melissa murray, nyu la professor who clerked for sonia sotomayor when the now supreme court justice was on the u.s. court of appeals. and robert costa, national political reporter for "the washington post," moderator of "washington week" on pbs. professor, i am duty-bound to begin with you with an important question. did anything the president signed today have the force of law, and have you any optimism that congress will come up with anything substantial to address what's going on in the streets and the ongoing loss? >> well, an executive order obviously has the force of law as we've seen from other examples of executive orders like daca, for example. but, again, the question is was this the kind of sweeping reform that individuals are expecting? everyone felt that the president had to make some kind of response to the unrest that we're seeing in the streets. but was this it? as mr. merritt said in the earlier segment, this is a very incremental, modest effort. there is no ban of choke holds. there are incentives provided to local police departments to eliminate the use of choke holds

melissa murray is back with us as well. she's an nyu law professor who clerked for sonia sotomayor when the now supreme court justice was sitting on the u.s. court of appeals. good evening and welcome to you all. hey, susan, what does his thinking on lincoln tell you about his thinking? >> well, brian, you're a student of history. tell me what are the questions about lincoln and emancipation because i am unfamiliar with them. i mean it's just hard to imagine. part of, i think, president trump's difficulty in talking about these issues in a fresh way. he's talked about race a lot in his life. he talked about race in 2016, back to the central park five, but it's been race in a different way, race as a wedge. so this different call for him to use race as reaching out to new attitudes to addressing long-standing racial injustices, that is something he is really just not comfortable doing. >> melissa, here's a quote from "the new york times" on donald trump and race and public opinion shifting around him. "whether it is suggesti

here with us again tonight, melissa murray. she's an nyu law professor, and she clerked for sonia sotomayor when the now supreme court justice was on the u.s. court of appeals. melissa, thank you for joining us. we mentioned that 2001 referendum in mississippi. i went back and looked at it today. the referendum to change the flag didn't just fail back then. it was almost 2-1. it was a 64-36 percent margin. here we are 19 years later and in the span of a week, a bipartisan consensus emerged in the legislature of mississippi and the governor is going to sign off on it to do away with that confederate symbol. what do you make of that seemingly very rapid change? >> i think it reflects the changing dynamics on the ground not just in mississippi but throughout the country. i think as these protests have spread throughout the united states, more and more people are taking an honest appraisal about what our past means, what these symbols mean. and in mississippi particularly, where 38% of mississippians are african-american, the symbol

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melissa murray is here to break down the biggest surprises of the day right after this. ♪ this viruss testing all of us. and it's testing the people on the front lines of this fight most of all. so abbott is getting new tests into their hands, delivering the critical results they need. and until this fight is over, we...will...never...quit. because they never quit. >>> black lives matter. >> they are chanting "black trans lives matter." a massive rally for black transgender rights. a real cause for celebration in an astonishing landmark ruling from the conservative dominated supreme court of the united states which ruled 6-3 that the civil rights act of 1964 does in fact provide employment protections for lgbtq americans. and that means it is now illegal everywhere in this country to fire someone simply because they are gay or transgender. two conservatives, chief justice john roberts and neil gorsuch a trump appointee who wrote the majority opinion, sided with the court's four liberals. not for liberal reasons, ruling that existing employment protections based on an individual's sex

melissa murray is back with us as well. she's an nyu law professor who clerked for sonia sotomayor when the now supreme court justice was sitting on the u.s. court of appeals. good evening and welcome to you all. hey, susan, what does his thinking on lincoln tell you about his thinking? >> well, brian, you're a student of history. tell me what are the questions about lincoln and emancipation because i am unfamiliar with them. i mean it's just hard to imagine. part of, i think, president trump's difficulty in talking about these issues in a fresh way. he's talked about race a lot in his life. he talked about race in 2016, back to the central park five, but it's been race in a different way, race as a wedge. so this different call for him to use race as reaching out to new attitudes to addressing long-standing racial injustices, that is something he is really just not comfortable doing. >> melissa, here's a quote from "the new york times" on donald trump and race and public opinion shifting around him. "whether it is suggesti

and melissa murray, an nyu law professor. it's been hours since i last spoke to her, who notably clerked for sonia sotomayor when the now supreme court justice was a federal judge with the u.s. court of appeals. good evening and welcome to you all. michael, i'm going to begin with you because you were the first to be introduced here and because with you, i have to nakedly ask a question about politics. so senators collins, sasse, and lankford just raised their head above the sand today and made the first baby steps toward criticizing their president. i note the president tweeted right at them tonight. this is going to require courage, michael, if republicans are going to speak up and not be okay with the brandishing of a bible in front of a church with a burned-out basement and profanity, including the president's name in spray paint, behind him, which apparently the advance team missed. this is clearly, michael, going to take courage. >> it is. i don't know what it will show up. you saw that line of senators going into the r

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. >> joining me to discuss is melissa murray and vince valezquez. good to see both of you. all right. vince, it's hard to look at that video and not say, boy, that's really disturbing. is the issue at hand here training, lack thereof or is it something else? >> you're right. it is disturbing. i would say training. we have heard officers in the community mention training, training, training and i want to draw a parallel from this case to the george floyd case. when we talk about training, there's something i call the singular officer position meaning when they're in a group of people officers should be trained that when something is happening that is not right, unsafe, unlawful they then have to act as an individual and stop that from happening as in the george floyd case with the asian officer that did smul nothing. in this video that officer comes out of the vehicle, taser in hand ready to tase him and every law enforcement professional knows if you have to use your taser it is for active resistance. they never put hands on him. the first officer was very calm and was tryi

>> melissa murray is a professor of law at nyu school of law. ryan lizza is a political analyst. elissa, can the president fire this u.s. attorney without cause? can his firing take place indirectly by way of the attorney general giving him word? or, are these investigations into the firing, could it lead to other legal problems for the president or the ag? >> as a general matter anyone whom the president appoints can be removed at the president's will with or without cause. the problem is that u.s. attorney berman appointed first by jeff sessions as an interim u.s. attorney. when his appointment lapsed after 120 days the judges of the southern district appointed him u.s. attorney and wasn't the normal process by which someone is con iffirmed by the senate. it seems that the president can remove him. why did the president want attorney general barr to do the work here? >> does he have to have a reason? >> he doesn't necessarily have to have a reason but the fact that berman was conducting investigations of some of trump's associates including rudy giuliani suggests more at work th

. >> joining me now melissa murray, law professor and former clerk to justice sotomayor.he history of bill barr a supporter of presidential powers but what do you think about what he said. >> if i were grading that constitutional law exam i would give it a "c", it is true that the president could send in federal troops into states to quell domestic unrest but the president has to first issue an order for the states to have the protesters disperse which hasn't been done here. so it is worth noting that the insurrection act is meant to be a departure from the ordinary authority of governors to deploy their own troops in order to quell domestic unrest through their own civil enforcement rather than resorting to the federal government. so attorney general barr has gotten some of it right but missed the essential aspects that this is intended to be quite extraordinary relief and typically doesn't happen if governors do not want that federal intervention. >> look, barr also said in the interview that active duty troops should only be deployed in the u.s. as a last resort. what

we should bring in melissa murray now, law professor at nyu, and also a former law clerk to then judge sonia sotomayor. and then the opinion writer for the "washington post." melissa, i'll start with you. explain the significance of this decision for folks who are watching and listening on sirius satellite radio. >> so this decision is huge. 6-3 opinion, the court decided that title 7, which is a federal law that prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of sex, also includes in the prohibition on sex discrimination, discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and transgender status. it is doubling important. just on friday, the trump administration rolled out administrative regulations that would prohibit protections for transgendered persons under title 7. the court basically said the administration's theory is all wrong. >> jonathan, how noteworthy is it that neil gorsuch, a trump appointee, mind you, that he wrote the decision? >> this is pretty spectacular. any of president trump's nominees led to a lot of concern, that a lot of the rights that had been won through th

melissa murray, professor at the nyu school of law, and richard rose president of the atlanta naacp. chief alexander, let me start with you. we've heard the 911 call. you're incredibly familiar with this area, this police force. was there anything the officer in this case former officer rolfe could have or should have done instead of shooting brooks? >> well, there are several things i've indicated in the past and i will continue to say this is that during the initial investigation, when they arrived to the scene, they spent 20 minutes there. it seemed to have been cordial conversation between mr. brooks and the officers. and they allowed him to park his car and in a parking slot, which he did and appeared to cooperate. the officers had an opportunity at that point to give him a ride home or to call him an uber. oftentimes arrest is not always necessary. particularly in light of where we are right now in this country, erin. we have to use discretion. certainly it was their discretion. i think all of this could have been avoided. once they investigated, they had a person that cooperat

melissa murray, a professor at the nyu school of law and michael hop kins the founder of northern startrategies. glad to have all of you with us tonight. beth, let me start with you, and the big question tonight out of the rally. can you do the cupid shuffle? yes or no? >> you know, i never tried but next time i see you, joshua, i'll do it with you. >> that's a deal, when we are allowed to be closer than six feet to one another. >> in the same room. >> yeah. seriously, what was your takeaway from tonight's rally. i'm making light of them dancing. we have seen other rallies that have not ended this pleasantly so, it feels like for whatever energy or maybe whatever strife the president was trying to bring, whatever conflict he was trying to arouse, headlines he was trying to generate, he didn't. >> yeah, my major takeaway from the rally was that thin crowd we've talked about quite a bit tonight on our air. and to me it was a sign that even president trump's most ardent supporters decided to prioritize their health over being a prop in his campaign show. and that's why they didn't show up

also with us is melissa murray, a law professor at new york university, and former law clerk to then judge sonia sotomayor. pete, same question i asked last hour about the significance of this victory is this for abortion rights advocates? >> i'm interested to hear what our guest thinks. couple things. number one, this was a tough uphill battle for louisiana to try to get this law adopted by the supreme court. it said that doctors performing abortions had to have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals. it was identical to a law passed by texas that the supreme court struck down two years ago. so in that sense, and what chief justice roberts said, i didn't think that ruling was right two years ago, but that is binding precedent. i have to honor it. for that reason, he joined the court's four liberals in striking down this virtually identical louisiana law. so that's obviously good news for supporters of abortion rights. secondly, the dissenters here say that the people who challenge this law, doctors and abortion clinics, should not have been able to get into court because abortion

with me now is melissa murray, professor of law at nyu and a former law clerk to justice sonia sotomayortrump's taxes, what do you think the chances are the court resolves this the. >> they'll definitely have to resolve it before the end of the term. the real question is when does this term end? typically, the court is usually winding down at about this time in normal years, but this hasn't been a normal year. they took a break between march and may to get themselves together and figure out how to conduct the rest of the term which they did, but that means we're basically a month behind on things. so this term may go as late as july. so we expect decisions tomorrow and on tuesday, but it's unclear whether the trump tax cases, which were among the later ones heard this term, will be in the group announced tomorrow. >> you also have six federal courts that have already ruled against the president on this question. does that give you any indication of what will happen at the supreme court? >> well, based on oral arguments, which were in may, it seemed that a group of the justices were very

we want to begin on all of this with the former executive editor of "the new york times" and melissa murray, a law professor at nyu. i want to turn to the big immigration decision in a few moments, but starting with that parade of what many would call horribles, i'm curious how -- what you see tonight. >> ari, i see tonight a country that's swept up in major crises and having to do so being led by a president who to use michelle goldberg's resident term is in a state of decomposition. and the racial news i think is foremost in my mind tonight because in 1954 when the warren court handed down its school desegregation ruling, i was an elementary schoolteacher -- pupil, excuse me, in an all-white school in birmingham. only ten years later, the 1964 civil rights act, effectively ended public segregation in all facilities across the south. that shows you how quickly a racial transformation might move in the right leadership condition. but it's taken us over 50 years to get back to what i see as another transformative moment. for the first time in my memory, we have polls showing that a majority

joining us is nyu law professor melissa murray. good evening to both of you.ark, i'll start with one of the questions we have been charting all day, an unusual day to be sure. can you ever think of a time where police officers have been indicted for felony murder in the first place? >> yes, there have been indictments for felony murder. don't ask me to recall it right off the top of my head. but the indictments -- the charges themselves although significant are just one piece of a larger puzzle and one step toward ultimate justice that i think the protests -- >> but i want -- and i want to get you on all of it, but before we jump ahead, given that three officers were hit with felony murder today, when we checked we found this to be relatively rare. this is very rare. this is a charge that typically is used against drug dealers, gangs, people who are involved in the commission of what you might call a more traditional street crime. and it's a way to throw the book at them. so i want to get all your thoughts. but i'm curious what you think about the significance

joining us is melissa murray, a law professor at nyu and a former law clerk to judge sonia sotomayor and a longtime gay rights activist and was an adviser during the clinton administration. richard, first your reaction to the ruling? >> well, i think as the plaintiff said, i'm still processing it. it is, you know, for over 50 years, the right not to be fired simply for being gair has been at the center of the lgbtq rights movement. although 25 states over time have enacted state laws that prevented people from being fired just because they were gay, over half the states where you could be fired. and, you know, that changed yesterday. i think i was surprised that we got six votes. i thought maybe we could eke out a five-vote ruling, but it was welcome news, a surprise, and probably the biggest victory for the lgbt rights movement in 50 years. >> melissa, i don't want to short the significance emotionally of what the ruling meant, but i want to get practical. practically speaking, what does this mean today for lgbtq workers? >> well, i think practically it's an enormously important dec

. >>> "outfront" now, melissa murray. she's professor at law at the ny school of law.ppreciate both of you being with us tonight. lz, i want to play for you how floyd family attorney ben crump described this moment today at the memorial. here he is. >> what we endeavor to achieve is equal justice for the united states of america and george floyd is the moment that gives us the best opportunities i have seen in a long time of reaching that high idea. >> lz, of course, benjamin crump has been at the front of some of these horrible events. and he thinks that this is -- this could be a moment that something changes. do you think this moment is truly different? >> well, it's definitely different in the sense of, there's no where are to run for the average american. because the pandemic has had us in our homes, because the unemployment is near great depression proportions, there's just a lot of people who don't have the natural escapes. you can't go to a game. you can't go to a bar or restaurant. you can't go to the theater or the movies. in some cases, unfortunately, you ca

also with us is melissa murray, a law professor at new york university, and former law clerk

also with us, nyu law professor melissa murray who clerked for justi justice sonia sotomayor.. mark claxton, i'd like to begin with you. how do we make failure to lower your high beams is not a defacto death sentence in this country? >> when you get to point where we no longer accept and we're prepared to penalize police officers who engage in conduct that is either criminal or unjustifiable and i think as painful and difficult as this particular video is to watch, it's just as familiar unfortunately. the use, the disregard of the use of force -- the chart that shows you how much force to use in situations as police officers, it's a disregard of that. the continuation of the abuse that black and the brown communities are talking about and demanding reform from. >> and professor, this is really an intersection of law and local procedure, remember when tasers first started to be a thing, they were sold to the public as a nonlethal alternative to subduing someone, presumably a violent criminal, and now we see the role that tasers play in modern american life. the probable cause s

also, melissa murray, a law professor from new york university.eading expert in constitutional law and justice issues. colonel jack, here's my question for you. does the military want this assignment from the president? >> no. you know, look -- the military trains for riot control all the time. it's very, very good at it, but it doesn't want to do it. and this is not something that one generally uses the military establishment to achieve. it's in defense of the republic, not against american citizens and the military establishment is not interested in doing this missio mission. >> melissa, i want to take that reality from colonel jack and play it against donald trump's reality. here's donald trump promising the governors that they're going to see a whole lot of the u.s. military in their states >> got a number of people here that you'll be seeing a lot of. general milley is here, who is head of joint chiefs of staff, a fighter, a warrior, and a lot of victories and no losses. and he hates to see how it's being handled in the various states and i h

claude, professor of african-american studies at princeton university and an msnbc contributor and melissa murraynyu law professor who clerked for justice sotomayor, now supreme court justice sotomayor. ed eddy, i don't want to lose the thread that zoe schaeffer introduced, a gift to all of us. i'm sure she's got this more right than i would get it, that this is a development to be covered if it bears out, the charges against officer chauvin may be upgraded and the other officers may be charged. but in zoe's words, it's not enough until she feels safe in her community. >> that's a very important point, right? in the history of these sorts of cases, even if the officers are charged and they're taken to court, often they're acquitted, there's no justice. we can place this within a broader historical context, nicole. usually when there is this kind of -- what is seen as a concession. we're going to charge the officers with second degree. we're going to charge the other officers with in some ways being complicit. then you get the question, what more does the negro want, which is the historic question