samsung galaxy s25+ on us. face on trump and elon musk's mass firing spree across the federal government. janice mandel, one of the officials fired from the office of personnel management, is going to join us. we're also going to talk to new mexico attorney general raul torres about the evolving legal strategy to fight d.o.j. that starts back here tomorrow, 8 a.m. eastern. be sure to follow us on social media at the weekend msnbc velshi continues our coverage now. good morning. >> good morning, friends. great to see you all. and as i sometimes like to do, i reach in and say, is there a weekend person who can join me on tv today? and simone got the short straw on that one. so i'm grateful to you because we're going to talk about something, even though michael should get it, given that we're apparently dressed in the same dark closet

today, we got the same stuff. but i do want to talk about a really important thing that you know a lot about. and you, you, simone and april ryan are going to be with me because april has been a reporter at the white house who has gotten into it with with president trump. and you've been on the other side of that, where you organize how reporters get information. and there's been a major change that's been, you know, overshadowed by a lot of stuff that's happened this week about how people hold the presidency to account. so i'm going to talk to you about that in not too long. >> i will be staying for you. ali velshi, anything for you, my friend. >> i'm grateful to you all. and you have a great day, and i'll talk to you later. velshi starts now. hey. good morning, i'm ali velshi. it's saturday, march the 1st. president trump continues to publicly push the united states closer to russia at the expense of ukraine, including a total abandonment of the multiyear american led efforts to punish and isolate vladimir putin for instigating europe's most destructive and deadly conflict since world war two.

the latest and most visceral episode took place yesterday during an oval office meeting between trump and the ukrainian president, volodymyr zelensky, who was in washington, ostensibly to sign a somewhat dubious deal giving american rights america rights to some of ukraine's vast and valuable natural resources in exchange for some unclear security guarantees. the deal didn't get signed. instead, what began as a talk about security guarantees quickly devolved into one of the most devastating and disastrous moments in american diplomatic history, in which donald trump said that volodymyr zelensky was acting not in defense of his country, but out of malice toward the russian dictator. >> you see the hatred he's got for putin. it's very tough for me to make a deal with that kind of hate. he's got tremendous hatred and i understand that. but i can tell you the other side isn't exactly in love with. you know him either. >> from there, things escalated dramatically into this shocking exchange. >> don't tell us what we're going to feel. we're trying to

solve a problem. don't tell us what we're going to feel. >> i'm not telling you. >> because you're in no position to dictate that. remember, you're in no position to dictate what we're going to feel. we're going to feel very good. we're going to feel very good and very strong influence. you're right now not in a very good position. you've allowed yourself to be in a very bad position, and it happens to be right about. >> from the very beginning of the war. >> you're not in a good position. you don't have the cards right now with us. you start having cards. cards right now you don't. you're playing. >> cards. you're playing cards. >> you're gambling with the lives of millions of people. you're gambling with world war three. you're gambling with world war three. and what you're doing is very disrespectful to the country, this country that's backed you far more than a lot of people said they should have. >> trump and vice president jd vance then demanded that zelensky thank them personally.

>> have you said thank you once this entire meeting? no. in this entire meeting, have you said thank you? you went to pennsylvania and campaigned for the opposition in october, offer some words of appreciation for the united states of america and the president who's trying to save your country. >> please. you think that if you will speak very loudly about the war, you. >> can start speaking loudly? he's not speaking loudly. your country is in big trouble. >> can i. >> wait a minute? no, no, you've done a lot of talking. your country is in big trouble. >> i know. >> you're not winning. no, you're not winning this. you have a damn good chance of coming out, okay? because you're not acting at all thankful. and that's not a nice thing. i'll be honest. that's not a nice thing. all right? i think we've seen enough. what do you think this is? this is going to be great television. i will say that. >> shortly after that, the media pool left the oval office. zelensky and the ukrainian delegation were kicked out of

the white house. and trump went on the attack on social media, posting in part that zelensky, quote, disrespected the united states of america in its cherished oval office. he can come back when he's ready for peace, end quote. trump took it even further when talking to reporters outside the white house before departing for mar a lago. >> i'm not looking to get into anything protracted. >> i want immediate peace. president putin is going to want to make and he wants to make. he wants to end it. and you saw what i saw today. this is a man that wants to get us signed up and keep fighting. and we're not doing that, not for this country. >> when you start talking. >> he's got to say, i want to make peace. he doesn't have to stand there and say about putin, this putin, that all negative things he's got to say, i want to make peace. i don't want to fight a war any longer. his people are dying. he doesn't have the cards. >> much of this monumental shift in american foreign policy has flown under the radar because of

the sheer amount of anti-democratic rhetoric coming out of the trump white house. but it began in earnest, at least in public, two and a half weeks ago, when trump held a one on one phone call with vladimir putin. immediately after that, trump administration officials began publicly parroting several russian demands for ending the war in ukraine, including that ukraine won't get all its territory back from russia and ukraine won't be allowed to join nato. a week later, secretary of state marco rubio led a high level delegation to saudi arabia for talks with his russian counterpart, sergey lavrov. another member of moscow's delegation, the head of russia's sovereign wealth fund, described the atmosphere to russian state media as being jovial and, quote, there were a lot of jokes. rubio told reporters that they agreed to work on ending the war with, quote, consultation with ukraine, end quote. but that quote, ultimately, the russian side will be indispensable to this effort. end quote. rubio also said that they agreed to explore the, quote, incredible opportunities that exist to partner with the russians, end quote, on economic and

geopolitical interests. this past monday, the third anniversary of russia's full fledged and unprovoked invasion of ukraine, the u.s. sided with russia at the united nations general assembly multiple times, including voting against a european drafted resolution condemning russia's invasion and supporting ukraine's territorial integrity. the united states voted the same as just 11 other countries, including russia and two of its closest allies, belarus and north korea. the u.s. also abstained from its own separate resolution, which contained no criticism of russia. after france, whose president happened to be at the white house at the same time, successfully amended it to include verbiage calling out russia as the invading aggressor. on thursday, the u.s. and russia conducted another round of meetings, this time in istanbul, discussing, among other things, restoring direct flights between the countries and issues dealing with diplomatic missions. that's according to the russian foreign ministry. putin, who has repeatedly ridiculed the united

states and western democracy, later publicly praised the trump administration's, quote, pragmatism and realistic worldview, saying things so far are, quote, inspiring a certain degree of hope. end quote. joining me now is the retired army lieutenant colonel alexander vindman. he's a former director of european affairs for the u.s. national security council. he also formerly served as a political military affairs officer for russia, for the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, and as an attache at the u.s. embassy in moscow. he's the author of a brand new book, the folly of realism how the west deceived itself about russia and betrayed ukraine. wow. first of all, i'd like the audience. i think i'd like them to think that we book our show really well on the news. but you were actually going to be here. we were. we had planned this a while ago because of your book, which literally could have been written overnight and published. what what we saw happen. i don't even know what you make of it. it's about 24 hours. >> it is. i wrote this thing years back, actually, to finish

up my doctoral work and then rewrote it, timing it for the release on the third war, recognizing that we were still going to have regardless of what party was going to be in power, democrats or republicans, we were still going to have war, and we were going to have decent prospects of peace. but the situation has really devolved, and the subtitle couldn't be more accurate, that we continue to deceive ourselves about russia and betray ukraine. and now we're repeating the absolutely worst mistakes of our literally. >> that's what happened in the white house. i'm reading deceiving. we weren't deceiving ourselves. the president was deceiving the country and the world about about russia and betraying ukraine. literally. that's what happened yesterday morning. what what was that? how do you interpret that? that everything we just saw. >> well, i think the fact is he could care less about ukraine because he doesn't understand the role that ukraine is playing in, that it's a bulwark against russian aggression further west towards nato, that if ukraine falls, that russia is more powerful, more aggressive, it starts to threaten nato and our european allies. these are the

folks that are protect us when we're in danger. they are the bedrock of european security. so he doesn't care about that. he doesn't understand it. so therefore he's okay giving away ukrainian territory, sacrificing ukrainian lives. what he doesn't realize is that this actually doesn't help his cause of ceasefire or peace, because putin will bank all that. he's like, okay, thanks. give me that. now, what else do you have for him? >> right. >> he wants to break us relationships with europe and nato. he's doing that successfully because trump vance don't understand the consequences of their actions. there was a clear break yesterday. we will see evolve and become manifest over the course of the next days. we'll see something come out of this meeting between zelensky and starmer, the prime minister. >> that's happening. >> now, that's happening now. it's going to roll forward. the us will be cut out of our security relationships. europeans are going to go it alone. we had this brief moment in which the us was really the sole superpower. yes. and we could do that because we were supported by nato, the european atlantic, euro-atlantic

alliance, with the europeans choosing to go it alone because they know that the us won't be there. we'll have this break towards what our adversaries want. multi-polarity slightly smaller states having influence over their regions, and then that kind of more lopsided advantage that they have, that it's the europeans against russia, not as much of a mismatch as us and nato, and that the us is not reliable in the pacific. so china could have its way. it becomes a far, far more dangerous world. our our adversaries are gleeful, our enemies are reeling and trying to figure out what to do next. >> before world war two, when germany went into sudetenland and took over a part of czechoslovakia, the understanding there was, okay, fine, you can have that, but no more. and of course, immediately thereafter they went into poland and world war two began. i the goal, then harold macmillan's goal in uk was appeasement. right. if you if you if you settle, if you just give hitler something, he'll calm down. that's not what was going on yesterday. what what was that. what was the goal of trump and

vance lecturing zelensky. what's the end goal. >> so i think part of the end goal was to actually sign this deal, which they're ham handed and kind of absurd juvenile behavior undermined. they wanted to bully zelensky but still get a deal signed. what they didn't realize is in some in some how trump and vance both looked like bullies and they looked weak strangely that they managed to do something very, very strange like that. and zelensky looked very, very strong. he held his ground. his country is in a state of war, and he proved himself to be the world leader that he is. >> well, remind, remember that they we offered to get zelensky out of kyiv in the before the war. he said no. then they said, why don't you at least locate to western ukraine? he said, no, i'm staying. and he stayed there. he is there under bombing, under threat. so i would imagine that as uncomfortable as that looked, zelensky. he's been through a lot. >> yeah, he's seen tougher times. i think there's another factor here though, that trump and vance trump in particular have been there are no

guardrails. there are no people that say i think this is wrong. let's take a different approach. they have been bred to believe that they could do anything and everything without consequence. and zelensky is pointing out, because ukrainians know more than there's a thousand years of history between russia and ukraine. they've been struggling for centuries for ukrainian national identity and independence. the ukrainians know what it's going to take to acquire peace. it's peace through strength. reagan said it. you hear trump make mouths the words for it. he doesn't mean it. but these these folks don't understand that the us side making the same mistakes, deceiving ourselves about russia. whereas zelenskyy is saying, look, i want peace more than anybody else here. the ukrainians want peace more than anybody else here. but the way we do that is we do that by showing russia that it cannot continue to be a military aggressor. it cannot achieve its aims through through military force. and we need to demonstrate that through the resolve of, of ukraine and our western allies. >> right. because ukrainians, we're talking about the fact

that we've just finished the third anniversary of the world war in the fourth year of the war. but to ukrainians, they don't think about it. they talk about when they lost crimea, which was when you were involved, you know, you were doing stuff there. let's take a quick break. when i come back, i want to have a conversation about your very important new book, the folly of realism how the west deceived itself about - it's apparent. not me. - yeah. the west deceived itself about russia and betrayed ukraine. nice going lou! nothing like a little confidence boost to help ease you back in to the dating scene. of course, that also includes having a smile you feel good about. fortunately, aspen dental specializes in dentures and implants made just for you, with affordable options and flexible ways to pay, and now, they■re 0 dollars down plus 0% interest, if paid in full in 18 months. helping our patients put their best smile forward. it's one more way aspen dental is in your corner. [dog whimpering] sorry bud, not while i weed. [loud splash] ♪ who let the dogs out? ♪ ♪ spruce! spruce, spruce, spruce, spruce! ♪

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that to the how the west deceives itself about russia and betrayed ukraine, because this isn't history, this is current. tell me what the deception is. when you were writing this book, what? what is the deception you feel that we have about russia and the betrayal of ukraine? >> sure. so the folly is the fact that we keep repeating the same mistakes over and over, where we are shortsighted about russia. they put bright, shiny objects in front of us. like right now it's a bright, shiny object of peace. that's not going to happen because russia constantly breaks its agreements. it's broken. 94 in 14. i mean, there's just so many different agreements that broke over the years. so that's that's the folly. we do this because russia is a large country. it's got massive nuclear arsenal. it had a powerful looking military up until three years ago where the ukrainians wrecked it. and we succumb to hopes and fears, hopes that we could do more with them, like a cease fire or fears that somehow the relationship is going to devolve. world war

three, you heard that play out in the oval office yesterday, and the russians are extremely effective at wielding this, and we make shortsighted decisions constantly, one after the other, whether it's about ukraine's independence and george h.w. bush suppressing that urge, and the ukrainians saying, we're going to do it anyway. just months later, we gave his famous chicken kyiv speech that ukrainians voted overwhelmingly, 90% voted to leave or denuclearization. we initially put massive, massive pressure on ukrainians and they were like, no, we're not going to mortgage our our security. but when we entice them with some with the economic aid that they needed and some assurances, not quite the same thing as guarantees came on board, or the orange revolution, where the russians started to graduate from just mischief making, economic coercion to outright, you know, hybrid warfare and interference in elections, we could have made a pivot because this was a ukrainian, pro-western ukrainian leader that was elected. we could have made a hard pivot to invest in ukraine, harden ukraine, and condemned russia

for its election interference back then rhymes quite a bit. and we didn't because there was a bright, shiny object of cooperating on international terrorism, defeating international terror. same thing through 2014, multiple resets all along the way. trump might not call this one a reset, but it's the same kind of pattern reset. what we should be should be doing is focusing on what really matters. we should be focusing on democracies. those are the things that give us kind of bedrock support when we're under threat. our our fellow democracies were there for us in nine over 11. there are most important, most robust trading partners. we should be investing in hardening democracies, nurturing, nurturing, struggling democracies. ours is one of them now and frankly supporting democratic institutions. that is the long term play that allows us to navigate past these really bright, shiny objects in front of us. >> and you you distinguish that the realism, the folly of realism is what you're saying, advancing us interests versus neo idealism, which you are saying should be a sort of a moral or a democratic approach to because ukraine, in that in

the world you talk about was doing all those things. they were trying to gain democracy. it was later than a lot of post-soviet states, but they were trying to get it. we needed to nurture that. ukraine would would have been a very strong position today, and we gave them guarantees. they gave up their nukes in exchange for their territorial integrity. and nobody stood up to them. >> no, that's that's very true. we made mistakes. if we had some wishful thinking in the 1990s, there was a lot of hope at the end of the cold war. by the time you get this kgb colonel in power that's running the country, and there's all sorts of democratic backsliding inside the country. illiberalism attack on media. we should have seen the telltale signs they graduated from there to war against one of their neighbors in georgia. they graduated from there to seizing territory in ukraine. we didn't do much in the way of either condemnation. we did some, you know, relatively modest sanctions, but we didn't do enough to harden ukraine because we wanted to normalize relationships. the fact is that there are alternatives. this school of neo idealism, this idea that, you know, us, could still recapture its moral leadership down the

road seems like a far fetched notion now. but when we look past where you look four years down the road, we are swinging so far away from our roots, from our values, from our alliances now under trump, that the next president that comes in when we reject this, this error, the next president is going to have to capture some sort of vision for the future. and that's one where values are central to our interests. it's a ways off, but we're going to just natural correction. pendulum swings hard to the right. it's going to have to swing and correct itself. and that's going to be enormous opportunities for the us i think domestically and abroad. >> i will take that ounce of optimism that you're providing. and thank you for that. lieutenant colonel alexander vindman is the author of a very important new book called the folly of realism how the west deceived itself about russia and betrayed ukraine. great to see you again. thank you. nice to see you. congratulations. all right. coming up, elon musk sledgehammer approach to cutting federal jobs isn't actually saving money, according to several analyzes. he says it's just like bill clinton's cost

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why are y? >> because you're screaming. are you hiding from used car shopping? >> yeah. >> what if i overpay? >> i get it, nearly half of all

used cars have been in an accident. but that's nothing to be afraid of. >> show me carfax. >> knowing how a car's accident history impacts price means, you don't have to overpay. >> way better. popcorn? >> definitely no fear. just fox. say show me a carfax.com. >> or. >> doge and elon musk are still at it. the consumer financial protection bureau, or cfpb, is facing cuts that would essentially eliminate the agency. in court documents released thursday, federal employees at the cfpb say the new trump appointed leadership plans to fire nearly all of its 1700 employees, and that leaders have been instructed to essentially wind down the agency, which was created by congress in 2011 to protect american consumers after the 2008 financial crisis. elsewhere, nearly 800 employees have been cut at the national oceanic and atmospheric administration, or noaa. among those fired are weather forecasters at the national weather service, which sends alerts for storms and other natural disasters. one policy

analyst at noaa told the new york times, quote, the loss of talent at noaa is going to set the agency back years and compromise the integrity of missions that directly support human health and safety, economic prosperity and national security. this is not a move toward efficiency. it's a move toward putting americans in danger every day. end quote. indeed, it's hard to see how doj's moves do anything to make the government more efficient and even less to save it money. according to analysis by the associated press, 40% of the canceled government contracts touted by musk are not expected to save the government any money. elon musk's sledgehammer approach to government has proceeded has precedent in silicon valley. mark zuckerberg's internal motto at facebook for several years was to quote, move fast and break things. but musk is now arguing that there is precedent in politics as well. president bill clinton's reinventing government initiative. last week, musk posted on x, quote, what doge is doing is similar to clinton gore dem policies of the 1990s. the current dem party has just gone

so crazy far left that it isn't recognizable anymore. end quote. now, musk would be on to something if it were accurate. would you be surprised if i told you it wasn't? the clinton administration worked closely with congress and with each federal agency and department to establish a bipartisan commission to oversee oversee the reinventing government initiative between 1993 and 1998. that's a span of five years. the clinton administration eliminated more than 400,000 federal jobs through a combination of buyouts, voluntary departures and layoffs. but there's a huge difference between d.o.j. and clinton's projects. for one, clinton presented his plan to cut costs to congress for approval. unlike the trump administration, which has so far bypassed congress, and clinton's process of deciding what to cut was far slower and more deliberate. elaine kamarck, a senior policy advisor to then vice president al gore, told fortune that clinton's commission, the clinton commission mantra, was, quote, creating a government that works better and costs less and that

they, quote, took the time to understand the mission of the agency and understand if it was important or not important. end quote. unlike musk, who just admitted to accidentally cutting some pretty crucial disease prevention prevention infrastructure. >> we won't be perfect. but when we make mistake, we'll fix it very quickly. so, for example, with usaid, one of the things we accidentally canceled very briefly was ebola. ebola prevention. i think we all want ebola prevention. so we restored the ebola prevention immediately, and there was no interruption. >> just ebola. what could go wrong? elaine kamarck joins me now. as i mentioned, she was a senior adviser to vice president al gore during the reinventing government initiative. she's now a senior fellow and founding director at the center for effective public management at the brookings institution, and a lecturer in public policy at the harvard kennedy school of government. elaine, good to see you. thank you for being with us today. i really wanted to talk to you after i read about you and the work that you did in the clinton-gore administration.

it's got to betle insulting to suggest that what dodge is doing is a mirror of what you did. >> well. >> you know, it starts out with this sort of similar premise that you should take a good look at the government and see where there are efficiencies, etc. but the method they're using is just outrageous. okay. they are paying no attention to consequences, which is why, by the way, they're having to backtrack all the time. they cut people who were working on avian bird flu. that's, by the way, running up the cost of eggs. they cut people, as he just mentioned, working on, on ebola in africa. they are about to cut people from the social security administration. and this is in the middle of the baby boom retiring. this is the biggest generation in american history. and they're cutting not out, not adding. and they're about to cut people from the irs in the middle of tax season. good luck getting your tax returns. your

tax refunds rather sent back. you know that 69% of americans get refunds and they average about $2,800 a piece. people are going to be really mad when the when all those refunds slow down. so what's going on here is a little crazy. they are not paying any attention to the consequences of their actions. and we did it exactly the opposite way. we went into the agencies and tried to find what could be cut, how could how it could be cut, and what could be made better. >> because i haven't met anybody who has said, look, i'd like to pay lower taxes, i'd like to have more efficient government, but they'd like they need the government to work. you wrote in an article for the brookings this week, in which you say dodge has an enormous opportunity to improve the federal government, especially in the area of information technology. however, blanket firings and poorly planned demands for employees to justify their workweek are undermining its credibility and authority as court cases continue. expect

more quiet reversals. no one wants to be blamed for rising egg prices or the next terrorist attack. this is an important point that you make here that it things can go wrong. the beauty of government when it works is that it's working as a background app, and you don't actually know it's working. this is where the danger comes in. if you don't look at the consequences. >> that's exactly right. i mean, look at what the dodge team is doing with these massive federal databases. this is really scaring people. this is this is even more serious than the cuts these massive federal databases are responsible for getting your veterans benefits, your social security checks for getting your medicare, your doctor's visits paid for on medicare. they're in there. we don't know who these people are. we have no guarantees that they have gone through the vetting process. and look, accidents can happen and will happen. and one of the accidents is there could be creating holes in these

databases for hackers to come through, or russians or chinese or anybody who wishes us ill, or they could be taking this data home in order to try and use it at some future point for some business that they're interested in. this is the databases, the across the board firings. it's just not how you go about doing this. >> well, i. >> appreciate someone with actual experience in trying to do it, shedding some light on this. i suspect you and i are going to have more opportunities to talk. elaine, good to see you. thank you for joining us. elaine kamarck is the founding director of the center for effective public management at the brookings institution. she's a lecturer in public policy at the harvard kennedy school of government. coming up, the trump administration is breaking 110 years of precedent and is now handpicking the group of media outlets and reporters who are allowed into the white house press pool. i'll tell you why this matters with my colleague symone sanders townsend, the former chief spokesperson for vice president kamala harris, and april ryan, the longest serving black woman in the white

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both chambers of congress. rachel maddow and. >> team will break down the speech. >> and its. >> impact at home and abroad. the joint address to congress. special coverage tuesday at eight on msnbc. as the. >> trump administration. >> forges ahead during these critical first 100 days. rachel maddow is on five nights a week. >> more than ever. this is not a time to pretend this isn't happening. >> the rachel maddow show weeknights at nine on msnbc. >> set in a not so distant future, america where muslims are detained in desert internment camps, today's velshi banned book club feature internment by bestselling author samira ahmed is a searing indictment of the american political sphere, but also a reminder of how much good can be done by a single, brave voice. do not miss my conversation with

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remember we are not looking at the final score. we are still in the first quarter. keep your pads on. the game has just begun. >> more than 110 years ago, in 1914, with coordination and cooperation from news outlets and both political parties, the white house correspondents association was created in order to solve a problem. of the hundreds of journalists covering the white house, which of them get to be physically present when the with the president, when there is limited capacity? the white house correspondents association has for decades acted as an independent group that decides who gets to be in the presidential press rotation, known as the press pool, with the understanding that that small group of journalists from different news agencies, sometimes covering the president that day, will distribute their write ups or their video that every media outlet gets the same access. well, on tuesday, the white house announced that it was taking control of that power to decide who now gets to be in

the president's press pool, and it will choose which reporters and outlets are allowed to follow the president closely enough to ask questions in places like the oval office and aboard air force one the next day. on wednesday, the white house denied reporters from reuters, the associated press, huffpost and others access to the president's first cabinet meeting. reuters, the ap and bloomberg, which have long provided the three wire services within the press pool, released a statement that reads in part much of the white house coverage people see in their local news outlets, whether they are in wherever they are in the world, comes from the wires for the public to have access to news about their government from an independent free press, end quote. later that day, the president of the white house correspondents association released a statement announcing that the group will no longer distribute pool reports from the white house's now hand-picked correspondents. the statement reads in part, quote, this move tears at the independence of a free press in the united states. it suggests the government will choose the journalists who cover the president. in a free

country, leaders must not be able to choose their own press corps. end quote. coming up after a quick break, i'll discuss the challenges facing the current white house press corps with april ryan, the longest serving black white house correspondent, and symone sanders townsend, former spokesperson for then vice spokesperson for then vice president kamala harris. lakesha: childhood cancer is-- it's a long road. it's hard. but st. jude has gotten us through it. st. jude is hope that you have a chance at life. and it goes such a long way for every child diagnosed with cancer because the research is being shared all over the world. it's awesome. [music playing] >> pet owners know the struggle. your best bud can track dirt, mud, sand, and all sorts of other gunk indoors. but now

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didn't call you. i didn't call you. i'm not responding to you. i'm talking to this gentleman. will you please sit down? would you excuse me? excuse me? would you please sit down? please? go ahead. >> thank you, mr. president. >> joining me. >> now, april ryan, who you just saw in that clip. she's washington bureau chief and senior white house correspondent for black press usa. and symone sanders townsend, former chief spokesperson for then vice president kamala harris and of course, co-host of the program the weekend right here on msnbc. good morning to both of you, and nice to see you again. symone, april, i really wanted to talk to you about this because that clip is important. i remember talking to you the day it happened or maybe the next day. it's important because the press is there to do a job. it's not there to be friends with the president. it's not there to not be friends with the president. it's not, it's not. it's you're just meant to hold people to account. but you can see from that clip why, if there were no guardrails on this, wouldn't the president just want friendlies around all the time? >> well, first of all, i want to put context on that clip because i was sitting close enough to the president to hear me. i

said, sir, what about voter suppression? and he said, i have your voter suppression. and so when a president respect for the president, when the president addresses you, stand up. unfortunately, it turned out into what you saw. it's still triggering. and but that is an example that is just a minor example of how this administration started with the press. now they've skipped 2.0, skipped 3.0. they've gone to 10.0. now it's about the friendlies in the room. you saw what happened yesterday with president volodymyr zelensky in the room. there was a reporter who asked him about why don't you wear a suit? >> yeah. >> you know, that was a friendly. that was a reporter friendly of this administration. we are reporters. the first line of questioning an american president. it's not about us. it's about what the american people and the world need. we are in a time when the stakes are so very high and all questions are allowed. but for a

friendly reporter to go in there and basically support the ambush or the tag team match with jd vance and the president of the united states. i've never seen this before. in my 28 years. i've never seen this before, covering five presidents, six presidencies. for a president to now pick the press, it's almost as if we're state run media. i'm not speaking of those who still continue to do their jobs, like those in the ap who are following him on their own dime, not filing, not flying on air force one, but flying on commercial planes to get to the spaces where he is to continue to file reports. this is an unprecedented era. once you knock down the press, there becomes dictatorship and look that up, because the late senator john mccain said that late republican senator john mccain said that. >> yeah. and simone, you wrote about this yesterday. you said the white house takeover of the press pool is a brazen attack on the first amendment. this was not when the white when the

white house press corps was formed, when the white house correspondents association was formed, these were not partizan things. and not only that, the members of the pool are not one organization. i think the public might be surprised to know that sometimes it's the new york times. sometimes fox is involved because there's an agreement. >> it's the daily caller, correct. >> if you are part of that pool, you have a responsibility to all your fellow journalists and the american public to report accurately. tell me about this from your perspective, because you were on the other side of this on the white house side. >> absolutely. you know, there is a there's an african proverb that says, until the lions have their own historians, the history of the hunt will always glorify the hunter. acclaimed african author wrote those words. and the journalists, especially the journalists that reported on the white house, they are the historians for the lions, right? for the american people. they are going in there telling the full picture of the story, not just the story that supports one party or another. and so when i was at the white house, were there days that i wish i could pick who was in the pool covering the vice president

that day when we were going on a trip? yes, but that is not how it works. the job of the press person is to be the liaison is to get all of, you know, if someone comes to me with a story when i was working for the vice president, it is my job. and if i don't like the story that there that the or the angle that they have for the story, it is my job to provide that reporter with all of the facts and, and the people surrounding whatever issue is that they're covering to make the case for the then vice president and the president. but i do not have control over, you know, what conclusion that they come to. and is that frustrating sometimes. sure. but in america, that is what the press get to do. and i remember very, very, very vividly, the last international trip that i took with the vice president was to france, and that trip was we were beleaguered by stories about her using a french accent, which she didn't do, or buying expensive creuset pots from from a local french store, and not about the issues, the real

substantive issues that she discussed with president macron in those engagements. and that was frustrating for me and my colleagues, i think, frankly, frustrating for the vice president. but we soldiered on because that is the work that you do. and so what we are seeing here now is a move that says we're going to box the people out that we don't like. we're going to pick the folks so that we can ensure control of the coverage, because how something is covered dictates how the american people understand it. and so they want favorable coverage so that they have a favorable understanding of what they're doing. the last thing i'll say is that yesterday or yes, yesterday in the in the oval office, a reporter from russian state television had access to the oval office and was in there while reuters and the associated press were blocked. and it was not until that was brought to the attention and made a ruckus by the reporters at the white house and others who were being told about this, that then the white house press secretary escorted that russian state tv reporter out of the oval office. let me tell you, honey, you don't get into the oval, let alone the white house, without being cleared. so they knew that they

were in there. >> april. >> but can i tag team on a little bit on what symone says? and yes, she was she was fierce when she was at the white house as the press secretary for the vice president. a lot of times she would knock us down. but there's always this friendly, adversarial relationship with the press and the administration so we can get the news out. they it's a give and take. but one thing that people don't understand, there's a certain criteria that the correspondents association has. when you become a member of the pool one, are you able to actively report on what's happening, to be able to give the facts, not editorialize, etc, to the volume of your audience? three you know, also, are you able to pay into the pool? because when we fly and when we do different things, it's not taxpayer dollars, it's our organizations that have to pay for this. so there's a criteria to be members of the pool, and we rely on those because again, the pool is

made up of radio, tv, print, digital. and it's in those small spaces, be it in the cabinet room, the oval office, the roosevelt room, you can't fit the 100 or 200 people in there. so there's a certain criteria that the correspondents association has had since the beginning of the pool. and let me tell you something. it was that press pool. that was the one who put out the word that john f kennedy was killed. it was the press for the press pool has been in existence since way before all of this happened, and ap was always there. ap was always there. ap has been the standard bearer with their stylebook. et cetera on who we are as the press. and now things have changed. and once you change this with the press, i don't know where we go from here because again, we're the first line of questioning an american president with the fourth estate, with the checks and balances. don't check out. you go to the accountability of questioning the president. and now.

>> and this is important because the ap there's a little bit of punishment going on here. right. because the ap has decided not to call the gulf of mexico the gulf of america in certain circumstances, and they're mad at them. the pool is not about whether you agree with the perspective of a particular news organization. as april said, it's whether you're qualified to be able to give that news out. we all get pool reports on our phone. they're very accurate no matter who what news agency, whether it's fox or cnn or the new york times, that we get accurate information from the pool. they keep their opinion for when they're on tv, doing their opinion shows. >> yeah. i mean, look, the reality here is, is that it has traditionally been the journalists that select amongst themselves through a very equitable process, a rotation for who is in the pool at any given day and who covers the president and the vice president. what the change now is, is that the president, the elected officials, the press people are going to decide who gets to cover them. and that

does matter. i that back in the obama administration, when fox was kept at fox, was in the pool one day and kept out of an interview with the treasury official, the other members of the press pool, they declined to interview the treasury official until fox was allowed access. they stood with fox news, the reporters, frankly, at the white house. god bless the white house correspondents association. but the individual reporters, they have not taken such a forceful stand publicly, collectively with the associated press. and on the day that the white house press secretary announced that it was the press secretary who would choose the reporters in the pool and not the other way around, she was not met with much consternation whatsoever, barely asked a question about it. i do think that the white house reporters need to stand up very vehemently, not just for themselves, but for access for all of their colleagues while they still have the opportunity to do so. but that room does not look like it used to. there are a lot of people, if you remember that first press conference, there are a lot of people who are bloggers who are very friendly to this administration,

and a lot of the traditionals are not as as strong as they used to be. and that's the problem. and i was on the board once on the white house correspondents association board for three years when barack obama was president, and we fought with the president. you know, there was a give and take, but i need to see this white house work with the association. they have not worked with them at the beginning when they said, we're going to change how we call on folks, they didn't talk to them about that, and they didn't talk to them about how they're going to do the pool. now, the white house needs to work with us and stop this. what is it? state one media type of atmosphere. it's got to change. >> this is what you call a slippery slope. thanks to both of you. it's great to see you both. april. ryan, always a pleasure to have you on the show. symone sanders, my colleague, the host of the weekend here on msnbc. thanks for staying late, symone. i know you've already had a long day. all right, another hour of velshi begins right now.