well, we have nbc's ben collins who wrote this exclusive story for nbc news. i want to interview you ben now on all you wrote here. i am curious first of all how widespread all of this is. how can a qanon follower even rebrand? is that possible? i hear q, i hear it is not anone. can you clarify? >> qanon supporters are well aware that their branding is toxic. that if you say you are a qanon supporter, you go to a school board meeting and talk about the cabal, if you say you are a qanon supporter you are going the alienate a lot of people. they decided to ditch that brandsing and evolve their branding. they think they can maybe win some seats. for example, general flynn, who is like a de facto leader of this movement, there is a quote from him who says get involved with the education of our children, run for school board, run for local office. you will get browbeaten by qanon supporters if you are say you are are a fan of qanon. they are saying there are qs and there are anones, but there is no qanon. they are encouraging each other to run for office but they ar

joining us tonight ben collins.covers disinformation and extremism online.s kavitha david, a sports and cultural writer for the athletic, author of "loving sports when they don't love you back, dilemmas of the modern fan." and comedian and actor helen hall, you might know her from wait, wait don't tell me or the netflix hit "never have i ever." hello, helen, hello, everybody. and ben, let me start with you. and that story we mentioned at the very end, this disinformation that's kind of massacre aiding in other texts. explain what's going on there. >> on facebook if you were to create a group that said the vaccine is filled with poison, you shouldn't take it that would get taken down very quickly. facebook does not allow that. so what are anti-vaxers doing to remain on the platform, they're changing the names of their groups to dance party or dinner party or swim party or things like that. s and once you're in the group y they replace the word vaccine with dance or beer or something. moderna gets changed to moana tha

standup comedian actress helen hong, also director and producer, nbc's ben collins, kavitha davens sportsure writer at the athletic. ben, i wonder if we're getting caught up in the weeds of some of this just because jeff bezos and elon musk are so controversial slash likable to some people as opposed to the benefits of being able to explore space in new ways including with reusable rockets that will just cost less to fly? >> yeah, i'm sure there are benefits. but, you know, at the end of the day these are some of the richest and most bombastic people on social media and in our lives. and, you know, they took a trip funded by our purchases on amazon apparently up to space while, you know, as motherboard reported this week, there was a woman last year who worked at an amazon factory and asked for lighter duty when she was pregnant, was not given that because of the demands of the job and miscarried. also over the last few years amazon has consistently down-played or flat out lied about the fact that workers have to pee in bottles to get through shifts. they say it's not happening. it's abso

ben collins has exclusive reporting out today. good morning to you this is some bananas stuff. about how this is bubbling up and how some of these people are having success running for the local elections. >> i think there is a movement recently to forget about q. and qanon believers back in society after their plan fell aparts. and there are still the same words, they are not using the branding qanon. one of the people they follow is mike flynn. they're taking the messages saying run for school board, run for local office. they have taken that and put that at the top of their qanon forums. and they will say, explicitly by the way, a person said qanon parents you should do this. the top post was "there is no qanon." stop saying qanon. they look to brand them extremists. if you say we're qanon everything we say is viewed as toxic. >> you quoted someone that say if you identify as a qanon people will think you're crazy. but if you say you're passionate about saving children and protecting them from trafficking then you're no longer a crazy cult people. people on the forums, wheth

let's bring in ben collins. he covers disinformation, extremism and the internet for nbc news. ben, great to see you, my friend. you know all about this kind of stuff. you are the right man to ask. what do you know about this group, rise of the moors? what can you tell us? >> yeah, sure. they're an offshoot of the moorish sovereign citizen movement. the last time they were in the news was back -- do you remember when qanon said in march there would be a thing when donald trump would be elected president again or whatever? >> i sure do. >> that stemmed also from sovereign citizen movement which is really disparate. it is all over the place but the baseline is people believe they don't have to pay taxes because their true identities are separate from the identities sent on the forms on tax returns. it is basically an anti-tax movement. it is spread out. there are militant versions of this and wackier versions of this as well. last month a member of the moorish operatives tried to -- there's a great tiktok you should look up. they went into someone's house, changed the locks and sa

. >> joining me now are senior reporter ben collins and white house reporter for the associated pressonathan, i'll start with you. why do you think we're seeing this sudden about face from republican leadership? why decide now to openly encourage people to get the vaccine? although you had senator rubio saying he's encouraging it from the start, it has not been the case for the broader gop and some of the other leaders. >> right. there have been some exceptions and to be fair, senate minority leader mcconnell has been on this from the beginning. he contracted polio as a child. he knows how important vaccines are. so he's been on it. but he's been a lonely voice on this and lot of republicans were either reluctant to talk about it at all or spectacle of the vaccine. it's not entirely clear what the shift is but it seems obvious it's the delta variant and how contagious it is and where the delta variant is running rampant which is are unvaccinated pockets of the country in the south and west, rural areas that largely are republican areas, polling suggests it's republicans who are indeed

ben collins is with us.i-vaxers on facebook that are being creative o get around the rules. here you have them using words like pizza for pfizer and molana for moderna. >> they're aware that facebook is on the lookout for them and they're trying to evade bans. one of the big ones, dance party. my nondancing doctor, there there code legends at the top of the page. it is not exclusive they were swimming and then they were running. this was groups and followers. tens of thousands of followers or, you know, people inside of the group. >> they have a group called people against the vaccine filled with poison and why you should take it. it's not super obvious. they put it in this that is a drop in the bucket. people who evade bans for a living are the best of this. think about the boogaloo boys. why did they wear hawaii shirts. they changed their name to the big luau to get around the moderation ploys and planes. they have been bragging in the last couple weeks that they're on the radar of the white house. this is

i'm joined by ben collins, an msnbc reporter.such a big impact. i'm not excluded from it. it reaches my texts, it reaches my dms, it reaches my in box. is there one specific plaform that tracks more disinformation than others, or is this spreading like wildfire? >> with telegram, it's the wild west there. they operate without code words or anything like that. with facebook they have to sort of get through the sensors to talk about vaccine misinformation. it's at wild west and they use it as an ammo dump to dispense what they call normal people to not take the vaccine. what you see that disinformation does is they have a doctor title in front of their name, and a lot of people say, hey, look at this paper from this doct. this doctor says don't take the vaccine. it's not safe. there are a lot of reasons why that guy behaves that way, but that's the big thing they do, they share around these, like, edge cases and these extreme, like, faraway blogs onto facebook and telegram and that's how it gets pushed out to regular people in real

kathy park, ben collins, thank you both, guys. appreciate it. >>> i want to move on to florida now, to surfside where we're learning demolition workers are planning to bring down the remainder of the building on sunday. officials, they feared over the past week that the damaged structure could come crashing down at any moment. that fear is heightened, of course, by the threat of tropical storm elsa looming in the caribbean headed towards florida. at a press conference earlier today the governor, ron desantis, addressing some of the concerns. take lace en. >> we have a building here in surfside that is tottering. it is structurally unsound. although the eye of the storm is not likely to pass over this direction, you could feel gusts in this area. we don't know. it is definitely a possibility. >> all right. so the demolition of the building would temporarily suspend search and rescue operations once again, but officials hope not for long. the death toll now standing at 24, with 124 still unaccounted for. with that i want to go to el

. >> ben collins, great to have you on the show. thank you to all of you for watching this hour. we'll put some of the highlights from ben's reporting on msnbc. right now we have a lot more with craig melvin who picks up our coverage right now. >> good thursday morning to you. msnbc headquarters here in new york. our country's voting rights are playing out in split screen this hour. first in austin, texas where the special legislature will get under way. the governor called this session after democrats walked off of the house floor at the end of pay to keep republicans from passing restrictive voting measures there. i'll talk to an activist that will be at the capital in an hour rallying around these measures. meanwhile, president biden meeting with civil rights groups about voting rights. the supreme course just delivered a major move to the white house and they're running out of options. ly talk to someone who will have the president's ear in just a few hours. we're also going to have an important conversation about gun cull dmur this country. new york state is taking a new appr

. >> thank you for being on, ben collins. thank you for watching this hour. we'll be back in washington then. >> good morning, i'm chris jansing. big new details about the skts committee investigating the insurrection and now all eyes are on her next move including will she add to the committee, will it be another republican. >> we will proceed in this. as i said they're in the process of the committees and they're in the process of hiring staff to that end. it is my responsibility to get to the truth of this and we will not stand in the way of this. house leaders call on their supporters to get the vaccine. but is that enough on the ground at the local level. in arkansas cases are up and the vaccination rate is abysmal. ahead i will talk with chris jones, a democratic running for governor there that could face off against sarah huckabee sanders. let's start with new developments. the battle over investigating january 6th. leann caldwell is on capitol hill so look. speaker pelosi knows what she has done in taking these members off of the committee. she though

ben collins following the latest on the battle of misinformation, and dr. peter hotez with the vaccine for development. cases aren't just jumping up with adults, with kids, too, how bad is it? >> reporter: the numbers are concerning and shifting quickly here, compared to last week, this week north carolina saw a 32% increase in cases in children under the age of 14, to the point where now that age group makes up 15% of cases statewide. here in durham county, those under the age of 17 makeup a third of cases. those numbers come at a precarious time for schools as they're making back to school plans. in durham they have kids in the classrooms, welcomed back year-round students monday. just yesterday, the governor made an announcement with guidance to school saying those in elementary school and middle school should be required to wear masks regardless of vaccination status. for high school students, should remove masks if they've been vaccinated. stephanie, durham public schools has taken it a step further, going to require masks for all schools, elementary,

. >> to be continued, ben collins, thank you and have a great weekend. olympics. i'm talking about shaquarri richardson. we'll talk with a former olympian about cannabis and the rules he wants to see changed. >>> fist, my hometown cleveland baseball team revailed their new name, 120 years since they first got a pro team, after years of criticism that many considered racist. in a new video narrated by tom hanks, they reveal they will now be the cleveland guardians, a nod to the guardians of traffic statues. >> it has been cleveland that is the best part of our name. and now it's time to unite as one family, one community, and build the next era for this team and this city. to keep watch and guard what makes this game the greatest. this is a city we love and the game we believe in. e believe in we did it again. verizon has been named america's most reliable network by rootmetrics. and our customers rated us #1 for network quality in america according to j.d. power. number one in reliability, 16 times in a row. most awarded for network quality, 27 times in

with me to discuss eugene daniels and megan malloy, founder, and ben collins. eugene, trump just beat florida governor ron desantis 70% to 21%. desantis would hold a comfortable lead over the others if trump did not run. "vanity fair" says trump and desantis appear to be on a collision course as desantis explores a run of his own. cpac did a second straw poll that shows results if trump did not run. you mean, just talk to me about those dynamics, the fact that they feel they need to do two different polls. >> well, it shows at once they're not exactly sure what donald trump is going to do. they have no clue. he is giving them no indication, therefore kind of like the democrats in 2016 when it was like will she or won't she with hillary clinton, the will he or won't he with donald trump is making it really hard for republicans to do much of anything. it makes it so ron desantis and nicky hailey and the rest of them who might run in 2024 have to move slowly, have to be very, very nice to him. and one of the interesting things when you talk to some of the trump su

. >> we just reported my colleague ben collins and i reported on these groups that were changing theirommon. it's of the internet. people have been doing it as long as the internet's existed so the fact that -- and also, i know for a fact that people have been reporting these groups for over a month, and facebook did nothing until nbc news reached out and suddenly they're gone. that's a problem because we are not facebook's content moderators, right? if facebook can't figure out that these groups are operating, they're not doing a very good job of content moderators and not fulfilling their mission of keeping misinformation off the platform. >> you have talked about the fact that amy klobuchar, there are a handful of smarts who do take this seriously and move at a faster pace than congress and some of these dumb hearings move. do you think there's some teeth to what amy klobuchar is trying to do? >> i would hope so. i think the challenge, ali with all of these things is to get the definition right. one person's misinformation is another person's fact. i'm going to push back on brandy,

and i'll test it with ben collins. >> yeah, i drove the aston martin dbs in "quantum of solace." >> oh

ben collins, that is you so much for your reporting.es as co-chairs, about you if after two years they cannot find an amicable way to work together, bill gates will take over in full. he would buy melinda out and provide her resources to do her own philanthropic work separate from the foundation. they have also agreed to increase the number of trustees. currently they and warren buffett are the only trustees. buffett announced in june his plans to step down. >>> naomi osaka opens up about her mental health saying it's okay to not be okay. "morning joe" is back in a moment. to not be okay. "morning joe" is back in a moment (realtor) the previous owners left in a hurry, so the house comes with everything you see. follow me. ♪ (realtor) so, any questions? (wife) we'll take it! (realtor) great. (vo) it will haunt your senses. the heart-pounding audi suv family. get exceptional offers at your local audi dealer. i'm morgan, and there's more to me than hiv. more love, more adventure, more community. but with my hiv treatment, there's not more

nbc's ben collins with more great reporting. nfl added a new layer yesterday which includes threatening teams with losses. joining us now mike florio. mike, it's great to see you, especially in the off season here. so explain a little bit yesterday this letter from the nfl to the teams, which will certainly snap many of them to attention in terms of getting their players vaccinated. >> absolutely, willie. this is just the next step in what has been a long process by the league and the nfl players' association which represents all players in the league, to persuade players to get the vaccination. it's not mandated. they've been creating incentives, and yesterday's news the strongest disincentive yet to remain unvaccinated because the forfeits will flow from an outbreak among unvaccinated players or staff that's when the forfeit happens. an outbreak among vaccinated players and staff, no forfeit. so another way to try to squeeze players to try to choose to get vaccinated. this has been really the biggest play yet by the league to

collin morikawa fighting hard. but louis oosthuizen, who began the third round with a two—shot lead, is trying to keep his nose in front. beneorge's for us and has been following the action. it has come alive in the last hour or so. we had a three—way tie for the lead about 15 units ago and now it has all changed on what we call moving day at the majors. but no change for louis oosthuizen at the top of the leaderboard. the 2010 open champion had a little bit of a wobble in the middle of the round and madejust one bogey in his first two rounds, but then it made a couple of bogeys in three holes. on the 14th it did not help, but then showed his mettle and made a birdie on the 16th, making all the difference to him. collin morikawa, that means he is a shot behind leader, louis oosthuizen. collin morikawa isjust leader, louis oosthuizen. collin morikawa is just a shot hind and

ben croucher has been following the action forfour days for us. what a moment ultimately for who is doing on debut again.— doing on debut again. astonishing sto from doing on debut again. astonishing story from collinn. astonishing story from collin morikawa - doing on debut again. astonishing story from collin morikawa and i doing on debut again. astonishing i story from collin morikawa and what i display in the final round. 0nly turned up wrote two ago and is already a two time major winner and the open champion. pecking over the course here behind me but colin morikawa over in the club out celebrating for sure. the story of the day is louis 0osthuizen starting very poorly and could not really recover after that. the first three rounds, he was leading and did not look what he had a trouble in the world but made a couple of bogeys today and signed a 71 to finish 11—under par, four shots behind collin morikawa who with the same time made three straight birdies to surge into the lead as his putter was red—hot. we thought that jordan's beef was going to be his closest challenger. after a sluggish start from the american, he made an eagle and for parties to close within one shot but we needed it most,

alan: tenemos una nueva emotiva de collins por un hombre que lucha por ayudar a los discapacitados. shacha; jennifer lÓpez oficializa su romance con benÑos. hoy estar en vivo con nosotros alguien que no se perdiÓ ningÚn detallepues estaba en la mesa de al lado la noche en que la diva del bronx celebra su 52 . alan: por quÉ hay quienes no quieren usar mascarillas? aquÍ se cursan los dos bandos para quesepan sus derechos. raÚl: "despierta amÉrica" comienza ahora. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ akan: es lunes 26 de julio, gracias por despertar con nosotros en "despierta amÉrica". lourdes se estarÁ con nosotros. lourdes: buenos dÍas a todos, gracias por Éste recibimiento en todo el equipo. carlos: nuestro querido alan se estÁ recuperando de una vasectomÍa, mÁs adelante conversar hemos para ver cÓmo sigue. >> tambiÉn aprovechamos para felicitar a carlos, pues ya sabemos que va a ser papÁ de un varoncito!! äplausosÇ carlos: gracias a todos.mucho amor para el niÑo que viene en camino. >> ya sabes el nombre? carlos: ya les dejarÉ saber el nombre. >> gracias por hacernos parte de Éste momento especial que tuvo sus sorpresas pero se vio muy bueno. lourdes: aquÍ s