granger.com, or just stop by granger for the ones who get it done. >> every day. >> feels like, you know, trying to put 10. >> pounds. of news into a 5. >> pound bag. >> do you. >> think it matters. >> that people. >> are standing. >> up for. >> usaid and foreign aid in the history. >> of the agency? has any other. >> president ever. >> tried to remove a member of the board the way donald trump tried. >> to remove you? what do you think. >> democrats can do right now in opposition, to try to. >> mitigate some of the. harm that's being caused as. >> they dismantle. >> the federal government? the opposition. >> is now awake. >> and increasingly emboldened. >> told you it's on. >> it is on. hi there everyone. it's 4:00 in

new york. think of it this way. like a violent home invasion. you call the police, and when they arrive, officers take the side of the intruders. you started it, they say, insisting the only peaceful way forward for you and your family is to let the invaders keep the upstairs bedroom. you'd, of course, be shocked. your neighbors would fear for their own safety. and how long would any semblance of peace in your house or neighborhood last? well, today donald trump called ukraine's president zelensky a man who has done nothing but valiantly defend his homeland and his people a, quote, dictator without elections, an especially insane and rich accusation. given the fact that trump's administration is right now at the negotiating table, not with ukraine, but with vladimir putin, who most recently won a miraculous 88% of the vote in russia, a figure nearly as high as it is preposterous. trump's entirely upside down, insipid and

backwards analysis that it's zelensky, an american ally who is somehow a dictator in this story was a response to an observation president zelensky made 24 hours ago that trump was in a, quote, disinformation bubble by suggesting that ukraine was responsible for its own invasion. it's another blinking red plot point in the republican party's descent from a functional political party, from anything resembling the good parts of what it used to be a departure from values it claimed to hold dear last week. watch republicans praise zelensky. >> zelensky and the ukrainians are clearly showing the will to fight. i do believe he's turning out to be a modern day winston churchill. you're the. >> ally i've been hoping for all my life. not one american has died defending ukraine. you've taken our weapons and you've kicked. >> our. >> ha! so what now, republicans?

it's not the first. and it certainly won't be the last time for choosing for republicans in a second trump presidency. so we'll pay attention both to what they say and what they do. like this. >> do you. >> agree with president trump that zelensky is. >> a dictator? >> i wouldn't. >> say that. >> but make no. >> mistake about it, that. invasion was the responsibility of one. >> human being. >> on the face of this planet. it was vladimir putin. >> to the extent that the white house said that ukraine started the war, i disagree. i think vladimir putin started the war. i also believe. through bitter experience that vladimir putin is a gangster. he's a gangster with a black heart. >> i will. >> look at the direct quote, but i certainly would not call president zelensky a dictator. >> that today, from the party that jettisoned liz cheney from

her post in leadership and turned her into a pariah. for her part, liz cheney posted this on social media today, quote, trump with his devotion to putin, abandonment of ukraine and lies about history is the antithesis of everything ronald reagan stood for. he is aligning america with the enemies of the very freedom that generations have fought and died to defend. history will not be kind to those who are helping him, especially those who call themselves reagan republicans. while they pretend not to see what is happening. siding with america's adversaries over america's allies is where we start today with some of our favorite reporters and friends. ambassador michael mcfaul is here, former ambassador to russia and msnbc international affairs analyst. also joining us, new york times diplomatic correspondent michael crowley, and joining us as well, retired four star general, msnbc military analyst, general barry mccaffrey. general mccaffrey. i remember in the days before the invasion, you were looking at

open source intelligence of the russian military, sort of lining up on the border of ukraine. can you just go back to the most basic fact check of how the war in ukraine began and who started it? >> well. >> first of all, i think you have to put it in the context that vladimir putin is a gangster. he is a murderous dictator. he kills his own internal enemies within eyesight of the kremlin. he has been involved in mass atrocities in syria, in chechnya, in georgia, in the invasion of crimea, and now the continuing war against the civilian population of ukraine. there's no question that vladimir's basic motivation was to re recreate the soviet empire. now it's ukraine, now it's the 20% he holds of the country. the next step will be

the rest of ukraine, the baltic states, poland. the europeans understand this. so, you know, listening to what's going on in washington today, it difficult to process this. it's utter madness. it's against the security of the united states and its allies. >> ambassador mcfaul, it's also, as with the beginning of the first term, trump has a lot of ability and capacity to completely change and shift u.s. foreign policy. but he doesn't get to make up his own set of facts. and what's puzzling is the adherence to the lies told by putin. let me just offer this again as a public service. these are the lies and these are the facts, trump posted. zelensky talked the us into spending $350 billion the facts, according to nbc news, this is inaccurate. the overall u.s. response to the

war in ukraine has totaled $183 billion from russia's full scale invasion through september 30th, 2024. he also said the u.s. has spent $200 billion more than europe. that, too, is inaccurate, he said. the u.s. will get nothing back. that, too, is inaccurate. 70% of ukraine aid has been spent in the united states or on u.s. forces. what, in your view, explains? and then tell me what the consequences are for abandoning any factual predicate for this radical, anti sort of ally, anti u.s. national security pivot. >> well, tragically, president trump has never had a big commitment to the truth. he's obviously in the bubble i agree completely with president zelensky. he's getting his information from this bubble. but it is not about opinions. i'm glad you're emphasizing that. it is a fact that russia invaded ukraine. you don't get to have an opinion about that.

two plus two equals four. you don't get to have an opinion about that. you don't get to say, i believe that two plus two equals four. it's a fact. putin invaded. zelensky also does not have a 4% approval rating. that is a fact. we have data to support that. but why? why is it important? it's important because it makes our president look like he's not in control of the facts, that he's not capable of leading the united states. it weakens our negotiating partners. when he says things like that, it emboldens putin, and therefore it is against american national security interests. and what really troubles me is what you started with nicole, mike wallace, the national security adviser. he knows that secretary of state rubio, he knows that i just was at the munich security conference a few days ago. i saw lots of republicans there. they know it. they need to step up now because this is a dangerous moment in american history, a really dangerous moment. this is

not a laughing matter. this could be a pivotal moment where we lose our allies, we lose ukraine, and then we are weak when we have to take on places like china. >> i mean, michael crowley, rubio authored the most devastating and damning indictment of donald trump's ties to russia when he took over as the chair of the senate foreign. senate intelligence committee. rubio knows that the things trump is saying aren't true. i think the other thing that's in sharp relief today is the complete impotence of trump's national security apparatus heads. i don't even know what we call them. what what is the sort of reporting coming out of the state department about rubio's role in standing by trump in these lies? >> well. >> nicole, i. >> think that, you. >> know, a lot of diplomats. >> and as we saw in the clips you played, even.

>> members of congress and. >> political allies of rubio are surprised. >> and disappointed. >> i think not. >> only in president. >> trump but in rubio himself, who, as you. >> said. >> you know. >> was a very. >> outspoken critic of vladimir putin. in fact, i've been looking back at. >> his questioning. >> of rex tillerson when. >> tillerson was. >> nominated by trump to be his first secretary of state in january of 2017. and rubio went hard at him in tillerson's. confirmation hearings, pressing tillerson to go on the record and say that vladimir putin was a war. criminal and tillerson. >> wouldn't. >> do it. he dodged and bobbed and weaved, i think because tillerson was in the position rubio is now in, he knew he was working for a president who wanted who admired putin and wanted to have a relationship with putin and wanted to do diplomacy with putin. and now rubio is in this position. and what you don't hear when he talks about his meeting with russian officials. >> in. >> saudi arabia to talk about the fate of ukraine, you don't hear him calling putin a war

criminal. you don't hear him denouncing the russians for launching an invasion of ukraine. it's a it's a very different tone. he's essentially on mute in many ways. and i think that that's very disappointing to people who felt for a long time like he was an articulate and particularly sharp and effective critic of, of putin and the russian regime. so, you know, at the same time, we do see the example of people like tillerson and other people who have worked for trump, who, you know. either sort of. changed their views or i think another possibility of what might be happening here. what i think has happened before is that people think that they can kind of control trump, so they see things differently, but they say there's no point in publicly disagreeing with the president. i'm not going to get caught up in a gotcha of i used to say this and he says that, but they try to be a guardrail. so one question here is that is that what marco rubio is trying to do? and i would say that the

that history suggests that the guardrail strategy has not worked very well. it's been a losing game. so if that's what he's trying, you know, you have to say good luck with that. >> well, i mean interestingly, tillerson would soon go on to conclude that donald trump was a total effing moron. so whatever happened between rubio and tillerson in that hearing, it was, i think, months that we learned that tillerson, with tillerson really thought of donald trump while he was serving as his secretary of state. i want to ask you, barry mccaffrey, what happens if trump continues down this road and not a single member of trump's cabinet who once saw putin the way all of you do speaks up or resigns in protest, if not a single republican finds their spine and does anything to stop. i mean, i think bob corker, as a republican senator, sought to limit a president's nuclear powers when he saw trump flirting with vladimir putin in

the first term. what happens if nobody has the courage to stand by what they said three days ago about vladimir putin, and america continues down this path. >> well, unfortunately, my own view is the damage is done. it's now irrevocable. there's not a shred of rational argument among european powers to trust the united states commitment to nato. and article five nato is a deterrent organization. it kept the peace for four generations. i think that's over. so i think right now there's a scramble among all the european countries to include the finns and the swedes and others and who are borderline states, the baltic states, poland, etc, that they think they're under the gun. i would be unsurprised if in private audience, they haven't basically committed themselves to wiping out any u.s. assurances. fortunately, both

the french and the brits have a nuclear capability. otherwise, the nuclear assurance that the u.s. grants to our allies in europe would be gone also. and by the way, nicole, i think you have to take an account. look, over the last few weeks, we've heard coercion of canada become a 51st state, an embarrassment, a ludicrous proposition. we might seize greenland militarily from denmark, a nato ally. and why would we do that? we're already there on a on a nato base, sees the panama canal in violation of a u.s. treaty, use military power against mexican cartels there. there is a series of sort of psychobabble announcements coming out of the us government that has the global leadership confounded, but they think we're gone, i think in europe, for the trump

administration, period. >> what does that mean? >> well, i think it it increases the likelihood of war. right now, we've got russian special operations troops conducting murder and sabotage operations in western europe, dredging up cables, cutting communications. they're at a very low level of war against against the europeans. and so trump's withdrawal of a nato assurance puts the second great economic power in the globe. the european union, at fundamental risk. these are adverse situations to u.s. national security and our own economic well-being. >> ambassador mcfaul, what do. what do people think of what

happened to us? i mean, anyone that's been to normandy and sees that at that moment of choosing what america did was storm the beaches to stand with our allies. i mean, the parallel here is to maybe show up on the shores and say, no, we'll go with we'll go with hitler. i mean, what do they think about the switching of sides with the turning of who occupies the oval office? >> well, again, i just got back from munich and the entire place was in shock. could not believe the speech that the vice president gave. and it feels like, you know, nicole, you and i have talked many times on this show, many for many years, about the fight between autocrats and democrats. and we've talked about how it's not just between countries, it's within countries. and there were many people in munich saying, are the americans now switching sides? and it's hard to look at what president trump has said, and it's hard to look at what his team has said about all the

concessions we're making to the autocrat, putin, to not worry about that. but i'm not as pessimistic as the general, general mccaffrey, because we are not a dictatorship ourselves. maybe we have people that have those proclivities. we are a democracy. not everybody agrees with with what trump said about zelenskyy or putin. there are we are still in this fight and we need to fight because this is not just about values. it's about our long term national interests. united states is better being a part of nato than being outside of it. the united states is being is better off being part of the democratic world than part of the autocratic world. and we still should fight for these things to stop and limit the damage that president trump and his team is doing right now. >> michael crowley i believe the latest reporting has trump at an event for the saudi sovereign wealth fund in the miami area. he's at the table. his team is at the table in saudi arabia

with putin's team. he is lying about president zelensky on social media. again, nobody has quit. no, no. republicans have threatened to go down to the white house and tell trump that aligning america with russia is a bad idea that we've learned about. and if you've learned about that, please correct me. what is the friction slowing down the scenario? barry mccaffrey articulates and the hope ambassador mcfaul maintains. >> i don't see a lot of friction, nicole. it's very different than in the first term. you know, in the first term, you had a cadre of very traditional foreign policy professionals around the president and members of congress who were pushing back on these kinds of things. and although there are some figures like that around him now, including the national security

adviser waltz and marco rubio, who are somewhat more conventional and traditional, i just don't see evidence that they are looking to battle him internally, the way people in the first term, like jim mattis or or rex tillerson during his brief tenure, or, or john kelly, h.r. mcmaster or people like that, particularly when it came to russia. and, you know, i think that people had to know going in this was more or less what we expected president trump to do. i mean, the rhetoric is surprising, and in particular, the vitriol that's starting to emerge towards zelensky is new. he was he was mildly critical of zelensky over the past couple of years, but calling him a dictator, talking this way is surprising. but having said that, i think that people who signed up for trump could not have been under any illusion that he was not going to quickly try to establish a relationship with vladimir putin and quite likely throw ukraine under the bus in any peace talks. and by

the way, one other point here, nicole, you know, people can believe whatever they they want about trump's relationship with putin going back years and what happened in the 2016 election and all of that. but the political reality is that the dossier, the mueller investigation, you know, russiagate, as it came to be known, is sort of passed past by us. and president trump is not facing questions every day about, you know, whether he there was a collusion to get him elected and whether he's a russian agent. and i think also that kind of general political climate and probably the reality that a lot of americans didn't end up believing a lot of those things just gives him a lot more freedom of action when it comes to russia. so. so i would not be holding my breath for some dramatic intervention in the near term. >> it's such an interesting point, and one we're going to get to when we when we come back. but interestingly, all of the attacks on mueller were so

frantic and frenetic when all that mueller concludes was that they shared a goal. i mean, that's volume one of the mueller report that russia and the trump campaign wanted the same thing for trump to win that that was in russia's interest. but yeah, the right has spent years maligning the mueller findings. and did all of you to stick around on a day like today ahead for us, the quid pro quo and the words of a prosecutor who worked on the case between new york city mayor eric adams and the trump doj, was the subject of a late afternoon pivotal hearing in federal court. we'll have the latest on that. plus, how the melding of donald trump's business interests and finances and his foreign policy is setting off alarm bells in the intelligence community and beyond. ex cia analyst and democratic senator elissa slotkin joins the broadcast. also later in the program, donald trump's latest power grab ending congestion pricing in new york city from the oval office, drawing a sharp rebuke from the top democrat in new york

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(man) cooool. ♪ (man) right on time! (vo) stay in the know. from your dock... to their door. citizens of the country. >> we are. >> all watching and waiting to see who is going to hold the line. don't miss the weekends. >> saturday and. >> sunday mornings at eight. >> on msnbc. >> what we do is try to cut right to the bone of what we're seeing in washington that day. >> what we're about to do here is a neighborly act. we're like a group of householders living in the same locality who decide to express their community interests by entering into a

formal association for their mutual self-protection. >> all free. >> men. >> wherever they may. >> live, are. >> citizens of. >> berlin and therefore, as. >> a free. >> man, i take pride in the words. >> ich bin. >> ein berliner. i've spoken of the shining city all my political life. in my mind, it was a tall, proud city, built on rocks. stronger than oceans, windswept, god blessed and teeming with people of all kinds, living in harmony and peace. >> it's more important for them than it is for us. we have an ocean in between and they don't. today i heard, oh well, we weren't invited. well, you've been there for three years. you should have ended it three years. you should have never started it. you could have made a deal. >> barry mccaffrey, who's going to tell him that the victims of pearl harbor and nine over 11 didn't feel that that ocean did much to protect them.

>> well, i you know, the first word that springs to mind is intercontinental ballistic missile. so the global security arrangements we have, the alliances, we have japan, south korea, australia and the pacific, the european union, the nato powers are essential to us security, economic, political, diplomatic. this is what's kept the peace for four generations. it's really hard to process all this. i think what's going on right now, by the way, is there's a feverish sense of fright among the major powers in europe the italians, the brits, the french, the germans are trying to sort out what do we do now? by the way, a few years ago, nicole, i had a private lunch, one on one with a senior polish national security official, and he said, you know, barry, one of our problems is we're stuck between germany and

russia. he said, when you lose to the germans, you lose your freedom, your sovereignty. when you lose to the russians, you lose your soul. so these countries in europe, world war two, is baked into their political dna. this is a life altering period that we're going through. we need to recognize that. >> ambassador mcfaul, are you surprised that the american people, to the degree that this is and is not registering? haven't sort of expressed their disgust? i mean, i you go to a baseball game in a world war two veteran, is honored lots of times. and there's genuine reverence for veterans of world war two. what what do you think explains. trump's ability to erase america's national

identity as, as again, the only member of nato that's called out from the bank that's cashed in on article five, which, you know, maybe people don't know what article five means in their day to day life. but after we were attacked on nine over 11, we're the only people that asked people to come and defend us as part of our alliance. >> we were. and by the way, they didn't ask us to repay them after that. i think that's an important point to make. mr. trump is asking for that. our allies didn't do that, including allies that died with us on battlefields in afghanistan. but to your hard question, which i think is a really important one, it seems to me it's kind of like climate change, right? it's hard to say. what why does it matter what's going on in ukraine to my life right now? it's far away. and it reminds me a lot of the 1930s. if you go back and you read that literature, americans said, you know, invading ethiopia, italy, they're japan, invading china, what does that have to do with us? then poland got annexed by the, you know,

the nazis and the soviets. it's like, not our war. and then because you mentioned it, pearl harbor, it became our war. and i hope that we have this conversation so that we don't have to get to another pearl harbor moment. and i'm encouraged by three things. one, it wasn't zelenskyy that convinced biden to give all that aid. those were majority solid majorities in the senate and the house that voted for that aid. number one. number two, quinnipiac poll just came out while we were talking. 81% of the american people do not trust vladimir putin. only 9% trust him. trump is out of step with the american people on that. and the last thing i want to say about the people around mr. trump right now, to the two of the former people that worked for him, worked with me here at the here at the hoover institution right now. and what i just want to say to people like secretary rubio, i know what his positions were. there are two kinds of people in

washington. you beat things and you do things. what good is it to be the secretary of state? he knows what tyranny is. he knows what communist dictatorships are. his family is from cuba. what good is it to be in that job if you don't get to do what you think is in the american national interest? and i hope he thinks about that. nobody is going to remember his being secretary of state. if all he does is capitulate to people like vladimir putin. >> michael crowley i heard from folks en route to munich a lot of parallels to neville chamberlain. i mean, is there anyone clever enough around donald trump to convey the truth of the capitulation to putin that it epitomizes almost unparalleled worldwide weakness? >> you know, nicole, i just i think that the way trump and a lot of people around him look at the world right now, it's

domestic and it's foreign. is that all the smart people are always wrong. and these mottos that they live by, like neville chamberlain and appeasement, are something that the establishment swears by. and it's gotten us into all these problems. it got us into wars in the middle east. and i just think they don't think that way. they're not, they're not they don't have the same reaction to sort of historical truths or, you know, slogans like that in the same way that that most administrations, every administration in my lifetime has. and so i just it's a completely different way of thinking. and to some degree, i think that the thought process in this administration sees doing something drastically different and almost scandalously different as a virtue. and that and that people who that think that they have

all the answers are always wrong. and so there's almost like a, you know, a self-congratulatory sense of we're doing something that's making everyone mad. everyone's saying it's the wrong thing to do. it must be the right thing to do, you know? i mean, you see this a little bit with the proposal about gaza and the way trump and before and in the last administration, jared kushner would talk about the middle east. you know, everybody was getting it wrong for generations. we're going to do it completely differently because their thinking doesn't work. so i just don't know that that's the way to appeal to someone like trump. i would actually at just the last point i would make, i think the better approach for anyone who's trying to change his mind is the point that mike just made, which is that i'm sorry. mcfaul which there's a congressman mccaul, which is that the public is not on board with this, and it's a very unpopular position. and is it going to cause trump political headaches? is it going to put members of congress in uncomfortable positions and force them to pressure him? and i think that's the much likelier

way to get a different approach here. >> yeah. i mean, because if you add the unpopularity of aligning with putin, who 81% of the public dislikes to the hit, his popularity has already taken in just the three weeks he's been there, he could be heading toward term one public approval crisis. ambassador michael mcfaul, michael crowley, general barry mccaffrey, thank you so much for joining us today. we're really grateful to all of you coming up for us. two of the lawyers who defended donald trump and lost in the criminal hush money case were back in court, ostensibly on his behalf today. this time, they were answering questions about what prosecutors have called a quid pro quo between the federal government and the mayor of the country's largest city. we'll country's largest city. we'll bring you that home. it's where we do the things we love with the people we love. so, what if we lived tomorrow in the same place as we did yesterday? with help, we can. home instead. for a better what's next.

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boosted with keratin hair looks tw lactaid is 100% real milk, just without the lactose. delicious too. just ask my old friend, kevin. nothing like enjoying a cold one while watching the game. who's winning? we are, my friend. we are. test of the rule of law was going down in a federal courtroom here in new york. the judge overseeing the federal criminal prosecution of new york's current sitting mayor, eric adams, ordered justice department officials who want the charges against adams to be dismissed, to show up in his courtroom and explain themselves, and to try to rationalize what former interim u.s. attorney danielle sassoon said, quote, amounted to a quid pro quo, that this was even a necessary step speaks to how completely the justice department has ceased to be a

criminal justice organ. when the justice department's own actions trigger a string of high level resignations. when former u.s. attorneys like jeff berman and david kelly and mary jo white and jim comey feel the need to publicly sound the alarm when 900 former federal prosecutors, including former special counsel jack smith, sound the alarm to, you know, we are in uncharted territory and this coalition spans the political spectrum. it includes people with, quote, bulletproof, conservative credentials, federalist society members and former clerks for the most conservative supreme court justices in history. listen to what another prominent former u.s. attorney had to say today. quote, in my seven years as a u.s. attorney for the district of new jersey, we brought 130 cases of political corruption. though i have been a lifelong republican, corruption has no party. the cases were against republicans and democrats alike. the reason those cases were so important

was that it showed citizens that betrayal of the public trust would not be tolerated, and could not be fixed or explained away. our ability to govern ourselves, the very basis of our civilized society could not survive for very long without that belief. that is why the events of the last week, regarding the dismissal of the prosecution of new york city mayor eric adams, are so disturbing and so dangerous. weaponization of the law is wrong. not just some of the time, but all of the time. the former u.s. attorney swinging away at donald trump's new leaders of doj. that would be chris christie. when chris christie and jack smith are in public cloud agreement about how dangerous something donald trump is doing, we will pay attention. we do not know what happens next. but we do know that today, the task of upholding the rule of law fell not to the department of justice. it fell to one judge here in new york. upholding the rule of law. used to be the job, used to be something that all three

branches of government at least cared about. but this president and this congress are not at the table anymore. so now it falls to that one branch, which is under excruciating pressure. and if we come up short there, that's because the system wasn't set up that way. it wasn't supposed to do that. but here we are. and that we are here is extraordinary and unprecedented in and of itself. for that conversation here at the table, former top official at the department of justice. msnbc legal analyst andrew weissmann back. also joining us, msnbc legal analyst. former s.d.n.y. criminal division deputy chief christie greenberg is back. she was in the courthouse today. plus new york times investigative reporter, msnbc national security contributor mike schmidt is here. christie, i start with you. you were there. what happened? >> well. >> everything you. >> just said in your. >> lead up about. >> all the alarm bells going off from all these former federal prosecutors. there was not a hint of that in this courthouse today. you went into that courtroom, and according to

beauvais, he got up and said, this is just like any other motion to dismiss. there's nothing exotic here other than the fact that there are some people behind me who may disagree. and he continued to say, this is just so ordinary. this is like any other case where somebody is executing, executing. they're exercising their prosecutorial discretion. and he made it seem like everything was normal. and the problem with that was it so clearly wasn't. he was alone at that table. there was nobody else there with him and all the other prosecutors, the four prosecutors who had been on that case. they all withdrew from that case. people resigned because of this case. it was the elephant in the room and the judge never bothered to ask about it. the judge didn't ask the tough questions that i think everybody in that room wanted him to ask. he frankly seemed very scared and intimidated to be there. he's a new judge, and i understand that this is a very unusual situation, but there are questions that really needed to be asked here. for example, when you have a meal, beauvais saying

even if there had been a quid pro quo, i don't think that would have been a problem with my motion to dismiss. like what? how do you not follow up? wait a minute. what are you talking about? whatso was there or wasn't there? i mean that it seemed to me that you would want to ask a follow up there. like he was saying really incredible things. he said that yes, there was no appearance of impropriety, not just an appearance of impropriety, but there was an abuse of the prosecutorial process by damien williams. how so? would be the next question. what are you talking about other than having, you know, an op ed in a campaign website? and he said he also said there are many ongoing investigations into the origin of this case and all of that. there was not really any follow up or pushback. in fact, the judge made multiple attempts to say, you know, he apologized for questions that he asked in case they may, you know, well, i'm sorry if these may seem elementary to you in terms of how a mask i'm just trying to

understand. he also, at many points said that i'm not taking issue with anything you're saying. i don't want you to misunderstand that i'm taking issue. i'm just trying to understand. it was just incredibly deferential in a situation where there was no difference that should have been afforded to the department of justice in this circumstance. this should have been tough questions, and they weren't asked. there was one other striking moment where beauvais said, the fact that mayor adams is in this courtroom today is the problem. he should be governing the fact that we have an elected official not doing his job is the problem. okay, so we're never going to have public corruption cases again. so that means nobody who is an elected official can ever be in a courtroom and never be prosecuted. that's what he's saying. but again, we didn't there was no questioning to really tease that out. and because mayor adams team was on the same side and consenting to this motion to dismiss, there was no other voice of reason in the room, and instead, you just got a lot of disappointment and

frustration from what should have been a really robust process. >> so what happens now? >> so there there's. >> sort of. >> small bore. >> and big. >> on the. >> small level. there still. >> are ways. >> in which there can be repercussions. >> for eric. >> adams. >> but that's not. >> really where. >> i. >> have my. >> you know, my eye on that. >> but the. >> district attorney can bring. charges that really are very. >> comparable charges that alvin. bragg could bring. >> and we all know sitting at this table. >> table. >> alvin bragg. >> has done that in the past. >> and it's. >> picked up where the feds have fumbled. kathy hochul. has an ability. >> to take some. >> action here. >> that's but that says. to eric adams so. >> that he. >> doesn't escape any accountability. >> what christie. >> is getting at. >> and the. >> issue here. >> is so. >> much bigger. >> it was. shocking to. >> read about and now hear about. >> some of the. things that i know. >> beauvais thought it.

>> was. >> appropriate to say. >> in a court of law to essentially. >> say, you know. >> what, a quid pro quo is fine. first of all, it's. >> not normal at all. it is. >> that is just not. >> something that happens. >> and you can't talk. >> about weaponizing. >> we talked about the idea that you are saying, i can bring a criminal. case against somebody and then. >> say, you know what. >> i'm willing to temporarily withdraw that. >> if you do my bidding. that is not this country. i mean, it is. it is. i mean, i can no longer be sort of like, i'm shocked, but it. >> is amazing. >> that somebody. >> who came from an esteemed. >> district. >> from the southern district of new. >> york, had the. >> temerity to. >> show up and. >> say that in that courtroom it is. it's really. >> a disgrace. >> mike, what's your reporting has borne out is how beauvais is the architect of the quid pro quo and even seeming to be a collaborator, based on your reporting with adam's own defense attorneys, how much of their work is he doing for them at this point? >> i mean.

>> he basically. >> builds the. off ramp for the justice department to take the car. >> off the highway. >> that is. >> what he does. he he goes to the lawyers and says, tell. >> me how. >> hard it. >> is for him to do his job. and obviously that gets you to certain. answers that got them to this determination, which he admits himself. wasn't based on the law or the fact i you guys were. >> both. saying this and it just can't. >> be said enough. and there's so much going on that it's. >> so hard. >> for us to concentrate. >> on one thing. >> this is. so extraordinary. the i don't have the legal experience that these two folks do, but i've covered a fair amount of cases. this is. not how a federal investigation ends, ever. >> there are. >> you know, different types. >> of things that. >> happen around sentencing. >> there's different types of things that happen around cooperation. >> pardons. >> that kind of this is this is. >> so outside. >> the bounds.

>> of what. >> we what. >> the, the post-watergate. >> norms are. >> and even the entire history. >> of the justice department. >> and i don't mean. >> to keep. >> on coming back to that. but in a time when there is just so much going on and it's hard to understand what's important, what really matters, what's different this time, what stands out and what are the long term implications? this is opening up a whole new door, a whole new world to the justice system. >> well, i have to i have to think. but i think on the other side, we have to stop failing to imagine why, right? why, why, why does he need that? why does he need a justice department that doesn't pretend to be about justice and truth? we'll sneak in a quick break. we'll all be right back. >> what was it like when trump got elected? what was the i mean, what was the reaction do you think about ice coming to knock on your front door to. >> you for president trump's first 100 days? alex wagner

travels to the story to talk with people most impacted by the policies. >> were you. >> there on january? >> i was. >> there on. >> january 6th. >> did it surprise. >> you that you were fired, given how resolutely nonpartisan you have been? you have been? >> and for more in-depth the highlight of the day is mahomes getting the new iphone 16 at t-mobile. it's built for apple intelligence. hustle down to t-mobile like a dog chasing a squirrel... chasing a nut! at t-mobile get iphone 16 on us. the itch and rash of moderate to severe eczema disrupts my skin. despite treatment, it's still not under control. but now i have rinvoq. a once-daily pill that reduces the itch and helps clear the rash of eczema —fast. some felt significant itch relief as early as 2 days— and some achieved dramatic skin clearance as early as 2 weeks. many saw clear or almost-clear skin. plus, many had clearer skin and less itch,

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[uplifting music] arearn: saint jude-- they gave it 110% every time. and for kenadie to get treatment here without having to pay anything was amazing. >> of new york. >> and a trump official would go on national tv to announce that they had made an arrangement in which mayor adams could continue his corruption as long as he was politically loyal to donald trump. they did that out in the open on tv because it's a signal to everybody else out there that the law will be applied differently to you if you are loyal to the president, and that the law will be zealously applied to you, maybe in excess of the letter of the law. if you

are a critic of the president. that's why they went on tv to show the world the corruption. >> i mean, democratic senator chris murphy made that statement on the floor a few minutes ago on the signal being sent by the trump administration. as it doe, these two things seeks to drop the charges against adams in exchange for immigration enforcement. and a story we covered yesterday here home and going on tv and saying he referred aoc to doj to see if she's committed anything potentially criminal by articulating people's rights when it comes to deportations. >> i mean. >> this is the quid pro quo. >> that you're seeing. >> i mean, this. >> is there's a reason. >> that. >> the. >> case was. >> not just. >> dropped for good. there's a reason that there isn't just a pardon. >> and that is the. >> power dynamic. and you asked just at the end sort of like why do this? and this is pure power. and this is saying we actually have the criminal justice system. >> it is. >> not going to be evenhanded. i

mean, the senator. >> has it. exactly right. that is. >> what is going. on here. and the reason you're seeing republicans and democrats. who are. >> former like fbi. >> u.s. attorneys. >> saying this. >> this does not. >> even remotely pass the smell test. it is not. what your oath of office is. >> that is why you're. >> seeing. >> 900 people signing a letter. >> you're seeing. >> so many people resign from. >> all walks. >> of life. i mean, this is. not just a new york thing or a d.c. thing. i mean, this is something. where if you have been in the justice department, at the fbi. >> or any. >> other part of the justice department, this. >> is. >> not how you're trained. it is, you know, you see it as you talk. >> about. >> at the beginning of your show. >> you're seeing it at the. >> international stage, and we're seeing it domestically here at home. >> i think what's important is that it is about creating a climate. i mean, congress is controlled by republicans, but they have chosen this path of acquiescing to the end of the

rule of law in america. the they could call the trump administration up today if they wanted to and ask bobby to. i mean, we're not without checks and balances. the republicans have just have just opted out of being a check and balance. and i think you look at this pressure that that places on the judiciary and rachel maddow makes it. we're not set up that way. i mean, the courts are not designed to replace a political party that's collapsed on itself in the face of a corrupt president from their own party. what is the best case scenario from this moment forward? >> you know, it's hard to say because you have in court today, mayor adams saying under oath when he was asked to say that his consent to this motion was knowing and voluntary. he said, i'm not afraid of them bringing it back. i'm not afraid of them bringing back the case. and of course, he's not afraid because he knows that he's playing ball like he knows what the game is. and so if it's all out in the

open and you're saying this under oath and like, everybody is kind of aware, and then you have bobby saying nobody can question me because i'm an officer of the court, you judge can only say, am i acting in bad faith? i'm telling you, i'm not. you don't have clear evidence. i'm not acting in bad faith. so case closed. and then. so it's basically, it just seemed like there was such a smugness that they knew that they could get away with it, that they could do whatever they wanted. i mean, you had both the doj and the mayor basically saying that, like, that was the tone in the room. it was very clear you, judge, have no authority over me. and it just, i don't know, the judiciary never felt so small to me. i remember being a prosecutor going into those courthouses and getting reamed out for much less. and to see him almost seem afraid in the face of this. i don't know where we go from here, where there isn't really the rule of law being upheld in the way that we know it to be. >> mike. >> i just. >> you know. >> keep coming back.

>> to imagine if. joe biden's deputy attorney general, acting deputy attorney general had to come up to new york and go into court, essentially because they couldn't find anyone else to do it to themselves. have this case dismissed. and if that deputy attorney general for biden had been one of biden's defense lawyers, i mean, the world would have flown way off of its axis if that had happened. and for the just the simple fact the acting deputy attorney general had to go into court to do this today. i mean, that in and of itself tells you something about this. and was sitting at the table by himself. correct. >> i am todd blanche was behind him, but he was at the table by himself. >> and just to be clear. >> what that did. >> is it. >> made it impossible. >> for the for the judge to say

to the line attorneys, tell me why you're here. and that would have opened the door to tell me about how you were. coerced to sign this letter. so it was kind of smart for him to be there, but, like, it's unbelievable. >> the acting. >> deputy attorney general does not go to court and personally. >> do things. >> and it was a way of basically shutting down the information flow to the judge. >> at least you knew where it was from representing trump, the criminal, andrew christie i don't know that i've ever seen the two of you like this. thank you for being here. mike schmidt, thank you for your reporting on this. up next for us, a dark turn in his rhetoric against ukraine's leader to an event courting the saudis starts the next hour. it's been a dizzying 24 hours of dark and troubling developments when it comes to america's standing in the world. we'll cover all of it the world. we'll cover all of it after home. it's where we do the things we love with the people we love. celebrating, sharing—living. so why should aging mean we have to leave

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at least he's a leader. you know, unlike what we have in this country. >> yeah. >> but again. >> he kills journalists that don't agree with him. >> well, i think our country does plenty of killing also, joe. so the man has very strong control over our country. now it's a very different system. and i don't happen to like the system, but certainly in that system, he's been a leader far more than our president has been a leader. >> putin's a killer. >> a lot of killers get a lot of killers. why do you think our country is so innocent? >> hi again, everybody. it's 5:00 in new york. it's always been there, right? the affinity, the affection, the admiration, the cozying up, the justifying and defending. the embracing of vladimir putin, russia's murderous dictator. we saw this bond emerge publicly between donald trump and vladimir putin in trump's public comments, going back at least a decade now, a relationship the russian government worked part and privately and publicly to solidify and cement and advance

in many ways, special counsel robert mueller found it, quote, interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeme would go to such

lengths. simply put, again from mueller's investigation, quote, the investigation established that the russian government perceived it would benefit from a trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through russian efforts. end quote. this relationship of mutual benefit has played out. it has continued. it has intensified through all these

years. through trump's shocking remarks at the helsinki summit, through putin's parroting of trump's whitewashing of the january 6th insurrection, and now through the brutal war in ukraine, where trump has escalated his rhetoric, siding with putin and attacking the president of our democratic ally ukraine, calling ukrainian president zelensky the dictator instead of russia's leader, and falsely claiming that it was zelensky who started the war in his own country. zelensky is fighting back today with his strongest pushback against trump yet, saying trump is, quote, living in a disinformation space. but the damage to the united states standing in the world is most likely done. trump's words and actions have been heard loud and clear. the united states is right now, today, on the side of autocrats and dictators. and speaking of trump's affinity for strong men right now, he is set to speak at an investment conference in miami, back by the sovereign wealth fund of another

autocratic regime, the government of saudi arabia. that's where we start the hour with michigan democratic senator elissa slotkin. she's a member of the senate armed services committee, the homeland security committee and a former analyst at the cia. i want to call on that. that third area of expertise, which you bring so skillfully to your role as a senator and ask you what's happening right now in ukraine, what are they having to do? based on donald trump's public statements? >> yeah. >> well. >> look. >> i was. >> just at the munich security conference and our bipartisan delegation met with zelensky. we obviously watched the jd. >> vance speech live. >> i think right now, ukrainians who have been fighting, who have been trying to hold off the invasion of their country, are looking around the world and saying that the united states, the country that since world war two has been on the side of democracies, is now not only just maybe. >> walking away. but actually siding. >> with the aggressor, with the

autocratic regime. >> i can't. >> overstate how different this is in the post-world war. >> two america. >> and i think ronald. >> reagan must. >> be rolling over in his grave right now to watch a republican administration, after all he did. >> to help. >> us win the cold war. now, not only sort of supporting putin's position at the table, but just sort of gushing over him in this bromance that they have. so it's a really. >> disturbing day because it will have. >> impacts on. international security and on the security of the united states. full stop. >> can you explain that to us? how does that how does that impact our ability to protect ourselves? how does that impact intelligence sharing? how does that impact what our allies will share with us? >> sure. >> well. >> it certainly, i think makes them hedge. and we saw that in europe this past week. again, the european leaders were like, look, we usually take our cues from the united states. we usually come to you first. we

usually push off. if the russians want to make a deal with us. >> or the. >> chinese want to make a deal with us, because we always prefer to be working with you and take our cues. >> from you. >> that's now not the case. they will openly say, like, you know, you've been the leader for 70 years. we're not. >> so sure you're the leader. >> of. the next 100 years. so that's not good. when they when they perceive us as weak, they perceive us as not serious. but i. >> think. >> more importantly. >> is. >> you know. >> you can think. >> whatever you. >> want if you're, you know, watching the situation in ukraine. but guess who's taking notes on everything that's happening? the chinese government, the chinese, which are our major competitor, they're looking and they're basically saying america just doesn't have the willpower to actually defend. when a democracy is invaded. that's important for us to know, because maybe we're interested in taking over territory like taiwan. so i just think it's not just about ukraine, it's about the signal it sends about america retreating from the world and being totally fine to cede leadership to places like russia or china. >> what do you hear when you

hear an american president say, it doesn't matter what happens there? we have an ocean. i mean, i you know, the history of pearl harbor and nine over 11 is that those oceans didn't do us much good here at home. >> yeah. i mean, look, it would be great. >> if we lived in a. >> world where the only threats to the u.s. homeland came from people walking right up to our borders. right. it's just look at look at what happens. across the world. >> on a daily basis. there are plots. >> to kidnap. >> and. >> kill american citizens every single week. there are plots to attack our homeland every single week. and i think the idea that somehow we're protected by some ocean when we just had a domestic terrorism attack, two of them right around christmas time, right? new orleans. >> and las. >> vegas, the idea. that we're somehow separated from the world when we have an incredibly connected and globalized world is just, at this point, ignorance. that's just willful ignorance. it just it doesn't make sense.

>> you've got a lot of examples of the republicans collapsing onto themselves and ceasing to be a political party at all, let alone one with beliefs that are the same from the time the sun comes up to when it goes down, their beliefs about putin might be a at least a temporary exception. i'm going to show you something that senator roger wicker said yesterday to cnn. >> you think. >> that putin can. be trusted. >> in these negotiations? >> no. >> putin is a war criminal and should be in jail for the rest of his life if not executed. vladimir putin has violated every tenet of international law. >> at least as of the time of that interview. wicker, not on board with trump's embrace of vladimir putin. do you have any back channel to republicans or any? do you dare to hope that they'll stand up to trump on the issue of ukraine? >> well. >> look, we don't. >> need a back channel that he's

the chairman of the senate armed services committee. i'm on that committee. i'm the most junior member. and i was traveling with him and others to munich this past weekend. and i think it is interesting to me that today, just the sheer number of republicans who have come out in the senate and actually said, no, i don't think it's a good thing to cozy up to putin. no, you know, i don't think this leads to good places. i wish they would do that on domestic issues. right. but it is interesting to watch, and it's because they know the precedent this sets. it's because they all complained about the really bad pullout from afghanistan and the video and images that that left the world with. they know that the same thing times ten is going to happen if we just hand over ukraine to putin. so i it's been interesting to me. you don't need a back channel. they've said more today in the past ten hours than they have about almost any other domestic issue. and i hope i would love if this was the thing that helped get them a little bit more backbone. on pushing back on donald trump. it does not

make us more safe. >> what do you do then, if they're going to find their spines in this new cycle? and i share your hope that they that they put actions behind their public statements of the last 48 hours. but what do you do with the people they've already acquiesced to having in the cabinet? people like tulsi gabbard? >> yeah, i mean, this is where intelligence sharing i it's hard to sometimes understand how the decisions that happen in washington can actually result in people being less safe in a place like michigan, where i represent. right. when you put these people in charge of the intelligence community, they're making decisions in the dead of night that american citizens never hear about. they're making choices about plots and how to disrupt them. they're working with our allies and partners to share in real time information to protect the u.s. homeland. and people have no idea what these people do every single day. and now you're putting people in charge who just do not have the character or the competence to be in those jobs. we don't complain about these people just because we they're

from another party. the president has the right to nominate people. i complain about them because they will make us less safe. i do not trust their judgment in the dead of night. and now our allies will be hedging and thinking to myself, thinking themselves, do i share information about russia with the us? do i share this tactical information with the united states? if they're just going to turn around and maybe share it with their new partners, the russians, it just is. people don't understand that it will make us less safe. >> this was argued sort of on the sidelines of a very abbreviated presidential contest. but the public didn't decide that trump's affinity for putin was okay. i mean, his hard line supporters at his rallies feel that way about putin, sort of the tucker carlson slice. but 81% of americans do not trust vladimir putin. how do you make sure that public pressure keeps republicans from acquiescing to trump's capitulation to russia? >> well, look, i mean.

>> it's already happening. michigan has a big ukrainian american population, and they've already organized a rally for sunday. i mean, people are speaking up. and that's from a state that the president won. president trump won and a swing state. so we need people to demonstrate their voice on this issue and a bunch of other issues. and i think, again, he's been flooding the zone with so many different decisions, so many different announcements that people are not sure where to look. now they're starting to figure out what is truly like strategic and irreversible. that he could do that is worth their time in speaking out about. and so it's coming out from the grassroots. that rally wasn't planned by any senators. that's ukrainian americans saying we're not going to let this happen. >> you talked about the trump strategy of flooding the zone. you've been pushing back on multiple fronts. i wonder if you can just share with our viewers how you're fighting back against the other overreaches, the seemingly illegal efforts to fire independent agencies to

move doge coders and programmers into sensitive areas where people's private data is at risk of being leaked. how are you fighting those fights as a senator? >> yeah, i mean, there's basically four ways for any people to think about pushing back on some of these things again that are putting our, our citizens at risk. number one, is legislation and appropriation, right? what we're doing here in the senate, we're in the minority, but we certainly have the ability to affect changes here. not as many as i'd like, but that's a vehicle. number two is litigation, and that's become a real front foot. we've got people who are firing off cases, particularly, you know, from the state of michigan against doge and their access to our personal information, our health information. what kind of backdoors are they putting on that data and for what reasons? number three is communication, right. there's definitely, you know, the republicans are very good at flooding the internet. obviously, elon musk controls

the algorithms of x. and so making sure we're communicating loudly and regularly. and then fourth is elections. i mean, we have elections in this country. we have midterm elections. and in our system, in a constitutional system, when the president has, you know, both the house and the senate, he's able to do a lot more. we need one of those houses in order to push back on him. so those are the four things where i focus my attention and where i recommend others do the same. >> what do you sort of advise your fellow democrats to? i mean, i think you stood out in the confirmation hearings for fighting for trying to hold the republicans accountable for the kind of people they were putting in charge of national security and personal data. and the pentagon. what do you advise in terms of how to fight this fight and how to set democrats up to have to be a check on the trump white house? >> yeah. well, look, the flooding, the zone put everybody on their heels. i don't think there's any hiding of that. it's our responsibility now to like,

set ourselves back on flat footing and figure out again what is the what are the strategic and irreversible things that president trump is engaged in, that if he does, our country is irreparably harmed, right? we can't answer everything. he's purposely crowding, you know, all the airwaves so that we're we don't know where to look. we can't be like kids to the soccer ball. we have to really be ruthless in how we prioritize what we focus on. and for me, it's those strategic and irreversible things. and then we need to go deep on those things, right. this is where the legislation, the litigation, all those things come into play. but i think what he's counting on is sort of democrats, you know, just looking in every different direction, sending off a tweet and then being done. no, we need to go deep on those really important things that are fundamental to our democracy. >> i love the word ruthless. senator elissa slotkin, you're always welcome here to go go deep on on anything that that you're working on or seeing. thank you very much for your time today. >> thank you.

>> let me bring into our conversation. staff writer for the atlantic, author of autocracy inc, anne applebaum is here. also joining us, former democratic senator, msnbc political analyst claire mccaskill is here. anne applebaum, if you know, you know, and people like the senator and like yourself and like claire know how dire this is, how far out on a limb trump is aligned with putin and against president zelensky. your thoughts on where we stand today? >> i think it's important to put this. >> in a slightly. >> broader context. >> what we're. >> talking about here is the end. of 80 years of u.s. foreign policy. so 80. >> years in. >> which the united states. >> prioritized a group. >> of democratic. >> allies. mostly in europe and asia. >> protected them. >> ensured that. >> autocratic nations. first, it was the soviet union. >> later it was china. >> didn't invade them. created a

zones of prosperity. >> that were. >> very important for the u.s. in terms of trade and economics, thereby made the u.s. >> the primary power in those. >> regions so that other nations look up to the u.s, take leadership from. >> the u.s. >> again in. >> in security, but also in economics. also in culture, also in other. >> kinds of ways. >> created markets for the. >> u.s. >> for u.s. goods, for u.s. movies. >> for, you. >> know, for, for, for tourism. for travel. >> for business deals. >> all of that was based on a set of assumptions. >> that really. >> it was it was pretty clear, even from trump's first term, that he was uncomfortable with. >> that. >> system. >> actually, going back to the. >> 1980s. >> he's been. >> critical of. >> america's alliances, but he was. >> restrained in. >> the past. >> he was kept. >> he was kept. from from acting. >> acting on some of those impulses by. >> the people around him. >> in his first term. now we see. >> him empowered. >> to do what he always wanted. >> to do, and that is. to go. >> for allies, to.

>> tell. >> allies that he's. >> not protecting. >> them anymore, that we're. >> living in a different world. you know, ukraine is a. piece of the story. jd vance. >> his speech. >> in. >> munich. >> which was apart from anything else. it was insulting. it was a group of people gathered. >> to hear about european security. >> and instead. >> he made a. >> flippant speech. >> saying that their big problem was their own democracy. >> and using. >> mischaracterizing incidents. >> from. >> from all over europe. people really got the message. and there is. a lot of rethinking and recalculating and restrategizing going on in europe. but also. as senator. slotkin said, all over the world. so everybody else. >> who has. >> counted on the united states. >> has assumed they understood their relationship. >> with the united states. >> now everybody is. >> rethinking. >> so, claire, i, i have heard this a couple times since i've been on the air today, you know, february, what is it, 19th, 2025, the day the republicans killed the western alliance? i mean, just talk about what that

means for americans, for how we see ourselves moving forward. >> i think the. >> hardest part. >> about this is trump is counting. >> on americans. >> not really. seeing how it impacts them personally. so, you know, what he thinks in his naive brain is that if he makes friends with the bad guys, the bad guys. >> are. >> going to be his buddies and they're never going to. >> hurt us. >> what he doesn't understand is when you weaken democracies across the globe, which he did by basically lying about the russian invasion in ukraine. when you weaken democracies, that is not a. >> path to peace. >> for the united states. that is a. path to war. and i mean, listen, ann is by far a bigger expert on all these topics than i am, and i'm honored to be on with her today. but i will tell you, the person who gains the most in all of this is key, because russia is not in a place geopolitically and economically

to really dominate the world. she also puts journalists in jail. she also doesn't respect human rights. she also wants to make up countries in the south china sea in order to box out western democracies. in terms of trade, he wants more global dominance than anyone else. and you know what? trump is going to deliver that to him by weakening our western alliances, by blowing up our western alliances. this is cheese dream. this is what he wanted to accomplish. and he's got donald trump in his king outfit today, distributed by none other than the white house doing his bidding. >> all right, you guys aren't going anywhere. when we come back from cozying up to dictators around the world to trying to be one here at home, why donald trump's latest under the radar move has experts warning that we're moving a big logistical step closer to being an autocracy. and if that were

not enough for you, trump declaring himself a king, as claire just said as he tries to put a stop to new york city's congestion pricing, that's new york's governor pushing back hard against him today, and one of the democrats in congress working to counter trump's authoritarian moves, congresswoman jasmine crockett of texas will be our guest here at the table a little later in the hour. deadline. white house continues after a quick break. continues after a quick break. don't go anywh check in time is 3:00 it's 2:55. i know. is this what he's doing now? as your host, i have some rules. first, no showers longer than 5 minutes. this isn't a spa. no games. no fun. yes, coach. (♪♪) meanwhile, at a vrbo... when other vacation rentals make you share your turf with a host, try one you have all to yourself. ever feel like a spectator in your own life with chronic migraine? 15 or more headache days a month, each lasting 4 hours or more.

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>> bernie sanders is talking to you. donald trump, our founders, established congress as a co-equal branch of government. but as with every other thing in the constitution and in our founding, everything else held together by respect for norms and traditions. trump has bulldozed it. yesterday, he signed a sweeping executive order that brings regulatory agencies under his control, under the control of the white house, agencies that congress established specifically as independent from a president's power and influence for the purpose of protecting consumers, of preventing fraud and regulating the things you see on your television. it is one of donald trump's latest moves to push his powers beyond the boundaries in ways that no other american president has done. politico reports this, quote, other presidents have not only declined to challenge the independence of these agencies in court, but have in many cases tried to avoid even the appearance of interference in their actions. speaking of

appearances, trump, not even trying to hide his power, grab today when announcing that he is pulling federal approval of new york city's congestion pricing tolls. he declared himself a king. he made this. and the white house sent out this picture on their social media account. joining our coverage, nbc news white house correspondent vaughn hillyard. he's in miami beach, where donald trump is speaking at an event hosted by the saudi sovereign wealth fund. and claire is still with us. vaughn, tell us about today. >> well, the saudi sovereign wealth fund is the primary sponsor of this event here. it's a conference in miami. and of course, it was the saudi sovereign wealth fund that was the initial investor of $2 billion into jared kushner's new private equity firm. six months after leaving the white house in 2021. i saw jared kushner in the hall, but also notably steve witkoff, who was there during the russia saudi negotiations just over 24 hours ago. elon

musk is also here in this room. of course, donald trump saying the saudis as key allies here during these negotiations. all of this is, frankly quite a lot watching this. and if i may, you know, i think, nicole, one of those interesting parts down here in florida was watching some of the republican lawmakers up on capitol hill today, really, for the first time of this administration, one month in speaking out against president trump in defense of volodymyr zelensky and more so outright calling vladimir putin evil. but what was notable to me was that his remarks yesterday, the president, were not very dissimilar from conversations that you and i were having 5 or 6 months ago. he was posting memes about zelensky calling him the greatest salesman, saying at the time that the u.s. was giving him billions of dollars for a deal that he didn't actually want and was already at that point in time laying the foundation to place blame for the ongoing war at zelensky's feet. and so, so much of what we're watching here in real time, including as the president is set to take the stage here momentarily, has so many echoes

of 2024, but now really coming to fruition in real time and real powerful ways. now with the oval office in his hands. >> i mean, one of the things, though, that that seems to be a flashing yellow light politically, to the degree that politics still govern the way we choose our leaders in this country. and i'll leave that out there for everyone to mull. is that your your extraordinary coverage during the campaign, i think, was jolting in that it was clear in your interviews with trump supporters that they had bought putin's propaganda. tucker carlson's propaganda and trump's propaganda about putin hook, line and sinker. but that's out of step with 81% of americans who don't like vladimir putin very much. is anyone sort of minding trump's political flank on the unpopularity and america's really disdain, distrust and disgust with putin? >> i think it's a really good question, nicole, and i think that this is where i think we

watched for a great amount of time in 2023 and 2024. level of ignorance among some republican lawmakers, to the extent to which there were millions of supporters, and again, maybe not a plurality of them, but a sizable share of americans who were retaining what some republicans at the time were calling russian propaganda. right. tulsi gabbard was making the case that ukraine wanting to join nato is the reason that russia had to invade ukraine. and at the time, mitt romney was one of the sole voices calling it russian propaganda and taking tulsi gabbard head on here. and yet, i know you and i had conversations for months last year that we were hearing this person after person after person, where the idea that zelenskyy was banking and making billions of dollars off of us american taxpayers. and this is where i think in so many ways, i think it's a serious question. it's the extent to which president trump may very well have strong support around the

country for his condemnation of zelenskyy today and his positioning of the us to potentially cease its support of ukraine and its european allies. >> vaughn hillyard, thank you so much for your reporting. wave your arms. if there's anything that breaks there where you are. claire mccaskill, i want to come back to you on this, on this possible friction politically. i mean, the reason we're here is because republicans like john bolton and chris christie, who are out with attacks on trump's foreign policy and in chris christie's case, trump's annihilation of the rule of law with his flagrant ushering in of a quid pro quo and criminal prosecutions being dropped with the absence of fact or cause, is because republicans like john bolton and chris christie hated democrats more than they love democracy. that's why we're here. that's why we're here. we've warned on this show for nine years what anne applebaum just articulated that if trump wins, he will end 80 years of u.s. foreign policy. and that's what's happened. and that was the warning, and it was on the

table. and it was something we talked about ad nauseam here. how do democrats get off the mat and hold republicans accountable for ending the world order? >> well, first of all, i don't know that democrats can hold republicans accountable as much as the people they represent can hold them accountable. i mean, people really need to get off the couch and quit complaining about donald trump. they've got to call. they've got to show up at the offices of their elected members of congress. and here's the thing. you know, some of these republican senators, and i'm looking at people like roger wilker, roger wicker, and i'm looking at joni ernst. i'm looking at deb fischer, i'm looking at mike rounds. i'm looking at lindsey graham, i'm looking at dan sullivan, i'm looking at thom tillis. these people all know that what trump did today was blow up the western alliance that has secured peace and prosperity for our country for 80 years. that's what donald trump did. now, if they can't come together and

issue some kind of rebuke and warning to the people of america about what he is doing, then they really need to tell their grandchildren that them holding office was more important than the peace and prosperity of their country, because that's the decision they're making. >> anne applebaum, is this a point of no return? you know, where are we? >> so i'm actually not going to say this. >> is a point. of no return. relationships can. >> be rebuilt. >> there are a lot. >> of layers. >> to the transatlantic alliance. there are military relationships. there are. economic relationships. you know, it's not. >> like everybody. >> is. >> going to stop speaking. >> to each other. >> but you're. >> right that it's very, very important, both for voters. >> especially republican. >> voters, for republican members of congress, for republican members of the senate to. speak up now and make clear what could be lost, what needs to be preserved. it's important for them to reach out to allies.

and i know some of that happened a little bit at munich. i heard a lot of republicans there actually talking about their. relationship with ukraine, lauding their long relationships with europe. i mean, that may be a self-selected group because of the republicans who want to go to want to go and visit europe. but but it's not it doesn't have to be lost. you know, there are there is always a next chapter. there is always a next phase. nothing is inevitable. and if people care about our relationships with the outside world, if they want the us to be aligned with other democracies. and by the way, i think our alignments help us. i think one of the one of the side effects of, of our membership of nato for so many years was that it strengthened american democracy. and that's a longer conversation to have sometime. but it's a if people care about that, if they care about the economic benefits america has had from allies, if they care about the security benefits we've had from allies, then they should speak up. you know, there's always a chance to change things.

>> we'll have that conversation because i think there's no time like the present to remind people that we're the only people who've ever pulled out from the bank of the nato alliance on the article five were the only people that have asked people to stand with us when we're attacked. we've actually never a bill that we've had to pay anybody else. anne applebaum and claire mccaskill, thank you both so much for being here today. when we come back, what democrats are doing about all of it. congress woman jasmine crockett of texas will jasmine crockett of texas will be right here at the table next. zyrtec allergy relief works fast and lasts a full 24 hours so dave can be the... deliverer of dance. ok, dave! let's be more than our allergies. zeize the day with zyrtec. swiffer duster traps 4x more dust, for a clean even mom approves of. that reach! making hard to reach... so easy. swiffer. wow. the mother of all cleans. love it or your money back!

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order when you sign up as a new vip only at fabletics. com. >> president donald trump. >> tweeted long. >> live the king! >> i'm here to say. >> new york hasn't labored under a king in over 250 years. we are not. we sure as hell are not going to start now. this is an attack on our sovereign identity, our independence from washington. and this is. we are a nation. we are a nation of states. this is what we fought for. >> new york governor kathy hochul denouncing donald trump's outrageous claim today that he is a king. he really said that when he attacked new york city's congestion pricing. joining us now, democratic congresswoman jasmine crockett of texas, i'm going to platform the conversation we've been having off tv, because i think everyone

wants to know where to get more you, where to get more fight. >> you know what? right now, i think a lot of my colleagues in. general are like, we want to give you the best of what we've got, right? but the reality is that not all 215 of us are necessarily media darlings. right? and so it's just about understanding that we are one team, though, and we all have roles to play. and there. >> are. >> spaces in which i'm weaker and spaces in which i'm stronger. and i am trying to do my best in the space in which i typically shine, which is to be able. >> to. >> communicate in a very digestible, educational way. and it's a way of communication that i think we all need to adopt within the house. but there's just certain people like, i know i hear aoc's name all the time, because she does have a way with communicating so that you don't have to have a phd or so that you're not just, like, bored to death, right? she's got personality, but she also has the knowledge, and she also knows how to make sure that anyone can understand.

>> i think it's also that you are in a state legislature, in a super minority, and you got on a plane and did something, and i think that democrats are acting. i mean, democrats lost an election by half a percentage point, and they're acting like they got wiped out. >> yeah. >> what is that about? >> i don't know, but they don't know nothing about my life. because you're right. that's when we met, right? yeah. and it was this idea. it's like, wait a minute. what what is happening? why are those lawmakers, like, leaving the state legislature? and we didn't have the numbers, but we looked at what we did have. we had enough to be able to slow down the process. we had enough so that we could highlight what was going on, and we had enough to actually take off some of the harms of that legislation by just standing up and fighting. and so, i don't know another way. i mean, i've always been in a triple minority where i came from, but i never had a minority mindset. i had a majority winning mindset. and i think that that is the mindset that my colleagues do have in

the house. it's just a matter of, how are we going to effectuate this? because our best way is stopping. trump is in the house. he's stuck in the white house for four years. god bless us all. and we know that the senate map still isn't necessarily our strength in the next two years, but here it is. i can't even imagine two years. we haven't had 30 days and i'm already tired of him and his nonsense. so for me, i want to focus on these special elections. i at least want to try. listen, i don't win if i don't try. but if i try and i lose, at least i know i was given my heart to try to make this world a better place before two years from now. >> tell us about the specials. >> yes. so we've got a total of three special elections. we have one that will take place in new york. new york. are you listening? i hope so, yes. so we need to make sure that elise stefanik, whenever she does get out of that race or whenever she does, formally announce that she's out, we need to try to take that seat. we also have the two special elections in florida for mike walz as well as matt

gaetz. now, these are what most people will say are ruby red districts. and i won't disagree. but we saw what happened in iowa in the special election for that state senate seat that swung 27 points. i remember a time when people said, oh, no, there's no way you can have two senators in the state of georgia. but we did. i remember a time when there was a man by the name of doug, got an alabama in a special election, and because things were so bad, we were able to take that seat. so i think that if there's any time for people to wake up, whether you're a farmer in those districts down in florida that is being negatively impacted, whether it's because of the policies as it relates to usaid or whether it's because of the immigration policies, because a lot of your workforce isn't showing up, because they are afraid of what may happen to them down in florida. we are here for you. we will listen to you. and if you still want trump, just know he's going to be there. but you want him to have some extra check. and that's what we would get. doesn't mean you're a democrat, but it does mean that you are an

american who wants to make sure that our democracy is preserved. and so i'm hoping and praying that a lot of people are waking up in those districts, and they decide to do the right thing and vote for the democratic opponents. >> i have to sneak in a break, but i want to ask you about the ability to push back against elon musk. and what are we calling it? doggy. >> doggy, dog. >> dog, dog. whatever congresswoman caucus sticks around, we'll be right back. >> go beyond the headlines with the msnbc app. read, listen and watch live breaking news and analysis anytime, anywhere. go beyond the what to understand the why. download the msnbc app now. the first 100 days, it's a critical time for our country. and rachel maddow is on five nights a week. >> now is the time. so we're going to. >> do it. settle in. >> do it. settle in. >> the rachel woman: we've waited so long for this spa day. oh yeah? shingles doesn't care. shingles is a painful,

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>> i'm trying to figure out exactly what it is that the republicans believe our job is, because right now they have relinquished their constitutional duties over to an unelected bureaucrats, someone who no one went out to vote for. >> are you surprised by the prominence and the audacity of elon musk? >> i am, i really am. i mean, he went from being the dork that was jumping around on stage to allegedly being this amazing genius that's going to save this entire country, the country that he wasn't born in, and a country that maybe he doesn't agree with the idea of a democratic republic, considering the fact that he may have been more so on the side of apartheid. so like, yeah, i am shocked. and i'm also shocked that maga, who is clearly a cult, would allow somebody else to come in and do anything. now, what we've seen, though, is that donald trump's approval ratings supposedly are kind of either going up or

holding while elon musk is falling. right. so you've got the pushback of steve bannon. like the fact that i agree with him on anything in life really has me like, oh yeah, we really are in the upside down right now. so i do think that there will be more hate that ends up being spewed towards him once people start to really wake up and realize, like, wait a minute. so you're telling me that i don't have any social security so that you could get an extra billion, 2 billion, $3 billion in government contracts from my tax dollars and or end up saving money on your taxes because you don't want to pay them. ■and can't even find a job because we're headed towards a recession. recession? that's what i want people to understand. i don't mean to be gloom and doom, but when you have somebody that is firing people from the 15th largest employer in the world, which is the federal government, and then when you are saying, let's kick out these amazing people that have actually contributed to our country in the form of building our homes. as you're complaining

about the cost of homes, when you're talking about people that are going and working the farms, as you're complaining about the cost of food, as you're getting rid of people that are working on bird flu and you're like, oops, you didn't realize that's what you were doing. we are living with this incompetent administration that is literally driving us to a recession at warp speed. and all i can say is, hold on to your money and make sure that you have a way to make money, even if you lose your job, because there are people that believe that, oh, i don't work for the federal government, so i'm fine. but that's not the case. we just saw the southwest airlines did the biggest layoff that they have ever done in its entire existence. we continue to see private industries laying off. so many private companies rely on federal dollars. >> what do you do when the republicans are saying all of the quiet stuff out loud? you've got tuberville saying that we just have to beg for carve outs from the massive government cuts that elon musk is putting into

place. is that is that the new game? i mean, is that you have to go beg the. >> no. the divided states of america is where we live, right? we know that he was taunting the state of california when they had the fires. thank goodness that we had allies that understand that all of the united states matter. and so we saw canada come in. we saw mexico come in. but the problem is that we have a president that is adversarial to states that don't vote for him. and so what some of these people fail to realize down in alabama, who's broke down in louisiana, who's broke, i can go through pretty much the entire south and tell you that they're broke and they rely on a lot of welfare from the government. to be perfectly honest, it is tax dollars from these big blue states like new york. yet they send a lot of money into taxes and then broke states end up benefiting from it. and now they are about to find out. so we're in the find out phase. and you've got, you

know, the other senator from alabama, she decided to weigh in as well because the largest employer is university of alabama. and guess what? they decided that they were going to cut all the research dollars. so research takes place at universities. so now you're going to have people in your already broke state that don't have jobs. the recession is coming. i told you here first. >> what should eric adams do? >> oh, listen, eric is out for eric right now, as far as i'm concerned. you know, i think that this is about, you know, what does the reputation need to be of democrats in the state of new york, right? and so i think the question is more so what is the governor going to do versus him? this is a guy that is trying to save his neck, and i don't know what i would do if i was potentially facing prison time, i don't know. i won't pretend to know, but i can tell you that there are other electeds that are in position that can make decisions, such as the governor. and i think that that is the bigger question is what will the governor do? what makes most sense? are we okay

with the fact that there is a distraction from the real work that needs to be done on behalf of the people in the city of new york? and him and his issues are a distraction. he's got his top lieutenants that are resigning. we know that a number of people around him have already entered pleas of guilty. this may not necessarily be serving the people of the city of new york. the best thing? guess what? he's still on the ballot. so if they want to vote for him, they can. >> congresswoman, thank you for being here and fielding all of our questions today. it's great to see you. another break for us. we'll be right back. >> so i can take the steak home. yeah. and as many butterfly shrimp as i want. cake. >> you can take home everything. >> ice cream machine. everything. dessert bar. everything. fork. everything. everything. fork. everything. that guy's had everything. ever feel like a spectator in your own life with chronic migraine? 15 or more headache days a month, each lasting 4 hours or more. botox® prevents headaches in adults with chronic migraine. in a survey, 91% of users wish they'd started sooner. so why wait?

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now four people hospitalized with the bird flu. and the cdc is reporting 68 total cases so far. and suggesting that it's spreading undetected to humans. not to mention the 972 dairy herds and 23 million birds infected. don't worry. doe is on the case. except there's one problem. as congresswoman crockett alluded to, the us department of agriculture says they accidentally fired several employees working on the federal government's response to the outbreak, and they are, quote, working to swiftly rectify the situation and rescind those letters. it's not the first time this has happened. last week, the administration tried to notify some nuclear safety employees who were fired last week that they are now due to be reinstated. we actually need them, but they struggle to find them because they didn't have new contact information for

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