i tell you, those facebook posts that i saw in carol lee's report were chilling and disturbing.of national security. and yet, 5,000 of these 70,000 members appear to be making the most extreme racist and intolerant comments that are reminiscent of the january 6th trump insurrectionists. as somebody who was there, i still have ptsd from being at the capitol on that day. i know what the consequences are if you don't deal with this. the military has been very, very slow to address this. that's why we need secretary austin. let me just say, i know the military is low to deal with extremism, because my own nephew was serving in the marines in afghanistan when he died due to military hazing in 2011. it took me seven years to just get an independent report done on this. it was only after that report was conducted by an outside entity the government accountability office, that any action took place. >> you used the phrase military hazing. do you think after everything you have learned, was it military hazing or was your nephew targeted due to his ethnicity? >> i think it had to do with

we're watching alongside nbc news white house correspondent carol lee.estion about gun safety and made clear that i think his message can be summed up as, yes, i can walk and chew gum. i can push infrastructure and gun safety. he pointed to the same thing that a lot of democrats are pointing to, that even law-abiding gun owners are behind background checks. he described the situation as a national embarrassment that every day there's a mass shooting in america. he said i'm not going to give up until it's done. >> reporter: that's right, nicole. and he also -- he was really forceful in those remarks, the most sort of animated that he got throughout this news conference, and he said, when it was questioned whether or not this was a priority for him because he's putting so much emphasis, legislatively, at least, on passing, first, the covid relief bill and now his jobs package, he said, quote, i've never not prioritized this. and then went through his background as a senator and various legislation that he worked on and also that he's put through some execu

i want to go right to carol lee for more. carol, this is scary. what's going on? >> yes, they looked at hundreds of posts in secret facebook groups for these special forces, we found a different side to these elite warriors. things like misinformation saying that the 2020 election was stolen, racist comments, particularly directed at defense secretary lloyd austin for his e6r9s to try to root out extremism in the military and, steph, even qanon conspiracy theory, support for that. i spoke with jack murphy, who is a former army ranger and green beret, who's been sounding the alarm about these issues. take a listen to what he had to say. >> i think it is dangerous. i think it becomes a question of dual loyalties. if we look in regards to the qanon conspiracy, if you really believe that our government consists of a cabal of pedophiles that are, you know, trying to deconstruct democracy, then it becomes a question of who are you loyal to, what are you fighting for or what are you fighting against? >> steph, i also spoke with gary reed, who's director for intelligence

joining news is carol lee. thank you for being up to talk about this with us. let's talk about the infrastructure plan. we showed how the white house responded in the face of mitch mcconnell's comments. this feels inevitable to me. i saw no way that republicans would get on board with the tax increases that the biden administration is proposing. i have to assume they know that, right? >> reporter: they do. it does feel inevitable, kasie, you are right. we all will go through the motions and the white house is saying the president will talk to democrats and republicans. he will start the meetings after the easter holiday. it is hard to see where they go from here because it is not just and you heard jen psaki there it is how they pay for it. they are open to alternatives. it is also what is in the package and the size of the package. $2 trillion. not all provisions that republicans will get behind. there are two ways this could go. one, they could break off. the white house could break off a small, narrow piece that may get republican support and move that forwa

. >> carol lee is outside of the white house for us. the question is, where does the compromise come in? what does each side give? we know what senate republicans think because of a memo put out a couple moments ago. they're being pretty straightforward about it calling this a slush fund, what are you hearing? >> that memo coming before the president gathers this bipartisan group of lawmakers and underscoring what a challenge it will be for him to get any bipartisan support for this jobs bill. the republicans are calling this a slush fund. they also call it a wish list of non-infrastructure spending and a flurry of tax hikes. they think it is too big. it's not just narrowly targeted on what they would see as infrastructure. the white house has a different definition of that and they don't support raising taxes on corporations which is how the president proposed paying for thunder so far. so it is really something where the white house is going to try to win over some republicans. look, this bill is going to change regardless because eve

. >> malcolm, nbc's carol lee reports members of the special forces have been spreading conspiracy theoriesking racist comments in secret facebook groups. some even mocking the defense secretary's efforts to combat extremism. what's the pentagon's plan, malcolm, to prevent other soldiers from being radicalized like this? >> well, you know, a lot of people who join the armed forces are already radicalized. one of the most famous terrorists timothy mcveigh was radicalized by his platoon sergeants. one of the things you can't stop is small talk and scuttlebutt they may pass in the privacy of their own rooms. what we can do is we monitor phone communications and cell phone communications when out on exercises, and we can find out from their chain of command people who are now talking about this. we had that case just recently of a navy department employee who wore his mustache like hitler and talked about the genocide as being fake all the time in his space around members of the armed forces. he wasn't found out until much later. so now that we have a top-down effort to do that, to root these p

carol lee yonnig. he's saw thor of "zero fail". out next month. and professor melissa murray of nyu law school who was clerk for justice sonya sotomayor before her nomination to the supreme court. ashley i'd like to begin with you. i'll begin by playing you some comments by lindsey graham this evening on fox news. >> if we don't win in 202 we should have our ass kicked, because they are destroying our country. people are dumbfounded about how liberal job's been. it's going to be a blowout year for republicans. if this election is about policy, we're going to win. >> so, ashley, i know you recently spoke to the senator for you latest piece on the pandemic and the intersection with the biden agenda. is there anything about biden's style and governance and his agenda that could make lindsey graham wrong, that could propel a democratic victory? james carville in a featured interview today is certainly nervous that 2022 is going to be a long and bad night for his party. >> so, there is, and i will tell you what that is, but i do first want to say that

i want to go straight to carol lee in d.c.oing this bipartisan meeting but is there a snowball's chance in hell any republicans are going to get on board? >> look, steph, it depends on whether this package, how it changes, right? as it is now, more than $2 trillion paying for it with tax increases on corporations, that's a nonstarter for republicans. the senate minority leader mitch mcconnell made that clear. other republicans have made that clear. nonetheless, the president is going to try to get some republicans on board starting with this meeting today with eight lawmakers. there's two republican senators, two democratic senators, two democratic house members and two republican house members and they're not some of the folks you might expect the president to try to be wooing but they do serve on relevant committees as relates to infrastructure, particularly senator wicker and senator cantwell are on the commerce, science and transportation committee, for instance. so the white house says this is the beginning of a series of

nbc news's correspondent, carol lee, has this report. >> they're the best of the best, the elite of theinside secret facebook groups shows something troubling. an nbc news review of private facebook groups for special forces, visible only to vetted members show some share disturbing content. misinformation about a stolen 2020 election, racist and disparaging comments about america's political leadership and even qanon conspiracy theorys. >> does that surprise you? >> i'm afraid to say that doesn't surprise me at all. that is what my own facebook feed looks like on a day-to-day basis and it has for five or more years at this point. >> jack murphy is a former army ranger and green beret who writes and has a podcast about the military. we described to them the troubling posts we found in two of four secret groups that rereviewed. >> is it dangerous that we see members of the special forces community espousing these sorts of views? >> i think it is dangerous. i think it becomes a question of dual loyalties. if you really believe that our government consists of a cabal of pedophiles that are

let's talk to carol who's calling from paul. lee's island, south carol. good morning. good morning gentleman. so this question is sort of outside the box. we are facing global instability because of the covid-19 epidemic and also the climate crisis. putting yourself into winston churchill's shoes as he was a great believer in world stability and a visionary. how do you think if he were alive today? how would he approach the existential threats of pandemic and the climate crisis? thank you. you know, that's an excellent question and it's always dangerous to put yourself in winston churchill's shoes and let alone in his mind. he is his no longer with us. he can't say in the world is a different place. so you really is hard to say what he would do or say in the current climate. however, i think is is he said famously the future is a noble but the past can give you hope love that line from churchill and you know, it's if you look at the past we can we can we can be hopeful that churchill might have first of all told us like it was a churchill was was very frank with the br

officer testified and shavings decision to kneel on floyd's neck was totally unnecessary to that lee force carol is on the reports now from minneapolis. at the end of the 1st week of the derek chauvin murder trial may have lacked the tearful emotion of the previous days but for the defense team it was perhaps the most devastating the jury heard from one of the highest ranking members of the minneapolis police force lieutenant richard zimmerman a nearly 40 year veteran and a homicide detective he was called on to the scene in the aftermath of floyd's arrest and subsequent death to investigate in no uncertain terms he condemned show vince use of his knee choke hold on george floyd. what is your. you know your view that use of force. totally unnecessary what do you mean. well 1st of all. pulling him down to the ground. and putting your knee on a knack for that amount of that amount of time. is just. uncalled for. i saw no reason why the officers felt they were in danger if that's what they felt. and that's what they would have to feel to be able to force. in an exclusive interview with out 0 after

carol byron lee has a very good book called fever of war that deals with the pandemic in the in the ranks of the military for the us as well. and then laura spinney's pale horse, which is one of the newest books came out for the 100th day. student it's an international history and again, really a beautifully done book by a very well known international journalist. i think she hails from england lives in paris and wrote this beautiful book. that's just one of the newest books i think on the pandemic i am also i have not had the opportunity to read these but two other things that were suggested to me. we're marilyn holt. she wrote some great articles pertaining to the spanish influenza for kansas history. so take a look at that if you are looking more for the kansas angle on this also, someone asked a couple people actually have some really good questions about orphans in and around this time frame and we would specifically encourage you to take a look at ellie vance's thesis that she put out in 2019 on the spanish influenza pandemic of 1918 a defining characteristic in the life in history

lee and the executive director marie zapella. thank you all so much for your advocacy and leadership on behalf of our library system. also here, is carol eisen. i have to say carol has been a tremendous partner this past year working with our staff who have been activated as disaster service workers and more recently helping us to recall staff so we can re-open the library. thank you, carol, for your partnership. it's so excitingtor here at this moment and i am beyond thankful that we're finally able to re-open our libraries for in-person services. it's been a long, hard 13 months, but now we're in a position to safely re-open our libraries for brows and bounce. patrons will be able to experience browsing our stacks again something i know they have dearly missed. we'll also have our public access computers available for printers and high-speed internet access. and, it's really fitting we'll still be offering spl to go and next week we're going to open the patrero branch and the west portal branch tuesday. we should have all of our branches re-opened by the fall before the start of school. and i really want to thank the community for al

now is nbc news white house correspondent karen lee who is at the pentagon, correspondent michael engel from london and retired general barry mccaffrey. carolexpect from the president? >> you will hear the president say the u.s. will begin withdrawing troops before the end of this month and they will complete that withdrawal, as you noted, by september 11, but potentially before then. what the president is also going to say according to excerpts of his remarks is that he is the fourth president to preside over the war in afghanistan and that he will not give this responsibility or hand it over to a fifth president, that it's time for the u.s. to end the war in afghanistan. he's also going to say that the u.s. will continue to support diplomacy between the taliban and the afghan government who have yet to reach their own deal. he'll also say the u.s. would continue to support the akian government and the akian security forces. he's going to say, it's time to end america's longest war, it's time for american troops to come home. katy, that raises a question which still has not been answered, which is how many troops are actually going to be c

lee and the executive director marie zapella. thank you all so much for your advocacy and leadership on behalf of our library system. also here, is carol eisen. i have to say carol has been a tremendous partner this past year working with our staff who have been activated as disaster service workers and more recently helping us to recall staff so we can re-open the library. thank you, carol, for your partnership. it's so excitingtor here at this moment and i am beyond thankful that we're finally able to re-open our libraries for in-person services. it's been a long, hard 13 months, but now we're in a position to safely re-open our libraries for brows and bounce. patrons will be able to experience browsing our stacks again something i know they have dearly missed. we'll also have our public access computers available for printers and high-speed internet access. and, it's really fitting we'll still be offering spl to go and next week we're going to open the patrero branch and the west portal branch tuesday. we should have all of our branches re-opened by the fall before the start of school. and i really want to thank the community for al

lee and the executive director marie zapella. thank you all so much for your advocacy and leadership on behalf of our library system. also here, is carols been a tremendous partner this past year working with our staff who have been activated as disaster service workers and more recently helping us to recall staff so we can re-open the library. thank you, carol, for your partnership. it's so excitingtor here at this moment and i am beyond thankful that we're finally able to re-open our libraries for in-person services. it's been a long, hard 13 months, but now we're in a position to safely re-open our libraries for brows and bounce. patrons will be able to experience browsing our stacks again something i know they have dearly missed. we'll also have our public access computers available for printers and high-speed internet access. and, it's really fitting we'll still be offering spl to go and next week we're going to open the patrero branch and the west portal branch tuesday. we should have all of our branches re-opened by the fall before the start of school. and i really want to thank the community for all your patience and support. y

lee and the executive director marie zapella. thank you all so much for your advocacy and leadership on behalf of our library system. also here, is carol eisen. i have to say carol has been a tremendous partner this past year working with our staff who have been activated as disaster service workers and more recently helping us to recall staff so we can re-open the library. thank you, carol, for your partnership. it's so excitingtor here at this moment and i am beyond thankful that we're finally able to re-open our libraries for in-person services. it's been a long, hard 13 months, but now we're in a position to safely re-open our libraries for brows and bounce. patrons will be able to experience browsing our stacks again something i know they have dearly missed. we'll also have our public access computers available for printers and high-speed internet access. and, it's really fitting we'll still be offering spl to go and next week we're going to open the patrero branch and the west portal branch tuesday. we should have all of our branches re-opened by the fall before the start of school. and i really want to thank the community for al

lee and the executive director marie zapella. thank you all so much for your advocacy and leadership on behalf of our library system. also here, is carol eisen. i have to say carol has been a tremendous partner this past year working with our staff who have been activated as disaster service workers and more recently helping us to recall staff so we can re-open the library. thank you, carol, for your partnership. it's so excitingtor here at this moment and i am beyond thankful that we're finally able to re-open our libraries for in-person services. it's been a long, hard 13 months, but now we're in a position to safely re-open our libraries for brows and bounce. patrons will be able to experience browsing our stacks again something i know they have dearly missed. we'll also have our public access computers available for printers and high-speed internet access. and, it's really fitting we'll still be offering spl to go and next week we're going to open the patrero branch and the west portal branch tuesday. we should have all of our branches re-opened by the fall before the start of school. and i really want to thank the community for al

lee and the executive director marie zapella. thank you all so much for your advocacy and leadership on behalf of our library system. also here, is carolmendous partner this past year working with our staff who have been activated as disaster service workers and more recently helping us to recall staff so we can re-open the library. thank you, carol, for your partnership. it's so excitingtor here at this moment and i am beyond thankful that we're finally able to re-open our libraries for in-person services. it's been a long, hard 13 months, but now we're in a position to safely re-open our libraries for brows and bounce. patrons will be able to experience browsing our stacks again something i know they have dearly missed. we'll also have our public access computers available for printers and high-speed internet access. and, it's really fitting we'll still be offering spl to go and next week we're going to open the patrero branch and the west portal branch tuesday. we should have all of our branches re-opened by the fall before the start of school. and i really want to thank the community for all your patience and support. you've hung i

lee and the executive director marie zapella. thank you all so much for your advocacy and leadership on behalf of our library system. also here, is carol eisen. i have to say carol has been a tremendous partner this past year working with our staff who have been activated as disaster service workers and more recently helping us to recall staff so we can re-open the library. thank you, carol, for your partnership. it's so excitingtor here at this moment and i am beyond thankful that we're finally able to re-open our libraries for in-person services. it's been a long, hard 13 months, but now we're in a position to safely re-open our libraries for brows and bounce. patrons will be able to experience browsing our stacks again something i know they have dearly missed. we'll also have our public access computers available for printers and high-speed internet access. and, it's really fitting we'll still be offering spl to go and next week we're going to open the patrero branch and the west portal branch tuesday. we should have all of our branches re-opened by the fall before the start of school. and i really want to thank the community for al

lee and the executive director marie zapella. thank you all so much for your advocacy and leadership on behalf of our library system. also here, is carola tremendous partner this past year working with our staff who have been activated as disaster service workers and more recently helping us to recall staff so we can re-open the library. thank you, carol, for your partnership. it's so excitingtor here at this moment and i am beyond thankful that we're finally able to re-open our libraries for in-person services. it's been a long, hard 13 months, but now we're in a position to safely re-open our libraries for brows and bounce. patrons will be able to experience browsing our stacks again something i know they have dearly missed. we'll also have our public access computers available for printers and high-speed internet access. and, it's really fitting we'll still be offering spl to go and next week we're going to open the patrero branch and the west portal branch tuesday. we should have all of our branches re-opened by the fall before the start of school. and i really want to thank the community for all your patience and support. you've h

lee and the executive director marie zapella. thank you all so much for your advocacy and leadership on behalf of our library system. also here, is carol eisen. i have to say carol has been a tremendous partner this past year working with our staff who have been activated as disaster service workers and more recently helping us to recall staff so we can re-open the library. thank you, carol, for your partnership. it's so excitingtor here at this moment and i am beyond thankful that we're finally able to re-open our libraries for in-person services. it's been a long, hard 13 months, but now we're in a position to safely re-open our libraries for brows and bounce. patrons will be able to experience browsing our stacks again something i know they have dearly missed. we'll also have our public access computers available for printers and high-speed internet access. and, it's really fitting we'll still be offering spl to go and next week we're going to open the patrero branch and the west portal branch tuesday. we should have all of our branches re-opened by the fall before the start of school. and i really want to thank the community for al