dental now.com. >> physicians mutual, physicians mutual. >> testing the limits. president trump is. snatching authority from. >> congress. sparking accusations that. >> he's breaking. >> laws and raising. real concerns. >> that he'll. >> defy court. >> rulings that go. >> against him. >> i'll ask senator peter welch of the judiciary committee and. >> norm eisen. >> of the states defending. >> democracy fund. >> whether they. think we are well on our way to a constitutional crisis. the purchase next. >> phase. >> more federal workers. >> got the ax. >> and there's new reporting on the. >> strategy behind. >> who's on the chopping block next. >> my political panel of. >> jonathan lovitz and. >> tara setmayer. >> will weigh in. >> the soul of the gop. >> what it says about.

>> the republican. >> party that senator. mitch mcconnell is the principal voice against president trump's unqualified cabinet nominees. i'll ask matthew dowd. >> why his. >> former party. >> is totally unrecognizable now. >> and no seat at the table yet. >> with the. >> president of. >> ukraine is telling. >> nbc's kristen welker about any american. >> led. peace negotiations. >> that don't include ukraine. >> and how. >> president trump is responding tonight. i'm jonathan capehart. this is. >> the. >> sunday show. >> you folks, we. >> may not officially. be in a constitutional crisis, but we are quickly hurtling towards one like thelma and louise. off that cliff. president trump started us down this road by using executive orders and billionaire first buddy elon musk to usurp

congress's constitutional power of the purse to halt federal funding authorized by the legislative branch. but now that his actions are being challenged in court, trump is bristling at rulings seeking to rein him in. when a judge in rhode island concluded last monday that the trump administration violated his earlier ruling to restore $2 trillion in federal funds and. >> ordered the. >> president to reverse the funding freeze, he said judges, quote, shouldn't be dictating what you're supposed to be doing. he also said this about judges who rule against his policies. >> we want to weed out the corruption. and it seems hard to believe that a judge could say, we don't want you to do that. well, so maybe we have to look at the judges, because that's a very serious i think it's a very serious violation. >> white house press secretary caroline leavitt took trump's judge. trump's judge comments to another level. she accused the courts of creating a

constitutional crisis rather than preventing one. >> the real. >> constitutional crisis. >> is. taking place within our judicial branch. >> we're district court. >> judges in. >> liberal districts. >> across the country. are abusing their power. >> to unilaterally. >> block president trump's. >> basic executive authority. >> we believe these. >> judges are. >> acting as. >> judicial activists. >> rather than. >> honest arbiters. >> of the law. >> so here's a little schoolhouse rock refresher for the press secretary. the judiciary is one of the three co-equal branches of government. thus, judges do have the right to rule against the president. it's part of the constitution's separation of powers. also, this past week, seven federal prosecutors quit over trump administration pressure to dismiss the corruption charges against new york city mayor eric adams. nbc news reports the doj attorney who finally agreed to drop the adams case did so to protect his colleagues. two of

the attorneys who resigned warned that what trump was offering adams amounted to, quote, a quid pro quo, dismissing the charges in exchange for stricter immigration enforcement in new york. adams has denied making a deal with trump, and the president remains defiant. in a social media post last night, trump shared his own legal philosophy, quote he who saves his country does not violate any law. i'm afraid that one's not in the constitution, mr. president. joining me now, senator peter welch of vermont, a member of the senate judiciary committee. senator welch, thank you very much for coming to the sunday show. first, let me get your reaction to that social media post from the president of the united states. he who was he who saves his country does not violate any law. what? >> well, that is. >> you know. >> the. >> so-called unitary executive

theory that is. extreme and basically says the president can do. >> whatever he. >> wants. >> independent of congress, independent. >> of the judiciary. you know, my view. >> here is. that president. >> trump really is on. >> a rampage of illegality. he has a lot of authority. he has an agenda. >> he's entitled. >> to pursue. >> his agenda with. >> all the power of the executive branch. >> but he's not entitled. >> to do it in a way that's unconstitutional. >> and probably the biggest. alarm is that he is. >> seizing the. >> appropriations power that is exclusively the province. >> of the. >> congressional branch. >> article one. and he's just. blowing by that, impounding money, firing people. who have. >> legal protection. >> and he's. >> asserting that he has the right to do it because he is the president. >> that's wrong. secondly. >> we've got. >> a situation with the republicans in congress. >> where they're. >> essentially exceeding. >> their independent.

>> authority in acceding. >> to whatever it. >> is the. >> president wants. >> the real. >> crisis will emerge. >> when there is a. >> judicial order. >> particularly from the supreme. >> court. and the president, as jd. >> vance has. >> suggested he should do, is tell the supreme court that let you guys enforce it. >> we'll do what we want. so we're in very. >> very serious. >> territory here with. >> respect to. >> constitutional principles. >> well, senator, what recourse would you have? meaning you being congress or anyone have, if indeed the president of the united states defies an order from the supreme court, is there any recourse? >> well, that's the that's the crisis. you know, when we had january 6th, of course, was an attack on the capitol. and it was two things. >> one, it was. >> a renunciation. >> of the norm. >> of the peaceful transfer of power. >> and also. >> number two. >> it. >> was the. >> use of violence, his way to try to stop an election. both of

those acts were completely. >> outside the. >> bounds of anything we'd ever seen. >> and what it. >> showed is. >> that whatever is in the constitution. >> that has been a. >> guardrail for. >> us. >> but that's. >> been cast aside. in the norms. >> are collapsing and. >> they're being under direct attack. so, in fact, there's enormous. >> jeopardy here because in fact, the president. >> bulldozes ahead. >> he has. >> a supine. >> congress, and then. >> he has a supreme. >> court that may. >> or may not. >> rule against him. >> but if they rule against him and he ignores. >> them, then we're in. >> total uncharted territory. and the dilemma that. >> we face as. >> a country is that for a lot of. >> folks. >> it's theory when we're talking about the constitution and if they like what the president is doing, that's okay. but in fact, the only way we're going to continue. >> to have another 250 years in. >> a very complex. society like the united states is if. >> we. >> have rules of the road, where the big difference is that we have to resolve. >> or done so. >> in an orderly way. >> and that's.

>> what's being under attack here. >> senator, what do you make of the sort of not so veiled threats being leveled by not only the president, but the white house press secretary against judges? >> they're explicit. >> i mean, what trump has done is used threats and followed through on threats against political rivals, starting with his primary. opponents in 2016 and then with political people along the way. and he is now using the justice department to go after people who were his opponents. and he also shows that he will use the power of the presidency to pardon people who committed very serious crimes. 1600 people, of course, were pardoned and those included pedophiles. that included a person who had previous crimes. and when he got out, was in a violent altercation with police and includes a drug dealer who was actually going online soliciting someone to do a hit job for him. so the vengeance is

a tool that the president uses quite energetically. >> senator peter. >> welch of the great state of vermont, thank you very much for coming to the sunday show. and joining me now. joining me now, norm eisen, executive chair of democracy defenders fund, publisher and co founder of the contrarian and white house ethics czar in the obama administration. he's part of a part of several lawsuits challenging the legality of elon musk's role within the trump administration. mr. isaac, thank you very much for coming to the sunday show. so is trump with all i think the senator said it a rampage of illegality. do you think that president trump is doing all of these things just to see how far he can go? is he just trying to test the limits, or is he just blowing past the limits? devil may care. >> jonathan. he promised he would be a dictator on day one when he came to office, and he

honored that promise, including by. one of his very. >> first acts. >> was to him to attempt to rewrite the constitution. donald trump will decide who is the citizen, not the united states constitution. the issue of whether people born here and birthright citizenship. and we know this about people who assume dictatorial powers when. >> they seize them. >> for one day, they very rarely let go of them thereafter. and that's been true with donald trump, as he's violated law after law. he's invaded article one prerogatives of congress interfering with spending enjoined by the courts that birthright citizenship. >> i've participated. >> in that litigation enjoined by the courts. he's fired people directly contrary to congressional laws. that's been enjoined by the courts, headed to the supreme court, and on and on and on. so i think he's very consciously trying to expand the

powers. indeed, he just said that if the. president does. >> it, i have it right here. >> he who saves his country does not violate the any law, that any law. >> that's the opposite. >> of the american idea, that no one is above the law. he says, well, if i determine that i'm saving the country, i'm above the law. so i think it is a very serious threat. and that's why i've participated in about a dozen cases that we've brought or assisted with. >> yeah. so i was going to ask you about the lawsuit involving elon musk. talk about why. why go. why go after him? why not go after. just keep the lawsuits focused on trump. >> three of those cases are involve elon musk. the very first case saying, hey, this doge is illegal. jonathan, where is this department of government

efficiency approved by congress or elon musk approved by congress? then he got in the treasury department, right. he attempted to get well. he we got another order. no, elon. we blocked him out of the treasury department. the biggest was just filed last week. we say elon musk is acting as a kind of super cabinet member. but like a regular cabinet member, you must be approved by congress under the appointments clause. the reason this is so important, donald trump has outsourced many of the functions of the presidency to elon musk, by far his largest benefactor in the campaign. he's an american oligarch. you see this in every autocratic regime. there's favored business figures. elon musk has business interests that many of these agencies he's cutting are regulating. so we've gone to court to say the

constitution doesn't allow this. we're very focused on this issue. >> so all. >> of these a lot of these cases will probably end up at the supreme court. how confident are you that the supreme court will rule in your favor in all or maybe most of the cases? >> well, i'm confident they won't rule in my favor. in all of the cases. i'm hoping that we see the supreme court that said, right before the inauguration, the 5 to 4 court, the three liberals, plus the chief justice and justice amy coney barrett, 5 to 4, said those 34 felonies that donald trump committed election interference and cover up in and around 2016, he has to be sentenced. he desperately wanted to avoid that criminal sentencing. that five four majority did the right thing. will it be that one or will it

be the six three majority that said he has these imperial powers? presidential immunity? we don't know. i'm hopeful that the court sees this. these attacks on the constitution, on american law, on judges. jonathan. yes, they are judges. i hope they realize he might come for them next if they give him these powers. so. but remains to be determined. >> one more question. we have less than a minute left, but i wanted to ask you about all the goings on with new york city mayor eric adams and the federal case against him and the quit the resignations of seven seven prosecutors who didn't want to end the prosecution. what does that say about the trump administration and how it views the rule of law? >> well, the leader of those prosecutors, the interim u.s. attorney danielle sassoon, and antonin scalia clerk, she is very conservative. she resigned

in the strongest terms. that is the kind of integrity we're hoping for because she said it was a quid pro quo. you can't drop a criminal case in exchange for getting immigration policy help. so she was very upset by it. she did the right thing. the other six did as well. that's the kind of integrity that we're going to. we're getting it from the lower courts. now we need it from the supreme court. >> norm eisen i didn't even get a chance to have you put on your former ambassador to the czech republic hat to talk about what europeans think, about what the hell is going on with america in the second trump term. but we'll just have to have you back. >> thank you, >> jonathan. >> thank you very much. norm eisen, for coming to the sunday show and coming up, the soul of the republican party and what it says about the gop, that senator mitch mcconnell is a beacon of sanity on recent cabinet confirmation votes. matthew dowd joins me next. and later, trump's legal and political assault on the media, how his rhetoric has turned into action, and what it means for first

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that guy. the former senate majority leader who stole a supreme court seat from president obama and didn't vote to convict donald trump during his second impeachment trial. but that was then. this is now. seemingly freed from the constraints of a leadership post, mcconnell voted against three of donald trump's most unqualified cabinet nominees defense secretary pete hegseth, director of national intelligence tulsi gabbard, and health and human services secretary robert f kennedy jr. more shocking than mcconnell's, no votes against them were where the yes votes came from. after expressing initial concern. senator joni ernst, a female combat veteran and sexual assault survivor, voted yes for hegseth, a man who has said women shouldn't serve in combat and has been accused of sexual assault himself. hegseth has denied the allegations. senator susan collins, a member of the

senate intelligence committee for 12 years, voted yes for gabbard, even though gabbard has zero intelligence experience. and senator bill cassidy, a doctor who worked in public hospitals in louisiana for 30 years and is a lifelong advocate for vaccines, voted yes for kennedy. a well known anti-vaxxer. you know, you've entered bizarro world when mitch mcconnell is the only one who did the right thing. but the sad political reality is this. cassidy, collins and ernst are all up for reelection next year. nothing like the threat of a primary challenger to soften the once firm republican spine on issues of character and qualifications. but it would also appear the gop has given up on being the rule of law and law and order party. just look at the mutiny at the trump justice department. seven prosecutors opted to resign rather than

acquiesce to a request from acting attorney general emil bove to drop a federal corruption case against new york mayor eric adams. danielle danielle sassoon, who had been appointed by president trump just weeks ago to serve as the interim u.s. attorney for the southern district of new york, described the adams case dismissal as, quote, driven by improper considerations. sassoon is no liberal. she is a member of the conservative federalist society who clerked for the late conservative justice antonin scalia. i admire sassoon's courage and conviction in upholding her oath to the constitution. what isn't admirable is the deafening silence from other conservatives, other republicans, in the face of an all out assault on the once bedrock tenets of their party. joining me now, matthew dowd, msnbc's senior political contributor and analyst. matthew, thank you for coming back to the sunday show. just

what i am just sort of dumbfounded that i am sort of lauding former majority leader mitch mcconnell for doing the right thing, for standing on his principles and voting against hegseth, gabbard and rfk jr. where has the republican party gone? >> well, that's the that's that's what we've seen over the last ten years. and it probably stretches further, but it's been accelerated over the last. ten years. >> this is. >> no longer a party that is a principled conservative party. i would argue that that mitch mcconnell, while he made machinations and did things i didn't like about garland and a number of other things, he at least acted from a principled, conservative standpoint, even if his machinations, i think, were harmful to the united states senate. that no longer exists in the republican party. the principled conservatives have been exiled. if they took a stand or or today, they're quieted and they just respond to

the sort of autocratic, populist movement that donald trump is at the head of in, in this. and i don't think it's so much the republicans are afraid, first of all, they are principled and they aren't conservative. so that's a that's a definitive thing, but they're not so much afraid of donald trump. they're afraid of their own voters. and the problem is a third of the country now. and that's what it is. about a third of the country is welcoming to. >> an idea of. >> autocracy. as long as it's their enemies are punished or they get what they want. and it seems like it's more about their enemies getting punished because a lot of them are going to suffer under donald trump. but that's where we stand today. it is a party of filled with voters that donald trump represents very well, but it's the voters they're afraid of. it's not necessarily donald trump. >> so then, matthew, what does that then mean? if we do indeed get into a legitimate official constitutional crisis, and i am defining that as the supreme

court says, president trump, you cannot do this. it is illegal. and the president of the united states does it anyway. >> well. >> obviously, that's the that's the horrible situation that that could happen. and it also could happen where we could be in a constitutional crisis if the supreme court makes certain decisions that are all helpful to donald trump, that are against the constitution of the united states, ala birthright citizenship, if somehow the supreme court ruled that it's not in the 14th amendment, when it is in the 14th amendment, we'd be in a constitutional crisis as well. i think, jonathan, where we are today is we're in a constitutional rot. and this has been happening for the past 30 or 40 years. but it's been it's been increased over the course of the last ten. and so the pillars of our constitution, our democracy, are falling, they're decayed. and somebody like donald trump is able to take advantage of that rot and do this in this. i would not be surprised if we get to the point where a federal court

order is ignored by the administration. i think they've all but said they're going to ignore certain federal orders in this, whether or not they ignore a supreme court court order is another thing. but we are at the precipice of a crisis, but we're in a constitutional rot. >> you mentioned earlier that a third of the country is down for what what president trump is doing and maybe down for autocratic leadership, as long as their their enemies get punished. what does that mean for the two thirds, the two thirds of us, will we have any power, any say in turning this around? or is the president all powerful? >> well, the president is all powerful because in the end, he has to answer to the people, and the representatives have to answer to the people. the problem is, is third of america is motivated against this and wants to push back and wants to do something about it. the other the problem is a third of america seems to sort of be acquiescing to this now. when

they suffer increased prices, when they suffer loss of services, when they suffer various things, they i think will rally in the course of this. but i think a message that's only about some a process message of, of where we are, isn't going to resonate with the third of the people that are demotivated and apathetic. i hate to say it, that we're in this point in time where a third of america is apathetic in this. but i think that's our job. our job is to sort of channel the people that are angry and upset, justifiably so, and try to motivate the people that aren't and explain to them what's happening or what ultimately could happen. in the course of this, citing various history references that there are fully acquainted with through the history of the world of how these things happen. but donald trump today is not stop owner of the republican party, not just the elected officials, but the but the voters, the voters. i saw a poll last week, jonathan johnson, donald trump has a 93% approval rating among republicans. that's after all

these nominees. that's after all the things he's done. that's after all the crazy stuff he's done. he has a higher approval rating today than he did on election day. >> and that's in addition to a poll with him, a national poll of him having a 53% approval rating. matthew dowd, as always, thank you very much for coming to the sunday show. >> great to be here. >> and up next, president trump now says ukraine will be included in u.s. talks with russia about ending the war. after ukraine's president tells nbc news he won't accept any peace deal made without him. jonathan lovitz and tara setmayer, my political panel join me after the break to join me after the break to discuss. if you have heart failure or chronic kidney disease, farxiga can help you keep living life, because there are places you'd like to be. (♪♪) serious side effects include increased ketones in blood or urine and bacterial infection between the anus and genitals, both which may be fatal, severe allergic reactions,

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decisions between the united states and russia about ukraine. never. and our people? never. >> can you. >> accept any. peace deal that is cut without ukraine? >> no. >> and do you feel like you have a seat at the table. >> right now? >> i not only count on it, i'm sure that we have to be there. otherwise, it's not acceptable. >> that was ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy earlier on nbc's meet the press, responding to concerns that his government was being left out of u.s. led negotiations toward peace between ukraine and russia. secretary of state marco rubio, national security adviser mike wallace and special envoy to the middle east steve witkoff will be going to saudi arabia this week to begin those negotiations with russia. this afternoon, president trump weighed in, saying ukraine would be included. >> you expect.

>> zelensky to be involved in these conversations. what will his. >> role be? >> i do. he will be involved, yes. >> joining me now, jonathan lovitz, a former senior adviser in the biden administration, and tara setmayer, co-founder and ceo of the seneca project and a former gop communications director. tara, i'm starting with you. do you believe trump? we just heard president zelensky saying, you know, there ain't going to be no peace deal without us. and then the president says, is he going to be invited? and he says, i believe so. yeah, yeah, he'll be invited. will he be invited? >> the answer is no. >> donald trump. >> is a lying. liar who lies. >> this is the same guy who got impeached the first time over, trying to impound money for ukraine to use against his political opponent. >> he has. >> sold ukraine out completely to russia. i suspect. that ukraine. if they. are present at any point. >> will. >> probably be. after trump and

putin. >> have already. struck a. >> deal and forced them to accept it, which is a travesty. >> an absolute travesty. >> we should. be 1,000% behind ukraine and what the ukrainian people have been doing, fighting for their own survival and democracy in europe. and most republicans, before they. >> decided to. completely sell out all aspects. >> of. foreign policy and doing the right thing, were supportive. of us supporting ukraine. >> and the money. >> that goes to support ukraine. >> 70% of. >> it went to american defense contractors and companies. >> for weapons. >> that we would have. >> had to get. >> rid of anyway and paid. >> to paid to get rid of because. >> they were. >> going to expire. >> so like. >> this whole thing about ukraine and america first and all that. >> that is a bunch of bs. >> it has nothing to do. >> with that. it's about. >> currying favor with vladimir putin. donald trump's bromance with. >> him, that's what it's about. and on that point, jonathan, i'm going to play another comment from president trump on the on

the tarmac in daytona about putin and zelensky. watch this. >> do you think he wants. >> the whole of. >> ukraine or just like. >> what. >> do. >> you think he wants? >> oh, i think he wants to stop. that was my question to him. because if he's going to go on, that would have been a big problem for us. and that would have caused me a big problem because you just can't let that happen. i think he wants to end it and they want to end it fast, both of them. and zelensky wants to end it too. >> and so jonathan, he is he was asked about putin and what what putin wants. i'm just wondering, do you think do you think that president trump is carrying vladimir, vladimir putin's water? i mean, they did have a conversation earlier this week, their first, i think it was their first one since his since his inauguration, or at least the one they told us about. >> yeah. >> you're absolutely right. i mean, this is the bromance extended internationally. this is the musk trump administration

doing everything they can to cozy up with their friends here and around the world. the problem that i see is extends so far beyond not just what's happening in ukraine, but what this means for america's legitimacy on the world stage. how can you trust us as a foreign trade partner, a foreign partner in direct investment into security, whatever it might be? if we can't accept your word on this. >> right, right. that is an excellent point. let's turn our focus domestically. and jonathan, you brought up elon musk. i want to put up this this headline from the washington post. and this is records show how doge planned trump's dui purge and who gets fired next. i'm going to read this. doge has planned for the trump administration to trim staff from dozens of offices across the executive branch, including those that protect employees, civil rights and others that investigate complaints of employment discrimination in the federal workplace. jonathan, you were in the biden administration. you were at the

at the commerce department. just broadly speaking, can you have you heard from former colleagues who might still be there, just how the elon musk dodgy wrecking ball is wreaking havoc across the federal, the federal bureaucracy? >> it's horrific. i've spoken to so many colleagues, career civil servants who are still there, who are terrified for their own future, terrified for the work that they've done for the american people, in some cases for 20, 30 years. the problem with the wrecking ball is it's totally indiscriminate. they're making up each day a new reason to go after some community, some office, some network. but what i think most people are forgetting is the impact this is going to have is not to, quote unquote, drain the swamp in washington. this hurts your grandma back home in the midwest, in the deep south, and out in the pacific northwest. like, this has such direct impacts because the people who are being targeted, these aren't policy makers. these aren't people who are going in there thinking about how they're going to influence american power. they're there to

push the paper and do the hard work, get the checks to grandma, fix the roads, get people the money that they deserve to keep living a well and healthy life. and it seems the antithesis of finding waste, fraud and abuse, which is supposedly doj's whole thing here, that we're also sending a whole bunch of republicans to the super bowl and wasting how many millions of taxpayer dollars to circle around the daytona 500. mr. president, if you want to be the leader of the free world, start leading. >> hey. >> tara, we've got less than a minute left, but i i'm just wondering, at what point do you think that the impact the real world impacts of the musk wrecking ball will be felt by the american people? >> as soon as the small business owner. whose business depends on government contracts, has to file for bankruptcy and lay off their local. >> workers. >> as soon as our parents and grandparents don't get their social security checks, as soon as you see the unemployment rate skyrocket, as soon as the maggots wake up and realize that

doge is coming for you too. elon musk doesn't give a damn about you. he thinks you're. >> a parasite. >> he said it. go read his twitter feed. so this is something that i think is incumbent upon democrats and messaging. if they don't start explaining very easily how this impacts everyday workers, they're going to lose the plot. this is a very easy thing to message to the american people why this isn't good. because if you look at the polling right now, the american people, a lot of them think, well, this is great. >> it's just an audit. >> it's just cutting waste, fraud and abuse. no it isn't. it's a decapitation of our government and it impacts you every single day. and it's enriching elon musk who gets $8 million a day while your grandmother lives on. >> $65 a day. >> that's who you want in charge. they need to repeat this over and over again because we're going to we're going to lose our government very quickly to elon musk, who is a welfare queen himself thanks to our tax dollars. >> tara and jonathan are going to they're going to be with us

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don't think they know they're trying to other trans people in a way that makes it easier for you to say, well, this is something that affects them. people i don't know, people i don't care about. trans people fight in your military and keep you and your family safe. trans people work in every industry that you and your family support. they're not going anywhere. and even as this administration tries to remove trans people from the history of the queer movement at the stonewall. >> stonewall. first of all, stonewall without the t. >> damn right. and we're going to defend that. and as you saw here in dc, in new york and around the country, people are standing up in resistance to that. and i think one of the most important lessons is actually something we take from the obama coalition and forward is if they're coming for us and our trans community on a tuesday, they're coming for your community on wednesday. so either link arms and get ready for a joint fight or get out of the way for people who are. >> and tara, again, we have a minute left. but also this comes as the trump administration is scrubbing websites of any mention of lgbtq people, among other groups. >> yeah. including women. i

mean, they want this country to be run by only competent white men. isn't that what the secretary under secretary of state darren beatty, said in his twitter post? this is. asinine and this is what they're trying to do. they're trying to erase our history, erase our accomplishments because they're threatened by us. they're threatened by our excellence because they're mediocrity and they're failing. up has been something that has rewarded them for many years. and when people of color and women and all the rest of us have equal rights, they actually had to now prove themselves. so this is something we need to pay attention to and not be okay with it and rise up and speak out about it, because they will not erase us. >> ever. right, right. jonathan lovitz, tara setmayer, thank you both for coming to the sunday show. and coming up, the trump administration takes aim at the media on several fronts. media reporter oliver darcy joins me with a look at the impact on journalists covering the journalists covering the president and how the media ♪

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retaliation. >> it is a privilege. >> to cover this white house. >> it's a privilege. >> to. >> be. >> the white. >> house. >> press secretary. >> and nobody. >> has the right to go. >> into. >> the oval. >> office and ask. >> the president of the united states a question. >> it is a. >> fact that the. >> body of. >> water off. >> the coast of louisiana is called. >> the gulf of. >> america, and i'm not sure. >> why news outlets. >> don't want. >> to call it that. >> on another front, fcc chair brendan carr, appointed by president trump, has opened investigations into npr, pbs, and comcast and its subsidiary nbc universal, the parent company of nbc news and msnbc. carr is also continuing a formal investigation into cbs after examining and releasing raw material from a 60 minutes interview with then vice president kamala harris. remember, before becoming president, trump sued cbs over that very interview, claiming the network deceptively edited the footage. cbs denies any wrongdoing and said the entire video interview and transcripts

that they released show that the 60 minutes broadcast was not doctored or deceitful. joining me now, oliver darcy, co-founder and writer of the status newsletter. oliver, welcome back to the sunday show. so the big picture question is the media rising to the occasion of covering the trump white house, or is it too early to tell? >> i do think the media could be doing, more broadly speaking. to paint a picture. >> to the average. >> american that. >> washington. >> d.c. is. >> an absolute turmoil. >> right. now that donald trump, along with elon musk, is dismantling. >> institutions. >> that they. >> are shattering norms. and that these. >> these changes. >> while might not. >> be felt immediately. >> are going to be felt by every. >> single american. now, in regards to what's. >> happening with the associated. >> press. >> i think. >> you're seeing the trump administration start to flex some muscle. and i think this is

going to be the first. >> of. >> many assaults. >> that they wage against the free press, but you're seeing them block. >> the associated press, the. >> wire service, a very important wire service that. >> a. >> lot of other news organizations rely. >> on for. >> basic information, for raw information. they're blocking them from having access. to very basic events. >> like a press. >> conference where there's. >> a lot of media. >> there, and it's very clear they're trying to make an. >> example out of the associated press by saying, if. >> you do not obey. >> if you do not really. >> conform to the. language and the way. >> we want to. talk about things, in this case, the. >> gulf of mexico versus. >> gulf of america, we will just shun you. and you see this at the pentagon as well, where the. >> have. >> exiled eight legacy news organizations from their, their, their workspaces and brought in far right organizations like breitbart and one american news in their place. you're going to see this play out, i think, in the trump administration throughout the next four years,

because they want to really control the information flow coming out of this white house, particularly as they are dismantling a lot of these institutions and facing questions from the press. >> but, oliver, do you think they will be successful in trying to choke the information flow out of the government, to the press? i mean, he just got here for a second term, but the free press is woven into the fabric of this country over two, over two centuries. >> yeah. i think it's a more complicated question. i think there are a number of things that the president has done that have put a chill out there on, on the, on the right to free speech and the freedom of the press. and you're seeing this happen, whether it's at paramount where because of the cbs news lawsuit, they're considering just settling this, even though most legal experts will tell you it's an absurd lawsuit that donald trump filed. you've seen it in technology

sectors where meta and x and others have settled lawsuits and conform to what donald trump wants, because they just don't want regulatory issues, whether it's jeff bezos or the washington post or patrick soon-shiong at the l.a. times, you're seeing this having a chilling effect. people don't want to for whatever reasons. most of the time, business reasons, they don't want to be in combat with the white house. and so by doing this, by making an example out of this press, i think it makes it clear that if you do not, if you do not obey, if you do not fall into your position, we will take retaliatory action, in this case, limiting access. now in terms of is freedom of the press itself going to go away tomorrow? no, i think obviously the protect that it's possible the courts will restore the ap's access here. but it certainly having an effect. >> oliver darcy, thank you very much as always for coming to the sunday show and more of the sunday show and more of the sunday show on msnbc (man) got one more antoine. (vo) with usps ground advantage,

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