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>> call 1-800-355-5939. >> five or. >> visit homeserve. >> com. >> hi there everyone. >> happy monday. >> it's 4:00 in new york. >> quote. >> this largely. >> aligns with. >> our vision. >> not one single. time in the last. >> 80 years. would you think that sentence would. >> come from the kremlin in reference to us, the united states of america and our foreign policy. >> until today? >> those words are from a kremlin spokesperson. >> in reference to friday's. oval office. >> ambush of ukrainian. president volodymyr. >> zelensky by donald j. >> trump and. jd vance. what is seen as a gift. to putin's regime? >> and they're not our words. >> this is the words that members of russian media are using to describe what happened

friday, and is part. >> of a. >> chain reaction of events serving only to. >> confirm that in the eyes. >> of the kremlin, a realignment that. >> works for them. >> not necessarily. >> us. >> has already taken place. when russian editor telling the washington post this. >> quote. we don't. >> even have. >> to step in. >> we can just. retransmit what the americans are saying. >> he notes that putin. >> had smartly. >> withheld comment. >> on friday's meeting and could afford to stay silent for now. quote the public will conclude that our leaders were correct. >> in their assessment. >> of zelensky as a leader of ukraine. this is a huge gift for them. that oval office ambush, apparently just one of. many gifts. >> from donald trump. >> to vladimir putin. >> defense secretary pete hegseth. >> has ordered a stop to all offensive cyber operations against russia. that's what the new york times describes this way, quote, as part. >> of a broader effort to draw. >> president vladimir putin of russia into talks on ukraine and a new relationship with the us.

the pause could, though, have the consequence of leaving the united states blind as they head into talks with putin. the times reporting this, quote, retaining access to major russian networks. >> for espionage purposes. >> is critical to understanding putin's. intentions as he enters negotiations and to tracking arguments within russia about what conditions to insist upon and what could be given up. and then there are the other rhetorical gifts that trump delivered to putin as well. here's national security adviser to trump, mike wallace, who once compared president. zelensky to winston churchill. now this. >> if we want to do a history. >> lesson on churchill. that he stood and fought for. his people. president zelensky stood and fought. >> for ukraine. >> but churchill was also voted out of office. in 1945. he was a man for a moment, but he did not then transition england into the next phase. and it's unclear

whether president zelensky, particularly after what we saw friday, is ready to transition. >> to. >> ukraine, to. >> an end. >> to this. >> war and to. negotiate and have to compromise. >> are you. suggesting that president trump wants zelensky. >> to resign? >> we need a leader. that can. deal with. >> us eventually. >> deal with the. >> russians and end this war >> and if it becomes apparent that president zelensky. either personal. motivations or political motivations, or divergent from ending the fighting in his country, then then i think we have a real issue on our hands. >> again, to be clear. >> but friday. >> was president. zelensky simply trying to insert facts into that admonition that j.d. vance and donald trump tried to deliver, but that there from mr. waltz is a stunning thing for anyone to say, especially

someone who once said the us had to do anything and everything it could do to keep zelensky alive. donald trump kept it up this morning. he piled on by suggesting that zelensky doesn't want peace. he said, quote, america will not put up with it much longer. that was after zelensky said that the end of the war was still, quote, very, very far away team. trump's attempted realignment with russia is being met with resistance in many forms and shapes. j.d. vance was greeted by protesters on saturday during a ski trip to vermont. local paper the vermont digger captured images of people holding signs. some of them read, quote, vance is a traitor. go ski in russia and trump serves putin. and this one, jd vance. zelensky is ten times the man you are. that is where we start today with some of our favorite reporters and friends. former u.s. ambassador to ukraine, now nonresident senior fellow in the foreign policy program at the brookings institution. ambassador steven

pifer is here. also joining us, peter baker. he's the chief white house correspondent for the new york times. with me at the table for the hour, former democratic senator, msnbc political analyst claire mccaskill joins us as well. peter baker, you've written some things that even as daily newspaper stories feel like they're written for history as the history is being made. but i want to hearken back to something you wrote last week about how washington had taken on a chill that reminded you of the time you and your wife spent as journalists in moscow. i believe you wrote that sentence before the oval office blow up. but i wonder if you could pull that thread through what you saw friday and over the weekend. >> yeah. what's kind of astonishing is we're seeing this putin influence in effect, both at home and abroad. right. so what i was writing about was the feeling in washington these days that reminded us of putin's early years in moscow when we were correspondents there. we were there from the end of 2000

to the end of 2004. and in that period of time, just over four years, you saw how much things were changing. putin had just come to power. he was consolidating control. he was neutering contrary forces in society like the news media, like the oligarchs, like the parliament. any other source of potential dissent or opposition. piece by piece, was being dismantled as he eventually took over what would become a much, even much more authoritarian state, even after we left. and what we see in washington these days feels familiar in a lot of ways. people who used to talk to us openly, who would be on the record saying critical things of president trump now don't want to be on the record, don't want to be on your show as much, probably don't want their names to be used because they're feeling a certain fear factor. and we see the president trying to take over the press pool in the white house, putting a lot of pressure on media companies, putting pressure on, you know, enemies through the justice department, firing people who he perceived to be enemies and taking a lot of authority to himself. that hasn't

traditionally been in the hands of the president. so that was before friday's oval office thing, as you say. and then all of this happening against the backdrop of a pivot on the foreign policy sense to a much more pro-russia point of view, that a lot of things that trump is saying these days about ukraine are exactly the things you hear moscow saying. >> peter, i have had an opposite experience with people not being willing to speak out. it's exclusive to the republican party. and what i've witnessed is men who was recently as ten days ago, 12 days ago, two days ago were praising zelensky, now agree with donald trump's attempt to remake him as some sort of american nemesis as opposed to an archetype. can you just say more about the kinds of people or their ideological affiliation, or their relationship to trump, where you're finding people unwilling to speak out? >> well, obviously, it's probably more republicans, like you say, particularly republicans who have any hope of an elected future, people who used to work for him, who were critical of him after he left office, some people, even who

quit his administration, spoke out but are now nervous about it. they don't want to have their heads up if they're worried about kash patel at the at the fbi, who's already, of course, come up with a list of 60 people he considers to be deep, deep state agents that is perceived to be an enemies list. these are people who, you know, had been in government and often were quite vocal about what they saw happening in the first term, but this time i think are nervous. i hear them say, look, i've got i've got a son who works in the government, i've got a daughter who has a grant, i've got a family. you know, i'm heading toward retirement. it's that was what was happening to us in moscow. people who talked to us when we first got there by the end said, we just really don't want to take that chance. >> mr. ambassador, your thoughts on the significance of what happened on friday and this culture of fear, direct consequence of the promises of retribution, i'm i'm sure, but also trump's intention to scare people out of speaking out.

>> yeah. >> no, i. >> mean, we haven't seen anything in the oval office that like we saw on friday and it clearly was, i think, an ambush by the vice president and the president to humiliate zelensky. my question is, why are we doing that to the leader of a country that has been a good partner now for 30 years? and look, this idea that zelensky doesn't want peace is just nonsense. he's had three years of every night. his cities are getting bombed and rocketed. you know, his soldiers are getting killed every day on the front line. he wants peace, but he doesn't want a peace that will prove false. so the president did not give him a chance to explain what his objection was just to a cease fire. but ukraine, from 2014, when russia seized part of donbas in eastern ukraine, it had a series of ceasefires. from 2014 to 2022, the russians regularly violated those ceasefires and ukraine didn't get back a single square foot of

land that was on the other side of that contact line. and i think that zelensky's fear is if he signs up just to a cease fire, then there's no further negotiation. russia has the land. russia has the ability to regroup, rearm and then violate the cease fire at a time of its own choosing. so what he's looking for, and i think what he came to washington was hoping for some kind of a security commitment, because if he makes a agreement in which he has to accept that his land is lost, at least temporarily, he said he'll never formally accept that that land is no longer ukrainian. but he did say last year he was prepared to agree that ukraine would not use military force to try to reacquire that land, but in order to sell that to a good part of his constituency at home, he has to have something. and he needs, i think, some kind of a security commitment. and unfortunately, the white house purposely, in my mind, blew up that meeting before they could have that conversation. it's just one last comment, because you you were at the white house when i was at the white house back in the 90s, a press pool spray in the oval office is

typically like 4 or 5 minutes. you get a picture of the two leaders, they say hello. they take 1 or 2 questions. this press spray went for almost 50 minutes, and it cut into the time that they could have had a discussion or even an argument behind closed doors, which is where it should have taken place. >> you said the question today is why? i mean, what is your answer to that question? privately, when people call and ask you why, why would trump do this? >> my answer is why i think donald trump dislikes volodymyr zelensky, and i think it goes back to his first term. remember that so-called perfect phone call that took place? and then trump suspended aid to ukraine and that led to his first impeachment. so zelensky was the target of the trump's extortion attempt. but i think trump's mind, zelensky is somewhat responsible for that first impeachment. what's hard for me to figure out is trump's affinity, his admiration, his liking for vladimir putin. if you go back over the past 10 or

11 years, you will not find any instances where trump has criticized putin or putin's actions, even though there is plenty to criticize. and that's much harder for me to understand. >> i mean, i want to come back to you quickly. i mean, quite the contrary. there's no instance of trump ever criticizing putin, but the thing he spent the most time attacking the press for is the russia hoax. what impact has that had on the ability to cover or probe or investigate trump's affinity for vladimir putin? >> yeah, i was struck by one a couple of things he said in the oval office the other day in which he was basically expressing sort of a solidarity, almost a bond that he had with putin for, quote, surviving, in effect, the russia hoax, which he likes to call the investigation. well, let's remember, by the way, the investigation didn't come up with a criminal conspiracy to be proved in a court of law between russia and trump. but it did find that, in fact, of course, russia did interfere in the 2016 election on trump's behalf. and trump accepted that help

benefited from that help. so, yes, there were no criminal charges out of that. that does not mean that there was not a relationship of some kind there, or at least a coincidence of interest anyway. and i think that's something that he wants to pretend didn't happen. but to hear him in the oval office talk about how we went through this together was really striking. and you're right, it's not just that he hasn't said anything bad about about putin. just this last week, he said he was smart. he said he was cunning. and when he was asked, was he a dictator the way you said zelensky is a dictator, he said, i don't want to use those words. i like to be careful with my words. well, that means that he's careful with his words when he says zelensky is a dictator and putin is not. that's a very intentional message. he's trying to discredit zelensky. the obvious inference is that he's trying to discredit zelensky and diminish support for ukraine among americans, so that when he makes a deal with putin in russia, that there is an acceptance of a deal that may seem to be giving concessions away to moscow. >> claire, one of the things that is. a hallmark now of trump's leadership, and it gets

to something peter said about people changing themselves to conform with trump's sort of reign of threats and retribution. no one encapsulates that more than the contrast between what john bolton, his former national security adviser, had to say. he came on our air and said marco rubio should resign. and marco rubio, here's marco rubio on russia in the past. >> russia is governed today by a gangster. he's basically an organized crime figure who controls a government in a large territory. there's no other way to describe vladimir putin. this is a person who kills people because of his political enemies. vladimir putin is a wily cost benefit analysis political actor who is trying to have russia recognized as a great global power on par with the united states, and who wants the world to return to a sphere of influence system of politics? >> donald trump. >> was seemed to be honored by the praise from putin. >> he shouldn't be. >> i don't think. >> if we just stop helping ukraine that.

>> the result. >> is going to be peace. i think we stopped helping ukraine. the result is going to be a slaughter, you know, followed by we now live in a world where the message will be pretty clear, and that is that. >> if you want to invade. >> a smaller neighbor and take their land, you can do it and there won't be any consequences. >> for it. >> marco rubio, now sitting next to jd vance as he humiliated america's ally, president zelensky. >> yeah, he's our head diplomat. >> and we. >> ought to reflect for a minute on what diplomacy is. diplomacy is the effort to use. our value. >> system to. >> positively impact the world and ultimately keep us. >> safe. >> and what was so heartbreaking. >> about friday. >> is if you were. >> paying attention. >> you watched. >> america's values. >> being destroyed. in front. >> of your very eyes. >> for the first time.

>> we had. >> a president. >> in the oval. >> office and a vice president. >> that were turning the concept of diplomacy on. >> its ear. >> diplomacy is. >> reflects the country's values, but it's also reliability. it's being cautious, it's being careful, and it's being reliable. well, we are. >> no longer. >> reliable, nicole. to our allies, they know we. >> are no longer reliable. >> and marco. >> rubio. >> he knows better. and so the question is what. >> happened to. >> all these guys. >> integrity. where did it go. >> well what's the answer. you know them. >> i think they think that trump is so powerful politically in their party. >> and i think. >> marco rubio wanted the power. i think he wanted to be secretary of. >> state. and he was willing. >> to pay the admission. and the admission. >> is. >> you have. >> to park your integrity at the door. >> and do whatever this guy says. >> no. matter how. >> nefarious it is, how. >> repugnant it. >> is to who we are as a country, the idea that we're voting with. >> north korea.

>> and russia. >> in the united nations. >> i mean, i remember. >> when i. >> didn't think. >> your. >> former boss. >> was all that. >> i was never. >> a. >> huge george bush. >> fan. >> but i. >> had to give it. >> to him that he could, when he spoke about foreign policy, reflect the. axis of evil. we are now buddies with the axis of evil. >> well, you know, you're the first person that's mentioned. bush. i travel the world with him when his policies post 911 were as unpopular as they ever were, not just in this country, but around the world. and i was with him when he would meet with the world leader who would say to him, listen, when we get out there, i'm going to have to criticize your bucket of policies, but it's because you know what you're saying. they violate our values. i never saw this animosity in private or public that was on display between donald trump and jd vance and an american ally ever. >> and the fact they wanted. >> to. >> do it in public, you know,

and. >> then they had. >> marjorie taylor. >> greene's boyfriend. >> in there. >> as part of the white house press pool. and she wants he wants to ask him a question about what he's wearing. when elon musk had just been at the cabinet meeting with a baseball cap and. >> a t. >> shirt, and he wanted to say. somehow that him reflecting the. uniform of the soldiers that are. >> losing their lives in. >> ukraine, that somehow that's disrespectful. i mean, it's a. >> clown show. >> and it's. >> so heartbreaking. i have. >> never i, i. guess there. >> could be another low. i guess. >> we could. >> you know. >> we're going to buckle up and. >> there'll be maybe another. >> low. >> next week. >> but this. >> you know, we still have. >> the republican chairman of the armed services. >> committee calling. >> putin a murderous thug. >> jim lankford, senator. >> from oklahoma, went. >> on tv yesterday and meet the press and said. >> he's a murderous thug. >> so there still are republicans that are willing to. speak out, but those who won't have. decided that they care. >> more about. >> their political skin. >> than america's values.

>> i need all of you to stick around. we have to sneak in a quick break, but still ahead. for all of us, it is beginning to look like a pattern. another extraordinary move by the trump administration. as we mentioned, giving vladimir putin carte blanche to do whatever he wants when it comes to u.s. security prerogatives. the latest move we're learning about comes from pete hegseth, secretary of defense. we'll bring you that reporting and reaction from someone who once worked at the highest levels inside the pentagon, plus those. elon musk. quote unquote, savings. he's trying to brag about aren't adding up just yet. but the outrage around them is very, very real indeed, despite what he and donald trump say about them. we'll get to that. and the latest reporting on elon musk's chainsaw practices when deadline. white house continues deadline. white house continues after a quick when emergency strikes, first responders are the first ones in... but on outdated networks, the crucial technology they depend on, is limited. that's why t-mobile created t-priority...

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the joint address to congress. special coverage tomorrow at eight on msnbc. >> what we do. >> is. >> try to cut right to the bone of what we're seeing. >> in. >> washington that day. >> i guess we should. >> have. >> known that everyone who. >> signs up to. >> work for. >> donald trump is signing. >> up for one. >> single project. >> and that is the transition of american. democracy to. >> a. >> kind of. kleptocratic oligarchy in which the. >> billionaires rule. >> in which they. >> get. >> to. >> steal from regular americans. >> and if. >> that's the. >> domestic project, then the way. >> that you. >> normalize that kind of government is. >> to associate. >> yourself with similar governments abroad, like the kremlin. so it's all part of one big domestic project, the foreign policy, the affection for dictatorships abroad is. >> in effect. >> a means towards transitioning our democracy to something very, very different, something we've never, ever seen before in this

country. >> mr. ambassador, that is all true. but the amazing thing about putin and russia, and it almost sets itself up like a bad joke. and i'm not a comedian, but how bad is he? he's so bad that even donald trump's massive propaganda arm starts at fox news. but it has tentacles throughout radio and the internet, and elon musk's company cannot change the stubborn number 81%. 81% of all americans right now, today, do not like or trust vladimir putin. and that's after nine years of this project that i think chris murphy accurately describes. doesn't mean they'll give up. but what should people be prepared for in terms of trying to turn what is hardened and correct? distrust and dislike for vladimir putin? >> well, i think the first comment i would make is the american people, at least 81% have a better understanding of russia and the threat that putin poses than the president apparently does. you know, we've

seen over the last 3 or 4 weeks what i would call concession after concession after concession to moscow. so already three weeks ago, the president and the secretary of defense are talking about, well, ukraine can't get its territory back. it can't join nato. so before the president even has the russians and ukrainians at the negotiating table, he's already making two big concessions to the russians view. for the last three years, there's been a western agreement that we will isolate and boycott trump. i'm sorry, boycott putin. and then trump agrees to meet with putin. and then we had this. it's already been mentioned. the vote at the united nations, where we joined russia, north korea and iran to vote against a un resolution because it mentioned russia as the aggressor. and i look at this and i say, what is the united states received in return? and i can't see a single thing. and i fear that trump is going about it all wrong in negotiating with putin. putin looks at the white house now and he sees weakness, and he's not

inclined to make any concessions because he can just sit back and see what tomorrow will bring, and maybe there will be another gift. this is not working even in the terms of president trump's own professed goal, which is to try to find an end to the russia ukraine war because russia sees no reason whatsoever to move. and president trump heads the most powerful country in the world. he has leverage that he could impose on putin to inflict costs if putin continues this war. and thus far, for reasons that are very hard to understand, he has not chosen to use that leverage. >> peter baker a lot has been made of trump's affinity, not just for putin, but for the minisphere. it includes a bunch of men who who look like dan bongino and joe rogan. i don't know who they all are, but they're very the masculinity seems to be the beginning, the middle and the end of all their stories. here's how weak the republicans and trump look in

front of their own voters. this is a caller to the mark levin radio show, and some voters in a trump district, a district trump won 5247. >> one thing that's really disturbed me today is all the people who are blaming zelensky like he's the problem, like he's the villain in this story and he's not. it's putin. >> i mean, russia. >> invaded ukraine. ukraine did not invade russia. and i am just perplexed at all these people who are saying. that zelensky is a crook or that ukraine wants war. >> listen. >> everybody's freaking out. >> yeah. >> everybody's like, you know, i'm mr. like, let's work together. >> let's try and find common ground. >> and what. >> happened in the white house yesterday? >> i was so. off. >> that it was just so. >> arrogant.

>> i think you had to get that out of your system. i wanted you to get that out of your system. >> so here, the point there. the man getting a standing ovation in a district trump won 5247. not a republican, not a trump cabinet member. not a man from the manosphere, but a democrat. >> look, i think that it reminds us how people felt about the ukraine war when the full fledged invasion happened in 2022. remember, americans all across the board flew ukrainian blue and yellow flags. there was a great deal of, you know, empathy and sympathy on the part of the american people for a people, for a nation that was invaded unprovoked. let's be honest about that by its more powerful neighbor, simply because the more powerful neighbors leader says it doesn't deserve to be an independent nation. remember that, by the way, when you hear russians or people who are sympathetic to russia say, it's really all about nato expansion. vladimir putin wrote a 5000 word treatise

in july of 2021, saying ukraine historically is not independent. nation doesn't deserve to be an independent nation. this is not about whether it's a member of nato. it doesn't deserve to be on the map as far as vladimir putin is saying. and americans felt that at the time, americans felt like the way they did when, you know, the nazis were invading poland and so forth. and now that doesn't mean that they want to necessarily spend, you know, hundreds of billions of dollars, if that's what it comes to. there's certainly a part of america that is tired of being involved in other people's wars. and trump taps into that sort of feeling. but there's a difference between that and suddenly taking sides with vladimir putin. that's not something that americans have historically been in favor of. just yesterday, i think cbs came out with a poll, a yougov, showing that of those who had a choice, 55%, i think, said they preferred ukraine over russia. only 4% said ukraine and 44%. i may have those numbers wrong or something in that range. didn't didn't think one way or the other. so a lot of people don't want to be involved, but if they do have a position, they're 10

to 1 in favor of russia. sorry, ukraine. >> ukraine. here's the poll number. i have a lot of this trump has made about spending and even on spending 65% of all americans. in the latest npr, pbs marist poll say that we've either spent the right amount or not enough aiding our ally ukraine, in the war against russia. 34% say we spent too much. here's my question. and it's about politics. the cuts not popular siding with russia. 81% of all americans don't don't like russia very much. inflation going the wrong direction, the stock market going the wrong direction. trump has not kept a promise other than putting all the pieces in place for retribution. and i guess dropping the case against eric adams. but i didn't hear him mention that in his stump speech very often. what is happening politically? well. >> it's interesting. >> because people. >> are still. >> saying that he's doing what he said he would do. >> and i think. >> primarily that's. >> probably around immigration.

>> deportation because. >> they're trying to do this. >> big show. like they're really taking out people. >> and yeah, he. >> they're not. >> removing anywhere. >> near the. >> number of people. >> that they said they. >> would remove on day one. >> and the other thing that's interesting. >> politically is he's picked a fight with canada. now, keep. >> in. >> mind that canada has intercepted more fentanyl coming across. >> the border from the. >> united states than we have. >> coming from canada. >> so he. >> tried to. >> blame canada and say, well, you're not doing anything about drugs coming across our border. meanwhile, russia allows cyber criminals to operate with impunity in russia. >> you don't think that. >> vladimir putin can go in and murder all these cyber, cyber criminals that are shutting down hospitals in the united states? they're impacting manufacturing companies. they are doing cyber warfare. russian actors are doing cyber warfare today in our country. ask anybody in the

intelligence community and they will tell you that. but for some reason, donald trump is not bothered by russia letting their criminals wreak havoc with some of our most important institutions that deliver important services to america. but he picks a fight with canada. now all of these chickens are going to come home to roost. and i'm using chickens because easter is coming and everybody is not going to be able to decorate that many eggs because they're not going to be able to afford it. so eggs have become a symbol of trump's failure, but it's one of many, and it's going to take a while. it will take six months, maybe a year. but if this continues the way it's going, there will not be good midterms for the republican party. >> is that the democrats thinking that they need six months to a year to really mount a robust. >> well, i think the democrats thinking is probably no different than your thinking or my thinking. horrified feeling somewhat helpless. depressed. this is really a time where

there's not one leader, and so everyone's looking to people to rise up from phoenix from the ashes, one figure that will lead us out of the desert and take on donald trump. effectively, that will happen in time. but for now, i think the democrats have to be disciplined about staying on the message of affordability and that your government is here to serve you. and if your government can't serve you because you can't get in the parks, you can't get your question answered by the irs. you can't get your mother's social security checks straightened out. that will all now be blamed on donald trump, not the deep state. >> ambassador steven pifer, thank you for starting us off. we'll continue to call on you as the story continues. peter baker, an incredible body of reporting last week and over the weekend. thank you for taking some time to talk to us today about all of it. claire sticks around after the break for us. the trump administration's decision to stop cyber operations against russia seems, on the surface, so outrageous and unbelievable, especially

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>> i can i don't. >> know, i'm unaware of that. >> i don't believe that that would be. there are too many, i'm certain considerations there for that to be an accurate statement. so blanket. >> you are confident that. >> the i. >> confident considering what russia is currently doing against the united states, the united states, the status against russia would not be that considering what we are facing from from russia operations. yes. >> so that was republican congressman and the former intelligence committee chair, mike turner. he was removed from that post at the white house winking and nodding. i believe that was him reacting in disbelief at a story that came out, a report that said that defense secretary pete hegseth ordered the head of u.s. cyber command to stop any and all offensive cyber and information operations against russia. but in fact, the reporting is true, contrary to what the congressman said. and despite russia's cyber

operations having only intensified against us here in the united states in recent years, nbc news has confirmed the move, with the u.s. official familiar with it who said hegseth made the order sometime late last month. that was still before trump and j.d. vance's public oval office ambush of the leader of ukraine. but it falls right in line with everything we've been talking about so far today. trump's alarming reversal of decades of u.s. foreign policy and protective things to protect us here at home. and it grants all almost all of vladimir putin's wishes while under the auspices of pretending to try to negotiate something with him. an end of the war with ukraine. washington post reports that the pause on cyber operations is meant to last only as long as those negotiations involving the united states continue. post reports that they could include the halting of, quote, exposing or disabling malware, malware and russian networks before it can be used against the us blocking russian

hackers from servers that they may be preparing to use for their own offensive operations, or disrupting a site promoting anti-u.s. propaganda. we stopped all that. >> for putin. >> joining our coverage. caroline zier she served as the japanese deputy chief of staff to former secretary of defense lloyd austin. claire still with us. caroline. why would we do that? >> well, let me say two reasons up front, and thank you for having me. two reasons up front that this could be normal in the course of business. the first is that it's not unusual for an administration when it comes into town. to review. >> standing policies. >> and operations. >> that's not unusual. it's also not unusual to pause operations activities and exercises when sensitive. >> negotiations or. >> diplomatic talks are underway. but what we need to do is zoom out and put this in

perspective. given everything else we've seen and the trend line we've seen, and i would characterize that trend line as a pattern of twisting ukraine's arm or embattled partner, who has been fighting tooth and nail against a much larger adversary for three years and forfeiting, throwing away leverage vis a vis russia by way of a. series of concessions. so my key question at this juncture for the trump administration and the secretary would be, what did we get in return? what else was russia putting on the table? did they cease, halt or stop something in some way? and did we do this in concert with allies and partners? because if not, we did this unilaterally and that means we pulled punches unilaterally. strongmen like putin does not respect that kind of behavior. and i think we should fully

expect that if this is the tact we're taking and will try to pocket these gains, he will use any pause on the battlefield or in any domain to reconstitute, rebuild and buy time to run through redlines in the future. >> is it the kind of thing that most countries put out publicly? >> no. i cyber operations offensive, defensive or any any form or shape they would take are very sensitive. that is not something that is discussed publicly. and you've seen the pentagon not be willing to discuss it publicly, which is not terribly surprising. i think what's most important is the point of what if this is the case? what then did did the administration get in return from russia? because my fear is they got nothing in return. and this was a unilateral way of

hamstringing ourselves without getting anything in return. >> i mean, claire, i guess the point is we did put this out publicly. this is in multiple press outlets. so the trump administration did put this out. they wanted the world and putin to know they they there's another report that has passed the wire in the last hour. this is in the wall street journal, that the us has essentially halted the flow of arms to ukraine. and let me read how this went down. the financing was halted in recent weeks amid the administration's freeze on foreign aid. but the move to potentially shut down the pipeline for arms transfers to ukraine comes days after a contentious meeting between president trump and ukrainian president zelensky at the white house. the tense exchange friday raised fears across europe that the us could be moving away from the wider western alliance. on monday, trump also attacked him on social media. but here's how they shut down the arms. the flow of arms in late january,

the trump administration ordered a stop to all foreign aid. this is reported in the wall street journal, including military aid except to israel and egypt, without a waiver. on friday, it's the day the oval office showdown. the administration said it was sending israel $3 billion in new weapons. rubio in recent weeks signed a waiver to exempt ukraine from the ban trump imposed on foreign assistance. but senior state department official peter marco hasn't sent the required letter to the pentagon to allow the aid to flow to kyiv. so again, the susan rice said on this program on friday that it was a set up. all these things. and i take caroline's point that we don't know what we don't know. but all these things happened in advance of and around this confrontation in the oval office friday. >> yeah, i is it is either gross incompetence in a, in a just a like i said before, a clown show or this was all planned. and either one of those are really bad for the national security of our country. and here's the

thing. all these republicans saying, oh, he looks so strong. he looks at that. all these republicans said, well, finally, we've got a president putting america first. and isn't he strong? and the way he did that, he looks like a tool of putin. i mean, putin is getting i mean, the point she's making is so valid. you would never have your secretary of defense say, on a plane going over to europe that, yeah, they're going to have to give up territory before you even start the negotiations. if this is the art of the deal, we're in way more trouble than we think we're in because they're giving putin everything and we are getting nothing. putin has donald trump under his thumb and he is squishing him like a bug. >> i want to ask both of you why that would be because. because i am always open to the clown car explanation. but even a clown car doesn't always fall over in one spot, right? i mean, the clown car is always falling over

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hold mr. trump to account for these reckless actions, and to exercise fully its constitutional oversight responsibilities. mr. trump's dismissals raised troubling questions about the administration's desire to politicize the military and to remove legal constraints on the president's power. we, like many americans, including many troops, are therefore left to conclude that these leaders are being fired for purely partizan reasons. it's signed by william perry, secretary of defense, 94 to 97. chuck hagel, secretary from 2013 to 15. lloyd austin, secretary of defense, 21 to 25. leon panetta, served 2011 to 13. and jim mattis served during the first trump presidency. what is the hope? what is the best case scenario for reversing anything that trump and hegseth are doing at the pentagon? >> well, first i'll say i, i appreciate you surfacing this memo, which is an important memo signed by secretaries appointed by both democrats and

republicans. and the key here is that what the administration has done, what president trump and secretary hegseth did in the friday night purge of senior officers, is a deeply troubling development for the us military, for the institution of the us military. and moreover, it's an un-american way to treat men and women in uniform. no explanation, no justification was given for the dismissal of these senior officers, including the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff and the senior military lawyers from the army, navy and air force. and it leads one to believe, to conclude that these were political maneuvers, political moves by the administration to push aside officers who who they thought were not focused on what they say is the need to refocus on warfighting. but this doesn't

hold up when you actually look at the records of these officers. i know many of them. i've been in the room. i've watched them in action. general cq brown is a fighter pilot with over 3000 flight hours, 130 of which are combat flight hours. and he, to wit, had a priority as the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. and that priority, among others, was war fighting. now take the jags, the senior military lawyers. they are not roadblocks, as secretary hegseth has suggested. they are necessary guardrails to ensure troops follow lawful orders. and that's what professional militaries do. they follow lawful orders in accordance with the laws of armed conflict. so you ask me what the best case scenario is, what can be done? congress has a key role to play here. they can really help. they can ask questions. they can

convene hearings, and they can really press in upcoming nomination hearings and even hold on nominating civilian and military leaders until answers are received. and we really should not tolerate this slide into politicizing the us military. >> every republican voted for hsc70 who was the only reason he was nominated is because he was willing to do things that i'm sure other trump allies said. i'm not doing that. people like tom cotton would have been a much more capable and able. he might have been confirmed by a bipartisan group of senators. i guess the thing that's amazing is that. >> or he'd turn into marco rubio. >> maybe, but he seems stronger than marco rubio, at least from the outside. i mean, what's amazing is that no republicans were offended by this, and donald trump didn't hide that he was going to do this. what? and i asked you a couple of blocks ago how long it's going to take democrats to, to mount a sort of an effective and cohesive

opposition? i don't think we have six months to a year. i don't think the military has six months to a year. what can what can be done now? >> well, you know, there are a number of republicans in congress that served. >> they voted for hegseth. >> i know, but let's. and by the way, let's remember what happened. i came to the senate because of the iraq war. in a large part, i was elected because the unpopularity of the iraq war and the whole snafu about weapons of mass destruction. and then obama gets elected. and i was on the armed services committee. no one even thought about going in and removing senior military leadership, because if you spent more than ten minutes really looking at military leadership in this country, you realize how blessed we are that we have a nonpartisan military and we have really strong military leaders and the people they have thrown out like trash, have given decades of their lives and risked their lives to keep us

safe. so it is outrageous that the people who have served that are sitting on the armed services committee in the house and the senate that have an r behind their name, the fact that they are not standing up for these men and women who are being booted out of the military for no good reason, is really unbelievable to me. joni ernst and you look at tom cotton, you look what lindsey graham has turned into. i mean, this is a guy who was a jag officer. he knows those jag lawyers weren't roadblocks. so i don't know what the answer is. nicole. i do know this. i know that america is paying closer attention now, mostly because of elon musk and his chainsaw activities. and i do think when things don't go well for the american military, the blame will fall squarely on donald trump's lap. >> caroline and claire, thank you for helping us make sense of all these headlines. great to see both of you. still ahead for us. claire teased it out a little bit. republicans continue

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>> at just 4.99 a month. call 1-888-246-2612 or visit homeserve. com. 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. >> my question is. >> can we count on you. >> to go back to. >> washington and demand immediate oversight. >> into joe's and his? >> can we count on you? that's the question. hi again, everybody. it's now 5:00 in new york. republican lawmakers are

feeling the heat from their constituents being asked directly, quote, can we count on you when it comes to the deeply unpopular slashing and burning that chainsaw wielding elon musk and his so-called efficiency people are doing to the federal government? that voter was speaking at a town hall held over the weekend by texas republican congressman keith self. but she was not alone, not by a long shot. over in rural kansas, a republican senator was faced with such strong opposition that he abruptly ended his town hall early. the local nbc affiliate described the 40 minute event as, quote, contentious nearly from the start. end quote. take a look at the final moments before senator roger marshall ended his town hall meeting. >> me just doing right now. as far as cutting. >> out those jobs. >> a huge. >> percentage of those people. and i don't know who you care about the veterans.

>> or the veterans. >> yes. >> and that is a damn shame. >> yes. >> yes. >> that is a danger. >> i'm not a democrat. >> but. >> i'm worried. >> about the veterans. man. >> yes. >> thank you. >> all right. >> well. >> i yield. >> it to. one of my elders, and i appreciate his com >> i think it's a great. >> i'm not going to. we don't have time for everyone to stand up. i do got two more commitments today. appreciate everybody. >> making the drive out. >> and god bless america. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> good night. >> not now. >> not now, not now. who? is going to. >> take pictures. >> with you, buddy? >> right. >> to vote. >> you out. >> you told me that a republican would leave the room when someone raised their hands and said, i'm not a democrat, but i'm worried about veterans. i might not have believed you. i might have. when asked about all that later, the staffers for

that senator made the fully unsubstantiated claim. and to our knowledge, as of 502 in the east, no evidence has been provided. but they claim falsely, without evidence, that that town hall was, quote, sabotaged by democratic operatives. in fact, as i played you heard in the clip, someone said, i'm not a democrat. i'm simply, quote, worried about the veterans. these events over the weekend and others in recent days and weeks showcase americans speaking truth to power at their local town halls, and they underscore the public's growing uneasiness and anger over a lot of things, but especially elon musk's complete takeover of the federal government. as for all those savings that musk is touting, as we've reported previously, as the new york times has been chronicling, those savings aren't always what they appear. times reports this quote while george w bush was president, the u.s. coast guard signed a contract to get administrative help from a company in northern

virginia. it paid $144,000, and the contract was completed by june 30th, 2005. 20 years past, presidents came and went. last week, elon musk restructuring team called the department of government efficiency said it had just canceled the long dead coast guard contract and in doing so saved the u.s. taxpayer $53.7 million. quote, these are not savings, said lisa mundt, whose firm the pulse of govcon tracks federal spending. quote, the money has been spent. period. point blank. that's where we start the hour. some of our favorite reporters and friends, new york times investigative reporter david fahrenthold is here. he's byline on the reporting we just read from. also joining us, msnbc columnist, author of the newsletter. to the contrary. charlie sykes is here. and distinguished political scholar, professor at princeton university. msnbc political analyst eddie glotzbach. david fahrenthold, take me through your latest reporting. i know we talked last week when the times

when you and your colleagues unearthed savings that weren't really savings. elon musk's team was in the process of eliminating those items. do you have new math, and do you have new examples of savings that aren't what they seem? >> we do. so you mentioned that there were a couple of examples of where they claim to have saved more than $50. >> million by. >> cutting contracts that had actually been dead since the presidency of george w bush. they also claimed $1.9 billion in savings by cutting an irs contract that had been canceled by joe biden. so after we reported on that late last night, the doge team updated their data again and they erased hundreds, about 1000 contracts that they had previously been claiming as savings took more than $4 billion of savings they were claiming as of last week off the board. so the longer that their wall of receipts has been out there, and the more scrutiny it gets, the less savings we see. the amount of savings they claimed on it has gone down from 16 billion down to about nine.

>> charlie sykes, what voters seem to understand. and it may be intensified by this indisputable documents based sort of accounting, forensic accounting kind of reporting, which is impossible to argue with or hide from. which is why elon. elon musk folks seem to be changing their stories every time they're confronted with new facts. but what people can intuit in their bones is that indiscriminate burning down of the government is going to impact their lives. and what's amazing to me is if you take an a scalpel, you could have sold cuts in efficiency to a wide swath of americans. you get 60, 70% americans who think that's a good idea, but they didn't even pretend to be pursuing fraud or waste. they are very brazenly. and elon musk does so by carrying around a chainsaw at political speeches. they plan, and their brand is to burn it

all down. country doesn't want that. >> well, you know, the symbolism of. the chainsaw doesn't appear to be that effective politically. look, what i'm struck by is how early all of this is, is happening. >> you know, we're. >> we. >> were just. >> past the one month point and people are already coming out and asking questions like, why are so many veterans being laid off? why are these programs being cut? and what you're seeing, of course, is a lot of the republican congressmen and senators have nothing to say because they've been cut out of the process. right. congress has been reduced to potted plants in elon musk's slashing. >> and burning. >> but i think very shortly we're going to find out. how the voters really feel about the economy, whether it really is the economy. stupid. i mean, we had the stock market. >> in decline with the. >> with the announcement of the tariffs. inflation is ticking up. people's 401 s are going to look much worse. >> at. >> the end of this week than they were at the beginning of,

of the week. and now we're starting to get reports about the cuts in social security. the one thing that i think most politicians know do not mess with. and you have a former commissioner of the of social security, martin o'malley, who is saying, you know, these cuts could actually and this is almost unthinkable in american politics, could interfere with the checks going out. so what you're seeing now feels like just a very, very small down payment of what will happen if, in fact, people's 401. s begin to crash and those checks are delayed. and given the sort of lack of discretion and prudence on the part of musk and company and his team of guys who call themselves big balls. it could get ugly. >> do they call themselves that? >> oh, yeah. >> one of the guys. yeah, that's his nickname. >> so. >> i. >> mean. >> what could possibly go twitter? >> 19 year old guy with a nickname big balls.

>> i quit twitter and, like, look what i've been missing. maybe i'll have to go. and i thought dan bongino was joe rogan. see, i've been missing all these things. you're going to have to teach me. here's, here's here's the other problem. it's not just that. it's the economy, stupid. it's the callous indifference from the south african guy with the chainsaw. here he is talking to joe rogan about social security and he. glenn. >> social security. >> is the biggest. >> ponzi scheme of all time. >> well explain that. >> oh, so. >> well. >> people pay into. >> social security. >> and. >> the money goes. >> out of. >> social security immediately. >> but the obligation. >> for social. >> security is your entire retirement career. if you look at the future. >> obligations of social. >> security, it. >> far exceeds the. >> tax revenue. >> so again, i haven't given political advice for, for very many, many years. and i'm not sure i was ever any good at this, but i would never advise anyone to say, quote, social security is the biggest ponzi

scheme of all time. it's life and death. it's medicine and food and heat. for a lot of people and it it embodies it encapsulates this callous indifference. i was talking about eddie. >> absolutely. nicole. and beyond the broken mirrors that david and his team reported on, this is a reflection of in some ways, as you rightly note, a callous heart, a callous heart that has no interest in the actual underlying values that inform social security. what are our responsibilities to our elderly? what are our responsibilities to each other? what are our responsibilities to the poor? and so as these folks bring out that that that what what chainsaw that he had. right. he's giving no expression, no account of the values that are animating our responsibilities and obligations to each other, that the government plays a role in executing. and so you hear people making explicit, we care about veterans. you hear people making it explicit. we care about our fathers and mothers

and grandfathers and grandmothers. right. and so what does it mean for these folks, for those and ball big balls. wow. right. going through, you know, government just slashing and burning the coal without any explicit acknowledgment of the values that define our way of life. and so here we are. here we are. i mean, you're going to you're going to really undermine our ability to really express our responsibility for the folks who raised us. come on, man. >> i guess we now have half of our guests who have said it. i'm going to stay in the half that hasn't. i'm going to come back to you with senator bernie sanders. david. >> no, i think what musk, the wealthiest guy in the world, just said is totally outrageous. that's a hell of a ponzi scheme when for the last 80 years, social security has paid out every nickel owed to every eligible american. quite a ponzi scheme. what we have got to do,

and i think most americans agree, and i just introduced legislation to do that, is you lift the cap on taxable income. right now, musk worth 400 billion, contributes the same amount into the social security trust fund as somebody making 170 million. you lift that cap. we can extend the solvency of social security for 75 years. >> i guess my question is, is there anything serious about what you've uncovered in your reporting of doge? because it appears that it's meant to create the impression of major slashing and burning of the federal government. but it's my sense, and if i'm wrong, please correct me. but but when they have that wrong, when they're canceling or showing a savings program that's been over since my old boss was president over 20 years ago, they quickly correct the spreadsheet. is there anything deep? are they trying to solve problems like the one bernie sanders is talking about there? or are they simply trying to market the

image of savings? >> well, to me, the flaws in these data and this data and they're still there. those cuts from the george w bush era are still there. the flaws in this data, it's not it doesn't mean it's disproven that doge is cutting things. it's cutting a lot of things. what it's showing, i think, is something about doge's competency, its ability to cut the right things, its ability to cut government in a way that makes it more efficient but still able to do its job. and what we've talked to people who've looked at the mistakes they're making, and they say, this looks like they don't even understand what they're cutting. they don't understand the machinery of government, the rules of government, the systems they're using to guide their cuts. and if they, you know, they can't make this sort of simple judgment like, oh, wow, this is a contract from 2005, not 2025. if they don't have that level of understanding and quality control, what does it mean for the cuts they really are making and the big changes they're making in our government? >> i mean, charlie, i think that we've all sort of answered our

own riddle, right? i mean, if you hire these people who call themselves what you say, they call themselves on x, they clearly don't don't care about what they're cutting. but i think the larger political point and the reason we're starting here this hour is, is because the voters do. the voters understand that the people that were cut were providing services to the citizens of this country. here are some of the slashed employees, in their own words. >> we as. >> federal workers, we just. >> want to do our job. we love. i loved my job. i don't know about you. >> when i got fired. >> like, this is the best job. >> i ever had. it was heartbreaking. >> to. >> be fired. >> to be. >> illegally fired, i. >> should say. >> i ran. >> toward this job because i knew it was more. it was leading the world's best ocean acidification program. it was walking alongside some of the most thoughtful, conscientious, and kind peers of my career. >> who we need to let. >> noaa's staff continue its mission. we need to let them continue delivering more.

>> and. >> now i don't know what that means. ocean acidification. but i know that if you live in north carolina or you live in florida, you're really glad that the people who are watching the changes in weather are able to provide an aid forecast so that you know how to protect your homes when these storms are bearing down. i mean, what what do you make of how far they got with this assault on expertise and government agency staff? >> well. >> i mean, to david's point, i mean, what you're seeing is the is this fundamental lack of competence. they just do not know what they are doing. they don't know the damage that they are inflicting. and so we're not going to know until a lot of these effects hit downstream. i mean, these are very, very compelling stories about the employees in washington, d.c, but the real political impact is going to come when people see it in their own backyards, when we no longer have warnings, for example, if there are life

threatening storms. if children's health is affected. and i think this is this is the whole question. do they understand what they are doing? now look, if you're if you're elon musk and you're donald trump, you want to be saying, look, we are going after the bureaucracy. we're going after the deep state. and but the numbers are not adding up and they are not aware of the consequences. and by the way, let's go back to elon musk and the whole ponzi scheme thing. you know, this sounds like a bunch of young conservatives from the late 1960s sitting around the dorm room with a few beers, you know, throwing around terms like that. you'd be hard pressed to find any elected republican official in the last 30, 40 years who would go to a town hall meeting in front of senior citizens and call social security a ponzi scheme. it's almost as if elon musk is doing kind of the sparks note version of conservative rhetoric. he's just pulling stuff out of the air. and i think you're seeing this with the cuts as well, that you have these kids sitting

around and they go, well, that looks bad. what is it actually do? we don't know. we're just going to simply cut it. so, you know what could possibly go wrong. we're seeing it in in real time. but i don't think the full impact is going to be felt for some time. and then what i think you're going to see is republicans realizing they do not dare to go to these town hall meetings and answer that. i mean, imagine the next congressman or senator who is asked about elon musk's comments about the social security being a ponzi scheme. imagine what that's going to look like. the problem is these elected officials can run, but they can't hide. they can't hide from the downstream effects of all of these cuts. and the recent history of the tea party suggests that it won't take a while. i mean, they're they're on to us. they're on to elon musk and donald trump, and they're on to the cowardice of republican members. i mean, for the purposes of this conversation, we called the cuts, but they're just as angry about donald trump capitulating and showing flagrant weakness to

vladimir putin. these are not stories that they can sort of put back in the tube. and the ponzi scheme comment is the offense against social security, but the defense against the cuts are things that everyone understands. pediatric cancer research, veterans health care. i mean, there are cutting things that nobody would ever intentionally slash and they're doing. and again, i think that figuring out whether it's their incompetence or their callous indifference is the work of folks like david fahrenthold. it may be too late for that kind of analysis in terms of the voters views of these cuts. >> you know, i think that's absolutely right. and, you know, i you know, it's callousness. it's incompetence. and it very well may be confusion. and what do i mean by that, nicole? that is to say, everything you said is right. and we can describe it by way of a shorthand that this is the kind of populist energy that has upended our politics in

a very significant way. and what does it mean that this populist energy is still evident? it's not it's not going out. it's not dissipating. right. and so what does it mean that it's running up against. right. these this billionaire, the richest man in the world. the richest man in the world. and so these folk are challenging the republicans rebranding of itself as a champion of the working class of working class white folk. and here you are. they are screaming that you are hurting us in deconstructing the administrative state. and so i don't know if the republican party has figured out what it currently is, or maga republicans, who they currently are right now. and you see that collision happening in these town hall meetings, and you hear it in the nonsense spewing out of elon musk's mouth. it seems to me. >> it is this incredible, incredible collision of sort of a lack of self-awareness that the richest person in the world is taking things from the most

vulnerable people in the world. and that's why you've got parents of pediatric cancer victims calling sean hannity and saying, no, no, no. we need the government to research pediatric cancer because it's not profitable. sean hannity tried to say, well, no, the big pharma can do it. and he said, it's not profitable. i mean, that's why you have this collision of the cruelty of what the trump movement has become in this second presidency and what even his own voters thought it was going to be. he didn't run on canceling out pediatric cancer research. he didn't run on canceling whether or spreading measles. but that is what is happening in the country. and voters are starting to figure it out. thank you for helping us sift through the day's most insane headlines, if you will. david fear and charlie sykes and eddie glaude when we come back from elon musk's chainsaw wielding and reckless slashing to donald trump's betrayal of our democratic ally in ukraine, something our next guest called the greatest geopolitical mistake since world war two.

senator angus king of maine will sound off in a moment. also ahead, dangerous new signs of the trump administration's attacks on two key pillars of america's democracy the rule of law and the freedom of the press. how these latest developments echo what has been ushered in, and other authoritarian regimes all around the world. deadline white house the world. deadline white house continues after a quick break. patients who have sensitive teeth but also want whiter teeth they have to make a choice one versus the other. sensodyne clinical white provides two shades whiter teeth as well as providing 24/7 sensitivity protection. patients are going to love to see sensodyne on the shelf. only if i had to. >> you've got a breach. >> i would do anything for you. >> i would do anything for you. >> thousands of innocent pe ♪ [suspenseful music] trains. [whoosh] ♪ trains that use the power of dell ai and intel.

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>> we got you. explore your treatment options and connect with the provider at. >> each week, veteran lawyers andrew weissman and mary mccord break down the latest developments inside the trump administration's department of justice. >> the administration. >> doesn't necessarily want. >> to be questioned. >> on any of. >> its policy. >> main justice. new episodes drop every tuesday. >> what we do. >> is try to cut right to the bone of what we're seeing in washington that day. >> i cannot think. >> of a rational argument for pulling our support from. >> ukraine. >> if we persist in walking away from ukraine, it will be the greatest geopolitical mistake

that this country has made since world war two. >> let that sink in. that was senator angus king, independent of maine, after donald trump threatened and berated ukrainian president volodymyr zelensky in an oval office pool spray on friday, weighing in on the disastrous consequences for ukraine if the u.s. withdraws all of its support. senator king joins us now. how are you doing? >> just great. well, great is a relative term, nicole. >> i know. >> i'm up. and, adam. >> one of the things i think, and you and i have had a lot of conversations over the last nine years, one of the things that we i think that that limits our ability to speak fulsomely about what we're seeing with our own eyes, is that word that you used there rational? what are the irrational explanations for why trump did what he did? >> i don't know, i mean, in that. >> interview he. >> talked and this is no secret. i mean, he's been admiring of

vladimir putin for a long time, and he talked admiringly of him. they had gone through. he seemed to say that there's a sort of a bonding experience because of the russia investigation in 2016 and thereafter, but that it seems to me that that well, the vote in the un, the fact that we cut off our support for keeping the ukrainian grid up and running last week indicates that we're now looking to solve this problem in a way that will benefit vladimir putin. >> let me show you what marco rubio seemed to believe before friday. >> we should. >> have been preparing for this and preparing for their insurgency months ago. we need to make this as long as painful and as costly for vladimir, vladimir putin as anything possible. another, you know, a vietnam for him, another afghanistan. final question. if we don't do that, he'll do more of this in the future. >> i don't need to tell you that.

>> marco rubio. >> marco rubio, i. >> go ahead. >> that's the marco rubio i used to know. >> so what happened? >> that's what. >> marco has been saying all along. you mean what happened with marco or what happened generally? >> well. >> as of. >> as of, i think it was. >> go ahead. i mean, he still works for donald trump. and donald trump, as you said, is now aligning the united states of america with putin. and that, i mean, we could we could use the whole rest of this hour to show you all of the things. marco rubio has called him a gangster and a murderer and a thug. and as of 526, he still works for donald trump, who is aligning america with the person marco rubio described as a gangster. >> well, marco is going to have to make his own decisions. i'm not going to advise him, but he's got to think hard about this. i think based upon where he's been, you know, i voted for him. i think he got 100% of the votes in the senate when he was being confirmed as secretary of state. so he's got a he's got to think hard about this, about what his responsibilities are to

the administration, of course, but also to the constitution and the people of this country. let me expand on the comment that you played the clip, that i said. it was an enormous geopolitical mistake. there are two reasons, nicole. one is, just as marco suggested, it emboldens dictators history fairly yells at us that if you can't appease a dictator who's territorially ambitious, and vladimir putin has said he wants to rebuild the soviet empire, and maya angelou once said, if somebody tells you who they are, you should believe them. and so he's not going to stop at ukraine. a friend of mine, i got into an argument on the on the street in bath, maine, a couple of weeks ago. the guy said, well, he's not going to go any further than ukraine. that's he just, you know, well, then why did the finns and the swedes suddenly decide to join nato after 70 years? they know the threat that they are facing, and they know putin and the russians a lot better than we do. so. and then, of course, xi jinping is watching this like a hawk and

wondering, well, if the americans sort of pull out and leave the ukrainians to themselves, the ukrainians to themselves, that indicates to me that the taiwanese can't really support on count on solid support from the americans. so that opens the door for me to try to do what i've been saying for years. i want to do, which is bring taiwan back under the control of the chinese communist party. so emboldening dictators who are territorially ambitious. we know better than that. it never works. appeasement doesn't work. i thought it was fascinating that a lot of this discussion 2 or 3 weeks ago about backing away from ukraine took place in munich. does that ring any bells in munich? the other reason to call that this is really bad is that it undermines our relationship with our allies, our allies are our asymmetric advantage in the world. china has customers. we have allies, russia has north

korea. and, you know, 1 or 2 other vassal states. but we have allies all across the world. and this administration seems intent on poking the eyes of our allies, whether it's the europeans talking about a significant tariff tomorrow on canada, canada, what what have they done? and they've been our staunchest ally. and so the two pieces put together emboldening the dictators and alienating the allies. that's what i meant when i said this would be the biggest geopolitical mistake that this country could possibly make. >> what can you do about it? >> well, part of it is to sound the alarm is to is to let people know exactly what's happening and why this is so dangerous. what i've been trying to get across is our support for ukraine isn't charity. it's not a gift. it's in our national interest. it's to avoid a much

greater conflict if we don't support ukraine. the president the other day said to lozinski to zelensky, you're gambling with world war three. well, number one, that's a point that russia makes. and number two, i believe that not confronting putin is a much more serious gamble in terms of what, world war three, because he's going to keep going. and so this is why this is so important that we that we, number one, keep our moral and ethical commitment to a democracy that was invaded by a murderous dictator. but also, as i say, this is in our national interest to avoid conflict in the in the future and to try to deter this kind of activity. >> do you regret your vote for marco rubio? >> i got to tell you, i'm rethinking it. i'm disappointed because i know him fairly well. i worked with him for 10 or 12

years on the intelligence committee. he's a very smart guy, and i understand when you join an administration, you follow the leader of the president, but also it seems to me, and i don't know what advice he's giving behind closed doors, but he knows better than what's going on here. and i hope that he'll he'll speak up in the councils of the, of the administration because this is this is not going to help, help them. i think there's already a negative reaction throughout the country to, to the idea of pivoting from a democracy that's fighting for its own survival in favor of a dictator who's trying to crush a neighboring country. and by the way, the other thing that bothered me about that confrontation was the president seemed to think that it was bad that zelensky he used the word hatred toward putin and the russians. how do you expect him to feel? he's lost almost 100,000 of his people. people have been tortured, kidnaped

children have been kidnaped. they're purposefully bombing civilian capacity in ukraine. you expect him to just say, oh, well, that's okay, vlad, just keep it up, man. no, he's got every right to be pretty damn mad. >> he's got 81% of the american people with him as well. 81% of all americans distrust and dislike vladimir putin. senator angus king, always great to hear from you. thank you for taking some time to talk to us today. >> thanks again. nicole. great to be with you. >> when we come back, there's some breaking news to tell you about out of the fbi, a high profile resignation coming under profile resignation coming under intense pressure. we'll tell you you founded your kayak company because you love the ocean, not spreadsheets. you need to hire. i need indeed. indeed you do. when you sponsor a job on indeed, candidates can find it easier. so you can hire easier. visit indeed.com/hire have you always had trouble with your weight? me too. discover the power of wegovy®.

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1-800-403-7539. that's 1-800-403-7539. >> there's some really significant breaking news to tell you about on the fbi front. the head of the new york field office, james dennehy, has retired under intense pressure. he had tangled with the trump administration over their demand that the names of all fbi agents who worked on or touched any january 6th cases be handed over. in a letter to staff earlier this month that we covered on this program, dennehy had written this quote. today we find ourselves in the middle of a battle of our own as good people are being walked out of the fbi and others are being targeted because they did their jobs in accordance with the law and fbi policy. he added this quote, time for me to dig in. end quote. that list of names was eventually handed over to

sources tell nbc news that dennehy was given a choice to retire or be fired, and he chose to retire earlier today. let's bring in to our coverage former top official at the department of justice, former fbi general counsel, msnbc legal analyst andrew weissmann. also joining us at the table, the co-founder and ceo of rappler, the leading digital media and news organization in the philippines. the winner of the nobel peace prize in 2021, the author of how to stand up to a dictator the fight for our future. maria ressa is back. she's also a board member of the committee to protect journalists. someone who has talked us through these times, and we're going to we're going to get to the journalism front, but we start here at the fbi. a big blow, a. >> big blow. >> this is somebody who, just like we. saw in the prosecutor's. >> office in new. >> york, the prosecutor's. office in main justice, the prosecutor's. >> office in d.c. >> this is it's useful. to remember this sort of resistance

started at the fbi. >> and this is sort of the next rung below. >> the director and the. >> deputy director. >> all of the assistant. >> directors. >> the heads of the field. >> offices, of which this fellow is the largest field office. >> in the bureau. >> this is this. >> is sort of. >> the crown. >> jewel that i say that. >> not just as a native new yorker. i mean, it really produces. just as. >> most. >> people has the most work. >> it is the. >> core of the terrorism. >> program is here. >> and this is somebody who. >> basically had to. >> be. >> forced out. >> by the trump. administration because he. >> was. by all. >> accounts. >> saying, you know what? i was trained. >> to believe. >> in facts. >> and law. >> so it's. >> again. >> another sign of where we are. >> it's really. >> important to see this as part of that larger. >> story as. >> to what's going. >> on in the. >> administration writ large, but. >> it's certainly within the department of justice. i cannot. >> stress to you, nicole.

>> how unusual this is. the only other time i. >> can think. >> of anyone of note leaving the department because of being asked to do something that they viewed as. >> against the. >> law. >> or. >> just not. >> supported by the facts. >> was the first trump administration. >> but this is that that was. >> a small. >> group of people. this is full bore. and it's a to me, that is just exactly representative of the difference between. >> where we were. >> in trump. >> 1.0 and where we are now. >> and what what would kash patel and dan bongino want that he couldn't have given them if he'd run that office? >> somebody who was going. to be fact based and law based and. was saying that out loud. >> that, remember, this is. >> exactly what denise chung, the head. >> of the criminal. >> division, was saying to her boss and to the deputy attorney. general's office, which was the facts. >> do not support. >> it and the law does not. >> support it.

>> and what's remarkable is that is a firing offense, just to remember what mr. dennehy special agent dennehy's position was. it was that there is nothing wrong with having worked on the investigation of people who participated in the january, january 6th insurrection. we all saw that that just it's worth noting this isn't misconduct. this it would be a dereliction of duty not to have done those cases. and the idea just remember, this is a public servant with a long career, not just at the fbi, but in the military. >> who is sitting. >> there saying, i can't stomach this. i mean, it is. >> it's remarkable. >> but he didn't there. blah blah, blah blah. this is real news, real breaking news in the making when it makes you stammer. i can see the story coming out of the printer. he's putting out publicly that he was forced out. i want to read to you from his resignation message. do you have that? thank you. this is how it happens. sorry. not so glamorous. the

retired and his retirement. message to colleagues. former. the former head of the fbi new york field office says he was forced out. quote, i've been told many times in my life, when you find yourself in a hole, sometimes it's best to quit digging. screw that. i will never stop defending this joint. full message all. quote. late friday, i was informed that i needed to put my retirement papers in today, which i just did. i was not given a reason for this decision. regardless, i apologize to all of you for not being able to fulfill my commitment to you to serve as a dc, ny. what's that? >> assistant director. >> in charge. >> that is that the. >> that is. >> their one of three people. the largest field offices in the country new york, washington, dc and los angeles. i can't stress enough how big and important. >> the. >> job is. this, this. but for sort of the director and the deputy director, i mean, this is the most important position in the department. >> let me read his message in

full then. as i leave today, i have an immense feeling of pride to have represented an office of professionals who will always do the right thing for the right reasons, who will always seek the truth while upholding the rule of law, who will always follow the facts no matter where they lead and be unapologetic about it? who will never bend, break, falter, or quit on your integrity? who will always handle cases and evidence with an overabundance of caution and care for the innocent, the victims, and the process first, and who will always remain independent. with that, here is my final top ten list. top ten things i'll miss about the fbi. the commute to work, not the investigations. does it matter what squad you are on? the work is the best in the world. the intensity. you have to be in it to realize what i mean. but we all know how significant what we do is. the fbi brand. do not fret. those three letters still mean something. and there's only a select group of folks in this

world, past and present, who can say they're with the fbi. be proud of that. the camaraderie within our own bureau family and with all law enforcement, local, state, federal and international, there is no better fraternity in the world. the opportunity to put on a suit and tie, to conduct interviews in the morning, throw on some street clothes to conduct surveillance in the afternoon, debrief a sensitive source at a safe house overnight, and then get up early for a swat arrest the next morning. then rinse and repeat the badge. what it took to earn it and what it means to carry it. the independence. we will not bend. we will not falter. we will not sacrifice what is right for anything or anyone to the impact. our work helps shape. foreign policy, community awareness, international relations, wartime decisions, and public safety every single day. number one, all of you, every single one of

you who has earned your position within this phenomenal organization. i've been told many times in my life, when you find yourself in a hole, sometimes it's best to quit digging. screw that. i will never stop defending this joint. i'll just do it willingly and proudly from outside the wire. wow. >> nicole, when you were in government and i was in government when you were seeing leaders, the what you had sort of front and center was looking at people like this and figuring out how do i support their mission. and how do i sort of get out of their way and what do they need operationally? and that statement sort of gives you a sense of the people, the mission of the fbi. >> can i press you, though? what do you want if you don't want him? >> exactly. i mean. >> but say it. what do you want?

if you don't want that person? >> to me, it means that you want somebody who is going to just do whatever you say. remember, the fbi is trained on facts and is trained on law. it has to go to court. it has to. it has to also look at themselves in the mirror. if you do not want this, it is because you are looking at a system which does not believe in facts and does not believe in law. and it's you don't need just this example. it's the reason you see so many people quitting saying can't do this. but it's the same reason that you see attacks on judges who say, you can't do this. it's the same reason you see attacks on the media calling it out. it's same reason you see on the international stage, not believing in the international rule of law, of denigrating all of their systems. it is when you when you believe only in transactions and you believe only in the law of the jungle. this is this is what you get. and this is this is such a heartfelt example. it gives

people insight into what the fbi is, but also a real insight into the people who are denigrating it. >> i just think quickly, our mission in this moment is to have our eyes wide open and cut right to the bone of the truth. and the truth is, if you're against these ten things, you're against the rule of law. and that's what's at the fbi right now. >> absolutely. i mean, the two things you've said, facts and law, that's the foundation of every institution, of every democracy. right. and i think as the fbi has come under attack, kudos to special agent dennehy for his position. he's a whistleblower, as are all the others who have resigned. and i think our task as journalists is going to be to dig deep. what forced them to resign in principle, on principle. this was something we didn't have. >> in the philippines. >> we had a, you know, a president in 2016 who just

pulled loyalty and was able to, within a short period of time, move the philippines. from allying with the united. states to china and russia without telling our our ministry, our secretary of foreign affairs and our foreign affairs department. but i think this is for america today. it's exactly what you said, nicole. what we're seeing is the utter transformation of institutions that are getting weaker by the second as men and women resign, who are standing by facts and rule of law. >> we have to sneak in a quick break. we'll be back with much more of this conversation on the other side. don't go anywhere. >> tomorrow, president trump addresses 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 tomorrow at 8:00 on msnbc. president trump's first 100 days. watch. >> i'm going. >> to be here five days.

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blown. >> learn more about celebrity. >> cruises latest offers. >> we're back with andrew weissmann and maria ressa. maria, i feel like when you're here, we have to ask your your counsel and we're going to have you back to talk about what's happening over at voice of america. but i want to ask, in this moment, since you're sitting here, what is your what is your advice? >> the strongest moment to. fight in a democracy is at the beginning, before the death of a thousand cuts destroys. >> so where are we? are we still at the beginning? >> we're no longer at the beginning. this month has been, you know, crippling. you've you have chronicled what has happened. right? but there's still room. it's still a democracy, although that can fade very quickly. >> how quickly? >> i mean, look, i pointed out in the philippines and under duterte when he became president

in 2016, within six months. so the philippines has a constitution patterned after the united states, three branches of government checks and balances, freedom of the press, the bill of rights. the same thing. and within six months, the president had was able to use fear and violence. and then in terms of the media, i talked about the three cs corrupt, coerce, corrupt. and by the sixth month, he was the strongest leader we had ever known. our institutions had collapsed. i am so worried that that can happen faster in the united states. and the impact of that is global. right. but the things that we have seen, especially on friday. right. you asked that question right before the break. this is impunity. so the question there is, if you normalize impunity, you lose democracy. and i think that's what we need to protect every citizen in how to stand up to a dictator. i wrote i asked

one question. it was the question i wanted every filipino to ask. and now every american must ask, what are you willing to sacrifice for the truth? if you don't stand up and demand that now, you could lose it. >> how do you make the people that voted for donald trump thinking that he would? i don't know what they cared most about. ndi seems to be what he spent the most heat on, the most right like of his public platform. time on eggs are more expensive. the stock market is not going in the right direction. but how do you how do you make those folks know the truth about the corruption at the highest levels of government and elon musk's self-dealing? >> all of these things will reverberate to the citizen. where is government today? what is it actually doing aside from this, when you stopped, when 10,000 employees of usaid, 88,000 have already been laid off, right? that's soft diplomacy that actually prevented a lot of things. and what about the diseases that. oh, wasn't it elon musk who said that they had accidentally

stopped ebola prevention? these things all have ripple effects. if a government, the united states is not a company that can move fast and break things because when they're broken, they stay broken and citizens do not get medicare or social security, right? this is supposed to not be touched, but i worry, what is our government actually doing now? >> well, so andrew, back to back to the fbi again. if you have to purge mr. dennehy from your ranks, does it make it easier or harder to fight crime? >> oh. >> certainly it makes it harder. but i, i think one of the things the message he was sending, which is the same message that you heard from attorneys who were were leaving under the same circumstances, you know, it's like resign or you're you're fired. by the way, wait for the lawsuits. because this is all going to end up in court. and

these people, i think, have really great lawsuits because none of this is about the merits, right? there's no. cause for having it's not like they did anything. it's not like poor performers. but i think the letter you read was just so extraordinary to i think what he's saying is like, stay strong. and you have to uphold your oath. they they can't get rid of their 30,000 people who work at the fbi. you want to get anything done, you need them. and those people have all taken an oath of office. and that's what he's saying is like, you know, stay true to why you're here. >> i guess i'll ask you a question that i've asked that i've asked before, but the prosecutors. if you are forced out for refusing to bend, how long are you really there? >> how long are you? is the institution there? >> no. how long? how long? how? if you're an fbi agent today and say you voted for trump, you like the stuff that he was talking about. but but you see,

the leader of the largest field office leave and put out a letter like this. what are how long are you how long can you count on being there? >> you can't. i mean, look, that is there's an insidious nature of this, which is one the message to people there who are these are this is their career. it's not like they're thinking, i was going to do this for a couple of years and move on. they do not want to take on big cases. they want to they want to sort of burrow in and also not take on any case they could be criticized for. who thought that if you worked on january 6th, you would suddenly, you know, be in the crosshairs? >> exactly. the largest investigation in the department's history becomes politically toxic. can you come back so we can have this conversation about really important story? it sort of got lost in all of the chaos. but we need, you. >> know, i think just at this moment, this moment counts. and every day that we as americans do not act is a is another day

where you lose your rights. >> well, we want to do we want to do the right things. and we need your advice to do that. so we're going to we're going to put you on the spot to come back and tell us what those things are. maria ressa andrew weissmann, what a time for the two of you to sit down. thank you. thank you. thank you for bringing me this story as it broke. another break for us. we'll be right back. >> safelite repair. >> safelite replace. >> nobody likes. >> a cracked windshield. >> oh. >> but at least you can go to safelite. com and schedule a fix in minutes. >> can confirm. >> very easy. >> safelite can come to you for free. and our. >> highly trained techs. >> can replace your windshield right. >> at your home. >> safelite repair safelite replace. >> go to safelite.com. >> and. >> schedule a replacement today. >> as a. >> cardiologist. >> when i put my patients. >> on a statin to reduce cholesterol, i also tell them it. >> can deplete. >> their coq10 levels. >> i recommend taking coq10.

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