rain. we're supposed to be in the rainy season right now, but we haven't had rain in southern california for months and it is dry as a bone out and there's very little humidity in the air. and that means that you take those windy conditions with with a tinderbox conditions, and you set the stage for the kind of

disaster that we saw. we're seeing a lot of stories of neighbors helping neighbors. >> i know the pasadena humane society has taken in. i think yesterday it was about 300. by this morning it was almost 400 animals. there are people who woke up tuesday morning with lots of things on their mind, maybe back to school, post-holiday resolutions, whatever. now they have no schools or no homes. how are neighboring communities helping those who've lost everything, including schools, if they have school age kids? >> you know, it's ironic because this disaster is showing the worst that nature can do, but it's also showing the best that people can do all at the same time. >> and this shows why we're proud to be los angeles, why we're proud to be californians, and i think why we're proud to be americans. because in tough times, we do pull together and people are really pulling together. we have had dozens, i mean, probably hundreds of

people reach out directly to me and my office saying, i have an extra guest room, i have an adu, send someone to me who's displaced, send me someone who's an evacuee, and i will put them up, and i will feed them and keep them safe and warm. we have community groups who are trying to find long term housing for people who are displaced. we, of course, have shelters open and we have so many volunteers coming in to help and so many people sending food and blankets, toys, everything that they think people need. yesterday i was at the equestrian center here in los angeles, in burbank, in my district, and there are dozens of people there taking care of the hundreds of horses that have been evacuated from surrounding areas. some of them found just roaming around, running, terrified through burning neighborhoods. we have hay coming in from across the state of california. it's pretty exceptional. >> we will, if you share with our team any information about resources. we will gladly help communicate with any viewers of our program. how people can help. congresswoman laura

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media platform in the world went the other direction this week, decided, na eff it. they turned away from any attempt to have a platform that showcases accurate information and even pretends to hold themselves accountable for disseminating accurate, factual information. meta ceo mark zuckerberg announced that his company was doing away with all efforts at fact checking on its platforms of facebook, instagram and threads. keep that in mind if you're on any of those platforms. they they said again, screw it, we're done. we're out of the truth and fact business. instead, they're going to turn to something called community notes. it's the model that the platform currently known as twitter. now. elon musk's ex, has used to basically turn that platform into a dumpster fire of disinformation. mark zuckerberg

and his deputies saying the system they had been using resulted in, quote, too many mistakes and too much censorship as to why the change is happening right now. listen to how they put it. >> the recent elections also feel like a cultural tipping point towards once again prioritizing speech. so we're going to get back to our roots and focus on reducing mistakes, simplifying our policies and restoring free expression on our platforms. >> meta recently elevated former white house deputy chief of staff to president george w bush, joel kaplan, to be its global policy chief. he went on fox and friends to echo his boss's praise of, quote, free expression and the incoming trump administration. and on monday, meta appointed this man to its board of directors. if you don't recognize him, his name is dana white. he's the ufc ceo. he happens to be a close

friend of donald trump. and if all of that doesn't have you worried enough, zuckerberg also said that meta will be moving its content review team from the state of california to the state of texas to, quote, help remove the concern that biased employees are overly censoring content. end quote. joining our conversation, president of media matters for america angelo carusone is back and professor of history at new york university. ruth ben-ghiat is here. ruth, i start with you. >> yes. >> well, you know, if you want to please donald trump, you will do two things which mark zuckerberg is doing. >> you will give money, lots of it to donald trump. and he's donating a million to the inauguration. and you will also create an environment that allows trump and maga and his

allies lies and claims and half truths to more easily circulate. and it is really striking that in his speech, zuckerberg said that it's fact checking that created a lack of trust, which is very orwellian, because of course, it's disinformation. the purpose of disinformation is to break trust among people and turn them against each other and cause people to not know what to believe. and so they're more dependent on the leader. and maybe the only trust that was broken was, you know, trump's trust in zuckerberg when he was, you know, actually upholding authenticity and upholding objectivity through fact checking. and so now zuckerberg has moved to take that obstacle away to him being treated well by trump, which seems to be his main objective. >> angelo, i feel like so many of our conversations are around

the non-reality and trump has done a good enough job at that to be reelected. why does mark zuckerberg want so desperately to help? >> i mean, he's in a way he sort of hinted at it in his announcement. and i think one is to avoid consequences. >> and we've talked about this with project 2025. one of the people that wrote the part of project 2025 around the section 230, which is the thing that prevents tech companies from being sued. it gives them immunity. brendan carr, he's trump's designated to be the fcc chair. and he, you know, right after the election, wrote a letter to these companies, basically saying, we're going to come at you and you're. 230 protections if you continue to censor. >> and one of the things that he described as censorship are these fact checking programs. >> so in a way, you know, zuckerberg was inoculating himself against what was likely going to be an assault. >> it's the implementation of project 2025, a small part of it. but then there's something more insidious than that. and that's the thing that he hinted

at in his announcement, which is he he sort of said he's going to work with the trump administration to push back and sort of get the eu to roll back a bunch of their policies and protections in place. the eu has a much more robust set of regulatory, you know, regulations around these social media companies for privacy, for data protection, for information, for their obligations around their algorithm, what they're promoting, what they're not promoting around hate speech and extremism. and it's pretty clear, just based on that announcement and where the tea leaves are, that he is going to be, he wants to be at the table. he wants facebook to be one of the benefits. and the recipients of sort of a lack of a lack of those regulations. >> and it's all going to be under the guise of free speech. >> but really it's about a free for all that advantages. >> as you noted, the alternative reality that that trump is spinning and that's that's really the part about this, you know, the fact checking piece of this is the part that's so unsettling is if all they did was roll back. fact checking

truth might be able to survive, but he did a lot more as a part of these changes of policies because in addition to rolling back fact checking, they're also getting rid of the limitation and the squelching and the slowing down of certain types of political information or a lot of political information, they reduced the reach of that for the last few years. >> so they're not only going to allow poison into the system, but zuckerberg is simultaneously opening up the spigot while this new poison is being injected into there. >> so some of it is done to avoid consequences. but also he's going to get something out of this, which is deregulation broadly. >> and then in the short term, it's going to, you know, greatly benefit the alternative reality that trump and his allies are trying to build. >> ruth, let me read you the bulwark. some analysis of this, because it's better than anything i could think to say. mark zuckerberg is a surrender monkey. this is jonathan, the last quote. tell me, what's the point of being worth $209 billion if you can't play offense against politicians who

might target you and your in your business? why is zuckerberg acting like a surrender monkey instead of a titan of industry who has an infinite bankroll in ownership of key platforms? couldn't zuckerberg be the one making trump's life difficult if he wanted to? imagine if zuckerberg oriented meta towards trump the way musk oriented twitter ex toward biden and harris and democrats. but of course, that is unthinkable. what is it that makes the richest and most powerful? and we also have an example this week of the cartoonists at the washington post quitting, who sought to simply cover in her journalism. jeff bezos, why is it the richest and most powerful who seem to crumble and cower, the fastest and most humiliating acts? >> it's certainly dispiriting and often disgusting to look at that, because indeed, they are

the people who should be, you know, they're relatively immune from any consequences of lawsuits. they have the money to defend themselves. but it's always been like this. autocrats make these kind of bargains with the richest, you know, industry titans. and, you know, authoritarianism is about taking a right, taking away rights for the many, but giving the very few more liberties. and that's where deregulation comes in. it's where privatization comes in. and that's been that's very important to authoritarianism all over the world, that the rich grow richer. it was a foundation of neoliberal economics practiced in chile during pinochet's dictatorship. and so people, you know, feel that it's a free for all, and they're going to cash out by being able to plunder the economy, plunder the workforce, because the regulations won't be there. and that evidently

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proximity to power to benefit himself financially? >> is there room to do some oversight over the trump announced nominees? >> what would you do as dnc chair to better communicate with this generation? >> you feel like the u.s. government is starting to figure out how to do this. everything matters. >> lots to get to is every monday night like this? make way on monday night? >> this announcement of the state of the vote by the president of the senate shall be deemed a sufficient declaration of the persons elected president and vice president of the united states, each for a term beginning on the 20th day of january, 2025, and shall be

entered together with the list of the votes on the journals of the house and the senate. thank you very much. >> and just like that, no rioting, no rampaging, no ransacking, just a refreshingly routine normal certification, thank god. absent of any threats of hanging anybody. but if last time proved anything to anyone, it is that such instances of democratic normalcy are for our country at this moment, newsworthy and remarkable and too fragile to be taken for granted or covered as anything other than that for now. and it appears that the vice president went about her constitutional duty. with that in mind. >> well, today was obviously a very important day, and it was

about what should be the norm and what the american people should be able to take for granted. >> i do believe very strongly that america's democracy is only as strong as our willingness to fight for it. every single person, their willingness to fight for and respect the importance of our democracy. otherwise, it is very fragile and it will not be able to withstand moments of crisis. and today, america's democracy stood. >> joining our conversation, former harris campaign senior adviser and top aide to vice president kamala harris, brian fallon is back. i'm brian fallon. we've missed you. you've been busy. what was it like for you personally to watch your boss do her, in her words, constitutional duty? >> well, i and i think everybody who worked with her was extremely proud of her.

>> you know, she showed her classic sense of toughness and grit that was on display in her early days as a prosecutor in those courtrooms. it was on display during the campaign, during the one and only debate that she had against donald trump. >> it was on display the day after the election, where she gave a concession speech at howard university, and it was on display again today. >> you know, she it was never a consideration to shy away from this moment. >> she felt it was a very solemn responsibility. and her closing days as vice president to show the country that what happened four years ago was an aberration. >> and if she was going to do anything in her closing days as vice president, she was going to help restore this norm of the peaceful transfer of power. >> she talked a lot in the campaign about the importance of upholding democracy and upholding our institutions and democratic norms. >> and today she walked the walk on that. >> what does she mean when she says that it is up to every single american, every single day to quote, fight for our democracy?

>> well, i think it's one thing to treat this ceremony, this certification process, as a perfunctory matter. >> that's what we want to get back to, for it to be a return to normal, where events like today do not become occasions for violent insurrections, but rather the results of the election are honored. and donald trump won this election, and there's no disputing that, she conceded. >> you know, that day after the election at howard university and, you know, she wishes the president well. >> however, if the president follows through on a lot of the things he talked about during the campaign, you know, then all of us as citizens will have a duty to stand up to him on some of those things. >> and so maybe a lot of that was bluster. >> it's possible that he won't follow through on some of the things that he discussed during the campaign, but if he does, then it's up to everybody to do their patriotic duty to not be weary and give in to, you know, what donald trump may seek to do in a second term. >> and she has said, for her

part, that she's going to continue to remain in the fight in her own way. exactly what that means. >> i think she's still figuring out and that she has some time to figure that out. right now, she's focused on completing her duties as vice president, but i do think she very much intends to continue to have a voice and speak out on the issues that were, you know, at stake in the election and that she still feels strongly about. >> this has been prime time weekend. i'm nicolle wallace. please tune in to deadline, white house and all of our prime white house and all of our prime tlakesha: childhood cancer is-- it's a long road. it's hard. but st. jude has gotten us through it. st. jude is hope that you have a chance at life. and it goes such a long way for every child diagnosed with cancer because the research is being shared all over the world. it's awesome. [music playing]

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