comcast business 5-year price lock guarantee. powering five years of savings. powering possibilities. comcast business. and find out. >> if sparks are. >> right. >> for you. at sparks. >> msnbc presents a new podcast hosted by jen psaki. each week, she talks to some of the biggest names in democratic politics, with the biggest ideas for how democrats can win again. the blueprint with jen psaki. listen now. >> all right, that's going to do it for me for now. but i will see you again on monday and all next week. in the meantime, you can find me on blue sky. do you have blue sky yet? you should try it. i'm on blue sky at msnbc.com. >> donald trump and elon musk's domestic agenda became much easier to understand this week.

now they talk a lot about waste and fraud and abuse. yes, we do hear them talk about it. and they've created a bogus new government agency that's supposedly making the government more efficient. but it seems that's just marketing. it seems it's a cover story. as we said last week, for all of trump's fake populism, he is continuing the american corporate elites 40 plus year class war on the working class and poor in america. and this week's house gop budget, which could slash medicaid funding by as much as $880 billion, is exhibit a nearly 80 million americans are covered by medicaid and the children's health insurance program. medicaid covers nearly 4 in 10 american children. so why do this? what's the gain? why would the man who was the first republican to win the working class vote in decades, crushed the government backed health care plan that covers 41% of all births in the us, nearly half of all children with special needs and 5 in 8 nursing

home residents. why to cut the deficit? well, of course not, because the house republicans are also working to extend trump's 2017 tax cuts for the rich, and that will cost $4.5 trillion and obviously raise the deficit that republicans used to pretend to care about. and exhibit b in trump's so-called class war this week, his gold card visa plan. we know how hostile trump is to immigrants, but it seems, and we now have a clearer idea. not all immigrants, wealthy foreigners with $5 million, to be specific, would be able to purchase permanent residency in the united states under trump's new proposal. so whether it's his budget priorities or his immigration priorities, there is one common denominator. this is simply a government of the rich, for the rich and by the rich. but these policies aren't popular. there will be political

costs to anyone in the gop who supports them. a poll by heart research this week showed that 71% of trump voters said cutting medicaid would be unacceptable. overall, 82% of voters oppose it. we're already seeing some republican lawmakers starting to squirm at the idea of going back to their districts and having to explain why the maga movement just took away their health care. it is a third rail. and speaking of third rails first buddy elon musk is now getting close to one. this is what he had to say to joe rogan yesterday about social security. >> social security. is the biggest ponzi scheme of all time. >> well explain that. >> oh so. well. >> people pay into. >> social security and. >> and the money. >> goes out of social. security immediately. but the obligation. >> for social security is. >> your entire. >> retirement career. so you're. >> you're paying. >> with your the you're paying like like if you look at the.

>> future obligations. >> of social security, it far exceeds the tax revenue. antifa if you ever looked at. >> the debt. >> the debt clock. >> that is an incoherent answer. it's nonsense. it doesn't even explain, nor does it accurately describe what a ponzi scheme actually is. and it's kind of surprising that elon musk would not know that while convincing trying to convince joe rogan, it is actually frightening to 20 million americans who are lifted out of poverty every year thanks to social security and to the rest of us who pay into it and want to see it continue to help the elderly in america not go broke. it still does matter. when he first ran for office in 2015, donald trump pretended to be a different type of republican. and ten years later, and we all know that's not the case. while he's promised to never cut medicaid and never cut social security, he has turned the government over to this man, his top donor, the world's richest man, and someone who thinks that the backbone of

america's social safety net for the past century is nothing more than a ponzi scheme. and to this man, the head of the office of budget and management, russ vote of the heritage foundation, the conservative think tank that has been gunning for social security for decades. these policy ideas, if enacted, will hurt millions of people. the social safety net in this country is already pitiful compared to other wealthy western nations. these policies must be confronted. if only there were a political party willing to fight for the other side in this class war. kicking us off this hour francesca fiorentini, comedian and co-host of american unhinged on youtube. and amara jones, founder and ceo of lash media. it's good to have both of you with us, francesca. it's not just medicaid. snap benefits are also now on the chopping block. do republicans not see how unpopular these cuts will be with their voting base, or do they simply not care? >> i think it's the latter. i think that they know the class

war is on, and unless they actually meet opposition from the democratic party or from the people in the streets or through the ballot box, they're going to keep doing what they're doing, which is, again, a pneumonic to sucking the money from the poorest to the richest to people who are straight up right now trying to write off their private jets. that was happened in the first trump tax cuts. if they are made completely permanent, that's what they're going to do. i guess my thing is this eamon, and i think this is what we have to talk about. there's no going back to normal discussions about the deficit. the deficit has always been a false flag, red herring, distraction. whenever we actually talk about things like universal health care, whenever we actually talk about something like a green new deal that gives people jobs but also addresses the climate chaos. the answer is what is? what is it going to do? the deficit. how is it going to add to the deficit? i don't ever

want to hear a democrat ever again say the word deficit, because you see these plutocrats, you see these oligarchs just straight up when they get into power, adding $4.5 trillion so they can write off their private jets. excuse me. and lastly, the reason we're here is because of the amount of money that is flowed into our political system and because democrats, sadly, have often capitulated to the framing that, yes, these so-called entitlement programs are the reasons that we're here. and, well, we should try and find ways to make social security more solvent. oh, maybe we should cut a little bit of medicaid. or maybe we should should have work requirements, even though the majority of people on medicaid already work like it is all the capitulation that has led us down this primrose path to plutocracy. >> yeah. and you're you're absolutely right about the framing of this. the democrats continuously fall into the framing that republicans want to create for them on this issue, and they need to look beyond that. amara, do you think we will actually see a divide within the republican party on this budget? the musks and

trumps of the world are obviously not in touch at all with the needs of the working class and working poor, but a lot of house republicans acknowledge that they have a lot of their constituents who depend and who rely on all of these programs to get by, and they have to go back to those districts. >> yeah. i mean, i think that what you're going to see is a tremendous amount of tension. but the question is whether or not that tension is going to manifest in votes. i mean, this is the tension at the heart of the republican party right now, which is even on something like medicaid, other government programs that it's going to be, you know, to use a phrase, the people versus the powerful. and we know that so far, the powerful are winning out. and we know that for two reasons. we know, according to vanity fair, that members of congress are afraid of political violence that has increased with the release of proud boys. i mean, these essentially constitute,

you know, a private army, for lack of a better word or phrase that is sort of on the side of the president of the united states that has stoked real fears on people who, within his own party, stand up and vote against their interests. and there's been a tremendous hoovering up of information by elon musk that can be weaponized against them as well. and so, you know, this combination of the possibility of political violence and sort of this digital hoovering up digital authoritarianism and the weaponization of that information constitute a real threat to democracy overall. i mean, you know, these are essentially weapons of mass destruction that have been unleashed on our democracy. and so far, they're having a really deleterious effect, and we wouldn't have even gotten this far. i mean, so many of the people, for example, who were voted and confirmed upon as secretaries of the cabinet wouldn't have made it without this kind of twin threat that's

out there. so there is this hidden force that's at work in democracy right now. and i think that it raises real questions of whether or not the normal process of something like this that would impact constituents. we know that red states disproportionately are benefit from medicaid, whether or not, you know, those normal forces are able to work because of what we've unleashed in american democracy right now. >> you know, francesca, i want to go back to a point that you touched upon, and that's the democrats in this because social security, medicare, medicaid, these are some of the biggest social and political achievements in america over the past 100 years, all passed by democrats. why can't the party that got these done, that created this social safety net that has sustained millions upon millions of americans for decades? why are they not able to basically rebuild their image around these programs, their expansion, their modernization, their reform, but at the core,

maintain what these programs are about and what they do for the american people. >> i mean, i think that's a really good question. there's a number of ways to answer that. i mean, one of them is not wanting to off their corporate donors, right? if they're going to receive money from from folks who are really, you know, reliant on things like snap benefits or social safety nets, you know, companies like walmart, who, you know, many, many of the employees who work there are also reliant on snap benefits. why is that? maybe it's because they don't pay a living wage for people to actually afford rent and food and gas and childcare, on and on and on. so that's one thing. but i think, what's god? if there's a silver lining about donald trump, it's that he breaks things that everyone's like, oh yeah, that was kind of important. and the real thing with democrats is you have to be messaging on this stuff all of the time. instead, they allow it to become the sort of let's talk about paygo. how are you going

to pay for it? we'll put it in a budget bill. we'll nibble around the edges. no, just if you're not expanding the social safety net, what have you been doing for the last 40 years? as you rightly said, the other side has been planning on dismantling it. right. and the whole thing of third rail. no no no, man. third rail been touched. all right. they are like electrifying their their their toasting their testicles over on that third rail. you know, that's like some tucker carlson stuff over there. they they love it because they know they're not going to get the fight back. and i do think the point about political violence is well taken and needs to be understood more. >> and more. i mean, i spoke about these issues in the context of class warfare. is the democratic party as presently constructed able to fight this battle on behalf of working class americans? >> i don't know, are you taking bets? i don't, it's not. no. look, the question is, what's the strategy here? right? so is it james carville? is he correct

that the party is just playing possum and is suddenly going to rise up at the right moment? or are we seeing some of the real structural weaknesses in the democratic party, where the people that are running the party are also having to listen disproportionately to billionaires and people who are wealthy and feel constrained with how much they can actually stray from that and put themselves on the side again, of the people in this case, and i don't think that we'll know. i think that we will know in a matter of weeks. i think in a couple of weeks we'll know the answer to that question. but is this just a temporary political tactic that is meant to lull the other side in a false sense of security, and enable the democrats to not be blamed by the press if there's a government shutdown, because the focus is on a republican party, because democrats say, you know, we essentially are toothless tigers, or are we seeing kind of the same forces play out in the

democratic party with respect to billionaires actually having a disproportionate sway? and i don't think that we know, but we're going to know by the end of march. >> we'll see how it plays out. my panel is sticking around. don't go anywhere. we are just getting started. next up, we're going to talk about what rfk jr is now saying about the measles outbreak. after initially downplaying it. >> work, play. blink. relief work. play. blink. relief. work. play. blink. relief. >> the only 3 in 1 asthma. does it have you missing out on what you love, with who you love? get back to better breathing with fasenra, an add-on treatment for eosinophilic asthma taken once every 8 weeks. fasenra is not for sudden breathing problems. serious allergic reactions may occur. get help for swelling of your face, mouth, tongue, or trouble breathing. don't stop your asthma treatments without talking with your doctor. tell your doctor if your asthma worsens or you have a parasitic infection. headache and sore throat may occur.

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specifically to fight harder. what can you tell voters tonight who say you could be doing more than you're doing? can you tell us what's going on in the senate right now? do you know what the group was trying to access at social security that would have caused the administrator to resign? right now, in our time today, the unpopularity of what they're doing really does create real political pressure at the source to stop it, to at least slow him down. >> america's new hhs secretary, rfk jr, is doing some damage control in the face of outrage for downplaying the growing measles outbreak in this country. in a post on x, he says he recognizes the serious impact on the public lists bullet points of what his department is doing to try to stop the disease's spread. and he says that ending the outbreak is now his top priority. this is all a very different tone from just a few days ago. watch. >> for measles. >> outbreaks this year. in this country. >> last year there were 16.

>> so it's not unusual. you have measles. >> outbreaks every year. >> as doctors and leading experts point out, there is nothing usual or normal about this outbreak. an unvaccinated child in texas died this week, becoming the first measles death case in a decade. texas is the most heavily impacted state right now, seeing its worst outbreak in almost 30 years, according to the most recent cdc data, there are 164 measles cases across the country. at least 32 people are hospitalized. the majority of those impacted are unvaccinated children. look, in any other administration, this health crisis would have been met with urgent calls from our nation's leaders, asking parents to make sure that their children are vaccinated. instead, we have a well known anti-vaxxer who is running the response. he just proved he'll only take an outbreak seriously if he's actually shamed into doing so. my panel is back with me. francesca, let me get your

thoughts. what do you make of this sort of backtracking by rfk jr? i mean, did he realize now how his comments could come back to bite him? because we know this isn't his ideology? as someone who has dedicated his life's work to sowing distrust in vaccines, and it seems it has taken traction. >> i don't think so. no, i think the person who wrote that was someone who just hasn't been let go from hhs yet. like, i'm not convinced that that's rfk jr having a change of heart. no, of course not. this guy, i mean, you think he would have learned after helping contribute to the deaths of 83 samoans because of sowing doubt about vaccines? but that's this whole guy's thing. it's he. he'll say he takes it seriously, but his answer to it is like, they should have just had more reishi mushroom. and like methylene blue droplets or whatever the hell he was putting in his water the other day on the plane, like, until he can get his little supplement bros in line to hawk the american

people with our taxpayer dollars on like the real cure for measles. he's not going to take any of this seriously. we know that. it's wild. i mean, like and this again, once again, let us learn. let us learn together. measles eradicated in the year 2000. but in in the 80s it was killing 3 to 4 million people, children specifically a year. that's pretty good odds. and even his math ain't math. and you hear him and he's like, you know, last year we only had 16 and we've we've had 16 outbreaks. this year we've only had four. and you're like, yeah, but buddy, if you're going to do that math, we're going to have 24 outbreaks by the end of this year if we're lucky. so this is someone and it's not to make light of it. yeah. but he truly doesn't take anyone's health seriously other than his own. >> you know amara. in 2021, rfk jr wrote the foreword for a book by the children's health defense, the anti-vax nonprofit that he founded, where he says that the measles vaccine is largely unnecessary and even claims that these outbreaks have been fabricated to create fear that, in turn, forces government officials to do something. i

mean, how dangerous is it to have someone with those beliefs now running our nation's health? because i'm pretty sure if i spoke to the parents of the young boy or the young child that died this week as a result of the measles outbreak, and i asked them about doing this over if they could vaccinate their child and not die, who would not die from this? they would have a very different sentiment than what rfk jr wrote in that book. >> yeah, well, i don't think that we can just attribute this to brainworm. i mean, i think that, you know, one of the things that we have to do is to take seriously the words of the people who know him best, which are his own family members who came out and said that he is, quote, dangerous, close quote. right. and we know that he's dangerous because his views have led to the death of a child already. and we know that if his views were to hold sway in another mass epidemic, of which there could be one this year,

according to epidemiologists, you know, if it's bird flu or something else that many, many, many more people could die. and it doesn't seem that evidence actually impacts his views. and that's what's most frightening. we have a person who is the head of hhs who doesn't believe in science. he only believes in pseudoscience and quack science and science, which says that the only thing that you need to do is to eat healthy and work out and, you know, just let it all run its course. and so i think that it's the exact opposite of what we need right now. >> yeah. and in fact, to your point, i was just going to run through some of these headlines really quickly to pick up on amara's points. you've got rfk jr causing a multi-million dollar project to create a new covid vaccine in a pill form. you've got the trump administration canceling a vaccine meeting on updating next season's flu vaccine. and you know, you just look at these two

from this week alone. it's almost as if public health is not actually their top priority. francesca. >> no, i mean, what's amazing is that donald trump didn't learn his lesson from covid 19, right? i'm of the belief that if covid 19 hadn't happened, i think he might have gotten reelected. right. as as horrible as it that sounds. and lo and behold, he was reelected just four years later. but anyway, you know, during covid 19, we were all like, where the hell is the federal government? where is our public health? who is who is working on this? right. and it it really was apparent that we don't have a robust public health infrastructure in this country. right? we do have some cutting edge innovation, clearly, which rfk jr and trump don't care about since they just, you know, nixed that program to make a covid 19 vaccine in pill form, which i think would be incredible if we could start taking our vaccines via pill. but they don't. and that's amazing because you're like, okay, so this really is what the federal government is. it is to hollow it out for parts, and it's to make it as

precarious as possible. i mean, the flu is just that is terrifying to me that, like, we're not going to be doing any more research into that. and that's the other thing is let's again zoom out. the goal is to get people to get sick. the goal is sickness. the goal is destitution. i know it's hard to hear that because like most of us aren't that evil, but rfk jr like tortured small animals as a kid, you know what i'm saying? like we got torture, small animals, vibes, running hhs. that's not a good combo. the more the sicker people are, the poorer they are. the more desperate they are, the easier they are to control. so what is when we come back and we i mean, a big ol we, i mean a coalition that is anti-fascist. yes, we all must be antifa in this moment, i said it. what are we proposing when it comes to public health? it better, as tim walz even said, it better be universal health care. >> you know, people are, you know, to francesca's point, rightfully scared right now in lubbock, texas, a pregnant mother told the bbc that she's

been avoiding public spaces for the last two weeks. we know that pregnant women are among the most susceptible to measles. you've got immunocompromised people and those who are unvaccinated, and it is clear that you know, those that are impacted the most are vulnerable communities. >> right? but, you know, we made a choice during covid to say that we actually don't care about everybody and that we were willing to allow people who were vulnerable to be left to their own devices and many of them to die. talking about the president trump's administration of covid. and so i think that what we're seeing is just a carryover from that. and i think that it's even more so than what francesca is saying, right? that actually getting people ill and letting many people die is a part of the plan of curtis yarvin, who is a guru to vice president vance and also peter thiel, in which they say that there are too many

people on the planet and that there needs to be some humane way of reducing the population, and that an illness released can be or allowed to run its course can be one of the ways that that sort of humane decrease in population can take place. so what we have to realize is that the fringe thoughts and the fringe parts of society and people who are extremists in every single way now are on the inside, have the keys to everything. and we have released weapons of mass destruction within the entire government. and we are seeing that right now play out in hhs. we spoke about how that's playing out in medicaid and the destruction is a part of the plan, and we have to accept that. >> yeah, we have even talked about the department of education that they want to try to undo and how that would affect tens of millions of children across this country. my panel is sticking around. we've got a lot more to discuss. up

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>> yeah. >> it happens. that's why vision works. >> gives you 100. >> days to change your mind. >> it's simple. >> oh. >> anything else i can help you with? >> like what? >> vision works. >> see the difference? >> for about a decade in the late 1940s and 50s, wisconsin senator joseph mccarthy spread fear and paranoia throughout this country by persecuting those on the left that he deemed, quote, un-american. many of today's republicans are mccarthy's ideological descendants. and one of their primary targets now appears to be the lgbtq community. in fact, just yesterday, iowa governor kim reynolds signed a law removing gender identity as a protected class in that state. now, trans and nonbinary iowans are no longer shielded from discrimination in education, housing, employment, or many other aspects of everyday life. but iowa is not alone. in fact, lawmakers in at least nine states have instructed measures, or rather, introduced measures

instructing the government to chip away at some of the rights of same sex couples right to marry. more than half of them, including the one in michigan, urge the supreme court to overturn the obergefell v hodges decision, the one passed in 2015, that granted same sex couples nationwide the right to marry. the michigan resolution was introduced by state representative josh shriver. it argues that the obergefell ruling is, quote, at odds with the sanctity of marriage. the michigan constitution and principles upon which this country was established. similar measures have now been introduced in montana, idaho, and the dakotas. the ones in idaho and north dakota already passed state houses that are dominated by republicans. and of course, this is not at all surprising. justice clarence thomas argued in 2022, after all, that the court should reconsider the same sex marriage ruling. and with that foundation in place, republicans have brought modern mccarthyism back into american life and placed a

target squarely on the backs of those in the lgbtq community. my panel is back with me now. amara, your thoughts on this? republicans, they're not even pretending to hide their desire to overturn obergefell any more. when you see these lawmakers in nine states try to undermine it, it's clear what they're trying to do. they got the green light. they got the signal. we've seen this playbook before. a supreme court justice kind of signals out there, hey, you know, you can change this through lawfare. somebody goes out and starts to bring case after case after case through the pipeline of the judiciary, with the hopes that one of them gets to this specific supreme court. and as we saw with roe versus wade being overturned. we see obergefell and hodges overturned. >> yeah. >> i mean, i think that, you know, what we saw during mccarthyism was a witch hunt based upon people's supposed political beliefs and associations. and i think what we're seeing here is a fundamental denial of people's rights based upon who they are,

which i think actually raises the level of concern here. right. are we looking at something that has more in common with the worst of america's past, like jim crow, honestly, than mccarthyism? because what we are seeing in iowa, for example, is the removal of trans people from civil rights protections that the state granted. you know, just a little over a decade ago, for example, and the rolling back of rights through a supreme court ruling and through a series of state laws. for example, that people have gained. so i think what we're looking at is an experimentation here on the part of the republican party and the administration for how you begin to remove people from public life. how do you begin to strip americans in a modern day, in a modern time of their rights? because i think that they understand that they're going to

have to reconstitute who constitutes an american if they're going to hold power over time. and all that's happening is because trans people are such a small portion of the population, you know, less than 1%. it's a great group of people from their perspective, to see what you need to do in order to remove people from public life and to strip them of their rights, which is why this is not going to stop only with trans people. we now see it moving to gay people, and it's going to move to ever larger groups of americans, and they're doing it in plain view and largely getting away with it, which only emboldens people who wish to enact the worst. so i think that everybody needs to be deeply concerned about what's happening. >> francesca, i want to talk about this. michigan state republican josh schriver, who hashed out his proposal to condemn same sex marriage. you know, he held a press conference to discuss his bill. you know, one that he, i assume is proud

of and thinks is better for americans. and yet he wasn't brave enough to actually take any questions and bailed after a few minutes. if you're going to go after people's rights, why not have the courage, the moral courage to actually answer questions about it? why run away? >> well, i mean, there's no question and answer. during the yale debate club. so, like, why should he have to answer any questions now? you know, it's weird that he's a white guy. weird. weird one. i think amara is absolutely right. let's just underscore what she said, right? this is a trial balloon. it always has been. we are in the top line of. first they came for the trans americans, right? and if we don't stop it there, it festers. we know they're also going after no fault divorce. they want to trap women, whether it's by rescinding their rights to their own bodies, when and how they can have a child. if

they can be safe in so doing. and then now trapping them into abusive marriages. i mean, they're trying to roll back the clock, right. and so this is my problem again. what do we do? what's the resistance look like? and for me we need to actually be openly and loudly talking about trans issues and trans americans and heralding them. talking about what it is to be trans. right. what gender affirming care is dispelling all the myths about all the children receiving trans affirming care when like, like maybe 1%, maybe it was a top 3% of kids under 18 are actually getting any kind of on any kind of hormone blockers, right? i mean, the stats are there. and so where are the democrats? where are the democrats on this? right. i mean, a lot of people accuse kamala harris of, you know, right. oh, she's the trump ad of she's working for they them trump's working for you. but was kamala even working for them. how was she proudly talking

about trans issues in a way that would be able to honestly demystify and stop making it such a scary topic for, and such an easy one to sort of bait and fearmonger around? >> and it's not just these lawmakers mri that we're seeing this anti lgbtq attack republican lawmakers. it's spreading in the federal government. it's spreading to the pentagon. you've got the bloomberg now saying that the department of homeland security has eliminated policies preventing the investigation of individuals or groups solely based on their sexual orientation or gender identity. and you can see where this is going. i mean, this is not going to just start with the legislators or maybe a fringe piece of legislation to score some political points with a constituency or two. it's actually now having real life consequences on americans who are serving in our government, whether it be the military or homeland security or anywhere else. >> that's right. i mean, it is even gotten to the point where

you can't even use the word transgender in the united states government. you can't say it. it cannot be in any official document, for example. and the erasure is real. i mean, the attempt to remove any data in the united states government that said anything about trans people. i mean, this is this is erasure. saying that trans people don't have to have equal access to housing, for example. the same is true for education. taking away passports from trans people, rendering americans stateless. when the freedom of movement is a bedrock of any free society, it is something that the united states prided itself on. and so when it comes to trans people, the country is betraying its most bedrock values. but because it's happening to a group of people that some people may not understand or find strange or don't know or think is small, people are looking the other way, but it's not going to stay

only in one group of people and it never does. that is not the intent here. i can tell you that they have big plans for everyone that are just being experimented with. on trans people. and so we're in a very, very, very dark place. and this is just the beginning. >> it sadly is. everyone, please >> it sadly is. everyone, please stick aroun when i was diagnosed with h-i-v, i didn't know who i would be. but here i am... ...being me. keep being you... ...and ask your healthcare provider about the number one prescribed h-i-v treatment, biktarvy. biktarvy is a complete, one-pill, once-a-day treatment used for h-i-v in many people—whether you're 18 or 80. with one small pill, biktarvy fights h-i-v to help you get to undetectable—and stay there whether you're just starting or replacing your current treatment. research shows that taking h-i-v treatment as prescribed and getting to and staying undetectable prevents transmitting h-i-v through sex. serious side effects can occur, including kidney problems and kidney failure. rare, life-threatening side effects include a buildup of lactic acid and liver problems.

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and incompetently run. >> yeah, this coming from a man who appears to think fast food is a food group, and not just for himself. you might remember in 2018 when, during a government shutdown, he served up mcdonald's and chick fil a to a college football player, to a team of college football players at the white house. of course, nothing says america first like cold big macs on fine white house china. and here's another weird one from trump's first cabinet meeting. there's a man who spoke the most. guess what? he's not a member of the cabinet, nor is he a government employee, nor has he been elected. can you guess who i'm talking about here? >> it was a pulse. >> check review. do you have a pulse? do you have a pulse? and two neurons? so if you're a pulse of two neurons, you can reply to an email. we'll make mistakes. we won't be perfect, but when we make a mistake, we'll fix it very quickly. >> if you have a pulse and two

neurons, you can reply to an email. francesca. one thing i cannot let go of is how no one is coming at how elon musk is dressing. before we get into the cabinet meeting, i want to get your thoughts on how right wing journalists came at zelenskyy for not wearing a suit, but nothing on how musk acts in these meetings. i mean, his son was there wiping his boogers, apparently on the presidential desk. he's always wearing a t shirt. he looks like dark dork, whatever that is. and yet, here he is. >> no one's bothered to put on a tie in a in a meeting like that. in the cabinet meeting. he's not part of the cabinet. yeah. no, he he's he's also still wearing the same shirt that says tech support. now, look, we can ask the audience, do you think he's got multiple shirts that are tech support shirts or is this the same? and it smells as he looks and it's probably the latter. yeah. i mean, this is embarrassing. look, i love the trump the trump line of like yeah, they're fat. they're

bloated. like was he directly looking into the lens of a camera and saw sort of his reflection like but but i do want to. and this kind of ties back to rfk jr discussion really quickly is that they the right is also really obsessed with big people, with fat people. there is nothing wrong with being big with being fat. many people embrace the word right. but again, they're so obsessed with the idea that if you are fat, you must be unhealthy, you must be shunned from society. you don't deserve health care. it's all your fault. and you also get treated differently from doctors. and that is a really insidious and again, very social darwinistic way to view people broadly. >> well, it's always projection with donald trump. he's always projecting about how what he thinks everyone else looks like and is and never has a chance to kind of reflect about his own appearance and his own demeanor and his own behavior. and you see that mri? i mean, these meetings are becoming unserious scenes that you probably see on

fictional series. what does this mean? what does this say, that this is not becoming the norm of how our government operates and our image around the world? when people look at the city on the shining hill that was once america, whether you believe it or not, there were norms and people respected it, and people walked into the oval office with a sense of awe of what that place is and represents. and now you look at the clown show that has become these white house sprays and these cabinet meetings. >> well, i have spent this entire segment trying not to guffaw. i think, first of all, because donald trump, if you believe him, says that he is the same height and weight as tom brady. so i think that, you know, it strains credulity. and, you know, when it comes to ellen's shirts, you know, if you spend several days in a k-hole, you may not necessarily be paying attention to, you know, your sartorial choices from day to day. i think, look, the serious part of this is that it's all meant to make democracy

look like a farce. and for us to think that it's a circus and for us, again, to undermine the sense of seriousness that you need about government so that government looks unserious and therefore they can begin to do more and more outrageous and outlandish and terrible things to the american people. so this is all a part of the theater of undermining it all. >> it is such an important point, and i'm glad you brought that up, because i totally agree with you. i mean, i've been saying this in some of our meetings here on this show that, you know, trump wants it to look this way. he would rather have americans focus on the theatrics of everything that is happening every day on their television screens, rather than the real life implications of what they're doing behind the scenes. what are your thoughts on this, francesca? i mean, is this all a tactic to help him do as much damage as possible while we and others chase these kind of like, silly theatrics? they're not silly, as in they should be dismissed and ignored, but they definitely suck the energy. they suck the oxygen out of the room,

while the kind of evil stuff happens in the shadows. >> i think. >> it's all become one. like, i agree that it's that that the debasement of the office is part of a strategy to make it look easy to govern. right? the idea that, oops, we just undid the ebola research, but we put it back together. you got to move fast and break things. so i agree with imara on that sense, but i disagree that we shouldn't cover the spectacle because at this point, it does matter that the richest man in the world is. yeah. on a three day bender sitting in the oval office at the first trump cabinet meeting, just kind of lording over, you know, folks who are nominated and confirmed, be they evil as well, that that does matter. >> all right. francesca fiorentini, imara jones, thank you to the both of you for joining us throughout the hour. greatly appreciate it as always, and hope to have you back on soon. >> thank you so much. >> we'll be right back. >> wow. incredible amazing. my

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>> before i sign off tonight, i want to address some personal news about my future at this network. this week, msnbc made some changes to its lineup of programing, and while i am saddened to see the departure of my dear friend, ally and colleague, the fearless joy reid, i am still encouraged by the network's steadfast commitment to fearless journalism and, more importantly, my place and my voice in that commitment. this week, several headlines claim that my show, this show had been canceled and that i was leaving the network, and that incorrect news created a wave of commentary and criticism about which voices can be heard and which cannot on mainstream cable news, especially when it comes to coverage of the middle east. and it is important for me that i set that record straight. i'm not leaving the network. in fact, quite the opposite. despite the challenging and fearless ways we have covered stories on this show for more than two years, msnbc has

offered to extend my tenure at the company. it has also offered me to launch a new show that gives my voice, and others, more expanded hours of coverage on saturday and sunday. soon this show, the name, the format will change and i will be joined by two new incredible hosts who will be announced soon enough. but one thing that won't change is my promise to you, the viewers, that i won't stop talking about the difficult stories and challenging topics that others don't cover. one other thing that won't change is the commitment of the incredibly talented and dedicated team of producers who work on this show, fearlessly and selflessly. without them, i would not be able to do what i do on this show and one that we do all together. that does it for us tonight. make sure to come back tomorrow at 7 p.m. eastern. professor jeffrey sachs will be here to discuss what's next for russia's war on ukraine. following this explosive address

between the president of the united states and vladimir zelensky, the president of ukraine, at the white house oval office. until then, i'm ayman mohyeldin in new york. have a mohyeldin in new york. have a good night. 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? talk to your doctor. botox® effects may spread hours to weeks after injection, causing serious symptoms. alert your doctor right away as trouble swallowing, speaking, breathing, eye problems, or muscle weakness can be signs of a life-threatening condition. those with these conditions before injection are at highest risk. side effects may include allergic reactions like rash, breathing problems, dizziness, neck and injection site pain, and headache. don't receive botox® if there's a skin infection. tell your doctor your medical history, muscle or nerve conditions like als, myasthenia gravis, or lambert-eaton syndrome and medicines like botulinum toxins,

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(800) 378-9643. call now. >> we're going to take a deep breath before we even start tonight. good evening once again. i am stephanie ruhle. welcome to the nightcap. >> it is